"This is the Right Place"

Hello Everybody,

So yeah, as ya'll found out last email, I'm in the Lenox area now but residing in Creston. For those who are up on pop culture, Lenox is now famous for being the location of a recent movie called "The Crazies," a movie about zombies or something. I think it's a pretty cool thing to be famous for. It did raise some questions in my mind, however, when a lady in a nearby town, Corning, informed me that she couldn't let us in because she was "Infected." Yep. Scary stuff.

Anyway, the area is about the same size as my first area, Muscatine. That doesn't help much, huh? Oh well. It goes a little north from Creston, down the Missourah border, and out west to the edge of the mission, or a ways past Corning, and about 15 or more minutes east of Creston. So much bigger than Knoxville but not as big as Yankton. The church building is actually a converted house, a fairly long rambler with a basement and converted garage, complete with parking lot and giant satellite dish in back.

As I brought up with Mom and Dad in my recent letter home, there's work to be done here, for sure, as I'm sure anybody who knows anything about missions can guess from a mid-transfer transfer. Transfers are next week, though, and my current companion knows he'll be moving along as well. His name's Elder Jameson. He's a good kid and will be good to serve with, but he doesn't know the area that great because he'd only been there four weeks before I came in. So it's been great.

But we did have two baptisms here this week!! They were Steve and Cindy. Steve had been picked up during this last transfer. He had been taught in the past but they started teaching him again. He seemed really great until this last sunday when he talked to his former minister who told him he would go to hell if he was baptized as a Mormon, and then he started doubting EVERYTHING. Great. But his wife, Cindy, was way solid, which was cool because she had originally not even wanted to listen. But as soon as she knew it was true, she knew. And nothing could dissuade her. But Steve kept having problems this week. So he was our main focus, trying to make sure he was ready to be baptized on the same day as his wife, Saturday. We met with them every day and brought recent converts who bore testimony to him and let him know they all had doubts but that they know that their baptism was the right thing and wouldn't trade it for anything. But he kept having doubts about authority on Friday, the day of his interview, I was led by the Spirit to be really bold. I like being bold. Nobody can argue with it, because true boldness comes from God and not from me and people can tell the Spirit's there. But I only feel prompted to be bold like I was with him every once in awhile, testifying and promising blessings in the name of Jesus Christ. It seemed to help him a little, along with the testimony of the member who was with us that had doubts up until he was baptized and received a stronger witness than ever that it was true. But he still wasn't fully convinced, but was willing to be interviewed. By this point, actually, I had the feeling that he did know but wanted to keep arguing because he was stubborn. Not sure. But he went and was interviewed by Elder Nelson, my trainer. Nelson told him everything we had but took it a next step and did what I felt we should have done but we didn't: gave him a blessing. That really showed him the power of the priesthood in action. After that, he was able to put the fact that he knew the Book of Mormon to be true to action and realize that because of that, everything else must be true as well. So he was baptized on Saturday and confirmed on Sunday. But, as he shared in Gospel Principles, he still had his doubts until he walked into church that day and felt a drop of water hit him on his back. He looked around for a source for the water to have come from and could find none. Finally, Steve had received an answer in a way he could understand. "This is the right place," he said. (Did enough sentences in that last paragraph start with "But?" Hmmm....)

I also spent a day and a half this last week in Osceola, the next town over with missionaries, on exchanges with them there. That, along with the baptism and baptismal interview questions that were in Osceola, I feel like I've spent most of my time in Osceola this week. Or driving. I'm so sick of Iowa driving. Give me some turns in the road or something to keep me awake!!

And a bad thing that came along with the transfer is that now I have no money on my support card (the one from the mission office that gets restocked with $150 every month for food and cleaning supplies and that). I had been assuming (I know the problem with when people assume, but still) that I would be in the same area for an entire transfer (crazy thing to think, I know) and that having very little money because I did some eating out would be no problem because we have plenty of food in our apartment in Knoxville. But now I'm in a house (YEAH! We live in a house! Rented just for us! Complete with basement and everything! WAY cool!) that had no food. Great. And then all the getting together with missionaries this week with district meeting and baptism and all led to more money to spend. But then, a blessing came. This week we were tracting and knocked on a door that, not surprisingly, had an uninterested christian answer. Politely, I asked her if we had interrupted dinner, and she said no, but (and this is the crazy part) invited us in to eat what was left over from dinner! So we spent awhile talking with them as they fed us! They were still not interested, but we got on very good terms with them and had a great time. She said she couldn't think of anybody to refer us to that needed help but would call us if she could think of anybody, and told us to call her if we needed help. Her son, who's in his senior year, said that he would like to play disc golf with us on Mondays and would bring his friends. So while they might not be interested, they seem to be a good way to meet people in the town! And she ("she" or "the christian," which, for once with all the people who claim to be so, is true, is Jane, a woman who I'm guessing is about forty and has three kids, one being out of the house, one being James, her teenage son, and Ryan, her daughter who's about to graduate from middle school) took it one step further: She came by last night with GROCERIES!! Really! I'm pretty much set until next month!! I probably will still have to pick up some Rice Milk (I really think I'm lactose intolerant. I've tried cutting out milk stuff and I've been feeling a lot better. Yeah, kind of stinks...), though.

Well, that's about it. Hope all's well. I'm so glad that I've decided to be a consecrated missionary because now that I'm in an area where it really matters and could be hard, the decision's already made, so all the daily ones aren't so hard. It's been VERY stressful this week, but I'm trying to stop having myself allow it get to me. I'm doing fine, no worries. As it says in Preach My Gospel, work is the only way to not get homesick or bogged down. So work I will. Nephi's last three words apparently were "I Must Obey." And so must I. And the way I think and knows he means it is not in the way of "Ah Crap I guess I have to obey," but "It's what I should, and, thus, need, to do." Obedience brings blessings. Whoa, I'm starting to get all Soapboxy and preachy. So I'll stop here.

Love,
Your Favorite Missionary,
Elder Charlie Gates