So this past week has been a pretty roller coaster week
full of lots of fun stuff as well as some tragedy. everything all really
started wednesday. Burns was hit with a big storm and we went to the
church to wait it out the day was going pretty slow and no one was home
really as this week was fair but fair didn't officaly start until
thursday but anyways after the storm blew over we decided to go see our
wml bro Johnson about a former investigator that we had contacted
earlier in the day and he lives outside of town on the other side of the
Indian reservation and as we are going up broadway which is the main
street in town we saw that there was an accident and they had the end of
the street blocked off and so we had to go around. As we drove passed
though it was weird as there was no cars that looked like they had been
damaged and the road was clear minus all the cop cars and the barricades.
So we finally make it out to Bro Johnsons house and we pull up and he
is outside working on one of his sheds and is also on the phone so we
get out and are standing there waiting for him to finish on the phone
which he finally does and the first thing he says is bad news elders.
and he said it so calmly that I'm expecting him to say something like he
ran out of nails or something super minor but instead he goes on to
explain that Jonathan who is a less active youth we have been working
with as well as a great nephew to him and the half brother of our two
investigators that we are teaching and who had recently moved in with
the family that they were living with and who we were starting to get to
know pretty well had been hit by a truck while crossing broadway and
that it didn't look like he was going to make it. A wave of shock and
disbelief just washed right over me while brother Johnson went on to
explain that he had to go to the hospital so he couldn't talk with us
right then which we totally understood and asked to follow him and he
said ok so we rushed to the hospital here we found out that he was
riding his bike most likely home from school wasn't paying attention and
rode right in front of a semi truck and that they were going to life
flight him to bend but that chances were slim that he was going to make
it. After waiting there for a little while totally in shock we followed
sister Johnson out as she was leaving talking to her about everything as
well as the former investigator we had contacted.while talking I felt
something hit my head and get stuck in my hair so I reached up to pull
it out and it then stuck to my fingers and saw the black and yellow
strips just in time to feel the wasp bite me which wasn't good as I am
at least midly alergic to wasps so we went back into the hospital to get
some ice to try and stop the swelling talked to bro sanders who is a pt
at the hospital then went to the chamber to talk to sister Harrison
about what happened and while we are there I get some more ice as now my
finger is twice its normal size and then after finding out that she
didn't have any medicine we went to the store and bought some benedryll
and by then it was time for our dinner appointment with the smiths which
live about twenty minutes out of town so by the time we got the the
meds had kicked in the swelling had stopped but I was feeling super
sleepy in addition to the shock I was in from the accident needless to
say I don't remember much about that dinner other than it was rice with
Yoshida sauce. After that we went to Jori's house for a lesson but he
had obviously forgotten as we walk in and he had a bunch of friends over
and they are watching sherk so we go into the kitchen to talk to him
and he starts talking about the accident and how it had shook his mom,
who was the head nurse at the hospital, pretty bad and so we ask how he
was doing and jori looks down and says "he's dead" and even in my
drugged state it hit pretty hard we went home and just went straight to
bed feeling completely over whelmed the next day things were a little bit
better as it was the start of fair and one of the members in the ward
had gotten us passes to the fair so we went there and watched all the
four h and ffa animals get judged and learned a little bit about what
they were looking for it was a totally new experience for me but was fun
then we walked around trying to talk to people as everyone in harney
county was there they had even canceled school but no one really wanted
to talk to us but friday the rodeo started which was soooo cool to watch
and there are this things called lion balls which tasted so good and
there was so much in addition to the rodeo such as horse racing which
was cool to watch they even explained how to bet so Elder Johnson and I
pretended to bet which was pretty funny we lost most of the time but
anyways since we weren't really having success at the fair we decided to
make saturday our p day and just enjoy the fair and then work today so
we did and while there we got cowboy hats and all of a sudden people
were a lot more willing to talk to us but overall the fair was fun so it
was a great way to end a rough week
Thursday, September 19, 2013
Sunday, September 8, 2013
ztms the ER and other great acronyms
Sept 2, 2014
So this week has been
a pretty busy week. After my email last week I came back to Bend with one of
the zone leaders for exchanges we got in at 8 and hadn't had dinner yet so we
went to Glory Days which is a pizza and more place in town. It’s the best place
to eat and the owner is a member and lets us eat for free. So we stopped there to eat. When got back to
the apartment and started to plan. That was exciting as I had to take the lead
and really be the one who was in charge of what we were doing. We had some
appointments and names just kept coming into my mind to visit and Tuesday we ended
up getting a lot done. We had two lessons one with a less active who we were
going to teach about patriarchal blessing from true to the faith. Except the
one problem was as we were pulling up I realized that I had forgotten the book
at the apartment, so instead we decide to go over a chapter in the book of
Mormon. So we go in and we are talking to her and then we ask where she was in
her reading and she says 2 Nephi 13 and so I say ok lets read that. Then I turn
to the scripture and it is about Nephi having a vision about the future of the Americas.
