May 19, 2011

May 18, 2011 - Week 3 of Transfer 11


The other day we were visiting a fellow in his home and the TV was playing in the background and all of a sudden I hear "Alberta, Canada! Forest fires are out of control and destroying towns!" It was weird to hear the US news talk about Canada, so it must be pretty intense! Got a little scared at first, thought the house might be toast.

This week has calmed down a little since the last but still pretty busy around the mission office. We try to stay out of the mission office (I'm here right now), we actually call it the black hole because it just sucks you in once your here! You can never get out, just always little things to do. There are eight zones in the mission right now and this week we are having zone conferences here at the misson office, check the mission blog for an update of pictures. They are split up among four days, Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday and Friday, just two more to go! This is the first time zone conference has basically been put into the hands of the zone leaders. We really aren't even suppose to be at them except for our own zone. The zone leaders have done a really good job of doing their trainings but after the first day President asked us to be at the rest of them. Just to keep things going and organized.

I'm excited for the Riverton zone conference (Elder Atwood's) he is a powerful trainer and speaker, he will also be giving his departing testimony. That area (my old area) is on fire! I am so jealous, a few of the baptisms I was able to go back for this past weekend and will be able to go back in the future. But it would just be fun to be teaching as much as they are, they are looking at 10 baptisms for this transfer. We are hoping to baptize weekly in our area (6 in transfer). But Elder Atwood is doing good with his new companion, and I get to see him quite a bit. I still love him, but Elder Bertolino fills the gap quite well.

Earlier this week Elder Bertolino and I left zone conference as quick as we could to go work in our area. The night before we planned to tract this apartment complex at 2:00pm, actually this one specific building, we both just felt it. So we skipped out on the end of zone conference and went to tract. Showed up at the building right on time and start to knock from the bottom down. First few doors nothing... then this less-active lady answered. Now recently for some reason Elder Bertolino has been pretty bold while OYMing (open your mouth) to less active people. Now with this lady we didn't feel that we should be bold at all, we just talked with her and we ended up talking for 10 minutes or so. Then we started to try and leave because this lady made no sense and was just talking in circles! BUT we couldn't! Now 15 minutes into the conversation we saw, in the corner of our eye, a lady and her child come home and walk into her apartment below us. We quickly wrapped up the conversation and continued knocking. Then we came to the door of the lady who just recently got home and she opened the door and her countenance was as if she was shinying. We bare testimony and it went good, then we invited her to meet with us. No... Bare testimony again and asked again but no. Then we tried a third time and asked a few questions that we felt inspired and asked again. This time she said yes and opened up. She told us she recently had twins and one of them died at 7 months and the other is now 15 months old and healthy. Her husband is on the other side of the country working and she has been attending several different faiths, just searching. What an experience that was, from the very second she opened the door I knew she was part of the "elect" who is prepared. The flesh was saying no, but her spirit was screaming yes and please talk to me.

The Lord works with us as you can tell by the timing, and even the questions that came to us. I love this work, I love my mission! I think I get to used to these spiritual experiences and feeling these promptings where I start to take them for granted and don't cherish them. I got to be grateful and keep them sacred, sadly the journal hasn't been given much love recently but it will real soon here. I hope that story made sense, there are alot of Elders going in and out here at the mission office and can be a little hard to get the flow going. Time is flying, I'll be home before we know it. Thanks for the emails they were good updates!

Love your son, Elder Pizzey.