Torch

Yooo hooo!

 

Speaking of which, one of the elders in my district is obsessed with the dink yoohoo...so we arent the only ones! And by that i mean drink.

 

This past week has been pretty busy. Well, kind of. Last friday we had a PMG Fundamentals training at the Felicita building (it's sweet looking...google map it) with President Cook. He is seriously like a GA. He said so many incredible inspired things. It was awesome. He had me read/answer things a lot...I think he is starting to like me! Haha. It was 3 zones, and we did a lot of practicing and watched video clips and read, etc. One interesting thing to do is to read D&C 76 thinking of it as a walkthrough of the doctrine of Christ. We did that and it was suweet! For lunch their relief society made us bag lunches with these huge sandwiches and cookies. They had a special bag for me off to the side that said "no cheese" on it, which was really cool. During lunch we watched the documentary of the Joseph Smith papers, describing a lot of things, including how he translated, a part where Oliver Cowdrey fell asleep, etc. A big point they made is that people who think the BOM is fake/a story obviously have never seen the couple hundred pages they have of the manuscript. It is written in flow, with no punctuation, at a quick velocity, to the point where it is literally possible to prove that they took no time whatsoever to plan, correct, or fix anything. The only part that was changed, was when Oliver spelled "Coriantummer" and Joseph corrected him with the spelling "Coriantumr," a phonetic device that did not exist in the English language, but rather Aramaic.

 

Another thing, which is epic, is that he talked of a time he interviewed an Arabic man. He was having issues with the Book of Mormon's authenticity, so President Cook referred him to 1 Nephi 5? I think 5. maybe not. Where Nephi says to Zoram "As the Lord liveth.." he will spare him, outside Jerusalem. The man was shocked. A middle eastern tradition which is basically a life or death oath originating from the time is "wa hayat Allah." Meaning in old english "As God liveth." Bam. That guy was like, okay nevermind some white american guy with a 3rd grade education did not pull that from thin air. Hahaha.

 

So that was awesome. We met with Candy again and she is progressing well. We'll be meeting more this week, since she is busy now. Suco has been dodgy but we met with him once....and he was high as crud. He kept laughing at random things. Sooo yeah. Candy wants her baby blessed "when" she is baptized, so she has the right attitude! Man it's so hard finding here, but we are working on it! One of my tires popped the other day, so I've been using a different one from another bike. We bike a ton, and my legs are definitely getting pretty strong. It's weird haha.

 

The ward is starting to trust us a lot. The Young Women's leader flat out said that she trusted us and loved us. Some awesome young couple we had dinner with said that it was nice having confident, trustworthy elders. Bam! Plus our bishop is just sweet. We had a special 3rd hour ward missionary presentation by Brother Lopez, which was sweetastic and got all the members way excited to live as an example and do missionary work! As President Hinckley said, "our people become the most meaningful symbol of our faith" instead of the cross.

 

So, all is well. We are pretty well fed finally! I had a Mountain Dew Supersonic vanilla milkshake at the other elders' today...that was like pure menergy. Oh, also, candy calls me "Torch" because she says my personality reminds her of the human torch from fantastic four. Haha!

 

Have a great week everyone, love you!

 

Elder Haskin

Update from Escondido

So, this week we went on exxhanges AGAIN! And I was with another greenie--one from my MTC class! It was pretty awesome, though we weren't too successful.

 

We are now teaching a guy named Joe, who is living with a member of the church ( plans on marrying her), and he wants to have the "happiness" she has. We invited him to be baptized next month and he is all for it, and is super interested in the Gospel. So far he hasn't come to church, but he really wants to. Speaking of which, another person we are teaching named Elizabeth, but she goes by Candy (black woman duh), came to church on Sunday! We havent had the chance to meet with her since, but we think she really enjoyed it and there were some good talks. Amy and Suco have been really hard to get to cause they're so busy but hopefully this week we will!

 

Some of the ward missionaries are the Barnharts, a younger couple, who also have the responsibilty of getting dinners for us. They are doing a great job, and we have met with tons of members and less actives because of it. Brother B is so awesome; he is a convert of a few years, and has a crazy story. He used to be into all sorts of drugs, and actuall died TWICE in one week from heroin overdose! After that, he decided he needed a change and joined the navy, and a few years later married a mormon girl and decided he wanted to join the church! He's 6'7" and has a bunch of tattoos and a goatee, so he's pretty intimidating, right? Wrong. He is the biggest goober EVER. He is so awesome, and he loves to come out with us!

 

Hmm other than what I've said there isnt much news. We ate at Bishop Dye's again, and it was tuna salad. Nasty. But I ate it. A couple also cooked us each about 20 oz of steak! That was awesome. We have biked a lot and man sometimes it hurts! Going north or east, you are ALWAYS going uphill!! It sucks, but the way back is always good!

Well, I havent gotten any mail this week so far, which sucks. But that's okay. Hopefully soon! Have a great week!

 

Elder Haskin

P.S. - A couple pictures since im short on time!!