The Ups, the Downs, the Undressed. September 13, 2015

Hey Family,

Yeah, I think it’s a smart idea to write a little bit every night.  I will try to do that I think.  My companion gave me this really nice wireless keyboard for my ipad so now I am able to type better.  So I am just in bed typing this, my companion is leaving home to Arizona tomorrow.  Lots of tears.  I’m going to miss him.  We had a really good day today visiting people.  All of our investigators have really made some progress lately.  So there is this part member family we are really close to, the race car ones.  The son is like, “Dad, I’ll quit smoking if you will”, so their both going to quit smoking.  The son is picking out a baptism date out.  Praying about it, so excited we have come so far with him.  I’m sad my companion will leave before he can be baptized.  I’m scared.  My companion is so close with everyone here I feel like I have been kind of in the background.  I’m going to have to “make a name for myself” kind of deal, idk.  I’m just nervous, I know I’ll be fine, I just don’t want to fail.  I’m scared for our investigators and the less actives.  I don’t want to let the Lord or Elder McCurdy down.  Ugh…my emotions are all over.  It’s been an emotional night with Elder McCurdy leaving in the morning.  He is going home and able to see his family active in the gospel for the first time ever and their going to be sealed.

So, I’ve been wanting to buy this thing from a store and really nagging my companion to go and today we were able to eat lunch right by the store.  But it wasn’t P-day and your are not suppose to shop except on P-day.  After lunch my companion asked me if I wanted to go into the store.  I made the choice to be obedient.  Ugh, man, it was hard.  It seems like a stupid thing and like of course don’t shop, but it was difficult.  Exact obedience is hard.  I need the blessings that come from it sooo bad.  I feel so inexperienced and unknowledgeable in like everything.  Idk…it’s just been a tough day for me I guess.  I just want amazing things to happen.  I want to be an amazing missionary and I don’t know how to get there.  I have kept a little bit of my comfort zone or something.

Oh, I almost forgot to mention!!  I got to go on exchanges two nights ago with Elder Robinson!  He is from Sky View and I knew him before the mission.  Lots of my friends back home know him too.  We had even roomed together in the MTC.  We’re really good friends. It was way fun spending some time with him.  Ha, he kept telling people that we didn’t know what we were doing because we were both new!  We actually did know what we were doing, I don’t know what he is talking about!  I mean we were tracting.  We even were able to have a good talk with this cool dad and his son and his son’s friend at the baseball field.  They were hitting balls and we were like, hey, could we give you a hand picking up baseballs.  He’s like sure.  We had a good talk.  He’s like sorry guys I would be Mormon, I just like beer too much.  I tried to set up a meeting, but he said he has member friends that have tried everything to get him to convert.  We were only able to get him to take a card from us with our number on it.

Thursday:

So last night was sad.  Elder McCurdy’s last night as a missionary.  We had some good talks.  I woke up packed my bags to go spend a week with the zone leaders because Elder McCurdy had left early for school.  I hate moving and having to pack and repack.  Ugh.  How to describe the zone leaders.  Well, Elder Kaafi is Tongan and is way funny.  He had to learn English so his accent is awesome.

Elder Egbert and Elder Kaafi

The other is Elder Killpack and he is a cowboy from Idaho.  They have a really nice apartment compared to ours.  Anyway, yesterday it was awesome, there was a trainers meeting and I got to see my MTC companion!  Our MTC district was  soo close, and we still are!  We took a district MTC picture at the lunch they put on after the trainers meeting.

MTC district meet again at trainer’s meeting.

