Servants of the Lord-March 9th

The main highlight of this week was hearing from Elder W. Craig Zwick (of the 70) as well as Brother Hemingway (the director of online proselyting in the Church). They came and spake to us as a mission on the trust that the leaders of the church have placed in us, as well as the new guidelines concerning using our iPads. This week we'll be receiving our new ones, and we'll basically be doing a restart on training and learning how to use them in the field. We'll also be off Facebook for a while, just as a heads-up. Hearing from a servant of the Lord was such a great experience. He gave us some wonderful counsel and things that I hope to directly apply to the work down here in Hyde Park. And, we've just been informed, L. Tom Perry of the 12 will be coming to our mission to speak to us this Saturday! We will be fasting and praying to spiritually prepare to learn from what he has to say to us. I'm excited, to say the least. This Saturday will also be Jamie's baptism, which I'm also trying to prepare for with much anticipation. He has progressed so well and is qualified to enter into the church as a fully-fledged member. I'll be sure to report on how it goes next week! I love having so many Elder missionaries in this Ward to work with. Granted, it does make it more of a temptation to want to merely hang out when we gather together, but I love having so many friends close by and working together for the same purpose. This week I had a wonderful "exchange" with our district leader, Elder Sami (who came out at the same time as me). My day with him mostly consisted of tracting, but we found a couple of awesome potential investigators, and I feel we learned from each other as we worked in his area. As an added bonus, things are finally starting to warm up and all the snow and ice we've trudged through these past 5 weeks are melting a bit! We're surrounded by worldliness down here in southside. I've never felt in danger physically yet, but some of the things we've seen and heard while proselyting are hard to witness. But as I once quoted in a Facebook post: Even though I accept that darkness exists, I choose not to dwell there. There's still a lot of good in the world, and we should do everything we can go continue sharing goodness and inviting the Spirit into our lives. I hope this was long enough of a letter for you all to swallow, haha! Thank you for your prayers, as always. You are all in mine every night. I promise to make you all Chicago dogs when I get home one day. :) Love, - Elder Jared Richardson