Elder Jesse Kissell: Da Week

Hey everyone!

Well, it’s kinda weird it’s already October ain’t it? I think it is! I’ve been out 4 months now already! I know it’s not much, but hey, it’s gone by way fast. AND, I’m lovin’ it! But let me tell ya bout my week…

So this week was a pretty bittersweet week. The bitter part wasn’t my favorite. But here’s kinda the jist of what happened. On Tuesday, we had our district meeting in Iron Mountain and on the way back from that we stopped by some referrals that we got from the fair a long time ago in Ishpeming. Both people were home and we got a return appointment, which means investigator, with one. Her name was Rene’. She was really excited for us to come back and we gave her a Book of Mormon and the DVD’s that she ordered and sweet stuff like that. Then we went over to the other referral and I about killed her…literally. It was kinda funny though haha. I knocked on her door pretty loud because I could hear the TV and she came to the door and she was breathing super hard and couldn’t talk for about 3 minutes because I had scared her so bad. But, she was less accountable and we were talking to her at her doorstep about anything and everything you could think about. From McDonalds to hurricanes. We were there for forever and finally I just had to say that we would stop by next time we were out in the area and see her. We had been on her doorstep for like 25 minutes and got nothing done, so I wasn’t really being that mean. And then we went down to Negaunee and were trying by some less active people and stuff down there. There was this black guy who was walking down the street with an office chair and I told elder Wessely I was going to ask him what he was doing with an office chair. So I did, turns out he just bought it and was walking it home, but anyway, he asked why we were all dressed up and we started talking about the church. We taught him very briefly and asked if we could come back and teach him and he said “of course brothas!” He was way excited and said he’s been searching for a long time for a perfect church for him. We told him he was probably gonna find it here. He was way pumped and set the time up for when we taught him. Same night we were going to teach Rene’, but later. So yeah that was SWEET! 2 new investigators in one night and our Thursday was getting filled up quick. The next day we went and talked to 2 of our other investigators, Ashley and Emmy, the sisters, and set up an appointment to teach them at the chapel and have a chapel tour lesson. Something I haven’t done yet but is said to be one of the sweetest methods to teach somebody. And they said yes that would be awesome and we got that all set up. So by that time we were way excited for Thursday and couldn’t wait for it. We had planned for a member to be with us for all those appointments too, including a brand new RM sister. But here comes Thursday…it STUNK!!!!!!!!!! EVERYTHING fell through. It was not cool. Ashley and Emmy didn’t show, Rene’ dropped us before we could even get inside, Eric (the black guy) wasn’t home, and a couple college girls we’ve been trying to teach for sometime weren’t home either. So yeah, our dream day fell apart. We were planning on having 4 investigators with a baptismal date and 4 lessons with a member which would’ve been sweet. Oh well…it happens. But yeah, the elders quorum president was with us at the end of the day and he said whenever he had a bad day on his mission he would go out to eat. So he took us out to eat and then we came home and contemplated what we could do better. But yeah, not my favorite day Thursday was.
Friday was a really stormy day and we had a few set appointments with less actives and luckily they were home. But it was really stormy out and we would get soaked instantly, raincoats and all. So no tracting that day. A tree even fell down right behind our apartment that day. That made me feel real safe. But we had some good visits. Nothing too spectacular though.

Saturday was CONFERENCE!!!!!!! How sweet was conference this year?! WAY SWEET! I have never been so excited for conference in my life. And it rocked. My favorite talks on Saturday were elder Bednars, president Uchtdorfs, elder Callister for the 70, and elder Andersens. Those were my faves but all the talks rocked for sure. We had 2 food appointments that day so that was awesome. And then late that day, we had priesthood session. It started at 8 here! So we didn’t get home til 10:15! I thought that was weird. But priesthood was awesome. I learned so much this year in all of conference. People say it’s the “missionary fire”…whatever that means. But maybe it is. I learned a lot.

Sunday was also great for conference. But it was a little discouraging in the morning though because we found out that Zachs girlfriend was living with him…not good. So yeah, he’s kind of struggling. So definitely keep him in your prayers. I don’t really know how to help him though, and besides, he’s technically the wards responsibility now. Harsh sounding, but that’s the truth. And he also told us he was going to conference 20 minutes before it started and he never showed. So that was also concerning. But conference on Sunday rocked. I had several favorites for Sundays sessions too. L. Tom Perrys, president Monson, elder Hollands, and Brent Nielsons. They all rocked though. Those were just the ones that stuck out to me. Elder Hollands was sweet though. His talks are always awesome to me. Straight forward, to the point, no denying, and just powerful. I loved it a lot. That will be a good article to use for our investigators most definitely. But I hope that you all enjoyed conference as much as I did! It was sweet.

But yeah, that was our week pretty much. Keep me, elder Wessely, and Marquette in your prayers. We don’t have any progressing investigators and the investigators we do have are more just talking to us because they’re curious, not interested. We are planning on doing some serious tracting this week, not making me too happy. We also need to get the ward more excited about missionary work. REMEMBER!!!! MEMBERS are full time FINDERS!!! WE are full time TEACHERS!!! That will make the work go so much smoother and help it be so much more successful.

Clark, my congrats to you and the Brazil mission call! That’s sweet man. You sure aren’t leaving for quite a while though. Kinda stinks. But have fun man. I’m way excited for ya. The mission is one spiritual high after another, can’t get that anywhere else in the world besides a mission. An apostle said that so that means it’s legit!

Love you all!! Keep me in your prayers. Look for missionary opportunities!!! Seriously. The lord will bless you greatly and the missionaries will be in love with you!

Love,
Elder Kissell

p.s. Guess what? I can see my breath in Marquette now! Jealous?! Oh, and remember how i said that like 4 weeks ago i might've broke my finger? Well, bishop, who is a doctor said i did. So i'm going to go see what i can do about getting that fixed today. It's going to be fun!!

Pictures!

1. One of the elders had to stop to use the bathroom on the way home from district meeting and there were bathrooms randomly at this sweet roadside park thing. Pretty eh?