Dear Parents,
I had a great
week. We had exchanges and I went down to Norfolk. The Elders down
there are in a trio of two Spanish and one English speaker. It was fun
and we were able to make some real progress with one of their investigators who
was trying to quit smoking. We saw him twice and the second time he
informed us that he had thrown away all his vape pens and had spent all his
smoking money on some new scriptures! We were ecstatic.
While I was
gone my companion and one of the Spanish elders visited a teenage investigator
of ours. While there one of the young men from the branch walked in!
Turns out he is good friends with this kid and his participation seemed to
soften the rest of the family's heart. The mom invited us to dinner and
promised to participate in the next lesson. We'll go and see them
tomorrow.
I cooked up
the sausage thing we got from our Vietnamese family. I thought Korean food
was pungent! I put the leftovers in the fridge and by the time I opened
it again the entire fridge smelled Vietnamese.
On Sunday it
was so cold here that we got a message from President telling us to stay inside
unless we had set appointments to go to. It was so boring. It
actually worked out well though because Elder Poole was sick with something and
barely made it through church. He still isn't feeling great but is doing
somewhat better. He got so dehydrated that we nearly took him to the
hospital!
Our
interesting older couple moved this week. They had collected
so much stuff that they needed a bigger place. They had promised to be
packed by the moving date but when we arrived they really hadn't done
anything. We spent about 10 hours this week helping them move stuff out
of their one bedroom apartment into a two bedroom apartment. We weren't
the only ones helping either! We did convince them to get rid of a lot of stuff though. We
snagged a creepy Santa doll wearing nothing but boxer shorts. They wanted
to throw it away but we are definitely going to hide it behind Norfolk's
bathroom mirror.
Emily's
testimony in her letter pretty much said exactly what I wanted to. This
Gospel has to be true. There is the part of PMG Ch 1 about the power and
authority of our calling.
Your power
and authority should be evident as you work and teach. Power may be manifest in
many things you do, such as:
Being led by the Spirit to say what
the Lord would have you say at just the right moment (see D&C 84:85).
Having your testimony confirmed by the
witness of the Spirit (see 2 Nephi 33:1; D&C 100:5–8).
Taking part in ordinances of salvation
(see D&C 84:19–20).
Giving priesthood blessings if you are an
elder (seeJames 5:14–15).
Expressing love for the Lord, your family, fellow
missionaries, and the people you serve.
We have all
seen the evidences of our power and authority. It is the coolest thing to
recognize and one of the best things about being a missionary. I look at
the email from Emily and the miracles she's seen and the things you are doing
with both of your callings and the miracles happening there. I love that
we can know that these things are true. We can know that we are doing the
Lord's will and exercising His power. That is one of the things that I
think is so attractive about what we teach. You don't have to
guess. You can know. People want that kind of confidence. I'm
glad that I was blessed to find it.
We have the
best family ever.
I love you,
Elder Stapley
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