JOY TO THE WORLD, THE LORD IS COME! LET EARTH RECEIVE HER KING!!!! It's Christmas time!! Can you feel it?!!
So here's how I'm gonna break it down for y'all. To answer your question mom, the work hasn't really be goin. The lady we had the super awesome heavenly gift with like a month ago (she lost her job just an hour before we came), dropped us. She told us she has her church, she's going to that, but she's happy with us & she appreciates our thoughtfulness. Another one bites the dust. And with like two other potential investigators when we've had solid appointments with them-- no joke --a half hour before we’re scheduled to meet they called and told us they've had a death in the family or a friend died, so they'll have to cancel. I mean c'mon! The odds of that! But we're still keepin on!!
So all I've got really is a lot of stories of day to day stuff that I keep forgetting to tell. We were eating with a member at Mazzio's, a pizza place, and we had this cute waitress. After dinner I mention to Elder Townsend "Hey didn't you think that waitress was cute? She was like the first semi attractive girl I've seen here since I've been out." He just looked at me and said, "Elder Traasdahl. You've clearly been in Purcell too long." Looks like I've already got my missionary goggles! yea yea! Another thing, I don’t know if I've already said this before, but if I have you'll get to hear it again. Oklahoma has some weird obsession with frog decorations. No joke. We play a game when we're out walking to see who can count the most frog decorations at a house. One has 37.
Something that both of my companions have been finding out about me too is my absent mindedness. I'm sure you can empathize with them Dad. Haha but we left the apartment a few weeks ago on our bikes and we were about 2 miles away when I realized, ‘wait a second, something's missing. This is way too easy to ride right now.’ Ha, I had forgotten my backpack! Course Elder Townsend wouldn't let me go back and get it, because it "was a waste of time" and "I should know better" so I went that day til dinner without my backpack! It’s funny how naked you feel without your scriptures and materials 'n stuff. I also forgot to put on my helmet once, and I made him go back with me for that. Safety first! I'm thinking on taping a checklist to the door, so I look at it each time before I leave. Good idea eh?
Eyyo bdog!! Mom has mentioned that you've picked up indexing! That's AWESOME! Keep it going man! I don’t know where I heard it, but I know someone important in the church said as you do family history work aka indexing, you'll have extra strength to be guarded against temptation! So keep it going man! What a great example you are to me.
On Saturday we went on mini exchanges with our Zone Leaders, Elder Fransen and Elder Hendersen. Both of em are studs. They came down to help us jump start our area. Elder Fransen came with me, and he served in this area for 6 months, so he knew his way around the place. He mentioned a couple of times "that's the second time that person has rejected me!" It was really funny. But Elder Fransen, he's a finding machine. He was chasing people down, heck he saw people that I didn't even know were there! He talked to EVERYONE. And that's not an exaggeration. He made me oym this kid that looked like he was in high school, and I was like ‘What? No!’ And then I thought of Tyler's last email and so I gave myself inside my mind three chest bumps and did it! And take a guess, you're expecting this kid to be our next golden investigator right? A miracle story! Ha nope. I went up to him and was like "hey how's it going" and then tried to talk about the gospel, and I was awkward. Straight up. Hahaha it was bad. But! I can only get better and I know as I get more comfortable doing it I'll get better. And, even though it was a terrible oym, I still know I was fulfilling my purpose and doing that which it is we are commanded to do. Talk to people.
Another story that just happened yesterday actually was way cool because it just shows the power of the priesthood. A recent convert, came up to us after church and asked us if we could go give his nephew a blessing who's 6 months old and has some respiratory deal-io that's going on that could either be harmless or super super bad. Now he explained it to me better but that's how I understood it. The little baby also had the flu or something or rather. So with the mother's permission, she's not a member, we went over there and gave this baby boy a blessing. Justin called her an hour or so later and his sister said that her son was crawling and being active like he hadn't been since before he was sick! Justin was so excited. I told him, "Hey man, this could be that chance you were praying for to introduce the gospel to them." Missionary in the making! Anyways, it was a reaffirmation of my testimony that the priesthood truly is the authority to act in God's name. What a sacred responsibility it is to hold the priesthood. My time's up but I LOVE YOU. And that goes for each and every single person that is reading this! Keep on keepin on and NEVER forget. The church is true through and through!! Oh and real quick shout out to Bishop Knight and his amazing emails. I'm always uplifted as I read them. Ok bye, I love y'all!!!
Elder Traasdahl
