Tuesday, November 12, 2013

Chopping Wood and Serving the Lord!

November 12, 2013

Tell people I am sorry I could not respond this week, but I only had 30 minutes on email today. I will get to them next week, promise!

Sorry I am a day late! Because of Veterans Day, the library where we email was closed! It’s the only place on the res with computers... but this last week was such a great week! My companion and I really focused on being effective with our time and it really paid off! Each day was chalk full of appointments and we had a TON of our less active "investigators” come to church. We had just over 120 people there! It was great!
The Fort Apache Crew
 We had a ton of really great and spiritual experiences. I want to share one. So, Saturday we went to a former member of the Stake Presidency's house to see if we could get a couple referrals of some people who might want to listen to us. This man knows everyone on the reservation and everyone knows him. We knocked on his door and a 20 year old man opened the door. He turned out to be a less active member who wanted nothing to do with us. We still asked him if he knew anyone that would be interested, because that's what we came for!! He couldn't think of anyone, so I finally just asked him "who is the first person that pops into mind?" He said a man named John who lived down the street but that he wouldn't be interested at all. Did that discourage us?! nooooo, we went to Johns house. When we got there, he was an angry looking man, with a chain saw.... nope, still not discouraged. We went up to talk to him. His name was Jeff, he is Johns father. We talked with him for a bit and soon enough His wife and John were all outside on their porch talking with us. All three of them have already been baptized but haven't gone to church for many, many YEARS. Each told us real personal and spiritual stories they each had experienced within the last 2 weeks that made them want to be closer to God. Jeff had been praying every day for the last week straight because he has been struggling and has been asking God for help. His wife saw us at the grocery store last Monday and had been praying for us to stop by, and John has been going through a lot of health struggles and wants God in his life. The spirit was so strong and everyone was tearing up. They had to go out of town this weekend, but they said nothing is stopping them from going back to church. I am so excited to work with them and get them to go to the temple too! What miracles happen on the mission! People are truly out there, being prepared to receive or come back to the Gospel! You never know how you will find them either, but the Holy Ghost does, and if you are searching, he WILL lead you too them!
Elder Vete and Elder Clark
Elder Vete and I teach about 40 lessons a week! We teach mostly to less actives (members who no longer attend). That is what we have decided to focus on! I absolutely love it! We do a whole lot of service in the mornings.  Everyone here heats their houses with wood burning stoves, so we spend a lot of time chopping wood. I thought I would get out of that coming to Arizona...

So drinking is a huge problem here, since there is really nothing to do out here, everyone resorts to drinking. Every day there are drunks walking around, just walking. Not really going anywhere, just slowly walking, or sitting, or sleeping on the side of the road. It really looks and feels like zombies everywhere, walking aimlessly around. We call them walkers. Not a day goes by when we don't encounter them, and they get crazy. But hey, it makes it interesting! I love it! I love the mission, and I love this Gospel!!
Preaching to all the Apache People

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