July 10, 2007

  • Dear friends, family, and fellow xangans,

    Today begins my last transfer. 6 more weeks. I can hardly believe it. Elder Smith was transfered today, leaving me without a companion. I am training, and so my new companion is in the MTC until tomorrow. Meanwhile I'm kickin it with the Zone Leaders.

    It has been kind of an emotional day. Elder Flores went home to Mexico this morning, and it made me realize how close I really am. Of course I will stay focused and will work hard- I have an example to set for my greenie, and a legacy to leave.

    Martha, who I baptized a few months ago, moved into the Creekside ward (where I served 6 months ago). I miss that ward. I can't believe that I have been in Chino for 6 months, going on 7 1/2.

    This past Monday was a really really good day. We found several new investigators in a neat area of Pomona. Previously we had never felt like there was work for us to do there. All of a sudden, though, we felt like this was where we needed to be. I felt inspired to knock an apartment complex and we found a family of 5 to teach there. Floating on the excitement of it, we went to another street and knocked. On the way there was a guy who stopped us and told us his address. He wanted us to go to his home and get some water. We knocked his street, and found a woman down the street from him that said we could come back later to share our message. Then we went to this man's house and got water. He is a nondenominational youth pastor/motivational speaker and counseler.

    After that we went to an appointment with a less active member, but she stood us up. We were going to leave because it was getting dark and it is not a great place to be in the dark, but my companion really wanted to try this small complex right in front of us. I decided we should. The first door was someone who didn't speak much English. The second door wasn't interested. The third door was a freshman in college. She had the light of Christ in her eyes. I told her about Jesus Christ visiting a people in ancient America. She said, "Wow, I've never heard that before. That's really interesting." I bore my testimony about the The Book of Mormon- about my first time reading it and asking God if it was true. My companion shared his testimony of it, and then I asked her if she liked to read. She said that she loved to read, and that because it was summer she had a lot of extra time to read. I gave the Book of Mormon and she agreed to read it.

    I know that the Spirit of God directs us in this work. I say this so that you can know that I feel a great sense of fulfilment in being a missionary. I hope that you enjoy reading about the things that I am doing so that you know that I am happy and that I have grown and developed. These spiritual experiences are the only way I know to "measure" my success in what I'm trying to do, and that's why I share them with you.

    Well, I love you all a lot. I miss you, and will be with you all shortly,

    Sincerely,

    Elder "Emo" Embree