Aaron 1/27/14

January 27, 2014

I love my family!

Hey all, it's been an awesome week again here in the OCM, minus some rather heartbreaking choices that one of our investigators made. 

It's the hardest things in the world to hear "I want my dad to stay, but mom won’t let him. I want him to stay." from a 5 year old boy. Killer...

But other than that it's been really awesome! The weather's been crazy, but we've been learning some extra tricks to stay warm. For example, my feet have been getting really cold, due to thin/wicking socks, and that the snow has been soaking my shoes. So we found a solution by putting on a pair of socks, putting a plastic bag over that, and then putting on another pair of socks! Warm and dry! :)

This past Monday we returned to a potential investigators house to find him nice and drunk with around 7 kids visiting. It was a fun visit for sure, but he's agreed to read and pray about the Book of Mormon :) haha

Tuesday was a work filled day (much as they all are!). Our planning has been getting longer and longer, and more specific by the day, so we can be more productive during the days. It means a little less sleep, because planning takes so long, but it's worth it! Unfortunately, plans don't always go as planned, so that's a struggle. I had the thought that when planning we were just thinking it out instead of depending on the Spirit to guide us, and we've seen even greater successes since having a focus on planning as Heavenly Father would have us do! 

Wednesday through Saturday were all pretty similar, with lots of lessons taught and a pretty good amount of finding! We've come into contact with a lot of former investigators who want to continue to learn, so we've been able to begin teaching 4 or 5 of them again! 

Question of the Day: How do you help a 11 year old boy living in rough family circumstances feel God's love, when he currently believes that God has abandoned him? 

Saturday Morning we got to do service! The only service I've been able to do since being here is shovel snow, and for that we've been wearing our suits and coats still. Finally we got to put on some jeans and a hoodie, and went to load up a U-haul for someone who was moving out to Columbus. I've never seen drifts on roads like I have Saturday morning. They would blow 3 feet deep in some places across the road!! We had to help push someone out of one haha. 

Sunday was a very interesting day. I forgot to tell yall last week, but church was canceled due to terrible weather. The weather yesterday was even worse than last week, but they still had sacrament meeting!! We showed up early to help direct traffic and shovel sidewalks. The drifts had gotten up again the church doors really deep as well. Luckily we had a snowblower!! Those things are awesome! 

Yesterday afternoon we went with Brother Vandiford, our Ward Mission Leader's son who is part of the bishopric, to visit our investigator Jake, who has been dating a member for 4 years now. He has decided to get baptized on March 16! Yus!

I know that this is God's work, and I know that he has me here in Springfield for a reason, and I love it! We have an awesome missionary force here (picture included of missionaries and ward missionaries) and the work is progressing! The "scripture" of the week is The Standard of Truth!! NO unhallowed hand can stop the work from progressing! Thank you for all your prayers and support, love and letters, and for just being awesome!

Love and Miss yall,
Elder Aaron Toombs

PS- I'm also attaching a pic of fried hotdogs, reese's cup, and m&ms in dorito batter. ;)