We had transfer calls last night, and I'm sure that every missionary that has served in the last 50 years can agree with me when I say that the nights that we get our transfer calls can be some of the most anxious and exciting moments of the mission. So many crazy things happened this week. I'll do my best to list them all.
1) I'm staying here in Windsor, Elder Eatchel is going further north. No surprises there.
2) Our zone leader was called to be assistant to the president. For those not familiar with missionary lingo, there are only two of those( AP's), and they work with the mission presidents 24/7. They are for the most part the Captain Moroni's of the mission.
3) The Chinese elders in Windsor are no more. There will no longer be a Mandarin-speaking companionship in Windsor. The Chinese elders stayed with the zone leaders in the 4 elder apartment( You know, the most amazing apartment in the mission). And they had a 7-passenger van. So with them gone....the zone leaders are all alone in a very large apartment and there's an extra vehicle laying around...I'm not going to be making any promises but things are really looking good right now. And the one zone leader that's left is putting in a good word with the AP's.
4) My new companion is Elder Laceste and he's from the Phillipines. He's about "halfway" through his mission, just like all of the missionaries here in the CTWM. But I'm guessing he's been about "halfway" for a little bit longer than most of us because he'll be senior companion.
5) I talked to Elder Bennett last night and he's moving to our zone!
6) And the best news yet, JENNIFER GOT BAPTIZED!!! When Elder Bennett told me that I wanted to leap for joy. So I did.
So that was all last night, now I'll talk about the whole week. The six missionaries of Windsor got together this week and tore the roof off of a member's house. It was a service project and it was a lot of fun. It wasn't just us; the neighbor was a contractor and didn't have anything to do for the winter so he volunteered to help out for free, and we had a lot of help from the members of both wards(we meet in the same church building).
This week it snowed. About 4 inches. Yesterday we were trudging through the untrodden snow, determined to bring the word of God to the spiritually cold, naked, and hungry. What starving man will refuse a loaf of bread when it is freely given to him? And yet we are refused. This week we had a tough time finding new investigators. The whole week was uphill. I remember last night we were tracting a street and door after door, no one was interested. We were almost done with the street, and we walked up to the last house. As we walked down the driveway I brought my hand to the chest pocket of my coat, thinking perhaps, that I should come to the door with my Book of Mormon in hand. But I thought--No, it won't matter. We haven't had a real conversation with any nonmembers all day. But when I knocked on the door, the thought came to me: This person will listen. A lady came to the door and kindly invited us in. She was really into family history work and said she would love to hear about what we had to share. This was just one of the many miracles of missionary work that happen every day. I know that the Lord is working with us, and in fact has been working ahead of us to prepare the precious people that are placed in our path. There are a lot of awesome experiences that I'm not always able to email just because of time constraints, but I can assure you all that things are happening here that are wonderful and I have so much to be grateful for. I love you all and hope you enjoy the Christmas season!
--Elder Wade
