Laughing Ralph

1.25.16

This morning elder Thomas and I went on a hike on this cool trail we found in Fort Worth. It was beautiful and it felt great to be in nature. I will attach a couple pictures of our hike:)

This week we had interviews with President Ames. Elder Thomas and I had to organize it all and share a training on the Atonement. it ended up going really well and we had a really cool discussion about Christ and his role in the Plan of Salvation. My interview with President Ames was also really neat, he is a very inspiring man and I can feel his love for me and the love he has for Jesus Christ. What a blessing it is to have someone like him to lead the mission. 

 In addition to interviews we were able to have some good lessons. The first opportunity came when a lady in our ward called us, and asked if we would come teach her daughter-in-law, whose sister had just past away. We went over and talked about the Atonement and the Plan of Salvation. We also shared a cool little video that simply teaches the doctrine of the Plan of Salvation, she loved it! We invited her to church this next day and she ended up coming and staying all three hours. She is battling with addiction, but hopefully the gospel can help her overcome that. My other favorite lesson this week was a lady named Janice. She was a referral who had requested a Book of Mormon. Elder Thomas had given her the Book of Mormon on exchange and had set a return appointment for Sunday. Yesterday we went over to do a bible study with her, and ended up teaching her the Restoration. It was really fun to show her through using multiple scriptures from the New Testament that the gospel of Jesus Christ needed to be restored by a prophet of God. It really opened her eyes, and she told us that she was going to pray and also read the Book of Mormon. Teaching truth is so fulfilling! We have an appointment with her next Sunday.

Also at church this week 2 of our investigators had really good experiences. The first one was Ralph. We have been worried about him, because he has been acting kind of strange towards us. Well during gospel principles he felt the spirit pretty strong and was making tones of comments. He also shared a cool experience he had before church. He has really bad health, and has a hard time getting around. He prayed and asked God if he would give him the strength to walk better. Ralph said that he was able to walk better after that, and he even got out of his chair without using the arm rests to get up. It was really good to see him happy and feeling the spirit. When Ralph feels the spirit, it makes him so happy that he laughs. He could not stop laughing during the lesson, it was hard to not laugh myself:) The other person who had a good experience in church was Ray. He is living with a member in our ward, his sister. He has been taught by missionaries for quite some time. He has a hard time coming to church, because he has a really busy work schedule and he is single dad. He ended up coming yesterday! He loved the lessons and made tones of comments. The ward was really good to him and made him feel very welcome. He told us afterwards that he is going to try to come more often. He really liked being at church, and he loved how nice and accepting all of the ward members were. Hopefully we can continue to teach him and talk to him about baptism soon.

 Have a great week!

Elder Griffin