It's been an interesting past week, but I want to share a funny story from the week before. As I continue on my mission it's become increasingly apparent that I cannot escape tire punctures, even now that I'm in a truck. We stopped at the church to drop something off when we hear leaking air as we exited the truck. Sure enough our back right tire had a nail in it. This was especially frustrating because it was at ~4pm and we had several other great lessons planned soon. We got to work, took off the tire, and lowered the spare. As we were rolling the spare to the truck we saw a screw lodged into the tire. It seems that some past missionaries had the bright idea to hold on to the flat, useless spare rather than address the problem. This was frustrating as we were stuck at the church with a Mitsubishi L200 Sportero with only 3 available tires. Luckily the MoBay Sisters also drive a truck, so we were able to have them drive us and our 2 tires to a tire shop, address that situation, then drive us back to our truck where we were able to finally get going.
Something I've learned from my father and grandfathers is that if I look hard enough, I can always find some sort of life lesson in there. I remembered Junior year Cross Country. I ran Varsity most races that year, but as it came closer to State I dropped to the first 'backup.' I was bummed. The night and morning before State I drank nuff milk, stayed up late, drank more dairy, and ate candy and stuff. I wasn't in any shape to run that day. Sure enough as we loaded the bus Coach Foster told me that I'd be running. Needless to say it wasn't a great race. Just like the spare tire, I wasn't prepared at all.
In the Book of Mormon, Amulek cautions us "do not procrastinate the day of your repentance until the end... Ye cannot say, when ye are brought to that awful crisis, that I will repent..." "for behold, now is the time and the day of your salvation. . .this life is the time for men to prepare. . .this life is the day for men to perform their labors" (Alma 34).
I also thought of the parable of the Ten Virgins, and the need of always being prepared.
We cannot afford to allow ourselves to become unworthy when called upon. We never know when we will be called upon. Grateful I learned this lesson with a flat spare tire rather than in a harder way.
As far as our investigators go, we're blessed to be working with some great people! Audrei continues to leave her home at 6:30 in order to be at church at 10. She had to wait 2 hrs for a taxi yesterday morning. Not to mention she walks a long ways in order to get near a taxi. She had a cool experience this week while reading her Book of Mormon. She was reading outside when she felt impressed to get up and walk away. As she got up and began to walk here massive breadfruit tree collapsed and landed right where she was. Glad she was reading! Right now the only thing stopping her from baptism is that she has illegal light. 'Thieving light' is roadblock for a lot of Jamaican investigators, but Audrei has the faith. 'Soon come!'
We've also been meeting a lot with Earl lately as well. Earl is a Rasta-man. Dreadlocks and some nasty facial hair. He reads everything. Pamphlets and Book of Mormon. Really great. As he ended our last lesson with a prayer, he just ended with "Amen."
"Earl, how do we end our prayers?"
"...Amen?"
"In the name of...."
"Joseph Smith!?"
Chuh. Hahahaha! We fixed that, ha!!
Likkle More and Nuff Love
Elder Ritchie
pic 1 - mmhmmm
pic 2 - Pic with President Brown at his departure devo last Monday (featuring by botched haircut)
