It's been an action filled week! I met my first anti- Mormon, and got
threatened with a shotgun!
Now that I've made sure everyone's paying attention...no, it wasn't
quite that dramatic. Last Monday night we were knocking doors and we
met a guy who is really against the Church. Sounds like he's holding a
grudge for something that happened a long time ago, and he kept
mentioning Joseph Smith and Brigham Young (that, and the fact that we
don't have the gold plates were really all the arguments he
presented). The most interesting thing I noticed about him though was
the negative air that surrounded him. It just felt dark. And even
though he was grinning, he was very clearly not happy. Not just
because there were Mormons at his door, though I'm sure that was part
of it! It was deeper than that- there was darkness in his heart.
As for Mr. Shotgun, I went on exchanges for the first time on Tuesday
and we knocked on this guy' stood. He was nice until he saw the
name tags...... Thank goodness that's not my area. Basically he said if
we came on his property again, he'd get out his shotgun. It was less
scary than it could have been, but it left a bad taste for the rest of
the night.
There were more positive parts of the week than negative, thank
goodness. We had our first district meeting! It was canceled last week
for zone conference. There's three companionships - us, the Spanish
sisters, and our district leaders. We talked about a lot of good
stuff, and learned a lot. We went over the How To Begin Teaching
section in Preach My Gospel again, and role-played it.
We visit a lot of less active members as well. We had a cool
experience with one of them. We'd planned to teach on faith, but as we
were talking to her, both Sister Girot and I felt that we needed to
teach about scripture study. We still started with faith, but we
wrapped it around to scripture study and challenged her to read this
week. Before we left, she gave us these crocheted scripture cases!
They're really cute, and she said they were very durable too.
One of our new investigators has got to be one of the most interesting
people I've ever met. To give you an idea- we walked into his house,
and floor to ceiling, there were stacks of banana boxes. They were
filled with books and stuff, but we are still curious as to why they
are exclusively banana boxes...he is so ready for the Gospel though.
We taught the Plan of Salvation and he really liked it and liked how
it all made sense, even though he had some questions we weren't sure
how to answer.
As for tracting in Hazel Dell, it's been going fairly well. We've been
practicing making our door approaches more interesting and varied
instead of sticking to a routine. It's been helping a lot- we have
more conversations now with people. We found one new investigator-
she's 95! We've seen her twice and we're going back next week.
It's also been pretty smoky from all the fires north of us. This
summer has been unusually hot and dry for them- I still haven't really
seen any rain, and last Tuesday the temperature was just over 100
degrees. Even so, the longer I'm here, the more I love it. The trees
are definitely growing on me (pun intended) and the more I'm here, the
more I think I wouldn't mind living up here. Of course, I haven't seen
any real rain, so maybe that will change my mind. The trees and
flowers are all so beautiful, and it just helps me to have some peace
when I look at the forest, and the huge pines, and remind myself how
long they've been patiently growing in that same spot. They've seen so
much, and weathered many storms, and they grew so tall. That's a goal
of mine, to weather all my storms and grow stronger because of them.
This week has actually been really good for me in that sense. I've
been learning a lot about growing and about the Atonement and about
leaning on God. In my life I've always been afraid that messing up
means that somehow I am the worst person ever, and that I can't be
saved. But this week has been eye opening for me. For about two days,
every lesson and every topic and everything I studied was about hope.
About how the Atonement is a hopeful thing. We read Ether 12 with one
of our less actives, and verse 27 is all about how we need to use our
weaknesses to come unto Christ and He will make them into strengths.
Then we read 1 Nephi 1 with a recent convert, and in verse 14 it says
"because thou art merciful, thou wilt not suffer those who come unto
thee that they shall perish!" It never says we have to be perfect or
that our mistakes make us irredeemable. In fact it's the opposite. All
we have to do is come unto Him. Okay, it's harder than it sounds, but
the point is that it doesn't matter how we've messed up as long as we
use that mistake as a way to come unto Him, to learn and change and
grow. It's okay to mess up, and we can be hopeful and positive about
it. We- well, I- don't have to beat ourselves up about our mistakes.
We will have regret and sorrow, but that doesn't mean we can't change.
We also read a conference talk from last April- "Latter Day Saints
Keep On Trying." I highly recommend reading it, including the
footnotes. I know in Gospel Library at least there's some really cool
points in there.
Anyway, being here is quite the adventure! I miss you all, and you are
always in my prayers.
Stay strong!
Sister Jacobs
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