July 31st, 2018

Righteous Indignation

Hello friends and family

How are you?

So, following the trend of last p-day, I will start off with a scripture and something spiritual first.
Here is my favorite scripture.

Ether 12
27 And if men come unto me I will show unto them their weakness.  I give unto men weakness that they may be humble; and my grace is sufficient for all men that humble themselves before me; for if they humble themselves before me, and have faith in me, then will I make weak things become strong unto them.

I have probably shared this scripture over email before, but it still stands as a great motivating scripture.  We all have weaknesses.  I have many.  If we humble ourselves and allow Heavenly Father to help us, we will be made strong.  It is a simple, but True Principle.  I know that if we humble ourselves, we will be made stronger, no matter the challenge or the difficulty.

This past week was good.  We talked to a lot of people.  In fact, our mission president has asked us to keep track of all the people we contact.  He did some math equations and he said if I talked to 10 people every day, that if multiplied, I would talk to...A lot of people over the course of my mission.  It was mind boggling to think of how many people we can share the gospel with, even if they deny or are disinterested.  It is amazing to think that little things done every day, make a difference in the long run.  It just goes to show us that the simple and small things (prayer, scripture study, church attendance, etc) actually do make a big difference.  It all adds up.  Like a gold miner gathering flecks of gold, to make a fortune (there is a Mormon message on that too).

It has been jumping from cloudy to sunny back to cloudy every day.  We see lightning in the distance all the time.

Story time.  So one night, nobody in the wards signed up to feed us, so we decided to work through dinner and eat when we got home that night.  I decided I wanted Little Caesars, so a few minutes before 9 we stopped by the Little Caesars down the street from where we live.  Ghetto Little Caesars are fun.  There are police cameras stationed around this particular shopping market.  There were some sketchy people outside doing some questionable activities, but they ignored us, so we just waited patiently for our turn.

Well, a tatted up dude and a woman walk in a they start talking.  Listening in for a moment, the words and slang they were using made it very clear what they were doing that night.

I finally saw my first prostitute and her pimp!  It was...hilarious.  He had a golden grill in his teeth and she was tatted up as well.  I knew they were around here, but man oh man, my first encounter made me chuckle afterwards.

I'm definitely not in Idaho anymore.

I saw a record amount of cops this week too.  Sooo many drug busts and car wrecks.

I've had a ton of fun here.  My companion and I have our work cut out for us, not only because of the demographic, but frankly because of previous companionship simply not working at all in this area.  We are busy, tired, and having lots of fun.

My companion cut my hair last night.   I picked a number on the clippers and he cut all my hair down to that size.  It looks pretty good, actually.

Thanks to my family members who sent me food, toiletries, and other tidbits that help me.  You were definitely inspired, because I happened to need some of those things, and I didn't even ask....

That's all for now.  Here are some pictures!  Me and my comp, Elder Picinich on Bikes, a street called Boomtown, our dinner calendar and an impromptu picture of me drawn in, a needle, and an upside down cross and a pentagram carved into the cement outside the church (for some reason).

Thanks Pals!

-Elder Moore