Personal Groves

Hey:)

That was the best into i could muster at the moment so I will just jump right into the recent highlights of my life here in the DK:

Progress:

We had some cool stuff teaching wise this week. We taught C* again finally. She has gotten better and felt up to really setting herself into searching the gospel message. We mostly had a lesson that set up where she wants to go from here and what she wants to do and how we could help. She has a tough time reading because it is hard on her eyes so we brought the audio version of the Book of Mormon and she was pretty stoked so I think that will increase her willingness to read now:) We also showed the video " The Hope of God's light" on youtube and she really was touched by it I could tell. Great lesson:)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2w49_1a9X0Q

We came back to visit J* again becuase he has been having a really rough time with life and everything seems to be just going down the drain for him. He had called a couple times so we came to visit and we were surprised to find out that he had stopped drinking all by himself and was 6 days sober! That was huge considering that had been a lifetime habit. So we are going to try and help him work up the self confidence to do the same with smoking because it is realllly wrecking him physically. J* is the first and foremost reason among many of why I will never touch a cigarette. I don't know of a better way to take 30 years off your vitality... crazy stuff. But hope is there for him if he chooses to finally shake and move and do something about it.

We met with Juan again. Way great! He is such an awesome human and I really learn a lot when we talk with him. He really wants to change the world and make a difference which is awesome. We had a rather long lesson with him on the plan of salvation but it ended up going the way the Lord needed it to go. It was fun because we all just took turns going off on our rants in a circle. Elder Bennett would introduce something and the Juan would take it and go on his thought train with it and then I would bring it back to what Elder Bennett introduced and then reinforce it and tie it into all the way quality things Juan was saying, An upward spiral of sorts. But in the end we challenged him to really find out if this is what God wants for him in his life and he is very open to try it. He says that we all are led into the places we need to go because God knows everything and helps guide things to work together so hew basically said he beleives that God very well could have guided us to him. Que bueno:)

We worked again with our friend M*. He is a member I don't know if i mentioned that last time... But he is a way hip 28 year old Romanian guy with killer tastes in cool lifestyles. We had some great convos with him strengthening what he already knows and helping him with some concerns and stuff. He is a great guy.

We had a way sweet zone conference on the Book of Mormon. This week Elder Bennett and I went out into a cool little forest. President O'Bryant challenged all of us to go out and have our own Joseph Smith experience and pray about the truthfulness of the gospel as restored by Joseph Smith. So, we went out and found some spots alone (but within sight and sound of each other;) ) and took up the challenge. It was a great experience. The spirit was there and the truths of the restored gospel were confirmed to me that Joseph Smith truly is the prophet of the restoration and that a Loving Heavenly Father leads his church here through a prophet. It works wonderfully:)

General Conference:

This year GConf has been fire so far! I say so far because when the Sunday noon session is streaming live, it is 10-12 oclock pm. So We are watching it in two hours with the Larsens and eating mexican food *fist pump*. My favorite talk so far had been by J. Devn Cornish. holy smokes he got to me! https://www.lds.org/general-conference/2016/10/media/session_1_talk_10/5151035222001?lang=eng I really was feeling the spirit the whole first session but when he came in with that... donezo. Such a good talk. And then the MoTab sang that version of "Be though my vision" and really nailed it. I've gotten progressively softer because there is more waterworks than the last conference every time. Maybe it is just that we look forward to it so much as missionaries but then again, i don't see why i couldn't have looked forward to it before like i do now. Anyhow.. favorite time in October:)

Other stuff:

We now have 10+ cacti of assorted small sizes. There is some kinda cactus craze and they sell them pretty much everywhere you are haha so you can get them dirt cheap (dirt included). Who knew succulents could be so hip?

We made a coffee cake, or conference cake as we call it in my family, in honor of General Conference! annnnnd we ate it within an hour.... no ragrats.

Elder Bennett and I have fun enlightening each other while we find/travel/whatever. Its really neat to have someone of high caliber that i can work with and work off of. He is really a sharp dude and its fun to pique his brain because i swear he knows EVERYTHING haha. Recently he has been enlightening me about stem cell research he did in a top lab with top scientists. Way cool stuff. I mean, this one time i built a shelf out of wood, but he is building potential body parts... i think. I'm still working on wrapping my mind around it but hopefully I will absorb that knowledge by the time we are through. Good stuff though. :) WE are having a beast time out here.

This morning as part of pday while our laundry was going, we played ball tag in the basement. The basement has no windows and is somewhat of a labyrinth of storage units and when the lights are off... that world doesn't really exist. So we basically just ran around in the dark and tried to peg each other with a soccer ball based off of echolocation that we didn't have. Fun times:) We stopped when Elder Erickson Beelined into the walll hahahaha. Such a funny thing to see in almost pitch black.

Spiritual thought:

This week during a lesson i started to realize that we would miss our bus which only comes one time every hour. I started to lose focus when the Holy Ghost popped the idea into my head that the 6a bus route (which I am not familiar with) would work just fine. So i thought it through half a second longer and then decided to trust it. After that lesson, all of our bus connections were perfectly fluid. We didn't even need to wait at the stop! My thought I would share is really work on learning how the spirit speaks to you and how God guides you personally. That has been something I have really focused on and I've come to really appreciate the word gift in "the gift of the Holy ghost" because it truly is something divinely given. :)

Also, for those of you who haven't done so recently, or who maybe haven't tried sincerely at all, I would challenge you to have your own Joseph Smith experience. https://www.mormon.org/beliefs/joseph-smith You don't necessarily have to go out into the forest, but really try and set yourself in the same position as the young boy Joseph Smith and pray about the truths of the gospel of Jesus Christ. Elder Bennett in his wisdom says a lot, you get out what you put in, and I have thought about it in regards to prayers. If you sincerely really want an answer like you want that new car, dress or whatever, then you'll get a sincere answer. I promise you he will answer! (I would recommend the forest if you have the chance)

Peace love and granola

Ældste j