There are a few interesting things this week and we're leaving in not to long to try to play Ultimate on the beach in not too long, so I'll try to be fast
QUESTIONS:
is your companion related to John Tate BYU and NFL football offensive lineman?
unfortunately Elder Tait is not. His last area was foxboro though (home of Gillette patriots stadium) and brother Austin Collie was in his ward, along with Jordan Deevey. Also he would do service at TB 12 (Tom Brady's physical therapy place) and saw Rob Gronkowski there once. They never saw Tom or Gizelle.
How many pair of exercise wear did you bring on your mission (shorts for sports? and t-shirts?)
I had a lot because I would get sweaty playing sports. Probably like 5-7 I think. No one else seemed to have that many, but it's worked out fine for me.
did you end up seeing any of the Boston Marathon last week?
yes! I'll write about that down below
what are your plans for p-day today?
beach for football or frisbee. Shouldn't be too windy this time
did your weather turn a little cold this last week?
yes. after the winter though it's all fine
Since Elder Tait has arrived, what have you done for exercise?
seems like most every day we have to get up early for something. When I did exercise it's usually 200 crunches and 20-30 push ups. Today we jogged around for about 20 mins, then I did my crunches/push-ups. We plan on jogging every morning now.
what did you eat for breakfast?
Today when I got out of the shower Elder Tait asked me if I wanted a chocolate peanut butter "smoothie" it was chocolate milk and peanut butter spun in a magic bullet blender. It was good. For lunch I ate a leftover meatball sub. Lately I've been eating some knock off cereal of CoCo Roos (or something. The little chocolate trix sized balls). It is not a good knock off. Also lots of corn pops (*High five for Christopher). Before that it was Reeses Puffs and before that yogurt and granola
Have you eaten anything different from the influence of elder Tait?
the smoothie this morning, which was fun.
How was church for you Sunday? Did you also have a High Councilor speaker?
good. No high councilor. One person spoke and he talked about the domino effect missionary work can have and talked about his mom who joined the church because missionaries tracted into her house. He said "where are the elders" so we waved from the crowd and gave a short shpiel about how we should not give up on tracting. After church I was able to catch him and tell him a short version of this story:
on friday we were on exchanges, I was in Revere 2, and English ward. That day the Revere 2 sisters were also on exchanges, so one of the sister training leaders was with them (who happens to speak spanish). The sisters had previously asked the elders to go with them to an appointment because a less active sister they mostly taught wanted to meet the elders. When we got there we realized there was not going to be another man there, so we elders were not allowed to go in. We decided to go tracting for an hour while the sisters were in the appointment (the sisters have the car, and we needed a ride somewhere afterwards). We tracted into someone who spoke spanish, and didn't understand our english at all. I was able to use my espanol skills to tell her we were missionaries and ask her if she would want to learn more about Christ. she said "Si!" we told her (this part was a heavy spanglish) that other missionaries would come soon who spoke spanish. After the sister's were done with their lesson they came right over (because the spanish speaking sister training leader was there) and were able to talk. Turns out that lady was actually a long-lost member (which supposedly she tried to tell me, but I didn't understand) and was very excited to re-connect with missionaries. Her husband is very against the church though, so it will be a little tough.
Do you have some specific goals that you still hope to accomplish before your mission is over? My goal is to still mail you 3 more fun packages!! Come on!
ummm nothing specific for now. I just want to do a good job with all the people here in Lynnfield area and with all the people in the Zone. I could give a more specific report next time if you'd like.
We had an interesting meeting last night. It was a meeting for all missionaries going home in the next 6 months. At one point President called it something like a "trunky defense protocol" or something like that. It is the first time he's done that. I think it was officially called a "charge" meeting. Sister and president Packard spoke. They talked a lot about sprinting to the finish. It was very good. It was the first time they've done something like that. President spoke a lot about the law of consecration, and temple covenants. He talked about what was possible here if we sprinted. He talked about re-committing to the Lord. Usually after things like this I try to break it down into a few specifics I really want to change, but for this time I don't feel exactly that way. More just a general feeling to try to actually live the Sermon on the Mount, and to do my personal best.
Also this month the Book of Mormon Musical (by southpark. very mocking) was in Boston. We got permission (from president) for all the companionships in the zone to get a night to stand outside the play theater and proselyte/give out (real) Book of Mormons as people walked in. Our night was this week. It was really fun. I hardly had anyone be mean to me either. Elder Tait was standing by the other door (just a few yards away, but in a noisy crowd) and he had a few more ruder people with the champion comment probably being "why would I want anything from you? filth!", which is a pretty funny response. A lot of people walked up and specifically asked for a book. We gave away our box of book of mormons in like 20 minutes and then a ton of pamphlets and cards. One person took a picture of me with snap-chat to send to his friends who he was waiting for. It was kind of awkward, especially for him, because he was probably hoping I wouldn't notice or say anything, but I talked to him and actually had an ok conversation about the church. He didn't take a book though. My favorite part was talking to the people who were standing near by waiting for the rest of their party to show up. They were usually pretty willing to talk, so we'd chat between me talking to the other people in line and handing stuff out. I'd usually ask them for advice too of what I should say to interest people, which was fun. This most often question I got was what was our/the churches stance on the play. I would say something about how we don't support it, but we're not going to throw a big stink about it either. One other funny conversation was when I offered someone a book and they gave a enthusiastic "yes please!" but then felt weird because they thought I was part of the cast just making a joke. Lots of people thought we were part of the cast at first. The other really neat part about the day was we got 3 different people's contact info on the bus route home, which is really good.
We got 3 new investigators this week, one was a former investigator, the other 2 were media referrals that actually worked out. So it was a pretty amazing week over-all. We extended baptism to one of them for the first sunday in June, and they are really thinking about it, they comer to church though. She had just visited her LDS friend in Arizona and went to church with her and a temple open house too.
Have any of you guys been studying PMG since Elder Ballard talked about it at gen conf? That's a big thing going on here. One thing that stood out to me from it this week was the page where they have quotes from every president of the church in the latter days about sharing the gospel. They are all inspiring and I find it interesting how similar they can sounds, almost like different versions of Joseph Smith's famous "After all that has been said, the greatest and most important duty is to preach the Gospel"
I think that is everything for now! Good luck with everything going on, whether singing, or RS or hot upstairs office rooms!
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