With Style

CONTACTING WITH STYLE

Last week my ukulele came in the mail.  It only took 2 months or so to get here (mexican mail system probs). When it finally showed, I spent literally ALL P DAY LONG playing it.  Played it so long and with so much love I wore all the skin off my finger and now its all scabbed up. 

We headed out that afternoon to a planned Family Home Evening with a bunch of less actives and members.  No one showed.  So we went and tried contacting a bunch of addresses we had written down from contacting that week. 

We showed up at a house and knocked on the door.  A little kid came to the door. "Is your mom home?"

"she's in the shower." he said.  Or in other words, she doesn't want to talk to two strangers who showed up on her porch to talk about Jesus.

Feeling a little disanimated, we decided to do something different for a change. "Can we sing you a song?" I asked.

"Can you what?" asked the boy, a little taken off guard.

"Can we play a song and sing it for you?" I repeated.

"ummmm ok?" he responded.

So there in the dark, in the middle of the Mexican ghetto, I played my ukulele, and we sang: I Know That My Redeemer Lives.  I made a lot of mistakes and we couldn't read the words that well, but in the end his mom who was "in the shower" came to the door and listened to the last verse. Then without any formal introduction invited us into her home to listen to the two strangers talk about Jesus. 

And we then taught the best lesson I've taught in a long time.  They accepted baptism.  And to pray. And to read the Book of Mormon. The little boy grabbed my hand, "When are you coming back so that we can learn more?" 

I'm excited to teach them again. 

Sometimes as missionaries, we fall into a really boring pattern.  We do the obvious and the normal ALL DAY EVERY DAY and it gets BORING.  So this week my challenge to all missionaries and all people out there reading this e mail is to shake things up.  Do things differently.  And make it fun.  Sing a song.  Be bold.  Change the same old same old to something better. And you'll see the blessings and the happiness roll right on in.

MONTE ALBAN

We went to some ancient ruins today.  It was pretty fabulous.  We all geeked out, like the missionaries we are, and related every rock and symbol to the scriptures.  It was very hilarious.  And very exciting. 

There were a million different people speaking a million different languages. We climbed a lot of ancient stairs and we all returned very tired and sunburnt.