Monday, March 15, 2010

Taking The Good With The Bad


Area: Townsend, Montana
Companion: Elder Lanham






Well this week was pretty good for the most part. We had some down times this week so I'll talk about those first to get them out of the way. First off L told us on Tuesday that she wants to hold off on her date and maybe push it back. This bummed us out and after talking about it she still wants to get baptized, she is just afraid the church will change a lot of things and she will lose some things in her life. Well then her parents really got involved with questioning which was good because we could just sit back and let them talk. Once the night was over she was just scared because her boyfriend who lives all the way in Baltimore wasn't very excited for her when she told him, and I think she is feeling some guilt like she should break up with him and that scares her. End of story girls, don't have boyfriends before you're old enough and problems won't occur. So we talked to her and told her that she is more ready for baptism than she thinks and that if she prayed to Heavenly Father and asked Him about moving her date that she would get her answer. So we'll see what she says tomorrow. She also got a lung infection this week because she choked on a carrot. We went and gave her a blessing yesterday. We are really praying for her to feel better physically and about her date.


Sat. was also our crummy day. It was cloudy and cold and after trying every name on our list and no one being home we weren't feeling too great about things. That and Elder L was feeling sick. So overall Sat. stunk and we only taught 2 lessons. Oh and then Monday! Oh man. Well there is this old guy we had been working with ~ he was a really great guy and really funny too. He's W M best friend. His name is B. Well he came to church with W every week and then would go to the Methodist Church with W after. Elder Lanham. said he was really progressing before he had a stroke a month or so before I came. Anyway he had been doing way better and Sunday night we ate dinner with him and the M's and he was just cracking jokes like always. Well Monday night we got a call that the M's went to get him for FHE and he was dead. Just like that out of the blue. This really hit W hard.  Sis M and us agree that he will for sure accept the gospel in the spirit world. W somewhat agrees too. The funeral is Tues. More on W later.


OK now on to the good stuff. We played ping pong at the H's Monday and had a really good lesson with their 17 year old daughter E. We think she might be ready for a baptism commitment in the next couple weeks. Tuesday I talked about already. The Zone Leaders were in town this week for team ups so they were at District Meeting. I had to give a discussion on Knowledge. It went pretty good. Wed. we had a really good lesson with the H parents. She was involved with Church Universal and Triumphant or something like that, pretty much a cult, and is lacking a testimony in prophets. So we talked a lot about having faith in a prophet and how we come to know someone is a true prophet. We also challenged her to go online and watch a few of Pres. Monson's talks so hopefully that will help her feel of the great spirit he has and the truthfulness of him. Thursday night the Zone Leaders came out to Townsend and went on team ups with us on Friday. Both of them are great Elders. My favorite is Elder Brooks from St. George. He is just a go-getter and really fun to be on teamups with. They brought us bad news though. There will no longer be teamups with zone leaders. Now we will travel to the District Leader's area and go with them. We had been doing it with both Zone and District Leaders but not anymore. This allows us to visit a Leader's zone and see how it's suppose to be done and so he can lead by his example rather than us just lead out in our areas and sit back. I think it will be good because I think it will let us learn a lot more from them. I will miss when the different elders come to Sis. P's and flip out because they get to sleep on big beds and she makes them breakfast. Oh well, I guess I'll just keep enjoying it for myself. haha


Zone Conference is this Wed. in Helena. It should be good to see Elder Stewart again. I noticed in the Talon today that he got a baptism last month so I'm excited to talk to him about that. Yesterday we went up to White Sulphur just for part of the day with Bro. S who is from Townsend but is called to be in the branch up there. It was a really pretty day yesterday especially up there in the mountains. We also had a great Sacrament Meeting up there. It's amazing what only 15 people can accomplish. We also talked to W M yesterday. For the first time ever he is thinking about potentially setting a baptism date. I think this has a lot to do with B's death. We told him to think about it and that he could just tell his wife and us and that way it will stay quiet while he works towards it. He is slowly getting there. Could be anyday now!


Good to hear BYU is a 7 and not an 8 again. Not surprised they lost to UNLV. I can't stand them! The tournament needs to be moved. So is anyone going to send me a bracket? I'd like to fill one out so I can see if I can do better than others without knowing anything. Right now I'm going to say Kansas. I only watched them once before I left and they looked good. I hope BYU can beat Florida. Should be interesting. Have fun watching March Madness. I had drawn on my planner a big bball and wrote March Missionary Madness on it. Well this President's letter in the Talon talked about that same thing. I thought it was funny. Oh, speaking of the Talon did you get your copy of it? They said they were going to send them to parents by email starting this month.


Thanks for the letter Andrew and Grandma and Grandpa G and D. Andrew I'm going to send a letter answering your questions maybe next week I'll just put them in my email. The library is kicking us out. Well I have to go now. I love you all. I feel once again like this email was sporatic. I hope everyone had a good week. I'm going to try to write you a letter so I can talk to you about tennis and stuff but enjoy your week off. Love you.
-Elder Davis