Too Much Food

Hello!

This week has gone by so fast! I could have sworn it was just yesterday that I was writing a letter. Things are going pretty well over here in Ledgewood. It's crazy how the roads are designed out here. The best description that I've heard for them is that someone took a bunch of spaghetti noodles and dropped them on a map, and that's where they built the roads. Yeah, It's that crazy.

We are having a baptism on Saturday for Sister Little so were super excited! She is a 59 year old woman who has Diabetes and some sort of brain injury. She is a really sweet lady, and is fun to teach because we have to re-explain things to her over and over again. She often calls me and my companion revrun, or father, or on one occasion master. She knows everything we have taught her, she just needs a review every once in a while (being every time we see her). Yesterday in church her blood sugar dropped really low, so we had to scramble and find her some snacks to eat. She was o.k., but it was a bit chaotic for a while.

Our ward is amazing, and I appreciate and love it more and more as each day goes by. They take great care of us, and we never go unfed. Sometimes its actually too much. Last night, Elder Larson and I ate at the Pettits, and we had burritos (seconds and thirds) and a huge bowl of ice-cream and brownies after. I thought I was going to die. Then we got a call from the Bishops wife saying they made chilli for us. Elder Larson LOVES chilli, so we went over there and ate again. Then they also served us a large bowl of ice-cream. I can't remember ever eating so much food! For a second I really thought I was going to die.

This week we taught a really cool family for the first time. Right away we talked about baptism, and they said that if they found our message to be true then they would be baptized. This is amazing to hear from investigators, because most of the time they get stuck on the whole baptism thing. They know that Joseph Smith was a Prophet, and that the church is true, but they always talk about how they are already baptized and how they don't think they need to be re-baptized. Constantly we are explaining the importance of being baptized by proper priesthood authority, but people just don't seem to understand. I would say that of all the principles we teach, that is the most frustrating of all. People just don't understand. So anyway it was great to hear that from them.

Last week Elder Larsen and I focused on how to begin teaching. Learning how to get to know your investigators and having them open up is crucial to our process in helping them receive the restored gospel. Our goal is to have them do most of the talking. It's important that we present questions and commitments in a way that will get them to act. The more involved they are, the better the chances the lesson will go well. This week we also talked to a man whose mother just passed away. He has had an extremely difficult life and told us that if there was a God then he was a cruel God, and that he didn't want anything to do with him. We tried to explain to him how the Lord gives us trials and challenges in life so that we may learn, grow and reach our full potential. He agreed that trials can make us stronger, but he couldn't get over the fact that people had to suffer as much as they did, and believed we should only have to suffer a little bit. We talked to him about how the more we are challenged, the better we can become. It's like a marathon runner who makes great time. It's great that they did well, but they aren't just satisfied with that. They train even harder to do better next time. I challenged him to pray and to talk to the Lord about his trials and to ask if he was there. He told us that we couldn't tell him there was a God because there is no proof, and so I told him he couldn't tell me there wasn't a God until he prayed about it. So he said he would try it out and call us back in a few days. We'll see what happens. I could spend all day talking about each of our investigators but then nothing would get done. Peace out.

Love, Elder Tilley