October 7, 2013 Week 13

To: Angie Finlinson, Annette Paulsen, Bethany Finlinson, Chad Killpack, Doug Finlinson, Duffy Pi

.....

We just got a new Elder in our district and he is from Draper... he came in with that one other guy I met at the Draper Temple, Elder Jolly... but the new  Elder in our district is Elder Cluff.  I am not the youngest anymore.   

I was just looking at my preaching certificate and I am coming home in june 2015...  dang that is a long time!  That's ok because missionary work is awesome.  But there is a chance that I could get home before I turn 20, now that would be gnarly wouldn't it!  

Thanks for all of the junk food, coat, gloves and the hard drive.  It is really bad, me and the district leader were going to start a diet last week and then you had to send all of that food-- so it got pushed back to today... Please don't send me any unhealthy food anymore por favor.  In the spanish cultures the term agua means that it is flavored water full of sugar-- I did drink hibiscus tea last night but it was loaded with sugar... In order to get pure water you have to ask for it.  Satan really came down on me with the diet thing last week.  O well..  

With Joel's head thing I honestly have no idea, but i don't know that is kinda weird.  Thanks for the carmelo X2 holy cow!!! Luckily our branch president had a hip replacement this week, so we went over to his house and gave him one of the trays... and that kinda leads me into one of the crazy things this week.  Well last transfer me and Elder Pug were reading in the PMG (Preach MY Gospel) and there is a story about how you need a relationship with the branch president.  So we brought it up LAST DL (District Leadership?) and said how we would all like to increase our relationship with him, and since he just got surgery he would be at his house.  The excuse was that he lived too far away and that the missionaries with cars--everyone except me and Elder Pugmire-- would use too many miles to go there...  me and Elder Pugmire set it up and we visited him with our whole district.  It turns out that he has been the Branch President for 9 years and NEVER HAD Missionary's VISIT HIM!!!! WHAT THE HECK.  No wonder there wasn't a good relationship with him.  And it turns out that he doesn't live that far away it is like 15 minutes from our apartment............

Well we had a very good talk and we gave him a priesthood blessing, and gave him the carmel.  It was a very good experience and now when ever I go into an area I am going straight to the Bishop or President to introduce myself.  He then stated that we should have dinner some time... That right there is when you know you did some thing right.  When a Hispanic offers you food it is like a welcoming into a friendship.  That happened like 3 times this week.  But no wonder the Branch President didn't listen to us or really care what we did!  When I came in all of the missionaries were just talking about how he didn't care about the ward and were just complaining about him.  Well I think we figured out the real problem. 

This week was crazy and disappointing...  we set the goal last week to invite all of our investigators to General Conference. And we did it!  We committed 20 people to go to General conference we called them and we only got 1... It was a really important week we just cleaned out a good chunk of our investigators last night... We are going to go visit them all and tell them how we were sad in not seeing them, if they give a good enough excuse then maybe, just maybe we will come back but it is going to have to be a good one!  

The cool part though was we had 7 less actives go and it was really cool to know that they were watching it...  I really liked General Conference..  Probably my favorite was Pres. Uckdorf.  I liked how he talked about how only God and Jesus Christ are perfect in this world and how this church is run by imperfect people and how their are mistakes even in this true church.  This helped me because I've been thinking how to respond to the questions about the questionable stuff that went on in the early years of the church...  It is so nice to have prophets that explain stuff so simply that you almost feel stupid ahah.. I can't wait to receive the conference Ensign I definitely prefer to read it and study it but it is fun to hear their voices and see their emotion when they speak!  

That coat is really nice thanks it should keep me nice and warm, yah i don't know what everyone wears yet because it isn't super cold.. but Elder Pugs has an overcoat thing, but i don't see why the one you sent wouldn't work.

I feel like I am forgetting something but I can't remember, oh well maybe I will remember next week?

Thanks for all of the prayers and love. 

Love from a colder OKC,

Elder Finlinson

Pants to be replaced by Missionary Mall....