MIGHTY Winds!!!

So mom, I totally agree with you when you said that you need another "Mother's Day" HaHa! Not that i'm home sick, but as we were walking to the library this morning I was like, "Man Elder, it seems like it's been sooo long since we communicated with our families! It's only been a week though!"

This week has been wonderful though! Regarding my title....On Friday night we got home and the winds were howling like crazy! Things flying everywhere and stuff all in the air. Odd, because we live kind of in a valley and also in Bozeman they don't get much wind at all! So we thought it was odd and would just go to sleep and it would be done by the morning for our service project. Thought wrong! Hahaha! :) It was even more windy in the morning and we were going to pick up rocks throughout the D's yard (a task that was bigger than we thought once we started working! haha) We weren't going to let that stop us from working though. We started at 10 and worked til 12 and still didn't get it all done. Probably because I broke the wheel barrel :/ haha Don't worry. I fixed it this morning ;) It was SOOO windy though! So windy it almost knocked me down a few times! Plus it dropped a few degrees and was pretty chilly. In the meantime, somehow (while wearing gloves) I tore the skin off my pinky finger so I took the glove off and just let it air dry and scab up and kept working. It was lots of fun and we had lots of laughs during the process!

Saturday we didn't have ANY set appointments at all which was a bummer, but we decided to make it a day of finding. Probably not the best day to do that, because one, NO ONE was out with how windy it was! We had a few people we were going to go by and see and NO ONE was home and EVERY door we knocked WAS NOT even opened! haha We did that for an hour and I could tell Elder Hokanson was losing his mind so I stopped and was like "Let's take some pictures!" I've attached some of them for y'all to enjoy! So we got back to work after that and then went and had dinner with the N's! After we left it was back to finding again! Elder Hokanson was like, "Man that was REALLY nice to be inside for a little while" and then me yelling back, "WHAT?! I CAN'T HEAR YOU!" It was windy alllllllll day long and the evening was just like earlier. People actually answered the door but we got responses like, "I'm spiritual, I'm good, not interested, I know Jesus, i'm saved, then (some old guy) Were good Lutherans, we're fine! WHAM!" It was a blast and each time I was like "Elder Hokanson, isn't this AWESOME! haha" Let's just say that day the scripture came true...

Helaman 5:12

"And now, my sons, remember, remember that it is upon the rock of our Redeemer, who is Christ, the Son of God, that ye must build your foundation; that when the devil shall send forth his mighty winds, yea, his shafts in the whirlwind, yea, when all his hail and his mighty storm shall beat upon you, it shall have no power over you to drag you down to the gulf of misery and endless wo, because of the rock upon which ye are built, which is a sure foundation, a foundation whereon if men build they cannot fall."

Satan put forth his "mighty winds" against us ALL day and "his hail and his mighty storm" with all the words and things said to us that night beat upon us. Our foundation is and still is set upon Jesus Christ so it was all worth it! No effort is wasted. We only received one potential who we could come back and see, but other than that nothing. I'm confident the Lord recognized the effort we were putting forth and we received 2 calls yesterday for people who are interested in meeting with us this week! So sweet! I know that if we persevere through hard times, the Lord will bless us! :) Through strong winds, rejection after rejection and no productivity we continued on! DO WORK!

Funny story during that day, Elder Hokanson was like "Man i'm surprised we haven't tracted into a member today" Then 5 minutes later we knock on someone's door and he tells us he lives right next to the Stake President (who didn't answer because no one was home) and then 4 houses down we knocked on the door, then knocked again. No answer. We start walking away and then they knock on the door and we turn around and it was President DaBell, the second counselor in the stake presidency! Hahaha it was so funny and relieving a bit too :)

We've had some AWESOME dinners lately and Elder Hokanson is beginning to warm up and become himself in member's home which is only helping the area! Lots of good work going on here! Members are now coming up to us and wanting us to come over for dinner and we're having to tell them that we would love too, but we're packed! I think we might start a lunch calendar too ;) haha jk The members are awesome! Got some free protein mix from it ;) haha One dinner we had with the C's. So much! Homemade lasagna and bread and such and then we helped take care of their land! Fed the fish out at the pond, pumped water for their cows, put snow mobiles up and all this other fun stuff! Such a beautiful house and property! They were the MC's for the ward talent show on Friday that we attended! Got to meet their son and daughter who came home from BYU for the weekend with two special someone's. We were in the talent show as well. Our role was when Bro. C would tell a joke and no one would laugh or anything, we would jump up and had these 2 posters that said "APPLAUSE" and "LAUGH" It was so funny and I think we pulled it off quite well ;) Everyone loved it!

Did some gardening this week too! EVERYONE here in Bozeman gardens and it's one way we use to find people! Met this nice family who was out gardening and we just offered to help and she said she never turns down free gardening. Good stuff!

I'm loving the mission and having TONS of fun! Got invited to a BBQ tomorrow with one of our investigators before she leaves to go back home for the summer! I miss Texas BBQ for sure!

Sounds like the family is doing awesome! :) Keep it up!

Let me know what I can do for y'all! I love y'all and think about y'all often!

Love,

-Elder Parr