Elder Austin's Missionary Journal for March 3rd - March 9th, 2014

Monday, March 3, 2014

Well today was a super busy day, but a good one nonetheless.  We emailed first, so it was good to hear from you.  I was so excited to tell you the big news too!  I'm still way excited to train and to see Bethany get baptized.  This afternoon, we had a wonderful lesson with a girl named Steph.  She's 27 and a single mother and she really just wants answers to all of life's questions.  Hey, we can answer those!!  We had a great lesson on the Restoration and she even felt the Spirit, she even said so!  And then guess what?! She committed to baptism!!!!  I'm really excited for her.  Other than that, it was a day filled with Elder Urbieta saying goodbye to people.  We talked to Bethany today and she is super stoked for her baptism!  AHH, so many miracles.

Tuesday, March 4, 2014

Again, it was another long and boring day of my companion saying goodbye to people.  I'm excited to stay here though!  So to prepare for him moving, we drove to Glasgow and stayed the night with the elders there.  It was a long drive and I am exhausted!  It's gonna be an early morning so I'm gonna crash.

Wednesday, March 5, 2014

It was an early start today.  We got up at 5 am to leave at 6.  If you think Arizona traffic is bad, you should see Glasgow and Edinburgh.  I dropped off my companion, then we drove to the mission home with a few other missionaries.  That's where we met all the trainee's and introduced ourselves.  I got to hike Pratt's Hill with them, just like I did 7 months ago.  We went back and that's when he announced our trainee.  My trainee is from Germany and his name is Elder Neideck!  Finally, I get a foreign companion.  He's a good kid, so I think we'll get along.

Thursday, March 6, 2014

Well today was a good first day for Elder Neideck.  We did some service for the Corrigan family.  We helped them replace the fence in the backyard.  In return, they fed us some good macaroni.  We saw a potential investigator named Allister, and at first he didn't really have a belief in God.  When we bore our testimonies, you could notice a change in him.  He was starting to accept the concept and invite us back.  I love seeing when people make those changes!  Oh, and we also went over to Bethany's and did some baptismal planning.  SHE ASKED ME TO BAPTIZE HER!!!  I'm so happy and so honored.

Friday, March 7, 2014

Finally, the weather was nice today.  The sun was shining over the ocean and there wasn't a cloud in the sky.  Angela invited us for dinner but afterwards we had to have a stern talk with her.  She hasn't been progressing so we had to tell her to start showing commitment or we were going to stop seeing her.  Thankfully, she'll start progressing again.  We went over to Bethany's tod o some more planning and to teach her the commandments.  She lives them all so it was very easy.  She's a little bit nervous, but I think that will be okay.

Saturday, March 8, 2014

As we do every Saturday, we visited the people who live out of town.  Of course my favorite part was visiting Peter at his rest home.  I always ask him for his advice on life and he gives me a different answer every time.  This week he said, "No matter what you do, always stay in the church."  He made us promise and I did!  We had an awesome lesson with this guy named Dom.  He had investigated the church in 2001, now we found him again.  He said he had been thinking about a picture in the front of the Book of Mormon and that is when we knocked on the door.  What a miracle!!!!  We taught him the Restoration and it was powerful.  He committed to baptism right then and there!!  Just another day of miracles.

Sunday, March 9, 2014

Well not much happened today, but I always love Sundays.  Bethany came to church and bore her testimony for the first time ever!  It was a good spiritual meeting for her.  After church, she texted us saying she was scared.  We told her that it was just her being nervous and that it was natural.  We told her about the Mormon Messages on the church website and told her to watch them whenever she feels scared or doubtful.  She texted us later saying that it helped a lot.  Another problem solved!

Love you!