Week 40: Who Is My Companion?

This week I went on 3 exchanges. I was only with Elder Phister for 2 full days this past week. It was crazy. But this week had some great moments! Also President has told us that we are going to be serving in two wards. One is our Spanish Ward, and the other is a YSA ward. Which also means we get the chance to go contacting on campus at Lonestar College; I'm pumped! General Conference was pretty incredible, if I do say so myself. There were a lot of great quotes given. I'll share some of my favorites a bit later, but it was so great to hear from President Monson. One of the missionaries said to me, "President Monson didn't say much, but the guidance he did give was of the most importance". How incredible is it that we have a prophet on the earth today. It's so incredible. Well I'm pumped to share the happenings of the week. Whoa let's go!!!!!

Tuesday: I went on an exchange with Elder Self. He has been out just a transfer less than me, and it was a lot of fun. Some of the crazy things that happened: We were going to a lesson and we got on the feeder road and then everyone just stopped. There were ambulances and police cars trying to get past all the traffic because there was a huge accident. We were stuck in the same place for 45 minutes. When we finally passed the accident we noticed that the car was just shredded up. We missed our lesson, but our investigator is super awesome. Well we got the chance to go do service at a mental facility with the Hermana's. When we got there the Hermanas, asked us if we saw the accident. We told them we had and they said that there was a burning car on the Freeway as well. Everything is crazier in Texas!!! All of our lessons fell through but, man, it was a crazy day!

Wednesday: Elder Phister and I exchanged back the night before but then split off again. I went on another exchange, this time with Elder Basset. I had the chance to go up to Conroe. It was funny because Elder Basset is new to that area, and all of the lessons he had planned fell through. So we had the chance to go finding for close to 3 hours. We found so many good potential investigators. There are so many people who are from Honduras who live in Conroe, and it was so much fun talking to some of them. Contacting is one of my favorite things to do as a missionary. It is so much fun meeting new people. At the beginning of my mission I dreaded it, but I absolutely love it now. Elder Basset has amazing Spanish. He served most of his mission in Costa Rica but then got really sick and had to come home for 6 months, and is finishing his mission here in Houston. He is a really funny Elder. We had a great time together. There were both things that we have been working on and we were both able to help each other out. He also has some really fun music. So we jammed as well! Had a ton of fun.

Thursday: Every Thursday Elder Phister and I now have the opportunity to go teach Family History at an Old Folks center here in The Woodlands with the AP's. So we got the chance to do that, and it was so much fun talking to some of the old folks. They are all so nice! We also got the chance to plan for our week! We did it at the church and we were both really cold and the only warm place was in the entrance doors of our chapel. So we got one of the couches and put it in there and planned in there. Sometimes you just gotta switch things up.

 Friday: Was very interesting. First we had Zone Meeting and we received a great outline for helping people understand the importance of the Sabbath day. We are so excited to go use it this week and help people understand the blessings they can receive as they go to church and partake of the sacrament. After Zone Meeting I went on another exchange. This time with Elder Marquez. He is a stud. He started in this mission, and about 7 months in he had to leave. He was gone from the mission for about 8 months and finally came back this transfer. We had the chance to go finding first. We contacted a lot of people who weren't very interested. But we came across some of these high school kids who loved the message we shared with them. We are so grateful for them and the opportunity that we have to share the restoration with them sometime in the future. After contacting, I started to feel really sick. I was feeling a little bit under the weather all day but after we went contacting was when I really started to feel bad. We were driving home and we hit really bad traffic and the pain was unbearable. When we got back to the apartment I couldn't work, eat, sleep and laying or sitting down did nothing to ease the pain. Elder Marquez asked if he could give me a blessing of healing. He did so. As he gave it, the spirit came upon me so strongly. The pain subsided as well. After the blessing, I thanked Elder Marquez and immediately went to my room and fell asleep in seconds. That moment was very powerful for me, because no matter what I did, the pain wouldn't stop. But immediately after Elder Marquez blessed me with the power of God, the pain stopped. How incredible is it that we have the power of God on the earth today. I know that it is absolutely incredible. 

Saturday and Sunday: General Conference was the highlight of these two days. Here are some of my favorite quotes. Dieter F Uchtdorf said one of the funniest things in the Priesthood session. It was. "If there was such thing as a perfect woman, do you really think that she would be interested in you?" But I loved the talk that he gave, as he shared his thoughts about families. It made me think of my own family now and also my future family. I also loved the talk by Bonnie L Oscarson who asked the question of “do we really believe?” Her whole talk was a testimony and it was so powerful. We need to be asking ourselves, do we really believe? There were some more great ones. Holland definitely owned it! I love him! As he was speaking I couldn't help but see the love that he has for all of us and especially the Lord. Conference is amazing. I invite all of you to look over and study once again the messages that were shared. We need to make sure they are engraven into our minds as we are preparing for the 2nd coming of the savior. On Saturday I had a dream that the world was ending and everything was black and gloomy. In my dream though, I was still a missionary with Elder Phister and we were still accomplishing the work of the Lord. The prophets and apostles have been telling us for some time now that the 2nd coming is coming very soon, so we need to do everything we possibly can to be ready for it.

Love, Elder Heiner