Weeks three and four

Hello how’s everything going for you guys?

Sorry it's been so long since my last email P-day is Monday out here. The flight out on Tuesday was long and cramped I was glad to finally get off the plane in St Louis, where we met Mission President Clark and his wife. We then proceeded to the St Louis Temple and had a tour of the grounds; later we continued on to the mission home where we sat through a safe driving video and had dinner.

The next morning we ate at the mission home before going to transfer meeting. The transfer meeting was exciting I met my trainer Elder Solomon and found out we were being sent to the Mexico area. It was to my surprise that we were not only whitewashing the area as Elder Solomon was new to the area as well, but we were also reopening the Mexico area after it had been closed for six months. The Mexico area is in country in Missouri and is about two hours away from St Louis. We were told that we would be staying with the Bishop and his wife while we found an apartment. We drove out to the church building to meet some of the ward as activity night falls on a Wednesday here. The ward is relatively small but the people are warm and friendly.

Thursday was interesting after going shopping to get what basics I needed Elder Solomon and I decided to go tract/contacting from the city library to a street called mars street on the edge of town (about a mile and a half away). We met Matthew who was interested in Christianity and wanted to interview us for his journalism class. He just asked why we had chosen to be missionaries, what it was like being a missionary, and what our message was.

Friday was good we mainly went around with one of the church members and looked at apartments, but we had some member visits in the evening and met the ward mission leader.

Saturday we went tracting in along trinity in Mexico and met Ester, Cary, and Sam. Ester was sitting out in front of her apartment when we were walking by. We stopped and chatted a bit and talked a little about the Gospel and asked if we could return later in the week and talk to her some more. Continuing down trinity several people said they weren't interested in talking to us, a few just didn't answer, and one saw us coming a slammed his door shut before we said hello. It was ok though because towards the end of the street we were invited in by Cary. Cary had said she had talked to missionaries before but didn't really remember what they had said, so we talked about prayer and the Book of Mormon and gave her one before we left. We then returned to our car tracting down the other side of the street where we met Sam. Sam seemed interested in talking about Christ but was short on time and indicated that I would be better to come back at a later time. That evening we went to a wedding reception at the ward building where we had been asked to set up a small table about the temple as there were several non-member friends who were attending. As it turned out the table was set up in corner away from people so we mostly mingled and got to know the ward better.

Sunday was pretty low key there was a farewell talk given by an Elder going to Boise Idaho Spanish speaking. After church we attended the baptism of Maddie who had just turned eight and were asked to serve as the two witnesses for the baptism. Later we were invited to dine with the bishop’s family. Afterwards we went and visited with some members to try and get to know the ward better.

Whew it’s been a busy six days it kind of interesting to see what exactly goes into opening an area. Anyways how is work going? How’s Seth doing in school and otherwise? How’s the Dog? What’s going on with the family up in Washington? And thanks mom and dad for your emails/letter they've been really fun to read.

With love

Elder Zach J Taylor