The Flecks of Gold

(Letter February 27)

One thing that I have been reflecting this week was a conference talk by Elder Ballard about finding joy through loving service (May of 2011). He describes the account of a man who sold all his possessions and went to California to take part in the Gold Rush hoping to make riches. He begins picking rocks out of the river, but can't seem to find the golden nuggets he had expected. Distressed and disappointed he is about ready to take his leave back home when an experienced prospector shows him the secret. He reveals that inside each one of those rocks are small flecks of gold, that when patiently and gradually accumulated can bring great wealth. I took this article and applied it to the missionary life. We have left basically everything we had to come to a far away place. We are constantly looking for nuggets of gold... aka... Huge miracles, funny moments, fun... and sometimes may get distressed when we don't see those huge miracles, or have super funny moments, or maybe we're not having as much fun as we hoped for in the beginning... But if we can look for the small flecks of gold inside each moment, those Small Miracles, small funny moments, and little moments of fun can lead to an accumulation of great wealth for a fruitful mission. As such, I've been trying to recognize the small flecks of gold daily in my mission. One way has come by keeping an account or record of cool things that happen throughout the day, or writing down when revelation was received and brought forth small miracles.

This week has been truly great. Besides the fact that we got juked by like 21 set appointments, the lord did bless us with a tender mercy. On Tuesday right after district meeting we received a media referral of someone who requested a missionary visit. Her name is Rosa Chavez. We went by that day to meet her, but couldn't go in and teach her because of the absence of a chaperone. The next day we went and taught Rosa only to find that her "Esposo" ( I don't believe they are married) is an inactive member that wants to start coming back to church. We taught Rosa the Gospel of Jesus Christ, and she said, ~"Quiero entregarme a Dios." Basically stating that she wants to give herself to God. We gave her the soft invite to follow the example of Jesus Christ and be baptized, which she accepted, and then we felt we should set her with a date, March 25th which she also accepted. She is an awesome lady from El Salvador, with a 7 year old daughter that she wants to be baptized as well. 

We lost contact with Rosa throughout the week because her phone got cut, which was a little discouraging. By Sunday we were getting ready to leave the house just accepting the fact that we couldn't get a hold of her and therefore she wouldn't be coming to church. As we were praying before we left the house to church, it popped into my head that we should just run by her house to invite her and see if we can get her to come. We head to her house, ring the bell, and she walks down the stairs looking like she recently woke up. We invited her, told her we had a member that could give her a ride, and told her the member would be by in 20 minutes to pick her up. She showed great faith and came to church on Sunday, and supposedly told some of the members that she was maybe going to get baptized on the 25th of March. This was a great nugget of gold on the week, and a tender mercy of the Lord, of bringing us someone prepared for the gospel without any effort on our own. I was truly amazed how the spirit of revelation worked as we prayed and the throught to just go by and try Rosa popped into my head.

We still have a lot of investigators that we haven't been able to teach more than once. Many of them still don't have enough desires to make it to church. Another small fleck of gold occurred this week in two parts. On Wednesday night we began nightly planning trying to figure out what we would be doing throughout the next day. Elder Wootton mentioned a less active that we could try, but I kind of shrugged it off thinging how that less active had no desires. The next day we went to a former investigator at 5 who lived on the same street as the Less-active. The former wasn't there, and the thought came that maybe we should indeed go and try the less-active. It was just a block away. We knock the door, but to no avail. We knock next door, and this really nice lady named Malina lets us in, and we taught her the restoration of the Gospel. We invited her to be baptized when she came to know these things are true, and she accepted a date for the 25th of March as well. It was interesting seeing how revelation worked through E. Wootton during nightly planning to go to that area, and then the same prompt came to me as we were in the area the next day. No we didn't find who we were looking for, but the Lord did bring us to someone who could be prepared to receive his restored Gospel.

Other small flecks of gold for the week... Elder Erikson called me on Saturday to inform me that Jimena Lazaro got Baptized!!! She was the really stand-offish girl that Elder Erikson and I taught for awhile in Passaic, but her heart slowly changed as she read the book of mormon and began living the commandments! Elder Erikson also said that Angie went to the baptismal service, really felt the spirit, and has a date to get baptized next week! This week Elder Ferrel in Dover told me that Fausta Sanchez (The lady that Elder Harrington and I baptized in Dover about a year ago) has a date set to go to the temple on May 19th! and hopefully Elder Harrington and I will be able to go there with her for that great experience.

Those were the Highlights of the week here in Trenton/Hightstown. We slowly see improvement in the Area and things are going well. We had an interesting morning as we talked to our Fleet Coordinator who told us that we should report the vandalism that has been going on with our car lately. About a week and a half ago somebody pulled out a key, and ran it accross the length of the right side of the car, and made 3 big scratches on the back. Then the other day I noticed someone had carved something else into our car... Oh the stresses that we confront each day. We called 911, who directed us to Trenton police, who directed us to the Hamilton police, and then we had a visit from the cops where we showed them our car. There isn't much they could do about it, but now they are aware. Another stress of the week was when I accidentally bumped a car in front of me when I was driving. I pushed the gas without realizing the member we were following was still in front of me as we were about to get on the highway, and upon looking up, she was still stopped. I slammed on the brakes, but still hit her car. The only damage was a dented license plate, but I still had to fill out an accident report for it. I filled one out for the vandalism of a week ago, and now they are saying I have to fill out another one for vandalism part two. So those were the biggest stressors of the week, but nothing too serious. (Sorry that was a very random rant at the very end of my letter)

The Gospel is True! I know that the Lord will bless us as we are patient, diligent, and faithful! I love you all so much!