Tuesday, January 7, 2014

Elder Robinson

December 9, 2013

Elder Chapman got his wish; he's back in Maine. I guess that's the only thing that could happen after a week of singing, "Take me home to Maine! Take me back to my homeland!" You kind of have to sustain "land" in order to make it rhyme.

What's odd is that he and Elder Robison, my new companion, switched places. Elder Robison is from Evanston, Wyoming, but his parents moved to Richmond, Texas after he left. He's been out for about 14 months. I don't know what it is, but he's incredibly funny and he looks and sounds intelligent. He drives so slow it makes me want to jump out of the car and walk.

This week with Elder Robison has been interesting, exciting, and a little difficult. We work pretty well together, though we are not yet in sync in teaching. He doesn't talk as much as Elder Chapman did, but that might just mean that he focuses on listening.

We taught Nelly, who Elder Chapman and I first visited, and brought Jake, a member. We bring members to lessons so they feel more comfortable, and so they have someone at church that they already know. We didn't plan on bringing Jake and we already had another member planning on coming with us, but we felt that we should bring Jake, that Nelly would benefit greatly from having Jake there. Jake called us and asked if we needed him, and we said we already had someone coming. After considering that Jake would probably be better to bring because he's closer to Nelly's age by several years, we called him back and asked him to come. After explaining that Nelly had grown up Methodist and had been baptized and had a son, Eli, Jake mentioned that he had been Methodist before joining the Church. He had already been baptized. During the lesson, after we invited Nelly to be baptized, Jake talked about how he struggled to understand why he needed to be rebaptized until he realized why the priesthood was important. I could not have planned that lesson any better. Nelly and Eli came to church yesterday. Nelly had a very spiritual experience in Relief Society. According to one of the Sister Missionaries, you could see the Spirit radiating around her. Eli enjoyed staying after for the "Linger Longer," the after-church potluck We'll be having dinner with them at their house this Friday. Nelly also wanted the Sister Missionaries to come for dinner one night. Coming to church really touched her heart and helped her understand the fellowship in the Church.

Louis is trying to drop us. I suspect it might be because he disagrees with the Law of Chastity, but bipolarity may have something to do with it. I hope it didn't make too bad of an impression on Elder Robison, who hadn't ever met him before. In the lesson, Louis said that he was pretty much done with reading the Book of Mormon, and he had learned all the tricks he needed. I guess he considers prayer to be a trick for getting evil spirits to leave you alone. Right now, we are trying to be good friends. Calling him every night. When we go back, we might teach him a Christmas-themed lesson. That would definitely bring the Spirit into his home. That's what he needs.

I'm personally doing well. No health issues. I'm still working on piano, getting worse (no time to practice this week). Still, I feel really great here, serving. Gotta go, time's up.
 
Love, Elder J.H.Richins

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