Well, this week wasn't too exciting. We had transfers and I got to see a bunch of missionaries I haven't seen for a while, which was really fun.
It's been freezing all week, literally. The church parking lot was so covered in ice that when the vans came in to get the missionaries they couldn't stop and slid quite a bit. All of the incoming missionaries were full of stories about how they almost died during transfers. I rest my case, snow is good for no one! (Well, it's good for water supply, but rain could take care of that too...)
Sister Beckstrand got to say goodbye to a lot of people, which was nice. It also meant we got a lot of lessons because we shared a brief message with everyone we visited.
This week I discovered I am better at playing air hockey with my left hand than my right. Who would have guessed? Sister Beckstrand was soundly thrashing me while we waited for the transfer van so I switched to my left hand because I figured it couldn't get any worse, and up ended up beating her with my left hand! Woo! New skills.
We had another great lesson with J--- this week. He had so many questions and actually had read the pamphlet and studied it out! He had also read from the Book of Mormon! He promised he would come to church on Sunday but he slept in and missed it. I was really disappointed and he felt really bad about it.
We weren't able to visit S--- this week because he got lost while hunting. Luckily search and rescue found him, but he still ended up with severe dehydration and hypothermia, so he wasn't really in a fit state for a lesson.
We had a great lesson with the I--- this week! He told us he wanted to be fellowshipped in, so boy are we taking that as a challenge! We brought the entire Tyler family to the lesson: two adults, two teenagers, and one returned missionary. So when all was said and done there were 11 of us crammed into the living room for a lesson! It went really well and the whole Tyler family was really involved. It turned out that they already knew the I---, so it went even better than we had planned! They are committed to praying each night as a family and we are excited to see how it goes!
We had a lot of cancellations this week, which means we didn't have nearly as many non-member/less active lessons as we had wanted to. We had a ton of active member lessons, but it was fairly discouraging. Hopefully this week will be better.
P--- dropped us this week because his wife doesn't want him to meet with us. I am SO bummed because he knows the Book of Mormon is true!! Ugh! Sometimes people can be so frustrating! I guess there are people out there who are ready that the Lord wants us to find and He is taking great care that we don't spend time with people who aren't ready. I just wish it had happened before it became absolutely freezing! It physically hurts to be outside. I'm so excited for it to warm up to the 40s for a few days this week.
On the bright side, D--- kept the commitment to keep the Word of Wisdom! I am so happy for him! Usually that's a hard one for people to keep right away. He's going to keep doing it to see if the blessings that the Lord promises will come.
This week we taught him about the law of chastity. Talk about one awkward lesson! Two young women teaching a grown man to be chaste. We totally should have made the elders do it. It was a hard lesson because he doesn't believe in keeping the law of chastity.
Oh well, we keep pressing forward and hopefully this coming week will be better! I hope you are all safe and happy! (And warm)
Lots of love,
Sister Draney

To see a spiritual message involving this snake, follow Sister Shaela Draney on Face book