Don Sherwood Family Blog: Transfer 1, week 6: Miracles and Transfers

Hey Everyone,
This week has been a great little week of miracles and preparation for things to come. I am really excited for several people, including Elder Ritchie.
This week we didn't have a whole lot of busy work, but we did see a few miracles. So that was great. Well, let's jump into it.
Preparation was a blast this week. Normally they are great, but this one was different. We went disc golfing. That was fun. It was hot, and kind of fast paced. We didn't really have an order to it. And I noticed that I was the only one trying to score it correctly(like normal golf). Everyone else was scoring it by stroke. But then what is the point of a par 3 hole. Weird.🤔 Later, we went to the Schenks for dinner. Nothing special there yet, but I'll come back to it.
Tuesday has a pretty good miracle. We had been working with our investigator John for quite a while now on his smoking addiction. The zone leaders had given us a lesson for a stop smoking program which has a very high success rate. So we studied it and gave it a try with John. Well, needless to say, it went extremely well. He gave us all of his cigarettes, and stopped smoking, after throwing out everything he had related to smoking. He has been following the program exactly, and we have been seeing some pretty great miracles there. No baptismal date yet on him, but one step at a time.🤗
We also helped one of our members practice roping cattle. So, that was fun.
Our other investigator, Jerry, has been progressing very very well. We had two lessons with him, and he is very golden. He knows the material, and has accepted a baptismal date of Aug 18th.😂 We are so excited. Jerry was willing to give up his occasional beer to become a member of the church. One of the little miracles we saw there was Bishop Steyee was with us for a lesson. And Jerry had mentioned that he was considering suicide before we arrived. But now he feels like he has more if a purpose in his life, and feels a lot of comfort from our church. It makes me feel really good to hear about and see the changes we are making in the lives of others.
Thursday we were really rushed around the place. The back story behind that is Elder Ritchie had lost his wallet. So when we went down to Great Falls for district meeting. Turns out it was sent back to Fairfield with a member. But we couldn't get it in till that night, because we had housing and vertical inspections that afternoon. So we actually drove around illegally for about 2 days, because I am forbidden to drive anything for another 5 months because of my driving record. It's a good thing we didn't get caught.🤗😲😥
Saturday was the famous swim day celebration for our area. Think of Pony Express Days, combined into one day. The whole day is spent on activities to raise money for the community pool. We helped in the community hall, with the church sponsored bbq. That was fun. We took tickets, and counted how many people were there. They cost $9, ouch. But luckily we got to eat free because we helped with the whole thing. We were at the building though from 10 am till almost 5pm cleaning up and service around there. There were auctions, music, a car show, and a small parade. That was all very cute, but it was fun to see.
The only thing that was new or exciting about Sunday was that after the three hour block, we had a pot luck lunch. Yumm. It was a great activity they do out here called "Linger Longer". Definelty worth the time. We were there at the church that day from 8am to 4:30pm that after noon. Phew, that's a lot of church. The rest of the day was spent doing normal Sunday stuff, while anxiously awaiting the exciting transfer news call.
Now, about that transfer news call. Guess what, I'm not going anywhere. I'm going to still be in Fairfield for at least 6 more weeks.😥 Sounds good. My companion, Elder Ritchie isn't so lucky though. He is getting transferred into town, and is now going to be one of the zone leaders. 😭So I'll still get to see him, but not as much.
Remember that family I told you I would get back to, The Schenks. Well, cool story there. On Monday for dinner, Ethan, who had just graduated high school, had previously stated that he was NOT going on a mission. But on Saturday, we ran into Brother and Sister Schenk, who told us that Ethan had changed his mind after we left, and was very excited about going. I didn't even think we had a major impact on him. But something changed, and I am so happy we were there to help him make that decision to go. So I guess that's going to be my spiritual thought for the week. The examples we set forth by our actions can have a major impact on others and help them to make their own choices. This makes it all the more important, to listen to the holy ghost, and make sure we are keeping ourselves in line with His teachings, because we are all watched, and the actions we make affect others greatly. This is probably the whole reason I am out on my mission, to do all I can to help others come into Christ, by the example I set before them.

All my love,
Elder Sherwood

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