The Zachtastic Movie Blog

Now that Elder Long has virtually overcome his illness, we finally got to do some legitimate missionary work this week; in other words, we are back on track. ...well, we needed SOMETHING to do while Elder Long was sick. This wasn't necessarily a stellar week for us, but even so we did witness some cool miracles throughout the week. We found a new investigator named Linda (yes, we just keep on finding one Linda after another) on Tuesday, so we are pretty excited to see where her progression goes. Sadly, a couple of people rejected our message after finally getting to teach them this week, but on the bright side we managed to find some new potential investigators for us to visit in the upcoming week. Also, things are going well for Barbara, Steve and Sabrina; while we are still trying to get them to attend church, once they do it will make all the difference in their lives. Sacrament Meeting is truly a great time during the week to show the Lord that you've sinned and ha...

I am sad to say that there is not much to report on this week, and for one key reason: Elder Long got very sick! We are still unsure what he actually came down with, but my guess is that he got a horrible sinus infection. Because of this we had to stay inside several days during the week since he was too weak to go street contacting, walk to appointments, tracting, etc. Thus, we spent most of our week sitting inside doing whatever we could to keep ourselves busy or spiritually engaged. I can't speak for Elder Long, but I know that for myself it was quite hard to have to stay inside that entire time knowing that there are many people we need to find and teach. There is nothing worse for a missionary than not getting work done. Nevertheless, if we have gained anything from this week, it's that our unity as a companionship has grown a lot stronger. If we are going to continue facing all of these trials, then we need to do our best to ensure we have a strong companionship. That...

As I had mentioned weeks ago, our   bishop's goal for us missionaries is to be like Ammon: servants to the community who show their endearing love through charitable service, and then they share the Gospel once hearts have been softened.   We have been waiting patiently for more service opportunities to arise here in our area, and   we finally had plenty of them this week. Throughout the week we had chances to do work for people ranging from breaking up a concrete foundation (something we are going to continue today), tearing down stables, painting a house, and helping a man missing his right leg do some woodwork on his porch. Some of these projects were for members of the ward, but even so we have already noticed miracles as direct results of the service we rendered. I do not mean to say this to make myself sound ostentatious, and if that is what I sound like then I apologize; my point is that I know that the principle of charitable, selfless service for your fellow men...

So it turns out that Elder Long and I will be staying in Green City for another transfer. I am pretty happy about that not just for the fact that I love the Kirksville District, but now that we have been here for six weeks we finally have a solid foundation in our area. We have investigators and solid potentials in every single "major" town we work in, while we also have a decent routine that we have established for each week concerning where we should go, what to do to best help our area progress and then planning around necessary weekly meetings. I am excited to see where these next six weeks take us. We have a slight mouse problem.  Let's just say we had to come up with a creative trap. Concerning the work that we were able to do this week, we are struggling to follow-up with some of the investigators we have but we are working hard nonetheless. We also struggle with our mile allotment situation, but that is a hurdle we will work through as well. I do not li...

My fifth transfer is coming to a very abrupt ending, and with that some changes are coming to the Kirksville District. For one thing,   two of the sisters in the Kirksville 1st Ward are going home, while the remaining missionary (Sister Ramsey) will be training .   One of our Zone Leaders down in Quincy, Illinois is also getting transferred   after being there for about 10 months or so. As for everyone else, we do not know who else is getting transferred yet; Elder Long and I are pretty sure we will stay, though. The only other change we know of is that the ward is gaining another companionship in Edina, Missouri, so at that point our district will be 10 missionaries strong, unless we get another tripanionship, which would result in 11. This picture is a little late, but here is all of us at the Nauvoo Zone Conference on the 18th. In other news, things are going well in our area. We are having slight troubles trying to follow-up with some of our investigators, b...