Fight Night

Alrighty guys let's talk about what happened this week. Also hope you all are doing fantastic! So this week I have very unfortunate news. Our golden investigator wasn't able to meet with us at all! She was super sick all week :(

We also had several services this week which was fun. One of them, we helped this guy move who collects watches. We also had a blast at this other service on Saturday helping this family clear out a jungle (welcome to Florida) but we had a massive bonfire or at least what could've been an awesome bonfire but we cooked hotdogs so giant bonfire isn't what we were going for. Anyways, while we were there, the neighbor of the guy we were doing service for came over to eat with us and Elder M did a great job getting him talking about religion to which he ended up asking us a ton of awesome questions and we taught like almost all of all 3 of the lessons. It was crazy. Anyways super awesome times.

Another fun thing that happened this week was that Elder M and I got boxing gloves and have had some fun sparring times. Nothing too serious and we don't do face shots but it's been a lot of fun. Its helped us come a lot closer because it's a sport Elder M likes. So far I've won our matches but Elder M is getting better. 

We also have had a wonderful time becoming friends with the members. The members here are so dope and it's absolutely so fun eating and teaching them. 

This week we focused a lot on charity. It's something we all can do better with but as far as a definition I would say charity is acting how Christ would act if He was here. He is all about loving others and putting others before Himself and so that's something we need to strive to do. And I know that when I forget myself and just think about others, the time here just flies and that is when you mourn with those who mourn and it's the best. Try to see others as God sees them and it's hard to hate anyone when you realize that's your brother or sister, someone who God has an infinite love for. 

We also had a great time today going to Disney Springs. It was a blast! I was able to have a fun time with the Elders and we got to go through that experience. Everything is crazy expensive tho so I didnt really buy anything except a shirt that everyone here has so I had to cop one too obviously.

I love yall! I love Florida, I love my mission and I love the Lord. 

-Elder Pettingill 

-Us at Disney Springs plus the Sisters that we saw while we were there!

-the guy's watch collection (there are 3 more pictures like this) 

Miracles vs Aliens

Ight y'all this week was sick. Honestly though most of the dope part of the week was like Friday-Sunday so I'll mainly be talking about that. 

Anyways story time: Friday comes along and we haven't been able to get in contact with our golden friend at all. She said last week that she was prob gonna have to go to the hospital so we were super worried about her. Anyways we have this bombin mission devotional about following the spirit. And we get the feeling we gotta go visit S. Anyways we have this dinner planned for 7:30 and we were gonna go visit S at 5 but then the dinner changed to 5 and I don't know why but we were like it's fine we will do the dinner and visit S afterwards. Normally that's a terrible idea especially after getting a prompting but anyways we go to the dinner and it goes way long so we don't get out until 7. And at this point we are like, ight let's go see if she's home. We get there and she has just gotten home from the hospital like 5 minutes before and she had just found out her dad died and when she was in tears we show up outta nowhere and she was absolutely amazed. We were amazed. It was dope. Anyways we give her a Book of Mormon and invite her to church and she was like yes I'll absolutely be there at church. So we were hyped and she was hyped and everyone was hyped. So Sunday shows up and we had gotten her a ride to church and she shows up and she loves it. After we were able to set up a lesson for later that day and we were able to teach her an awesome lesson about the Plan of Salvation. Absolutely amazing and we invited her to be baptized and she was so hyped about it. So she was hyped and we were hyped and everyone was hyped. So we told her how often we would need to meet with her so she could get baptized and she wrote down on her calendar when we would come and all this dope stuff so we are a little bit a lot a bit excited for her!

Anyways before that on Saturday we were able to do a fun service for some people in our ward fixing up the house they will be moving into. It's a dope house but a lot of work to be done. So I had fun sanding the ceiling so that the finishers can come in and do everything else (feat the pic of me below)

Lastly Saturday night we did a Bible study with this guy. Heck of a time with him because he was able to explain to us about how Satan via his demons (basically aliens) have warped us and created all these kind of hybrid humans and that's where all the stories about Vampires and Werewolves and giants and all that stuff comes from. He also explained to us how the Vatican church is actually led by Satan and they do a lot of work to cover all this stuff up. And that the reason we think we've seen aliens is because it's actually Satan's devils who do all that. Honestly I'm down with but we decided against meeting with him again because turns out he thought the first vision was dope but he wasnt interested in it or the Book of Mormon. So bummer there but quite the experience. 

Something I absolutely loved from our mission devotional was the quote "ordinary people doing ordinary things can lead to extraordinary miracles" and I absolutely love that! A lot of the times all we need to be doing is trying our best and the Lord will guide us. A lot of the times we just do what's logical or what seems logical at the time and the Lord will do the rest. He will place us in the position to do His work if that's what we desire. We can be the ministering angels to our brethren if that's our desire. I absolutely know that is true. We don't have to be perfect but if we are trying Christ will make up the rest. Coincidences don't happen simply because. Coincidences happen because we have a Father in Heaven who is watching over everything we are doing. He loves us so much. I hope you guys are able to see how much He loves you. If you don't know, look for His hand in your life because I promise He is there. 

