Week 34

Another week of tracting in the cold and driving for hours on end finished! I'm very thankful for the fact that our mission president is understanding about miles because there is absolutely no way for us to not go over on the limit.


MONDAY we had some p-day activities here in Taos with the district. It was pretty nice for Elder Shawcroft and me because it let us save some miles and not spend half the day driving. We spent most of the time just walking around the Taos plaza and going to some thrift stores. The plaza is a pretty unique place with a bunch of random stores, so it was fun seeing what everyone wanted to check out. At the end of the day, we had to drive an hour down to Española so we could stay in their apartment for the night because we had zone conference the next morning and wanted to shorten the drive a bit.


TUESDAY I woke up pretty tired because I didn't get the best sleep, but we all got up and got ready to head to Albuquerque. We had a 2-hour drive down so I ended up getting some sleep whether I wanted to or not. Zone conference was pretty great because I was able to say hi to my old companions and say bye to some of the missionaries I know that are heading home at the end of this transfer. We had some really awesome talks on our covenants and how important they are in our spiritual growth and safety. At the end of it all, we said our goodbyes and started the 3-hour drive back to Taos.


WEDNESDAY we did our planning for the week, setting up times to meet with a lot of the people we have been teaching. We then got back to finding for the rest of the day, which went really well because we were able to have some really spirit-guided lessons with a bunch of the people we talked to.


THURSDAY we served at one of the local food banks in town. We normally just help people take their bags to their car and take their shopping carts back inside, but today was really busy so we ended up helping with some of the other stuff like cleaning up empty pallets and helping with the line of people.


FRIDAY we had a really great District council on what we learned from zone conference and a talk from Elder Uchtdorf called "Fourth floor, last door." We talked a lot about having hope for the promised blessings that God has for us and enduring through some of the hard and boring times. Afterwards during lunch with the zone, one of the elders had brought a yo-yo he had gotten on p-day which led to at least half of the zone trying to learn how to do some tricks with it. This may become another obsession in the mission along with pickleball.


SATURDAY we spent the day visiting with a lot of our lessons active members, inviting a lot of them to prepare for general conference in a few weeks. A lot of them were pretty happy to see us and talk with us, with one even asking us to give him a blessing.


SUNDAY we went out to the branch (which is basically just a smaller congregation) we cover in Tres Piedras. It's a really middle-of-nowhere type place so on the drive out there, we'd see a house and then not see another one for something like 10 minutes. It was interesting because I have never been in a branch before so it was new to be at church with so few people. The rest of the day was a lot of tracting in the snow.


My spiritual thought for this week is about the importance of preparing. In Alma 49:7-8, 13-15 it says, "7 And being thus prepared they supposed that they should easily overpower and subject their brethren to the yoke of bondage, or slay and massacre them according to their pleasure. 8 But behold, to their uttermost astonishment, they were prepared for them, in a manner which never had been known among the children of Lehi. Now they were prepared for the Lamanites, to battle after the manner of the instructions of Moroni....13 For they knew not that Moroni had fortified, or had built forts of security, for every city in all the land round about; therefore, they marched forward to the land of Noah with a firm determination; yea, their chief captains came forward and took an oath that they would destroy the people of that city. 14 But behold, to their astonishment, the city of Noah, which had hitherto been a weak place, had now, by the means of Moroni, become strong, yea, even to exceed the strength of the city Ammonihah. 15 And now, behold, this was wisdom in Moroni; for he had supposed that they would be frightened at the city Ammonihah; and as the city of Noah had hitherto been the weakest part of the land, therefore they would march thither to battle; and thus it was according to his desires." Satan will always be trying to go after us at our weak points and our times of struggles, but as we take the time to prepare ourselves spiritually, we will be able to resist him.


1, 2, 3- plaza
4- bye to my first DL
5- statues
6,7- Tres Piedras 






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