Well shoot another week has gone by! And it's been rich with blessings and miracles and opportunities and fun! Let's see, where to begin....
So since we're in a walking/biking area and E Bradford has a bike, I was kind of needing one. I spent the first week of the transfer asking around and eventually came up to the conclusion that I needed to go ahead and buy a solid $500 CTR bike, since we can't borrow bikes at all. Well just before I called them up to order one, I got a call from our High Councilman Bro Hardcastle. He said he had gotten something put together and wanted us to come with him to get a bike for me. It was strange because the day before we had interviews with president and I asked him "if members are willing to buy a bike for me to keep, is that ok?" and he said "if it's within their budget and they're willing to do it, that's perfectly fine." Anyway bro Hardcastle took us to Red Rock Bicycle company and we narrowed the bikes down to the one in the picture, which performs exactly like a CTR Specialized bike only for a cheaper price. He also threw in a bottle rack and a helmet and a nice comfy gel seat and some thinner road tires for me. Apparently the High Councilmen got together and divided up the cost, and whether it was the church's fund or from their own pockets, all in all it cost $740, which is funny because that's about how much tithing I've payed in my short 20 years in this cool world. So it's like all my tithing in the past 20 years rolled back to me in the form of this bike. Such a beautiful bike! Such a blessing from God!
The work is going much better by the way! Since we're doing less active work now, our numbers are looking a little different. We haven't taught nearly as many non member lessons as I have in other areas, but the less active lessons are up! (obviously) it's a different adjustment but I'm pretty sure I'm like the only missionary in this mission that likes doing less active work. I don't really care about just baptisms...I care about conversion to the gospel! So anyway it's been great...we have two regular investigators that we're working with and two less active units that we're teaching as well. It's a ton of fun! I still hate teaching but I love helping people feel the spirit, so no matter what happens I enjoy every lesson (as long as the spirit is there) haha. One less active family, the Jerden's, are wanting to become temple worthy, and the husband wants to get back into the priesthood and receive the Melchizedek priesthood. We're starting from lesson 1 and working our way there together! They have a little one year old boy that they want to have grow up in the gospel and have a strong testimony, so even though the lessons can be super distracting with a little 1 year old boy flying around and screaming, it's all worth it. I love that family!
Yesterday we were attending one of our four wards and had just sat down for sacrament meeting when a member walked in with a young man that was wearing a white shirt, jeans, no tie, and some Asiscs. The member came up to us and said "Hey elders, this is Casey, and he's a non member....will you take care of him for the rest of church?" Unfortunately we had to go to another ward, but we sat with him for sacrament. E Bradford explained the meaning of the sacrament and how it represents our commitment to Jesus Christ. It was the fist time Casey had ever been to an LDS service. Well, we had to part ways after the meeting, but we gave him our phone number and somehow didn't get his....but he said he wants some spirituality in his life and you can tell that he's already made some big changes in his life. Golden! What a miracle. We'll try to get in contact with him again this week.
Hmm, well other than that, we had a great week! We found a random active Korean family that wanted us to come live in their basement and eat their food, we found a relevant Pokemon card on the street, and we climbed to the summit of Mt. Everest (or something like that) in our backyard! We also taught an agnostic man named Zach (of course) at his doorstep, and Elder Bradford got excited and drove his bike off road right into an ocean of bullhead thorns. I didn't have enough time to warn him of the danger. His tires were caked in stickers. Just when all hope seemed lost and air was coming out as we pulled out the thorns, some oozy green slime came to the rescue and patched up all the holes! We air it up and it has been fine ever since! Such is the Atonement in our lives...
Well I love you guys!
Elder Payne!
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