3.17.2014

3.17.2014

I'm glad to hear that you are doing missionary work at home. I sent you all letters.

Last Tuesday I went on a trade off with one of my zone leaders named Elder Gibson. He is from American Samoa and it   was fun to be able to work with him for a little bit. The investigator named Richard I talked about earlier is progressing slowly but surely. He can't read the Book of Mormon very well because he has bad eyesight. We gave him the audio version and he is listening to it. He is also warming up to the idea of baptism.  Friday night we had Wanda's Chicken and it was really good but we didn't have any sour cream to add so it wasn't as good as when you make it. We are also teaching the grandson of the 1st counselor in the branch. His name is Darren (12) and he has a baptismal date for April 5th. He is really open to the gospel and his mom, who isn't a member but is supportive of him going to church but we need to check with her about the baptism. We are also teaching a couple who lives very close to us in a house where the only piece of furniture is a dirty mattress. We sit on coconuts during the last lesson. I can see them changing their lives and it is awesome. This is the same couple that just a few weeks ago were fighting and beating each other. Now when we pass by we see them improving their house and putting a front door on their house. They are reading the Book of Mormon and have come to church. We taught them the word of wisdom last time and they accepted it really well. That lesson was on Thursday. They have agreed to be baptized but they don't have dates set up yet. The only other investigator with a baptismal date is a girl named Doniesh. I don't know if I have told you about her yet but she has a lot of faith. This last Tuesday, we gave her a blessing so that her migraine would go away and that she would feel better because she may be pregnant. She was feeling ill from that too. As soon as we said amen, she was healed and then we had a great time reading from the Book of Mormon. Yesterday we met with a less active member named Akelia. We found out that she has a serious problem with forgiving herself. She wants to punish herself by never forgiving herself.  We read and talked about how the Atonement is for everybody and that part of the repentance process is forgiving yourself. I don't know what to do. Otherwise the work is progressing well. We have several people who have accepted the invitation to be baptized as they find out that The Book of Mormon is true. That's the case with Richard. The last thing that happened last night was that ants attacked me. Elder Jacobson and I were standing off the side of the road talking to a man named Bob. While Elder Jacobson was talking I felt a weird tingling/stinging feeling moving up from my foot. Then it started to hurt. I looked down and both of my legs were covered in little biting ants. I felt like I was in the Indiana Jones movie. Thankfully a guy named Alex, whom we had met before, gave us a ride back to the apartment so that I could shower and get all the ants off of me. That brings new meaning to the phrase ants in your pants. At this stage, I don't know about transfers, I'll find out next week. For family home evening you should go through the PMG lessons in chapter 3. It's never a bad idea to get a refresher on the fundamentals of the Gospel. The work is going well.

I testify that Jesus Christ lives and that through his Atonement, we can be healed of any wounds we may have.

Hurrah for Israel!

Love, Elder Parker