And, finally, today's letter (post #5 of 5):

Summer in the Mojave Desert

Monday, May 19, 2014

Everyone,

So this week was pretty mellow. We have a new requirement to do 10 hours of service a week and that is helpful to us because it is a nice change of pace. But with the weather heating up the average summer temperature of the mission is probably 110 degrees, we'll see how long we do this. But all in all, it was a decent week. For sake of efficiency, I'm going to try something new and go day by day and give y'all the highlights:

On Monday, I had an epiphany about obedience and how it ties in with missionary work. Bottom line: when you obey, you have the Spirit and your "job" is a lot easier.

On Tuesday, we went on exchanges with the zone leaders and I got to go to the Spanish area! Usually that means just tagging along all day, but we actually ran into a lot of English speakers, including a student at the local college that's run by a different religion. Now don't get me wrong, I know that they are not all mean and spiteful; but it is very refreshing to talk to one of those students and not have them try to bash with you. Such was the case with this guy. We chatted for a few minutes and he shared his conversion story to the preaching of the Gospel, and we were able to leave him a Family Search card and invited him to look for his ancestors. AND...we both left feeling uplifted and edified. Success!

Wednesday was service oriented cleaning up a yard for a less-active. We also had a lesson with our really solid investigator who has pretty much all the basic LDS beliefs. She's been through a lot in her life, but realizes that God's hand is in everything that happens. Even now she recognizes that Heavenly Father has put her in a position now to learn about the Church and see that she agrees with a lot of the same things.

Thursday I gave a Book of Mormon to the convert I baptized that had my and my family's testimonies written in it. He's leaving to go back to Sacramento for a few months to work and get some money saved up to live off of easier.

I won't go too much into the circumstances of Friday, but just know I really like President Hinckley's words when he was visiting a mission (paraphrasing): "You lot aren't much to look at, but you're all the Lord's got."

Saturday night I went and calculated out what I think the standard of excellence is going to be for the hours requirement. Let me explain: to better track how missionaries are using their time and to see how efficient they are being, we are asked to keep track of the number of hours spent proselyting, serving, and planning each week. We as missionaries don't know exactly why this is being put in place. Well... we have our suspicions, but I'm going with the theory that as it says in Romans 14:12, "So then every one of us shall give account of himself to God." Because when progress is measured, progress improves; when progress is measured and reported, progress accelerates.

Sunday was laid back and we had a nice lesson with a kid that we'll be handing over to the YSA (Young Single Adult) elders most likely.

That's all for the week, I don't know if I like this new way of writing. It's a little faster, but doesn't seem that personal. Let me know what y'all think (What was that? No, I'm not desperate for emails, what makes you think that?). Love you all and I'll let you know if I'm going to be moving or not. Most likely I will, I've been here 6 months so we'll see what happens.

Love,

Elder Cox