Then we did some stuff until 7, we drove 30 minutes to the visitors center with a less active.  The guy was kinda loopy.  I asked him what his previous jobs have been and he said if he told me, he would have to kill me.  Ha, jokingly the zone leaders are like, oh, come on, really tell us what your job was.  He told us he was like a stripper at a bar.  Wow, that wasn’t what we were expecting.  We had a good time at the visitor’s center.  I got to see the two sisters that were in our MTC district again because they work at the visitors center.  They introduced me to their companions and stuff.  Then after we got in our car driving back to our apartment, Elder Killpack and Elder  Kaafi are like man, it’s been a hard day, I think we should treat ourselves.  I was like uh, yeah, sure.  Elder Killpack’s like hum, I think we’ll go to Hooters to eat tonight.  I’m like yeah, whatever! Then we’re driving and there’s a Hooters and he pulls in!  I’m like what!!!!!!!! They park kind of far away and they get out and are like hey come on, let’s go.  I’m like real funny guys….It was a good joke, really funny.  They played it off real well, I can’t do it justice writing it in this email.  Use your imagination.

Saturday

So we went tracting today.  Man, I’ve been tracting before and rejected before, but today was especially bad.  People are just rude sometimes.   

When we offer to help them with service or just talk to them for a quick second and they are like, “Get the heck on down the road” or when people drive by and yell, “Hail Satan”  Errrrr…I get a flash of adrenaline and anger, but I have to let it go.  🙂  Ugh…Sometimes it is hard to love everyone.  How did Jesus do it?  We had a good conversation with this lady who had been told some anti-mormon stuff.  We talked with her for a bit and she was so wrong in some things.  I just wanted to just whip out a few scriptures and make her feel stupid.  She was like, Jesus is going to appear in Jerusalem in the second coming because their “special”.  I was like, lady, God is not a respecter of persons.  She also was like, there is no way Jesus came to the Americas.  I was like, so you only think he taught the people of the Middle East,  even though he said, other sheep I have that are not of this fold, John 10:16 and in Matthew it says the gospel will be preached in all the world…why not then also.  It was good, it wasn’t an argument, we were just able to accept that we differed on things.  She wouldn’t take the BOM we offered her because she already had heard about it.  I said, do you think what you heard could have been biased?  She’s like uhhhhhh….maybe.. I said then what better way then to find out for yourself and she still wouldn’t take it.  People…  Later that day we went to a loony house and had a lesson with 3 people.  Two of them were not all there, but one of them mostly was.

Sunday

Woke up went to my ward that was 40 minutes away at 9 o clock.  A member brought a non-member to church.  It was awesome!  She is only here for two weeks, but was always curious about the Mormon church.  She is from Alaska and looks native Alaskan.  The three some got to see her and visit for a minute.  Then we went to the zone leader’s church.  Then we went to dinner and had hamburgers, home cut fries, and onion rings.  Then we went to visit some people we had appointments to, they fell through so we tracked around, got a couple of doors slammed on us.  This one guy yelled, “Go away, I use to be a Mormon!”  Then Kaafi and I talked to this lady from Panama about the gospel, gave her a BOM, but she wasn’t interested in setting a return appointment for us to come over and teach her.  Then as we are driving home, a basketball rolls out in front of our car.  I’m like, Yessss, people to talk to!  I jump out of the car, get the basketball and go give it to these two black kids who were playing.  I was like, “Hey, how’s it going!”

Basketball in the road contact.

Then I continued to talk a little about the gospel and give them a BOM and pamphlet.  This whole time it’s just me, solo.  My companions are both still in the car.  I asked the teens if they knew any of their friends that could use this message and they started giving me addresses, so I motioned for backup from the car!  Then the teen’s dad came out and he agreed for us to come back tomorrow and share a 15 minute lesson, so we’re in!  YAY!  Man, I have a lot of work to do with my whole teaching simply in a way that even a child could understand.  Then we went to the crazy house and taught a lesson again like the previous night.  I was frightened when I saw this old man pooping on the toliet…awkward…But it gets better as were were leaving we are walking down the hall and Elder Kaafi is like where is that ladies pants?  I’m like whaa?  This crazy lady is walking around with just a shirt!!!  Whoa that was weird, we quickly walked out of the place, then burst out laughing.  It’s never a dull day out in the mission field!

Well, sorry this letter is so long.  It is what it is.

Love you Dad, Mom, Paige and Claire!

Keep up the hard work on the cabin, share the gospel with everyone.  Have a great week!

Elder Egbert