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| Elder Moffitt and Elder Bourne |
Elder Moffitt went out to Utah to BYU with his 3 best friends from high school. Elder Moffitt was the first of the 4 to enter the MTC, Elder Bourne was the 2nd. They crossed paths for about 4 days in the MTC but actually ran into each other several times and got to have a quick catch up.
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| Last night in the MTC |
This is our last night at the MTC where our whole zone sang "God be with you 'till we meet again" in Spanish of course.
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| Me sitting on my bed at a nice and early 3am on the day of departure for the mission field 6-17-2013 |
That Monday was one loooooong day I'll tell you that. Our
flight out of Salt Lake City got delayed for an hour and a half. Elder Powell
and I said it must be for a reason, so we went ahead and started talking to people
in the airport. We found two people, Linda and Steve who we ended up talking to
for like 20 minutes. We kind of did a mini Plan of Salvation lesson. They were
on their way home to London, Just southeast of it actually, where I think
Matt's mission should cover. If so, wouldn't it be awesome if he baptized
Steve? Steve was really interested in what we told him. He said that he was not
a religious person, but after we had talked he said he could see himself being
one. We got his information, and hopefully the missionaries there will be in
contact with him soon.
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| Elder Powell and Elder Moffitt outside the Lubbock, TX airport |
Flying into Lubbock was crazy. I was a little frightened. You can see nothing but farms, and farms, and then some more farms. I was thinking the whole time, "Oh my gosh, I am seriously going to the middle of nowhere?." Once we got off the plane and drove to the city it turned out to be pretty big. Also, where I am right now is one of the "big" cities in our mission. I sent you a map of the mission. It is divided into zones and areas as you can see. I am in the Abilene (dark green) zone. I am in the Abilene 2nd area. Elder King and I cover the Abilene 2nd ward, and the Spanish branch in the city also.
Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday were all super long days. Monday we didn't get to the church in Lubbock until 6. Tuesday, the people heading North took the transfer bus to their areas, so that's when I said goodbye to Elder Powell. The rest of us stayed in Lubbock for the day and did some good ol' door knocking. When we were knocking we actually found a really cool lady. Her name was Andrea. She said she had met with the missionaries a few years before (only one visit) when she was going through a really hard time. They prayed with her and she said she really felt the spirit and received the comfort she needed. She said she hadn't seen them again until we knocked into her that night. She said that she probably wouldn't have been able meet with them during the intermission because of problems with her daughter. But those were over, and she said, her exact words "that you coming right now is like a sign from God." We definitely got here name and number, and the missionaries in Lubbock are going back to see her. Knocking doors in Lubbock was quite interesting. 99% of the doors I knocked on either had a cross, picture of Jesus, or some Christian statue in the window. Ok, I don't think that that was completely accurate. It was probably 100%. Seriously, everyone there is Christian. Here in Abilene it's not quite that religious, but still very very religious. Much different than Virginia where so many people didn't care about God at all.
The second picture is me putting my bike together. I did it
all by myself. There is only one problem. During shipping, one of the brakes
broke. The other one is super loose, and I'm not sure how to fix that yet.
It's nice to not be sleeping with 3 other people anymore, especially when one of them snores so loud there is absolutely no way to go to sleep unless you had earplugs.
I almost forgot! Elder Powell is getting sent up into the Panhandle region of the mission. It's the gray area on the map; it's the really big one that starts with a D. I don't remember the name exactly. A little bit about Abilene. It's pretty decent sized. As you can probably tell since it's one of the smaller areas in the mission. However, Elder King and I still have a car. It is especially useful since we are authorized to drive out of our area (and need to often) to meet with all the Spanish speakers. The Spanish area is on the other side of town, so we spend a good couple hours up there ever day. But it is really hard to run into Spanish people. Basically the only really good way to do it is through other Spanish speakers. There is an interesting law in Abilene about proselyting... We can't do it after 7. So we try to schedule our appointments for later in the day, because if you don't have a set appointment, you can't knock on anyone's door. We have also done some service during this time.
