So first I want to start with what we have done so far today. This morning at 8 we drove up to Bro. J's house with some Elders from Beattyville to go fishing in his pond. He has about 5 or 6 acres behind his house and at the bottom of the hill is a nice pond. Ill send pics. But before we went fishing he made us a huge country breakfast. Pancakes, eggs, sausage, bacon, biscuits & Gravy and Orange juice. SUPER good. I've started to love biscuits and gravy a ton. People make them a lot here. After breakfast we went down to the pond and started fishing for Catfish! For bait we would use chicken liver. They like that a lot. And you just toss it out there and let it sit on the bottom of the pond and wait. And man O man when they find that liver they take it and they put up a fight. I was able to catch 2 big ones. Elder Burns caught 1 and Bro. J caught a giant gold fish. It was sooooo fun! And then after the fishing we went up the hill to the fire pit and started a fire and then started to shoot marbles with sling shots at glass bottles that he had set up. His house is just a hill billy playground haha! And for lunch he made us fried catfish, which was pretty good! Being at his house is always a blast!
This past week was pretty good I guess. Didn't teach a whole lot of lessons. Barbara and Jessi are doing alright. They weren't able to come to church because Barbara was having problems with her Dialysis through the night... And they are struggling with quitting smoking. They've quit drinking coffee but can't shake smoking yet. We started them on the LDS 15 step program for quitting smoking. Its a pretty awesome program. Please keep them in your prayers. They want to get baptized so so bad! I can't wait for that day!
We had zone meeting this week up in Lexington on Thursday. I gave a training to 3 different groups on Believing in Baptizing. It went awesome. In preparation for it we felt the spirit really strongly and were inspired with a lot of great things. We used the Bible video "Christ heals a man born blind" and related it back to seeing with our spiritual eyes and Blinding our Natural eyes. We asked the question "When you teach someone for the first time, do you look at them with your natural eyes and see all of their faults that might be holding them back from be baptized? Or do you look at them though the eyes of Christ and see them as what they can become?" The blind man in the video could not see with his eyes how to get to the pool to wash and be healed, but he went by faith on what Christ told him. He did not doubt or ask questions. He instantly went and did as the Lord commanded him. We can relate all of our lives to this man.
Other than that this week was just another normal one! I have to go to Richmond tonight to exchange with the Zone Leaders. Lots of driving to do down here!
Oh I totally forgot! This sunday I gave a talk in sacrament meeting! Theya sked me to speak on my conversion to the gospel. In my talk I talked about how it doesn't matter at what age you join the church, we can all be converts. There's a difference in believing the Gospel and being converted to the gospel. I started off with 1 Nephi 1 and changed Nephi's name out with my name. I talked about how it was my family and my parents that helped me to become converted to the gospel. I don't think I was totally converted before my mission but I did eventually when I understood the Atonement more fully. It's not enough to read the Book of Mormon and believe in Joseph Smith as a prophet, we must understand the Atonement. Everything is just an appendage to the Atonement. But you can't just read about the Atonement to understand it. You have to experience it. You have to use it. And being a missionary, you experience the Atonement A LOT. As Elder Holland has put it, "How could we ever bear a moving, lasting testimony of the Atonement, if we haven't ever felt a token of what Chirst has felt?" This is true. The Atonement is wonderful and I love it!
I love you all so so so so much!!!
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This is the second one I caught. And yes I did kiss that fish! I am now a true southerner! |
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| This is Bro. Johnsons giant gold fish he caught! |
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