Chapter 34: Anabelle

2/16/2021

Today Elder Gomez and I gave a training on internalizing the message of the Restoration, and learning to teach it in every encounter that we have. The training went really well, and set a great tone for the rest of our District Council. I was actually very excited about our District Council today, it was our first meeting after all of the old members had left, now leaving me the oldest member of this District (I’m a grandpa now), and yet it was still a lot of fun to interact with everyone, despite the newness of it. I might have spoken a little too soon when I claimed last week that the Redlands District was dead. I also cut my hair this morning and it turned out very well. Gomez and I made steaks for lunch with our limited missionary budget which was a really nice treat and turned out very well, but the smell of the meat never really left the house; The permeating smell was cool for a couple of hours, but not so now that it's 10:20 and it's made me hungry again.

2/17/2021

Today was a really good day, except for the cut that I somehow got on the pad of my left ring finger. I super glued it shut, but it opened again, which is the first time that super glue has failed me. To this point, I’ve really liked the idea that if you are somehow cut in someway you can just glue the human body back together and it’s totally fine. Anyways, the lessons we had tonight were very powerful. One in particular stood out, the lesson that we had with the Gammons about missionary work. When we were done they were all so motivated to be missionaries, we were so proud of them and the desire that they all had to let their light shine. It was an amazing moment to get to be there with their family and see their desires to engage in this great work. At the end Sister Gammon said contently, “The Spirit’s here tonight, do you all feel that peace?”

2/18/2021

Today we went out to get food, the Elders we were with wanted to go to Wendy's. The funniest thing I heard all day came from Elder Douglass as we were driving up: "Holy freak, 50 chicken nuggets for $11?! 50… 50… chicken nuggets… guys, *deep breathing* holy… guys, I think I'm about to get 50 chicken nuggets." And then he did. Today also had some pretty sad moments, though. Sister Thompson’s dog, Anabelle, who had been her best friend for years and seen Sister Thompson through her most difficult moments, had to be euthanized today. We got to go over with Sister Thompson minutes before Anabelle was put down. We spent a half hour sitting with Anabelle in the sun while Sister Thompson rehearsed everything Anabelle had been through in the past few days and why she loved her so much. Then, at 2:30, I picked Anabelle up and we carried her to Sister Thompson’s car. It’s hard enough to deal with the death of anything you love, but the drive to the vet to have Anabelle euthanized must have been torturous. We called Sister Thompson multiple times later in the night and had a class with her and another member which she seemed very grateful for, and she was the biggest point of discussion in our correlation meeting with our ward mission leader tonight. We’re going to continue seeking to do all that we can to check up on her these next couple days.

2/19/2021

Today was pretty sad. We spent a good amount of time with Sister Thompson just listening to her. It was quite miraculous at the multitude of people who showed up. When we arrived Sister Benefield pulled up with her son as well. When we got back the Redlands Elders came to visit with Sister Thompson as well. We must have looked like quite the odd group all filing into her back yard. We shared a message with her about vision and having our eyes opened to see God’s will. We then testified to her of Heavenly Father’s mindfulness of her, as demonstrated visually by the group that was literally surrounding her, ready to buoy her up. It was a very powerful moment to hear the truth of those words and see this physical manifestation of God’s love for her and that she wasn’t alone in this time. Sister Thompson cried a lot, but there was an incredible amount of peace from The Spirit resting there in her backyard.

2/20/2021

I ended up not writing in my journal on this day because I was trying to use the time to make a painting for Sister Thompson. In an effort to comfort her I started a painting depicting the Savior and her dogs and hope to finish it early next week to help in the grieving process. We did have some great lessons on this day, though, and got to meet some new members which expanded our teaching pool a bit.

2/21/2021

Today was another miraculous day. We picked someone up again today which is like, the third time in four weeks this has happened. Compare that to the one time it happened over the six prior months we had been here for and it’s easy to see the exponential growth our ward members are making in missionary work. We’re so proud of them, they’re all doing such hard things and growing so much because of it. The pick-up lesson we had tonight was incredible, too. Elder Gomez and I taught the Restoration in fifteen minutes and the three member families that had joined into our lesson over Zoom did such an incredible job of answering questions and helping the investigator to feel comfortable.

Today for a spiritual thought I wanted to share a verse from Doctrine and Covenants.

D&C 11:20 Behold, this is your work, to keep my commandments, yea, with all your might, mind and strength.

Our work in this life is to learn to love the commandments, this is our purpose, and only through doing this will we be able to receive all of the blessings God would have us receive.

Chapter 33: The End of the Redlands District

The missionaries of the Redlands District!

 

2/9/2021

Today we had a District Council and got to practice teaching the plan of salvation to our investigators. I tried some stuff I never had before, and it was a really cool switch, this lesson was a lot better than any I’ve ever taught before. We also got transfer news today and it was one of the biggest reliefs I’ve ever had, I’ll be staying here another transfer. Every time I get more and more nervous about leaving, but fortunately I’m safe for another six weeks.

