Week 12 (1/7/19) The Least Productive Week of My Mission

That is a disheartening statement, isn't it? Well, it was rather beyond my control. 

New years eve p-day party was slightly thrown off by the fact that I was throwing up the whole time. I felt rather better New Years day, but we stayed in to recover. That night we went on exchanges with the zone leaders, I was with Elder Stevens in Oakhurst. It was a really good day. We tried by one person who had said that the Elders could return. Well, she let us in, but was trying to tell us she wasn't interested. I say trying, because we began to testify rather boldly. The spirit was very strong, and I know that this woman felt it. Before we left we got her to agree to pray about if our message was something she should learn about, and let the Elders try by one more time. She may or may not, I haven't heard from the zone leaders, but it was a powerful experience. When Elder Stevens and I returned to Cleveland we discovered that Elder Gunderson had what I had. So Thursday we stayed in for him to recover, until we went down to Kingwood for interviews with president, which went well, nothing particularly to report. Finally, Thursday night, we began to be missionaries again. 

Friday was district training, and we received some new instructions for the new year. The biggest change is that for every 2nd+ lesson we must, absolutely have a member. No member, no lesson. It'll be hard to make happen, but I think it is really going to have a great effect on the missionary work in the area. The second change that really effects us is that Saturday's until 6 oclock are now car-fast days. No cars, period. I'm excited for how the work is going to move forward with all of this. 
For how the work is going, C___ is super excited to be baptized on the 19th, and we are excited for her!
We currently have a small teaching pool, but are looking forward to adding new people to it this week by following up on some return dates that we got from families we found this week. I'm super excited for our plans for this week. 

On Saturday, when we were obediently out biking all day, we found this really cool Sister. We were just stopped at the tables outside of the library to write down some information when she pulls up, and runs up and plugs a laptop into the outside socket at the library. Apparently her electricity had gotten turned off, so she had to find a plug to be able to find out what was going on. Well, we struck up a conversation, and it turns out that she had met with missionaries before and was willing to again! Super cool!

Another cool thing this week happened when we were trying to contact a person we had taught the restoration to two weeks ago. Our zone vision is to be following the spirit, so before we went up and knocked we said a prayer. As I prayed I just had the experience where the words came into my head and I prayed that if R___ wasn't home but his wife was, we would be able to touch her heart and that she would want us to come back. We went up to the door, she answered "R___ isn't home", we testified of how our message helps the family and she set up a return appointment! Following the spirit does wonders! Of course, the return appointment didn't happen...but we aren't giving up hope!

Okay, well that was my week. Cleveland is still great, the weather is holding out strong (can't wait for summer, since I'm walking around in short sleeves in the middle of winter) I love the Lord Jesus Christ and the scriptures, two-hour church is weird, our ward mission leader is awesome, and this should be a great week. 

Elder DeFord

P.s. happy new year

P.p.s I dont actually give people that scripture I shared last week...it just makes me feel better when I'm grumbling. But part of developing my charity, I am no longer complaining about people as I walk away from their door. It's a hard habit to break.