Hey everyone!
Man! Life has been great out here! I love it when the
weeks just seem to fly by. They seem to
get shorter and shorter the longer I'm out. We got our transfer news last night
and with everything going on in our area I was stressed out of my mind. We have
a ton of people out here that I love visiting and they will be devastated when
I leave, but I can't stay in this area forever right? I was pretty stressed out
about it anyway. When we checked our
emails, we got the news that we are both staying! Three transfers in a row! The weird thing
about all of it though is it’s like déjà vu.
I got with my first companion at the same point in his mission as I did
Elder Sweeten. We were together for three transfers. On the third transfer we celebrated Elder
Parker’s 24th birthday. This transfer we
will also celebrate Elder Sweeten’s 24th birthday! The third transfer Elder
Parker hit his 18 month mark. This
transfer Elder Sweeten will hit his 18 month mark. It's kind of crazy! Haha!
This week has been great! Alisha who is trying to quit
smoking isn't doing a very good job at it. There are some things going on in
her life that are pretty horrible. It's confidential stuff, but she definitely
needs any prayers she can get. Just know her life is like Hell right now. The
trailer she lives in is tiny. It's super
dirty and nasty, and she just got rid of the bed bugs in there. It's pretty gross. She was so stressed out yesterday that she
didn't make it to church. We don't even
know where to start with helping her... She feels like her life is so stressful
right now that she can't quit smoking, but she's trying to cut back a little.
It's unreal to me the things going on in her life. It's almost like the things
you only see in movies or might hear about on the news occasionally.
Stan is doing great! We went over to his house on Tuesday and
dumped out some more liquor; this time, all of it though! I'll send some pictures.
There was a lot of it; at least $600-700 worth of it. It was nuts! We dumped
out a few other things too but he told us we weren't allowed to tell anyone
that he even had it, so I can't tell you what it was, but we found a lot of
that stuff too that we flushed. Just know that everything we got rid of could
have paid for both mine and Elder Sweeten’s missions if we sold all of it on
the black market. Stan says he hasn't even used any of it in about
4 years, but now if he gets more we'll know he does, so that'll be a good
indicator. But yah! Stan's on fire! He was pretty stressed out over transfer
news too. He was glad that we are
staying together again. He plans on taking us out to a nice dinner on Saturday,
so that'll be fun! He considers us his best friends. It's awesome! He never has
been married, has no kids, he's an only child, so he has no siblings, his
parents both have passed on, so he literally has no one, especially since he
quit drinking because none of his friends want to come over for a drink when he
doesn't drink one too. We go over there almost every other day for lunch and a
lesson. He gives us all sorts of things that he finds that he'd forgotten about
too. I now am the proud owner of a Louis Vuitton! (That's a super nice watch.) So now I have my
Louis Vuitton, my Rolex that I bought myself as a Christmas gift, and the cheap
Timex I bought before I left. It's
pretty awesome! (Don't worry, they're fake ones.)
Daymian is finally ungrounded!!! We used to go over there
all the time and he was progressing like nobody’s business. Then he got grounded for a couple of months
and wasn't allowed to meet with us, go to church, go to mutual, hang out with
any of the young men, nothing! It was pretty bad, but now that he's ungrounded
he can do that all again. We went over and made contact with him again
and taught him how to crack a whip, so that's pretty awesome! He's pretty good
for such a skinny guy. I'll have to get a picture with him sometime so that you
know what he looks like. He's 14, but he's probably about 95 pounds. He's a
pretty cool cat though!
Carl is also on fire right now! He's doing awesome! On Mother’s Day he made me look like a super
good missionary by texting me while I was Skyping my family asking when he
could get baptized. Then yesterday at church we set a date with him for June 13th!
I'll be able to be here for his baptism! His life is pretty hectic too, but
that's alright, he can deal with it pretty well. It's kind of funny because his
three kids always come out when we come over because they love us. The only
problem is they all are super talkative and distracting, so usually what
happens is one of us teaches Carl while the other sits and tells stories from
the scriptures or just fun stories or watches videos on our iPads with the
kids. It works out pretty well I guess. Those kids are all super smart. The 3
year old just turned 3 last week, but the way he talks I could swear he was
like 7 or 8! Their 6 year old sounds
like an adult when she talks just with how incredible her vocabulary is. It's
kind of crazy... But all three of them can talk and talk and talk. You don't
even have to respond. They'll just sit there
and talk for hours on end. One fun fact about Carl, he's only a year older than
Elder Sweeten, but he has a family with three kids, and all that stuff going
for him! It's crazy! I can't tell if he's a young dad or if Elder Sweeten’s an
old missionary. Haha!
We also met a guy named Matt. We got a media referral to
go visit Matt Hatten, which is a text that comes to our phone after someone
puts in a referral online. He opened the door and I swear I know him from
somewhere, but I can't pinpoint from where.
When he opened the door he said, "Oh good, I'm glad you guys are
here! I wasn't expecting you guys to come so quickly. I only put in a request for you guys a few
days ago.” We learned that his dad and his grandma both told him he should look
into the LDS church. They both are Baptist, but both think that this would be a
good church for him. We taught him the Restoration in a round-about way. We
then invited him to come to church with us. He said he works nights and that it
would be kind of like us going to church at two in the morning, but he told us
he would be willing to come and see what it was like. After sacrament meeting
he said he felt super peaceful. He had never been to a church before that he
left feeling peaceful like this. We explained to him that it was the Spirit he
was feeling. He also felt very welcomed. Lots of people came up to him and
introduced themselves and were wondering about him, so that was nice! After the
second hour he was about ready to pass out, so he went home, but I don't blame
him. While talking to him he said the biggest thing that stood out to him was
that everything in this church is structured just like it's explained in the
New Testament. He loves the Bible and knows it very well. The lesson we had was
on the priesthood offices. When he
learned about area 70's and Apostles and Prophets and then saw that we have a
lay ministry and a bunch of other things, his mind was blown at how close it
was to the way Christ set His church up! He's awesome! I still can't figure out
if I actually know him from somewhere or if I'm just going crazy, but yah! He
is super solid!
Anyway, things are going so well right now it's kind of
ridiculous! I've never seen things just fall right into place like they are
right now. People just show up to church and ask to be baptized or refer
themselves online, or somehow get in contact with us and are super prepared! My
mind is constantly blown at all the miracles going on! It's truly amazing!
Love,
Elder Mullins
These are photos of all the alcohol we dumped at Stan's.
No comments:
Post a Comment