Happy New Year! See Ya, 2014! Hello 2015! Now I feel a little bit older, because I graduated from high school in 2014, but that was like a year ago......
Anyway, this week! Was absolutely amazing! To summarize how our area has been the last couple of weeks: IT'S BLOWN UP!
To give ya'll the numbers: two media referrals, three accepted Baptism invites, four new investigators, four investigators @ church, and one Rock Star investigator who I can guarantee is going to make it!
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| Elder Caldwell especially liked this part of the Scout Camp... It's the 3rd biggest Skate Park in the world! |
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| Notice how all the elders with WVU gear got put on the left. :) Yep, I feel tall: 2nd tallest of this group! |
During our lunch hour, Elder Caldwell and I gave each other haircuts. (Apparently he did a lot better than I did.....) But, those must have been lucky haircuts....
....because we were able to finally sit down with our media referral named, Claude. His son is a member of the church in New York, and referred him because he's been struggling emotionally and financially. We immediately loved Claude. He's been really sad since his wife passed away three years ago, and he's really emotional. He really took the Restoration to heart. The part about multiple churches really made sense to him. The lesson went really well and we promised him he would be able to see his wife again and be with her forever. He had tears in his eyes and didn't even let us finish the whole Baptismal invitation before he was nodding his head and said, "Of course." This was amazing! We said a prayer of gratitude as soon as we got back to our car.
Then it only got better. We received a 2nd media referral Monday. We went to contact him right after Claude. He invited us right in. His name was Michael; he's got a great family, with five kids! We asked him how he came in contact with the church. Turns out he was talking to one of his friends, who is new to the church, and his friend gave him a couple of pamphlets. We asked him, who his friend was, and he replied, Matt Browning! HAHA! Incredible! Our top investigator is sharing the gospel with his friends before he's even a member! Michael said he could really tell something different about Matt Browning, and he'd asked him what it was. Michael referred himself, after seeing the website on the back of the pamphlets. Funny thing was, midway through the lesson, Matt Browning knocked on the door to check up on Michael. He was happy to see us, and quickly left, as to not interrupt the lesson. Michael is really smart; he had a lot of questions, and every single question he had, we were able to answer with the doctrine about the Restoration. Near the end of the lesson, when we brought up prayer, he got emotional and said, "I haven't prayed for a long time, but when I read these pamphlets, I prayed Sunday and Monday, just like how it instructs you to do so in the back of these pamphlets. And I was praying for an answer. And here you are!" God answered this man's prayers through us! I got to see first-hand how I was an answer to someone's prayers! The Spirit was so strong during the lesson. He didn't let us finish the Baptismal invitation either, before he said, "Oh, Yeah, for sure!" How awesome! This was incredible! We sent up another gratitude prayer soon after that.
Dec. 31, Wednesday: New Year's Eve! We met with a couple of former investigators today. I can see why they are former investigators - they don't ever let the missionaries talk! :)
But, today Tom Poe cancelled our appointment at the church at 3:00, so that was too bad.
So, we took our mind off of that, and hit the pavement. Tracting we went! We decided to tract in a small, unincorporated town I hadn't even seen yet. It worked out good. We spent a couple hours there and found six potentials! WOW! Awesome!
Laxton's and the Heller's invited us over for New Year's Eve party finger foods!
Jan. 1, Thursday: New Year's Day! We had zone meeting! What a great way to kick off the new year!
Our appointment with Robin & Richard Snuffer. cancelled, but since we were still out in Jumping Branch (great name for a town, right?) the Johnson's signed up to feed us. Brother Johnson doesn't come to church, and jokes he doesn't have a testimony. So, we taught them the power of testimonies. I got really emotional! I don't really ever do! But, this had to be the most emotional I've ever got on my mission!
Jan. 2, Friday: After weekly planning, we went to go teach Margaret. Megan Young (Young's daughter) was in town, so we invited her to come to the lesson. It went better than expected! Margaret's friend, Kristen, was there and Margaret & Kristen both knew Megan Young from high school! It was great - they were all the same age, they all knew each other. Megan Young added a great testimony, as well! We had a very great lesson/discussion. They had a lot of questions, and have a lot of differing beliefs. We invited them to church, and they accepted, and they invited us to theirs! (Margaret's grandpa, sat quietly in the corner, and may have been asleep for the whole lesson.)
We also taught David Lilly tonight, with Bro. Snuffer. He didn't show us his butt this time, but the lesson was kind of all over the place.
Jan. 3, Saturday: Saturday has now become our day to go up to Sister Jackson's house, help her out on her farm, hang out with one of the coolest families in the world, get fed a delicious meal, and have a great member-present lesson with Matt Browning. Done Deal! We taught, "The Gospel of Jesus Christ" tonight and it went very well because Matt is just eating it up! Also, good news is that Rebecca and Matt are working really hard to get a marriage license, so Bishop Geisler can marry them soon! So, Matt has almost quite smoking, he and Rebecca are going to get married soon, and they are coming to church every week! Everything is going great! I can't wait one day to reunite with this family, all sealed together!
Jan. 4, Sunday: Not one. Not two. Not three. But four! Investigators at church! Matt Browning came, of course! Tom Poe surprised us, again, and sneaked in the chapel without Elder Caldwell or I seeing him. And then Margaret and Kristen came, too! Wow, four! That's the most this area has ever had! Also, as a district, we had EIGHT investigators at church! I thought five last week was a lot! It was also testimony meeting. There were a lot of great testimonies that were borne; only one or two that had me on the edge of my seat with investigators being there, but it went great. I got up and bore my testimony; this could possibly be my last Fast Sunday here in Beckley, so I've known for a while I needed to.
After Church, we had a lesson with Tom Poe. He accepted Baptism, but he didn't accept the Baptismal date we had in mind for him.
After trying to contact all the awesome potentials we found Wednesday, we ate dinner.
Later, we went to Margaret's and Kristen's church. It was very different; everyone was dressed casual for the Sunday night service. And they had a great youth band who had some great Gospel Contemporary songs. Their drummer was really good! (I was super jealous) The pastor preached on "hating sin." It was actually pretty good; I took some notes. Elder Caldwell, Megan Young, and I had a hard time following along because he was preaching out of "a modern Bible." After the service ended, all the band members (age 18-25) swarmed to us! We were the only ones in suits. But, we spent like an hour talking with them and the pastor afterwards. We couldn't exactly proselyte to them, (being in a church and all) but we told them a lot about what we do! It was fun to get to know all of them, and they really wanted us to come back!
Like I've said before; the people out here are just wonderful. I just love thinking how much more wonderful their lives could be with the true, restored Gospel!
Anyway! Hopefully, more great weeks to come!
Love Ya!
-Elder Brenchley
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