"I have been doing this craziness for a whole year now"

This week was full of so much craziness. I feel like I say that a lot, but this was legit CRAZY. Everything from dying to spying and everything in between. I don't really want to accept it, but I guess first of all, I have been doing this craziness for a whole year now. So I think I'll just start sending pictures from exactly a year ago instead of any new ones (not really).

So last week (like mentioned, Elder Bagget and I went running the morning after basketball. Then later Tuesday we went on exchanges with the Paintsville Elders, Elder Perkins and Elder Kovac (who is from Switzerland, but is actually Croatian). I went to Paintsville with Elder Perkins and it was pretty sweet. Found some sweet husband and wife to teach who are related to a less active member here, so that was a good time! All the while, I was really tired from basketball and especially running... this is an important detail.

Wednesday morning I was tired, but Elder Perkins and I had a good study and then we exchanged back later that morning. Then we went and worked doing some service working at this park. It was really hot and tiring!! Well we went out and were able to work for a while and found this old guy named Lee, who is just a real funny old man. We actually found him on accident looking for someone else, but he is open to meeting and reading, so we were pretty pumped. But, by this point as you can guess, I was exhausted. Well, I guess I got a little too tired, because my body decided to die on me. Remember when I was sick a few weeks ago? Well I guess it decided to come back and get revenge when I was tired, so I ended up sleeping the rest of the day with a 102.3 fever... yeah that sucked. Literally I ran myself into trouble (hence the title) haha. Oh well, I am better now!

Thursday was a fun day. (WARNING: MOTHERS, PLEASE SKIP THIS NEXT PARAGRAPH)

We got a referral for a bible at this one house in Prestonsburg. We were talking with Bro. King (he is a policeman and he lived right down the street) and he said he knew which house we were talking about. He said he had busted it a few times for all sorts of drugs!!! But clearly if they are doing drugs, they need Jesus especially, so we went anyways. Sadly, they had moved, but we did get a sweet picture of their door notice before we left.

Friday we had Zone Meeting, my first one in Huntington Zone. It was awesome. Elder Kropushek and Elder Curtis are the Zone Leaders and we went on exchanges afterwards. I got to be with Elder Kropushek again which was sweet and Elder Curtis was reunited with Elder Baggett. I had a fun time in Huntington, we got to teach some awesome people there. Then Saturday on the way back, we got held up in traffic due to a parade. That was pretty annoying, but oh well. It was a good exchange. On the flip-side, Martin was going crazy. So we found out earlier in the week that Thomas, our investigator, has had some problems before with the law. So we asked Bro. King, the recent convert, to check if he was on probation or parole, because if someone is, they have to go through an interview with President Salisbury. Well, he ended up finding some sort of warrant for his arrest.... So, before the appointment they had with Thomas on Friday, he was arrested. Yeah, that sucks.

Then, we also found out another one of our investgators, Sister Kidd was in the hospital, unresponsive after a seizure. So that was really sad to hear. Saturday was a good day though, we got to teach the “L” again! We did what is called the 'stop smoking workshop' with Sister L. It is pretty intense, but really awesome at the same time. So now she is officially done smoking! It's that quick and we are so excited for them. We taught them about the Plan of Salvation and it went really well. They are still on date for baptism and we are so excited for them! We also organized with some of the other Elders to visit Sister Kidd in the hospital and give her a blessing.

Sunday was where everything comes together. After church we were able to teach Jonathan, and he has been reading a lot of the Book of Mormon, so he is doing awesome. Then we decided to swing by Thomas' house to see if he was home. We were pretty sure he wasn't, but to our surprise he was! And he told us what happened without us asking, which saved a great deal of awko-taco time. The warrant, as far as I understood, was accidentally issued a month early for some fine he had, so he was only actually arrested for like 2 hours and then came home! So that was an awesome surprise I guess! And, he has totally quit his word of wisdom habits, which is awesome!!! He is reading and doing super well. And even better, he had a good friend move in with him who is from Virginia, who was interested and is now an investigator! We got to read Alma 32 all about with Faith with them, and overall it was just a strange/awesome/funny meeting. Then later after dinner, we heard news that Sister Kidd was given a blessing and was responsive!!!! That was good news. Plus, Elder Baggett made brownies, so that's always a plus.

Spiritual something: So Sunday, I gave a talk. That was a wild ride for me if I do say so myself. I had just been asked to speak a week ago, which was fine. I wrote an entire talk about scriptures and something else to do with that. I thought it was pretty good, but apparently the Spirit thought differently. As I was sitting on the stand during the sacrament, I just felt an overwhelming feeling that I needed to speak on something else (luckily I didn't have an assigned topic). I really felt like I needed to just talk about how Christ is both our Savior and Redeemer, and why those names are so significant, which was something I just studied for like 10 mins a few days before. So that is exactly what I followed. I left my talk on the seat and just spoke about whatever the Spirit helped me speak. It was absolutely terrifying, but I managed to take a whole 20 mins and didn't make a fool of myself. And I really couldn't even tell you anything specific I said, it was really all the Spirit saying something that was way more important than whatever I had planned. It was a very spiritual experience for me personally and I just hope I don't have to do that again. So I just wanted to encourage and invite all of you to PAY ATTENTION! Listen to all of the spiritual promptings you receive, especially during the sacrament, and follow them! The Spirit will always guide you right, I promise.

Anyways, it was a jam-packed week and other than being sick, it was awesome. Plenty of pictures to send, so I'll get that going! Hope you all have a great week! Stay safe and don't visit meth houses!!

Take Luck

Elder Goold



 

12 mumfs ago I done left california

METH