Elder Samuel Burge: Meetings & Priesthood Blessings

Hey everybody,

Unfortunately we don't have any big plans for St. Patrick's day- other than I'm going to do my laundry and get some groceries. We have a lesson tonight, which is good! Other then that though, it's going to be a rather mundane holiday for us.

I guess the thought of school when I get back it isn't really stressing me out too badly. I just don't have a very good idea of what I want to do. The thought of trying to go for SLCC to get the first year or two outta' the way without taking out big loans would probably be a good idea- but then again I really want to live out on my own, like on a college campus. No offense, but I don't really want to live at home for very long if I can help it any. It looks less and less probable when I first get back though. Either way, I think USU is still up there on my list of schools right now. The amount of student loans and debt I'd be racking up kind of freaks me out a bit. I don't want to owe anything more than I have to.

Well, tell Ben not to feel too excluded about spring break. We didn't do anything too crazy either- I have a lot more meetings now that I'm a district leader. We spent most of Thursday and Friday off at various meetings. We had a leadership council up in Lake Oswego where we talked about the mission, our districts, and received some training on various things. It was actually a really insightful meeting and I got a lot of good ideas and thoughts about how things I can do as far district meetings, exchanges, and all that kind of stuff goes. We didn't get very many opportunities to teach this week- had quite a few cancelled lessons. It's okay though, I'm really hopeful this week we'll see some more success! We're going to be doing a lot of door-knocking (we do a TON of finding as of the past several months here in Aloha), but we have a few lessons scheduled and I hope those go through!

We've had a lot of people in the district this week getting sick or injured. We have a sister whose ankle/foot got really messed up in that big snow-storm awhile back, another elder who was having some issues with his hearing, others with the flu. Everybody is just sick or afflicted in some way or another. I'd been having wicked charlie-horses in the middle of the night (which happened to me in my last biking area), but I got a priesthood blessing and like an hour later my calves felt great . We gave the sisters and elders blessings as well, and some have seen improvements but the sister with the messed up foot is still having a really tough and painful time with it. It's hard to see them struggle, but they're all going along like champs!

We have a zone conference tomorrow, which I'm excited for! I always love those, you get lots of revelation and insight about everything. Our mission president asked every zone to have some lessons scheduled after the conference in the evening so he could come with some missionaries to their lesson and, after talking with the zone leaders, we were like the only missionaries able to get something set up. So- we're probably taking the mission president out with us to a lesson as well! It's going to be interesting too- this guy we're meeting with is incredibly knowledgeable with the Bible, and he's definitely been one of the most challenging people I've ever taught. He's making good progress though, definitely more accepting of the Book of Mormon and he's really nice! Definitely difficult trying to help him work through some of the objections he has (like the Trinity, etc.) I think he's felt the Spirit though, and he's been prepared by the Lord.

It was a good week though. Time seems to just go by quicker and quicker as I keep going. I've got some former companions going home pretty soon, and it's made me think a lot lately. I remember when I first came out on the mission I was checking the time on my watch to see how much longer I had left! Even fairly farther into the mission I was hard-working and actually wanted to be out here in Portland, but the thought of going home didn't bother me much or make me sad. The closer and closer I get though the weirder it's felt, and I even had a dream a few weeks back where I came home and I honestly felt pretty sad when I realized that my mission was over. I don't know, this one guy in my second area told me that he thought I'd be one of those missionaries they'd have to pry off his bike and throw into the airplane, and I totally thought he was reading me wrong.. But I don't know, I guess I am changed a little bit. I'm grateful that I came out here, it's been such a good experience.

Well, that's all I've got this week. I hope that everybody has a good week!

-Elder Samuel A. Burge