Are you church people?

Awh man, Aubrey! YAH GOOF! [Aubrey was slow to realize that Connor was just kidding about the tornado in his last letter.] That is so hilarious! I'm sorry your week was boring and uneventful... Mine was too. :) haha No, really it was pretty dang good. Collin, I’m glad you had a good time at PROM. I'm also glad you won your games. I was a little bit worried about those ones. ;) So, we just finished playing 2 hours of sand volleyball with the zone leaders. Elder Schofield is gone and we have a new zone leader in training named Elder Jensen. He is a really cool guy and a stellar missionary. It is actually getting pretty competitive. It's definitely a really good stress reliever, especially because I'm undefeated. The Gilbert game is going to be crazy! Collin, you better win... OR YOU'RE WEAK!!!!

 I apologize. I forgot to bring my journal today so I have to remember all my experiences this week. First off, I did go to the temple open house with an investigator. His name is John and he worked for Hallmark as a photographer for 40 some years. He is an older man and RLDS (there are a ton down here). The RLDS church believes that Joseph smith III was meant to be the next prophet instead of Brigham Young... Even with the BOM though, their church lacks DIVINE INSPIRATION that can only come through a prophet of God. So in the past 20 some years their church has split, removed a good chunk of the Doctrine & Covenants and is starting to allow stuff that I’m pretty sure Jesus Christ wouldn't allow into his church 2000 years ago... like gay marriage. So John kinda stopped going. At the temple he took some pictures outside (they are some of the best I’ve ever seen. He is GOOD at what he does. Anyways though, before we went to the celestial room we were asked to be quiet. We got in and started to enjoy the spirit when after 5 seconds John starts going off on all the reasons why he can’t join the LDS church... Nobody had said anything to him but I’m convinced it was the spirit slapping him in the face. On the way home he was saying too that he just wishes he could be happy again... GAAAHHHHHHH! We will help him understand how this week.

Also man so many miracles are happening this week between the ZLs and us. Tuesday we met with a former investigator, his girlfriend and 10-year-old daughter (sound familiar, Trevor?) This guy’s name is Greg. He weighs 350 pounds, is an ex UFC fighter and he is HUGE! Their whole family knows that it’s true and they really want to get baptized but Greg is on federal probation until 2015 so he will need to get First Presidency clearance. We had a super awesome lesson over there and stayed for about 2 hours. The 10-year-old girl’s name is Alexa and she had some awesome questions like, what if there was no Satan? and why do we need to repent? We also had a music battle with her recorder and my ocarina. Don't ask. I have no idea how that happened. Oh, and then after the lesson, Elder Bills runs out to the car and we get in and he was not doin’ good... at all. On the way home, he says, “Forget it,” and parks in the middle of the gas station. Twenty minutes later, Shane Pope and I are teamed up and we see Elder Bills come out and he was still a mess! He couldn't even find the car on the way back, which need I remind you was in the middle of the gas station. He gets in and I offer to drive. He says no and, long story short, Elder Bills spent the night in the bathroom, so Shane and I planned together until his mom came to get him. Shane btw leaves for the MTC in 2 days. He is going to Germany. The next morning Elder Bills still wasn’t doing good and we had 2 early appointments so the ZLs took him to district meeting while Shane and I went and taught. I kinda flew solo. It was weird.

Also, this week we met a kid named Adrian who is 19 has a rare form of cancer. When he saw us he said, "Are you church people?! I need to get baptized!" MMMMMMHHHHHHMMMM. We shared the restoration and gave him a BOM and set a date for the 5th of May. Oh, and on a sad note, Bernard kinda started blowing us off since we set him on date... heartbreaking... oh well! Discouragement is just one of the 6 destructive D's—Doubt leads to discouragement, to lack of diligence, to disobedience, to something else and then disbelief.

Oh hey! On May 5th there is the cultural celebration! The Prophet and Jeffrey R. Holland are coming down! You can't watch it on BYU TV or online but you can talk to Bishop and he can set up something in the chapel so you can watch it. I think it’s pretty much the same deal as the priesthood session of conference... if that makes sense, but ALL the missionaries are joining together to sing "To Bring the World His Truth." So, not only does that mean I get to be in the same room as the Prophet, but I get to perform in the cultural celebration! Oh, and it means I will see Elder Jordan Clare!

I’m super pumped and I love you guys so much. Give Zach my well wishes and Collin, once again, PLEASE smash Cody and Ty [Gilbert High School’s best volleyball players]. PLEASE!

Love,

Elder Ward