18 March 2019

So we had a few interesting events happen this week. Mostly on Friday. That was one of the strangest days on my mission, and that's saying something! It started off pretty normally, we worked out and had an inspection planned for a little later at about 10. Then, stuff got weird. Elder Lacey (my new comp) went to the bathroom and flushed the toilet as normal, then went and took a shower. The problem is, you can't flush that toilet like normal, because it'll seem like it flushes normally, but just keep filling the bowl after everything has been flushed away. So he went to the other bathroom and started to shower and thought nothing of it. I was eating breakfast on this pretty high up stool. A few minutes later, I started to stand up to put my bowl in the sink. Strangely, when I put my foot on the ground, I felt in become enclosed in ice as I stepped in the freezing half inch of standing water now in our kitchen. I quickly ascertained the source, shut it off, and promptly worried my companion by saying, "Hey, Elder.... We've got a bit of a problem..." He was still in the other bathroom, and came out to see water spreading out further and further. It was a ton. Fortunately, it was all on the tile area. So we broke out this massive pile of towels that we had and it did very little. We ended up sweeping and mopping the water out the back door, and would sop up as much water as possible with a towel, wring it out, then repeat. It was crazy how much water there was! Also, a member last minute the night before had asked us to go to the hospital with them to translate right before the inspection, which we had to push back for them. We had just about finished with the water after fighting it for about an hour and a half when the member knocked on our door to pick us up. So we got ready really fast and went to the hospital with him. While there, we got a call from the Boutons (the senior couple inspecting our apartment) asking when we'd be getting back. We had no idea, so they ended up just asking the Tyndalls (our branch president, neighbor, and landlord) for a key to get in. We told them what had happened that morning, and they must have taken pity on us because they're notoriously picky. Our apartment wasn't very clean, it wasn't fully dry yet, and stuff had been all pushed to one side for clean up. When we got back, Sister Tyndall said that we passed. Surprised, we went in to see a bag of desserts laying on the counter, something they only give to the missionaries who miss almost no points on the inspection, and another fan set up to help out with the drying process. I was surprised, but I'll take the pity points there if they're being handed out.

That particularly eventful morning is kind of dominating my memory right now, and I can't remember too much else from the week. We did get a really great text Saturday morning, though. Nisha texted us back for the first time in probably 3-4 weeks and said that she was coming to church, which she did! It was really great, and we're going to be able to start working with her again. Also, we had another appointment with Wayne. Previously, he had mentioned that his nurse wanted him to stop putting sugar in his tea, but he never would because he loved sweet tea too much to ever give it up, and was getting irritated with his nurse for asking him. There's a saying out here that goes, "Water is for washing your hands, sweet tea is for drinking." Wayne abides by that fully, and we were pretty unsure coming in. However, it ended up really well! He agreed to live the Word of Wisdom and to live the Law of Chastity with very little fight! It's great to see the Lord changing people's hearts and minds and preparing them to receive the gospel! 

I think that's it for now, have a good week y'all!

11 March 2019

So, this week has been pretty interesting. Transfers are tomorrow, and Elder Rivas is going to be leaving. But yesterday was a pretty eventful day.

Over the week, we've not been able to get up with a ton of people. However, we had a bunch of lessons yesterday, and someone came to church! It started with Mike, where we got to teach him about prayer. He talks a ton, and always has long rambling answers to any questions. But yesterday we asked him about why he didn't like to pray in front of us, and what was the difference between talking with us and praying with us. He just kind of sat there for a minute and eventually said he didn't know, and that it was a really good question. He's going to start praying out loud every night now to make himself more comfortable with it. He's also going to come to FHE tonight!

After him we had dinner with Dawn. Wr didn't get to teach her very much, but we dideget to meet her husband. He's never there, so we always have to bring someone with us. The biggest thing holding Dawn back is just that she wants to have her husband's support, so it was a big step to get to meet him. He said that it's not too long until he's going to start working locally more and we'll be able to talk to him more often. 

Following Dawn, we had a lesson with Esther (who came to church!) and her mom! We had no idea that Esther was going to be bringing her, and we read Ether 12 and discussed it. We also were able to teach Esther's mom the Restoration, and it was really powerful. It was also the first time I've been able to teach a lot in Spanish in a long time, and I got some compliments on it. One of the more fun ones was, "Your voice when you're speaking Spanish reminds me of the Spanish dubs of National Geographic! Before you leave, I need to get a recording of you speaking." They also said I have about no accent while speaking, thankfully. I know that I don't sound like a gringo. 

