Hola Familia!
It's already the last week of the transfer. I don't expect a change at all
here but you never know.
We got to go to the temple on Friday. It was great. Pres. and Sister
Gardner came and we all got to hang out a bit afterwards. It was a bit
bittersweet saying goodbye to some of the Elders leaving for home this week
though.
Did you get the picture of us in front of the liquor store? We were
walking along and the people working there saw us and waved us over. We
wouldn't go in so they came out and talked to us a bit. They were trying to
convince us that Jesus liked wine (water into wine was one of his first miracles
after all) and we could come into the store and talk with them. I was
uncomfortable the entire time because we were standing at the door of this
liquor store along the main street to the temple. Sure enough we walk into ward
council on Sunday and the Bishopric is laughing at something on Bro. B's
phone. He had seen us and driven around the block a second time to snap a
picture. During church the Bishop kept talking about what a great job we were
doing at talking to everyone and the ward council would all quietly snicker at
us. I asked Bro. B to send the picture to you, thought you'd enjoy
it.
So we've been working hard on talking to a lot more people and we've sure
met some interesting ones this last week. A lot of people just wanted money for
"milk", or "gas", while swearing cause they misplaced their id. Why do you need
an id to buy milk? One lady came up to us in McDonald's and started asking for
money for food and the bus. We talked to her for a little bit. She told us how
she heard evil voices that wouldn't leave her alone and that everyone was out to
get her. She knew she needed help spiritually but refused to actually do
anything about it. She wouldn't even take a Book of Mormon unless we bought her
a tablet that she could read it on. We couldn't really do anything for her.
Mom talked about how I can see the potential in others but I sure do get
frustrated when people are so stupid that they won't even take the iron rod
right in front of them. This lady had even said that prayer had made the voices
go away but she gave up on it because it didn't permanently fix the problem.
I'm grateful that God is patient with us but I can't comprehend how he does
it.
We did have a number of really good experiences too, miraculous even. We
got a feeling to talk cross the street and talk to some people out on their
porch. It turns out that the man whose house it was had just lost his wife. He
was having a crisis of faith and his friends had come over to try to comfort
him. One of the guys was a deacon in another church and had been really worried
about coming over there because there were a bunch of other people over that
were bad influences. He prayed for help and the bad friends left and we showed
up. We shared a message and honestly we don't even remember what we said but
the spirit was present and we know the guy felt it. He didn't really respond
but we hope that he remembered how it felt.
Just yesterday we ran into a lady who was initially really suspicious of us
but eventually admitted that she was raised in the church. She started crying
and told us how the church had played a role in her early life. It was
heartbreaking to see how her life had turned out because she had let go of the
iron rod and wandered off. It seems her husband doesn't like the church but she
wanted to stay in contact with us at least. I hope we are able to help her
out.
I'm out of time already. I wanted to include something spiritual but I
guess I'll get it in next week. You got more stories than usual at least.
Love you,
Elder Stapley
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