When One Door Closes

Feb 23, 2015

So, I have some good news, and some less happy news... First, Gainesville was closed. That is the less happy news. The happy news is that there are so many new places in the mission that I get to go and discover! As of now, I have been transferred to the Alexandria 2nd ward. I am back in the Mt. Vernon stake! The last time I was in this stake was when I served in Ft. Belvoir clear back in the summer. Crazy cool, huh? Oh! So this was super odd. We walk into sacrament meeting (late from getting some sisters a GPS) and we sit down just before the Sacrament begins. We sing a hymn and they begin to bless. The first thing I noticed was that it wasn't the voice of a 16-18 year old. It was an older guys voice. The prayer ends and I look up and see six men stand up to pass the sacrament. Then it hit me; there is next to no youth in this ward! So weird. Anyways, I thought that was interesting.

     So the past couple of days have been pretty crazy. If we didn't have a car, I don't know how we would have managed. So as soon as transfers get over, we scramble people's luggage into cars and head off to our areas. It was really cold outside, so we didn't really stay back to mingle. Too cold for that. We get to our apartment, drop my suitcases and stuff in the room and head off to find other missionaries luggage. Some had half of theirs and half of others, so we had to mix and match them all. We drove a total of 84 miles that day figuring stuff out. Oh! Elder Rickertsen is in my zone! I am so excited for that! Anyways, we finally get home and it is time to plan for tomorrow then get to bed. Crazy stuff.

     On Saturday, the stake had a huge youth activity at all the missionaries had to be at to help with. The stake did a mini MTC where the youth came and learned how to be a missionary with the full time missionaries and practice teach with them. I think it was a HUGE success. One of e best parts of it was seeing some of the youth from he Ft. Belvoir ward and having them remember me! Huzzah! I have already run into a bunch of people that I met a while ago. Fun stuff. The whole time while the youth are learning and moving place to place, we were in charge of all the work behind the scenes with trying to figure out where each missionary was supposed to go and tell them what they are going to do. We had some missionaries teaching a "district meeting", some being investigators to practice teach, some to be people to street contact, and some to be the people the youth knock on their door. I thought it was a blast, but amazed that my brain kept up with if all. And such is life.

     Thanks for taking the time to read about my experienced as a missionary. I hope and pray that it can and will inspire and uplift. I  love this Gospel!

~ Elder Zac Snell :)

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