Well this week was flat-out wild –and not in a good way,
sadly. We lost one of our investigators
with a baptismal date due to some unforeseen circumstances. Another investigator got angry at us for no
reason and while all this was happening, we were getting very frustrated.
I just want to start by saying that the Lord provides. No
matter what you're going through, be it missionary work or making it throughout
the workday or finances - the lord always provides. Most of the time, this is
contingent on faith. That being said,
while we had a sad week in some cases, we were still able to have 55 Quality
Gospel Discussions and find four new investigators.
Monday: The week started
out with a much-needed PDay (day off).
After doing laundry and shopping, we played basketball all day. A member brought us fresh fruit, which was a very
refreshing surprise. Following
basketball, we had dinner with the L__ family. We had a burrito night and then
talked with the family and just had a good time.
Tuesday was the day that the stuff hit the fan. It all started out all fine and dandy. We got a text from our investigator C___
saying she wasn't able to make it to church on Sunday because she was ill. She was still sick on Tuesday. During that time we checked in and asked her
if she needed anything every day, Sunday - Tuesday. Later, she freaked and told us that nobody
was there to help, even though we and several ward members had offered to
help. That was the kind of
roller-coaster day Tuesday turned out to be.
Along with the drama, we got a lot of good work accomplished.
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| P-Day Basketball (soon I'll be sending these 3 home) |
Wednesday: Even more
stuff hit the fan on Wednesday. The day started off with our weekly District
Meeting. During the meeting, we had Zone
training on how more effectively mark the Book of Mormons we hand out to
people. We learned a lot, but it was
also kind of different. After the Zone training, we went to In-and-Out Burger
with Elders Bangerter and Eldridge. After
that, we went to meet with C__, (a different C__ than the one mentioned above),
She had recently took a liking to the Church and wanted to be baptized. A couple years back she got in a car accident
and had some kind of head trauma which makes it really hard for her to comprehend
and remember things. So, we've been
meeting with her and she's willing to learn, but she can’t retain information. So, we ask her simple questions like, “How do
you know the Church is true?” and “What is your favorite aspect of the Church?”
We ask a lot of simple questions like
that so we get an understanding of how she feels towards the Church and what
she likes about it. Questions like that
are all required for a baptismal interview.
That's when she freaked out on us. She no longer wants us to teaching
her. That's sad - but things happen for
a reason, I guess. It wasn’t our fault.
Thursday was also interesting. While having a good day of contacting people
we got a call from a Ward member. C__
had called the member and complained about how we had called her mentally
ill. We had said no such thing. The member, not knowing the truth, was upset
at us and the whole situation turned into a merry-go-round of hate towards the
missionaries = us. We had to do some
damage control. We even called Mission
Present to ask for help. He said that we
were not in the wrong, so no worries there.
He said that we should stop teaching C__ and transition her over to the
Sisters Missionaries.
Friday: We spent the
day doing weekly planning. Later we had
a dinner, then met with V__ and G___ and it went well. She is excited to continue towards
baptism.
Saturday was quite a day – for different reasons. Saturday we got to help move somebody in the
morning. Well, it actually turned out to
be an all-day move - until 5:00 or so. After
we had loaded up the truck, it turns out the apartment they were moving into
was up 5 flights of stairs. We made well
over 50 trips up and down, so my thighs are still on fire!
Sunday: We had a good
day of church. As it turns out, as the
week finished up, we almost hit the Mission’s “Standard of Excellence.” We reached all of the qualifications needed,
except we needed to have two investigators attend church on Sunday, but we only
had one. Other than that, we had all the
other qualifications: We had over50 QGC's,
set two baptismal dates, found four new investigators. We just missed the standards of excellence
which is very hard to get, but that's okay.
I hope you all had a wonderful week to make up for my roller
coaster of one, but if there's one thing I've learned - it's everything happens
for a reason. Even though we may not know why, God sure does and its all contingent
on faith. We need to rely on our faith
to get us almost anywhere.
I love you all and can't wait to hear from you!
Elder C.W. Dickinson
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