Monday, January 25, 2016

First week in Kansas

Hello all! 

Thank you so much for all the love, support, prayers, inquiries and concerns! 

I am in my first area: Hays, Kansas. My trainers is Elder Hilborn from San Francisco. He has been on his mission for 13 months and really knows his stuff. I am learning a lot from him.  
I was able to call my wonderful family in Salt Lake City and Dallas during my journey to Wichita. After I hung up the phone, Elder Colton and I ventured around the enormous airport looking for something good to eat. We finally found a subway and a vending machine and started heading back to our gate. When it came into view, we saw it was about to close so we took a sprint to ensure we wouldn't be stuck in Texas. Fun stuff. 

The flight was awesome! I sat next to a woman in her early twenties named Leslie and taught her The Restoration. I gave her a Mormon.org pass along card as well. It was a wonderful experience to share the gospel with someone who wasn't acting. 

When we arrived in Wichita, the President, his wife, and a companionship we call "AP's" (assistants to President) were waiting for us. We were greeted with hugs and a very warm welcome. They packed our luggage in a trailer and whisked us off to the monument of which you were supposed to receive a picture of me, president and his wife. We got a snack at the headquarters which is just a church with a few mission-specific rooms and were assigned temporary companions to work for a few hours. I got to go knock on doors and street contact. Not a recipe for Elder LaMont's good attitude on the first day, but I turned it around. One's missionary attitude, after all, is a reflection of one's feelings towards the savior and his gospel. That's in preach my gospel. 

We stayed in Wichita for a night so we could watch the first missionary broadcast and get assigned to our area. I took a lot of notes from the broadcast and got to see two girls I knew in highschool (Sister Shelby Pederson and Jarbi Joyner).

There was almost no food in the apartment so I was eating some weird stuff. But the worst part is that the apartment was absolutely filthy. I've been going crazy trying to clean throughout the week but now that it's p-day got a lot done. We are still not done though! 

A spiritual story: it was my very first lesson with a long-time investigator named Jessy. She has issues with the Word of Wisdom and has had desires to be baptised for a long time. I was prompted by the spirit to teach her the following metaphor: I held a piece of paper on the table in front of us and told her it symbolized her obstacle of overcoming the word of wisdom. I taught her she was so focused on the "wall" the challenge presented and needed to focus on the blessings that were on the other side of the piece of paper. I taught that the atonement folds that piece of paper (the obstacle of keeping the word of wisdom) in half and allows her to see more clearly the blessings of keeping the word of wisdom. The spirit lit up the room and she was so excited, she was even taking notes! Elder Hilborn said it was the best lesson he had with her and had been meeting with her for quite some time. All credit goes to the spirit though. I definitely "blacked out" while I was speaking with Jessy which is the Holy Ghost's way of demonstrating the spirit is teaching. 

I don't have a funny story for you guys yet, but I'll be sure to have one for next week. 

I do have some pictures of some food I've made though in case anyone was worried about me cooking (; 

Love you all! Thank you again for everying! I appreciate all the emails! If you haven't emailed me, you're missing out! I respond to every email I get! 

Love always, 

Elder LaMont




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