2/10/2021

Today we finally had a lesson with our Bishop. His kids don’t feel super comfortable with the missionaries, so pulled out our best game (it was a hit with all the primary kids) and used it with their family. The 16 y/o loved it (just kidding, but he tolerated it, so we were very grateful). We really loved our lesson with them. We also got to talk to the Fosters tonight and we felt terrible because we let their girls down, they were hoping that we could come by in person, but we ran out of time so it had to be a Zoom call. We compared the Atonement to skiing for them and it was the cutest thing ever. That analogy was also a miracle because the girls gave us exactly the terminology that I needed and filled in the missing pieces in my brain to help them make this connection. It was very important to Heavenly Father that we teach those girls about the Atonement because He made it work. At the end of the lesson Sister Foster thanked us for the calls we’ve been having with them, she told us her girls had never loved missionaries like they have with us before and the energy we brought to our lessons meant a lot to them as parents. The Fosters are one of my favorite families here so it felt good to hear that they think so highly of us.

2/11/2021

Today was very sad. Elder Bott and Sister Makasini left our district today because of transfers. We were very sad to say goodbye to them, both of them had been here from day one for me, and were the “old, wise members of our district”. We were very sad to let them go, especially because seniority now falls to me; I’m the oldest member of Redlands, having served here for six months now. Honestly it’s pretty cool  to have gotten to stick around long enough in an area to say that, I’ve been moved around so frequently that I never thought that I was going to get to stay in an area as long as I have now. During our work today we had service and a lot of lessons. We ended up being pretty busy all day. The only awkward part was when we had to take two calls in a members driveway because all of our lessons ran overtime and we were behind so we had no time to travel. Also, we had dinner with an older lady tonight and she tried to make food for us, but I don’t think that she remembered to defrost the chicken, so when we looked at the finished product it was very pink. Fortunately we were going to the church and I was able to cook it more so that we wouldn’t all get salmonella and die. We were very grateful for that Sister, though. She always takes such good care of us even though she struggles with most tasks. Her acts are like the casting of the widow’s mite.

2/12/2021

Today was a really good day. We got to go on a walk to pick up dinner, and it ended up being a half hour long venture. Walking was a nice way to destress though, we’ll have to make walks a more regular part of our schedule. We had lessons with Brother Bynum and his family, and it was pretty incredible. We talked about marks of Christianity throughout the ages. One of the coolest things was about Mandarin, and the fact that the symbol for “garden” was a man and a woman being cast out. It’s ingrained in their language, they probably don’t give it a second thought, and yet there it is as a testimony about the truthfulness of Christianity to all the world.

2/13/2021

Today we got rejected pretty hard by the Bangerters, so Cai’ran and Patience are no longer on track for the 20th. I was pretty disappointed for a bit, but decided that this was going to be a Nephi moment, and so after praying for help we made brownies for all of our formers and dropped them off at their houses. We have a couple of pickup lessons scheduled for tomorrow now, and we’re really excited for it. We’re coming down to the wire for baptizing in February, but we’re not out out of the game yet.

2/14/2021

Today we picked someone up! She’s someone who has had contact with the missionaries for a really long time, but it sounds like missionaries were never really able to meet her where she was at. She has a pretty good knowledge of the Bible, though, and so Elder Gomez and I were able to hit things off with her pretty quick. We also had quite the busy lineup of lessons today, which was a lot of fun.

Normally for a spiritual thought I like to share a scripture that's touched me this past week, but today it's going to be a little more about the "Nephi moment" that happened this week. This week I learned the importance of not just complying with all of the commandments, but loving them. Well, a lot of the 'commandments' for us as missionaries involve going and doing. Missionary work can be an incredibly demanding sometimes though, as all of our lives can be. On one of the most disappointing days of my missionary work, by choosing to "go and do", especially when it was difficult, brought some of the greatest of blessings that we could receive as missionaries. I am a witness that those who trust in God and are willing to go and do, especially when it's difficult, are able to receive the highest of all blessings.

Chapter 32: Dead Bodies and Broken Records (apologies to my grandma for the concerning heading)

Parable of the Ten Virgins Video Lesson

Two awesome missionaries!

Elder Anderson loves the interest that is found in an elderly person's face, he also wanted to show how we should fix the temple in our sights in this great drawing he made.

