Saturday, January 31, 2015

Augusta National Golf Course and Blessings

Hey yall, I aint even gunna front, this past week was the hardest week of my mission so far. new area, a greenie who is older than me by a couple of years, a wreck of a trailer and hardly any work, and separation issues! its weird being in a trailer with just one other missionary and not seeing other missionaries on a daily basis.. its been almost a year since I've lived in just a 2pad. We decided to fast on Friday to help us out, and now looking back, with Sunday and what happened on Saturday, I can see the blessings from fasting.  The previous missionaries left us with a handful of people to see regularly. its a good start I guess. we have a lot of work before us though haha.  

Friday I had probably a life maker. you know that moment you have dreamed of but never really thought it'd happen. Last year my hopes were dashed, but this year they are kindled again! My area is just south of Augusta, we don't cover the city, we mainly cover a lot of the country and then some nice neighborhoods.. hard to describe. but anywho. Friday Elder Sutton and I had to get a tire fixed, we found a nail in one of them. so we headed off to Augusta. Well, on my GPS I noticed a golf course symbol.. uh, you already know! we drove past the members only gate into the Augusta National Golf Course.. oh man. my adrenaline was rushing!! My dreams were a turn away! haha.  





Saturday was an amazing experience. The church building here was built last year, and they had the open house and dedication on Saturday! Oh my goodness, that was an incredible feeling. The way it is built, is so that they can add on to it later when the membership grows and grows! We took people who came in on tours around and just talked about the building. one cool experience I had, I was out on the highway corner with one of the youth waving to cars passing by, and we saw the car pull over and park and this man get out, well me and the 14 yr old walk over to him and start talking, he was going to look at this abandonded house across the road cuz he is a realtor something or other.. ya know, fix it up and sell it.. well he was new to the area from Chicago, and he is working on the power plant that is up the road a bit. we invited him to the open house and then he asked if we had coffee and donuts in there.. haha I laughed and said nope, he didn't know much about the church at all.  well he had to go and wasn't able to come. and unfortunately I didn't catch his number before he left.. shoot.. oh well. So as I left my 14 yr old companion on the corner with some other youth waving, I started walking back to the church, I had left my companion with our ward mission leader and the other missionaries., and as I was walking back to the church, a maybe 50 yard walk, I turned my head and saw President and Sister Cottle driving by! haha, oh it was funny. the one time im walking away from my post!  We had a good laugh about it. But oh, you should have seen my greenies face when I walked in the door behind President Cottle. haha!  

After that, we helped a family move. That was a neat experience. The family who we were kind of helping move had ties back home! to Logan, Smithfield, and Lewiston! it was awesome! it was a weird situation. we moved a family out of a house to their new one a couple streets over, so that the members could move into this one. we were able to make a good friendship with the lady who isn't a member. she had lived in Nicaragua for a while and fed the missionaries there! so cool! where we moved her into was a neighborhood which elder Sutton calls the heart of our area.. its a nice big neighborhood with a lot of potential. it doesn't help me though that it is on a golf course! haha. so nice.   

Sunday church was great. We have a young part-member family that we are working with the husband, such a good guy, he has come regularly since October when they got married! after church we had a really good lesson with them! It was Elder Sutton's first real lesson and we committed Michael to baptism! he has been ready for a while!  I am really excited about this area, even though it was difficult at first, well that's an understatement.. it was more than difficult at first, but I have already grown to love the people here.. for some reason it just is natural for me to be able to connect with people and want to help them.. I suppose I shouldn't say 'for some reason', it it just another testimony to me about patriarchal blessings... I have read mine everyday this week and I know of its power, also prayer and fasting.. it truly does work.  

If you feel like you are slowing down and are all alone, read Mormon ch. 8.. its never that bad for us. so smile :) I love you all!
-Elder Bodily

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