Mandolins and Violins

Hello!

This week was exciting. We tracted into a Spanish woman last transfer who decided to take the missionary lessons with the Spanish Elders. After only 6 weeks of study, she’s decided to get baptized! Yay! We also set a baptismal date with one of our own investigators this week. It’s pretty exciting!

Yesterday, we were leaving a sticky note for one of our investigators, when we heard someone playing bluegrass music on the other side of the street. We looked over and saw an older man sitting outside his house playing, so we went up to him and found out that he was playing a mandolin. It was so fun to listen to! He asked us if we play any instruments. When he found out I played the violin, he explained that the mandolin is just like the fiddle, as far as fingerings go. Then he got out his fiddles and asked me to play with him! It was incredibly fun! He started on the mandolin when he was 8, but then picked up the violin in his 30s. Due to his bluegrass training, it was really hard to follow him, he used a lot of embellishment that made it difficult to keep time. I explained that I learned classical violin, and therefore, couldn't fiddle very well. It would be so fun to learn how to do that better after the mission! Anyway, the guy plays bluegrass with one of the brothers in our ward. They go up to the bluegrass festival in Durango every year and perform together. They were just up there on Friday as a matter of fact!

We had interviews with President Anderson this week. After the representative from Church headquarters came in last week, there has been an increased focus on letting people know “Our Purpose” right up front. “Our purpose is to invite others to come unto Christ by helping them receive the restored gospel through faith in Jesus Christ and His atonement, repentance, baptism, receiving the gift of the Holy Ghost and enduring to the end.” Well, they asked us to invite people to pray about our message and consider being baptized on the very first lesson! We’re excited about this, but it will be interesting so see how everything works out, since when you do this, people don’t know exactly what all the commandments are that they will be asked to keep. I guess that’s where faith comes into play. If they receive an answer that they need to be baptized, then it will make it a little easier to keep those commandments. It is a little scary to teach those difficult commandments though, after someone already has a baptism date.

In interesting news, we met a woman who is an energy worker. She has intuitive powers, and said that she saw two little cherubs floating around Sister Crossley. They are twins, and are looking for a good mother…and she also said that they want to come soon. So that made us laugh a little bit . Soon eh?

We taught one of our investigators about the Joseph Smith story this week. I’ve never heard someone explain how they felt the Holy Ghost in a cuter way. “It’s like I have goose bumps…except, I can’t see them! They are on the inside!” Me too! I felt. I love having a reconfirmation of the truth nearly every time I teach.

I was reading about the Spirit World today, and there was a quote about how there is a thousand times more work to do there than there is to do here. I loved thinking about that. Sometimes I get frustrated teaching people who aren’t progressing. But it made me realize, that whatever they learn here, in this life (which IS the time to prepare to meet God) will only help them progress faster in the next life when missionaries on that side continue the teaching record there.

Well, that’s pretty much it. Thanks for your love and support! Ay Yo Nen Shney = I Love You!