Anyway the exchange was good. I went with Elder Read in Orderville for the day. It's a pretty redneck town. There's two wards scattered in the few tiny little towns in their area. We ate lunch at one of the bishops houses and had Navajo tacos (which I love by the way!) and then since we didn't have a dinner we ate dinner there as well haha. The bishop shared with me their ward mission plan, which is to treat all non members like cattle: gather em together, rope em up, brand em, and let em go! And I was just like "hey whatever gets the work done!" I also met this recent convert who is super enthusiastic about helping the missionaries. His name is Ricky. He has one leg and is an old war vet. He said to me "when I'm bored, I count my blessings." Good advice! We took him to a LA's house for a lesson. The house had some big steps leading up to the porch, which was going to be an interesting challenge with his wheelchair. Well he just hopped right out of his wheelchair and scooted up the steps and into her house on his bum haha and again I was just like "hey whatever gets the work done!" Then later we took Ricky to meet one of Kanab 2's investigators named Rodger. He's another old war vet down the street and he goes everywhere with his walker. So there I was listening to war stories with two older guys with absolutely no filter on their mouths haha. Seriously reminded me of the guys on Secondhand Lions. Classic. Later on I found out about the types of ward activities they have in Orderville. One of them is donkey basketball. "What's that?" I asked. "Well it's where we take a bunch of donkeys and put rubber shoes on them and take them into the gym in the church...and we play basketball while riding the donkeys!" Yep...whatever gets the work done! Awesome exchange!
So after my own personal episode in the Andy Griffith show, I finally made it back to Little Valley! We've had lots of other adventures this week but none as great as Slim's baptism! Everything came together really well and he had some family come in and lots of friends and buddies from school. There was about 70 or so people there! Pretty good turnout. We started in the chapel and then crammed into the RS room for the ordinance. Bailey's boyfriend Chase did the ordinance and they got it done right the first time! Whew thank goodness...I always get nervous that they'll have to do it more than once since that kinda kills the spirit and memory of the sacredness of the ordinance. All was well! The program was sweet and we all went over to Slim's house afterwards for some bagels and snacks. Success! And yes Slims mom took a TON of pictures...Slim was getting a little irritated haha. That's probably how he's going to remember his baptism.....the pictures. The cool thing though is that the parents are reactivated and hopefully they'll start looking toward a temple sealing as a family! We're going to do our best to help them all get there. Bailey got baptized last August and now since Slim just got baptized and confirmed then the goal is in sight! The confirmation yesterday went well...his bishop did the honors. What a blessing it is to provide opportunities for elect and prepared people like Slim to participate in such an important saving ordinance. Slim really looks up to us and his cousin serving a mission, and Slim said he wants to serve a mission too! Haha he's awesome and super chill. After every lesson he says "stay sweet."
We haven't been able to catch up with the Demarco's this week. Go figure, roller coaster again. We'll keep trying, but we don't want to be too pushy. Shane is doing really well! Today he should be completely off tobacco and nicotine! He's been hopping to a bunch of different wards though so we're not sure where he's going to end up being baptized. But at least he's meeting the requirements, and for the right reasons too! Lindsey is still nonexistent. We met with the Alo's and even though the wife was at work we asked if we could just meet real quick with the rest of them. Bear (the dad) thought that was really cool for us to do that. His heart is pretty open right now! Everything else is going pretty well.
Other than that, we spoke in the Stone Hedge ward yesterday about food storage. Just kidding. We spoke on missionary work. (What else?) It turned out really well. In Priesthood we sat down next to our ward mission leader Bro Warner. He introduced us to his friend from Idaho Falls. Automatically we kinda assumed he was, well you know, mormon....right? So E Lewis jumped right in and jokingly said "Would you like to repent and be baptized??" And he kinda chuckled and looked like we had just pulled a hunting knife on him or something haha. Then Bro Warner said, "haha...he's actually investigating the church right now!" ooops! haha it was all good though, at least he knows our purpose!
Gotta fly!
Love,
Elder Payne!
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