17 meses!

Yeah that is right! I hit 17 months (meses) on the mission yesterday. It's crazy to think about... I really feel like it was just the other day when I hit 13 months and was still with Elder Sherwood. Time flies... But it has been great!

To report on this last week, it was good.

Elder Frei and I have been thinking of ways we can improve the work and so we (mostly me) have decided to stop eating with members so that we can focus on finding more and searching for the elect. I say mostly me because I don't think he likes it very much. He is the one that is always shy to tell the members why we aren't eating with them and what not, but I'm not because it was a great idea on our part.

We started doing it this week and the Lord has blessed us because of it. Our past, normal weeks usually went like this: Every Monday we would have dinner with the same family (a recent convert) from 7-9. And then the other day's dinners would last for 1.5 hours or more because the families never had dinner ready when we got there and we would always be eating at like 6:00 or 7:00, right when it is prime time knocking hours.

But, because we stopped dinners we have been eating at 4:30-5:30 or 5:00-6:00 and have been knocking from 5:30-9:00 or 6:00-9:00 right when people are getting home and the family is together. And like I said, the Lord blessed us this week.

On Monday night when we would have normally been eating dinner we were knocking instead and found OB Williams. We call him OB-1-Kin-Obi because that is how we remember it. We set up a return appointment and we went back last night and had a great lesson with him. The Spirit was strong and he accepted a baptismal date for the 24th of July.

Tuesday we received a Headquarters referral from Salt Lake City, and we went and contacted it that night and set up a return appointment for the next day. They seemed very interested, even though the appointment fell through because his Dad went to the hospital. But we will be working with them as well. They are a part-member family and they have just moved here from Brigham City, and so we had a good talk about that.

Wednesday we went by the family of 6 that we have taught once. We were supposed to have an appointment but only the Dad was there. But, we had a good talk with him about the pamphlet of the Restoration and he really liked it. In fact, he read it twice. We will be going to teach them this Wednesday as well.

Thursday we taught a guy named Sergio and invited him to be baptized, but he hasn't returned our calls or texts so apparently he wasn't very interested. Then, a funny thing happened on Thursday. We were knocking this apartment complex and we knocked into this pastor that is like 27 or so and we get talking. He had talked to Elder Frei before and what not.

We hit on the Book of Mormon and on the Gospel and how it is necessary to be baptized by the proper authority. Well, he didn't like that and he asked, "Where in the Bible does it say that baptism is necessary?" and so I responded, "John 3:5." He looks it up and reads it and says, "That is the most lame scripture there is, and that's not what it means, the interpretation of it is that when a mother's water breaks that is being born on water..." Well I don't have a lot of patience when people say stupid stuff and they have no idea what they are talking about and so I said to him, "That is the MOST embarrassing thing I have ever heard, you should be embarrassed. Maybe you should open up The Book of Mormon and open your eyes a lot" and we walked away. He then started to yell "That book is trash!!" and we just kept walking. Elder Frei had a good laugh about it and so did I.... I know, I know, not very Christlike, but I couldn't put up with that.

Friday and Saturday we knocked all day. I had buzzed my head so I got really sun burned on the top of my head. But it was all good. We talked to a lot of people and got a lot done.

Sunday was the highlight of our week of course. It is the day when the fruits of our labors shine. Every success depends on if our investigators come to church or not. And we had success...! Saturday night we stopped by a potential investigator. When I first got here, two days after arriving, we went to the cemetery to dedicate a grave for this family, because one of his best buddies is a member of the church and he wasn't able to make it. So we did it for him and we tried to go by to teach the family but they weren't really interested. Well we felt prompted to stop by on Saturday and talk with them. We had about an hour conversation with the dad and how he was going through a rough time with the family and what not. We testified that if he wants to have it improve that church is the place and the Gospel is what he needs in his life. We invited him and his family to church... and guess what.... they came!! Now the coolest part about this is that it is a family of.... 13!!!! They have 11 kids... probably 6 that are over the age of 8. And they loved church!!! We are going by to teach them tomorrow and talk about what they learned and felt at church. They are very promising because they are going to love the fact of eternal families. We are stoked for them!!!

And we also found a woman last night named Olivia, that we taught and she said that she is searching for the truth and has always wondered which church is true. Well you can imagine how that conversation went. We are teaching her this week as well...

Like I said the Lord is blessing us. We have talked to a lot of people and have found a lot of people this week that we are going to start to teach and help progress towards baptism.

I told you that this week's email would be a lot better than last week. The work continues!!!

Love you all!

Elder Harvey