Obedience and Trying New Things Brings Success (Week #79)

My week's been pretty interesting! 

Elder H is a great guy. He's a really good replacement for Stone. We get along super well. He's from Salt Lake and he was going to go play D-1 football, but he tore his ACL his junior year. A school in Iowa called William Penn gave him a full ride after his mission. He's reallllly good. Super hardworking guy.

Yeah Sister F is from Hillsboro. I don't know much about her honestly. She's really quiet. She likes to run. Doesn't know anyone I do.

We're still working with M. Every Sunday something keeps him from church. This last one was the closest yet though. He was literally in the parking lot of the church at 10;30 and backed out cause he thought it was over (lack of cars apparently...only 6 people at churchSunday  including us...). G has completely dissapeared...we tried by everyday but she never answered...weird..

What are the main things that happened on the following days?:

• Monday - Went to the H's like every pday and ate with them. Taught a lesson about obeying parents (obviously I know nothing about that...)
• Tuesday - Today we had a meeting in Corpus, where President Torres came up and talked to the missionaries and the ward leaders. Basically trying to get everyone on the same page and working together. It went well but it's a little tough to plan with your ward leaders when you don't really have any...
• Wednesday - We had a lesson with M and tried to help him get an answer that Joseph Smith is a prophet...We testified super hard and prayed with him, but he still doesn't get it..The spirit was really
strong. I don't think I've ever testified so hard, so many times to one person, without them feeling it. Something's holding him back...

• Thursday - We had our monthly leadership conference thing. It was really good. President changed things a little bit. Now we have an hour a day where we go out and just knock doors. It's weird haha drove 8 hours...the whole day was driving and in a meeting. Craziness
• Friday - First day trying out the knocking doors was super weird. The first one pretended they weren't home even though we saw him walk in, the second was a JDub who tried to convert us and just about everyone slammed the door in our face and turned us down. My sarcasm came in real handy to keep a positive attitude haha but we found a really cool lady named C who has buddies in Utah who are Mormon and wants to come to church!
• Saturday - Finally got to see the G's again! They're doing good. We're still working on church with them.
• Sunday - Had 6 people in church. We got to talk to M. He asked us for a church tour on Wednesday which'll be cool.

What has been your biggest challenge this week?We had a lot of time spent in other places cause of meetings and stuff like that. So we had to make up a lot of work.

What has been your biggest concern?

Sorta concerned about what M is missing. We've done just about as much as we can. We'll see what happens.

What has been your biggest success?

Finding C was a really cool thing. Good sign that obedience and trying new things brings success.

Who has been your favorite person this week? Why?

Elder H. He's a really fun guy and works and works and works.

What has been your most significant tender mercy?

It's been super hot over here. It'll rain for like a minute and then get so humid it feels like 115. It's nuts. So anytime we get water it's a huge tender mercy.

What are you looking forward to this coming week?Teaching M and C and knocking doors everyday.

Which scripture has had the biggest impact on you this week?

I read a little bit about the atonement the other day. I felt God's love really well when I read it. It was awesome.

How has your testimony grown this week?

I've seen the importance of listening and obeying God's servants. We'd never tracted in our missions before so it sounded a little crazy before, but once we tried it, it was simple. Kind of like the Israelites and the brass serpent.

Love you guys tons!
Elder Hess