Little kids are super funny. There is a family that we don't really know but that we have tried to talk to a few times that lives in the apartment building across the street. As we were walking out to our car the other day one of the kids (who is probably about kindergarten age) yells, "Look! There are those GUYS again!"
Another thing about kids in apartment complexes is that they seem to form gangs. There'll just be a pack of a dozen kids running around in the evenings. We walked past one such gang while out trying to find someone to teach, and two of the kids happened to be in our ward. They saw us and yelled, "Those are the MISSIONARIES! They came to my house today!" and waved a lot. Some of the other kids waved too. Sharing the gospel is that easy, I guess!
This week was our second week back to two-hour church! It is pretty exciting, but also kind of crazy when you have both a branch and a ward. You can end up in church for a long time. It is really exciting to see all the progress, though.
On Saturday, we were out on the bikes, looking for people to talk to. It's been starting to heat up outside, so we made sure to keep a couple water bottles in our bags. We were just going through a residential neighborhood, and we saw a man working on something in his garage. We tried to say hi, and he said "No thanks." But then, he said, "Do you want some water, though?" One rule of missionary work is never turn down water, so we said yes, and he brought us each two bottles. He told us that his father is a pastor and you don't see young people doing what we are doing, so he appreciated what we represent. We continued on our way, and about 30 seconds later found a couple that appeared to be from India cooking in their garage. They also respectfully said they were not interested. They said, "Would you like some water, though?" And once again, we said yes. I think at this point I already had three water bottles in my bag, but the man kindly gave us another bottle and wished us well.
We kept going, laden with all our water, and passed a park. There were a lot of people under the pavilion. We biked past, and suddenly someone calls out, "Elders!" We turned around, and there was a nice Hawaiian man who is in the bishopric in his ward in Hawaii. His mom lives here in Las Vegas and was celebrating her 83rd birthday. His whole extended family came from all over to celebrate. So there was this huge Polynesian family with Hawaiian music and a bunch of food and they all talked to us and loaded us up with a bunch of food. They were so nice. We ate for a minute and then continued on our way.
Later that same night, we had a party with our Spanish branch. Our building has a little grass field with a pavilion out back, and we grilled a bunch of carne asada. The branch loved it, and we got more people there than we do at church, I believe. We also had two of the students from our English class come, and they each brought friends and family! That was pretty exciting. There were 6 total nonmembers, plus two of their kids. After all the food, they had a piñata for the kids. I was the tallest person there, so they had me stand on a table and hang it up. Our ward mission leader announced how it would work, and he explained, "We will go shortest to tallest. So, that means Elder Harris is last. But, thanks to him, we were able to hang up the piñata! It was just a really fun and uplifting atmosphere.
The sweet older lady we are teaching that is really excited to be baptized was visiting another member's home with us, and we asked her how things had gone reading 1 Nephi 1. She said, "Hang on a second, let me get my notebook." She opened up a notebook and had two pages of notes written down! She started reading: "Nephi was always faithful, so he was blessed and favored of the Lord. He always remembered to offer thanks..." She kept going with all sorts of amazing insights about her reading. It was really powerful.
We had another amazing experience when we called someone that had requested to talk to the missionaries through the Come Unto Christ website. We called and started talking to a younger woman. She is probably in her mid 20s. We introduced ourselves and asked what questions she had. She said she wanted to know about how we can be completely saved. She also said, "I was also wondering about baptism. Like, I haven't been baptized. Is just accepting Christ enough? Or do you actually have to get dipped?" It was pretty funny and we were really excited, but we managed to contain ourselves. We started walking her through some scriptures and texted her screen shots so she could follow along. We talked about faith, and then talked about repentance, and how it allows us to be clean and is positive and healing. She seemed really touched by it. When we got to a scripture about following Christ's example by being baptized, she said, "Oh, so you do have to be baptized to follow Christ." She then asked if we have church services and said, "Do I have to come to church every week? Or just for the baptism?" We hadn't even invited her to be baptized yet, so she pretty much beat us to the punch. She is super cool. Since that first call, we have learned that she has a lot of social anxiety that makes it so she really has to work up her courage to even do a phone call. She definitely still has some hurdles to overcome. But as we sat in the car, you could just feel the Spirit. We were just so grateful that we had been part of something so amazing and special that had pretty much nothing to do with us and our abilities.
Another time we were at the film studio to make our English class that we put out on the internet. The guy who films it hadn't gotten there yet, so we were waiting. Some people came in and we waved and said hi. The guy finally got there, and we started getting ready to film the video. While we did, and elderly Hispanic couple came into the studio. They are psychologists and were going to film something about Mother's Day and creating strong family relationships. They weren't members of the church. As we talked with them for a minute, the camera man told them that we do this English broadcast as a community service and that our church does lots of things like that. The wife nodded and said, "That's good. Besides, they radiate a lot of peace." I thought that was really cool. Our only interaction with these people was to smile and wave when they walked past us, and they could still feel something. Our smallest interactions really seem to have an effect on people.
There are lots of things that make being a missionary really special. Like running up to someone who is walking away from you and asking if we can pray with them, and having them say yes. Or hearing somebody say, "I needed to hear that." They are certainly experiences never to be forgotten.
'Til we meet,
Elder Harris
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