Riverfalls Week 3

So this week was pretty average. Nothing too interested happened. Oh, besides the fact that Elder Holland, Elder Dube, Bishop Stevenson, and President Callister came to Minnesota and put on a mission conference for us. Every missionary but 4 (the missionaries in thunder bay canada) came to New Breighton and they spoke to us. We also shook all their hands and took pictures with them. Then they taught us for 3 hours. SOOOOOOOOOOOO AWESOME!!!!!! President Callister told a very amusing story I will now share: When he was a mission president he was speaking to his missionaries one time and a lot of them were falling asleep. So to get their attention, he pulled out his wallet, raised it in the air, and said, "Who wants all of the money in my wallet?" A lot of people raised their hands. He saw one Elder sitting in the back, who he knew did not play the piano, and said Elder, if you come up and play We Thank Thee Oh God For A Prophet I will give you all the money on my wallet. (you can see where this is going, ha ha) President Callister then started to plan out this object lesson he had set up. The elder was going to say sorry, i cannot play the piano. Elder callister was then going to say, well why not? You have fingers. you have the means to do it. and then he was going to relate it to the gospel and studying or something like that. However, this is not what happened. That elder, who didnt play the piano, got up and walked all the way to the front of the room and sat down at the piano. He then opened up to We Thank Thee Oh God For A Prophet. President Callister closed the book and told him to play it from memory. The missionary then proceeded to play We Thank Thee Oh God For A Prophet from memory. Afterwards, president callister was like I thought you cant play the piano? The elder said, I cant. but my mother made me take lessons as a child, which i hated. BEfore she let me quit, she made me memorize one hymn. so i memorized We Thank Thee Oh God For A Prophet. President callister then had to hand $180 over to the missionary. He said he thought about only giving some of the money, but he had made a commitment. He has to keep his commitments. (That was the point of the talk, NEVER BREAK A COMMITMENT). So funny. Elder Holland told us we must come home with one convert: ourselves. What happened next I am not sure I will ever forget. He basically started screaming/fervently and emotionally yelling at us to never ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever,ever go home and fall away from the church. He told us if we ever did we better pray we never meet Elder Holland again because we would be quite sorry. He told us the Lord has made an investment in us. We are His investigators. It was pretty crazy. and epic. and awesome. Also Elder Dube is a boss, i love that guy. Go look up some of his talks. 

So then the next day Elder Holland gave a talk at a special stake conference. He basically told us the story of how is father came back into the church because a bishop, elders quorum president, and sunday school president came to his house one day and asked him to teach a sunday school class. Frank Holland (the father of Jeffrey Holland) realized through inspiration that they wanted him to teach Elder Holland's sunday school class. Elder Holland said that there was only one pathway into the heart of his father, and that was his children. He said the president of the church himself could have asked his father to teach a class and he still would have refused, but because he realized it was his son's class, he came back to church. He threw away his cigarettes right there, got rid of his alcohol, and went to church early a couple days later to drop off tithing. Elder Holland said it was because of normal ward members like you and me that he is now an apostle of the Lord. He thanked us and said to find His lost sheep. He then proceeded to give a father's blessing to the congregation. Such an awesome experience. 

Anyway, lets backtrack to the beginning of the week. Elder Berg and I are apparently doing pretty well here in River Falls teaching wise. Every time we meet missionaries they ask us, "how do you do it?" I feel so privileged to be in an area where the people are so ready. Elder Berg and I are just a couple of young missionaries. (I have been out one month now, and he has been out 5). The field is white and ready to harvest here. Literally. so awesome. Unfortunately a couple of our investigators dropped us this week. But that is the life of a missionary. On wednesday we taught the resto to this guy on the street, but he wasnt interested. I then noticed a guy hanging around behind us. He then approached us and asked us what we believe. His friend showed up about 5 minutes later. We then had a 2 hour discussion about our beliefs in the middle of the sidewalk on the busiest street in the town (its a pretty small town though, only 15k. also a college town though). It was interesting to talk to them and they were very well versed in the bible. We avoided bible bashing pretty well. Although when we gave them the Book of Mormon they were shocked and asked, "you guys read scripture in old english?" We replied yes, even in the bible. they were like wUt. 

Yesterday we had a pretty awesome experience. So I keep memorizing scriptures so I will more easily remember them for when I need them. My setting apart blessing also told me I will study what my investigators need to hear (so far some of the stuff i have picked up and randomly read on a whim i have pulled into conversation and i sit back and think, "oh, that is why I decided to read that randomly".). so we taught this man on the sidewalk and he believes in God and his mercy and is a very faithful man. But he said the bible teaches us that people will try to bring forth new scripture and we should be careful about it. A few days ago i had started learning Ezekiel 37:15-17, so i whipped that out and he was like oh. that.... actually makes a lot of sense. and he sat there in a daze for a little while. it was so powerful. 

And the day before on the sidewalk right next to where we taught the aforementioned man we stopped a girl and taught her the restoration. Afterwards she was like you know, this is ironic. i had been praying to find something like this. we bore testimony that this is no accident, and got a return appointment.

Anyway, I love you all! Have a fantastic week everybody! 

-Elder Damron