Hey hey hey!
It has been a good week. Very busy as usual. But I would have it no
other way. Zone conference was great! I felt super boosted in my
faith. We all left glowing! It was especially fun because this time
for zone conferences, President wanted each zone to do a zone
activity. So after the conference we all got a special tour of the
Mayo Clinic. Our Stake President is the Chair of the Radiation-
Oncology department and he gave us the tour. It was awesome. He is
an awesome guy. The Mayo Clinic is super impressive. It is
ENORMOUS! So that was cool. And when we came back we have a nice
barbeque, played some sweet games and finished with ultimate frisbee.
It was really fun to be able to do that with the whole zone.
President and Sister Clements even played the games with us. We did
an egg toss. And we also played a game invented by missionaries
called cracka wacka. You tie saltine crackers to your waist with
fishing line and then run around with rolled up news paper and try to
hit each others crackers. Once your crackers are broken off you are
out. Ha ha! It was hilarious! We had a lot of fun with it. So that
was cool.
Sorry I keep forgetting to update you on our investigator who gave up
coffee. She is doing really well! Making great progress. It is
still slow. But it is amazing compared to her past progress. Some of
the most spirit filled lessons I've been in have been at her house.
She still struggles knowing if the church is true but she is willing
to act to find out. The real problem is she just doesn't sincerely
want to know it is true yet because she doesn't want to live the life
style. So we are inviting her to repent by helping her live the life
style with the hopes that her heart with change and she will see the
blessings of the restored gospel and gain a testimony. She is well
on her way to a testimony.
We had a killer awesome first lesson with a guy in his 20s this week.
It's actually quite the miracle how we found him. We were driving
somewhere to go tract and we made a wrong turn into this hidden street
and so we decided to just stop there and tract. The second door we
knocked on we met this guy who said he always wanted to learn about
the church but never got around to it. He even said that once he
learns what we are about he might join the church. Coolness! So our
first lesson was yesterday and it was really awesome. After sharing
the first vision we pointed out the spirit and recognized he felt it.
It was awesome! So we invited him to be baptized and he told us not
yet but will definitely consider that. We have high hopes for him in
the future!
I am just amazed at the presence of the spirit with us as we are doing
this work. I'm starting to notice it more and more that it is with me
all the time. That is the blessing of the gift of the holy ghost. It
is so powerful to think that God would give us his spirit to be with
us always at all times. That truly is one of the greatest blessings
we can have here on earth. And it makes you happy! I love being happy!
I've been learning a lot about our eternal progression this week. I
have always been an obedient missionary and so it is pretty much just
a habit now. But I'm finding that coming to Christ is much more than
not doing stuff that is against the commandments (and mission rules).
There is a whole new level of things to repent of and that is
developing the christlike attributes. As I watch other missionaries
and especially seasoned powerful members like President Clements or
our Stake President I realized how little charity I have and how I
need to be SO much more humble and the list goes on and on. This life
is definitely a very big learning experience. And I am learning a lot!
Well, I better get running! I can't believe how fast things are
going! Next week I will know if anything is happening for transfers.
I am just blown away at how quick these transfers go.
Love you!
-Elder Ruesch
