Sister Moreland! I didn't know you were serving in the Ireland-Scottland mission!?

                                                                      Neither did I.  Neither did I. 

                                                                           Inkom in all its glory.

Pday at the Nickells' - roasting marshmellows and playing football, guitar, singing, and tire swings

This week, it was 70 degrees. And then the next day, it snowed. And then the next day, it snowed. And then the next day, it was 75. Wat.

Hello, my loves!

Well, Tuesday-Thursday was kind of uneventful this week, so I'm gonna skip straight to the highlight of the week--Friday.

On Friday, one of our Sister Training Leaders, Sister Hill, came around with us in Inkom. She's from Texas, too, so it was kind of funny when people asked us where each of us were from, and we all 

say the same thing.

So the first half of the day consisted of a heck of a lot of piddling around the neighborhood, knocking on doors and trying to find someone home, but with no success. With that afternoon combined with the previous few days which passed quite unproductively, I was starting to get kinda down, wondering why in the world there were even missionaries in teensy little Inkom all all. Thinking there simply isn't enough work here.  After feeling quite useless, we finally had a lesson--a great one--with investigators Rob and his 18 year old son Preston. We simply read the first chapter of the Book of Mormon with them, and they talked about how The Book of Mormon seemed much easier once we just sat down and read it together.  

Then later in the evening, we had an appointment to have a lesson with a part-member family, but 10 minutes prior to the lesson, they called and canceled. Well, now we were left having to find something to do again. From the parking lot we had stopped in to decide where to go, I suddenly spotted a man outside working on his boat, so I said to Sister Leon and Sister Hill, "Hey, let's go talk to that guy!" So we did. He ended up being a less active guy that wanted to come back, and his wife is a former investigator. He said that he had seen us drive by a few time during the week, and thought to himself "we need to start meeting with the missionaries again!" Lo and behold, here we were! I'm really glad I followed that prompting of the spirit to go see him, because now we're going to start meeting with him and his wife again!

Then, as we knocked on another door, who's owner wasn't home, we saw two men walking down the street (which is odd here in small-town Inkom) . How do I describe them...well these guys had their gangstah pants on. But we approached them anyways, and I was kinda being doubting Thomas over here, thinkin, "Man, these guys are punks. They're not gonna want to hear about God from us Mormons."  But surprisingly, one of them was very friendly.  The friendly one ended up being the son of a couple that Sister Leon had been seeing before I got here.  His friend was a non-member from Pocatello, and although he was stand-offish at first, as we began to talk about Christ and ask them questions about their lives, they slowly began to open up.  We told them about the Book of Mormon and how it testifies of Christ, and offered them each a copy, which they both took gladly. In fact, one of the men, seeing that his friend's copy of the Book of Mormon also had a pamphlet in it, said "Hey, how come he got a pamphlet, I want one too!" Haha, it was so great! So we gave him one, too :) We set up times to see them both (Sister Hill happens to serve in the area where the nonmember friend lives).  What a MIRACLE. What a testimony that there is always someone who is prepared to receive the gospel, even when grumpy ole' me thinks that there isn't.  What a humbling experience. What a blessing in disguise that the one family canceling on us turned out to be! If they hadn't canceled, we wouldn't have ever met those 3 men that were in need of Jesus Christ in their life.  When one door closes, 2 more open.  

On Saturday, we went "rock picking"!  Don't worry, I had no idea what that was, either, before I did it.  Basically, the farming fields in Idaho get these big rocks in them every year, and a big group of people volunteer to go out to the fields to pick up the rocks for this year's planting. It's a huge service project, because if the rocks are left there, they get stuck in the plowing machinery and cause a lot of problems. So I go there thinking that we are going to be picking up these golf-ball-sized and orange-sized rocks. Then when we got there, the guy in charge told us to leave the little rocks there and only worry about picking up the rocks that were grapefruit-sized or bigger. I'm thinking "psshh there aren't going to be hardly any rocks that are bigger than a grapefruit! This will take like 30 minutes!"  Boy was I wrong. The field was covered in rocks bigger than basketballs. Talk about some back-breaking work! I brought my camera with the intention of taking pictures when we got there, but I completely forgot. So sorry, no pictures of rock-picking. But I did get quite the farmers tan! :D What fun, Idahoan week!

I would like to briefly emphasize the importance of friendshipping new converts. and not just saying hello in church for a few months. These people need true, solid friends. Someone to be there for them. Someone to spend time with outside of "church" things.  A support system that they can turn to with their questions, concerns, and doubts.  In reality, we all need that. But it's especially important when someone is coming into this completely foreign world that we call the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints.  Please try and find ways to make friends with those who are struggling as well!  

Well, that's the news and updates for this week! Love you all so much!

God Bless, 

Sister Moreland