It was too late to change so for the next hour I'm trying to explain this
chapter and what’s going on while keeping her on track. Which was hard but it turned out to be good
while it wasn't a chapter I would like to go over normally. I was glad I was there to help clear things up
or else I think she would’ve walked away with some really weird ideas about the
chapter. Then we visited some more people before our first appointment with our
two new investigators which was rough at first as there were a lot of kids
packed into that small house, and there were lots of distractions. We were able
to teach part of the first lesson and leave them with books of Mormons and
reading assignments. Wednesday we visited some more people and had another
lesson with the two girls where we finished the first lesson and talked about
the intro to the book: and recommitted them to read that and pray about it. Then we went to another lesson with Jory and
that was really good. We talked about chew,
he seems to have more of a desire to
quit now and then we played basketball with him. While we were warming up
mutual was going on. As I'm getting a rebound this girl comes out of nowhere
and tries to get it at the same time, but I start talking to her and it turns
out she is the one girl we got a referral about. A little bit later she asks how she can join
the church. Then before I could really talk to her she leaves. I felt really
bad for not talking to her more but then she was at church yesterday and we
talked to her more and exchanged numbers, and told her we would call her later
to set up an appointment. Thursday we were in Bend again and got back in time
to go play Frisbee with some members and nonmembers which was good, except I
always hate explaining that I go by my last name because I'm a missionary. That
and everyone here has a really hard time saying Telford. That was fun my team
won and after being tackled a couple of times I woke up the next morning with a
bruised rib which wasn't fun, it’s getting better. Saturday we went with a recent
convert family up to the Steens mountains and right as I get out to take my
first picture of the mountain/ valley thing my camera died, so you'll just have
to google pictures of the Steens and pretend I'm there. Sunday we had fast and testimony meeting and
as we are sitting there I feel a tap on my shoulder from Elder Johnson and he
motions for me to go up and at first I was really confused but then I realized
that he wanted to bear his testimony which meant that I had to go with him and
bear mine as well. I felt really nervous as usually I had more time to think
about what I wanted to say and I usually get really nervous anyway bearing my
testimony to the whole congregation. As
Elder Johnson is bearing his I silently prayed for peace and to be relaxed and
right before I had to get up I felt this peace wash over me and I know that it
was from my Heavenly Father and I bore my testimony which in itself wasn't
anything special, but as I sat down again I had a special testimony in my heart
that Heavenly Father is real and that he loves me so much as to bless me with
something that was really very minor but important to me. After that we went to
lunch with a ranching family in the ward. They bbqed steaks and that was really
good. Then we planned for the coming week and went to a lesson with Kenzie and
Zoey the two girls we started teaching this week. Hardly anyone was home not
even Zoey so we just taught Kenzie, and things went a lot faster. She had done
her assignment and prayed and we asked about that at the beginning of the
lesson how she felt while she prayed? She
said hot and cold flashes and so we said sometimes answers don't always come at
first and then continued with the lesson and the whole time I had this feeling
that we needed to talk more about her prayer, so at the very end I felt
impressed to ask her how she felt after her prayer and she said good. I asked if she felt like she wanted to do it
again and she said yeah so I bore a short testimony that those feelings were
from the Holy Ghost, and that as she continues to read and pray that the
feelings are going to get stronger and she will know it's true so that was good. Then we went to go to a less actives house to
share a message and as we are going and it’s like 8 by then we get a call from
a member that works at the hospital asking us to go over and administer to a
girl from the Crane Branch who had been in a car accident and was having some
really alarming symptoms so we called Bro. Johnson and he met us over there. We
go in and all the lights are off and there’s this teenaged girl laying in a bed
with sunglasses. We talked to her and her mom for a little bit and then we gave
her a blessing and during the blessing even though I wasn't saying it I felt
the spirit really strong and felt like everything was going to be ok. So overall a busy week, I got a haircut again
I think it’s the shortest I've ever had it.
Best of luck and if you ever have any questions ask the missionaries
they can help
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