Working hard

Well this week was another hard one.  We worked hard and my ego is a little shattered with only one less-active lesson for the entire week.  If you ask any missionary, that is really bad, but when I met with President this week he just said, "I could care less about numbers, success isn’t measured by numbers, but by your commitment to be diligent and try your hardest." It’s just weird how this mission is nothing at all like what I thought it would be. I thought the biggest problem I would have is people not coming to church, even though that happens all the time. I have been able to grow more as a member than I would have thought, as a missionary.  This mission thus far hasn't shown me how to be a better missionary, but a better member that does missionary work. Damian told us he would go to church and so did David.  I don’t understand the point of them telling us something that they will lie about week after week.  It’s pretty much a waste of our time. It's like telling a cop you weren’t speeding when they have the speed gun right in front of you.  I am meant to love these people.  It’s getting hard but I know I’ll get there. We don’t have any solid investigators.  We went to a door where a dog was practically breaking down the door and the guy looked really interested and said, “Well my dinner is on right now but can you come back in like 10- 15 minutes when I’m done?”  So we chapped a couple more houses and then went back and the guy didn’t answer his door... I just thought what was the point of that. Elder Patterson was just so let down and frustrated and I just said, "Well that bites" and we just kept going for a couple more houses. I later told Elder Patterson I really couldn't care less if he rejected us because he’s not really rejecting us, he’s rejecting joy. 

On P-day we went to the mining museum.

We have a new greenie in our district

Handwritten letter sent home, arriving in Seattle Saturday, April 19, 2014

March 24-28

So, I’ve forgotten to write in my journal pretty much all week.  So, I have a little catching up to do.  So on Monday, we went to Summer Lee, a museum about Airdrie and Coatbridge.  It just had a lot about steel and coal mining.  It was cool to see all the great history.  Tuesday we went on exchanges so I was with Elder Davis and we had lunch with Jonathan E.  It was great.  I love being around return missionaries because they know a lot of what we are dealing with.  We talked about how we need to just pretty much work with less actives because there are just far too many of them.  On Wednesday we had zone interview trainings.  I got interviewed by President and it was pretty good.  We laughed a couple times.  I love always seeing him.  On Thursday we had dinner at the Blacks and instead of them making us four missionaries dinner, I made everyone chocolate pancakes.  They said they were the best, but I thought they were just okay.  April and Shawn both said they tried to make them the same but they were nowhere near as good.  On Friday, I went with Elder Dalton on exchanges with Jamie to see widows in the ward and later that night we both got super lost and found a huge lake and thought it was pretty cool.

March 29

Today we played basketball with Thomas and Jonathan.  It was good to finally play an actual game of B-ball. T Then Br. Johnston took us out for Indian food.  We talked to a couple of crazy people on the bus.  It was a good day.

March 30

Sunday was good.  Again, no one that we invited came to church.  It is very discouraging with the amount of success we have made since I have been here.  This is just such a hard area.  The people are very ignorant and un-accepting but I will still work and always will.

March 31

Today’s P-day consisted of just a lot of shopping and we watched Sam and Luke’s 5000 Days Project, after we got permission from the APs.  That documentary has taught me many things.

April 1

Today was a little hard.  We had a lot of finding and a lot of walking but we had a great dinner at the Blacks.

April 2

Today was good.  The morning started off a little slow but we got to do more service and had a good lesson with Sister Jonson.  At the end of the night, I stayed up with Elder Dalton because we are in the same group that came into the mission, we talked about how we are both at the same point of our mission and we just talked a lot about our thoughts and how we never thought our missions would be like this at all.

April 3

Oh man, I love moving or just doing some good service.  I remember when I was younger and I hated it but now it’s pretty sweet.  We helped Sister Bryce move and she actually gave us her deep fryer!  Oh boy, we made so many chips and we fried chicken and tried to fry a candy bar…it didn’t work but it was a fun day.

April 4

Today we taught an actual good lesson!  We actually taught today for the first time in a month and it just felt amazing.  If I didn’t have such a hard time last month, I wouldn’t love teaching as much as I do.  It just makes me feel amazing.  I’m not sure how much will come out of it, but to testify and bring truth to someone is the best!

April 5

Today we got to play some football-volleyball which was interesting.  We did some finding in Glasgow and had lunch and then watched the Saturday morning session of General Conference.

April 6

Today was full of conference, it was great.  I got to meet up with a bunch of Elders and that was cool too.