We had another baptism this Saturday! Once again, it was the elders', but I'm still excited about it! Tommy asked me to speak about the Holy Ghost. I hope I made sense. I talked about how our sins go into remission like cancer and the Holy Ghost is like a pill to help us get better and keep the symptoms under control. It sounded a lot better then, trust me.
We've been working a lot on making sure we encourage the members to do missionary work of their own. We've been helping them brainstorm ideas of how they can share the gospel with their friends, neighbors, and family. I hope they get as excited as I am about sharing the gospel. We've also been continuing seeing less actives. We found one who actually lives around the corner from where I live. He's older and lives in an assisted living, or group home. He was happy to see us and let us share a message with him. He was originally a convert to a church and we asked him why he joined. He told us it was because of the testimony of the missionaries and the Book of Mormon. I then asked him if he still had a copy of the Book of Mormon which he said he did not. I gave him a copy and the look on his face when he held it was priceless! I know it's going to be a journey and a struggle to get him to come back to church because it's been seven years, but I'm not giving up on him! He still remembers a few people in the ward. We went and talked to those few people on Sunday and they were shocked! One of them had been trying to track him down for years. Another one was so overjoyed she almost started crying. She had though that he had died a few years back. It's kind of crazy and sad how these people can fall through the cracks. We made sure that he now has home teachers and we're going back this week to visit him again.
In other news, our 70 year old investigator dropped a bomb on us the other day. Apparently she can speak in tongues. She also has a hard time understanding that even though she think she did, she did not get baptized with the proper priesthood authority. It looks like we didn't go over the apostasy as well as we should have. But she came to church on Sunday and is excited to come back! The ward members were so great and welcoming with her. The Bishop made sure he came right up and introduced himself to her after Sacrament Meeting. She couldn't stay for all three hours but plans on staying next week. Well two weeks from now. Next week is stake conference, which she wants to come to as well.
I also have a new best friend in my upstairs neighbor. She first made friends with the elders who lived in my apartment before sisters were whitewashed in. She's super funny and really smart. She's my age and a grad student in some sort of complicated branch of market research. I think it's called syndicated data analysis.
We play volleyball every Friday together with the elders in my area, a few ward members, and some investigators. We all suck really bad so it's kind of hysterical to watch. It's a nice change of pace when Elizabeth Hampl, who's an athlete at SIUE, comes and plays with us. Suddenly we do a lot better. I'm pretty sure she'll be an olympic athlete. She's way talented when it comes to sports and is a nationally ranked shotputtter. Is that the right term for that? Don't know, don't care!
And thus ends another exciting report from the sleepy town of Edwardsville. Until next Monday!
-Sister Trop
P.S. I'm SUPER excited for fall! There are so many trees here, it's going to look awesome. And I'm told I have to go drive the Old River Road in Alton because it's beautiful and bald eagles nest there!!!
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