Week 59 (12/9/2019) You're a Mean One, Mr. Grinch

Dear y'all,

I guess when I come up with a subject line like that I am actually supposed to have a reason for it. But my mom already stole "It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas", so I had to come up with something else. It is definitely beginning to look like Christmas in the apartment, we have a big Christmas tree and a little one. Outside, though, it is in the 70's and beautiful. This week has been lovely weather. It'll still probably be another month before it gets cold here. 

This week ended up being a lot of meetings. Tuesday was our Mission Leadership Council, so we talked about how to help the mission. One of our big goals was to baptize 100 people before the end of the year, and we are still very short, so they are trying for a big push. Another big announcement, and I guess we can link this with the Grinch  is that beginning January 1st, we will only be allowed to eat with members on weekdays if there is an investigator or less active there. So I will probably be losing all those mission pounds I gained, which I guess is a positive. 

I guess I should go back to Monday. Monday nights we have FHE with the YSA, and this week we did a white elephant. I ended up with a jar of dried carolina reapers, the hottest pepper in the world. So what do you think Elder Hardward and I did? That's right, and yes, it hurt. They sure do burn. 

Thursday morning we had to plan our district training for Friday, we decided we really needed to talk about using and studying Preach My Gospel. After we got back from planning, we helped decorate a members yard for Christmas. Once we were done with all of that, we were ready to hit the ground running. Something really cool, one woman answered the door and said "oh, hi elders". Now, people don't usually know who the elders are, so we were quite curious. It turns out that she had met with missionaries 20 years ago, but still remembered and felt good towards the church. She said that she was happy with the church she is going to right now, but that she had some friends and her son that didn't like her church, so she would bring them to our church long enough to get them assimilated, and then she would let them attend with us while she went back to her congregation. Hey, it works for me! It was pretty cool. 

Friday we taught District training, starting at 9 and not getting done until about 5, blegh. A lot of teaching, driving, and good stuff like that. It went well, though. 

Saturday was a baptism for one of the other companionships in Pasadena. Since the church is in our area, we walked around the neighborhood inviting people to the baptism. Nobody wanted to come, but we did meet a YSA who said he wanted to come to our FHE, so that was sweet. 

The First Presidency Christmas Devotional was excellent, if you haven't had the chance to watch it I am sure it is recorded somewhere. First Presidency Christmas Devotional

Merry Christmas! 

Hope y'all have a white Christmas, not much chance of that here. 

Love,

Elder DeFord