January 17, 2011

What's up fammm? I hope you're having a great time on the cruise. It sounds like you are so far. You're on your way to helping someone learn about Christ in the Americassss. Pretty sweet. I knew you would be up to it ;)


Things here are wundafool. We had a leadership training in Orlando on Wednesday. Brother Watson and Brother Woodruff from the missionary department came and spoke to us. It was about 6 hours of pure training. It was SO good. Brother Watson has been in the missionary department for 30 years. He's amazing. Brother Mark Woodruff saw my tag and talked to me because he knows Uncle Bobby. They worked together a long time ago with some sort of fundraising thing I think. Small world.

So we learned a lot from them and a lot of things are going to be changing in the mission. They introduced a new contacting approach to us that's going to do a lot. The culture of the Florida Orlando Mission is to state that we are representatives of Jesus Christ first thing when we contact people. But they told us about this mission that gets return appointments with 75% of their contacts. The way they do it is start with a thought-provoking question or a question that can open up a conversation about the Gospel. For example something about families or where they see themselves in 10 years or other things like that. It's a good way to not come off intimidating and just start a normal conversation. So Elder Whitworth and I are trying to think of good non-threatening questions to ask people. Could you help us out with some? We'd appreciate it. What would you want to hear someone ask you if they came to your door? Thanks.

Then on Thursday we met with Tonya and the member that referred her to us, Sister Stuart. We watched "Joseph Smith: Prophet of the Restoration" and then set a baptismal date with Tonya for the 12th of February. She's so cool. She said the BOM hasn't left her side since she got it. She's been reading it a bunch. Then Friday we went to the Temple with Gramps. We did initiatories and an endowment session. It was so good to do initiatories again. I haven't done them since I got endowed. There are a lot of really great blessings that I had forgotten about.

So those were the highlights of my week. Hope you have a grrrrrrrrreat week! Don't have too much fun on the cruise if you know what I mean. Ha love you!

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Elder Austin Gable Engemann aka dubEE fresh