55th week in Spokane

We had somewhat of a rough week with all our investigators who are working towards a baptismal date. Satan has been working double time to keep them from entering the waters. We were only able to meet with the Stephens family once this week because they kept calling and canceling and they are still having problems with the word of wisdom and so they can't be baptized this week. Its all been very frustrating. But on the upside we did find some sweet new people to teach this week. One of whom is Ricky, she's way interested, has tons of questions, and has a whole lot of potential. We also found a new family, the mom has been taught before but she is re-interested and has two kids that she wants to learn more about God and the scriptures. So we are looking forward to seeing what comes from that. We have been getting a lot of requests to split wood for people and so of course I love doing that. As for the zone, there was a baptism this Saturday, a guy named Calvin. So that was good especially since there hasn't been a baptism in the zone since August. Next week there's another baptism on Sunday. so things are looking up, we just need to have people quit holding cigarettes higher than they hold God, which is exactly what they are doing. So there's been a lot of questions about the responsibilities of a zone leader. So basically it works like this.. two missionaries make up a companionship where there is a senior companion who is accountable for that companionship, a few companionships make up a district where there is a District leader who works closely with all the missionaries in their district, especially the senior companion, and is accountable for the companionships in his district, a few districts make up a zone where there are two zone leaders in a companionship who work very closely with the district leaders and are accountable for the all the missionaries in that zone, and then there are two assistants to the president in a companionship who work very closely to the zone leaders. So that's how leadership in this mission is broken down. So as far as responsibilities go, there's not a whole lot different then any one else, other than we work very closely with the stake, or stakes, in which our zone covers, meeting with high councilmen and the stake president and helping to ensure that the missionaries and the church leaders are on the same page with everything. So as zone leaders we have meeting with the stake, we also go to the district meeting within the zone, we meet once a transfer with all the other zone leaders in the mission and the president in whats called a zone leader council, which just so happens to be tomorrow. We also have a conference call every Thursday night where all the zone leaders and the president are all on the same line where we give some sort of accountability and receive direction from the assistants and the president. there's also whats called a zone conference that happens every other transfer where all the missionaries in a few zones meet together where we receive direction and training from the president, then we split up and receive training from the assistants and then the zone leaders give trainings after that. Then there's also one more thing that's fairly new, called leadership training, I went to it as a district leader in July. basically its where we receive training from the president for four days, eight hours a day and all zone leaders, district leaders, and trainers are invited to that..Its pretty intense but its so awesome at the same time and that just so happens to start tomorrow too. So for this upcoming week I will be in Spokane from Tuesday morning to Friday night. so I'm looking forward to that, it will be fun. So I don't know, that may sound like a lot, but its not. Well I'm looking forward to reporting on this week next time. I love you all thanks for all you do!