Holy cow what a week. I see God's hand every day, but not like this. The Laurel area is on a revival and it doesn't show any sign of stopping. This was an awesome week. I'm gonna start by talking about Zone Conference
This one was held outdoors at the Casacde Park in Arlington. It was the best one I've been to on my mission, mainly because there weren't any moments where I almost fell asleep. It was a great experience, and I loved almost every minuite of it. It focused on the power and impact that the resotation of the Gospel had, and we all got these cool tshirts!
Also, my comp, some of the other missionaries in our district and I got to perform a musical item, so now i can officially say that i played Cascades Park on my mission. We performed a version of "Joseph Smith's First Prayer" which is a really pretty song. We originally got told it was gonna be another song, then we were asked to change it, then we were told we were doing this one! I didn't really mind, because it just meant that we could keep playing and writing songs. The video of the performance is on my Google Photos album, which is here
But I'm really pleased with how the performance went. I've never performed guitar live before, and it went well. The G string was a little out of tune, and it was especially prevalent as I was playing high up on the guitar, but im still satisfied with my performance. Also, cascade park is just beautiful. Reminds me of Alva Glen back home
Not much happened during the week. We had an hour-and-a-half long lesson with one of our members and her husband. Folk have been trying to baptise him for ages, but he's almost as stubborn as I am. He accepted the commitment to read the Book of Mormon, so hopefully that goes somewhere. Our KI's were really down until the last few days of this week. The Lord really blessed us with fortune, because last night we got about five media referrals, and we were able to make some of them friends! There's a lot of people out here who need a good relationship with the Lord, and we are the only ones who can do it. The proper way, anyway
There was this one friend we went to go and see because he wasn't answering any of our calls. When this happens, we break down the door like SWAT and interrogate them as to why they've been ghosting us. Unfortunately, this guy had no door to break, or house, for that matter. It says on Google maps that there's a house there, but it must've been translated or something because there's literally nothing there. There's also gonna be a video of that on the Google Photos. Don't get fomo now.
The place looked like somewhere out of a cheap 80s horror film, and as we were going to knock his door we were joking about which one of us would get shot first if it came to it. My dear comp, who is awesome, said that I'd get shot because he couldn't understand me. Don't know about that one. If I've survived 8 months in the field, then I think I'll be ok
Our friend Eric is getting baptised next week! Hopefully it all works out, because he's not the fastest responder, and we need to plan a whole bunch of stuff. His baptismal interview is tonight, and I really hope it all goes well.
We (us and the sisters) were at a dinner yesterday, and it was a party. They must've invited more members of the church or extra family to come round or something because the house was packed. You'd think that someone had an empty
Anyway, I got told HALF AN HOUR before the end of dinner that we were gonna be performing a song at the end of dinner.
This has happened before. At Perth uni back home we were told, the day of, that we needed to play a twenty mintuite set at lunch. So not the first time this has happened, but luckily someone had a guitar, which I tuned and we played a version of "Isarel, Israel, God is Calling" that I made up on the spot and it was awesome. Didn't get a video sadly, but it was really pretty
Spiritual thought!
Church on Sunday was, interesting. It was a good day, and we had one of our friends come to church. As sacrament meeting ends, we chat and wait for Sunday school to start. The bishop is running it because it's a fifth Sunday, and he whips out a projector. I take a glance at what's being projected on the wall, and I'm met with a sight that makes the Scot in me regret my life decisions.
A painting of the founding fathers signing the declaration of independence is on the wall.
Sunday school is all about the constitution and the founding of the United States.
Unfortunately, we did not watch Hamilton
It was one of the most awkward Sunday schools that I've been in. It was all about how, apparently, God inspired the US constitution (as it says in D&C 101:76-80) and how great of a land that "we" live in because we get to practice religious freedom. It is a great thing, and something that I'm really glad someone pointed out was that it's important to have agency. It's part of God's plan. The constitution allows people to worship whoever they want, and that was mainly what i focused on, was the agency part, and not the underlying "we are the best" vibe that i got from the class. The First Presidency asked if we could have a discussion on it (I'm not sure if they asked all of the wards and branches worldwide, or just the ones in America. I'm really hoping it was just America) and they (The First Presidency) also invited us to "participate in a unified fast to express gratitude for religious liberty and to pray that it be strengthened throughout the world"
Im gonna tackle that bridge when I get to it, but something that i thought of was how important agency is. The reason why the flood happened in Genesis was because corruption had reached such an agency destroying point that spirits could not, in justice, be sent here. It's good that there are places in the world where we can worship our God. And I'm grateful for everything that he has done for me.
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