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Thank you so much for the birthday presents you sent me! I especially loved the new shoes! (which were sorely needed) It sounds like you all had a great week, with the Special Olympics and Klondike and everything else going on. I'm glad you are all staying busy, it's always best that way. We've had a really hectic week, as usual. I think I mentioned this last week, but with the new areas opened up in our zone Elder Hirshfeld and I are super busy now. We're going on 3 exchanges a week! I never have any idea where I am or what's going on, things are just so hectic... It was a great week though. We saw alot of miracles. It started off with Zone Conference on Wednesday. We basically went over all of the same things that we learned the week before at Zone Leader Council when we had that instruction from the missionary department. It was really good though, I still learned a ton. The focus was on our purpose, and most importantly how important baptism is to our purpose. I learned a ton preparing for that, and from President Merkley's instruction, then we talked specifically about setting baptismal dates and did alot of role plays associated with that. As part of that, we learned
alot about the importance of using silence to resolve concerns. It's so amazing how well it works. Sometimes it's hard to just sit there and listen when you want to just jump in and immediately resolve all their concerns for them, but it's SO much more effective! We've already seen miracles from that as we've set 2 more baptismal dates this week! The first one was with a woman with Tamila Bennett on Thursday night. I haven't mentioned her before because that was only the second time we've ever met her, and the first time we actually taught her. She's a referral from the Geurts, a family in the ward, and she is SOLID. She's so spiritually in tune and so converted to the gospel, she's amazing. She's in her 40s and has a 9 year old son still at home. We're working with him, too. :) He wasn't there the first time we taught her, but I'm pretty confident that he will be baptized with his mom on March 6. Then Danielle Smith is getting baptized on March 6. We were finally able to set a date with her. The only downside of this week was that a bunch of stuff came up with the Riveras, so their baptism, which was supposed to be this last Saturday, had to be pushed back to the 27th. It was hectic this week with exchanges, too. Wednesday after Zone Conference, Elder Hirshfeld went to Salem with Elder Draney, and I stayed in St. Robert with Elder Davis. (my son!) We were together Wednesday night and all day Thursday, then he went back Friday morning. Friday and Saturday, though, we were doing an exchange with the Mountain Grove Elders, so Friday morning we all met up in Houston and did a 3-way swap, then I went down to Mountain Grove. So Elder Hirshfeld and I only got to do missionary work TOGETHER last week on Tuesday, Saturday, and Sunday... And that was a relatively light week! This week is even crazier. Thurday to Friday we'll be on exchanges with West Plains, Friday morning we'll be instructing at their District Meeting, then Friday to Saturday we'll be with Mt. Grove again. Also, yesterday (Monday) we were on exchanges with Lebanon. Tomorrow (my birthday) will be our only "normal" day this week! Except that we're going to Rolla for District Meeting in the morning. By the way if you haven't figured it out yet (though I'm sure you have) the reason I'm emailing you today is because we moved our preparation day to Tuesday because of President's Day yesterday. Holidays are always the best for catching families together at home.
So anyway, that was our week. I'm not complaining at all, just trying to show you how insanely busy we are. I'm really loving every minute of it. We have 6 investigators with baptismal dates right now with potentially 3 more on the way in the very near future, so I definitely don't have anything to complain about there! The work is so amazing here. This morning I was studying Doctrine & Covenants Section 4 and Section 12, and it's amazing how much powerful stuff is in those few short verses. One of the many things that stuck out to me today is the use of the word "assist" in D&C 12:8. I love that because it's so true, all we are doing is assisting in this work. It's not my work, it's not Elder Hirshfeld's, it's not President Merkley's work, it's not Thomas S. Monson's work. This is God's work, and He is allowing us to take part in it. It's very humbling seeing the incredible amount of success here, and the miracles that we witness every single day, because there is no way that that comes from us. We are so weak without Him, but through Him we truly can do anything. I don't thank you enough for raising me with that knowledge, but I want you to know how lucky I was to have you both as parents and for the great upbringing you gave me. I know I didn't always appreciate it then, but I certainly do now. Thank you. I love you!
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