Dearest Familia,
Here goes.
For the longest time now my companions back has been hurting, due to the fact that he had to sleep on a hardwood floor for 6 weeks in his last area. It's no good. So due to that fact, and the results which will come later, we had to walk out to our appointment in gunbarrel (another town) which ended us taking about 2+ hours, in the hot sun. So we got there with just enough time to make it to dinner, and then got a ride home at which point my companions back was killing him so we had to call it a night.
Wednesday was a great day. ZONE CONFERENCE!
So we had to be there at 8:30, got there sat down saw a bunch of old friends from all over the place, it was so cool. I feel old, ive been out almost 10 months now and by december I'll be in the oldest 1/3 of the mission. what the heck.
So at the beginning of every zone conference we do reviews where our mission president selects 3 companionships that we don't know ahead of time and calls them up do give reviews of the last trainings at zone conference. So, apparantely crossing your fingers doesn't work, and my companion and I got called to give the last training out of 3. So, it was on preparing people for baptism, the importance of baptism, how to help them understand the purpose of an interview, and an effective baptismal service. And apparently it went really well. After we got done my Mission President stood up, said he was very pleased with the reviews and then commented on my presentation skills. He mentioned a couple of things and then was like, and elder allred you did an excellent job with your microphone placement. Just goes to show you that being in a hardcore band before your mission pays off for something! Then We got to sit back and relax, and watch some DVDS that are getting released into the missions world wide about teaching people and stuff. I watched the first series called the District, with mom before I went into the MTC, and now it's the District 2. Funny thing about it is they asked our Mission President to film it in our mission, but he said no because it would be too distracting to our work. So they had to go to California as 2nd pick ha ha! But it was good. Then the Assistants (who are so tight) gave a training about "breaking down our walls". The walls that we put up saying, I'm not good enough, or this area is terrible, or I can't teach, or I am not good enough at this...or anything. And i found that it applies not only to missionary work but to life in general. I think we as people grow up building walls for ourselves and we need to break them down with God's help. The AP Porter, who I know from Arvada, mentioned something I said in my training and embarrassed me again, but it's ok cuz he's the man. Then at the end President Ely gave a training about the Atonement. Sometimes, he said, we as people are too hard on ourselves. We believe that the Atonement is real and that it can help other people, but maybe just not us. We need to have faith and hope....he used a ton of amazing scriptures that I don't have on me right now so I'll try and share them next week. But the amazing thing was the two trainings from the aps and president, they just fit exactly how I was feeling and they were exactly what I needed to hear. It's great to know that God inspires those who help us, to help our specific needs. What a great blessing.
So then we got home, it rained which helped to put out some of the fire in Boulder, and then we had dinner. After dinner we Had a lesson with DS about the Atonement (basically just taking it from the training we heard at Zone Conference) and it went well.
Thursday was district Meeting. It was about a lot of things. My favorite was we went over how to get the most out of our studies. I like to call it Juicing the Scriptures. What you do is you go through (we did 2 Nephi 31) and read 2 verses. Then you look back and you say, what principle is being taught here. How do God and Jesus Christ feel about what's being taught. And how does that effect us/what are we supposed to do. It's amazing how by following those steps, you can fill up a page of paper (not that it's all about quantity) in about 6 verses. I feel like it helped me to dig deeper and understand the underlying meanings and stuff. It was neat.
After that we went to do service at the Memory Loss Old Folks home. It was fun, no bingo but we got to talk to some old ladies about life and what not....extremely funny and quite interesting. Then we had to walk home, tried to see some people. Went out to an italian food place for dinner, it was super thick. And then that night we had another lesson with BH, discussing the Gospel of Christ and reviewing those principles.
Friday was pretty uneventful. We did weekly planning. Got a fire cracker thrown at us out a car window, while we were walking along the side of the road. Went to a dr. appointment for Elder Petrone down in aurora and then had dinner and finished weekly planning....pretty boring.
Saturday we had a morning appointment all the way at the south end of our area where we barely ever go. Then in the afternoon we worked at a sorting distribution center for the donations that have come in for the victims of the wild fires that have been going on. Now there is another one in Loveland which is 2 cities north of boulder...it's nuts. On our way home.......not to get into too much detail...but we saw some people, well, let's just say I'm 100% sure It's illegal to be doing what they were doing on a tractor bed 100 feet away from the road in a public place....yea, you can figure it out. That was kinda eye opening. i think i can honestly say, i've seen it all now.
Anyways...then Sunday was great. We went to church very sleepily. My comps back started killing him and we had to go home at 11. We did lunch and got an appointment over to a family's house who we were going to see. We did it about baptism since the youngest daughter is about to get baptized. She's awesome and is super excited. Then after the lesson, she asked me if I would baptize her and I almost cried. So i said yes, and that will be on the 26th of this month! I'm so excited for her and look forward to the day when she can make that sacred promise with our Heavenly Father. After that, yet more back pain, but we made it to dinner and to one more appointment after that. All in all it was a good week, a ton better than last week, and pretty happy over all. This morning though, we went a chiropractor to get Elder Petrone's back checked out and then Doctor said that his back was seriously messed up. Sooo, he is going to be on bed rest for several weeks, which means I'm going to probably read the mission library, the entire standard works, and memorize preach my gospel over the next little while. I think we're allowed to be out and about for 4 hours a day, 2 in the morning and two after lunch...so hopefully we can still get some stuff done.
But, I want to end this update with my sincere thanks to everyone for all the support and love that has been shown to me over the last little while and my whole life.
Families are forever, and we need to realize that now!
The secret to not being down is WORK! and effort.
One of the things I've learned this week is that Faith is a gift and a CHOICE!
we can choose if we want to be happy (to an extent).
Sometimes we get in the habit of saying "he made me do that"...which is entirely wrong.
It may be, he did something and then i chose to react this way...but no one can force us to react anyway. we get to choose. And choosing to be Christ like is the best choice that I've found so far.
Happiness is to be found in our families, in the gospel of Jesus Christ, and in helping others!
Press forward and make the world a better place!
Love you all
Elder Allred
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