This week has definitely been a progressive one. Our finding efforts for some reason are in vain right now. It’s been a while since we’ve gotten any new investigators, perhaps meaning that we need to focus more on the ones we have. I don’t know if I’ve told you guys this yet or not, but we have 3 investigators who will all be baptized by next Tuesday. Our longtime Biblical scholar, Cassie, has been working towards it for a while now and although she still has trouble admitting to herself that Joseph Smith is a prophet, she believes the Book of Mormon to be true, so in that sense she’s converted. She came to all three hours of Church yesterday and I’m pretty sure she enjoyed it. Even after she was interviewed for baptism by our new mission president, President Topham, himself. (President Topham is a funny and transparently inexperienced, but he has a very good heart and will grow to be quite the leader in time. Something that’s interesting about him is that he didn’t serve a mission himself, so I wonder how that will affect his decisions…) Our other investigating family, Amie and Leo with their 3 young children, are completely stellar. Although they come from a very minimalistic religious background, they feel as if this is the right thing to do and accept everything we teach them.
Although our investigators are progressing marvelously, that doesn’t stop us from having doubts. It seems that they all have their weaknesses and potential pitfalls for falling away from the Church. Cassie seems to be spiritually converted but not very sociable with other members of the congregation and Amie and Leo seem to be socially converted, very accepting of the Church’s varying programs, but shaky on how much they study the word. Either concern should be settled with that confirming witness from the Holy Ghost that this is God’s true Church. So we thought that what better activity brought the Spirit than the movie “Joseph Smith: The Prophet of the Restoration,” focusing on different points in Joseph Smith’s life and the struggles of the early Saints. Unfortunately, we came to possess two DIFFERENT versions of the movie. One that we showed to Amie and Leo, which was supposedly a better one for investigators by clearly portraying all the doctrines of the early church, and the other which we showed Cassie, was the official version as it was showed in the Joseph Smith Memorial Building in Utah. I can’t even express how terrible the alternate version was. When we showed to Amie and Leo and their young children, we came to realize that not only was this an uninspired compilation of poor quality clips, but that the content was more violent, focusing too much on the persecutions and not enough on the Spirituality of it all. We felt so bad and uncomfortable during that movie with Amie and Leo that we thought they might drop us right there. Thankfully, they’re still relying on their faith and are not letting that bother them. Elder Zaleski then literally destroyed that version of the movie before we showed the official version to Cassie.
Well. This is it. This is my last couple of days with my trainer. It’s weird how fast and slow the whole mission process can feel at different times, and right now, I feel as if these three months have zoomed by. In my “farewell” talk, I expressed that I didn’t know why I entered the MTC at the time I did, why the Lord would delay my mission date for those six weeks. But now I am sure that the purpose of him doing so was so that I could serve with this wonderful missionary, Elder Zaleski. He has been nothing but loving and a Christlike example to me. Even when I was discouraged, angsty, or downright frustrated with the work, he gently pushed me in the right direction, solving all my angers with a humble attitude and a forgiving heart. There was one night in particular that I can remember when I was mad at him for some reason or another, and it was very apparent to Elder Zaleski. Just after our nightly planning, I sat at my desk writing furiously in my journal about how our companionship needed faith and peace in this trying time and he came over and left the phone beside me. A couple seconds later after he had entered our bedroom, the phone rang with a text message from our own phone number. It said “Thank you for all your hard work today. I love ya.” I really do have the best missionary as my companion. It will be so hard to see him leave on Tuesday, but the time we’ve spent together has been immeasurable in how much he has taught me. I still don’t think I can be considered “out of training” yet, but if I can be even close to the missionary Elder Zaleski is, I know I will be successful.
Don’t be surprised to see the name “Elder Alexander L. Zaleski” in the General Conference someday.
Elder Low
P.S. In a way, it’s kind of sad that Bishop and Sister Heninger won’t be there when I get home! Wish them luck for me; they’ve been such a wonderful influence in my youth!
P.P.S. That’s alright to hear that you haven’t sent the package yet. I guess I’ll expect it sometime next week then? ALSO, please make note that this is the beginning of my third transfer in the mission field. It’s extremely likely that it will also be my last in Bedford. So if anybody’s still sending letters to my Bedford address, please start now in just sending them to the mission, who will forward it to any address I’ll be at.
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