The WEEK that Was............Amazing!!!

Hello,

Hey happy hello to one and all. Well, this has been an eventful week to say the least. I have a lot to talk about and not much time to do it in. First I will start with transfers…..nothing is changing for me and my companion…we will have a few new missionaries in the zone though which is good and bad….I’m starting to be one of the old missionaries now and it is a different change for me. We will have two more brand new out of the box missionaries from the MTC on Tuesday night….one is a sister and the other is a Spanish missionary. So that’s all the news from transfers.

On to more spiritual things: I had one of the greatest tracting experiences of my mission on Saturday. Let me start by saying I don’t like tracting very much, mainly because I hate bugging people in their homes. I was on splits with another missionary in my zone and we were tracting in our zone leader’s area. They (the zone leaders) weren’t there because they were at the hospital get X-rays done. Don't worry, everything is ok with them. So we pick some streets and started to tract….we got to about the 3rd or 4th door and a very nice lady answered the door….the first thing she said to us was…”hey, come in!" Now those of you who are missionaries or served missions know that doesn’t happen….ever. So we went in and she started talking about how she had had LDS neighbors before and how they had been so amazing and stuff like that. Well,we started talking to her and she said missionaries had come by and taught her before. We asked why she hadn’t joined the church after the missionaries had taught her. She said she wasn’t good enough to be a Mormon - that we were called to be better then her….I then told her that she is a daughter of God…we then kept teaching her talking about a lot of different things and answering questions….it got to the point where the companion I was with committed her for baptism…she wasn’t quite sure still what to do…..so I asked “Would you like to pray right now for an answer?” Now, I have never done or said that to an investigator in my whole mission…it was scary waiting for a response. I had to ask her three times if she wanted to pray and had to read through Joseph Smith History about his prayer to get her to realize it was a prayer that would help to know what to do. She finally agreed….we all knelt down and each said a prayer, with us two going first and then her going last….by the time it got to her she could barely pray…the tears were flowing down her face. It was so amazing. The Spirit was there and it was cool. She thought that we had been sent by a member but really it was the Spirit guiding us. It was so cool.

Then early in the week Elder Zwick from the Seventy came and trained us on how to be better people and missionaries….mostly missionaries though. He talked about not limiting our capacity and striving to be the best we can. It was very inspiring to meet him and his wife, we were able to shake their hands and talk for a minute. His wife gave a great training on being able to talk to everyone. This story I think is inspiring for everyone. Their oldest son has handicaps and had seen his little brothers and sisters go on missions. He would always ask when he was going to get to serve a mission. When they were going to pick up their son who was finishing his mission in Thailand. They were able to get their son set apart by an apostle and he was able to serve for 10 days with his brother as his companion. He was able to share his small and simple testimony that he loves Jesus and Jesus love everyone and he wanted everyone to know that. It was so cool to hear that he was willing to share his small and simple testimony with people. Then he was on a plane by himself and he started talking to the guy next to him and asked him where he was from. The man told him where he was from and he said that there was nice temple there…and the he asked if he was member and then why he wasn’t…he told the man to read the Book of Mormon because it made him feel good….oh yeah their son can't read or write….so know that all you need to share with people is your testimony of feelings and it will touch people's hearts.

Know that I love all of you very much and I hope you all have a great Thanksgiving and eat a lot of turkey and watch lots of football. Again, I know that the Gospel is true and will bless you lives if you live by its precepts…again I love you all.

Love,
Elder Taylor