A Merritt's Adventures in NC: First Week in Durham: Trials and Blessings

Hey Everyone!

Things are going alright here. Me and my companion Elder Rawlins have had some bad luck this week.

Tuesday: When we first got to our apartment on Tuesday and the missionaries before us left a huge mess for us to fix. While they were here they ruined relationships with the members so President James (our mission president) sent Elder Rawlins and I to do some repair work. Also we had no up to date teaching records for us to go off of, so we pretty much have started this area over. Also on Tuesday night we were tracting in an apartment complex near our apartments, and a lady pulled out a taser on us... So that was interesting.

Wednesday: On the second day of being out here my bike kinda exploded. Well more like the front wheel popped off. I guess when they put my bike together it wasn't on tight enough and I hit a bump in front of our apartment and ate the pavement. My pants and shirt got ruined, so at least I got some souvenirs when I get home! So on Tuesday, when we were getting our area assignments, the missionaries in the Durham 1st ward before us told us that our thanksgiving dinner had to go out of town. So Elder Rawlins and I were planning on just feeding ourselves. Then Elder Rawlins said we should pray to see if someone would invite us over for dinner Thursday night.

Thursday: Well let's just say that prayer was more than answered. When we woke up there was 10 new messages on our phone. All were people asking if we had a thanksgiving dinner plan. It made it hard to say no to the other 9 people, but it was pretty cool to see such a small prayer answered that way. After our dinner we went tracting to an apartment complex we have never been to before. And we came across this girl named Betsy who seemed interested so we got a return appointment for Saturday. We were so excited to actually find an investigator!

Friday: Nothing super exciting happened on Friday. We pretty much just tracted the whole day, but we came across a Buddhist named Weikun. And we taught him about the Restoration.

Saturday: We met with the bishop of our ward at 6:30 am and went to breakfast with him at a place called Elmo's. We asked him how good the members are with member missionary work. He made it sound like they focus on it a lot here. Then around 11 we met with the Ward Mission Leader Brother Broderick. He is a really nice guy and loves helping the missionaries. But he didn't get along with one of the ones before us. I guess one of the elders before us told him that he is lazy and doesn't do everything he should be doing in his calling. I see why President James took them out of here now. We also went back to talk to Betsy but she wasn't home, but her brother said we could try back Sunday afternoon.

Sunday: I guess the missionaries before us weren't liked very much in our ward because no one had anything nice to say about them. I guess me and Elder Rawlins can't do much worse! The first Sunday in a ward is really overwhelming. Everyone was introducing themselves to us, and there was no way we were going to remember all of their names. We also were asked to teach the Gospel Principles class for Sunday School last minute, but we did a pretty good job for not being prepared for it! After church we tried Betsy again, but she told us that she wasn't interested anymore, so our only investigator was gone... This week had been so hard this is what we were looking forward to, and POOF it was gone. We got back to our apartment feeling kinda discouraged. We worked all week and had nothing to show for it. But around 9:20 there was a knock on our door. It was Pam our neighbor.

Let me give you some background on Pam. So the missionaries have been talking to her for a while now, and she has been very interested. She gave up smoking and drinking, she reads the Book of Mormon and Preach My Gospel. She just has one problem. Her husband. He abuses her and she won't turn him in. And every time she says something to him about our church he beats her. Well we can't do anything about it because we don't know everything, but on our first day we moved in she said hello and talked to us for a little bit. Through the entire week I kept telling Elder Rawlins that I had a feeling about her.

Well now back to the story. So we answered the door and Pam was there. And all she said to us was, "I'm ready." She told us she wanted to be baptized and wanted to talk with us some more! Everything bad about this week just went straight out the window. We plan on talking to her today and seeing what needs to happen for her to be baptized!

Well that was my week so far! This isn't going to be a regular thing. I'll probably do these when I have an interesting week. Talk to all of you next week!

Pics of the Week: