1-27-14 Wave Our Hands and Work Our Voodoo

Hey family!

 

Thank you for the package, the fudge is delicious, Elder Porter was mad because he couldn't stop eating it. We are doing well together, we both like to work hard and he is a big joker so all we do is laugh. He makes me read my journal entries to him every night because apparently the way I express myself through journal is really funny. We are having a good time working hard so no worries. 

We are still doing a lot of tracting, one of our investigators is real hit and miss on appointments, another is taking his sweet time to ask his girlfriend to marry him, and another is ready to get baptized but her less active husband is slowing her down because he isn't super motivated to stop smoking. So we tract a lot haha but good stuff is happening. 

We finally received a member referral this week and it was amazing! The member invited their neighbors over for dinner and us as well and we ate and then taught a lesson and they were interested and all wanted to read the Book of Mormon, it was a father and his two sons. President Hinckley was right when he said that working with members is a better way to do missionary work, we just have a hard time getting the members here to see that. 

We also ran into a few weirdos while tracting, always interesting. One man in particular had quite an unusual mind or lack of reasoning skills for sure. He opened the door and asked if we were LDS, we said yes, and he said "We have a problem". He then went on to explain how some part of his family history on familysearch.org was wrong and that he couldn't go in and change it because we "waved our hands over it and worked our voodoo" and that the information is a lie so our church is a lie! Then he slammed the door. We had a good laugh about it, not our fault he doesn't understand how to use the website. It is unfortunate that he lumped the misinformation on the website to our entire church being false though... Ah well. 

We also got job offers from a man we tracted into. He wasn't interested in the church so we moved on and when we were coming back down the opposite side of the street he ran out to us and asked what we did for work and if we wanted a job because we are used to walking and have a good presence about us. We told him that we don't work as missionaries but he was a nice guy! That was fun. That's about it for the excitement this week though. 

Sounds like things back home are excellent, I love hearing about all the temple stuff and sounds like Chase is a serious baller, 'atta' kid.Well I love y'all, have a blessed week!

 

Elder Williams

 

P.S. I can no longer get refills on my meds because I have been out for so long now so if you could help me out with that mom it would be great. I only had so many refills up until 1/16/14 and we are passed that now so we need to renew all that. Also if anyone has any good stories about blessings from keeping commandments I'd love to hear about them, they could help enhance my teaching.

1-20-14 Same Door Slammed In Our Faces Three Times

Family!

Y'all are a bunch of trouble makers! Starting fires, ignoring permit laws, inviting people to your Mormon temple thing, heretics!! Just kidding, giving you a taste of the Baptist love we are feeling down here. 

This past week was great. We had our zone meeting which was coupled with interviews with President Durrant which was great, he is an amazing man. The trainings we gave went well but we have a small zone so it was a bit dead. And our zone just got smaller with the transfers. Elder Porter and I are staying together but we had quite a few changes in the zone and we lost a companionship so we only have 7 in our zone, oh well. 

As for excitement this week, we had a Muslim/Indian guy come out and go off on us about how he loves God but doesn't understand why we limit God by thinking God needs missionaries. He got really close to my face and he didn't smell too great either so that was fun. 

Then we were tracting in an apartment complex and this man opened the door and slammed it right in our faces, opened it again and thanked us for waking him up, slammed the door again too hard so it bounced back open, then slammed it shut successfully the third time. He was not a happy camper. We met some rude people this week, just a part of life though. We had our service hours cut down to four a week again so now we get to do a lot more finding, it's a positive. We've been putting most of our efforts into finding lately, hopefully we can find some solid investigators soon. Other than that, not a lot to report, just having a good time doing the Lord's work. I love you all, have a wonderful week!!

Love,

Elder Williams

1-13-14 Missionaries Aren't Weirdos

Hola familia,

 

Tracting! That about sums up the extent of our week, it was pretty slow. We played volleyball on Monday last week which was fun, not much opportuntity to play basketball around here, we don't have the most stellar athletes in our zone... But that is okay! We make due with what we have. 

