10-7-13

This was one of the most spiritual baptisms of my mission!

Family,

 

Well I just love conference a ton! MACK!!!!! I was thinking of that, Dad. How could I not? Anyways, this was a super super stressful week and especially past few days. But this is to help me grow and will be for my good, that's for sure. Let me get into it.

 

So on Monday we found out the transfer roster (as I sent to you). Elder Johnson is cool as a cucumber. But there are a few things that made us not be able to work a lot last week. I know on Tuesday we had a super awesome lesson with one of our investigators. We didn't really teach a whole lot, but just had a good conversation. 

Wednesday was the super stressful day. So what was happening was that we were collapsing the zones again and making it just one big zone. The Maize 2nd ward Elders were moving into the apartment that we were to move out of. So we helped them move in while we moved out. Elder Johnson and I along with Elder Eliason and his new "son", Elder Hulse were staying for a couple of days for the baptism on Thursday. We then moved into a member of our stake presidency, President Cessna. Missionaries have been living there for a long time. In particular, zone leaders. So just as I got settled and moved in, President Cessna told us that we were to move out for a week because thye were re-doing their wood floors and couldn't have anyone coming in or out. So after only being there for a few days, we moved back into the old apartment I was in for the time being. I forgot a few things from home that would have been helpful for the use of missionary work. 

Thursday was the big day. We did miles, stake reports, and weekly planning for the majority of Wednesday/Thursday. So we haven't been able to do a whole lot of work (which really stinks). But we didn't have a terrible week, espeically with a baptism! So the night before her baptism, her old Catholic priest called her. Her parents are active Catholics and do not approve of her decision to be baptized a member of the Lord's church. So the priest told her all about this anti-stuff. Juts a bunch of bologna! The baptism was AWESOME! The spirit was so strong! It may have been one of the most memorable baptism for me on my mission. Mike's bapitsm, being my first, had to be first, but this was a great one too. I got to meet her boyfriend's parents, the Hassel's who was a stake President in San Antonio and mission President in Switzerland. They were also on "The District": missionary reality TV that we have to watch as a part of our 12 week training program. It was sweet to be able to meet them. I wanted to get a picture but never had the opportunity to. We also had the rare priviledge of getting her confirmed right after the baptism. We got it approved a few weeks prior. After, we all went to dinner at olive Garden. Yummy. The next day, they flew out to Salt Lake to go attend conference. How sweet would that be to be your first conference experience! To be there in person! 

Friday was another moving day where we moved into the apartment with the Maize 2nd elders. These past few days have really been a patience-trying experience for me. Elder Johnson likes to get up super early in the morning and work out. As I have said, he is a body builder. Forunately, other missionaries have wanted to go workout with him. 

Conference was awesome. I think my favorite was President Uchtdorf's talk on Saturday. It was just perfect for the investigator that we had there with us and of course all of those less actives that need to come back and experience the joy of the gospel yet again. I also loved Elder Oaks' talk yesterday.  So that's what I'll be trying to empahsize this week as we share messages with our members and others during dinner or similar setting. Let me also just say, I loved not having the distraction of football and other worldly things this past weekend. I feel the spirit more as I don't have those things in the back of my mind during a lesson. I can get distracted fairly easily during a lesson so that is another thing I can work on. Well this upcoming week should be another week filled with meetings (with MLC on Wednesday) and moving some more. So hopefully we can find some time to do missionary work. Isn't it awesome that I am a part of the revolution of missionary work around the world? I'm so grateful to be one of the 80,333 missionaries around the world, as President Monson addressed on Saturday.

 

No it hasn't turned cold yet. There were some storms this past week, but nothing too terribly bad. But, as usual, thank you for the family updates! I love hearing about how y'all are doing in improving your relationships one with another. I best be off, but y'all have a great week and I can't wait to hear how things are from the home frontier! Sorry I'm not writing too much about you and how your week went. Maybe next week will be better. We'll be back in the home we live with and just us 2. 4 missionaries living in the same apartment would be pretty crazy if it was full time, let me tell you that. But y'all have a great week and can't wait to hear from you next week! Love,

 

Elder Sutherland