Dear Family and Friends,
This week has been quite a busy week with a bunch of highs and lows each day, but altogether, it turned out to be really good for the most part.
Last Monday we had a really fun Family Home Evening with the Marble Family! They were watching Sister Melanie Lorenzo's grandkids so that Melanie could be with her mom, Sister Janet Cruz-Lorenzo all day. Sister Cruz ended up passing away around 10am that morning. I have really fond memories of her and I just love her to death. I remember when Elder Whaley and I first started teaching Sister Cruz and her family when I was first out on the mission. They were a part member family that we had found that wasn't on the ward roster. I had some of the most spiritual lessons ever with Sister Cruz, and I got to see her regain her testimony and see the great faith that she had in our Savior Jesus Christ. I can't tell you how much that the Plan of Salvation hes helped me in knowing that I will be able to see Sister Cruz again. She had a memorial on Saturday morning for her that we went to. It was great to see all of her family there again, and just to be there to help give them comfort.
For the month of February, all of the district meetings are going to be on the role of the Book of Mormon. Today's district meeting was pretty fun. We had an activity with a lot of yarn strung out throughout the entire church, and the lesson was on holding tight to the iron rod. After district meeting, Brother Owen came out with us to go and visit with Colleen. Right now, she has a baptism date set, but we aren't sure how solid that she really is. We finished up teaching about the Plan of Salvation to her. It has been really difficult to tell has interested that she really is on being baptized. This week will tell if we continue teaching her or if we are going to drop her.
On Wednesday, we ended up biking quite a bit, but we met lots of great potentials throughout the day that we are going to follow up with. That night, we went to the church to have a lesson with Taylor Corey. During that time that we were having a lesson with her in one of the class room, my bike got stolen from the inside of the church. Elder Stephens and I had put our bikes in the hallway right next to the kitchen. There were people in and out of the church for mutual night, and scouts. Nobody in the church saw it happen, but we came walking out and saw my bike missing. I was pretty ticked off that someone would come into the church to steal a bike. Now I am in the process of trying to find some transportation for this next week. One of the members here is going to let me borrow his bike until I get another one, so that I am blessed for.
This week we received two church headquarter referrals for people wanting a Book of Mormon. The first guys name is Chris, and we went over and taught him the Restoration and he seemed to be really interested, and we went back the next day and introduced the Book of Mormon to him. He even committed himself to coming to church. Later Thursday night at missionary coordination meeting, we got a Facebook message from Chris saying that he was done taking the lessons with us, but he just felt more comfortable with going to his grandmother's religion. Not much we could do about that besides pray that he will continue to seek for the truth.
The other media referral that we received was for a guy named William. We went and visited with him and started teaching the Restoration to him. Everything was going great until we got up to Joseph Smith's First Vision. That is when we heard a knock at his door. Instantly, I knew that something wasn't right. The guy at the door was his Baptist Preacher, and the first thing that he said is "I heard that you were having a Bible study, mind if I join you?" I think that Williams wife had called him and told him that we were there. We reiterated everything that we had already shared with William, and proceeded to share Joseph Smith's experience. Afterwards, we asked them how they felt, and William felt really good about it. We told him to pray and ask if this was true. When we turned to the Preacher and asked him, he went off on a rant on how you can't trust you feelings. He then proceeded to tell us everything that we believed was wrong, and just wanted to bash with us. It wasn't the best experience that I have had on my mission, but it sure did strengthen my testimony on the things that I know are true. He kept on contradicting himself several time, and I thought of several scriptures that I could use to bash back, but I just kept my mouth close because I know that's not the best thing to do.
On Friday, we watched Ephraim's Rescue for the Movie night at the church. I think that this is now one of my favorite movies. I loved it so much, and the way that it showed the Priesthood being used to bless the lives of others. William Cotton surprised us tonight by coming to it. We didn't think that he was in town. He talked about how he liked seeing the gift of healing, and then we talked to him about him meeting with Bishop so that he can receive the Aaronic Priesthood. It made my day being able to see William again. He is such a great guy. He is really nervous about receiving the Aaronic Priesthood though, because he knows how important that it is and he doesn't want to mess anything up. We are still working with Felix and trying to help him quit smoking. He is doing much better now.
So yeah, that was my week in a nutshell. I hope that you all had a great week also. Love you tons!!!
Love, Elder Leavitt
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