We did an exchange this week with our district leader, Elder Carey, and his companion. Elder Carey came to Rowlett with me and Elder Porter went to Rockwall with Elder Osborn who is in his first transfer and worked him hard. Elder Carey and I tracted all day in the the cold mist, it was nice but we jsut got out and worked and I tried to give Elder Carey some ideas to shape up his district meetings which have been lacking a bit in... well everything. So that was fun, Elder Porter almost lost it with Elder Osborn, he's an odd one. 

We met with a man named James this week, he is a Catholic but very open to discussion. We had a great chat about the origins of the Book of Mormon and also some of the commandments like chastity and the word of wisdom. He said that he was pleasantly surprised while talking to us because he was expecting us to be weirdos but we turned out to be normal people with good Christian values, what a surprise. 

And I got to contact a few people in Spanish this week. I know enough Spanish now to get a referral for the Spanish missionaries, woooo! That's about it for the excitement this week though, just plugging along. Just got a haircut, yaaaay!

 

To answer mom's questions:

 

1. I need a new small storage container to carry my oil around in.

 

2. Elder Porter and I hate each other. (only kidding, he is great!)

 

3. No I haven't had any other singing opportunities besides in the shower or in the car.

 

4. Basketball, at least good basketball, is not really an option at this point.

 

5. See my description above about the week.

 

Sounds like things are going well at home. All the temple news is exciting, keep up the good work! I miss y'all and you're always in my prayers, have a good week!

 

Love,

Elder Williams

1-6-14 Happy New Year! The Work Goes On!

Hi everyone,

 

Happy New Year to you all as well! I hope it's a great one. This is the one year where I get to spend the whole year as a missionary, it's exciting! I'm glad y'all made it through skiing in one piece and that things are so exciting back home. I can't wait to hear how the temple tours go and the about the cultural celebration. Maybe it is a good thing I'm not there to be in it and Chase is because he definitely got the dancing ability between the two of us.

 

This last week picked up a bit since the holidays are coming to an end. This weekend has been freezing though. The humidity makes the cold go right through you down to your bones and then the wind starts blowing, it makes knocking doors and adventure. We had Missionary Leadership Council this past week and they changed up all of our zones. Now each stake is it's own zone so the zones now have a mixture of Spanish and English missionaries. We lost six companionships and gained three so we our zone is small now, only 8 companionships. Should be fun though. 

Elder Porter says that he doesn't know the people you mentioned mom, I guess the world isn't that small. 

We had a follow up lesson with Destiny and got her back on track, she recommitted to reading the Book of Mormon, praying, and coming to church and she did on Sunday so things are looking up. We are now also teaching this young Hispanic guy, probably our age, who seems like he is totally ready to change. It is funny how the Lord provides you with teaching opportunities. They always seem to come from other sources, not directly from the work we do (which is mainly tracting). Most of our solid investigators right now are referrals. The Lord is blessing us though, that's for sure.

 

One funny story for the week. We live with the Hoyts, an older couple in the ward who are quite unique. Anyways, Brother Hoyt is starting to lose his marbles a little and he says some weird stuff that Elder Porter and I end up laughing at for hours. He is also hard of hearing and he mumbles whenever he speaks. With that as a backdrop, we were sitting in sacrament and all of a sudden we see him going up to the pulpit to bear his testimony and he mumbles through a strange story that some how includes having the Lord with you which we have heard before and is just a strange thing, then instead of closing with "In the name of Jesus Christ, Amen." He just mumbles "thank you" at the end of his story and walks down. Elder Porter and I almost lost it. We were sitting there shaking for about ten minutes trying not to laugh. He is just the epitome of an old grouchy guy who is a colorful character.

 

So that's my story for the week. Transfers are in two weeks. I don't think anything will change for us but you never know. I hope we stay another transfer together, we are working hard and having a great time.

 

I love y'all, hope you have a great week and I hope you set some goal for the new year!

 

Love,

Elder Williams