It's all there

Mon, Feb 16, 2009

Sldjfkdjfldkfjd I don’t know where to start. I'll tell my favorite story from this week.

Joshua:
We met Joshua in a parking lot. He’s 33 and got shoulder length hair that he wears in a ponytail, he plays the guitar in a bunch of different bands, and he has his own recording studio, and is pretty easy going and nice. He looks like my little brother Clint and his mannerisms are similar to Clint’s. We offered him a card and introduced ourselves. He said that he has a friend who is Buddhist so he’s open to stuff and agreed for us to come over and teach him. So the next day we came over and taught him the restoration and gave him a Book of Mormon. He asked questions and was nice, but didn’t seem incredibly interested but he promised he’d read 3 Nephi 11 and we made an appointment for a few days later (Feb. 14). Valentine’s Day was not exactly the best day of my life. All of our appointments fell through and we were pretty discouraged, at least I was. But Joshua didn’t cancel. We walked in for our appointment and Joshua was super happy to see us. He said, “I got you a card, and some flowers, and some chocolates for Valentine’s Day.” Oh great.
But then we read the card: “Sisters, I’m so glad I met you! You’ve shown me what I’ve been missing, and what I didn’t know I wanted! And that I’m not alone. God bless you. Joshua”
What? Where did this enthusiasm come from? He didn’t seem that interested before. In his excitement he explained that he had read the pamphlet we left him and he read 3 Nephi 11 and loved it so much that he started the Book of Mormon at the beginning and read 80 pages in two days. He told us how he had heard people his whole life telling him good things, but he didn’t know where they came from. He read the bible and he didn’t see them there, but he pointed to the Book of Mormon and said, “It’s all there!” I can’t describe to you how happy I was at that moment. My mouth hurt because I was smiling so hard. He was bearing his testimony about the Book of Mormon! Also, the last time we talked to him we asked for a referral and he told us about his next door neighbor that he had just met. After telling us about how much he loved the Book of Mormon he told us that he invited his neighbor to come over and listen to the lesson. So his friend, 26-year-old Zach, comes over. Unfortunately he came over during the middle of our lesson about the Plan of Salvation. We tried to summarize, but he was mostly still stuck on “Whose Joseph Smith?”
Joshua came to church and the ward members were so awesome! They made him feel warm and welcome. Unfortunately all the talks were about Zion and I didn’t even understand what half of the people were saying, but it doesn’t matter cause he felt the spirit. Then in Sunday school the discussion went from prophets to the three Nephites to the priesthood to the temple and then finally on to a debate on whether we should learn things from those who are not LDS. The whole time I was sweating bullets thinking, “What are these people doing in the basic gospel principles class. Send them back to the high priests' class” I stress too much. It was fine, although Joshua was super confused, nonetheless, he felt the spirit. After elders quorum he told us that they learned about missionary work and he told us ways he was going to improve. Who is this guy? He’s great, and the ward loves him. Cross your fingers.

I’m not good at dodge ball. I hate it actually, but once a month we play it and the sisters are forced to stand there looking like idiots as super fast rubber balls go whizzing past our heads. Sister Davenport’s good cause she can catch the ball. It's torture cause Elders want to get back at all those sisters who called them immature (not me, I don't say it to there face. haha, okay really I respect them)...or I think the Elders are hoping for a Sister Waiwa-miracle. This sister named Waiwa was the last one left in her zone during a tri-zone dodge ball tournament. It was her against like 50 billion elders, but she single handedly caught (okay she probably used two hands) a bunch of balls and her zone ended up winning the tournament. We are all judged against the legendary Sister Waiwa. I can’t handle that kind of stress! Thus, dodge ball is dumb.

I love you all very very very very much. Happy V-day and I hope you got lots of chocolate!

Sister AJ