On Wednesday, I took the bus from Lubbock (we left and 9 and arrived and 5) down to Abilene. It would have only been about a 2 and a half or so hour drive if we had driven straight there. But the transfer bus does kind of a little loop to drop everyone off in all their respective zones, so it was a long trip. On the way I was able to see some pretty neat country side. I don't know if you can tell in the first picture, but there was literally a line in the air where you could see the beginning of the dust storm. And the second picture is just a join load of windmills.
It's nice to not be sleeping with 3 other people anymore, especially when one of them snores so loud there is absolutely no way to go to sleep unless you had earplugs.
I almost forgot! Elder Powell is getting sent up into the Panhandle region of the mission. It's the gray area on the map; it's the really big one that starts with a D. I don't remember the name exactly. A little bit about Abilene. It's pretty decent sized. As you can probably tell since it's one of the smaller areas in the mission. However, Elder King and I still have a car. It is especially useful since we are authorized to drive out of our area (and need to often) to meet with all the Spanish speakers. The Spanish area is on the other side of town, so we spend a good couple hours up there ever day. But it is really hard to run into Spanish people. Basically the only really good way to do it is through other Spanish speakers. There is an interesting law in Abilene about proselyting... We can't do it after 7. So we try to schedule our appointments for later in the day, because if you don't have a set appointment, you can't knock on anyone's door. We have also done some service during this time.
On Wednesday, I took the bus from Lubbock (we left and 9 and arrived and 5) down to Abilene. It would have only been about a 2 and a half or so hour drive if we had driven straight there. But the transfer bus does kind of a little loop to drop everyone off in all their respective zones, so it was a long trip. On the way I was able to see some pretty neat country side. I don't know if you can tell in the first picture, but there was literally a line in the air where you could see the beginning of the dust storm. And the second picture is just a join load of windmills.
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| Elder Moffitt and Elder King |
Meet Elder King! He is from Lindon, Utah, and actually knew Braden! Pretty small
world huh? He's only 18, but his birthday is this coming Sunday. He has only
been out in the field for 3 months. It takes 3 months for a missionary to
officially be done with his training. He went straight from being trained to
being a trainer. Pretty crazy for him. But we're doing ok. He's a great
missionary. Our Spanish is a little fun at times, since we're both still
learning, but he is much better than I am. Also, most of our lessons are in
English right now since we are covering an English ward too. The Spanish branch
only had 4 people last Sunday 9, yesterday. I guess 2 of them were less actives, 1 was an
investigator, and 1 was baptized less than a month ago, 1 that can only speak
Spanish. All the other 20 or so people in the branch speak English fluently,
and are just there to help the branch start out. Yeah, the branch was started
like 3 weeks ago. So exciting times here in Abilene.
My first full day here in Abilene was Thursday On Thursday I found out that contrary to my belief in the MTC, I know exactly no Spanish at all. We had one Spanish lesson that night, and my mind was blown. Both the parents, Martha and Nicolas don't speak English at all. But their kids Trine, Jackie, and Nadia are fluent in both. When Nicolas started talking to me super fast every word of Spanish I had ever learned I forgot and I understood nothing. Saturday, we visited with Jovita, a less active hispanic woman (who came to church this Sunday!). She spoke much slower and after much prayer for the gift of tongues I was able to understand most of what she said. Either way, the language is going to take a while, but that is ok. Somehow, it's already been almost an hour, and I still need to e-mail the mission president.
I love you family!
My first full day here in Abilene was Thursday On Thursday I found out that contrary to my belief in the MTC, I know exactly no Spanish at all. We had one Spanish lesson that night, and my mind was blown. Both the parents, Martha and Nicolas don't speak English at all. But their kids Trine, Jackie, and Nadia are fluent in both. When Nicolas started talking to me super fast every word of Spanish I had ever learned I forgot and I understood nothing. Saturday, we visited with Jovita, a less active hispanic woman (who came to church this Sunday!). She spoke much slower and after much prayer for the gift of tongues I was able to understand most of what she said. Either way, the language is going to take a while, but that is ok. Somehow, it's already been almost an hour, and I still need to e-mail the mission president.
I love you family!
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