When sowing seeds

Good Morning Everyone,

This last week has been rather slow. We have found a few new people who may listen to the gospel, but we didn't teach a ton this last week. As far as my personal adventures; again, nothing much has happened. We did have a day where we went on a crazy car chase. We were asked to help prepare for a baptism this last Saturday and we found out that we didn't have any XL jumpsuits for the fathers who were baptizing their daughters. We went to the Carthage chapel and they didn't have any there and then we drove all the way to Rome to pick one up. When the baptism day came, both fathers ended up wearing their temple clothes and so the entire jumpsuit run was completely useless. Oh well, that's why we have been saving miles by biking in case anything like this happened.

This week we have Zone Training Meeting and so we will be going down to Utica on Friday and I look forward to it. Hope you are all doing well and that you can all continue to push forward through all trials that may arise.

Elder Melanson

Address Change

1110 Holcomb St. #4
Watertown, NY
13601

Watertown is CRAZY!

Hello Everyone!

We finally found some people to teach and will be seeing them tonight! Her name is Ashley and she has a sister named Kaitlin who will join us on the weekends. We were tracting and they were on the porch, so we asked if we could share our message and Ashley said "Sure." We then taught the Restoration and gave them both a copy of the Book of Mormon. So that was really great.

President asked us to go knock on apartment complexes regardless of the signs we saw, so we went tracting in an apartment complex that said "No Soliciting and Private Property" as well as "Residents Only." We got one potential, but as we went to the next few doors, the second one that opened was a woman who told us essentially to get lost. I really don't feel comfortable with the no soliciting signs and Private properties. We were also mistaken for EMT's! We got a referral from the Carthage Elders and we decided to try and see him. We get there and ring in (since it was also an apartment building) and a little girl comes running down the hall and opens the door. We followed her in and a grandmother asked us who we were when she saw we weren't EMT's. We said we were missionaries and she said now is not a good time, in a family crisis. So we said we were sorry and essentially ran with our tails between our legs. We think we will try again in a little while, but this week has been crazy.

So far, even though it has been a crazy first few weeks here in Watertown, I feel good about working here. My new companion, Elder Champion, is a cyclist and we agreed to try and save miles on the car for large trips and emergency trips as well. Because of this, we have been biking around from appointment to appointment. This last week, we went almost 80 miles on our bikes! He is literally trying to kill me I think! Haha, just kidding. But this is the most exercise I have had here on the mission, but it is all worth it.

Hope all is well for you all back home and may you all have a blessed week!

Elder Melanson

Transfers right around the bend

Well, to start off, I will now be serving in Watertown! My time here in Fayetteville seemed really short, but I was here for three months. My patterns keep happening so far, I will be in my third area after serving in Johnson City and Fayetteville for two transfers each and having a new companion each transfer. Also, my new companion is the district leader, so that is 5 in a row too!

Anyhow, life has been good and some of our investigators are progressing really well! One of our investigators is making huge strides in his search for truth and I am going to miss working with him. I am not sure as to how much I will like Watertown, but if it is anything like I have experienced in my last two areas, I will look forward to the new adventure. I hope you are all doing well and that you are finding success wherever you are.

Elder Melanson

His heart grew 3 sizes that day.

Hello Everyone!

It is so good to be able to email you all again after this long week. This week has been a week filled with changing hearts (hence the title). One of our most interesting and kinda difficult investigators named Don Douglas (veteran, gang member, ex-police, African-american) has broken down in tears on multiple occasions! We have been showing him video after video from the church (Meet the Mormons, Mountain of the Lord, 17 Miracles, John Tanner Story, Only a Stonecutter, etc.) and as we did so, he would let a single tear slide down his face and then tell us how much he respects these people. He was making waterfalls after Meet the Mormons, Mountain of the Lord, and 17 Miracles and he was so touched by the spirit. He also came to a church tour where he prayed in the chapel and came back to us in the foyer with more waterfalls coming down! It was this day that "his heart grew three sizes" and he accepted a baptismal date of September 2nd.

We also picked up a new investigator named Ivy (pronounced eevee like the pokemon) and she is really interested in what we have to share. She was a referral from our recent convert Ralpheal and she is from Puerto Rico! She has gone through many different churches and she feels that the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints may be for her. We also saw Peter twice for the first time in a week and the lesson we had with just him in his home about the priesthood and the great apostasy went good, but he still has a lot more to understand about it. Peter, Cary, and Big John all came to church (our first week where we had three investigators at church!) and they all had a good experience.

I hope you are all doing well and I continue to pray for you all. Keep doing your best in whatever you are doing and I know God will bless you.

Elder Melanson