Hi everyone! wow this last week has too many stories to tell. Just a little warning, this email is gonna be a big one! well to start off Monday night we were doing visits and we had just left a house at 845 pm and we were planning on making our way home, but the bishop called us and said that he NEEDED us to go to a family home evening with him, i thought there were going to be investigators or something real special, so i said sure although i told him we had to be home at 930 and he said he would get us home by that time. Well guess what? we didn't get home by that time haha, and since were zone leaders we have to tell the assistants when everyone is home, and since we weren't home on time he called us! i was just like yeah i know im in trouble. So that was a fun way to start off the week! Then on Tuesday we had our zone meeting! first off i knew this thing was going to go south real quick since the sisters had planned most of it. And then the Sister trainer leaders( basically the assistants for the sisters here) had their part and they start talking about faith and all that fun stuff. they said that we should sacrifice something as a zone and when they started making the list i knew right where this was going. They ended up saying that we should sacrifice some of our writing time on Mondays and time of our pday to do more visits. Now this is a very touchy subject for alot of missionaries since they like their pday. Long story short they basically forced the entire mission to sacrifice their pday. That was awesome(not) because there were a whole lot of mad missionaries and the spirit was no longer in that meeting. i ended up talking to the assistants about that problem actually. Thankfully our stake president came about an hour later to our meeting and saved the day! He pumped up all the missionaries to go out and work hard and find new investigators. He set the goal that we could find 20 new investigators in a week and also that we could talk to 120 people in a week! these are really big numbers in our mission! He said that each companionship that met those goals, hes gonna take us to a V.I.P. restaurant! the one where they take all the general authorities and all the important people who come here haha. Then he put the goal that if the zone got 18 baptisms this month, he would take us all to the temple!(this DOES NOT happen in our mission) so its gonna be so awesome if we meet that goal! Needless to say, the missionaries were pumped by the time the zone meeting got over. That same day i was able to do divisions with my good buddy Elder Smith! i hadn't seen him in a long time, and now that hes here in my zone we took advantage of the opportunity and did divisions! as is mandatory, we bought coke and pizza and told stories until bedtime after we got home haha. Thursday and Friday we had the interviews with President Egginton. He caught me by surprise because while we were waiting for more people to show up to be interviewed he just told me to come into his office! honestly i wasn't prepared because usually we go last haha, it was great though. Our mission president is the coolest guy every. After everyone had finished their interviews on Friday, me and my companion talked to the president along with the sister trainer leaders. He talked alot about the little problem we had in the zone meeting before, that was fun (not). But we talked out the problem and we got the situation figured out. Whats funny is that the mission department of the church is going to change the mission schedule(this is classified information our president gave us). The mission department is going to make our pdays even longer, since they found out that its one of the most stressful days of the week for us! so its kinda funny that the sisters wanted to take away time from our pday, when that goes completely against what the mission department thinks haha. After we ended our meeting President Egginton asked me and my companion what we were going to do in the night, and i just said "do a few visits, why what can we help you with?" and thats when he said he wanted to do visits with us! So he went back to his hotel and we went to lunch and planned on meeting up later. I was so nervous for these visits that while we were knocking on doors, i knocked on the door of a church without even realizing it! I felt pretty dumb after haha. But as we started our visits with the president, the spirit made all my worries go away! We had such awesome lessons and it was honestly great to be able to spend time with our President. Also it was great being driven around in his REALLY nice van haha. Anyways now its time for the really cool part about this week. Me and my companion decided we were going to meet the goals of finding 20 new investigators and talking to 120 people this week. We wanted to put a good example for the zone and we went to work! we have been talking to as many people as possible this week, we have literally knocked on every door of some streets, and we had very little success throughout the week. a few people here and there accepted us, and by the time Sunday came around we still needed to fin 8 new investigators. With the hopes to find them we left home early that day to go knock on more doors. After an hour no one accepted us, so we just went to an appointment we had at 1030. We planned on visiting a member of the church and teaching his family who aren't members. As we went in we started the lesson with just 2 people there, then a few more came, then a few more, and before i knew it i was seeing a miracle, 8 people were sitting down listening to us. When i realized this i was filled with joy. we ended the message and set a time to return, and as me and my companion left the house we were jumping with joy!(not kidding here) we couldn't believe what had just happened! as we started walking to the church the song came into my mind that says "i saw god today". I really had just witnessed a miracle. it was a great mercy of god that we were able to teach that family, and it was by his grace that we were able to meet our goal. That day we were able to sit at church happy and content( something we were sure we weren't going to be able to do). I know that God knows us and loves us and hears our prayers, he helps us if we have faith in him, and after we have given everything he helps us with the things we cant do. I am so grateful to be on this mission and to be able to have these experiences! but the week doesn't end there, last night at about 1020pm, the sister trainer leaders called us and said "yeah were sorry, we realized that what we did really did cause a big problem in the zone. you guys were right, were sorry about that". i couldn't believe the first miracle i saw that morning, but 2 in one day? haha I told you i had a stressful week! But i love everything that I'm doing and i love this gospel, I'm so grateful for the opportunity i have to help other come unto Christ. I know this church is true and i know if we do what god asks he will bless us with blessings untold! i love you all and i hope you all have a great week!
Love Elder Griffin
Couple weeks ago.. Elder Bocanegro saying goodbye
Bishopric...
Bishop and Stake President...
This weeks Pictures--- January 10, 2017 Zone Meeting
Divisions with Elder Smith.
Can you see the beard growth.... 24 hours!
My shoes are worn out! I needed new ones... so I bought some new boots!
They are 10 times nicer than the ones I bought in LaPiedad... those lasted 1 month. these should last 10 months, or hopefully through the end of my mission??? Hopefully!!!!
No comments:
Post a Comment