-Elder Pettingill 

-The blue light glasses my sister picked out for me!

- I got a little covered in sawdust

- a dinosaur pancake I made along with buttermilk syrup I also made (that's right ladies I can cook now and make adorable shaped pancakes so win win)

Transfers

I know it's been crazy and I'm being transferred again! It's been crazy recently all this moving around that's happening. Oh wait psych I don't get transferred, we all know this. So I'm still here in Kissimmee East with Elder M but we did have a bunch of people in our district get moved either because they're going home or just were transferred so we are getting 3 new elders and 2 new sisters. Very sad to see my friends leave but we have a greenie coming in our ward share that we've planned on messing with and we will also have a greenie in our district so hopefully next week I'll have some stories for y'all. 

As for this week not much happened. Ok that's a lie a lot happened. Lots of crazy fun stuff but I don't have a ton of time this week so I'll be fast.

Tuesday we did an exchange. I went to St. Cloud with Elder G, met this guy here. Super awesome member but he's inactive. He loves the church but has some problems with some other members. I was able to help him and he loved having me there. It was awesome to see that God knows and has a wonderful path for us.

We stole like all the investigators from the Canoe Creek sisters because of the ward boundaries all their people are in our area now. So that's awesome. We felt bad but they just both got transferred out so it's all good! RIP the incoming sisters

We have been just absolutely loving this ward. Everyday we are so blessed to be a part of it. God really knows what He's doing and He always has a plan. 

Love yall! 

Elder Pettingill

-Our district

-playing volleyball

-I taught sister E how to cartwheel 

Kissme in the East

 Alright what's up ya'll! I know you're all dying to find out what happened to our area and yes we were transferred! Our area is now Kissimmee (ki-sim-me) East which is awesome because it's crazy in Kissimmee. Elder M was a little overwhelmed with the transition but it's all good because this area seems super awesome. There is already so much for us to do so we are excited to get to work or at least I'm excited to get to work. 

We are still ward sharing with some Elders who are super awesome and we already love them plus they like sharing so we set up what areas we would cover and we would send over any member or friend in their area and vice versa. So when they got a referral for this lady in our area they were kind enough to let us teach her. Well she ended up being super dope so I kinda feel bad. But she wants to get baptized and loves us already. Huge answer to our prayers because in every prayer this past week we have been adding in to find someone to baptize by the end of March because as a mission our goal is to have each companionship get 1 baptism every quarter. So we are super excited because she is very set on getting baptized and we think we can definitely get her taught everything she needs to know so that she can be baptized. Like this lady is super awesome. RIP to the Kissimmee West Elders but we are very grateful.

We also did exchanges with the Zone Leaders! It was so fun because I got to go practice my Spanish with Elder Turley, my Zone Leader from Conway who I was really tight with. So fun to get to spend the day with him even if it wasn't as successful as we had hoped. I did get the opportunity to bear my testimony in Spanish and I can confidently say I understand 90% of all things said in Spanish as we had dinner with some Spanish members. Also fun story is that we were supposed to show up for dinner at this one family's house but the meal calendar showed an address for that family's mom because they had moved out back in September! So after talking with her and she was definitely the hardest I've heard to understand Spanish but I still caught almost everything (that's the main reason I'm confident with 90%). Anyways it was a blast and to end the day off right we went to Twistee Treat which is like a little ice cream shop that is super good.

Those were pretty much the only exciting things that happened this week. We weren't able to work with I a ton because we were often busy in the mornings and she isn't available after about 4:00 everyday so we definitely want to focus more on her this week. 

Something I loved from my readings of the Book of Mormon this week is from the end of the war chapters. In Helaman 3:27 it says, "Thus we may see that the Lord is merciful unto all who will, in the sincerity of their hearts, call upon his holy name." I love this so much because throughout the wars that the Nephites had with the Lamanites whenever the Nephites were prideful the Lamanites would gain some advantage but immediately as they turned humble again God would lift them out of their suffering and allow them to prosper again. I love that he is willing to let us make mistakes so that we will turn back to him again. But immediately when we turn to him he will lift us up. I saw something that was awesome on Facebook and it said "God doesn't love you in your mistakes but rather he loves you despite your mistakes." Just because we mess up doesn't mean it's over. Sure we will have consequences but as soon as we turn to God he will enable us to be healed through his son. I know that Christ lives and loves us so much more than we can even imagine. All he wants is for us to return to Him. He mourns when He watches us suffer especially when we suffer without His help. He went through the Atonement alone so we wouldn't have to go through anything alone. We will never understand, truly, His suffering but He understands, truly, ours. Turn to Christ everyday. He is pleading for you and I'm pleading for you.

I love y'all so much! 

-Elder Pettingill

-good ol' jack brack love that guy

-Elder Turley and I at twistee treat!

-us with our delicious icey cream