This week was awesome! We saw some insane miracles on our area and we
know the Lord has been prepping people like mad out here!
Tuesday, we had to do what's called stake reports; we call each
companionship and discuss how the work is going along with a certain
group of people they are working with that are progressing toward
baptism. That takes most of the day since we have to call and wait for
people to call us back so Tuesday's are the LONGGGG days haha. Well,
we finished up and we went and prepared all the
information we collected for a meeting with the Stake President where
we report to him how the stake is doing with the work. So that took
about the whole day, we were able to give a blessing to a sick member
but other than that we spent the day with the reports.
Wednesday, we had district meeting in St. Joseph (the hometown of
Eminem). It was an awesome meeting about accountability and the
importance of the Holy Ghost. After that we had a district lunch then
we went on exchanges with the Elders in Blue Mills, Elders Anderton
and Butterfield. I went to Blue Mills with Elder Butterfield and Elder
Hunt stayed in Platte City with Elder Anderton. The day started off
slow, we had like 5 people not answer or say no and it seemed like
things just weren't working out. After countless failures we decided
it was dinner time, so we grabbed a bite since our dinner canceled.
After dinner we grabbed an 18 year old from the ward for team ups and
the first house we went to was a part-member family where the mother
is a member but the son is not; well the mom told us that she was
leaving soon so we wouldn't have enough time to meet with her son, but
while the 18 year old from the ward was talking to the mom , we
quickly taught the restoration to the boy, just a brief version. After
we left we tried a part member family where, again, the kids weren't
members, who the Elders hadn't met with in like 2 months, this time
was different. We got in, taught the Restoration, and had the two
unbaptized boys set a baptismal date of February 27th!! WOW! That was
awesome! From there we went to another part-member families house,
where, again, the child isn't a member, and we read some scriptures
and had a good discussion about why going on a mission is so
important. So it was a pretty dang good day.
Thursday, we exchanged back and after our studies we planned out the
upcoming week. After planning we talked to a recent convert, K,
who's husband, J, is a less-active member we are trying to get
back to church. J, is a retired Marine who served a few tours in
Afghanistan and has some PTSD; and has struggled with the word of
wisdom because of it. He is currently serving a prison sentence for a
DUI in the past, it's just a 15 day thing but, it's still hard on the
family, obviously. It seems that this has been a bit of a wake up call
for him since he realizes that if he continues down that path, it will
put him where he currently is for much longer than two weeks. So we
visited with his wife, K and just talked about how he is doing.
After that we tried some people before going to dinner. After dinner
we went to a families house where they gave us a pie and we tried some
more people out.
Friday, we had to do a lot of driving. We drove up to St. Joseph, and
picked up Elder Sutton, then took him down to Parkville where he and
Elder Katoa, the district leaders, went to a special district leader
training. We took Elder Katoas companion, Elder Kelly (he's from Las
Vegas, he went to Arbor View) with us until the meeting was over. We
went and taught the Plan of Salvation lesson and then we did service
at the local thrift store for a few hours. After service we wet back
to Parkville and went to lunch before dropping Elder Kelly off with
Elder Katoa. Then we drove Elder Sutton back up to St. Joseph. From
there, we drove straight to dinner but while on the way, we got a call
that two Elders had gotten stuck in mud and were wondering if they
could get help getting out. We had Elder Sutton take care of it. After
dinner we had a lesson fall through but we were able to contact some
inactive members we've never met before. Then we had a lesson with
Arthur about the importance of reading the Book of Mormon, and he
committed to read.
Saturday, this was the miracle day. We wake up to two text messages
from A. At 1 he told
us we needed to talk, and at 5 he said that he was 48 chapters into
the Book of Mormon and knew that it was true, ARE YOU KIDDING ME?!?!
It was awesome! Well, that morning we visited Jesse in the Jail, we
had a good talk with him about after he gets out. After Jesse we went
and did some more service at the thrift store here and boy did we go
at the right time, it was crazy backed up and we were able to get
everything back to normal. Following the service, we went and tracted
out a certain set of town houses because we had success talking to
people there so we spent about and hour and a half tracting those out
and we found two potential investigators who seem promising but we
will see. Then we had dinner dropped off for us. After dinner met with
Arthur; and wow, it was insane! He told us about how up until that
night, his only intention meeting with us was to disprove the church
and try to convert a Mormon, but after reading 48 chapters, or
listening to them at work, he found out that it was true. The coolest
part was his Facebook post, which we typed out.
He said, "There are things that have been revealed to me. I'm only
here to tell you what I have come to learn. Though many will disown me
and turn their backs, it is still something I must share. Over the
past 7 months I have been in research of what most people think of as
Mormons. The intention? To try and help on maybe just one person
realize that their doctrine was false and a complete lie. To save
them, so to speak. I lied to countless Elders as I welcomed them into
my home as if I was waiting to learn. I very cautiously and sneakily
brought scripture that seemingly destroyed the doctrine in which they
so strongly believed. After every meeting, I added things of hate,
things of destruction to their faith.
But I am, telling you the truth when I say this. As my first motive
was of destruction to them and the church. God has opened my eyes to
see the truth. The truth of deception that is so deeply rooted in
Christianity from the beginning of the Catholic Church. All the lies,
all the deceit, all the oppression. It was only through my research of
evil intentions did I learn that I was the one deceived.
I stand here today proclaiming that the Book of Mormon is true. It was
wrote by man, through to re-establish the church Jesus Christ came to
establish through his perfect sacrifice. I'm sure you are skeptical.
As I was one who thought of this church to be of Satan. I would
encourage you to start with first Nephi chapter 1 verse 1, and find
out for yourself. Just as you should read your Bible to know what your
teacher says is true you should also read the Book of Mormon and see
if your teacher calls it untrue. Much love to everyone God Bless!"
A
we are stoked for that!
Sunday, we had breakfast with a family in the ward who also invited a
less active member over, it was sweet. Then we rushed to the church
for a quick missionary correlation meeting before ward council. After
all those meetings we participated in the ward choir practice.
Sacrament meeting was good, we had two investigators at church so that
was awesome! Talks were on: agency, preaching the gospel (a girl was
going on a mission), and establishing Zion. We taught Sunday School
about the sabbath day, it was a good lesson. Then third hour was
training by the first presidency about keeping the sabbath day holy,
it was some awesome stuff! After church we had a visit with an
inactive man and his wife who isn't a member. We talked and answered
some questions she had about the church and they decided to feed us
this coming Friday night!! After that we went to dinner with our ward
mission leaders family, the Arendts. Then we visited with Arthur and
watched the short Restoration movie and talked about his similarities
to Joseph Smith with his testimony.
So this week went great! We are pumped that things are starting to
work out here and we know it's only through the love, mercy and grace
of Christ. He's how we get anything done in the mission, through his
Atonement we are enabled to have the spirit with us at all times if we
live in such a way as to allow ourselves to feel it. It's always
there, we just need to learn to recognize it. I hope you all have
great weeks! Take care!
Elder Hinrichsen
Elder Hunt and I at the jail waiting for Jesse
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