Also, during the week, we were able to get up with Wayne. He's had some really rough times, and we got to teach him the Plan of Salvation. Basically, he spent the whole time going, "That makes sense!" So he's going to be progressing well probably. We'll see how he goes.  But that's all for right now, have a good week y'all!

 

 

4 March 2019

So we've been encouraged to go out and find service opportunities. So, we started serving at a thrift store. Now, I've been looking for an automatic breadmaker. Turns out this store had one for 3 dollars, and it works. So I've made a whole bunch of bread already. It's been nice. Anyways, on to important stuff.

We had interviews this week, and those were pretty nice. We talked about the work in Clinton, and just how I'm doing. Other than that, nothing really remarkable.

We found someone new named Damaris. She is doing pretty well, we've already had two lessons with a member with her. She couldn't make it to church because she got sick, but she wants to go next week. Other than that, I can't think of anything super crazy off the top of my head.  Sorry, short one today.

25 February 2019

We had a missionary devotional yesterday, and that was the big thing for the week. Well, we had stake conference 50 miles away, so we got permission to work with the Raeford elders all day. It was super nice to be able to talk to a whole bunch of the old members that I hadn't talked to for months. But in the devotional, every missionary had to sing in a choir. They asked for some volunteers a week or two ago to sing in a small group or do solos. So I decided that I'd like to sing in a small group, and went to the auditions. About 8 or 9 elders showed up, and Sister Goodman (the senior missionary in charge of it all) started having people sing different things. So, I got called up and I sang a part of Savior, Redeemer of my Soul. Evidently it was good enough where I ended up being voluntold into being in the small group and the solo thing. The small group was 4 elders singing the chorus of the second verse of How Great Thou Art, and I ended up singing the higher part. Sister Goodman asked who could sing a high G, and apparantly I can. With the solo, I sang the first verse of Savior, Redeemer of My Soul with Elders Schmidt and Oberstadt. Second verse was just me as a solo and then Elder Oberstadt was alone on the third verse. I was shaking pretty badly, but everyone I talked to said that I did a really good job still. (There were about 500-600 people there.) One member said that my future wife was probably in the audience, so I'll take that as I did well. The whole devotional was really spiritual and had lot of great speakers. It was interesting though, there were no conducting officers or anything. It just flowed from one part to the next. But it was super good.

25 February 2019

Dear Parents,

I hope you are enjoying this wonderful new opportunity to visit more regularly with your missionaries. They are such a delight.  We are in the midst of doing multi-stake/zone musical devotionals titled Joy in Christ right now and I wish you could see their smiles and hear them sing and pray and bring the Spirit to the room with such power. 

As we move into this new era of communicating home, I wanted to share a mix of my personal observations and reminders from the Brethren that I hope you will keep in mind.

--The length of your calls is up to you and your missionary, but please remember not all missionaries are in the same situation when it comes to family support and relations.  Be mindful of how keeping your missionary on the line might be affecting their companion.

--The principle is one call home (or two, if parents are not together).  Others family members at home may join in the call.  In that spirit, other family members may also join that call electronically (conference call, or video link).  What should not happen is multiple calls to multiple family members throughout the day.

--Remember the principle the Brethren had in mind when they changed the name of the day to Preparation Day when it used to be called Diversion Day.  The day is meant to get the missionaries ready for the coming week to do the work, not as a day to divert or distract them from the work. Please know that the missionaries have many things to do on P-day to get ready for the work and please do your part to help keep your missionary mentally and spiritually focused on their purpose of: “Inviting Others to Come Unto Christ.”

--Missionaries are to initiate the contact during regular PDay hours, not you.  If you need to reach them please message me or the Mission Office directly and we will facilitate whatever contact judgment warrants.

--While virtually all of the missionaries are excited with the option to call home every week, many have already expressed that they may not want to do this every week.  The Brethren have indicated that it is not their expectation that missionaries will call home every week. 

--There will be no increase to mission budgets for these calls. Missionaries are not authorized to make long distance calls which incur additional charges on their mission phones. Missionaries without easy internet access would typically buy a phone card with their own funds. 

