Howdy y’all! How is everyone doing!?!? This week was transfer week, and as you can see by my email title, we had LOTS of meetings. Also, if you didn’t read last week’s news, I got called to train again, so I picked up my new comp this week! Let’s get into it!
Monday: Hats off to Elder Midgley! He is our zone leader right now, and he has gone above and beyond for this zone! He spent a lot of time and money throwing a big zone Halloween party, and it was pretty fun! We played lots of games and had a chili cook-off and so much more. If you’re wondering who won the chili cook-off…. “come on now”. Aunt Christy’s white chicken chili never loses!! Shout out to Aunt Christiy!!! LOVE YOU! We spent the rest of the day chilling and getting ready for transfers. During this transfer, I was the zone tech rep lol. And so I was in charge of making sure the missionaries were contacting referals and doing social media work. At the beginning of the transfer, we set a goal to get our media referal teaching rate from 11% all the way to 20%! And if they did, I’d buy them all pizza. Well, they did it! So I got pizzas and brought them to our closing zone devotional. It was super sad because it was the last time I saw Elder Reeder. I love that elder so much. The mission seriously lost its best missionary. Also, it was Momma’s birthday!! LOVE YOU MOMMA LISA!
Tuesday: It was a Pretty normal day in the area. We got a lot of stuff packed up and cleaned for the departure of Elder Hunsaker. We had some good lessons with Tina and Andrea, though! They are both awesome, and I will update you on them later. We had a great dinner with the Staleys, and man they are just so wholesome. I wanna be like them when I’m old.
Wednesday: Transfer day! We packed up and went to the mission office for transfers. Got to see some of my best friends in the mission, so that was great. Sad to see Elder Hunsaker leave, but I know he is off to bigger and better things. I spent the day with Elder Hansen, who is also is training. He is a dawg. We got asked by some missonaries in Brea to bring some bikes because we have the truck. We hauled some bikes up to Brea and got some lunch at Matikis lol! We had a couple of lessons in Elder Hansen’s area that went pretty solid. Then the time came to go get our new companions. Got to the mission home and picked up Elder Robinson! He is from Star Valley, Wyoming, and he is pretty cool! He has a deep Wyoming voice; it’s pretty funny.
Thursday: HAPPY HALLOWEEN!! It did not feel like Halloween at allllll. It was really weird. I also got hit with the reality and humbling of how hard training is. haha. I seemed to forget that the new missionaries know absolutely nothing. So it’s been rough in that aspect. We had our first lesson together, and it was teaching the law of chastity. Man, his face when I told him that was comedy gold. Unfortunately, Tina isn’t married to her boyfriend and has been living together for years. She said they aren’t going to get married becasue then Tina will lose her disability money, and then they can’t provide for the family. It was heartbreaking to hear that, so please keep her in your prayers so that she will be able to keep the commandments and be baptized at the end of the month!
Anyway, we got Elder Robinson knocking on some doors early on, and we witnessed a miracle. haha! At the second door he knocked on, a dude opened up and said, ” Explain to me how Jesus and Satan are brothers.” I was like No way this just happened to him on his second door. But the guy softened his heart, and we got a return appointment. haha! It was crazy. Because it was Halloween, we had to go back at 6:00 pm. We did a mission kahoot, and then we went to call our families. It was good to chat with them, and I got to learn what up to my boy Ian Larson!
Friday: Because Elder Robinson is in training, we have more comp study, and man, does that get boring and exhausting. I just wanna go visit people and find converts, but we are doing so much study that we can’t! It’s okay, though; the Lord will provide. We had a new missionary meeting, which was short, so we drove Elder McCord and his trainee back to HB. The traffic was horrible so it took a long time. However, we had a good lesson with Joshua, and he is just devoted to the Catholic church even though he doesn’t believe in it! It makes no sense! We are working with him, though.
We had an opening zone devotional, and they announced some crazy changes. President Galotera is realigning the mission more to the handbook, so he got rid of all devotionals and extra meetings we have that aren’t in the handbook. And because our Misson area is so small, we do zone council instead of district council. However, he just got rid of those too! It’s so crazy. However, I’m low-key excited to see how it turns out.
We had an opening zone devotional, and they announced some crazy changes. President Galotera is realigning the mission more to the handbook, so he got rid of all devotionals and extra meetings we have that aren’t in the handbook. And because our Misson area is so small, we do zone council instead of district council. However, he just got rid of those too! It’s so crazy. However, I’m low-key excited to see how it turns out.
Saturday: LONGGG DAY. We had the social media meeting in the morning, and it was alright. Been through that a couple of times, lol. We did some service for a lady in the ward, and that went pretty solidly. We visited some members and got Elder Robinson introduced to them. We went to a training meeting at the end of the night, and I was so done for the day. Idk why, but the day felt like it was never going to end. Here is a funny story, though. Saturday morning at like 3:00 I heard Elder Robinson wake up. He walked out of the room and started turning on lights and stuff. He said he was really confused as to why I was still sleeping. He took a shower and started getting his pros on when he saw me still sleeping. I woke up because he was so loud, and I go, “Elder are you good??” He is like, ” Yeah, it’s time to get going.” I asked him what time it was, and he checked his phone and goes, ” Oh….” He takes off his clothes and goes back to bed. hahaha. That was funny but also low-key rough cause I couldn’t fall back to sleep.
Sunday: Another funny start to the day. So, as y’all know, it was daylight savings, so we get an extra hour of sleep. My parents trained me to you know to reset the clocks the night before and get it all situated beforehand. So, I had already gotten that all figured out and knew my alarm would wake me at 6:30. Well, Elder Robinson got confused again, lolololol. He woke up around 5:30 and went to the bathroom, which I thought was pretty normal. I fell back asleep as I should. Then he walks in and wakes me up and said, “Rise and shine, it’s time to go!” I was like, ” Elder Robinson, what time is it?” He goes, ” Um, not sure, but it’s time to go; it’s light outside.” I asked him to please check the time as I turned my back to him, low-key annoyed, and all I hear is, ” Oh… ” And then heard him crawl back into bed. It was good to see that he was ready and willing to get out to the work. Sunday was good! Tina came to church, and nothing else happened besides a goated member meal with the Secrists! They are awesome!
Well that’s it for the week! Sorry for the long email I apologize! This week has been an eye-opener on patience and diligence. It is hard explaining the same things over and over again. But I know the lord is strengthening me! I definitely didn’t have this patience when I trained Elder McCord, and I know it’s because of the experiences I’ve had on the mission that I have gained more tolerance and strength. I love the Lord.
Love you all. Have a fantastic week!
Elder L. Griffiths
