02.24.14

Comrie

Steak and egg dinner elder Merrill made me for my last exchange.

My extensive tartan tie collection. (Eleanor recently gave me 4 more as a present.)

 

This is officially my last week as a full time missionary for the Lord. So almost everything I do will be a last. The times they are a changing.

 

It's been another great week. I went two exchanges. One with Elder Boehme from Arizona and another with Elder Merril from Pleasant Grove. They were both pretty great. My main focus right now is to finish hard. I can honestly say that I've done my best out here and I don't want that to change the last week. My goal is to achieve all the goals we've set.

 

We have had many miracles happen recently. We are teaching a lady named Sandra - she's been getting taught by missionaries for about 2 years, but has never accepted a baptismal date. Anyway, we have been focusing on helping her feel the Spirit and not pushing her too much, and last week she finally told us a specific date she wants to be baptized. She chose the 15 March. We are so excited, even though we won't be here to witness it. It's the fact that she is making this decision that matters.

 

We had another Dundee Zone Fast on Sunday and it was amazing. We started the fast Saturday night and when we got to church we noticed a woman walking in who hasn't wanted anything to do with the church the past 5 weeks. She was very close to a baptismal date in the past, but her husband kept harassing her about it so she shut herself away from us. But, the Lord blessed us for our efforts and brought her back. We also had a less active lady text us that night and tell us that she would like us to come teach her. Good stuff.

 

We had a very simple spiritual experience that meant a lot to me last Monday. We went to see a Polish guy named Thomas we found and he seemed so sad when he answered the door. We could tell that he has a little family because we could see small shoes stacked up behind him. His flat is very small and humble. Anyway, he said he just barely lost his job and that he didn't know what to do. He had been drinking the day before and he felt bad about that too, cause he's a recovering alcoholic. Well, we went there planning to teach him the Restoration, but we knew that wasn't right. So, in very simple language (He can't understand English very well) we explained to him that we wanted to say a prayer for him. He agreed and we prayed on his doorstep that God would let his family be happy and that He would help Thomas find a new job. We looked up from they prayer and it was evident that his heart had been touched. We left and went back to our routine for the night, but we received a text a few hours later. All it said was, "thank you." It was such a great feeling.

 

Not much else. Rain. Wind. Snow. Clouds. No sun. Humour. Rain. Taught an awesome guy covered in tattoos. By the way, don't judge someone by the way they look cause this guy is super humble and prepared. I also gave a talk in church, but I don't think anyone paid attention cause there was a toddler running around on the stage by me screaming the whole time. It was pretty sucky. haha. Love you all! See you next week!

 

Elder Goodwin