Week 60

Hello Family!
This week has been one of those rough ones that we all have to go through every once in a while.. Haha but it was still a great week and i learned a bunch!
We had a total of 14 appointments bail on us this week, and that was rough.. But we still did some teaching and we had some sweet lessons!

On Wednesday night, we were going to check up on a potential investigator in the area because our appointment didn't go through.. We knocked on his door and he was pretty reluctant to see us.. We started talking, and he told us his life story and it was the saddest thing. I won't go into details.. But just take my word for it when i say that he had some rough things happen to him in his life.. He questioned the existence of God. The part of him that wanted to believe in God was angry with God because of the things that he has been through. He couldn't believe that the things that he'd been through were part of "God's plan" for him. We talked a lot about faith, and how he can gain faith.. We talked about how Jesus Christ can help take away the anger that's inside him, and how he can make these trials in his life shape him to who God wants him to be. It was sweet..
He started talking about his mom, who had died about 2 years ago.. He started crying because he missed her so much. He talked about how smart his mother was and how much he helped her in his life. He said that his mom always made him do things as a little kid that he never wanted to do. Like reading books, going to church, cleaning his room, doing chores, and being nice to his sister. He said when he was younger that he despised his mom for making him do these things that he didn't want to do. But now 30 years later, a little more wise and much more mature, he feels as if he will never be able to repay his mother for the priceless lessons that she taught him as a boy.
While he was telling this story, I had a awesome spiritual confirmation come to me. I knew that this relationship(which almost every young boy has with his mom) was almost identical to our relationship with God. God asks us to do very specific things here upon this earth, and I'm sure we are all guilty at some point of saying "ugh.. I really don't want to do this." or "this is just to much for me to handle" or "i can't take this anymore.." But one day, when we know more about this life, and more about ourselves, and when we become more wise and mature, we will have the same feelings that this man had towards his mother. We will never be able to repay God for the things that he's taught us here upon the Earth. It made me especially grateful for the challenges which God gives us! Through them we have the opportunity to grow and to become who God wants us to become.

I think i told you guys about a Less-Active member that we were working with maybe a month or 2 ago who was an alcoholic! Well we had a huge miracle take place with him. So one day we went over to his house, and there he was sitting in his car, with a pint of beer in his hand. We talked for a little and he was just trashed. We asked him if we could take his beer and throw it away for him. He really didn't want to give it to us. Haha when he went to hand us the bottle, his knuckles were white because he was hanging onto it so tight. He let go and I dumped the beer out and we went on our way.. We knew he most likely had more in his car, but we decided to not to be to pushy. Later in the week probably 6 days later, we went back and visited him and when we got there he gave us a big old hug! It was pretty funny actually. But he told us that he hadn't drank since we came over. He said that after we left the last time that we were there, that he reached under his seat and pulled out another pint of beer. He said that the first sip that he took tasted like slimy, hot, mud! Hahahaha! And he got out of his car and broke the beer bottle on the ground, and vowed that he'd never do it again. SOO sweet!! It was awesome and now he's doing great. He's getting back to his normal self again.

I love it too much! It's so fun to be a missionary. SO hard sometimes.. But soo much fun. And so rewarding.

MOM, My license expires in January, and that means that i couldn't use it to fly home, and i won't be able to drive the last month that i'm out here.. I talked to the mission President about it and he wants to get it taken care of as soon as possible! He said that there is an option i can get at the DMV that can extend your license for 3 months or something like that and that would be perfect. Let me know if thats possible in the state of Utah. He wasn't sure if it was an option there.Thanks and let me know next week so i can tell him.

I love you all! Thanks for everything!

Love Elder Russell