Tuesday, February 11, 2014

No pictures, but still a faithful letter writer!

I feel obligated to start my email off apologizing for not sending pictures. I keep saying I will do better, and I don't do it! I just don't think about it during the week honestly. I even started carrying my camera around with me, and I still would forget that I had it.

So this past week has been good. They seem to keep flying on by. Sister Erikson called me this week to ask me some info. to verify about going home, so that didn't make me happy. It's sad how fast it's coming to an end.

No new people were found this week, but we did hear about a couple new names of people we hadn't heard of before which doesn’t happen often, so that was good. Maybe we will be able to find some members to help us work with them soon.

Cecilia has been doing better. She gets closer to her answer every day. Taegan still wants to get baptized, and he will be with his mom this weekend, so he can go to church this Sunday. His mom, Kellen, has still not talked to Taegan's dad to see if he is ok with him getting baptized, so we are praying he says yes.

Eric is a teenager that was investigating with Elder Harper and his previous companion, but we dropped him as soon as I got into the area, because he had hit a wall where his dad wouldn't let him get baptized. But we got in contact with him last week to see how he is doing, and he is reading and praying everyday and going to church every week. This past Sunday we fasted with him, so he could ask his dad again. He doesn't live with his dad, but he still needs/wants his permission to do it. His dad just keeps saying he wants him to investigate the Catholic Church and find out if he wants to do that instead. Maybe we will bring Elder Ward over to give him a quick history lesson of the Catholic Church to make sure that doesn’t happen. (Elder Ward majored in ancient roman history and knows everything about all that stuff).

Elder Ward has been doing great as an assistant. He is a natural leader, and I think enjoys the extra challenge it is bringing him to deal with a lot of different things. We had mission leadership conference yesterday, which tends to be very frustrating. Elder Arnold (seventy) came and talked for a while and asked us to change some things in our mission. After he left we discussed some things, which just resulted in us leaving not really having come to any conclusion. It was weird to sit there and look around and see I am one of the oldest zone leaders there. Elder Ward and I, one year ago, were sitting together as the youngest zone leaders in the mission and were so intimidated by all the old scary missionaries and felt out of place. Time really does fly by.

We played zone soccer this morning and then went to Costco with Elder Harper and his companion and Elder Kelley and his comp. All my old companions are doing well and enjoying their missions.

I can't think of anything else. I know my emails are getting weaker. I need to think of more things to talk about.

Teresa is great; she is getting her last recent convert lesson this week. She has been recovering poorly but came to church to just take the sacrament anyway and went home.

The Billman’s came to church!! That was exciting, They even stayed for all three hours. The kids will be there this weekend, but they don't want to sit in on the lessons. We need prayers to soften the Billman teenagers' hearts.

The gym closed three days a week so we do zone insanity. (The sisters' idea.) The start off zone study went well and things have improved. Last week we had three dates and this week we have fourteen as a zone, so it’s improving quickly. We just need to keep the momentum. We have two great district leaders that are brand new.

Elder Coronado and I had to do the transfer point so we sat at the church building and called people that left stuff behind, and they gave us subway gift cards for it so we were happy.

We went out to eat for dinner last night (members took us), and I had biscuits and gravy (this restaurant is famous for them), and it was so disappointing. I'm excited to see Grandma Bassett and eat good biscuits and gravy. (I love Grandma despite her cooking skills, but the biscuits and gravy are just a bonus.)

We spoke in a couple more sacrament meetings. They used some of our stories in young women's lessons, so I guess that means they were listening which doesn't happen too often in sacrament. The more I speak in sacrament every week, the more I realize what gets people to listen. When I am writing it, all I want to do is read scriptures to them, but people check out so quickly. I almost always try to have a few stories to keep people listening, more types of ways that the scriptures applied in people's lives. Maybe I could use that in my teaching by telling more stories. Pres. Hiers tells lots of stories, and I love hearing them.

Love you all!
Elder Bassett



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