The Key to the Valley

Had probably one of the best weeks of my mission this week. This week was one of those 1 or 2 huge things that happened that just made you go "woa" and made me feel like Ammon in the BoM or something like that. It was so sweet. I'll get to it though.

We tried really hard this week to Teach on the Spot with people and we ended up finding like 3 potentials off of it. It's pretty easy here because most people are very relaxed and have time on their hands and are fairly open. Also that last 5 or 6 missionaries in Sanford have been pretty cool so people have started to trust us more. Before those 5 and 6 the missionaries destroyed Sanford. But it's come back with some really good missionaries before me and all that stuff. So one guy we were just chatting with about random stuff and then I made some joke about Mormons and he laughed and we started talking about the church. He ended up accepting a Book of Mormon, and the way we found him was such that we actually became friends with him. So when we went back he was still cool with us. That was a good part of the week, finding new people to work with and seeing the fruits of some of our efforts.

John also was back in town this week after having been at conferences the past few. He has really felt the gap in his life from missing church to go to National Security Administration conferences, and so he's like "No more conferences. Until i go to Pennsylvania next year, because I'm doing a church history tour". He also is trying to get to conference next April. Woot! Ordered all the institute manuals and got a bunch more books. He said he listened to an hour long anti program in Oklahoma on "How the Mormon Church is Wrong" and talked about how ridiculous it was. His only question from it was they brought up the Jesus/Satan being brothers thing, which we explained. But ya, he's got home teaching families now and is doing great!

I want to share probably the funniest comp inventory I've had on my mission with Elder Park. We were talking about conflicts we had with each other. Now, he sometimes has a hard time getting out of bed in the morning, so I would go and yank off his sheets and in some goofy voice, reminiscent of my father, say something like "Good morning sunshine" etc. etc. You get the picture. Well here's how the conversation went down (and I share this with his permission)

Elder Gibb: So, what do you got for me, any conflicts?
Elder Park: In the morning, when you pull off my blankets.....I have strong desire to kill you
Elder Gibb: Alright, no more blanket pulling

So we worked it out and there has been no morning problems since. But I laughed at that for a good 10 minutes. It was the way he said it, in his Korean accent and minorly broken english. Even reading this on the screen right now I still laugh about it.

The senior single adults had a thanksgiving party this week, so we brought Tony along, and it was pretty good. They'd asked if us, our WML and someone else from the ward could sing a song. We'd talked about it a bit with our WML and at first I joked about singing "For the Longest Time" by Billy Joel, which he was like "ya! that'd be awesome" but we decided against it seeing as it is a difficult song, the stake president would be there, we are missionaries etc. etc. So we chose "For the Beauty of the Earth" acapella instead. We did a pretty good job, and the member of the ward told us he'd gotten requests for us to perform it somewhere else, but we are pretty busy and so was he so he had to decline. That was pretty fun though and Tony loved it. He didn't come to church though...

OK so we started teaching Steve this week. We've taught him 3 times now and he's so solid it's unbelievable. I won't go into details of what he said, but I'll leave it at, he is pretty much the key to getting the whole valley baptized. It's so amazing how the Spirit has prepared him and what he knows he needs to do. The problem is the divorce and stuff, his ex-wife is in the ward he's assigned too, but amazingly enough, we had a somewhat solid commitment out of him to come to the other ward, but I was sitting in the chapel Sunday, and about 5 minutes before church I turn around and look out the door to see Steve walk in, practically bathed in light. I have never felt anything like that before, seeing him come in when really, we didn't have a lot of faith he would. He was like "well, I'll have to deal with it eventually, so I might as well just do it". We are so stoked, have a lesson with him tonight at a members home and have an inspired plan to give him a baptismal date. Could be my last baptism here, if I get transferred on the 13th which is seeming more and more likely. We are so excited and it's been such a miracle!

Also, my investigator Robert, that I found and taught in Parker for a couple months got baptized this last Saturday. It was such a good week!

Elder Gibb