How are you all doing? It’s super sunny and hot here in El Paso. With all the time spent out in the sun I’m going to look more Mexican than white. Which I guess would be a good thing. The days here are getting very tiring, and we started to go to bed around 9:30pm. It’s like I walk in the house and fall asleep. I almost want to pull an Elder Calhoun and sleep in my suit. Other than that the work has been going pretty well. This transfer seems to be too much to handle sometimes. It very literally feels like we are sifting through the dirt looking for the gold, except with people. New people come and go every week. Last week we ended the week with 6 baptism dates and most of those being new, and we lost 5 investigators last week. It’s so hard to have someone tell you that they don't want to have anything to do with what you believe in or what you love so much after not really even giving you a chance.
But on the other hand I can’t complain because I also had some super spiritual experiences this week. So my favorite one is around Tuesday of this last week we were riding bikes down one of the biggest streets in the area. So we were on the sidewalk, and here when you’re riding on the sidewalk you cannot see when a car is coming from the streets you are crossing over. So it is actually pretty dangerous. Anyway, once Elder Humpfreys passed this one street that was coming up I started to get a really bad feeling and the spirit screamed at me "Stop!" So almost flipping over my bike to stop and slammed the breaks, thinking there was going to be some huge car that comes out from the street, but there was nothing. I just stood there super confused as 2-3 mins passed by, Then from an apartment to my left a little old lady and he husband come running out and asked me for something spiritual to read to bring them closer to God. I asked what was wrong. And she said that they were going through a really hard time; the landlord was kicking them out, they had no food, her husband is a disabled vet going through dialysis treatments, and they were down on their knees asking for help, and when she looked up, she could see me right in the middle of their barely opened window. We were able to come back and teach them, and set baptism dates for them and everything.
When Sunday came we called them and they said that they were all ready for church and asked us if they could bring 2 of their friends with them too. Well that was a no- brainer. So all 4 of them came to church, but it turned out to be a total nightmare. In Sacrament meeting, I don't think I have ever seen such disrespectful behavior from any ward that I have been in. All the Priests and young women and even the young single adults who for some reason are in a family ward sat in the back and where being very inappropriate. I was hard for me to even feel the spirit myself. On top of that, our ward mission leader was taken to the bishopric and so we had some random guy teaching the Gospel Principles class. He turned the "Priesthood lesson" into a talk about the Word of Wisdom, Tithing, going to the Temple, and one day becoming Gods lesson. Needless to say, 3 of them where so mad that when we told them there was one more class, they said. "No thanks, I hated it" and asked for a ride home. Not going to lie, I don’t blame them, If I wasn’t a member and that was my first time at church I doubt I would have come back not to mention, no one really tried to talk to them. Well anyway, after I got them in a room with just Elder Humpfreys and me, I did what I could to save it. We calmed them down pretty well, and they said they would give us another chance. But you never know if they were actually being serious. To make a long story short, out of all 5 people that have come to church in the last two weeks we were officially dropped by one and probably will be dropped by the rest this week. Trying to keep spirits high. And open to any suggestions.
But at least General Conference and the Temple trip are coming up. YAY!
-Love Elder Stewart
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