Hey family,
I really enjoyed your letters, so much. They really lifted my spirits from a really tough week. Thank you so much for sharing some stories and letting me know whats going on with the family, and thank you so much Danielle and Sarah, I really liked your letters, it was so nice to hear from everybody! It really made my day.
Sarah, you made me laugh with those stories. I really miss you guys. I was laughing pretty hard just reading about the fence story, and thanks for sharing about your "buckets" haha :) Your funny.
This week was good. It went by. Some weeks you kinda have to just endure, and pray that God will give you the strength to keep pressing forward. It seems to work the same way with all the trials we receive, they get harder and harder until it seems almost unbearable, and you want to give up. When it gets to that point, if you endure just a little longer, a little past what you think is possible, God will lift that burden off your back, and pour out blessings for your diligence. The light always comes at the end of the tunnel. A witness comes after the trial of your faith. You just have to show that your faith is strong enough.
We have a baptism coming up soon. Her name is Niecy, she's Star-Neesha's sister. Idk if you remember Star, but she's one of my favorite recent converts, because she has such a strong testimony and she wants to spread the gospel to her whole family. Star's mom Catherine got baptized and Star's daughter Kanitra got baptized. Now we're working with her sisters. Niecy is awesome though. She's a 22 year old single mom, she's living with her mom right now and doesn't have a job, she has a 3 year old son, Mike (that kids crazy), and she just hit a point in her life where she feels like she needs to start making more time for spiritual things, and she's really interested in our message. She's golden, and she's really excited for baptism. She's getting baptized on Sept 10th! That'll be sweet :) We also have 2 other investigators preparing for baptism on that same day, Shatoria, and Amos. I hope they all go down, but Niecy is definately looking the most solid at this point.
Elder Christoffersen came to our mission on... Tuesday, I think. He flew in and spoke to us, the Arkansas half of the mission got to see him, but the Memphis half just watched him from broadcast. It's too bad I didn't get to physically meet him, but he did come to the mission and speak to us, it was pretty sweet.
Then Elder Gonzalez (sp?) who is from what I understand in the presidency that presides over all the qourums of the seventy, not sure though, he's somewhere up there, but we did get to meet him and shake his hand, he came to the mission Friday. That was cool too. He had the coolest accent ever, and he's the epitome of a member missionary. Missionary work is just built into his character, he's a stud, and relates everything back to the Book Of Mormon so perfectly. I wish I could take him tracting with me and see his door approach, that'd be sick.
Elder Kowalk's adjusting to the mission nicely, and he has drive, which I love. It's so nice looking over when the alarms going off at 6:30 and seeing that he's getting out of bed too, so we can start the day off with a prayer and build on a ladder of success. He's great, and he puts up with me, so I respect him. He's really into cooking and cleaning, it's like I have a maid living with me, it's pretty cool, and when he makes breakfast he makes it for both of us, and he loves making banana pancakes, so we eat a lot of those, it's sweet.
We've been going through the lessons together and really drilling on become better teachers. I'm excited because he's looking for ways to improve. Which is obviously essential as a new missionary, but not every missionary you serve with has your same view on teaching, and a lot of missionaries get complacent with thier teaching abilities, but for me, I'm never going to be at a point on my mission where I can just say " Alright i'm done learning and improving, I just wanna stay where I'm at." You're always moving, and I you're not moving forward, you're moving backward. I wanna make sure I'm moving forward! I'm excited, because Elder Kowalk feels the same way, and we're evaluating the lessons and trying to pin point areas we can improve.
The mission sure wears you out though. Everyday I wake up feeling like I haven't slept in days and I can't believe I can find the energy to make it another day, but everyday my body and mind keeps working, and when we go in a lesson and start teaching, suddenly I have all this energy, then we leave and I remember how tired my body is, but I aways have enough to keep going. When there's a will, there's a way, and when there isn't a way, God will provide a way.
I don't have any great stories for you this week. Oh, except one interesting thing did happen. I got out of the shower one morning (which was freezing cold, cuz elder kowalk didn't know you don't run the washer at the same time as the shower) and come to find out, the hose that drains the water from the back of the washer fell out, and water flooded half our apartment. So we're getting our carpet replaced soon, but the apartment smells horrible right now, from the nasty damp carpet. lol. It was ridiculous though, Elder Kowalk was freaking out.
I love you guys so much. Keep us in your prayers. We'll keep on keeping on.
-Elder Justin LeBaron
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