In our district meeting Monday night
we learned about how we need to help people understand the doctrine if we want
to change hearts. The comment was also made that we have all of the mission
rules to put us in the shoes of our investigators.
We have all of the strange extra
rules to help give us a testimony. For example with the word of wisdom we don’t
have problems with drugs coffee or any of that stuff but as we live our higher
law here in the mission (no pancakes, no soda, candy at night stuff like that). We are understanding more the position of our
investigator and our words have more power because we have a little better
understanding. It is our way of living the same doctrine as them but in a
higher plane; "doctrine without experience is just literature".
Tuesday not much happened, it was
rainy and there was thunder. We left the house and it was nice outside and
looked as if it would be a sunny nice day. But we had to go back and grab
umbrellas and warm clothes.
On Wednesday, we biked to Fabella,
it is a little ranch like 3 or 4 miles outside of Anahuac. There was a recent
convert out there and we had to go get a signature on a baptismal register
because the old one was lost. The lady has a farm out in the back of her house
and she showed us around and had us take pictures. She had this mint plant and
we were able to eat the leaves and they tasted like mint gum it was really
good. That day we had a lesson with Juan and he asked us how long the
"team" was going to be in Anahuac. He said that he doesn’t want other
missionaries to come because he is accustomed to us. He said he wants to come
with us and help us preach.
On Thursday we had another lesson
about finding and addressing people’s doubts, and the doubts were compared to
icebergs. We also were given some hamburgers by a member. Thursday we had to
buy some other food because this last week we weren’t able to buy vegetables
for our stir fry and our zone leader said we should eat some better food. We
bought some stuff to make fried egg ham sandwiches with toasted bread. And we
were going to make peanut butter and fry that with some bananas in a sandwich. When
we got out of the store we got on our bikes with our groceries and it started
hailing and pelting us as we biked back to the house.
On Friday we all went to Cuauhtémoc
and watched meet the Mormons. The movie was actually pretty cool. It had some
cool stories. After the movie my companion and I stayed in Cuauhtémoc because
some people in the old zone of Elder Hansen wanted him to go visit an old
investigator to see if he could convince them to be baptized.
We ended up eating at a buffalo
wings place called red sauce. we got a whole bunch of different flavors: mango
habenero, bbq, hawaii, buffalo, and chipotle. They were not too bad either. After
that Elder Hansen went with another missionary to find this lady and I went
with my zone leader Elder Gallup (he is from Park City). We had to go tell
someone that their baptism was invalid.
The previous missionaries just had
too much confidence in them that they would do the things they said they would.
The people had been lying in their interviews about smoking and drinking
coffee. And, above all, they were living together and not married because they
still needed to get a divorce from other spouses. They were told if they separated
until they were divorced then married they could get baptized, but they only
did that for a week. And the president of the mission decided it was better for
them to not be baptized because it lessens the condemnation for them and he
gave them a chance to progress towards a baptism correctly.
It was a crazy experience because
there baptisms were valid up until this companion, who had received direction
from president who held the keys said something. So I decided to pay close
attention when we got in there to see if I could see a difference. It was a
real subtle difference, but when he told them their outward appearance or their
countenance became darker, like a light left or went out within them.
On Saturday we got a call at 1 pm
saying that Elder Babbs companion or Elder Perez my district leader had
changes. He had to pack up and leave at like 5. It sucked to see him go because
he was a great teacher. Our zone leaders say that he was probably the best
teacher in the mission, I learned a lot from him. So my comp became the new
district leader.
That night after we had gone to bed
we got a phone call at 10:50ish, it was our zone leader Elder Campusano. He
said that he had just got off of the phone with President Chavez and that he
wants me to be a district leader this next cycle. So I was going to go to Cuauhtémoc
for a week with the zone leaders and another district leader so they could
train me.
Yesterday after church I went back
to the house and packed for the next week that I would be spending in Cuauhtémoc.
I will be working with Elder Newman(from Utah has same amount of time as Elder Hansen)
and helping him with his district. That night I had to prepare a lesson for the
district (which is just a companionship of sisters) and I will have to give
that lesson later today.
Love Elder Blanchard
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