Ups and Downs. And Ups. And Ups.

May 7, 2014

Hello all!

This week had its ups and downs for sure. Luckily, in the context of the gospel the ups are always a lot bigger than the downs. I think a lot of the downs just came from a combination of making transitions/taking over the area/preparing for zone meeting/trying to squeeze in monthly planning/depending on public transportation/a ton of cold rain and other little stressors here and there. I had some humbling moments, but now that that is out of the way, let me tell you of the much good that came!

First off, being with Elder Kia is great! He is full of faith and knows his purpose out here. At the same time, we are having a good time doing the work- we have been setting fun goals in addition to other goals. For example, work in telling a joke during a contact, slip a nice note into another missionaries pocket, choose a baseball team and contact everybody wearing that team's hat, etc. Doing such keeps things from being mundane and has pumped me up when I am feeling down. He is great and we will have a great cycle or two together!

We set four new baptismal dates for people to be baptized by the end of the month. One is Xzavier- this story is awesome! I am just going to copy and paste from the zone Facebook page...

Elder Kia and I went to our investigator Xzavier's house last night. Xzavier has been putting off baptism for awhile now, so we decided to teach the gospel of Jesus Christ to him and his family. His family is kind of crazy, but one by one they went off to do their own things leaving us with Xzavier and his mom and so we talked out baptism with him. Elder Kia popped out the calendar and pointed to May 10 to get my approval. He didn't know that Elder Davidson and I had planned out everything, after last Zone Meeting, to get him to be baptized on May 10. We already had it all planned out, and I was barely holding on to that idea of Xzavier getting baptized on the 10th, but we went for it. We exercised our faith and watched the Spirit work in him to get from saying "maybe" to "possibly" to "I might" to "I am going to do it!" He is getting baptized in  a week. I know that because we exercised our faith as we monthly planned, and kept going with that plan, God blessed us. I know that we will be able to expect that in the future and we hope all of you can build your faith off of the experience with which God has blessed us.

Just for some more context, Xzavier is a fifteen year old and is the last nonmember in his family. His family is great and I actually was in a lesson with them a year or so ago before any of them were baptized- I was on a split and we went there. So that was a miracle for sure! And then Garron is a twelve year old son of a recent convert- his mom was baptized in September last year. He agreed to be baptized on the 24th of this month, and is still feeling good about that. We also committed another son of a recent convert to be baptized and the 24th. We had a powerful lesson with the spirit present. Better than us giving a logical argument on why he should be baptized, we testified and let he spirit give him the hope that he needed and resolve the concerns that we can't see, and so he is on board. We also had a lesson with a guy named Jovan- he has come to church twice now independent of our efforts. We talked with him and it was probably the weirdest lesson I had- he claims to be the Messiah preparing for his second coming. Typical story from the Bronx... But we know and have faith that God can help him to understand things and can change things and set them straight in his mind as he is taught true doctrine, so we set a goal with him of the 24th of this month, and a return appointment for Friday. I have been tempted to deem him as crazy and move on, and have repented of already having done such, but I know that he is a son of God who needs some direction in his life. He also is a lot more humble than the other self proclaimed Messiahs that I have met or heard of out here. So yep :T Those are the people we are working with. Things are exciting! We are shooting for five baptisms this month, so pray for Xzavier, Garron, Bentley, especially Jovan, and then  a miracle!

Things are good! Chugging away at goals. I haven't had as much time in the past week to work on the French, but I still had a couple of opportunities to speak it- a couple contacts on the bus, members on Sunday at church and then a senior couple that inspected our apartment both speak French (I could understand them pretty well, but when I was beginning to learn Spanish I understood white people a lot better than natives). This week I should have a little more time (usually I take a little time at nights, during breakfast/lunch and a little bit of language study when I actually have language study- not the priority since I'm out of the Spanish program I guess). And then less active work is going well- Doreatha came to church this week for the first time since I have been here. She is a tough cookie sometimes, but I am excited for you guys to meet her, in about a week and a half now, huh? She is excited to go to the Lawrenceville Ward, so that will be good for her. Things are great- I love the mission!

Thanks for the support and prayers! You guys are great and I hope you have a good week!

-Elder Griffiths