Fireworks

This last week was pretty good. The mission goal was to hit double the standard of excellence which would mean 40 lessons. We got 10... But it's all good. For the most part I can look back on the week and say that I worked hard throughout, even if it doesn't show in our number of lessons. We ended up dropping Honie because she's not going anywhere and I'm fairly certain the only reason that she meets with us is because she thinks it's social hour and because she has nobody else to talk to. Maybe in a couple of months she'll be ready but I don't think she is right now. We had some good lessons with less actives this week though. Mostly only one, we talked to this guy who actually is less active, not inactive. He doesn't really have a solid testimony of the Church having the fulness of the gospel but he likes the church. We talked about patriarchal blessings and it went really well. He said he's gonna talk to his friends about it (they're active members don't worry) and then maybe the Bishop. He's actually dating a lady from Texas who's super active in the Church so I think that's going to help him out a lot and he's good friends with a lot of active members. That's one thing that the Ava ward is really good at is fellow-shipping, it really is like a great big family. One day we were just sitting in the foyer of the church talking to a kid who's gonna be going on his mission really soon and a random lady came up to the door and asked for help because she said that they were on a half tank of gas and they lost their debit card and whatnot. Well me being in missionary mode was like 'sure we'll definitely figure out a way to help you out.' And the kid, who's name is Gabe, is a super nice guy so he wanted to help too. So we called Bishop and he said there was really nothing they could do for these people. So we told them and they were like ok and they took off. Then all three of us were like, I'm pretty sure that they were lying. I remember I asked him if he knew anything about the Church and he was like "more than you know." I don't know if he was saying he knew more than I thought he knew, or he was saying he knew more than I knew, but whatever he meant, that when red flags started going up and I'm pretty sure the Holy Ghost was like: hold up. So the gift of the Holy Ghost is a real thing. We also went tracting this week. We knocked on this dude's door and we had a nice little discussion. He knew about the Book of Mormon, in fact he had studied it for 2 years with the intent to prove it wrong. He really likes history so he looks at it from a historical angle. He knew all sorts of archaeological evidence that would support the Book of Mormon which was neat. We talked about agency and what we believe happens after death. He thought those were very interesting. He said he wasn't a Christian because, from what I understand he got offended by some preacher. But we set up an appointment with him and we got his phone number and everything so we'll see where it goes. Then we were eating at Pizza Hut for dinner and a lady came up to us and asked what happened to some missionaries that apparently served here a couple of months ago, although her description doesn't match any of the Elders that served here since they got Elders, because I actually know all the missionaries who have served here since August. But apparently some missionaries knocked on her door and they had a great discussion. So she's either telling the truth or the missionaries stopped by, she bashed them and they never came back. So she's gonna call us and set up a time. If there's a preacher there when we show up we're gonna turn around and leave. That's pretty much all that happened this week. President and Sister Shumway are gone. We get to meet President and Sister Loveland tomorrow. This next week is looking to be a really good one. Last night we had dinner at an awesome family's house, and we stayed there for 4 hours while he told us about what he did on his mission to find great success. He was a solo zone leader for the last 8 months on his mission and their transfers were only 30 days and every 30 days he got a brand new missionary. He said he trained 7 missionaries as a zone leader. It was nuts. We're hopefully going to be able to implement the  things that he taught us and work with him a lot more closely because he knows most if not all the less actives in the ward. The only problem is that he's super busy. He's got 7 little kids and the company that he started has a contract to build Buffalo Wild Wings and Orange Leafs all over the place. He's only 37.

We also had a nerf war and watched fireworks with the family that we live with. 

Love, Elder Naegle