Columbia 3 Branch

Buenas!

Well Columbus really ruined the whole write your family thing yesterday, sorry about that. It has been a crazy day today, we had District Leader Council and then Zone Training this morning and President decided to attend both. Now I'm on exchanges with one of our District Leaders so I may write a shorter letter. Which is a bummer because we had an amazing week! Thanks so much for the quotes and scriptures. Mom, not sure if you knew or not but Alma 29:9 is my mission scripture haha, I love it.

Well Mom and Dad, I know how you feel to send your kids off. Me and Elder Green are empty nesters. But we still keep a framed picture of us three on our counter, hahah. We had a lot of fun activities this week so it kept us from missing Elder Dutson too much. Elder Jones (the vehicle coordinator) asked us to test drive the new 2014 Chevy Cruzes; it was weird being in a car by myself! Afterwards Elder Jones wanted to buy us lunch for our "service" hahah. Another fun thing we did was pick up a families new arm chairs, love seat and couch... while it was pouring rain (Maryland pouring rain is quite different from Arizona). It was an adventure! Last thing that made me laugh was my carb counting class my doctor told me to go to. It was me, my companion, and like 3 old black women in the class. I didn't have too many questions, but boy did these women have some high level questions. "How bout watuhmelon? Is that good to eat?" or "How many carbs does shellfish have?-response None- Oh ok, yeah I don't like shellfish." and finally "My A1C was 11, is that a good level?" (Not Zach's A1C!!) Needless to say, the Carb Class held my interest about as long as Ms. W's math class. (probably should delete that last sentence)

Anyways, Elder Green and I have seen so many miracles this week! We went over to visit "D" with a member last week and he has been praying and read the introduction and first chapter of Nephi. He wants to know if it is true! We had a powerful lesson and afterward the member was ecstatic. He knew "D" when he was basicallly anti-religion and to see him change from that to now is just incredible.

We went to visit the "C"'s and after dinner we asked if they had watched General Conference. Hermano "C" just lit up and talked about all his favorite talks and speakers. He went on for 20 minutes straight of how much he loved President Monson and President Uchtdorf. It was so amazing. He asked about prophets a little bit more and we talked about the Restoration once more. It was then that the Restoration really clicked for Hermana "C" (who is less active). It was a miracle visit.

All in all the work is going amazing here in the Columbia 3 Branch. 9 people have been reactivated since July and we are teaching 4 part member families right now! (Not counting our other investigators) The Lord has been blessing us a ton and I am just loving my mission.

Well I'm going to finish up and send some pictures. I love you all!

-Elder Greene  

In Living Memory of Elder Dutson

Saying Goodbye to my son...