Weekly Update - 31 Aug 2009‏

Tomorrow August will be over and the month of September will get underway. This past month went by real quick, but I'm anxious for the upcoming month. There will be a lot of solid events coming up on the mission front and football season is about to kickoff. Even though we don't watch the games or get the updates from the internet, it's still a great time of the year. Keep me updated on the action.

Life sounds like it's going well. There was a good spirit in the e-mail as I read it. I laughed when I read that Taylor has a countdown or something like that for when I get home. I hope he's still anxious to see me when I actually walk off the plane. He's a stud.

Thanks for the Michigan article, I enjoyed reading it. Way to go on the 12 lbs. lost! That's impressive. Keep it up! With this kind of progression I won't recognize you when I get home.

We're still in the process of teaching and preparing a handful of investigators for baptism. We've ran into some dramatical issues (as mentioned in previous e-mails) that have caused baptismal dates to be postponed or done away with over the past weeks. One of our investigators, Gabe, is still going strong and he'll be baptized after he gets married. The wedding is scheduled for 26 Sept and he has set a baptismal date for 10 Oct. Hopefully that one goes through, especially since the other three baptismal dates we've had recently have not.

We got a phone call from one of our really solid investigators, Jason, this morning when he told us that he wanted to meet with us tomorrow evening. He has been going to church every week for the past 10-12 months with his girlfriend, who is a member, but he has been having some trouble overcoming a few doubts and questions in his mind relative to the gospel and some of the commandments. He's been taught all the lessons and he meets with the Bishop regularly, so when he's ready to go, we're ready to get him baptized.

The past 3-4 days have been toasty - 95 to 101 degrees for the highs. The fires around here don't help too much with the temperature influx and they may even be the primary reason for it. The fires are a good distance away from the mission boundaries and there have been no evacuation precautions issued for anyone within the Los Angeles valley. We played football this morning in the church parking lot for over an hour and it was hot! Good thing we have sunblock.

I went on splits with an Elder in South Central on Saturday and it was good to see some of the sights and hear some of the sounds from a familiar part of L.A. where I served close to about a year ago. We knocked doors for 3.5 hours, taught lots of spanish people, and slept in a humid apartment the night prior to the day's worth of work. It was a good day though. It felt good to get out of the office.

We have a "zone tour" this week from Tuesday night until Saturday night with a zone that covers the downtown L.A. area. We'll be speaking spanish everyday and we'll be near the big ol' apartment complexes near the large office buildings on a few days. I didn't sleep under my blankets for the full four night stretch during our last zone tour and I'm not anticipating the need to use them this week due to the recent weather trends. Elder Gentry and I will work with four separate companionships on four separate days and it should help us get a good look at how certain missionaries are progressing and teaching.

The mission marches forward and the reminders from other missionaries about having five months left are coming often. I wrote an article in the "CLAM Chatter" (L.A. Mission Newsletter) about perspective and how the beginning of the mission causes many of us to feel like the mission is a two year "black hole" with no end in sight. I fell into that mindset at times during my first 6-12 months, but the light has shown itself at the end of the tunnel. It's an interesting contrast of perspective when I talk with a new missionary and he tells me about how he's feeling, what he expects of the mission, and then I tell him how I'm feeling and what the mission really is. I often think to myself, "You're in for one heck of a ride. I hope you're ready."

The mission is great and I'm enjoying life. Thanks for the prayers, e-mails and letters. I have a lot of gratitude for those who are willing to not adopt the "out of sight, out of mind" mindset.

Have a great week! Quote for the Week: "When the time for action has come, the time for preparation has past." - Thomas S. Monson

Elder Brycen Gold