--You might be interested to know I send this as a mission president, but also as a father with a daughter on a mission.  I was giddy with love and excitement as I got to speak to my daughter last week.  We will do so again, I am sure.  But, we (meaning me, my wife and my daughter) have all agreed that mission letters are a treasure and should not be discontinued or be entirely replaced by calls.  You say different things (often better things) when you write, rather than call.  We are also agreed that part of the mission experience is to grow in individual maturity and independence.  Just as a great cake cannot bake with a constant opening of the oven door to check on it, a great mission experience is often only achieved after some period of individual struggle without direct, parental observation and intervention. 

I pray for heaven’s blessing upon you and your missionaries as you thoughtfully and prayerfully consider your communications in light of these reminders.

It continues to be the finest honor of my life to serve your noble sons and daughters who give so much to the work of the Lord and the salvation of the people of North Carolina.

Best,

President Holland

18 February 2019

So, in brief, this was an odd week. We're teaching a man who had a flesh eating bacteria infection in his groin and had tons of surgeries and is constantly in pain, and he talks about it every time. He originally was Irish Catholic but it pretty skeptical about almost every church. Fortunately, ours isn't one of them! So he's really interested in learning a lot more. He's not super sure about joining the church, but we'll work with him.

Our weird story for the week is about going to the local HerbaLife to contact the owner again, Al. Well, an older millionaire Rhodesian street preacher came in and started talking to us. He tried to get us to join his ministry, but we politely declined. He later praised us and kissed our hands because "it's a hard job and nobody gives us praise." It was just a weird time. He also bought us shakes. So, that's the week's story. 

4 February 2019

So I now have done my first week in Clinton. It's bigger than Wallace, but that isn't a very difficult feat. Still, it has some more stuff. We'll just have to figure out something to do on P-Days now... Anyway, on to the week.

It started off with getting the apartment cleaned out and throwing out a lot of food. Wallace got shut down due to a lack of missionaries, and we had to clean out everything, and the APs were very insistent that everything be taken out. Nothing was allowed to stay. The rest of the day was saying bye to the members and finishing up our cleaning. 

Tuesday rolled around and that meant it was time for the hour and a half drive to Raleigh. I'd picked up quite a bit of stuff in my months in Wallace, and Elder Reynolds also had a lot, plus all of the stuff that had to be taken out. (Mostly the food.) So, the Malibu was riding pretty low. And got terrible gas mileage all the way to Raleigh. But we made it, and I got my new companion, Elder Rivas. He's from Utah and has been out for eight months. So we went and headed off to Clinton, where I was almost overwhelmed by the size. A whole whoppin 8,600 according to Google Maps. It did feel a lot bigger though. The apartment is interesting. We're next door neighbors to our branch president, and it's not an apartment. It's actually a little stand-alone house. That's really nice because we don't have to worry about loud neighbors or anything like that. 

Throughout the week I've mostly been getting to know the people we're teaching. We've got some really good people, and we set a baptismal date for someone named Cornelius. He's a really nice guy, he just needs to stop smoking. I also had my first online lesson with someone named Esther. She's been learning from the missionaries for a long time now, but just hasn't taken the steps to develop her faith all the way. We're trying to encourage her to read the Book of Mormon, as that's been the hardest thing for her to do. She's a college student with a kid, so it's understandable that she's busy. The lesson was just us reading the Book of Mormon with her, and that was interesting. Doing it over Facebook Messenger gives you kind of a weird seperation, and the connection dropped at one point. Still, she liked it and ended up coming to church. 

Speaking of Sunday, we went to someone's house who we'd set up a return appointment with only to find that there were a bunch of 20 ish year olds there as well. We were pleasantly surprised at how well they received us, and they had a lot of good questions about what it was like to be a missionary. Two of them were 20, and it was hard for them to think about what it would be like to just give up two years of your life to go and preach the gospel. This was made even better by the baliadas the mom had made us. We won't be able to keep teaching any of the kids because they had to go back to school the next day across NC, but hopefully they'll remember what they heard when other missionaries find them down the road. 

I think that's all the major news for this week, I'll keep you all informed!

(Oh, yeah, I hit my 18 month mark this week too. I forgot about that.)