2/2/2021

Today was a lot of fun. We had a member who knew us too well, she brought us Chick-Fil-A for dinner, and I was very happy. We actually had a lot of really weird food today, Elder Gomez made a Mexican cocktail [non-alcoholic, of course!] for lunch (which is nothing like an American cocktail), and Elder Bott made burritos that had french fries in them. Our companionships are turning into foodies, we’re pretty much always having two lunches now and constantly encouraging each other to make new, cool foods. We’ve been eating good, balanced meals because of it, which I have really liked. Today we also got to dig a grave for a body. It was in an old riverbed, so instead of digging we were really splitting rocks in half with a shovel to get deeper, but it was a lot of fun and a great workout. I suppose I should add in that the body belonged to a dog, not a human, and it was a service, not a cover-up.

2/3/2021

Today we got to walk Sister Thompson’s dogs with her, and afterwards had a discussion about faith. We talked about the principle of “having faith to be healed”, and it was a very powerful discussion. We also had a lot of lessons today. In one of the lessons I think we might’ve overwhelmed the lady a bit because of how much information we gave her. Most missionaries focus on opening their mouth more, but I actually think I need to do it less...

2/4/2021

Today we had a combined district council where we got to talk more about our Zone’s plans for the upcoming month. It was a good meeting, and it was a lot of fun to see so many of our missionary friends. At the end we went to take a picture, which Elder Bott usually directs, but another Elder brought a massive tripod selfie stick today, and Elder Bott and the rest of the Zone got very frustrated with him as he tried to figure out how to take the picture. Eventually Bott lost his patience and went up to do it himself, right as the Elder got it to work, which led to my new favorite picture of the Zone: Everyone with their comps except for Elder Bott who was angrily marching up as everyone shouted at him to get back in place for the picture. We also had a plethora of lessons today, multiple that members invited others to, which was a really big deal. In one of the lessons a debate arose, and confusion increased among everyone until one lady stopped everyone else and said, “Elder Anderson knows, he can explain it”, and then I felt everyone shift their attention to me, who had been a bystander until that moment. It felt good to be needed.

2/5/2021

Today we had a couple of lessons with members which was a lot of fun. Elder Gomez wanted to go get some fast food today, and I decided to do something completely opposed to my nature and get a soda. It was just enough to help me remember why I don’t drink soda, and I ended up giving half of it to Gomez. Elder Gomez and I got to do a lot of planning today for our next week of missionary work, and it was very productive.

2/6/2021

Today was pretty disappointing. It felt like everything that really could go wrong did, today. There were still a lot of good, small moments, but the much bigger, much more important stuff fell apart. I did feel the companionship of the Spirit all day today, though, so at least I didn’t have to do today alone.

2/7/2021

Today was a great Sunday, and one of the busiest I’ve ever had. We had eight lessons today, which was a new personal record and probably a record for this area. We had a discussion tonight about the parable of the ten virgins, and it was a really cool thing to get to do. We had a few members join, and my family members got to join as well, so tomorrow I’ll get to hear if it was a good thing to do, or just a waste of time.

Today for a spiritual thought I wanted to share the message that we learn for seeking after that which is of God:

1 Corinthians 12:31 But covet earnestly the best gifts: and yet shew I unto you a more excellent way.

We are told to not only seek after good gifts, but to earnestly covet them! All of our daily desire should be spent in fervent prayer that our Heavenly Father will help us grow spiritually, for if we humble ourselves before him there will be no end to our capacity to grow, we will become like unto Him. God promises He won't leave us alone in this search either, it's not us against Him, but rather He will show us the excellent way to achieve all of our goals of spiritual development.

Chapter 31: Pick-up Part Two

 Good Samaritan Video

Christ Healing the Woman With the Issue of Blood

1/25/2021

The most interesting thing that happened today happened in the last five minutes of our night before we left: Elder Bott has been terrorizing my companion (although they both seem to be having fun, so I don’t know if it’s really an issue), and tonight he messaged us, “I’m coming”, so Elder Gomez went and hid in a closet, locked the door, and I barricaded the entrances to our classroom with rows of chairs set with their legs pointed up towards the entrance so as to stop any efforts to run into the classroom. I then flipped our desks over, “building a fort” about 5 steps away, and loaded it up with paper newspaper balls that I crumpled up. All of this happened in about 30 seconds, and Captain Moroni would have been proud. Bott threw the door open, saw that he was blocked, and then got pelted by crumpled up paper balls. He tried to return a few, but the desk-fort did its trick, and Bott quite obviously lost that round. We also painted during our pday today as a district Bob Ross activity, and I used oils for the first time.

1/26/2021

Today we had a Zone Conference. It was really cool to get to see our Mission President, and our meeting today was a lot funnier than they have been in the past. At the start of the meeting our President asked all the new people to introduce themselves, and they were given a few basic questions to answer. Then our President added his own question to the end, “And: The last four digits of your social security number”. That was pretty funny to hear from him. Our conference was really good, and I think one of my favorite parts was when Sister Rees gave her training where she talked about different types and symbols of Jesus Christ. She’s a really smart lady and I really enjoy getting to hear all of her thoughts, because they’re always so in depth. 

