Week 3 in Dunn: Tongue Tacos

Hey everyone!

This week was awesome as usual! Elder Larsen and I worked hard and made some really good progress with our investigators. 

One of our investigators, Emily, is the daughter of a part-member family. They are a Hispanic family, so elder Larsen really wanted authentic Mexican food. They said they would make us lengua (cow tongue). I was nervous the whole week!! Thursday finally came and we had tongue tacos. They were so good! You couldn't even tell that is was tongue. It tasted just like a steak taco!

In our daily schedule, we are to go out at 10 am to start proselyting. 10 came around, we went outside. We decided we wanted to go tract some town homes around the corner. Elder Larsen knocked on the first door. A lady answered, and shut us down real quick. It's my turn to knock on the next door. I knock, a guy answers. We didn't even introduce ourselves and he said to come in! We walked inside and he says, "I've seen you guys riding your bikes around. I wondered why you are so dressed up." We told him we were missionaries. He told us he had never talked to the missionaries before. HE LIVES AROUND THE CORNER AND MISSIONARIES HAVE NEVER TALKED TO HIM?!!? How? It's crazy how sometimes there are people who live so close, but have never heard what we have to say!

Kristen is now working with the bishop to get everything set straight. We are no longer needed on the team for that. We were supposed to teach Reece this week, but he was gone for Memorial Day weekend. We went by to talk to Dories and her husband, but they weren't home.The rest of the week wasn't very interesting, but hoping next week will be great! 

Have a great week!!

Love, Elder Merritt

District or Zone

Week 2 in Dunn: Dunn Is Pretty Great!

Hey Everyone!

Dunn is a great place! We have a lot of stuff going on in the next month. hopefully, a couple people will stay on track to be baptized.

Kristen is the person who had her records removed. We found out it was because of the church's statement concerning children of same-sex couples. She is really excited to come back. She has to be re-baptized since she had her records removed, but it won't be a problem. We met with her this week to help resolve any concerns she had. We are trying to set up a time to meet with her again.

Emily is 15. Her parents are both members. She is super solid. She loves to pray. We committed her to read the Bool of Mormon and to pray about it. We are going over on Thursday to teach her some more.

Reece is 14. His mom is an active member, and his dad is less active. He wants his dad to baptize him, so we are trying to help his dad get re-activated. His date is for July 15th. Hopefully, we can work with his dad to make it happen! We teach him during Young Men's, this week was the Law of Chastity. All the young men were so scared while we were teaching it! They're supposed to help us out while we teach it, but this week was struggle I guess. 

We have a few more people we are working with. They aren't progressing as much. 

Hope everyone has a great week!!

Love, Elder Merritt

Week 1 in Dunn: Dories Has My Dream Job

Well, Dunn is a whole lot different from Apex or Durham. Our area is huge! We are also in the middle of nowhere. We have a full time car, which is awesome. The area is pretty cool though. Elder Larsen is a stud! He is a professional organ player. He will be playing for the Mormon Tabernacle Choir one day!

Tuesday was transfers. They were crazy as usual. We made our way to Dunn and went to a member's house for dinner. Then, I unpacked.

On Wednesday, we had some records on a recent convert we had to send  to Dominica. We also received information that a music minister at a Methodist church is a less active member, so we decided to go break in! We wanted to find out her name. We really didn't break in, the pastor at the church likes us, and gave us the code to the building. I filmed our "secret mission." 

On Thursday, we went to the Habitat for Humanity here to figure out what time to be there to do some service.  We also went to the church and cleaned the font. That was pretty fun! It apparently hadn't been cleaned in a while   We went back to the  Methodist church and acquired the name of their music minister. Then we searched her in the Stake Directory and found out what ward she lives in. Then, sent the elders in that area after her! We are pretty much "secret agents."

On Friday, we went and volunteered at the Habitat for humanity. We organized their entire library! Trust me, that was not easy! I had to vacuum the library after and could not get it to work, Turns out it needed to have water in it. Who puts water in a vacuum? We also had our mission coordination meeting with our ward mission leader. 

Saturday was probably my favorite day of this week. We went and met Dories. She is a 70 year-old woman and plays video games all day. Well, I guess video game. She plays Grand theft Auto for like 14-15 hours a day! She is one of the funniest people I have ever met. We went over to talk to her and her husband, who is a member, and we listened to her tell us that she couldn't come to church because she needs to save up money for the new update that is coming out. The best part is she is getting paid to do this! She is on disability and makes money by staying home and playing video games! I figured out what I need to do. We also got a referral for someone who had their records removed from the church, but now wants to come back. We got in contact with her and got her a ride to church. She is super excited to be coming back to church! 

Well, that was my first week in Dunn. It was a fun week!! 

Here is my new address:

719 W Harnett St.

Dunn, NC 28334

Love, Elder Merritt

Me and Elder Larsen

Week 6 in Apex: Getting Transferred

Well, Everyone, Apex has been great! It's time to go to Dunn! Apex is getting combined with another area, so this is our last week here. 

We had a pretty solid P-Day.

On Tuesday we played corn hole with the old folks again. It's a blast. I put my team on my back this time. We won 149-147! I scored 59 points in that game! I might as well be a corn hole Olympian! 

On Wednesday we had District Meeting. Afterwards, we got our supplies. In the supplies we get a mission newsletter called, "Tar Heel." In the Tar Heel are a list of the recent baptisms of the mission. And, Chris was in there (the man I taught in Durham)! We also met Bill Booze. Yes, that is his actual name. He came up to us while we were tracting, and he wanted us to "enlighten" him. We gave him a Restoration pamphlet. 

On Thursday, we met Ken. Ken is a very interesting man. He is a conspiracy theorist and loved to tell us about Hillary Clinton scandals and underground slave selling rings. He gave us water from a $1000 water filter. Let me tell you, water has never tasted so good in my entire life! We left him with a Restoration and Plan of Salvation pamphlet. Hopefully the elders will go back and see him. 

We volunteered for Habitat For Humanity one last time on Friday. I will really miss serving at that place. It was so fun!

Saturday, we got the call from President James about transfers. We have been cleaning and packing the past two days. There won't be any elders in our apartment after us, so we need to make it spotless. Hopefully, I have learned all the cleaning knowledge I need to finish this. 

Next week I will be in Dunn! I will get the new address and put it in the next email. Until then!

Elder Ryan Merritt

Week 5 in Apex: Elder Kimber Doesn't Know What Happened This Week!

This week was really slow. We found a couple of people this week, Sal and Hugo. Hugo we met the other day, and he wants to have us over for dinner. 

We got in a bash this week. It wasn't the best thing to happen to us. But, if you could win in a bash, we totally won. I surprised this guy because I knew more about the Bible than he did! 

That was pretty much it this week. Super boring week.

The church is true! It's awesome! Learn it. Live it. Love it!

Elder Merritt