Well this week was my birthday and it was awesome! I woke up at 6:25, turned off my alarm and to my surprise, 4 missionaries walked into my room with a flaming birthday cake singing happy birthday. My companion just about fell off the top bunk. Apparently the zone leaders baked the cake the night before, woke up at 6 AM, and then drove all the way to our apartment. Now that's dedication! At dinner time, we went to Sister Umbach's house for a birthday dinner. She invited most of our district, unbeknownst to me. She even made cookie cake with real bacon in it. Sister Umbach always experiments on us, but it tasted pretty good. For dinner we had hot dogs with BBQ sauce and some macaroni/spaghetti and cheese.
Marlin is getting baptized next Sunday at 1:00pm! It's right in the middle of our sacrament meeting so we will have to sneak out and see it.
This week was St. Patrick's day and, living in a University town, and having the nicest March weather in at least 20 years, there were a TON of partying students. Being the mature missionary that I am, I decided to fulfill my purpose by stepping onto the balcony of our 19th floor apartment, look down upon all of iniquitous drunkards and shout, "REPENT!"
It was awesome.
This week our district leader challenged us to "liken" the scriptures to ourselves, one scripture every day. It's amazing how when you do that, the scriptures just speak to you. I'm in Alma right now in the Book of Mormon, and this week I read about Alma trying to teach the people in Ammonihah. It was the exact situation we are in right now; no one really wanted to listen to him and he was in a bit of a slump. But then he decided to go in a different way, a different route. He found Amulek, who took him in and fed him. Amulek was in a unique position to share the Gospel. It wasn't that Alma wasn't a great, righteous missionary. Alma needed Amulek's help because he was one of the locals. He was well-known and helped Alma by providing another witness to his message. My interpretation, my "likening," is that Alma represents a full-time missionary and Amulek represents the members. The members take us in, feed us, and help us share the Gospel. They provide a meaningful witness that we, no matter how righteous we are, could not provide. That's the witness of a friend, a neighbor, a peer. And that is how we share the Gospel.
Thanks for everyone that helped with my birthday, and congratulations Justin on your mission call!
--Elder Wade
