Week #59 “A Leader Leads By Example, Whether He Intends to or Not.”

Hey Mom and Dad! Tell Taylor and Celeste I say congrats on their new baby girl! That's so cool! The neighborhood is changing so much! I won't recognize things when I get home!

I told Dolly to Facebook Hayley and tell her I said hello. I didn't think she'd do it but she told me she did so that's cool! I'm glad it made Hayley happy though :)

This week went by really fast. We had our zone meeting on Tuesday, so Monday night was a little crazy at our apartment with 6 other missionaries staying the night with us. I don't really enjoy having to go to zone meetings (or any meeting really haha...that much has not changed with me!), but it's sure nice to enjoy being in a building with A/C. It feels so good!

We spent more time this week finding new people to teach and even though we only found a few, they were cool people. We met this older couple who were investigators about 10 years ago. The lady almost got baptized but on the day of her baptism her husband ruined things and she wasn't able to do it. She still has a desire to be baptized to this day, so we are hoping her husband will let us help him and his wife. They are very nice people though. We met another lady who was out cleaning her yard. I figured as soon as we said hello she would be grumpy with us (lots of old grumpy old ladies here haha) but when we started talking to her the first thing she said was "My boyfriend is here" and she pointed at me haha That was the first time I've ever gotten that response to making a new contact! She was a really nice lady and she ended up being very nice to us.

We spent some time with our investigators in Magubilan trying to finish teaching them everything before next week so they can be interviewed for baptism. It's not easy to be baptized into the church! There is a ton of stuff they need to learn. But they are way smart and follow through with everything --they are really motivated which is awesome.

On Saturday it was miserably hot! Elder Alpon and I were both sweating our faces off trying to make it to the Bismanos's house for our lunch appointment. I always run my hands through the water as we cross the river and that seems to help with the heat. I just wish so bad that I could jump in and swim. haha  Anyhow, it started raining while we were there, so we stayed with the Bismanos family for about an hour as the rain came down and the floods came up. There were two huge lightning strikes right over the top of the house that were so loud!  I don't think I have ever experienced lightning that close before. Poor Sister Bismanos was scared out of her mind! We met a nice guy yesterday who is part of a member family but he is really shy and has avoided the missionaries for years.  We finally caught him where he couldn't escape haha so we finally got to know him. He is a super cool guy and was very comfortable talking to us so we taught him a lesson and are hoping he will come to church next week. We'll see!

Thanks so much for all the the pictures! Elder Seeds and I are really Utah homesick seeing the trees changing colors and having a motorcycle in the picture just makes me feel even more homesick haha but please don't stop sending me pictures.  It feels good just to see them!

Tell Grandma Shirley I say Hi! I've received all her letters too! I will send her an email today.

Thanks so much for your emails Mom and Dad! Love you lots. Love Michael