Monday, November 29, 2010

Family and Friends,

These pass couple weeks I have been so busy and I have so much to talk about ha ha ha. So bare with me. I had the opportunity to have dinner with president Watrous. Bobi (an amazing ward missionary that helps us with everything invited us to have dinner with her and the mission president and his wife. Just me and Elder Bannister. I love Bobi but she thought she was doing us a favor and said this is a once in a life time chance to have dinner with the president with just you and your companion. Yes, that was true but I was so nervous and stressed out ha ha. I just told myself to act myself and I did and it turned out great. I love president and Sister Watrous! It didn't turn out as bad as I thought but we didn't get out of dinner in a hour so that was the only bad thing ha ha. Bobi, if you see this "Thank you" for all your work. I was able to finish The Book of Mormon for the third time this year and for the first time on my mission. I love The book of Mormon and the Gospel of Jesus Christ that is in it. I am reading more then I have ever had and I love it. I also love personal and companionship study! We are teaching two young men Zack and Zane!! 13 and 16 years old. We have taugh them almost all the lessons and their baptisms are scheduled January 8th. SO EXCITED!!!!!!!!!!!! We are continuing to teach them and reactivating their father who is an amazing guy. I was able to go on another exchange with the Yale elders over to the Chinese Branch. I was with Elder Ellis and we taught an old 80 year old Chinese man that spoke no English. I just smiled and nodded my head. ha ha. Elder Ellis and I were tracting this one neighborhood or cul-de-sac and we were on one side of the street and there were to girls on the other going door to door also and we met up house to house. Elder Ellis told me they were Jehovah Witnesses. I said, "No way" and started laughing hysterically. How often does that happen! It was like clash of the religions. We tried talking to them but they skipped the house we were at and went to all the houses we went to. It was ridiculous, but funny. I also taught English to a Chinese and Korean sister and they were so funny but it is hard to teach English when they don't understand you and I don't understand them ha ha. By the way, I keep calling exchanges transfers. I don't know why but an exchange is one day but a transfer is at least 6 weeks. I did another exchange with the zone leaders. I was with Elder Lawrence from Riverton, Utah. He has been out for a year and 6 months. We found a lot of potential investigators and talked to a Buddhist monk old lady who hair was shaven and had a sacrifice table. She had all the vegetables she would sacrifice. It was the weirdest thing I have ever seen. She was very nice though. ha ha. Turkey day was the best, it was like every other day ha ha. The only difference was we had a huge Turkey dinner with the Moore family. I enjoyed it because I was able to tell everyone why I was so thankful to have the Book of Mormon in my life and being apart of Jesus Christ's Church. My Parents spoiled me by giving Brother Sparks ( a member of my home ward) a ton of goodies, a toaster and a pillow tie ha ha which he dropped off on his trip through California. Thank you for that surprise Mom and Dad it made my day. I also got a sweet Christmas tree that I adore. I have had the terrible experience of losing three amazing investigators who were my friends and I loved very much. First family I taught Lia and her two children. This week they have been praying, reading the Book of Mormon and committed to coming to church and we were going to set up another Baptismal date. When we talked to them on the phone they said that they could not meet us anymore and that Lia will not let her kids read the Book of Mormon ever again. We went and talked to her and she said that the Book of Mormon was racist and that it was man made. She read the part where Laman and Lemuel skin turned dark as a cursing. She read the whole book in one day marking all the "racist" versus. I have never felt so bad, so sad in my life. She was progressing and doing all the things necessary to gain a testimony of the Book of Mormon. She would not listen to us and said that our whole church was racist and that she could not trust her kids around us. We have done so much service and things for her kids that i really could not believe it. I didn't know what to say. I bore my testimony that the Book of Mormon is the word of God and he loves all his children Black or white, Male or Female, bond or free. She said it was a contradiction to the book that sets us apart from every one else. I told her how much I loved her and her boys and that she would come to an understanding of that in this life or the next and that Heavenly Father love her to. She shut the door and that was it. I did not know what I was suppose to say. It hurt to think that all we have done for her, all the spiritual experiences she has had, she cut it all off because of a misinterpretation of one thing. This is Why a mission is hard. I just need to continue to rely on the Lord and pray for guidance and support and everything will go as planned. I know that we set up a good seed with Lia and she knows how genuine and caring we have been for her. I want all of you to know that The Book of Mormon is another Testament of Jesus Christ and it is the most true book. That you will come closer to Jesus Christ by reading it. I love you all hope you had a wonderful Thanksgiving and give thanks to all of you. Stay tuned for next week see ya.

Elder Brown