Dear Family,
I am in my new area, Oakbrook. We have a great area! The bishop is awesome, he is really missionary work oriented. The last missionaries here didn't leave any notes, but they left a tape and a broken tape player with all their information of the past investigators they were working with. We borrowed a tape player from the missionaries in Summerville. The tape didn't work very well, it sounded like the voice of a seven foot tall man who had been smoking cigarettes since childhood. We were able to get a lot of information off of the progress records left behind and from the Bishop and Ward mission leader. I really impressed that the Bishop and the ward mission leader knew most of our investigators by name and knew what they had been taught. The bishop and the ward mission leader are excited to work with us. We told them that we had fasted and prayed for a baptismal goal and that we came up with a goal of 4 baptisms for this month. They were excited. We have not met any of these potential baptisms yet in person, but we identified four people on our progress records with our bishop who look like they can be baptized in the next month. We contacted their fellowshippers and set up a time to have their fellowshippers introduce us to the investigators this week. In church two members, one a recent convert, and the other a previously less active member told us that their children want to be baptized, but they need to take the missionary discussions. They are ages 9 and 12. GREAT! Two baptisms just waiting. We are so excited to be in this area!
Thank you for the Halloween package. We got into the area Wednesday and that is when I received your letter about the package. I didn't see any thing, so today we stopped by the apartment office and asked if they had received any new packages and they told us that they had one for me, AND one for my new companion, sweet!!! We also picked up a free new air filter too, it felt a lot like Christmas walking back to our apartment with two packages and a new air filter! Our old one was pretty dirty.
My new companion is Elder Cooper. He is a really cool guy. I forwarded a picture of him from Sister McConkie. He is learning really fast and he has a powerful testimony. We are in a biking area so we are biking everywhere all the time. The poor guy is soooooo tired. Sunday afternoon we got home from church for lunch and after he ate he was gone like a light. I remember how tired I was in the beginning of my mission, I think I just got used to it after a while. Sometimes I feel like I haven't slept in a year, but I just keep moving. Elder Cooper is from Utah. He is a really outdoors kind of guy. He really likes biking and going mudding in his truck. His family does a lot of hiking and his dad is a bit of a mountain man. Though we have very different backgrounds we get along great. The work of the Lord has a great way of doing that.
I know that God is our Father and that He has a plan for each of us. I know that he is molding me into the person he wants me to be with each of the experiences that he gives me. This week he taught me patience and forgiveness. We locked up our bikes on a pole and went to go see a less active member on Saturday. When we got back to our bikes some one have let all the air out of the back tire and they took the axle out of my front tire and threw the parts everywhere. It took about 30mintues to find most of the pieces of the front axle, but I still came up short of a spring and one crucial piece. Some one lent us a bike pump to pump up my back tire, and a member drove us to Lowe's so I could get some parts to ghetto rig my bike. It works fine now. Thanks for being awesome! I love you guys.
Elder Calvin Smith
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