"Well, you could try them... Actually, no. They're probably drunk."

Quote of the week explanation

This week whilst tracting we knocked into a really nice lady. She had had a lot of previous exposure to the church, so we spent a few minutes talking to her and had a great conversation. As nice as she was, she wasn't too interested, so we asked her if she knew anyone who we could go try to share a message with (as is standard procedure). Unlike most people, she actually thought about it for a while, before pointing to the house next to hers (which we had already knocked and been rejected immediately at) and saying the above quote. Good times.

‘Allo.

Its that time again. The time back to sit back with your cold, non-alchoholic beverage of choice and read the ramblings of an only half-sane missionary serving in a part of the country which has almost completely lost its sanity. But I suppose that isn't the most pleasant topic to go into for a missionary general email, so I will refrain from saying any more.

We are still grinding forward. Continuing to move along. It has been a pretty good week in the finding department. We taught a lesson to one family (who unfortunately will be returning to China at the end of this month) and we also found a few people who showed genuine interest in learning more about the gospel and attending church. The final few weeks of the transfer should be pretty exciting.

A little more enlightenment on the lesson we taught this week... It was pretty good. This was a family that we had previously gone to contact, who were friends with a member and are the proprietors of a very fancy, very expensive Chinese art and ceramics store. It is the kind of place that you feel dirt poor just walking into and looking at the prices attached to their wares. We went back there on Thursday evening with our member and taught the husband and wife lesson 1 from Preach My Gospel, which is the Restoration and the Book of Mormon, with some other background on who God is and things like that. These people already have a Christian background, and their understanding of the concepts we were teaching was very good. They gladly accepted the invitation to start reading the Book of Mormon. Unfortunately, they're super busy getting all of their business items wrapped up since they're moving back to China in around a week-and-a-half, but we hope to see them at least one more time before they go. They are super nice people, anyway, and always seemingly happy to talk with us.

Backing up a little, we had exchanges with our zone leaders this Tuesday. I left the area, and went with a gentleman by the name of Elder Smith in the English area. That was quite possibly the best exchange of my mission so far. Elder Smith is a dominant missionary. He exemplifies several traits that I myself am striving to improve on, and is also just a very fun individual to be around. It was a miraculous day. We tracted for around three hours in the evening... and only knocked on around fifteen doors. We talked to and even taught several people for the majority of our tracting session. The very first person we talked to started off by saying that he was "busy," and then ended up talking to us for the better part of an hour, and allowing us to share about the Book of Mormon and a lot of other things. 

We were also let into a house and taught the guy basically the whole plan of salvation (PMG Lesson 2) and also about the restoration and Book of Mormon (PMG Lesson 1). He was a little resistant, being a member of another Christian denomination; but he really opened up at the end of the lesson. It was great. 

We also found a super humble, super super solid lady when out contacting people. It's a pretty crazy story- basically we were out contacting people in the area book as our last activity of the night. We felt like we should go contact this one guy, so we went over to his apartment. It turns out that he had moved away at some point- but this lady had moved in and seems very prepared to hear the gospel. We talked to her on her doorstep for a while, gave her a Book of Mormon, and even ended by saying a prayer with her. It was great. 

Unfortunately, it is not in my area, but it was still amazing to get to take part in the happenings of that day.

Another story- this one slightly different in nature- occurred this Wednesday. My usual companion, Elder Evans, and I were out tracting in a different area. I knocked on one door, and a very kind elderly gentleman answered it. I started by explaining who we were, to which he responded "I know. I was a Methodist." So we talked to him for a  minute more before bringing up the Book of Mormon and asking if he had heard it or anything. "I know" he replied "I was a Methodist. I taught Sunday school." Slightly confused by his repetition of that statement, I tried to say something else, but he cut me off to inform us that he had moved here from Kentucky and that he was a retired banker. We tried to talk to him for a few seconds longer, but it had become obvious that this conversation wasn't going anywhere and that our seed had already been planted. So, I gave him a pass-along card and gave him a little schpeel on how great comeuntochrist.org is (product placement. Heh heh...) for answering questions and things like that (fairly standard procedure when we talk to uninterested people). Before I can close the conversation, though, this fellow (Jim, I believe his name was) asked: "What church are you from?" Thinking that he perhaps hadn't heard me the first time when I was introducing us, I responded by telling him that we were from the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints. His reply: "I know, I was a Methodist. I taught Sunday school." Now, I feel kind of bad for Jim, simply because he appeared to have a high-level case of short-term memory loss, but at the same time it was so hard not to laugh when we were talking to him, because what proceeded to happen from here is he repeated himself almost exactly, and we had basically the same conversation that we had had only moments before. What ended up happening, in effect, was me doing the exact same door approach and getting the exact same responses three times in a row; the first time giving him a card, the second, a pamphlet, and the third, a Book of Mormon. It was definitely an interesting door. We had to physically start walking away to close off the conversation at the end.

And that was, for the most part, the "exciting" parts of the week. We did talk to more people who were interested, who we will hopefully get in contact more with this upcoming week, but for now I think that I have addressed everything that anyone would actually care about reading. Not too many crazy people this week, and no cars totaled. Pretty mellow, I suppose.

It's been a pleasure.

G’bye

-Ben "why does The Good Dinosaur exist" Rivera

P.S. A bit of explanation for that last bit; this week I had a short conversation with another Elder about how neither of us could understand why someone thought it would be a good idea to make the film "The Good Dinosaur." I'm sure all of you who have viewed that particular cinematic feature can agree that it's hard to fathom why it exists in the first place.

P.P.S. "Hello, and welcome to the first episode of Noah's Food Reviews. Today we will be reviewing... KWAYFT MIWIKIW WIP!"

P.P.P.S. Good 'ol Noah.

P.P.P.P.S. There is this one section of freeway that we drive by all the time that has a goat farm right next to it. Not sure if that was a very pressing matter to address, but at least now you know.