14 April 2014
Hello, "Daf!" (yeah, iPhone typing is a pain) (I'd signed my letter "Love, Daf" -- I don't do well with the iPhone keypad.)
Sorry about your computer; hopefully, it gets fixed
quickly. We appreciate your thoughts and prayers; we had a hectic but
productive week. We combed through the less active list for the area,
which is geographically enormous. We combed through Glenwood, Pacific
Junction, Henderson, and Malvern this week; we have yet to comb through
Thurman, Tabor, and Randolph (Mineola, Burkett, Silver City, and the most
western block of Hastings are in our area, but have no known less
actives); see Google Maps for an idea of how huge this area is. (I saw Google Maps. It is a huge area.)
Thankfully, we're still under our mileage limit, but we've really gotta
conserve them at least until the end of next week when they get updated
again. We tracted like mad throughout Glenwood and we have a couple of
potential investigators. The meal calendar went from being
scant to filled for every day of this week except for Thursday, and most
of the remaining days of this month are filled. Oh, keep this on the
DL, but Bishop Jacob's uncle is D. Todd Christofferson (the Apostle? The very
same.)
We had a pretty contentious run-in with an anti-Mormon;
we went to an address for a former investigator couple, found a man
working the yard of the house, asked if the former investigators lived
there, he replied that they owned the property, and we decided to go for
the next window of opportunity: talking to HIM about the Church.
Looking back at it, it started off shaky and I could feel at
least some contention without even saying anything. It was like our old
investigator on steroids; it was the same old junk, that we're a Satanic cult,
we didn't really know the scriptures, we need to remember the creeds, and so
forth. All we could do was bear testimony that we know that what we're
doing is right and true. He encouraged us to restudy Paul's epistles, was
just condescending and a jerk, and told us to stop what we were doing and then
maybe he'd see us in heaven. Elder LeFevre responded that there was no
way he'd stop being a missionary and I replied in return, "No can
do." I almost said, "No can do, slick," but maybe that
wouldn't have been a good idea...
It's been an adventure and I know that there will be a whole
lot more, but we're striving. We appreciate your continued thoughts and
prayers and I extend mine to you in return.
Love,
Elder McMurray
 |
| Iowa Daffodils |
21 April
Hey, Dad:
No worries about the short email; you sounded like you had a
good Easter. Thank you so much for the gift basket, it's awesome.
We had a pretty good Easter; our Bishop gave another excellent talk; it
was about the importance of partaking of the Sacrament worthily and
centering our minds on the Atonement of Christ. We had dinner at our ward
mission leader and his family's home (burgers, potatoes, JELL-O, and salad) and
a family called the Fitzpatricks. Brother Fitzpatrick cracks me up; he's
a Kansas farm boy and Iraq War veteran (never saw combat though, but he was
there) and he's very deadpan. The way he says, "Seriously?"
cracks me up. The area actually doesn't go quite to Missouri if you're
looking on Google Maps, the northern boundary is from the Missouri
River on the border of Bellevue, Nebraska to a little west of Highway
59. The eastern boundary is from that point down to the town of Randolph,
Iowa. The southern boundary is from Randolph, Iowa to the Missouri River,
and the western boundary is the Missouri River up to the border with
Bellevue. The Shenandoah area actually borders the state of
Missouri. So the towns that are in our area include:
Glenwood, IA
Pacific Junction, IA
Mineola, IA
Silver City, IA
Henderson, IA
the westernmost block of Hastings, IA
Randolph, IA
Malvern, IA
Tabor, IA
Thurman, IA
Bartlett, IA
Still, it's pretty geographically big. That's great
that the song turned out good and that camping was tolerable. (We
went camping this weekend. It was good. Our Priesthood quorums sang a
special musical number on Sunday. It was tolerable.) How are the
dogs and cat(s) doing? A member in the ward has what I think is a
Labradoodle and I think that she and Auggie would either get along or hate each
other.
It's
great that spring is finally there; we're seeing it
too. The weather has warmed up, the grass is greener, we've gotten some
good downpours recently. We're in a drought, so we've been praying for
rain. And we have two baptisms set and a handful of new investigators.
We had a wonderful exchange with the Assistants to the Mission
President:
Elders Layton and Scott. Elder Scott went with Elder LeFevre (who's my
companion) and I went with Elder Layton. They're both good guys; Elder
Scott is very enthusiastic and LOVES Glenwood (it was his first area and
a lot
of people here love him too) and Elder Layton is extremely spiritual,
approachable, amiable and a great missionary. He and I hit it right
off; we talked the Gospel, missionary life, music, it was terrific. He
and I also had a great experience giving a less active a blessing and
the
Spirit was so powerful. So we're in good spirits and we've gotten to be
more discerning of the needs of the people according to the promptings
of the
Spirit. Elder LeFevre and I had a great night just talking and planning
yesterday and we're having a pretty good P-day. He's got a lot of
potential.
Thank you for your continued thoughts and prayers and I hope
that you can feel mine and ours in return. I love you, Dad, and I send my
love to all in the family and the Church down there.
Love,
Elder McMurray
No comments:
Post a Comment