Letter 11.22.18 { week 9 }

Hey Mom! 

Here's the email for this past week and a half. Thank you a bunch for the greenie package! I really did like it  especially the rhymes written on there! Oh and in case you are interested for whatever reason I tried egg nog for the first time today and I felt as though I was drinking liquidated candy! Wow that stuff was sugary, but hey it did taste pretty good. I dunno if I'll get it again but I'm glad I tried it!

There are a few different people who we are teaching that have been progressing super well. We continued talking to Jefferson and he can be spotty to get in contact with but he really likes meeting with us. He relies on us as missionaries a lot to get the encouragement to continue reading the Book of Mormon, so we asked him how we can help him to remember each day to read! We offered that once a week, if he reads on his own, we would also send him a scripture to read as well. He seemed to really like that idea. A lot of people who we teach are going home for Thanksgiving so unfortunately for us we aren't able to meet with them this week, but we are still texting them positive and uplifting scriptures to read while they are away!

The next person we have been teaching is Lewis. Lewis' faith in our heavenly father is UNWAVERING. He knows he is only where he is because of God and Jesus Christ. That being said, we are very concerned for him because hes really not doing well. I cannot go into too much detail but hes just not doing well. We have been praying and praying for him hoping that he will continue to be safe and okay.

On Wednesday we had our booth setup for the last time of the year! Our mission president, President Evans, even came with us! He is such an amazing guy. 

President Evans also came with us to meet with Yoon again! She is super solid. We met with her and invited her to church but unfortunately she has meetings from 9am - 3pm every Sunday! We asked her what goes on during the meeting and she said it's a lot of presentations. We have a few ideas for her to see if she can ask the professor to be excused early to come to church, we pray that her professor will allow her to. She has such a strong desire to continue to feel the holy spirit and to go to church. She knows that if she comes to church she will better feel the spirit. She knows this is true! She has such a desire to come closer to our savior and we are trying everything we can to give her every opportunity to do so!!

We also met with Patrick again who is absolutely amazing! Hes such a solid guy and asks crazy deep doctrine questions. Unfortunately our first few lessons were very intellectual and not so spiritual. After we realized this we focused our next lesson to be entirely on BAPTISM BY FIRE AND THE HOLY GHOST! I say that excitedly because baptism by fire just sounds so awesome (and it is!!) Anyways, our lessons are much more spiritual now. We tie everything back to the Book of Mormon and receiving that spiritual confirmation that it is true. He has yet to receive that confirmation, but we know he will!

We also had exchanges again! Last time I was on exchanges with elder Edwards, our district leader. This time I was on exchanges with Elder Clinger, his companion. We were super hungry for dinner and we decided to go to Burger King. We saw an advertisement that said "$1 - 10 piece nuggets" so naturally we both take upon ourselves the 50 chicken nugget challenge. 

It was a hard battle against those nuggets, but with a lot of help from ranch, sweet and sour, and barbecue sauce we were both able to finish the challenge! Pictures will be here. Guys don't try this, it was fun to do once but I dont even want to look at another chicken nugget for the rest of my mission.

On a more spiritual note, we received a text while on exchanges asking us to come to the hospital. A member's daughter hurt her eye very bad and needed surgery. Before they took her to the children's hospital we were able to get to the triage room and give her a blessing. Thank goodness I had my wallet on me which holds my oil because Elder Clinger didn't have any. We were able to drop everything and get right over there. I've yet to receive any update on how she is doing, but as soon as I know I'll report on that here.

On Sunday we taught a gospel doctrine class and talked about Faith in Christ. I'll go into more detail as part of my spiritual thought for the week. 

On Monday, which wasn't pday, we went to UB and after about 10 minutes I looked over to my companion and said "I'm honestly feeling like we shouldn't be here." We prayed about it, then decided we should go parking lot contacting. So we drove about 10-15 minutes to a parking lot and we put the car in park and I said again "Elder Hawes, I don't think this is where we need to be. Let's pray again and find out where the Lord wants us." We prayed again, and decided to go door knocking at some student homes. As soon as we parked I knew this is where we needed to be. An hour and a half later we actually ended up teaching 3 first lessons! One of those lessons was even taught at a frat house while we were looking directly at a coffee table filled with many items that totally goes against the word of wisdom! We planted many seeds that day. Within the coming days those seeds will grow, and they will call us back, we just know it.

Anyways, that was basically my week!

Spiritual thought:

We were talking about faith in Jesus Christ on Sunday, and someone related faith in Christ to the faith we have in a mechanic who fixes our car:

We don't know everything about Christ, nor God's plan for us, similar to how (most of us) don't know how a mechanic fixes our car. BUT, we do know that the mechanic DOES fix our car, just like how we know that Christ is perfect along with God's plan for us. 

Elder Breshears

Pictures:

1. Elder Hawes (my companion) and I

2. Elder Clinger and I (who I went on exchanges with)

3. Elder clinger and I with our 100 combined chicken nuggets + sauces

4. Elder Edwards (my district leader) and I

5. A screenshot of the weather here! I love it!!!
6. "Chair" picture for our district. Apparently its tradition that you sit upon the amount of chairs for how many transfers you have left. Of course this was the end of my first transfer so I had the most with 16! Elder Edward's up front as you can see is only sitting on one chair. Hes about ready to go home in 6 weeks!