Caught in the middle of a shootout
This week was another crazy one! We had zone conference, a walk through downtown, and exchanges with zone leaders.
Zone conference is when all the missionaries in a zone get together to either be chastised by the mission president and his dogs (the aps) or we receive spiritual upliftment. For zone conference, we were fed cafe rio, which is so much better than half a sandwich, especially with it being 8 hours long. The main focus of that zone conference was to chastise us... The mission leaders (mission president and his wife) have no trust in us missionaries, so they spent an hour showing us how to eat food with members, how to text members, and then what we need to do as missionaries to be better. But we got to wear normal people clothes, which was nice.
Our walk through downtown Minneapolis was very interesting. For anyone that doesn't know, im right in the middle of all the unrest, which is fun for me. It keeps things interesting. As we were walking around, we were stopped by some dragqueens and talked about God and what we have to do to be saved. They had some interesting things to say. My companion is so confident, that he doesnt let me speak when we are with other people, so I only had the privilege of listening to my companion talk and say false doctrines (like Mormon wrote the Book of Mormon, and all we need to do to be saved is believe in Christ). Then we were walking back to our apartment and thats when it all happened. It started with us taking a picture of the George Floyd memorial. The people in the "peace garden" started yelling at us saying that we are dirty cop spies and then came to us real mad. Then the shootout started. We were right in the middle of it all. It was so crazy, but so fun. I wish that actually happened. Haha no shootout, just some angry people. But we went over to their peace garden and said hi to a lot of the people and they don't hate us now, we're just racist because we're white and we wear white. We got to talk to a lot of people during that walk which was great.
Then we had our exchanges with the zone leaders. Thats when we change companions with another set of elders for the day. That was fun. My temporary companion and I had a delicious breakfast with some members to start our exchange. And then we had a full day. At the end, during a lesson with a latina girl, I got to share my testimony in Spanish. It was a really good exchange.
I gave a talk on Sunday about prayer. As I studied the topic, I found a few things that really stood out to me. One, is that Heavenly Father will answer in one of three ways. The first, is through feelings of peace, or a "burning of the bosom". The second, is an unsettling feeling, or a stuppor of thought. And third, is no response at all. That doesn't mean he isn't answering your prayers, but he is answering by letting us know he trusts us. Prayers aren't a one and done thing. God doesn't work that way. He wants us to grow. We were sent here to struggle, so we can learn and grow to become like Him. Answers to prayers will be a step by step, or line upon line, not everything given us all at once. It is important that we also give thanks to our Father for the answers he's given us. Elder Bednar gave 3 principles to have more meaningful prayers
Principle #1. Prayer becomes more meaningful as we counsel with the Lord in all our doings
Principle #2. Prayer becomes more meaningful as we express heartfelt gratitude.
Principle #3. Prayer becomes more meaningful as we pray for others with real intent and a sincere heart.
Here are some pics from back in Winona with Elder Downey. Then one pick of the george floyd memorial/peace garden. Then at a 4th of July party we went to
