November 28, 2011 E-Mail

We had a great week. But with the Thanksgiving holiday everything sort of just went by to fast. And as usual, I can't remember much of what happened. The coolest part of the week was that we had a baptism! John got baptized into the young single adult branch here. It was awesome. It happened on Wednesday night and was a great service. We were a little worried that not many people would show up since it was the holidays. But we had a great turn out. He had one of his really good friends baptize him. He was already practically a member. It was great to see how the branch fellowshipped him. The only bad part about the baptism was that while they were changing we watched the first vision. When they came out my companion got up to shut off the tv and some random guy there started to boo. That really killed the spirit. But over all it was great. I ended up giving one of the talks because the kid that made the program called us about a half hour before the baptism and said, "Hey Elder Schvaneveldt I asked you if you could give a talk on the Holy Ghost right?" He didn't, but that meant I had to. It went well.
Our turkey day went great as well. We had to do a lot of planning and paper work and that was a good day to do it since we couldn't really go out and knock doors. It was still a proselyting day, just not knocking. After all of our paper work and things we went and had dinner at the Pedersen's. As usual, that was really good. Then we decided to go to the hospital to see an investigator we have up there. We spent some time with him and shared a good lesson. After about an hour we decided to leave. As we were leaving a lady from behind us yelled, "Are you mormons?" We turned around and she could clearly see that we are mormons. He dad had just been admitted in the hospital and she was looking for someone that could give him a blessing but they are from Moses Lake so she didn't know anyone from up here. That was a good opportunity to be in the right place at the right time.
We have one investigator that is doing really well right now. Her name is Jennifer. I talked about her last week a little bit. Her boyfriend is a less active who I have been working with for a while. The both of them have come to church the last two weeks and really enjoyed it. Last night we had a lesson and as we were testifying of the atonement, the both of them got some watery eyes. The spirit was really strong. She wants to be baptized but they have a lot of changes that need to be made. But through the gospel of Jesus Christ they can do it.
That's about it for this past week. My back is doing a lot better this week. It helped after getting cracked back into shape by that chiropracter. I'm so grateful to be on a mission and to experience everything that I have. I know that we all have trials, members of the church, and non members. But through Jesus Christ we can overcome any trial or temptation that is thrown in our path. I love the scriptures and the teachings that they contain. Thank you for all you do for me! Have a great week!

Love Elder Schvaneveldt