Well!
There isn't too much warm air up here! If you could find
some way to package it up and send it up here, I wouldn't complain about
a little global warming, ha ha. It's pretty consistently -12ish Celsius
now, and it feels a lot worse because of the wind. We're just kind of
figuring out that surviving up here in the winter is all about wearing
lots of layers and breaking up tracting as much as possible with
teaching appointments. Snow kind of comes and goes, but there is about a
foot or more of snow on the ground still. I think that the ski resort
in Smithers is already open, but I'm not totally sure. It is the worst
how short the days are up here! The culture is that 8:00 feels the same
as about 10:00, and so when we are knocking doors at 8:30, everybody
seems put off by how late it is. Oh well! We'll be blessed by being
obedient to the schedule. A truth-seeker won't care what time we knock.
And transfers are... on December 20th, I think. So I'll probably be
leaving right before Christmas. It's pretty weird to think about
actually, because this has been my whole mission experience so far. I
can't imagine not being here! The branch up here is just really awesome
and so Burns Lake has kind of become a home away from home. I can't
imagine serving in a ward. Or having more than 4 or 5 people in Elder's
Quorum. Or being in an area where you can street contact. It will be
weird to see what happens on transfers! And on Christmas, I'll go to a
members home or something like that to call. I'll probably have
somewhere around an hour to talk, and I'll probably be able to tell you
about what time the call will come in email the week before or
something. I'm not exactly sure exactly how it will work out, since I
probably won't even be in Burns Lake on Christmas, but it should be
great!
Is it Governor Herbert that Ethan has to be nominated by? Just have
Ethan bring that picture in to the interview. He'll get the nomination
by relation to me, I'm pretty sure. That would be awesome possum if
Ethan got called to Vancouver. But I predict South Africa. Ha ha. As far
as the election goes, members are talking about how there are a few
more people that have moved up here to join their family in BC after
President Obama got re-elected, and renounced their American
citizenship. Making a stand is great and everything, but if high taxes
and socialized medicine isn't your cup of tea, Canada is not the place
to go.
Well, we had a lot of miracles and a lot of setbacks in Burns Lake
this week. You really love the people that you are working with, and so
when they are progressing, you're doing awesome, and when they don't
keep commitments, you're devastated. A lot of highs and lows. We're
really coming to realize the miracle that Vanessa was. She is going to
be instrumental in getting more people in Burns Lake to come unto
Christ. We met with a former investigator, Heather Tom, who knows
Vanessa, and had a very powerful first lesson and set a baptismal date
for December 29th with her. Earlier that day she had committed to
herself that she was going to quit drinking, and she was looking for
something to help her do that, so she had a really soft heart. How the
lesson worked out was a miracle. We set a return appointment and we were
super excited about it. We had a member coming into town all the way
from Southside to come with us, when Heather cancelled last minute. We
still had the member, Dallin (who is 17 and leaving on a mission
probably when Ethan is) coming, and so we frantically tried to figure
out what we could do. We said a prayer, and I just started calling tons
of potential investigators to figure something out. We called this other
native lady, Lillian, who has been a potential investigator for months,
but we haven't had a member for an appointment, and it's really hard to
schedule appointments with members on the reserve because sometimes the
people can be a bit flaky. But we called her, and she said she would
love it if we dropped by in half an hour (probably because we had
shoveled her walk a couple times before Ammon-like service is super
important with missionary work). As soon as we called her, I felt really
calm, like everything was going to be okay. And then Vanessa called,
and asked randomly if there was anything she could do to help us, so we
invited her to the lesson as well. Turns out that Lillian was pretty
good friends with Vanessa, and Vanessa just bore her testimony really
strong about what the church has done for her, and we had a really
powerful lesson. Now Lillian wants to get baptized too. Whew. it was
really hectic, but it was all orchestrated by Heavenly Father. It was
awesome. Nights like that happen all the time. But... then the next day,
even though we had 6 people committed to come to church, none of them
came. Lillian had health reasons, and the others, we're just not sure
about, but... gah. It is so stressful sitting by the doors to the church
the 15 minutes before church starts. Seriously. Ups and downs. Ray
didn't come, but Brooklyn is still progressing a lot. It is so fun to
teach a 9 year old. Her date is for December 29th.
In other news, I have officially tracted everywhere in the area at
least once, surrounding areas included! Hutter Road in Decker Lake was
the very last one. Except for Topley, a little not-even-one-horse-town
that might be in our area but might be in Smithers' area. Still.
Awesome. We're putting in a lot of time knocking on doors! We're going
to find somebody else to baptize this week, and we're excited about it.
Tracting has become second nature now. A day doesn't feel complete if we
haven't done it for a couple hours. And it's still productive! That
still blows me away. We found like 4 new investigators this week. At
this rate all of Burns Lake will be a potential or former investigator
at some point!
Well, I hope that everybody has a great week! Keep Burns Lake in
your prayers! I got the Christmas package the other day. Thanks a bunch!
Elder Blotter
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