Heat & Humidity

Hey,

Mom's questions:

Am I suffering from heat waves?  Waves, no.  Heat, yes.  Only in the last couple days has it cooled down to under a 100 but before that it was brutal.  It would get over a 100 and the humidity would equal the temp.  It felt like I was drowning in a pot of boiling water.  The collars on my shirts show the effects of it.  We also were running low on miles that we could drive in the car at the end of last month so we were walking and biking the majority of the day.  I"ve got a pretty nice tan to show for it.

How am I doing on the missionary budget? Good I think.

Do I need anything from home?  Tons of pictures in the mail from the upcoming tri would be great.  Also can I get some mission apropriate workout music.  If you could burn all of my Vitamin String Quartet music and the song from Requiem for a Dream from off my iTunes that would be fantastic!

The new mission president, Pres. Weston, is great.  We had interviews with him this past week and he is way different that Pres. Kunz was.  When I spoke with him we chatted for a while about triathlons and running.  One of his sons just completed the St. George Ironman and a daughter-in-law (I believe) just did the Boise Half.  I also found out that he was a 4:32 miler in high school.

We've made tons of progress with M.  To give some background, she was the woman that when we first went to her house there was a triple combination on her coffee table from having spoken with missionaries in the past.  She's awesome.  She told us how peaceful she feels from our visits and knows that's the holy ghost.  She was baptized Catholic as a child but doesn't believe in it.  She said that this time she wants a choice in the matter and wants it to mean somehting.  Also she had once listened to the j.w.'s but doesn't like them, because they just confuse her and she doesn't feel good with them.  She's wanted to be baptized for awhile but wanted to wait till her husband N would commit to doing the same.  However for him religion isn't a huge importance.  We taught her and helped her understand that she could be an example to her husband by being baptized and becoming a member and that through her he may one day see the importance.  After that we committed her for baptism later this month.  We went over again later this week and she expressed her doubts, stating that she didn't know what she wanted to do.  She told us that she suffers from depression and often doesn't have any interest in things, hence her sudden lack of interest in joining this church.  She was willing to continue working with us though.  After her confession to us, we spent the rest of the afternoon helping her in her basement sort everything.  She promised that she would come to church, but yesterday they had an emergency that prevented them from coming.  Their sink was leaking black water.  Darn Satan is working his butt off trying to stop us. 

We had a cool experience in  an apartment complex where we have several people we teach.  We were walking on the top level and could hear that someone was playing Lil' Wayne (popular rapper, very expilicit lyrics).  A door opened and out came 4 people in their early 20's covered from head to foot in tattoos and piercings.  They saw us and walked the other way, and we could hear them talking about us (those darn Mormons again).  They turned into a doorway and disappeared from sight.  However, two seconds later one of them (a young women named C) turned around and came to us, asking if we could come to her apartment to teach her.  We came back the next day and taught her and her boyfriend the Restoration.  Growing up she had never believed in God, but had an experience that changed her.  She just recently got out of jail and while she was in there she would read the Bible often.  One time a preacher came and talk about how God and Jesus Christ are the same person.  This struck her and she didn't feel right about it.  She asked us and when we told her is wasn't true she felt better and agreed with everything else that we taught.  I would love to continue teaching her but we're probably going to hand her over to the English elders soon. 

That's it for this week,  Love y'all

E' Harker