New Companion!

His new companion, Elder S

Hola a todos!

Well, a new transfer has begun here in Smyrna. On Tuesday we had to drive up to Nashville for transfer meeting. Elder A was sent out to Mayfield, in Kentucky, and he's now with Elder B, my CCM companion. My new companion is Elder S. He's from Houston, TX, but is originally from Venezuela! Yep, he's a native, which is great. I've already picked up quite a bit of Spanish from him. He's been out about 9 months, and he's served in Paducah, Lewisburg, and most recently, Goodlettsville. He absolutely looooooves basketball. His dream is to play in the NBA one day. We'll see how it goes, considering he's only 5'7 haha. He is uhh....interesting. It’s funny because he has the personality of a black guy, but he's Spanish. It's like serving with the black guy from "Suits on the Loose" but he speaks fluent Spanish. He's a hilarious guy though, kind of a goofball, but we get along pretty well. Being friends with Abdul prepared me for this, haha. Another interesting thing is that he doesn't have a driver's license, soooo, I get to drive the car this transfer! Woot woot!

We had kind of an up and down week. I'll start with the downs: We weren't able to meet with the V family or H. H wasn't able to come to church either because Hermano F, his ride, was sick. Also this week, we talked to M at her door a little. She told us that they just had some friends move in, because they have nowhere else to stay for a few weeks. Apparently, these friends are very anti-Mormon, so M doesn't want us to come back until mid-January. Which means, if I leave Smyrna at the end of this transfer, I might not get another chance to visit with her. So that was a little sad. She is so prepared, but her husband just doesn't want to listen to us.

Now for the ups: We finally found a doctor for H! We still need to work out a lot of stuff with him, but he is a cardiologist up in Nashville. The only thing is, he'll be out of town for a couple weeks, and we don't know how long it will take to hear from the First Presidency, so we've had to postpone H's baptism indefinitely. Also, we had a chance to talk to E at her door last night. She didn't have time for a lesson, but she did tell us that she's reading in the Book of Mormon, and wants to learn more! Highlight of the week though was our lesson with O. He was asking us about the differences between our church and other churches, and we got to talk about a lot with that. He told us about how he was baptized into the Catholic church as a baby, but how he would feel better about baptism if it was his decision. Then he just started telling us about how he wants to change his life and join our church (even though he hasn't attended yet). It was super cool, and we just hadn't realized how prepared he is. We committed him to be baptized on January 9th and we are hoping and praying that everything works out!

My ponderizing scripture this week is Alma 57:21 which reads, "Yea, and they did obey and observe to perform every word of command with exactness; yea, and even according to their faith it was done unto them; and I did remember the words which they said unto me that their mothers had taught them." As missionaries, it is so important to be obedient. Russell M. Nelson said that a mission is a two-year exercise in obedience training. Also, if we aren't being obedient, we can't have the spirit. I love what it says in chapter 10 of Preach My Gospel. In talking about investigators, it says, "Their understanding will be influenced by your personal worthiness." It's our job to keep the spirit with us so that investigators can understand our message, by the spirit.

Hoping for a good one here in Smyrna, and I hope y’all have a good week! 

Love,
Elder Mitchell

They found a street named after a prophet!