Week 2 in Wilmington: The Legends Are True!

This week was awesome! We found 5 new investigators! All from tracting! Lots and lots of tracting. But, we did have some crazy stuff happen this week, too!

We went on Exchange with the assistants. Elder Rawlins, my trainer, is an assistant now. We got to exchange together! It was super fun to be with him again. We tracted a lot and found someone named Terri. She's pretty cool. Hopefully, she progresses. 

I went on Exchange to Hampstead this week too. That is where all the crazy stuff happened.

First, we were tracting in the afternoon in a pretty nice area. After about 30 minutes, we had a guy tell us that we were on the neighborhood Facebook page. Someone had posted that we were knocking on doors,and not to answer. That explained why no one was talking to us!

Next, we knocked on a lady's door around 7. When she answered, she thought we were legal people. She is apparently under witness protection, or something, and isn't allowed to open the door for anyone. As her door opened, her cat bolted out the door! We told her not to come outside, so she didn't get in trouble, and that we would get her cat. It finally went back in after she called for it 20 million times. 

Then, we were tracting in that same neighborhood around 8. And, this guy came to the door with a GUN! At the beginning of my mission, that probably would have scared me. But, I was excited! I have been waiting so long for that to happen! Now, all I need is for someone to call the cops on us, and my life will be complete!

The Facebook thing and people coming to the door with guns are legends/myths. Now, I can say that they are true because I have experienced them! 

Well, that was my crazy week!! Talk to all next week!

P.S. Here are a couple pictures from the week. Me in my unicorn head and of our Exchanges.

1st Week in Wilmington: I Finally Made It!!

So, after 15 months, I finally made it down to the beach! I am with Elder Moeller in Wilmington. We opened the English work for elders here. So, this past week we had nothing to start with. We decided to try to find some people this week, but with no avail. Out of 100 or so doors that we knocked on, only 4 answered. All said they weren't interested. Well, that means that so far we have had a 4% door answer rate, with a 0% success rate. We can only go up from there! Hopefully, this week we can find some people, and get some work going!

On Thursday, we got lost in Wilmington for about 2 hours. Now, I have never been lost before, and we were both making fun of ourselves because neither one of us brought a GPS. We finally found a street we recognized, and followed it back home. Well, that day we decided to walk everywhere to try to get used to the area. We walked about 9 miles or so.

While we were tracting on Saturday, I saw my life flash before my eyes! We rounded a corner, and a huge dog cam charging at me! i planted my feet and got ready to take this dog. As it was few feet away from me, it jolted backwards. It was on a leash! I was so thankful that it saved me! 

Sunday we decided to go to the beach in our area. But we went around 6:30 at night. It was so cool! 

Well, that was our week! Hopefully, this week we can have people to tell you about!!

Love, Elder Merritt

Week 6 in Laurinburg: Transfer Time Again!

Hey Everyone! So, it's transfer time, again. Sadly, I am leaving Laurinburg. It's been a good 6 weeks! We have done a lot of work here, so, hopefully, the elders coming in will have a good time.

We got some great news in the mission! We are getting smart phones! Well, we have to buy them, but we're allowed to use them. It will be so great to have technology! Even better, we don't have to share them with our companion! 

This week wasn't the most exciting. We didn't have many lessons. And, we didn't really have anything crazy happen. We spent a lot of time tracting though. Sorry that this letter isn't too exciting. I hope to have some stories from my next area Talk to you all then!

Love, Elder Merritt

P.S. Here's an updated picture of my district

Week 5 in Laurinburg: CHOCOLATE!!

This week was kind of slow, but we had a good lesson with one of our investigators, Yvonne. She is the one who called us the Heroes of the Kingdom.

We were on exchange with the Zone Leaders that day. We had our appointment scheduled for 2 o'clock. Well, we pull up, and as soon as I parked the car, we got a text. It was from Yvonne. She said she would have to reschedule because her son had to leave soon with his dad. We decided since we were already there, we would knock on the door to reschedule. Well, she let us in! It turned our that her husband got held up, so we had an hour to talk to her. She gave us her condolences for President Monson passing away. She saw it on the news, and after it they had a documentary on Joseph Smith. She watched the whole thing! She told us that she saw some similarities between his story and the 12 Apostles in the New Testament. She was very interested to learn more. We just answered her questions, but next time she has questions from the Restoration pamphlets we gave her. So, that'll be good!

We got snow here this past week. And, like last year, the people went crazy! We weer told to stay off the roads. Well, we went to Walmart to see the chaos that was going on there, and we decided to go see the clearance aisle. As we were going through it, I saw something out of the corner of my eye! It was.. a 3 POUND chocolate candy bar! It was 50% off because it was part of the Christmas stuff. After a few seconds of internally battling with myself, I bought it! No regrets here. It was totally worth it! I haven't even eaten half of it, yet. But, it's really good!

The Dunn's are a less active family we eat with every Friday. They invited us over for Sunday, and after gave us some good news. They have had three of their grandchildren living with them, they go to court on Wednesday to see if the kids get to be with them. I think they are trying to get custody, but I'm not sure. Anyways, if the kids do end up living with them, they want them to be baptized! So, we will get to teach them, and the Dunn's are going to start coming back to church! 2 for 1! I'm super excited! 

Well, those are the highlights of the week. Hopefully, this next week shows some progress as well! 

Love, Elder Merritt

Week 4 in Laurinburg: Heroes of The Kingdom

Happy New Year, Everyone! 

This week was good, nothing too crazy happened to us. We got to call home for Christmas, which was great! I only have one more call on Mother's Day and then that's it until I get home in November. 

We were in a lesson with one of our investigators, Robin, and she asked a question that I had never heard before. She asked why there aren't any female prophets in the Book of Mormon. She said it seemed sexist that there weren't any. We had no idea what to really say to her. We told her that we didn't know. We told her to pray about it when she prayed about the Book of Mormon. So, I guess we'll see how that goes.

On Saturday, we were tracting and no one was wanting to talk to us. After about 30 minutes, we decided we should go to a different place to tract. As we were walking back to the car, a lady on the other side of the street was by her car with her two kids. She yelled something to us, and in my head I was like, "Someone talked to us! There's no way I'm letting this one get away!" I pretty much printed across the street and yelled, "We're missionaries! Can we give you a card?" She said she would take one. She started talking to us about how she has never seen missionaries in Laurinburg before. She told us that she saw the Mormons in New Jersey when she lived up there, but not here. She told us that she was part of a church that did missionary work as well. She called her sons over to talk to us. Well, as we were talking, she told her boys that if they ever saw us, that they had to talk to us. She looked at us and said, "It's really hard out here to preach the word. All the Southern Baptists are happy with what they have, but that devil is the one that doesn't want them to have more truth. It's especially good to see young men out here building the Lord's kingdom. You're like...the Heroes of the Kingdom!" It was pretty cool to have someone call us the Heroes of the Kingdom! It's the best when you run into people like that!! It just makes your day!

Well, that was pretty much our week. Hopefully 2018 brings some good, exciting stories! Talk to you all next week!!

Love, Elder Merritt