6 Months and Staying to Train!

Sooooo. . . Elder Campbell is leaving to West Lake (the richest area in the mission) to serve with Elder Dorius, my MTC companion!  I am staying and will be follow-up training Elder Kim.  For clarification: the first 6 weeks are training, the second 6 weeks are follow-up training.  This means that I will still get that extra hour of studying every day!  It has been sooooo nice for these last 6 months to have extra time to study!  Yeah, 6 months.  Crazy!

This week we found some pretty solid potential investigators that I look forward to visiting again.  Many of our previous investigators are not progressing and we don't know why.  We have been leaving commitments, giving them a card with the commitment on it and our next appointment, and following up, but most of the time they still don't keep them.  We must be forgetting something.  Maybe we need to work on discerning their needs better, and showing them how important these commitments are.  The ward is really supportive, and someone is usually available to come with us to appointments.  It's disappointing when we bring a member to a scheduled appointment and the lesson falls through.  It has happened more than not.

Twins! Same tie, same sweater, white shirt,
 black pants, glasses

Elder Campbell will do great with Elder Dorius in West Lake.  These last two transfers with Elder Campbell have been such a growing opportunity for me.   He has taught me to love, to be bold, to not worry about what others may think of me, and to "cut to the chase".  We have seen many miracles as a result of our faith and diligence.  Elder Campbell will not rest until the job is done, he will call people to repentance, he will not tolerate bad behavior, and he is clean.  I thank Heavenly Father and President Felix for the wonderful assignment to train him and be trained by him.




I am coming to a realization of the reality of the eternal nature of our spirits and of the need to choose to follow Christ in this life.  As I read the scriptures, I find that God is pretty "cut and dry".  He openly speaks of the consequences of sin, that is: death and hell.  We are told in our manual "Preach My Gospel" to use the words of the scriptures in the language that we speak.  Often I am too lax about the bad choices that others make.  I say to myself, "that is their choice," and I leave it at that.  However, my calling is to give others the opportunity to accept or reject the gospel of Jesus Christ, and I must let them know the consequences of the choices they are making.  This does not mean that I boss people around. At no point in time will I endeavor to force anyone to do anything; even so, I must explain the results of their current poor decisions.

We did 6 1/2 hours of service this week.  One man that we did service for definitely felt the spirit.  He expressed it in praise for us young men doing good in the world and making right choices.  We gave him a new hope for the future, and it really touched his heart.   We will be bringing the ward over soon for more service, and I hope that he will investigate more after seeing the good hearts and the faith of our ward members.  As President Monson said, "Our future is as bright as our faith."

Elder Campbell at dinner with a member.