Update 10/30/07

Chris continues to be busy with the Assistants duties. Following are some excerpts from recent letters.

10/8/07
This upcoming weekend we have some exciting things happening. Elder Bednar will be coming for stake conference here in Lansing and he's invited recent converts and investigators (and their missionaries--that means us) to join him in a special meeting in the Relief Society room here at the stake center. We have invited Brother Nicholas Azzam to come, and he should be there. What a neat opportunity to be close to a member of the Twelve! We are both very excited.

10/15/07
Yesterday I shook Elder Bednar's hand and went into a meeting with him and investigators and recent converts in the Relief Society room. This weekend was really amazing. He is probably the best teacher in the world. Period.

He answered some questions from investigators in the special meeting. The final session he rebuked the Stake about missionary work, saying that the missionaries are called to teach. The members are responsible for finding. The missionaries really liked that. To be honest, it has been frustrating for Elder Savage and I. We feel like outsiders in this ward, and it has really never been quite like this in any of our other areas. Elder Bednar said that to pray for the missionaries to find people to teach and for them to find those who are prepared is a faithless prayer. Members ought to pray to find people themselves. Then he talked about prayer and how there's a way to continually pray. In the morning, we pray specifically about what we will accomplish that day, then the action part of prayer begins as we do those things, then we report back to Heavenly Father when we give the closing prayer to our day. What an amazing experience, and I was able to write down some exact quotes and put them in my scriptures and in my Preach My Gospel. We also talked with Sister Bednar for a while in the foyer. She was such a nice person. His son and daughter in law were there with them as well.

We had a great experience Saturday and Sunday with prayer. We prayed that Heavenly Father would let us know what we would do to find a new investigator. It's neat how the first door we talked to someone at on Sunday became a new investigator. She was really excited to talk with us and thought it was the coolest thing in the world to have the records of prophets here. We got more than one investigator yesterday, which was such a blessing because not only have we not had much time to proselyte in our own area, but when we have it seems like no one wants to listen. People have been really funny as we've been door knocking. We are pretty cunning in our questions, but people don't really answer them. No, we didn't ask which church you attend, we asked if we could share with you a copy of the Book of Mormon! ;) You just have to laugh or else you may get down.

10/20/07
Brother Azzam called us up and I talked to him this week. He is leaving to go to Chile on Monday. He'll be baptized down there on the 28th, so that's exciting. So Brother Azzam passed his interview and will be baptized next week. He'll be confirmed two weeks later here in Sacrament meeting. We are excited about that.

We have another very interested investigator we have worked with for just over a week now. I think that she might be our next baptism here. Her name is Mary Lee. It's neat to see how sometimes just when one investigator is taken out of our responsibility, another solid one comes in.
We were going over to her house this week and Elder Savage went to park the car. We didn't see, but in a pile of leaves next to the curb there was a piece of broken off concrete sticking out. The car tire rubbed against it and it slashed the tire. It was an adventure to find and get out the spare tire and get it all changed in our suits. The van is a stow and go van, so the tools were hidden in the wall and the tire was under the van right directly between the driver and front passenger seats. Right in the middle. We were in a lower-class area, so I'm not surprised we got some looks from the locals--two guys in suits changing a tire of a baby blue dodge caravan. ;) The new tire and to have it changed was a total of just over $7--Discount Tires. So that was good, although it took some time to get the whole thing sorted out. Oh, and it was the right front tire--on the same side as the big dent that lady put in it.

10/29/07
That's cool you got the message from Sister Bednar. We talked with her for about ten minutes. It was weird because she only talked to Elder Savage and I and asked for our parents' numbers.

Anyway, we are teaching a really neat family. A husband, wife, an older daughter and two younger kids. They have only one Book of Mormon right now and they're bouncing it among themselves. They have been making changes by themselves without us asking them, like trying to quit smoking and stopping swearing and having family prayer. They are trying to get a car to come to church and it looks like their financial situation is improving. It's neat to see how it hasn't taken much on our part and they seem to be progressing on their own! The wife's name is Mary Lee, and I was the one to talk to her initially on the street in another part of town. It's cool to see the change that has taken place. It would be really cool if the whole family became members. That would be sweet--an entire family! I think it's very likely it will happen.

Well, I have a lot to do. Hope things are going well there at home.