Monday, May 20

Dear Family,

      So this week has been pretty good.  We’ve got transfers tonight, but I and the entire district are staying where we are.  So I’m excited, I’ve already spent the majority of my mission here in Cimarron Ward.  I got here early December I believe, a lot different than living in 3 different places your first 3 transfers.  Now I’ll have been kept put for 5, who knows maybe 6.  It’ll be weird for the new mission president doing transfers his first time.  But anyways, this week has gone well.  

     T wasn’t able to make our appointment Monday night, but E was and we taught the third lesson.  She understood pretty well and had actually read the first 12 chapters of Nephi.  She enjoys learning about it and all, and doesn’t have or see a problem with any of it, but just doesn’t have the internal conviction of how important it is, why she needs it yet.  So that’s good.   We showed up for J's appointment but he wasn't there so he haven’t seen him yet.  I was pretty shocked, so I hope things go well.  Sunday morning no one was home, but we left a card with a message for him.  I hope we get to see him again before he moves. 

     Tuesday we tracted into this guy named M.  First he talked to us through the door, and was saying he was Baptist and started talking about awful things that have happened with association with the church, especially a recent thing about a baptism. It sounded like it might be a recent thing in the news.  But he then let us in; he has no teeth, he’s going through some  operations to get them though.  He had them all pulled so they could do this.  He had a really nice 3d tv he could talk to which was cool, and had a little bird that wanders the house and a crazy dog.  But he talked a lot and told all sorts of stories.  I’m not sure how much is true, he seems very emotionally involved with them and there’s no reason yet that I’ve seen to not believe any, other than that they’re crazy.  But some stories about his time in Iraq, his PTSD.  And then some other strange significant stories of heroism in the war, and then about being the one with the nuclear weapon’s codes.  And some stuff about when he found out about his wife, and some of his high school accomplishments... So it’s really unbelievable things, but he also for the most part has these stories down in a detailed way, and actually does seem to know a lot and answers questions well and confidently, so in my opinion he’s just developed his own life story and has been sticking to it for a while now, so I have no idea if any of it’s true.  His house is just covered in bird crumbs and stuff, but he does have some nice stuff and it doesn’t appear he works.  He also talked about his experience with his mom’s death in the hospital, and how strongly he felt the Spirit, and the experience he had there that by which he knows there is a God.  So we worked with that experience and talked about the Plan of Salvation in that and the return appointment we had for the next day, so who knows what’s what, we’re doing what we can, so I hope there’s some honesty in him, that his spiritual experiences at least are real.  Even though it’s a lot of him talking, he’s come a LONG way since our initial contact, he was very against it, but has read some now, and really likes it, and wants to try church and read the Book of Mormon, but he’s got some intense mouth surgeries soon ("first one to do this new operation in Nevada") so we’ll see.

     Thursday we had a good Lesson 2 with J. Wow.  She understands great, and we basically taught Lesson 3 with it, as well as several commandments.  She really loves it, is being baptized June 1st, and excited for the blessings and testimony building experience of giving up tea and coffee even though she doesn’t understand why.  So that’s exciting, she’s a neat lady.  She’s currently looking for work.  Although she’s "interesting'" she’s smart, doesn’t do dumb things, and is normal to talk to and everything.  She’s got a car, and control of her life and everything, she’s responsible and all. 

     So we had a lesson with K Sunday at the church, but he didn’t go to church because he thinks it’s too much to take in and wants to go slowly, last time they started about the law of consecration without defining it at first, and though he did figure it out, and learn about it, and he understands that’s what’s going to happen when he comes to a church meeting full of people who have known the church a long time, he takes no offense and isn’t annoyed but wants to move slower.  But we got him to commit to attending Sacrament Meeting.  So he had been reading quite a bit from different resources and likes to learn extremely carefully and slowly, always checking footnotes and what not, and writing down everything.  So he came with basically a list of words and things he’d thought of that he wanted to understand so he can better take in what’s happening at church, so we basically taught the whole time just showing in the scriptures how the Priesthood is passed down, how the church is organized, offices of the Priesthood, how people receive callings etc.  So it was kind of fun for me, using the Bible to explain all these things, and he now knows it all pretty well and has it all written, but I think it went well at the end how we really smoothly showed how the important thing to take from it all is that God works in a very orderly manner, and that all these different things is the way God still works in the restored church, with restored keys.  And so it felt rather complete I guess when we finished, and we can move into Lesson 2 smoothly next time.  Other missionaries had taught him and he had studied the restoration, so he was already set there, but this just reestablished it as he felt he needed.

     Elder R’s learning a lot.  He’s pretty comfortable in telling me the main points of all the different PMG points now.  Now he knows the basics well enough to know what we believe, and how the lessons kind of are to flow.

     But that’s what’s going on there, gotta go.

     Love,

     Elder Pyron