I'll have to tell you about the really big miracle we
witnessed this week a bit later, but we have been able to meet and in some
cases exceed our goals that we have been setting here. We were
blessed enough to have 9 lessons this last week one of those was with a less
active Member, and the other 8 were with investigators. 2 of our
investigators came to church and we had a total of three non-members at
sacrament meeting.
R - Is our big miracle. We met R first while we were
tracting a trailer park. We were knocking doors, when he walked by. We introduced
ourselves as missionaries and he made a comment but he just kept walking. So we
shrugged it off and kept walking too. A few days later (New Year’s Day) we
were tracting in the same area and we knocked on his door. He invited us
in and was nice. We talked about his religious background and beliefs. He was
raised Christian but fell away in his late teens and partied a bit but later realized
that that wasn't taking him anywhere he wanted to be and started taking a
second look at religion. When he started reading the Bible again everything
just clicked and he knew it was true. We asked if he had ever read from
the Book of Mormon before. He said that he had but that he never really got
that into it. We explained what the Book of Mormon is and how it came
to be that we have it. We talked about Joseph Smith and invited him to church
on Sunday. Saturday morning we got a call from him he said that he had been
reading from the Book of Mormon and that he had received a witness that it was
true. Sunday he came to church and bore his testimony of the truthfulness of
the Book of Mormon. We actually had two non-members bear their testimony in
fast and testimony meeting!
M - Is an older guy, who used to work logging trees, but is now retired. He
lives alone in a little trailer a bit out of town, and LOVES to tell stories
from when he was logging. He's known the missionaries for a while, and is
pretty good friends with several members of the Branch. He has two copies of
the Book of Mormon, one of them is quite a bit older and has kinda a funny
story. The other is just one of the ones we hand out. He's read some of the
Book of Mormon and had some concerns. He wondered why God would tell somebody
to kill an unconscious man. We explained that Laban was a wicked man who had
rejected the commandments of God as given through his prophets, (i.e. Lehi) and
had, on top of that, robbed and attempted to have Nephi and
his brothers killed... twice! And that even if Nephi had been able to get the
plates without killing Laban, considering Laban's earlier reaction to them just
offering to buy the plates he would have be even more furious and
committed in his campaign to have them killed. M agreed to read from the
Book of Mormon again and to come to church with us on Sunday (which he did
do). He also has a dog who likes to eat icicles!
T - didn't make it to church. But there is at least some
level of interest there and he said that he'd give the Book of Mormon a
go, so if he does that, then the spirit will be able to touch his heart. He
really likes Native American art (Which, I must say, I'm a pretty big fan
of myself). T is just pure unadulterated awesomeness! Last time we were at his
house he took us down into the "Man Cave" and it was indeed the
manliest man cave I have ever seen. The walls are covered in Native
American and African masks and planks carved with native art (some of which he
did himself!) against one wall is a flat screen TV with swords (and a spear!)
stacked to either side. Against another wall is an old entertainment
center, with every drawer full of different kinds of knives. there are more
knives our on the tables and three different rooms coming off of the man cave
in one is his gunsmiths shop (he is a gunsmith and used to shoot competitively)
another is his wood an machine shop and another is his room that he has (and
needs) to store all of his guns. I think he may have more guns and in greater
variety than the gun section a Cabellas!! He practically has his own museum!!
... Except there were no "please do not touch" signs anywhere and he
would just hand you 200 year old revolvers and start explaining how old it
was, how rare it was, and the shiny penny he paid for it. Needless to
say it was really easy to get distracted when we were in there. But it was
still really cool. He said we could come back sometime and get a picture in his
gun room. :D
Gotta run, love ya bye!
Elder Thomson
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