Saturday was a good, good day

Probably the coolest thing this week was Saturday.  Saturday morning we went to a specialized training with Elder Dallin H. Oaks of the quorum of the Twelve Apostles.  I got to meet him and shake his hand.  Then we had a two hour meeting where President and Sister Thomas both spoke and gave us instruction.  Elder Gay of the Seventy talked about member involvement in missionary work, and Elder Oaks spoke to us at length about personal revelation.  Something that really stuck out to me was that the scriptures are a personal Urim and Thummim.  I'd never really thought of the scriptures in that way before.

Then at four o'clock that evening we watched the baptism of Bill Grey, our district's most recent convert and one of the purest souls I've ever met.  John and Melinda Bennet came to the baptismal service and the sisters in that area had a pleasant surprise when one of their own investigators came unexpectedly.  It was a good experience for all concerned.

Finally, to top it off, we had an awesome lesson with a single member in a restaurant (Firehouse Subs, good food). I won't go into too much detail but I will say that it was among the best lessons we've had recently.  Saturday was a good, good day.

Sunday was good, too.  We were blessed to have three investigators come to church.  One of them was LIz, who I've told y'all about before.  She came at the invitation of her member friends, the Berrys.  From a missionary perspective, there is just nothing cooler than an investigator coming because members asked her to.

All told, this was one of the best weeks we've had yet.  Another cool thing that happened Sunday was that a part-member-sort-of-active family came to church and brought the non-member-sort-of-active part of the family with them.  To make it even better, the non-member-sort-of-active-part invited us to come over again.  We'd been there once before and didn't think we'd had too much of an impact, but hey, we can be wrong.  We can take it.  We can cope.  Especially when it comes to a new investigator. :)

Something that's been of immense benefit to me is a talk that Elder Bringhurst and I had during a rainstorm on Monday.  Thanks to Elder Bringhurst and his exceeding great stubbornness I've discovered that being happy is a choice, and moreover, it's a choice you only have to make once.  I made that choice.  It made a difference.  I'm happier, I can take more crap from people (Elder Bringhurst), and I don't have to struggle with it.  It used to be a battle for me every morning. I used to let the little things weigh me down.  Now I don't have to.  It wasn't a magic cure; I still feel sad for people.  But I'm not sad for me much anymore.  Which is good, because I don't have time for that.

Elder Fronk gave me a tie that matches my fedora. :D  It is a pretty sweet tie.

Well, I gotta got now.  Elder Bringhurst wants to throw a frisbee around.  I love y'all, though, don't forget.

Love, Elder Brown