September 16, 2013

I am so happy to hear that you all are doing good! I am also happy to hear that you have been getting rain, I know we needed it so bad! It rains all the time here. We actually got caught in a terrible lightning/thunderstorm on night this week. We were out tracting and the lightning started and it seemed like it hit right in front of us, we were terrified, and we had this overwhelming feeling like we needed to get back to the car. We made it to the car before anything happened, but we were sure frightened. It was also so intense that we could feel the pressure from the outside in our heads and sinuses (I don't know if that makes any sense, but we had a huge headache on the drive home). 

So this week we almost got into a bible bash with the manager at Dominoes Pizza. He said that he liked our name tags and then he asked what church we were from, we told him The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, He then asked if that was the mormon church and we said yes, he then tells us that we don't read/believe in the real bible, but we told him we read it almost everyday, and then he said "well, you don't believe in Jesus" and we both thought, "come on dude we just told you we represent the church of Jesus Christ, but whatever," we stepped back and went on our merry way, because we were not going to get into that while we were waiting for our food.

We finally have a few investigators!  We have one named Moesha.   I just adore her! She has been through a crazy amount of trials lately and she has told us that she is searching for the truth. She is so elect it is not even funny, but we can't tell her that we are the answer to her prayers, she has to come to that conclusion on her own (which is really frustrating). We are also starting to teach a young 10 yr old boy. He is amazing! His family lives in a tiny trailer and they have very little. His 11 yr old brother teases him because he wants to get baptized, but I have a feeling that he will be converted too. We had a grand old time tossing around a football with him and his bothers while we just got to know them. They are so sweet and he is so prepared to be a member! He really reminds me a lot of Hayden, he just wants to go all the time, but he is so sweet and caring and you can tell he really loves his family and others.

So this week we also visited a less active sister. She is fabulous! She was raised hardcore baptist, and was dirt poor. She told us she didn't even know that there were clothes made for little girls until she was five and started to go to Kentucky to see her rich father, before then she ran around in her underwear. Every summer she would go and live with her dad, who was crazy wealthy and came from the family of Thomas Payne and Henry Clay and so they were well known. Her dad used to drive race cars at Daytona when he was young, but then stopped when he divorced her mom. When she was older she left the Baptist church and became an administrator for the Episcopal church. She raised three children, but never really liked being married (her father was abusive, and she just doesn't put up with anything that a man does, because she is afraid that she will get hurt). She then joined the church when she found that the doctrine at the Episcopal church changed with the times. She said that the hardest thing she has ever done was join the church, but she knows that it is true. She also was once "heart-attacked" by the activity day girls and she keeps the notes in her kitchen and reads them everyday. She truly treasures those notes of encouragement from those young girls. It made me think of Linda, and the time we did that for her. I think stuff like that really means much more to people than we ever realize. 

I love it here! We have definitely had some hard days, but the good days make it so that I can keep going and not think about the hard stuff as much.

P.S. The elders in our ward had a baptism yesterday! That was exciting and it was cool, because it was our Bishop's soon to be son-in-law.

I finally caught a lizard.

Sis Davidson walking down a beautiful southern road.