Week 78: Newbury Park

April 4, 2022

Today was a fun day with a really awesome finish. We did a lot of skating, had a fun time doing that with Elder Burkhart and Elder Koffard. 

When we were driving by to a friend tonight, we decided to visit a dot earlier than we had planned, to someone we have been trying to get in contact with for a while. We saw that his gate was most likely locked as we were driving by his home, but something told us to try it out anyways. We went up, saw that was locked, and it looked like nobody was inside. So we started walking back to our truck, and the tiniest urge told me to look inside the window one last time. As I did, I saw a silhouette walking towards the door, so we stopped, and our friend came over and opened the door and unlocked the gate. We were able to start teaching his wife. We had a shaky, but Spirit-filled lesson. We were very thankful that the Lord led us in many small and simple ways to be able to do His work, imperfect as we are. Excited for MLC tomorrow. 

April 5, 2022

We had MLC today, and like we expected, there were some more changes to how we do things. We are continuing to move the mission culture towards being principle-based and being primarily accountable to God instead of mission leadership, for our missionary work. The first of which was getting rid of CDC's, which were never really supposed to be a thing anyway. After a pit stop at Cane's, we headed back to our area and made a bunch of stop by's. It's always a little hard to have a working brain after MLC, but we managed. 

April 6, 2022

It was a very, very busy day. We started the day with interviews with President and Sister Carter, with Chik-Fil-A for lunch and a discussion about inspired questions afterward. We then took care of a lot of tech stuff and did Stake Reports, and other "chores", just things that need to be done. When all was said and done, we only had about 7:30 to 9:00 to find. But I'm not worried about it, that's just the way it is sometimes. The days go by very fast. 

April 7, 2022

We had exchanges today. I went with Elder White into the Agoura 2 area. We took a drive up the canyon to a trailer park, and beat the streets in some pretty hot weather. We even had an impromptu lesson with a 'do not contact' person. Talked to some humble people, and visited some pretty wealthy places. We were able to visit a place at the top of the tallest hill near Malibu Lake. Later on, after some stop by's, we had a Come Follow Me lesson with a less-active member. Then another visit with another member, and that was the night. 

I love Elder White, such a great elder, this was my second exchange with him; the first one was in my first transfer. 

April 8, 2022

District Council. I gave a discussion about urgency and productivity. Our goal is not just to be busy, but to be busy with the best things. We had a bunch of other things to do, and we had some busy work until the early evening. So we were productive with the little bit of time we did have, to find people to teach. We also had a member visit where we shared the new Easter video and talked about it. Such an uplifting video, I really like watching it. Good things ahead. 

April 9, 2022

I went on exchanges with Elder Packard today, and we had a really successful day. We had a doorstep lesson with our friend Ryan, but we didn't start teaching him because he actually is an active member. After some study and lunch, we hit the road again. We had our companionship study outside, and so we were able to talk to our friend Dave, who was walking his goldendoodle at the time. After some stop by's and street contacting, we had a nice walk/lesson with our friend Hildegarde. She is such a funny older lady, and she is willing to visit, so we started teaching her. After dinner with the MacDonald's, we had a phone call visit and started teaching Shoria, Nipom's son. 

We truly were led by the Spirit today, and were blessed in all things. Days like this make doing missionary work easier and easier. 

April 10, 2022

A busy Sunday, it was a great fast and testimony meeting. Sister Gaida got up and bore her testimony about her temple trip. It's been a huge blessing to help her progress. We had dinner with the Pace's, and a Zoom call with Sister Fowler. We have been keeping up the priority to stop by as many dots as possible. A really successful week, found three people to teach.