How the Flu Flew First off, it's been a wild week. We had a booth at the fair here this last week and we rotated which companionships were there each night. There were so many Hispanic people at the fair I couldn't believe it! It was so much fun to talk to so many people! The fun, of course, didn't last without some sort of price. Between Thursday evening and Sunday morning, every missionary in Fort Walton Beach except Elder Black and Sister Robinson took a turn throwing up...so it's a bit late for the vaccine. On the bright side, this flu bug flew pretty fast and in under 24 hours was gone (but not before being passed to someone else apparently). I realized I had caught it when I started feeling weird right before dinner on Saturday (which wasn't much of a surprise since we were the last companionship to get it and had been running around to all the others to deliver meals and blessings and pick up fair tickets and supplies all day), so I made a smart call and didn't give myself insulin for dinner. My Blood Sugar was perfect all that night! [EDITOR'S NOTE (MOM): TYPICALLY A BOUT WITH THE FLU LEADS TO HOSPITALIZATION FOR TYPE 1 DIABETICS] Besides that, we got training on Wednesday from our mission president. The members of the quorum of the seventy that came to visit us a while back had spoken with him and they had collectively determined to change how we're doing our missionary work here in a way that has only been done once before in the church, in the Philippines. In short, no more tracting. At all. That means no more knocking on any doors (unless you know the person on the other side). We're now supposed to drop pretty much everything we spend time doing in order to find people and instead focus all that time on teaching less active and inactive members of the church. We still talk to everyone we see on the streets, teach English class, etc. But when we plan the day we're supposed to focus primarily on investigators we already have AND less active members. It's so fantastic! We already have several that we know and teach occasionally but now we have a ton more ideas and recourses to help them with (I don't have time to describe everything, but just trust me good things are happening). I love that this focus also helps us clarify some things that we already knew like: the goals have never been how many times you baptize someone on your mission or other shallow uninspired perspectives. I can just see how now is the opportune time for something like this based on where so many of the less active members we teach are spiritually. It's time to reintroduce them to the gospel of Jesus Christ and the blessings and joy and peace and happiness that come from it! | I don't have much time, so I'll move on and sum up what's going on a bit now. First, we were teaching Juan Pablo this week and he was telling us how he sometimes gets confused with all the names in the scriptures and he said to us, "The only names I know in the Bible are God, Jesus, Mormon, (at this point we started laughing pretty hard) and Cowboy Martin" , (at this point we died laughing). Upon realizing that we had never heard of "Martin Caballero" he threw his hands in the air and in exasperation exclaimed, "You don't know Cowboy Martin? What class of missionaries are you!?!" (People, this is a ten year old!) HAHAHA love him so much!!! Jenny's birthday is the 17th we found out and she's still praying to know if she should be baptized then or on the 24th (how fun would that be, baptism on your birthday!), and we're super excited for her and all the progress she's made. Jazmin is ready and going to be baptized and confirmed this upcoming Saturday and Sunday! She's recovered from being sick and is readjusting to her new prescription and having seizures less frequently. She's as faithful as ever and determined to make this wonderful covenant with God. A blessing in disguise is that, now that we moved the date, we can have the baptism an hour later and her husband Manuel may be able to make it (prayers and fingers crossed)! This week's challenge: start meditizando "ponderizing" (don't try looking that up, it's a made-up word in Spanish, too) If you don't know what I'm talking about, listen to this just 10 minute talk by Devin G. Durrant https://www.lds.org/general-conference/watch/2015/10?lang=eng&vid=4531487647001&cid=4 Just to answer questions I've received since my last email, yes, I did use all my tree puns while Elder Black and I removed that stump :) That short sleeve shirt used to be long sleeved and I just decided to teach myself how to hem (NAILED IT!) and yes, I do love you all and enjoy receiving mail from you all more than you know! Thanks so much for letting me stay a part of your lives! Les quiero! Elder Smith |
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AuthorI am Elder Mathew Ross Smith serving a spanish speaking mission for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints in the Florida, Tallahassee Mission! Archives
January 2016
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