Bum, Bum, Bum, another week bites the dust. I'm not getting home sick, and I don't really want to come home, so thank goodness that I still have 10 more months because this is the greatest work that I have ever done. Being a Missionary is absolutely fantastically awesome!!! It’s so cool that I’m almost done with a second journal and I have the third journal ready to go for more writing and more revelation and more cool beans stories. I found out yesterday that for Mission Tour that the Marquette Sisters (U.P) will be staying the night at the Appleton 1 Sisters place. When I heard this I replied "All hail the mighty Yoopers!" In reply to that outburst, I got five missionaries rolling their eyes at me, which I'm fine with. J

Elder Allen and I just learned that we are sixth cousins. Cool! We had a member this week teach us how to use Familysearch.org, the church's free genealogy website, we had a lot of fun as he showed us a few of the ins and outs of the website. I am very happy to see that the vast majority of my family’s Temple work has been done on both sides. Go Team!!! Speaking of team, the Packers played their first pre-season game. They lost (which the people here are not happy about) but it is as official as it gets, the Packers are out, and this will affect the missionary work one way or another.

Hamming it up with my 6th cousin - Elder Allen!!!!

This past week was hard diligent work. Elder Allen and I did a lot of walking, tracting, visiting people we knew, and contacting. We started the week with zero appointments and finished the week with only one scheduled appointment. This can be really hard for missionaries because it means that we are filling our entire day with people that may or may not be home. Good things we did happen though, we taught some very powerful lessons, and extended three invitations to baptisms. One said yes, M_____, he is a great guy. He found us on the street a couple weeks ago. M____ was crossing the street and he asked us if we were salesmen out to sell vacuums. We had a great chuckle with him as we told him who we really were. We proceeded to ask some question about whether or not he had had any past interaction with the church and he told us he hadn't. So we started to teach a little about the Restoration and we pulled out the Book of Mormon and he said "can I have that?" I gave him a copy and a book mark, than he asked for the pamphlet in my hand. We were both really surprised so we quickly gave him the pamphlet and we continued to teach and answer a few questions that he had. Then M___ kind of stopped us mid-sentence and asked for our contact info, so we traded numbers and we got his address. Then we set up an appointment with him and said a prayer with him on the corner of a busy intersection. It was a great first lesson with him. Our scheduled lesson was on Monday evening. We got to his house and he told us that he had to step out for 10 minutes and that he would be back. We told him we would house sit until he got back. And that's what we did. A small side note: I don't understand why people would let two strangers house sit, but M____ is the second person that Elder Allen and I have done this for. It's only a little weird snooping around someone’s house that you have only met one time previous and we barely even know the guy. Back to the main story; our lesson was super fantastic with M___, he had read the introduction to the Book of Mormon and he had a few questions that we were able to answer as we went through the Restoration more in detail. As the lesson built up we invited M___ to be baptized on September 13th! It made for a great P-Day. As we rode our bikes back home, Elder Allen and I sang Lion King songs, church hymns, and a few other appropriate songs.  We sang them as loud as we possible could all the way home like two happy little pigs.

Short story: On Tuesday we four Elders were asked to help a family move into a new home. We were tight on schedule so my companion Elder Cook and I (we were on exchanges) couldn't stay the whole time. We moved some of the bigger stuff out first and waited for the truck to come. In the time we waited, Elder Cook laid down on the couch. I backed up an appropriate distance and then ran and hurdled over the couch. It was fun, and Elder Cook said that he was convinced that I was going to hit him in the face. Please! I am confident in my hurdling skills. We also got a video of the event.

Scripture for the Week: Moroni 10:31-33

 31 And awake, and arise from the dust, O Jerusalem; yea, and put on thy beautiful garments, O daughter of Zion; and strengthen thy stakes and enlarge thy borders forever, that thou mayest no more be confounded, that the covenants of the Eternal Father which he hath made unto thee, O house of Israel, may be fulfilled.

 32 Yea, come unto Christ, and be perfected in him, and deny yourselves of all ungodliness; and if ye shall deny yourselves of all ungodliness, and love God with all your might, mind and strength, then is his grace sufficient for you, that by his grace ye may be perfect in Christ; and if by the grace of God ye are perfect in Christ, ye can in nowise deny the power of God.

 33 And again, if ye by the grace of God are perfect in Christ, and deny not his power, then are ye sanctified in Christ by the grace of God, through the shedding of the blood of Christ, which is in the covenant of the Father unto the remission of your sins, that ye become holy, without spot.

Thank you, enjoy your week!

Elder Luymes