About a thousand things happened this week, which is normally how the weeks go, but for some reason I can actually remember a lot of them this time. So strap in!
First off, transfer calls were on Saturday, so I've got a picture of the district old here for ya. Sister Harris and I are staying right here in Fargo with Sisters Elzinga and Feeny, so that's going to be fun! A few elders are moving around and the STLs went to the other ward, so it'll be fun to get to know the new people at the end of this week.
We met with a less-active member for breakfast. She lives out of town and works 8-4 overnight so breakfast was kind of the only option for her schedule. For some reason we decided that it would be acceptable to meet at 5:00 because that was the time she suggested (turns out she thought missionaries got up at like 5:30). Worst idea ever. It totally messed us up for like three days afterward and we were super out of it. And it turns out 5:30 Sister Myers doesn't take excuses about not liking church. Basically told her that if she went to church expecting to feel discouraged and alienated, she probably would, but if she was willing to get over herself a little bit she might find something worthwhile there. Must have been loving enough, because she told us she'd love to meet again at a time that's more acceptable to us diurnal folk. So we'll see where that goes :)
We met a former from the area book. He was pretty nice and kinda weird, but he's a pagan. Like straight up self-identifies as a witch. He assured us that he's not a devil-worshipper, but switching religions would be tricky for him because he's made a blood pact with Odin. Soooo we're probably not going to go back there anytime soon. North Dakota: who knew?
We helped with activity days for the other ward. We have a lesson-active who loves to draw, so we were able to involve her. It was a lot of fun, but those girls are NUTS. Holy cow. Keep it up, those of you that work with the youth - you're doing great things!
We missed out return appointment with Mandi, but we stopped in the other night and she was home. She hasn't had a chance to read the BoM yet, but she did stop smoking. She was going five hours strong when we stopped by, so hopefully she keeps it up! She's the cutest. If that's not enough, her friend Keith was there making jam to sell at the farmer's market and he's really cool! He said he's never been to a Mormon service and would be totally open to coming. We're going to stop by the market on Thursday and hopefully we'll be able to teach him.
We have a new investigator named Bob. He's a really nice middle-aged guy who is super positive and really appreciates the small things in life. We sat on his porch with his ancient Chesapeake lab, Mary Lou, and taught him the restoration. He said he'd think about baptism and I think he understood the concept of the priesthood better than anyone I've taught so far. He wasn't able to come to conference, but we'll get in touch with him soon. And he gave us a bunch of peppers from his garden, 4 of which are ghost peppers. We have a plot to make the elders try them :)
Speaking of elders, we owed a couple of the elders ice cream, so we went over there when they were at priesthood session and gave it to one of their neighbors to keep in the freezer so that it wouldn't melt. But then we didn't tell them which neighbor so that they'd have to go tract out the floor to find their ice cream :) Gotta have some fun somewhere, right?
Conference was incredible! So many good things, so many things to work on and ponder. I hope that your heart was touched and that you were able to set some goals to improve. I realized this conference that there's a lot more I could be doing to be an effective missionary, and in order for repentance and grace to apply to us, we have to try with sincere hearts. And even though that's hard, it's worth it. There were a few times this week when I was really frustrated or depressed even though some great things are happening here, and the only thing that made me feel better was going and getting to work. Action is the cure to feeling spiritually stagnant!
(Though ice cream certainly doesn't hurt.)
One last thing: we went street contacting last night and talked to this group of college boys. When I saw that we were going to cross paths I didn't really want to talk to them (because eww, boys), but we did anyway and they were really nice! They're all hockey players and childhood friends and they'd seen lots of missionaries before. They each have a Plan of Salvation pamphlet now, and they all took off their hats when we said a prayer with them. It kind of made my night.
Thanks for sticking out to the end of this novel! Hope your week was filled with small miracles and that you were able to recognize them. You're all wonderful!
