Monday, September 24, 2012

Letter for September 24, 2012


Hey all!

This week has been a very good/interesting week.

It started out super slow this week. We didn’t have the greatest week
last week like I wrote about. We were trying to do a lot of finding
and we were diligent in doing so, and the Lord blessed us with more
people to teach.

So, first off for the family. I will let you know that I did something
very silly on Tuesday.  I was messing around with some of the
settings on my camera, and it turns out that on accident I erased all
of the photos and videos I had taken on it. That goes clear back to
when I was with Elder Excell. I was really bummed about that. I had a
lot of sick videos and pictures to send home. I was just about to send
it home too. So now I'm trying to make up for it by taking a lot more
pictures. Sorry about that. I can't do anything about it now.

So from about Monday to Thursday was just really hard. We would struggle to even find someone to teach. We would drive all around to just about
every investigator we had everyday. They were either not home, or they
were home and were super duper busy. Even when we would find someone to
teach. They were already on the edge of being dropped, or it wasn't
the best lesson I had ever taught. We kept going though.

Friday is our weekly planning day. That is when we take 2-3 hours of
the day to plan for our investigators and for the area every week. We
were in the middle of planning and setting goals for how many lessons
we wanted to get in when Elder Janne stopped and looked at me. We
talked about this area. We decided to change our mind set about the
work and the area. We went out, we went knocking. We found a really
cool older lady name Amalia. We were just talking to her about the
Book of Mormon and what it was. She was like "oh it's another book to
help us understand the bible better right?" We were amazed. She had a
lot of responses about our comments of the restoration that went in
line with our beliefs. So we are really excited about that. We also
have been contacting a ton of referrals that we have been receiving
from members, and other missionaries. The coolest one we found was
Luis. He is fourteen years old. Very smart kid. We were explaining and
teaching him about the restoration and he loved it. He knows a lot
about the bible too. It really surprised us. He accepted to be
baptized. So we are going to follow up with him soon hopefully. That
might be our biggest challenge with him.

We are also still teaching Miguel. We taught him a lot about church.
That was our biggest focus with him. Because that was our biggest
problem when I taught him in La Habra. So we taught him a lot about
it. He really opened up to us this week about how he feels
"spiritually dead" he feels that's how his spirit is. So we read with
him in 2 Nephi 4. I could see on his face how bummed he looked. He
told me that he feels like how Lehi felt when He said he was "drooped
in sin" we explained that through Christ he would never have to feel
that way anymore. We went on Sunday morning to wake him up to go to
church...nothing. He didn't go at all. I don't know what we are going
to do about that, but I do know that the Lord will direct us in the
right direction.

We also started to teach some former investigators that sister
missionaries taught. Their names are Jesus and Hortencia. They seemed
way open about the restoration. They also accepted dates to be
baptized. Now we just have to get them to church. So we are excited
about that.

So we saw Miguel and Dane, the Jehovah's Witnesses again a few times
this week. We actually had a really good lesson with them. See because
usually when we had a member with us they would go off on a whole
other topic and they would eventually get back to what we were going
to teach them, but it would always end up bad. We just went in
ourselves. We told him our purpose as missionaries. We taught them the
restoration again. I don't know though if they really are interested.
bad I know, but they got the whole message in. So this next
appointment we have with them is probably their last chance. We
learned why Miguel is 'afurera' or outside his church. so we'll see
what happens.

That is basically the week we had. I'm starting to gain a great
testimony on the power of the priesthood though. so last Sunday I was
asked to give a blessing to an elderly sister in the ward who was
about to take this strong medicine. and how she basically had to be
confined in her room for like a few days and stuff like that. She
wanted a blessing and asked that I perform it. I did, then we left
and moved on and I didn't see her for a week. She came to church the
next Sunday. And she shared her experience. She told me that all that
I had said and blessed her came true. She did not feel pain like she
was expecting to. She went through the whole process without any
problems either. Which she and the doctor’s thought she would. She also
said that when I blessed her I said 'tu vas a sentir el amor de Dios
que tiene para ti" or something like that. That translates to you are
going to feel the love that God has for you. She said as she was in
her room when she took the medicine. She could feel the spirit so
strongly and she said she could feel the love God had for her, and
that she could feel Him helping her and comfort her. I thought that
was awesome. I know the power of the priesthood is real, and that it
has the power to work miracles.

I'm also starting to get a greater love of the Book of Mormon. I
receive revelation everyday reading from it. How could one not read
it? I guess I never thought that growing up. I wasn't the best at
reading it. But let me tell you. I will never go a day without reading
it. I know it's true and that it's the word of God.

I love you all! Thank you for your support and for all you do to help
me out. I've been so blessed. Can't wait to hear from you soon!

Elder Dallin M. Ollerton

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