Family and friends,
**Quick Note**
(This email was started last week but I just never got around to finishing it so now you get last week's update and this week's!)
LAST WEEK
It was a solid week and I'm not sure where to start! But we attended English Connect for the first time which was great! We're really there to assist if needed. We are still working with one of the students there to help her practice English and it's going well. She always enjoys messaging us in English so we're always in contact. Her 14 year old son will be doing some group activities with the young men every other week so we'll actually try to attend a few of those. Two of the people we are teaching are getting pretty close to baptism. One of them just needs more faith so we're trying hard to help him. He really wants to be a member so that he can feel more part of the congregation when he attends, but he thinks he just doesn't know enough.
This weekend we got pounded with rain. A tropical storm came through and flooded a few places. I'll send a photo. I thought we weren't going to be able to get out but the water went down later in the morning. Then early this morning around 5:00 I woke up to my companion moving his bed around and I asked what was going on and he said there was water dripping on his face. That was probably the best scenario if we would ever have a leak so we could start catching the water early enough. But the maintenance crew in the complex said that they're going around fixing like 40 other places that had leaks. They recently did roof work and I guess they messed something up since everything is now leaking. It could have been worse though so it's fine. Streets were just flooded though. One member had an Alligator wash up on their street and they sent us a photo.
We have a mission tour with Elder James Martino starting tomorrow so I'm really excited! We're supposed to find out more about that tonight. So I'll talk more about that next week!
THIS WEEK
That week flew by but it was another one for the books!
The mission tour with Elder Martino was just incredible. Brilliant even! He gave such great training and I walked away with so much. We were inspired to try new things and be better! It was one of those moments that make you love the mission even more.
Those two I had talked about from last week ended up attending church with us! With another over zoom so we had three. But I want to mention the first two that were in person. Before Sunday, I had watched the recent missionary devotional by Elder and Sister Bednar. They did a companionship study together on following the Spirit! And the idea was casting out fear by not worrying about what it will lead you to do. Of course Nephi's example of going to get the plates was used! And later that Sunday, that is exactly the similar experience I had! We welcomed the Mother and her son as they came in and then we sat down. I then had the thought to just give them a chapel tour right after the meeting. I wasn't worried about it or anything since I assumed we would walk around the church building telling them about different things. We just hadn't planned for that so I had not much of an idea about what was going to happen. After the meeting they accepted the invitation! So we began. And immediately the Spirit just flooded all of us. It was "one of those moments." We started walking down the first hall and they stopped at a painting of Joseph Smith. The Mother asked who that was with a very anxious look, like she just needed to know! And I broke out into the biggest smile! Of course they couldn't see it since I was wearing a mask. But I began by saying he was the one who God used to restore Christ's lost church on the earth again. That struck many follow up questions. And right there we just had a mini lesson on the restoration. It was perfect! We shared Joseph's experience searching for answers and how he came to his conclusion. We told them about the first vision and what Joseph said of it. And in that moment of relaying the Spirit, it hit its climax. Directly after testifying, we asked how they felt. She said that she couldn't think of the words to accurately describe it besides beautiful. And her son, looking very wide eyed, nodded up and down slowly to agree. After that they were extremely interested in the rest of the paintings as we passed by them and it seemed to all fit into some sort of order! After Joseph's it went to Angel Moroni showing Joseph the plates, then onto the Savior's birth and other events in His life, then Joseph of Egypt being blessed by Israel, and it then ended with the Lord's Second Coming. After it was all done they asked for a copy of the Book of Mormon in English and in Spanish and thankfully we had both on us. They said that they want to come every week! We can't wait.
It was a great week and I look forward to sharing more next time! Take care!
- Elder Markham
Alligators, floods (neighborhood, street at the chapel, our parking lot, etc..) and bird :)
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