The One with April Showers & Osceola

Usually I try to say something clever right here before I jump into the rundown of the week. If I think of something as I'm writing, I'll go back and change this. Otherwise this will just have to stay.


On Tuesday, we had another district council that went pretty well. We talked about using the Book of Mormon, and then went on an exchange! I got to go to Blytheville, Arkansas, the furthest Northeast area in the mission. We didn't make it into Missourri that day, but we did get to walk around ~Osceola~. I don't wanna say it's nothing special, cause it's a cool little town. But it's just a few more run down buildings shy of being a ghost town haha. But we met some cool people, and some little kids even told us to knock on their door and that went really well, actually!


After Osceola, we walked around a town just outside of Blytheville where the elders up there live, trying to contact a few people who didn't end up home. They've got a pretty fun little duplex up there from long before whenever the air force base closed down. So it's got the colorful tile in the bathroom, and an old kitchen and everything. It'd be kinda fun and not much work to make it look like a retro movie scene. (Aka, my vibe)



The next day, we exchanged back somewhere close to where Johnny Cash grew up, so that was cool! His old house is out there, somewhere. We had a great lesson first thing back in West Memphis. It was really cool to see how this lady's situations were being talked about so closely in the first few chapters of the Book of Mormon. It was really special for all if us.

Next, some members took us to Cracker Barrel. I'd never been there before, but now I can rest a little easier knowing that there is still a place back West I can go to get my fix of southern home cooking. 

Later, as we were walking around in a neighborhood, some little kids started talking with us. (Little kids are almost always a lot more friendly and teachable than adults... I think Jesus said something about that haha. Although one girl did ask if my tie was a woman's tie because it had flowers on it lol.) A neighbor down the street brought this group of kids a box of donuts and they shared with us haha. 

We had our Book of Mormon class that night, and got in touch with someone we were teaching to ask if he needed a ride. He said yes, and 18 minutes later, we and our branch mission leader were in his driveway, but he didn't answer or seem to be home. Solid. We had a lot of that kinda flakiness all week. Especially with people coming to conference. We were expecting a good half dozen people to come to at least one session, but nobody came. Sad, sad days. But still happy, cuz... General Conference. 

Thursday was rainy, so we weekly planned and met a guy at Wendy's the sisters had set up an appointment for us with. They had been teaching him, but felt like we might be better for him. When asked why he went to church, he explained it was "for the beautiful women and because I've got nothing else to do." Ahh. That's why the sisters sent him to us haha. So we'll see where that goes. 

But then after that, we had one of the best "intro to the Book of Mormon" lessons of my mission. He was already somewhat familiar, and so we just read a few key passages and he was writing down the references to study later. I compared 3 Nephi 11 and so on, when the Savior visits the people of the Americas, to the Holy of Holies in the old testament tabernacle. The whole book is a holy place, but those chapters in particular are sacred and powerful. I felt the spirit really strongly as I explained that, never having explained it that way before. It was cool. 

General Conference was great! You can watch it online if you missed It! 
@ www.lds.org

We also got to give another one of the sisters investigators a blessing between sessions on Saturday. This tough looking guy had tears rolling down his face and was feeling some pretty serious regret for some decisions he had made for... not the first or second time. He wanted to change. So we talked for a while, and both those words and the words of the blessing seemed to come a lot more clearly than they typically have. Speaking confidently, and yet knowing your words aren't your own is another really special feeling.


But anyway! Those are the highlights of this week! Love y'all!
Elder Dahl

oliver.dahl@missionary.org

107 McCain Blvd Apt. D,
West Memphis, AR, 72301