Hey all,
Sorry about that confusion. I guess I kinda forgot to mention that my P-day wasn't changing this time. Also, the two weeks after transfers isn't a hard rule like it was with President Pratt. President Low has done some changes with the schedule a bit, but I don't know if they will last forever. This transfer was different because Elder Haynie was visiting, so he picked out the days and everything.
This week has been pretty busy, but it's also been pretty cool, learned some good things.
On Wednesday we normally have district meeting, but it got moved to Friday because President Low was coming to our district meeting, and moved it then. So instead we had a lot more time open for us, which was pretty good and needed, as we have tried to do a comp study with every companionship in our Zone this week, so we were able to work with three of them Wednesday. We have been talking to people about how to counsel, and principles of it. That was one thing we really wanted to help everyone start doing, because as we've been counselling together, we've had better Comp studies and have learned more together.
Thursday we had exchanges with Woodstock, one of the District leaders. We get to have them twice, cause he's our DL as well. This time it was our exchange, here in Fredericton. It went well, we got some good finding in with them both, and Elder Olsen took Elder Robinson to a member lesson, which went well. I learned a lot about lifting people up, and recognizing the good they do. It's pretty remarkable how much a sincere complement can help someone improve their quality and confidence in their work.
Friday was really cool. We had district meeting with the Low's. It was pretty good. We gave a training on how to use our time effectively, and creating visions, goals, and plans. (speaking of, my attitude on those have changed so much because of my mission. I used to HATE trying to set goals, but I gotta say, now I actually understand why I should and it's made such a difference!) I kinda feel bad for the district leaders, because of the rule changes, it's going to be a lot harder for them to do everything they want/need. We worked with President Low that night, we took him street contacting, and taught our Recent Convert Martha, and it went really well.
But one thing I am really grateful for is how obedient our mission is. Most stories I hear are pretty crazy, and has been pretty different from my experience. I have never had really strict rules before, instead when I got to the mission I had people around me who really wanted to be obedient as possible. And that wasn't unique. It was cool to be obedient, people looked up to missionaries who worked their hardest and were obedient as possible, and I had a strong desire to do the same. We felt a lot of trust from President Pratt. He gave us a lot of freedom, but that didn't make us disobedient! People want to be obedient so much that there aren't really any problems in the mission. I really hope new missionaries feel the same thing. President Low is kinda in a tough spot, because these rules are from the area presidency, not him, but people might shoot the messenger. We're trying pretty hard to make sure people keep feeling like President Low does trust them, (he does) because if there is just a rule in place, people might not care as much. I've already seen that happen a bit with driving rules in the mission. People push it to the limit. A law of Moses could change a lot of people, so they only keep the lower law instead of the higher law we've been living.
Saturday was pretty good. We got to teach Jacob and Brendan. Jacob is our only investigator as of right now, he's 11, and the son of a less active we're working with. Brenden is his uncle, who helps take care of him on the weekends. He's returning to activity too, and he's so cool. He's really wise. We have some really good talks with him, about all kinds of things, and his insights are pretty remarkable. He was the one who helped us learn so much about counseling. But anyway, we got to teach Jacob at his house. It was about the 10 commandments, and it went pretty well.
Sunday they both came to church, and it was pretty good. We also got invited to go to a pentecostal service, so that night we went to it. I have already been to one, so I kinda knew what to expect, but it was the first time for Elder Olsen. We talked about it afterward, and we both felt like our testimony of the Restoration was strengthened. I know that the church is the only true church. (speaking of Pentecost, there's a really good topic page from the saints website about it, it taught me a lot!)
Monday was pretty standard. We had call ins. Big highlight of the day was that we found the best deal in Canada. At superstore, they have this 5$ box where they give you a bunch of chicken and fries, and it's way good! Literally the only way to make it better would be to add Chick-fil-A sauce. And it's super cheap too, so definitely going to go back for that another time! Other highlight of the night was while we were contacting, we ran into this old couple, who just kept talking about Donald Trump, on and on. They kept saying that we shouldn't be in their country, that we should go back to the US and teach Donald Trump. We tried so hard to be patient with them. We explained to them 5 times that we don't talk about politics, we don't know what's going on, and that we don't care, we just want to share about the Book of Mormon with them, and that Donald Trump has absolutely nothing to do with why we are here. But they just went ON and ON! Finally we just had enough, he started talking about how "trump said (insert whatever offended person is offended about) and he can destroy Canadian trade," and Elder Olsen and I just looked at each other, and just told him that if Canada can't handle someone talking about their trade, then they have their own problems to worry about, and we're glad that President Trump taught them that, and that ended it. :)
Anyway, it was a pretty good week. Love you lots!!
Elder Marsh
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