WA-TAC Week 2

Ok, so first of all this week has been really great, the weather this week was amazing almost all week and when the sun actually comes out here it is beautiful! Today we are back to overcast but whatever. So P-day's are sooo much fun! After I got done emailing last Monday all of the elders from the zone came to the church building and we played kurnsball (it's a made-up game, it's basically soccer with volleyball rules, and a line of chairs is the net, it's a blast) and then we played an intense game of handball it was a blast.

People still hate us :)  But we also have some really great people that we're teaching. We recently knocked into this 17 year old kid named Thomas. His hand is deformed (I think he was born that way) but he is just a normal, smart kid who is seeking answers. We set up an appointment for the next day, and that day we had to go on splits with the elders quorum. So what happened was I ended up teaching the first lesson to Thomas by myself with the Ward Mission Leader, which meant that I had to teach the first lesson by myself basically. But it actually went really well and he came to church this Sunday and he is going to mutual this Thursday with the youth here. I'm really excited for him.

A couple of days ago we were walking down the street, knocking doors, (we do a lot of knocking here) and this guy stopped his car next to us and told us he wants to talk to us and that he lives 5 houses down. So we walk over there and by this time he had run inside, grabbed his bible, Book of Mormon, and his notes and he is just ready to bash with us. It was pretty funny. (On a side note Elder Marsh has told me that he used to be really into bashing so he actually knows his scriptures pretty well) anyways in the end Elder Marsh just shuts this guy down, in a positive way, and it ended up being pretty funny.

The other thing about Washington is there are a lot of pot-heads and meth addicts. Sometimes we will knock on a door and when they answer they have no teeth, it smells, and well it's just really awful.

Two days ago we had a pretty neat experience. We had a couple appointments set up but they all fell through and nothing that we were doing really felt right, knocking felt like a waste of time because no-one was home, and nothing was working. So we said a prayer and a few minutes later the bishop of the Brownsville ward texted us wanting us to go visit this young unmarried couple, Erick and Sarianne, Erick is a non-member who was an alcoholic, did every drug you can imagine but for 2 years now has been clean since taking the missionary discussions. He wants to get baptized so bad but they are not married, and she is just a little nervous. This has been going on for a long time. So we went over there, got to know them, and ended up getting into the problem and it was super spiritual. Finally she turned to Erick and said "set a date for your baptism" so that was crazy. We are going to continue to work with them and hopefully that will be fruitful.  But amazingly that day went from seemingly useless to having helped someone out and that was awesome.

Yesterday we had a missionary fireside which was AMAZING!! it was new converts bearing their testimony's interspersed with the missionary choir (us) singing our versions of certain hymns and I love the way we sing them so so much. If I end up getting the opportunity to go to another transfer meeting to hear the music again I'm recording it because it's amazing.

Also the Elders Quorum President here is brother Snyder who apparently knows Krista Maurer and Brother Brad Gaynier. Apparently Brother Gaynier and Brother Snyder were MTC comps, so that's crazy.

Anyways I think that's it for this week. Everything is really great here, I love this mission a lot. there are already things that I'm going to miss when I go to Brazil.  But at the same time I'm slowly losing my portuguese so it would be nice to go pretty soon. :)

I love you all so much, thanks for all the amazing support you give me

Love,
Elder Chandler Hyer