1/27/2021

Today was a really good day. The most significant part of today was probably when we prepared with our Ward Mission Leader tonight for the lesson that he’s going to be giving on Sunday. We originally intended to teach the lesson with him and didn’t mean for this responsibility to fall solely on him, but he was very gracious in accepting of the opportunity to teach and in being willing to help us out. He’s an incredible ward Mission Leader to be willing to take on such demanding responsibilities on top of the business that he runs and his duties as a husband and father of six.

1/28/2021

Today was a great day. We were very busy with the number of lessons that we had, which is always a good thing, but it made for a very stressful night. We had so many lessons and I accidentally double booked some of the appointments so our dinner ended up being 10 minutes at 8:30. Our members are very patient with us, which I really appreciate, I changed our dinner appointment time like, four times, and the poor lady was so kind to us when we showed up. I began apologizing profusely as soon as we saw her, and instead of accepting it, she turned it into an opportunity to compliment us and tell us how much their family loved us as their missionaries. They said, “this really isn’t good on our part, but before COVID we couldn’t have told you the names of our missionaries, but we’re never going to forget yours”. That was heart melting, and made our night.

1/29/2021

Today was a great day. The lessons that we had were really good, but the most notable thing that happened was probably a roleplay that Gomez and I did. We roleplay lessons sometimes to continue practicing teaching Gospel lessons, this act is an act of faith that we’re going to find someone to teach and that they’re going to need their missionaries to bring their “A-game” when we do find them. Anyways, roleplaying lessons with Elder Gomez can be a real challenge sometimes. He usually acts like the least interested investigator in the world, which gives me terrible flashbacks to my time in Brazil (although I would LOVE to teach Brazilians again with the knowledge that I have now). Today our roleplay was especially painful. Our lesson was upwards of a half hour, and he fundamentally opposed every single one of the points that I brought up, and I frequently got frustrated. I think one of my favorite lines that came from our roleplay today was when Gomez cut me off and said, “Why is Jesus white in the picture that you’re using, shouldn’t He look more Jewish than European?” To which I promptly had to remind him that his question was way above the knowledge level of the person that he was playing as because of the other questions he had put me through, “you haven’t even read the Bible, you’re not allowed to ask that”, I told him. So yes, Gomez knows how to frustrate me, opposing every point that I talk about is frustrating. It was a good frustration, though, it was edifying and a lot of fun.

1/30/2021

Today we got to do service in an orchard. The orchard belonged to a member and as we started gathering up the prunings near him he started asking us Gospel questions, as a test of our knowledge. Elder Gomez and I completely blew the test out of the water, he was incredibly impressed, and said, “boy you’re sharper than a whit!” I don’t know what a “whit” is, so maybe it’s actually something very dull, and wasn’t much of a compliment, but we were on cloud-9 afterwards because after we passed his knowledge test, he told us he wanted us to help him teach a family he had been focusing on with him. Getting a referral from him and feeling of his confidence in us was pretty awesome.

1/31/2021

We picked someone up! We picked up two people, which is the second time this has happened in my time in Monument. Even better, these people are already confirmed to live in our ward. Now, we’re really excited, because our Mission President promised us that we would baptize in February. He’s our Heavenly Father’s representative for missionary work, and so if he promised us that there was someone to be found in our area this month who was prepared to enter the waters of baptism, we know that this promise was one that came from Heavenly Father, not just the man He works through. To get someone baptized they need to attend church three times; That’s one of the biggest restrictions to baptism, because it’s a time requirement, it takes three weeks to fulfill that requirement. However, this family is now on track for baptism in February, this is fulfillment of the promise our Mission President gave us.

Today for a spiritual thought I wanted to share (I originally wrote "we" instead of "I", I'm getting too much into companion mindset) a verse from John. I'm not sure if this is my Sister Lily's favorite verse or not, but she frequently quoted it to us, and had it memorized. She would probably give a better explanation of why this verse is so meaningful than I can, but since we used it so much in our teaching this week, I'm going to give it a shot anyways:

John 3:16 ¶ For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.

The message of the restored Gospel is built around the Atonement. I'm so grateful for our understanding of the Atonement, the most important of all the acts that ever occurred. Without the Book of Mormon, we would be limited to the handful of times this word appears in Leviticus, in my readings of the Bible I believe that's the only place we ever see the word Atonement used, and it's used as a part of the preparatory gospel, or the law of Moses. If not for the Book of Mormon we would have no idea the expanse of God's love, because our knowledge of that word would be limited to one of the books of Moses, and let's be honest, who really studies Leviticus anyways? Indeed, the reason why the Book of Mormon is so powerful, the reason why a man can drawer closer to God by abiding its precepts than those of any other book is because it contains the doctrine of all doctrines, even the Atonement, the reason that all of us can have everlasting life.