Week 30: Brevard, NC

June 26, 2023

It was a good P-day, we went up to the SAB building in Arden and balled up with the District for the good part of the day. Before we went home, we all went to Dick's and walked around a bit. Pretty chill day. 

June 27, 2023

We had this intro Zoom call with the Barlow's today, which was sweet. They seem way nice. They asked for questions at the end and Elder Johns asked some pretty useless questions haha. After that we went to District Council and lunch at Wendy's. The rest of the day was mostly a bunch of blundered contacts and finding. We did go to Fuji's tonight because Sister Payne is the best saint in the world. Nothing like Japanese steak and shrimp. 

June 28, 2023

We had a really good lesson with Bruce today. He has very extreme southern Baptist beliefs, but it's understandable him being 85 or something, and has lived in Rosman his whole life. He has been reading the Book of Mormon and is open to talking about our church, so it's all good. Then we dusted up on some of the ol hispanic contacts, nothing crazy though.

Later we had a really good lesson with Matthew, who we met about a month ago. He is a very smart dude and made a few connections between the Book of Mormon and his personal beliefs, such as the advanced civilizations in South America and Jesus visiting other people. Super cool guy and we had a great Restoration lesson with him. After that we had Missionary Coordination with the sweetheart President Booth. He's actually such a cool person, you just got to give him a chance. He shared with us his pristine van from the 80's, which was supa fresh. 

June 29, 2023

The day was pretty much finding in ghetto trailer parks looking for hispanic people. We ran into the occasional white homie who worships in his own way or goes to Biltmore. 

In the evening we had dinner with Alyssa and helped her clean out her basement. We brought Soren Onderdonk with us too. Alyssa's basement was covered with massive cobwebs, moldy exposed insulation, and pretty much every kind of bug. She inherited the house from her parents or something, so it's super old. It was a good time though, we were all strapped with gloves and masks, cause safety first haha. 

June 30, 2023

So we went up to Greenville, TN again to meet the Barlow's. They are the sweetest people of all time. I got to talk with President and Sister Barlow for a bit, which was fun. Their whole focus is on making lifelong friendships, which is hype. I'm super excited to serve with them. After the meeting, we drove home 2 1/2 hours and that was pretty much it. 

July 1, 2023

Highlights of the day: We went and helped the Farragut SMS Missionaries with a recorded interview they were doing with Alyssa, Leland and Roy. Pretty much we held up a blanket backdrop to help with lighting. They all bore some of the most heartfelt and pure testimonies of Jesus Christ and the church, it was sweet. Later in the day we called this referral that was absolute nuttssss. The referral name was "donnabagley6@gmail.com" which was a bad sign already, but then she just spit straight blasphemy for like 20 minutes. It was a bunch of wack stuff about prophecies and the Second Coming. Some of the stuff was actually pretty valid like the Baptist and Catholic Churches being wrong, but everything else was basura. We voice recorded the whole call, which is hype because it's the funniest thing of all time. Something else I forgot to write about was this lil homie Brennan. It was like four days back, but we decided to ring the doorbell of this random house. Turns out this kid Brennan lives there, who is a Sophomore in high school. We talk for a while and he tells us his favorite thing is playing the guitar, and told us some of the songs he's been working on. Bunch of them were songs I had learned before my mission, which is cool. Anyways, we tell him about our church and the Book of Mormon and he tells us he doesn't really know anything about God or Jesus Christ. It's no problem because we can teach him, but it's not something you hear out here. He tells us his mom is also looking for a church, so we gave him a Book of Mormon and told him we'd come back. It's not everyday you meet a young homie that plays electric guitar and wants to come to church. Sister Harris hooked us up with some amazing dinner tonight too. 

July 2, 2023

It was a good church day. Guillermo came to church again, which is sweet and we had almost 100 people in sacrament meeting. There was a bunch of visiting families from Utah and summer camp kids. After church we went over to Sister Powers' to give her the Sacrament. It's been about a month since she's been healthy enough so that was great. Honestly not much else for the day. We did have the first "knit-together Sunday" tonight. Pretty much it's a massive Zoom call with the whole mission and their families, and it was pretty cool, not gonna lie. Anyways, P-day tomorrow babyyyy.