Ups and Downs...

This week started off just fine. P-day was pretty good. We went to a church and played a bunch of games with other missionaries. We played this one basketball game that I actually did pretty well at. I think it was because I got most of my points from rebounds. When ever I would play as a deacon or teacher I was told to stand under the hoop and get rebounds because I am big and tall. So that was pretty fun. Tuesday, I went on an exchange with the District Leader, Elder Macfarlane. He is an awesome missionary! He is just able to talk with everyone! It was really cool to be able to teach some lessons with him. For dinner that night, we went to Gold Star Chili, Skyline Chili's competitor. Elder Macfarlane said that they are pretty much the same. So I got to try the famous chili that everyone talks about. It was pretty good, I guess. It definitely wasn't bad. I think I will have to try it again sometime. As we were leaving, Elder Macfarlane asked, "So what did you think of the Chili?" I said, "That I need to try it again." I also need to compare it to Skyline Chili. There was a picture taken, but it was on Elder Macfalane's camera, I will get it to you next week. 

Wednesday, was an interesting one. The first person we saw was Daniel. We had a couple more lessons to teach him and we wanted to see if he could fit into one of the baptismal jumpsuits we had. We got there, he attempted to try on the jumpsuit (he is a very large person), and then we started talking. Daniel said that he had a dream where the Lord showed him all of the churches that his father took him to growing up. He says that the Lord told him that those are the churches that he needs to be at. He said that he no longer wanted to be baptized. Daniel said that he doesn't think that the Mormon church is true any more. We tried to do what we could to know that the spirit wouldn't direct him away from the church, but it was all for none. We left Daniel's house and I had the weirdest feeling, I don't know what it was. All we could really do was go to our next appointment. I am so glad we did. We taught a man named Chet. We had met him and his wife earlier and they had us come back, but only Chet was there. We taught him outside of his apartment because he had some people over who are rather weird. There was a bunch of kids running around as well as some other lady running and asking everyone if they knew where Jennifer was. We were pretty sure she was high. Even though we had all of these distractions, we were still able to have a really good lesson with Chet. He really enjoyed it and said that he couldn't wait for us to teach his wife. We really needed that after we had just been dropped by Daniel. 

Something that was also happening this week was a finding challenge. Would get 1 point for finding a new investigator, 3 points if an investigator was a referral, 5 points if we found a family, and 8 points if we found a family that was a referral. This was a mission wide competition. The zone with the most points would get some of Sister Porter's cinnamon rolls. There was another competition within the zone, the companionship who got the most points gets to go to Olive Garden with the zone leaders. I don't know who won for the overall mission, but Elder Woffiden and I won the zone competition with 27 points! That was another pick-me-up needed after Daniel dropped us. 

This really is hard work, but I love doing it. I have a lot of things to work on while I'm here, but that is half of the fun! I can't wait to see the improvements that are happening within me as I go throughout my mission.

Thank you, I love you

Elder Hayden Cannon