Monday, May 11, 2015

The One Where I Got to Skype Home!

Hey everyone!

So this was a long week but it was pretty dang awesome! I just wanna start by congratulating Drew and Shavaun for getting married! I love ya'll and I wish I could've been there but I know I am needed out here in the OEM!

Monday was transfers and it was like any normal transfer day. We showed up at the transfer spot and I got to talk to some missionaries that I have served around and got to catch up with them. We went shopping afterwards and then we went and played ultimate and football afterwards. We had dinner with the Central Point 2nd Bishop and then hustled over to Gold Hill for a lesson only for it to cancel...

Tuesday morning we were supposed to meet up with Brother Mad*** but he had to cancel because he got sick so we tried some people in the Gold Hill area before lunch. We stopped by the Gold Hill apartment to pick some stuff up before going into Central Point for lunch and a guy was sitting right in front of our door. He told us he was hanging out with Jesus and we talked to him for a little bit. We didn't have much happen until after dinner. We went to the church and had a font-to-table-to-temple lesson with Eric and Samantha. What a font-to-table-to-temple lesson consists of is us teaching about the Gospel of Jesus Christ and showing the baptismal font to them and then showing the importance of the sacrament and show them the sacrament table. Usually it ends there, but we got a temple in our backyard and so after we talked about the sacrament we went and walked around in the temple grounds. That was an awesome experience. That whole lesson was just awesome.

Wednesday morning we drove to the church for a funeral. It was a member of the 2nd ward and I taught him a couple of times before he died. This member is the third one to pass since I have been here! It was super sad.. Anyways, after the funeral we had to go take the truck in to get a flashing light checked out. It turned out to be nothing serious so that was good. While we were there, we texted Trent and he had to cancel on us so we tried to go see a couple of people when we finished up with the truck. We had dinner and then drove into Gold Hill to go out with Brother Vit*** and see one of his home teaching families. It was a great visit! The husband usually doesn't treat missionaries well but he stuck around and was cordial! We then booked it back to Central Point for correlation.

Thursday morning found us at Sister Par***'s home helping out on her property! While I was there, I got to talk to Sister Martin! I sure do love that woman! We had a load of fun and we got a lot accomplished! We cleaned up and had lunch before doing weekly planning. We then contacted a few members before going back to Sister Pa***'s for dinner! Sister Martin bought me a Texas shirt and a Texas flag! It was super awesome! After we hit a couple of golf balls into Sister Par***'s lake and we helped her get a canoe, we had a lesson with Samantha and Eric. Although Eric's parents were not able to be there, we had a great lesson with the two of them. We talked about the law of chastity and it was easy for them to commit to live it. We then went over what Samantha could expect for her baptism and what happens during a baptismal service. When we finished the lesson, Samantha dumped all their coffee and tea and I dumped out the Dr. Pepper that I had and she committed not to drink tea or coffee and I committed not to drink Dr. Pepper. It was great!

Friday morning I had the first district meeting of the new transfer and it went really well. I used a baseball analogy about working with members and then played a game about companionship unity! It was fun stuff! After lunch I went on exchanges with Elder Burnett, one of the zone leaders over in Jacksonville. We had a lot of fun together! He was born and raised in Austin, Texas so we had a lot to talk about haha! We went and tried a few potentials that lived in this trailer park before heading out with a member to a lesson with a woman named Annette. She is an interesting woman haha! There was a lot of discussion so we were not able to go into depth about the Restoration but she said she would get baptized if she knew it was true! We then went and saw a recent convert and put her non-member husband on date! The member dropped us off after our lesson with Mary and Dave and Elder Burnett and I tracked for a couple of minutes before going to dinner. After dinner, we headed over to the church to help out the Spanish missionaries and Elder Burnett hit a bird haha! Luckily it didn't leave any damage and we made it to the church in one piece. We then tried to teach a young couple that lived in the trailer park we visited earlier but we weren't able to really teach anything... The baby threw up and a lot of other things happened but we were able to say a prayer with them and set up the expectations for when future missionaries come by.

Saturday we headed over to the church to help out the Jacksonville Ward set up for their ward party/auction. It was good that we were down near the temple because I felt like I was able to be at Drew's wedding in spirit! After we got tables and chairs set up, we headed over to one of the zone leader's investigators for some service. Stefano is a super cool guy! He had surgery sometime ago and needs help every now and then with stuff around his home. The thing we helped him out with was cleaning his cymbals (I think that's the right kind of cymbal!) for his drum sets. It was super fun and then at the end he did a cover of "What I've Done" by Linkin Park! It was pretty awesome. We exchanged back shortly after and Elder Best and I went and saw Adam. We had a good talk with him and shared a message with him about how the worth of a soul in the Lord's eyes. When we got out of Adam's house, we got a text from the zone leaders telling us to go check our emails for instructions from the AP's. We drove over to the church and helped out the Spanish Elders get ready for a baptism they were having that afternoon while we waited for our email to come. The email contained instructions for a special project we were supposed to get done by 9 that night and so we were able to get it done before driving over to Kevin's home to talk about the baptismal interview questions. We are really hopefully that he will be able to get baptized on Saturday! Keep praying for him and Samantha! After our lesson with Kevin and dinner at a member's home, we drove into a Gold Hill for a lesson with the Jankow*** family. It was a really good lesson and we got Jeff to commit to come to church! We then had correlation with Brother Vit*** to end the night.

Sunday we were at church all day and we had to sit impatiently during both sets of meetings to be able to talk to our families! Unfortunately we didn't have any investigators come to church due to sickness or moving so that stunk. Elder Best skyped his family before dinner and then after we visited with Samantha and Eric for a couple of minutes we drove to a members home and I got to Skype my mom and dad and the rest of the family! I miss y'all so much haha!

Thank you for all your prayers and your love. I know that the Book of Mormon is the keystone of our religion and I know that Joseph Smith is a prophet of God. I know that this Church is true! There is no doubt!

Love y'all and until next time!

Elder Tonini

No comments:

Post a Comment