This week was pretty good, I feel that we could have done better, at least I know that I could have done better. One of the things I am working on to assist in that goal to improve is to work on my prayers. I had a great study on prayer and revelation this morning, and then I knelt down to pray and implement the things that I had learned. I hope to do this for the rest of this week, and into the future until this becomes a habit, and I can turn to something else. A few of the things which I learned to make prayers more meaningful is to give thought to what you say, don't just pray to pray, but think about what you are saying to the Almighty. Also praying for guidance, strength, the Spirit, and others around you. As I did this this morning I felt that my prayer then was a lot better that my prayers in recent history. I felt a power and a peace in my prayer that I think has been missing a little. Prayer does have a power, and I am working on accessing all of it, or at least as much as I can. After all I need all the help I can get.
As for the work this last week:
Monday after dinner we spent our evening working more off of the unordained list we had put together, and trying to find new less active members to teach, as well as partmember families that we could unite in the Gospel. We were unsuccessful in our teaching, but we were able to find some people that had moved.
Tuesday we had our zone meeting, and they talked to us about how to record our stats. The recording of other lessons is different than what I had been told throughout my mission, but it is from PMG, and I must have just overlooked that detail. I am glad that we were corrected. After that we were ablt to do a little bit of tracting before our lesson with T Iwanchuk , she is from Switzerland, and she has been curious about what is different about our church. She is really interested in learning, and she knows a member family in the ward already. We talked to that family, and asked the wife is she would invite her to church, and she said no, we also asked her if she would invite her to a RS activity this week and she said no again. I'm not sure why, but she is really hesitant about being involved with her friend in the missionary work. She is afraid that she could lose her friend os something, I'm not sure. It seems like it would be easier to invite now that she is already meeting with us, and in interested in learning more. After our lesson on the Restoration, which went great, we went back to the street we were tracting, and finished the other side of the street. As we did so we found an inactive member, who accepted our invitation of service. We helped her rake up her leaves, and were able to talk with her for a while. She was really nice, and was open to us coming back for service again. We got her number too, so that we can call and set up another time, that way we can change into proper clothes, and not get our slacks dirty again. Later that night we also met with C Gifford, we taught him about the Word of Wisdom, and prophets, and he told us of his goal to make it back to the temple by the end of April. We look forward to being able to help him reach that goal.
Wednesday we did some more tracting, but not much potential. Later that day we had another lesson with W Manula. She asked a bunch of questions, and didn't accept any of our answers. She asked about the Trinity. She believes that they are seperate, but thinks that the Book of Mormon teaches that they are one. We explained the meaning of "are one", but she still didn't understand. She also believes that as lond as you ask for forgiveness you will be forgiven because of how loving God is, and therefore we don't need baptism. She wants to have all of her questions answered right now, and won't allow us to teach. She does read everything we leave her, but she is not progressing to this point. After our lesson with Wendy we were able to see David and Mellissa. We had a really great lesson with them about prophets. We were able to really help him understand what prophets are and why we have them, as well as what the priesthood is. We set a baptismal date with him for the week after the two of them are getting married which is June 22. He recognized that he feels the Spirit when he goes to church, and he came on Sunday, and said that it feels good to be back.
Thursday we met with Tom M, we had a powerful lesson with him about the Atonement, and repentance, where we invited him to repent at the end of the lesson. He came to church yesterday, and it was great to see him there. After dinner we met with Howard M, and talked with him about scripture study, and how it is important to actually study, rather that just read. You can read a book a hundred times, but until you actually study it you miss a lot of the meaning, and lose some of the power. This is especially true I think with the Book of Mormon. We also had a lesson with Dirk R. And he started off by bringing up the church's new website mormonsandgays.org. He said that it disturbed him because he has friends who are gay, and he supports them. We talked about that for a little bit, and then talked about prophets, and their role in helping us come to Christ, and how they teach us to keep the Sabbath holy,and attend church. He was going to come this week, but had a family thing come up, and called us on Saturday and told us he couldn't make it. The feeling I got from that lesson is that I think Dirk might be gay. I'm not sure, but thats the feeling I got.
Friday I had an exchange with Elder Richardson, he came to my area, and Elder Lott went there with Elder Lasley. we had a pretty good exchange, though it didn't start the best. Elder Richardson slept in till 7:30, and caused studies to run late. We had a great day when we got out though, we were able to do some tracting, and we gave a Book of Mormon away, and she said that we could come back, a possible family to teach. Also we were able to meet with the Rivers family, and talk about the sacrament. We taught Shawn G, who is a marine, and usually works on Sundays, he seems to be kind of indifferent to this, but is willing to meet with us, and thats the first step.
Saturday we met with Bishop S and went over the ward misison process with him. He is planning on doing a training on that in ward council next week. We are going to help him train. That night we stopped by Jon R, who we found from the unordained list. He and his son, who is also a lessactive member had just gotten home from the bar. They weren't drunk, but had been drinking. We listened as John told us why he doesn't come to church. He has had a sad life, with lots of run ins with hypocrisy, and he is tired of it. we both shared our testimony, and I promised him that Moroni's promise works, and invited him to try it out again. It was a powerful visit.
Sunday was a great day. During testimonies the Bishop got up and talked about missionary work, he also said how great missionaries we are, a definite sign of trust. From there the whole meeting flowed with a missionary theme. It was powerful. Most of the ward members came out of there fired up to do missionary work, and we hope as we go and teach them during dinner that we can capitalize on that and help them to be "doers of the word, not hearers only". That night we were able to go out and do visits with our EQP, and we were able to find out that several of the people had moved. Not full of teaching, but a productive night nonetheless.
That was about it for our week. I think that since it is the end of the transfer that I should give you a review of Elder Lott. He has made so much progress, and is constantly trying to do better. He is humble and sincere, and loves the people. He is commited to being obedient, even if is companion is not. He has taught me so much, and I feel it a priveledge to have been able to serve with him. He is a fantastic missionary with a powerful testimony. I will be sad if we get transferred, though I expect that it is going to happen. I am looking forward to the future, knowing that it is going to be good.
Love, Elder Schultz
PS. I don't have time to include scriptures in this email, but I will try to add them next week.
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