Busy is good

This was a great week! BUSY BUSY BUSY!!!!....We were only in our area for like 2 of the 7 days. 

We went on exchanges with some Elders down in Thomaston, its about 65 miles away from us. I went with one of our District Leaders down there and it went so well!!!!

I had to go do two baptismal interviews for them and on our way we stopped by a mormon.org referral. We had one of the most amazing lessons I have ever been in. This email will not do any justice to the experience and the Spirit that was felt there! He is an older man who is a Deacon in his church and said he was comfortable and he had accepted Jesus as his personal savior so at first we thought oh he just wants to talk the bible. We continued to talk with him and did whats called beginning teaching basically it is just setting expectations of what we do as missionaries. After he responded well to all that we said we prayed and began to teach him the restoration. He pull out his bible (one of 9 he has around the house so he can read whenever he feels the urge) and his note book and took notes. We taught about the apostasy and how Christ's church fell and he loved it, it made so much sense to him. We then went through the Joseph Smith story. After the first vision and the Spirit was burning inside his home he said "confirmation" so I invited him to be baptized by someone who holds the authority of god and he said "amen" we continued to teach and introduced the Book of Mormon and he said " I read about that on mormon.org and I'm anxious to begin reading it" he committed to read it daily. I then invited him to be baptized on the 24th of November, He accepted and asked how often the elders should come by to get him ready. We said at least 2 times a week if not more and he said come everyday if you want I'm retired and i'm ready to learn. He asked about where the church was and said that every time he drove by he felt his heart turn towards it like it was calling him. We blessed him and his home with a prayer and left him with tears in his eyes. It was an amazing experience!

The Lord is preparing his children for the gospel. I can promise you that!!!

The next day was not near as good. I took off with the same Elder on bike and we started tracting when we got a call that was very broken up. Elder........car.......broken bumper..... cross streets.... hurry.... so we took off on our bikes and made it to our companions about two miles away who had just been t-boned. Not exactly the news you want to get. No one was hurt the car was wrecked pretty bad but no injuries not even whip lash! Good thing they are elders hahaha.

we got it towed and a very nice senior couple came and got us fromThomaston. Which is in the middle of no where with no cell service hahaha. 

The next day we did a Zone Training meeting it went great! President and the AP's came. Elder Anderson and I tried to direct a lot of conversations and communications and get everyone involved by using the church's new teaching program which is using smaller sub groups to discuss things and then have a spokes person talk about the findings. It went really well we all enjoyed it! 

Saturday we had a baptism!!! R was baptized and he was so excited all week he keeps telling us can't Saturday get here already!! This week is so long, i'm so ready for this! A lot of the branch showed up and it went great. Elder Anderson Baptized him and I confirmed him in sacrament meeting the next day! He is so solid and such a good guy. He was interviewed to get the priesthood next week and is studying and loving what he is learning. 

May the Force be with you- The Griffiths family

Saying goodbye to this branch has been hard. This is probably my favorite area. Things really got going here we have two baptisms set up in two weeks and many others who are very close. The Branch has been giving us their friends to teach and helping us out a lot. When I told the Branch President I was leaving even though Elder Anderson is going home he said he's calling the mission president hahaha. We told the high council man over missionary work in the stake Brother Griffiths about it  and he said the same thing. He invited us over for dinner last night. They are such a good family. They are both from Oregon and know the Ainges  actually. They love Star Wars so we had light saber battles. They are such an impressive family I was so glad we got to work with so many stake leaders as Zone Leaders, we got a lot more opportunities to meet so many other people than we other wise would not have. They are one of those families that just gets it, they live and share the gospel.

This Branch is so great and now I have to move on to other places,in English, which will be a big change. They won't tell me where I'm going all they said is I'm staying Zone Leader and need to go take care of some things. I am really sad but looking towards new opportunities that the Lord has for me.

I love and miss you all!

Something about that southern food.

love Tanner