Dear Family,
What an interesting week this was. A lot of it was spent getting to know the ward a little better, as well as visiting part-member families, less-actives, and even an excommunicated lady who brings her kids to church every week.
One very interesting family are the Stevens bunch. They have two sons living with them named Johnny and Thomas. Both of them have learning disabilities of some sort; Johnny is autistic but Thomas I'm not sure about. Brother Stevens is an amazing man, incredibly active in the church. He's quite large and works at a mental healthcare centre, keeping the patients in check. Think of a bouncer at a night-club, and you've pretty much imagined Brother Stevens. He's got the most British sense of humour I know, he's always making these dry jokes and I'm the only one who gets them right away. He's taken quite a liking to me because of that.
Johnny Stevens, however, is an interesting case. He understands the gospel and gets up every Fast Sunday to bear his testimony, and can speak quite clearly and everything, but his autism seems to prevent him from turning in his mission papers, at least according to the bishop. He wants to go on a mission more than anything in the world but the bishop is worried about him, and recently asked the missionaries to work with him more, and get him out to appointments. Which wouldn't be a problem at all.... if we actually had investigators. So right now we're considering taking him with us to see less-actives and that sort of thing, see how he manages in a teaching environment.
One thing we also have been doing as missionaries is taking some of the young men out with us to go knocking. I just hope it's not breaking their spirits! We do tend to get a lot of rudeness and door slams in Beverly. Everyone is quite comfortable here, I think I mentioned that before. But the young men are amazingly resilient , I think the people of Beverly are impressed by the power the youth of this church seem to carry with them. In a few years there will be many powerful return missionaries in the Beverly Ward, I have no doubt about that.
Not much else happening in the world of Beverly. Wish I could send pictures, then there would be something new. I feel like the whole purpose of having missionaries in the Beverly ward is not to do missionary work, but rather to teach the ward members the importance of missionary work and how important it is to set that open example for all the world to see and to want to follow. The Gospel of Christ truly blesses lives, but the good people of Beverly need to see that emulated in their neighbors and co-workers, not to have it told from two young men knocking on their door. Being a missionary completely reverses your whole perspective on the world. Even more than being a cashier did. It's hard to explain, but I've changed so much already... it's hard to imagine what I'll be like when I get home.
Anyways, we've got to head off now. Plenty of preparation to do. Somehow our cork board fell apart so now we have to go way out somewhere to get a new one. Beverly is a small little town, not a lot of shopping choices. Wish everyone luck, especially Alisa on getting those papers in and done with.
Love,
Elder Alsop
No comments:
Post a Comment