My Last Week In Beautiful Orange, Texas....

Tuesday, Jan 19, 2016

"So I got transferred so that is why this email is a day late. So here it is my last week in Orange, TX...

It was mostly a pretty average day except when we went to a members home to visit them today and I guess her husband went hunting and got some deer and made deer jerky, so they gave us a bag and it was so good.

The next day was a blur, but all I can remember is we met with an investigator who it took 3 1/2 months to contact her again, but we finally got a return appointment. We then tried to meet a person with the last name of  Craquio. We went to their house and we were not sure if it was the wife or the husband who contacted us. So we get to the house and the kids and the mom are riding around on motorized razors and one of the girls stops and talks to us. She said she was going to grab her dad. She goes inside for like 15 min. and then comes out and asked us where her brother was. We look and tell her her he is riding down the street with her mom. So we wait on the driveway and we were like we will talk to the mom and get it straightened out. We are waiting there and the son stops and walks up to us and the the mom keeps on riding! She doesn't even look at us. We are two white guys with white shirts and ties and our tags. We are standing on her property talking to her kids. How could you not look? But she didn't and she kept on riding so we thought we should come back in a couple of days.

So, I'm going to teach you today about how sometimes bets are good to make. We taught one of our investigators today. His family lives at their mother-in-laws home. She is inactive. We are talking to our investigator, Josh and the mother-in-law comes in. She starts to hear us and then says to Josh, "Dude, when are you getting baptized?". His response was, "When you come to church, I'll set a date with them." Then they shook on it. They made the bet and it was super funny. Also, we were walking to the other elder's apartment and this little kids who was probably about 4 was outside. He started to talk to us and he was super funny. He points at me and (I don't know if it's a red tie or not) says. "Hey, you look like that character from "Spider-Man". So yeah, honestly it made my day cause that kid was freaken cute!

Today we had another lesson with a guy named Russell. I've talked about him before, but here's a quick run down: He's been investigating the church for two years. He is a baptist chief of deacons(which is like 2nd in command to the preacher). He is also the church's treasurer. He knows the Book of Mormon is true and that Joseph Smith was a Prophet, however he is too high up in his church to leave. We meet with him every Thursday at 1. Anyway, today we thought we would switch up lessons and teach him something from the Bible( a book he is very, very, very knowledgeable on) So we show up and started to talk about Matthew 13. Now if you aren't familiar with Matthew 13, it is the chapter where Christ gives the people eight parables. We start talking about it and he is a very smart man, but we have a trick up our sleeve. We started to use the LDS student manuals in gospel Library. We got him to download them and follow along. Not long into the lesson, we were having him read quotes that Gordon B. Hinckley said and Joseph Smith quotes. He kept saying, Wow, I never took this parable to mean this, but it makes so much sense. So hopefully we are trying to get him to use Mormon beliefs in his church he teaches at and we can baptize the whole congregation. 

We had a referral that came in so we went to his house and we met this guy. He was super nice and invited us in, so we sat down and talked to him. He told us he is studying to become a Baptist preacher and wants to know more about our faith. We are meeting with him two times next week. He told us he doesn't want to bash us or anything. He just wants to talk about our religions, so we will see how that works out.

So today, we had a meeting with one of the stake presidency. He taught us some things about Lehi's dream. After we were driving to his less active's house. We saw this guy on the side of the road with a shotgun. We stopped and talked to him and he said he was hunting, in the middle of the neighborhood! So we were almost to the less actives door when we hear like 5 gun shots. Elder Hunter yelled, " Did y'all get him?" and then there comes back a voice, "Yeah, but there is not much left of him.

We went and taught a few more people and then we got a call from Sister Bishop(Sister Evans). She asked if we could help her move some hay bales. We got in our street clothes and when we got there, it started to pour down rain. So we were working and we probably spent about 45 min in the pouring rain. But then Sister Evans cooked us some fried chicken and corn and it was worth it. We rushed home after to get some dry clothes. 

Today was my last Sunday in Orange, so I said goodbye to everyone. Had lunch at a members after church and then another member invited us to dinner. 

It is transfer day today, so I got transferred and I am now in Mid County, which is about 30 min from Orange, so not much of a change. So lets see how this transfer will work out. He seems pretty okay but hey it is only 6 weeks, right? Maybe 12 if I really gotta learn humility.
Love,
Elder Saunders

Thanks for "stickin' with me, Elder Venche, Elder Lawrence, me, Elder Hunter! Orange, TX  January 2016

An awesome member in Orange, TX  Everything about him is cool.