Well hello there once again!
My Harrison Ostler Mission guess. This one is simple. He is coming to Arcadia California with me. I will be his trainer. Oh yes, that's it. Inspired?....hmmm time will tell.
This last week was pretty interesting. It definitely didn't go quite according to plan. We had more scheduled appointments throughout the week than I have ever had before as a missionary. It was set up to be the most successful teaching week I've had so far on my mission. One thing I'm working on as a missionary is my planning skills. And I was thinking that this last week was going to be just an absolute testimony to the fact that the better we plan things out, the better the success (mostly as far as teaching lessons goes). But, almost every single lesson we had planned on fell through. Even all but one of our most solid appointments fell through. The only appointments that didn't fall through was our dinner appointments. So I should be grateful for that.
Hmmm speaking of dinners, fun fact on dinner appointments: Elder P and I are the most fed missionary companionship in the ward. It's great. But we actually don't talk about it very much because it's kinda a tender subject amongst the other missionaries in the ward. It used to be Elder Ingram and I getting fed the most. Then it was Elder Rauckhorst and I. But now its Elder P and I. Please notice the constant variable in there (ME) ;) Haha ok that's really not true. It's definitely not me. I wish I was that cool. In reality, what I really think it has more to do with is how well Elder Ingram taught me to work with the members. He was really good at that. And then when Elder Rauckhorst came, he was also a pro at working with the members. I have had two awesome examples to follow. Somehow, I have been able to mimic what Elder Ingram and Rauckhorst were so good at even without having as awesome a command of Spanish as they did. That is a huge blessing. And just one of the perks to being good at working with the members (besides receiving referrals) is that we get fed!
But, that little member work/food talk was quite the detour from what I started talking about. So back on track. Even though we didn't have our teaching week go quite according to plan, we still had quite the week. While nothing went according to our plans, things still did go "according to plan". We still had plenty of opportunities to fulfil our missionary purpose. We were stopped several times this week by people who wanted to talk to us. I'll admit, that's pretty backwards to what my expectations are (usually we are the ones doing the initiating of a contact) but it was fun! The only bummer was that the people that stopped us either didn't live in our area, or didn't speak Spanish. So we have to do some referring to other missionaries. But that's ok.
I think the funnest one was when this dude yelled at us from across the street, "Hey! Are you guys the Latter Day Saint Mormon type?" I responded with, "Yep, that's us!" He then yells, "You guys are good people! You guys were right after all! That Joseph Smith guy knew what he was talking about!"
We went over and talked to him for a while. He was very excited to talk to us. Apparently he had seen something on the History Chanel that proved the Book of Mormon was true and that Joseph Smith didn't make it up after all? It was pretty funny hearing his take on it. I really enjoyed it. I think he went on for about 10 straight minutes telling us all these history channel scientific truths about how the Book of Mormon is true. It was great fun.
Well, Love you all! Till next week.
Elder Benjamin Ostler
P.S. The First Presidency sent out a world wide missionary rule change regarding email. We no longer have limited email time. It is now a choice between you and your companion how long you spend emailing. Additionally, we are now allowed to use email to communicate directly with anyone, including friends serving in different missions. When we learned this, I realized, "Whoops! I never replied to the letter from my buddy Jacob Moss!" Could you get me his email address in the next letter and I will send him a quick email next week? And could you tell his parents to tell him that he should be expecting a letter (email) from me soon? Thanks
