Saturday, December 27, 2014

Leage City, Week 13: December 15, 2014 - December 21, 2014

Monday, December 21, 2014

Merry Christmas everyone!!! Hope it's a jolly one!

That’s so fun ya'll went downtown! I miss that, especially this time of year. It’s pretty and lively. That’s awesome Jordan sang as well. Yeah, I get to converse with ya real soon! I can call, Skype or Facetime, its up to you. I’ll have all available I believe. We'll be at Elder Ve'e's aunt’s, who lives down the street. I’ll call around afternoon to evening.  Excited to hear from you or possibly see you on Christmas! I’ve got 40 minutes. I’ll probably be different! So, on Christmas, we have breakfast at some wardies, then lunch with Bro. Knabel at the church and dinner with another ward family. I get to open presents and have a Christmas tomorrow too. We have a mission conference and then a party basically. We'll be there all day. Utah Utes for the bowl win, heck ya!!  Seems early for bowl games. 


This week was exciting! Tuesday we had district meeting! I didn’t have to do anything this time, but I enjoyed it. We lost our dinner calendar last Sunday because the relief society president ran off with it. So on Tuesday, we knew we had dinner, but couldn’t remember who and she had the calendar at her house. I went to pick it up and she wasn’t home. I called her after and no answer. So that was lame and stressful. But we lucked out because each family we ate with this week would call or text us first. It’s funny because they were like "Do we have dinner tonight? Are we doing that?” And we were like ohhhhhh, yep. So, we got fed a lot and just hoped that they would keep letting us know.

We went to Jason’s Deli with some newly weds on Tuesday. They were cool, but too lovey-dovey. It was weird. Also picked up a new investigator who was working with the spanish sisters and now got passed to us. She’s 9 years old and her family is less active in our ward. We taught about baptism and I invited her to be baptized! My first invitation! She accepted and her family wants us to work with all them. Plus we can’t baptize unless the family will help her live the gospel and get her to church. 

Wednesday, we moved in the Janson dude into the ward! He came from Atlanta and has a family of four. He had tons of stuff and the elder’s quorum was supposed to help, but it ended up just being us and them. That family is way sweet. 

Thursday we had an awesome day. We met with Kasey and talked about the plan of salvation. She had some great questions. She told us the family situation. It turns out she  and Dave aren’t married. Dave doesn’t believe in the restoration either. He’s friendly, he just doesn’t believe everything we say and then talks and fights with Kasey after. But, we got to understand more of her life and past. We just listened and then I bore my testimony after her telling about everything she’s been through and putting up with at the house. I told her the gospel just makes life easier and that Christ will make us stronger and make good things happen if we let him. The Spirit was strong and then the baptism invite just rolled off my tongue. She accepted. We just need to figure out the marriage situation, help Dave see that some of  the things he has heard aren’t true and help him understand the restoration. Hopefully Kasey, and maybe even Dave, are baptized by January 31.

We went to see the Albrights on Wednesday too. They are some investigators that were referred to us by bishop. Things haven’t gone too well with them until recently and we've seen them for a month. We have had some more serious lessons and we invited them to be baptized as well! There is a mom, Brittany whos 11 and Loretta whos 12. The daughters accepted. The mom, ever since we met them, said that she could feel the Spirit. Its too bad though because she has that feeling but she could feel it more if she just read the Book of Mormon or came to church. But, they’re starting too. They also get super nervous to pray before we leave and they finally prayed this week! It took a month to get them to pray. It was hard but it was emotional once they did.

I went on an exchange on Friday to Bacliff, which is right by the gulf shore. The elder I was with was a little rowdy and I had to step up and tell him we don’t do certain things. I also lead out the studies in the morning because I could tell he wouldn’t talk about anything spiritual. It’s funny because he’s 24 and been out for 6 months. We had a good day though. We saw lots of people and taught well together. We played guitar for a family too. But, that day was terrible with the weather, it rained and flooded everywhere. It rained for 13 hours straight. I haven’t seen anything like it before. It was like a monsoon.

Sunday, I got to sing in sacrament meeting. We had a group of ten members. I did not know what I was doing because they wanted me to sing the alto line and an octave below. We only had one practice last week and that didn’t help. It was scary but I finally felt comfortable on the third verse. We sang Far Far Away on Judea’s Plains. All of sacrament meeting was music. It was instruments and singing, way neat. Ashely has been out of town for the past two weeks. She’s missed church, but we will try and see her tomorrow. The Garza’s came to church though! They came because they had both of the kids this week. If they start becoming more active, their son can be baptized. He is 9 yrs. old.

Last night was pretty crazy. We had to usher 'The Messiah' Sing Along at a Methodist church. So, we welcomed people and gave them programs. I mostly just told people where the bathroom is. Then, they asked us to collect offerings! Weird, weird. A lot of our stake came because members performed and so the stake president okayed the collecting of offerings if we took off our nametags. But, we literally passed a bowl around in another chapel, it was nuts. But a fun week as you can tell!

Love ya,
Elder Janz



Sunday, December 21, 2014

League City, Week 12: December 8, 2014 - December 14, 2014

Monday, December 15, 2014

The Christmas initiative is sweet huh? We use it a bunch. OYM’s (Open Your Mouth, talking to anyone new)), lessons, and of course get referrals. That came out the end of November. The cards are received well. People like them and sometimes we can do more than say hi and wish them a merry Christmas after we give it to them. 

We met Gwen at a gas station on Tuesday and she wanted to come to church and said she liked our first lesson. Then we met her again at the same gas station cuz her friends tell us where she is and we found her outside. She didn’t look too good, smoking a cig and not too happy. We started talking to her and found out that she talked to her pastor, big no no for us. She doesn’t believe in a prophet and isn’t interested anymore. We listened to her concern, tried to explain and we stood on the curb out front for 30 minutes, I swear. She won’t meet with us anymore. We just kept bearing testimony, then thanked her for everything and left. It’s a bummer, but I’m used to it. It just means we have someone else waiting and we can find them.

Thanks for the thoughts and prayers. Had an interesting week. Went up and down during the weekdays. Not much progress, but were trying our best. Yesterday and today have been great. The Spirit won’t leave and that’s how it should be. My favorite part of the week was giving two blessings this weekend, both to members that we’re close to. One is going in for eye surgery and other is way sick. I love those. I still get a little nervous, but that’ll go away soon.

I had a spiritual experience by myself during my personal study the other day. I was praying to close  the study and the Spirit overcame me and revealed that I can do better. Iit cheered me up. It testified that everything I was doing was right and it was just what I needed. All week, there were things that got me a little down and I also wanted to feel closer to my Savior, so my prayer was very sincere and repentant. I cried and had a good time, ha ha. But, I know that prayer, when done with full intent, works. We will receive if we pray, have faith and try our best.

I have some musical performances coming up. I’ll be singing in an octet next Sunday in sacrament meeting. We’re singing "Far Far Away on Judea’s Plains".Then, on the 23rd, I’ll be singing and playing guitar at our mission Christmas Devotional/Zone Conference. I’ll play "Away in a Manger during the week.

Life is good, having a good time
. We just need to work a little harder, find and help people come to Christ. We can get lazy or forgetful. I’ll let you know in two weeks if I’m outa here. It’s quite possible. That would be sad.

Love ya,

Elder Janz