July 11, 2021

July 12, 2021

From Mom - Rain At Night

Dear Ben,

After we chatted briefly on Monday, we got into the serious business of camping in beautiful British Columbia. It was hot, but happily it rained a little every night which is so lovely to listen to inside our tents while tucked in our sleeping bags. It cooled everything down, brightened the world, smelled great and made the trip that much better.

Highlights include hiking to find some hidden lakes. Besides Mark and Todd’s huge full-grown puppies trying to knock us off the trail, our lives were NOT in danger in spite of the “bear-with-cubs-in-area” sign. There is some beautiful water and flowers to see, alpine air to breathe and it was rejuvenating in more ways than one.

The girls loved the traditional tube rides.

We tried paddle boarding and loved it.

Did some cliff jumping.

Sat around the fake propane fires (due to the fire ban).

Found a couple of geocaches. (Mia may have converted the little cousins.)

Ate a lot of junk food.

But honestly, my very favourite was sitting around the picnic table after breakfast and discussing Come Follow Me.

D&C 76.

It’s a deep one. I love the questions the girls asked and I so appreciate the back and forth of true discussion. The take away was that we believe in a God who truly desires our greatest good and developing faith requires some practice on our parts.

The scriptures are like rain at night, cooling off the heat of life and making things a little more bearable. Btw, I loved your #hearHim video.

We arrived home Saturday night and attended our first church meeting in our home ward today. I loved being able to sing together, to hug our friends again, to sit in a classroom face-to-face in discussion and feel the beautiful, sustaining influence of community.

Rain at night. I’m a fan.

Love you forever,

Mom

From Ben

On Monday we delivered this bomb lesson to this older couple. We talked to them about modern prophets, the Restoration, and answered a couple of wild questions that the husband was throwing down. He asked about why we couldn't drink coffee and had some beef about the Book of Mormon. We stressed that he didn't have to take our work for it and invited them to read and pray out for themselves if the Book of Mormon was true and they agreed to. We shared our testimonies, felt the spirit, then had some divine cheese biscuits to close off the night.

Unfortunately and unexpectedly, two days later, we got a call from a friend of the wife. She explained that they we should NOT try to contact them anymore because our meeting with them was causing some high levels of tension on their relationship. So that had us shook. They were super friendly and curious so we did not see it coming.

We also got to teach that adorable little girl Vanessa (the one that had me stressing last week) about the nature of God's commandments, why they weren't arbitrary rules of some unknown deity (we phrased it differently of course) and what a couple of them were.

But dang.

That lesson was rough. Turns out you probably shouldn't throw down the ten commandments on a child in a 15 minute span. She gave the classic head nod of agreement that said "I legit have no idea what these two dudes just told me, but I'll nod so their feelings don't get hurt" gotta love NEVER ENDING LEARNING EXPERIENCES... (humbled to the dust is actually the best description of serving a mission so far.)

On top of this, I played myself by praying to the Lord to show me my weaknesses (Ether 12:27 promises that weak things can become strong, so at the time I was feeling pretty hyped about it.) My prayer was answered. Turns out having your eyes opened to even more of your flaws doesn't feel very good. I was like "show me my weaknesses!" my pride was like "you fool" God was like "how many?" and I was like "hold up"

Needless to say, I found out I am unexpectedly good at judging people. Not the obvious "dang that guy needs a life, get on my level" kind of thoughts, but more the subtle and almost unnoticeable micro thoughts of criticism or self elevation. (I have many more flaws than this, but I won't expose myself too much in a single email.. :)

The miracle of the week was that this cool old guy we've been meeting with, Brother Wilkinson, brought his grandson to church. When the branch president asked if anyone would volunteer to bless the sacrament, the 9 year old grandson Liam raised his hand. We had a laugh after the fact about that.

1) This cool guy named Ernest who is a part of the community of Christ.