Well, congratulations to Kiley and Traci - they win the prize for "most diligent writer". I've only gotten 2 snail mail letters since I've been in Indiana. Mom and Dad get the "most email" award. I haven't heard via email from anyone else. (Mom did you fix it so people can just click "reply" to this email and it sends it to candice.humpherys@myldsmail.net? I hope so.) I haven't heard anything from Shana. When I tried to call from the airport, it said the number didn't work, and then we had to board.
Well, for Thanksgiving, we went and helped Sister Thayer with some preparations and then we went to Emily's to eat and play games. It was a lot of fun, and very good food. Then we went to the Feiks (ward missionaries - young couple) for games afterwards. They all offered us food, but we ate way too much at Emily's.
Friday was an awesome day. We had district meeting and I got to see Elder Chase from my MTC district. The zone leaders committed us to either drop or commit to baptism our "eternal procrastinators". In our weekly planning on Thursday, we had dropped a few, and we were going to call Pam Spaulding on Friday and explain that we had to drop her if she wasn't going to progress. She's been meeting with missionaries for a long time and has had all the lessons multiple times. She's hung up on the authority issue, and Sister Jenson said that missionaries haven't gotten in to her house for 9 weeks. We'd go and she was always busy or not there or something. After district meeting Sister Jenson felt that we needed to go see Pam rather than call her. We reviewed what we would say and then went. She answered the door and said she was working on something, but much to our surprise, she invited us in! We sat and visited with her for a bit and she told us she found out her friend is a member of the other ward in our area and she was going to go to church with her on Sunday! Then we found out that she knows the Thayers and when we told her Ashley (Sis. Thayer's 14 year old daughter) was getting baptized on Dec. 5th, she said she was definitely coming! She was so excited to find that she knew members. She's a great lady. She invited us over to make candy and also insisted that we come over for Christmas. (Side note - Christmas will be a p-day for us.) So, we did mention to her that we needed to spend time with people who would progress, but we changed our mind on dropping her. I think she feels more comfortable now knowing some people, and I think it's time for her. Unfortunately her grandson got sick and she didn't make it to church, but we took her a conference Ensign (she let us in again!) and we're still planning on making candy and teaching her and getting her to the waters of baptism.
As if that wasn't enough awesomeness, also in our Thursday planning we made a goal to get 1 referral a day for this week. We got TWO referrals that day for BOMs! We called them back and we will see them later this week. Nathan sounds like a YSA, so we'll have to turn him over to the YSA elders, but we can still teach him first.
Sunday was even more awesomesteristic than Friday, believe it or not. Sharon Flake came to church with Sister McGlone. Sister McGlone teaches primary, so she asked us if we would take her to the classes. Sharon's sister and some other family members were members of the church. She moved to Bloomington about 12 years ago to help her sister who was sick. Her sister passed away recently. As we talked to Sharon, we came to find that her sister was really strong in the gospel and shared her testimony often with Sharon. Sharon was a smoker. She told us that she wanted to quit, but she just couldn't do it. Then in October, she prayed and said "God, if you help me quit smoking, I'll go to Your church". She quit smoking, and there she was at church on Sunday! She told us of going out in the fields and talking with God and receiving answers to her prayers. She is such a dry Mormon (just add water)!! It's awesome! She's so eager to learn. She just soaks it right up. We are teaching her at Sister McGlone's house tomorrow. In priesthood/relief society, Bishop gave the lesson and he was talking about making people feel welcome and loved at church, and he asked for comments or quesions, and Sharon raised her hand. She said that she felt so loved at church that day. Wow! She is awesome! We are going to set a baptism date with her tomorrow. Her sister has prepared her and the experiences she's had over the last few years have brought her closer to God. I am so excited for her!
That night we went to Emily's and watched Finding Faith in Christ with her and her son Jayden (8) and Hannah (12, baptized on Nov. 8). Jayden is awesome! We are teaching him since his mom is recently activated. He loved the movie and jumped for joy when we told him he could have a copy of it. He understands so much.
Monday we went tracting in Spencer (about 30 minutes from us, close to Gosport where we were last Monday). We were having no success. People weren't home or they said they weren't interested as soon as we said our church affiliation. The last place we stopped was an apartment building. Sister Jenson doesn't like apartment buildings, but I wanted to go. The first door we knocked on, we found Brad. We talked to him for about 10-15 minutes. He was nice, and when we asked him if he was interested in learning more or coming to church, he told us he wanted to say yes to be nice, but he wanted to be honest. He told us he was turned off to organized religion because of the Catholics. I was leading and Sister Jenson popped in here and there. She gave him a BOM and we asked him to read 3 Nephi 11. As we bore testimony and told him that God wants to bless him and help him find direction in life, we could tell he felt the Spirit and he felt our sincerity. He told us how recently people from like 6 different churches have come to his door and we told him maybe it was God trying to get his attention. I can't remember all that we said, but it was really neat. At first he sounded disinterested, then he seemed like he was just being polite, but then he felt the Spirit and his demeanor changed. I don't know if he'll progress fast, but he said he would read 3 Nephi 11. I told him he would feel God's love for him as he read and prayed, and he said "I hope so". I hope he remembers what he felt when we were talking to him, and I hope he is really as sincere as he sounded and that he will read. We only go out there on Mondays since it's so far. He doesn't have a phone, and he's in the middle of working out a new schedule, so we told him we'd just try to catch him at home next Monday. Oh, I hope we do catch him!
We went to Gosport for our return appointments from last Monday, and sadly they all fell through. We will try again next Monday though.
Some interesting things:
• Who 'da thunk I'd live close enough to walk to church here in Indiana? We walk every week.
• We've been called JWs a few times. One lady answered the door and seemed nice and asked if we were JWs. When we told her who we really were she got bitter and shut the door. Guess she really wanted us to be JWs.
• Hardly any of the houses we visit (including our apartment) have ceiling lights. How annoying.
Well, that's all for this week. Hope this finds you all well and good. Please send emails and letters. The addresses are on the blog and facebook.
