Nick Is Soooooo Lucky!

Nick's first bike area lasted exactly one week! They suddenly got a car. He was so happy! And the missionary in charge of the cars told Nick they were allowed 1,500 miles per month. Nick knew that was way too many and said he asked him about 20 times if that was correct. The guy acted like Nick was dumb for asking. Then later in the month he got a voicemail telling him it was actually 500 miles per month. Oops! They had already racked up a ton of miles. Too late for this month.

The second week of November was amazing. The coolest thing was meeting Etoka and Regina and their children Eliza and Miambo. They are refugees from the Congo. They don't speak English, only Swahili. They've been coming to church for a few months, and even paying tithing. They know nothing about the church's beliefs, but say they want to be baptized because they know the church is true because of the feeling they have whenever they go. It's a little difficult to schedule appointments with them because they can only do it when their translator is available.

They picked up nine investigators in just two days; the family from the Congo, a guy who's wife is a member, and another family of four. Nick thinks the second family's 15 year old son will go the the NFL. He already has BSU and some other schools looking at him. There are also other referrals to contact. They were visiting one investigator in a retirement home, and a girl their age who was visiting someone there, asked them to teach her.

Mike and Mikey, a father and son, committed to baptism in December. They had been rethinking baptism because they didn't like the commitment of going to church every Sunday. But Nick and Elder Huyett talked them through it and the baptism is back on. They told them that church isn't easy for anyone, but once you know it's right, you have to live it!

One week they had to have three days of leadership training meetings from 8:30 to 4:00. He didn't think he would like them because they're long and they have to do a ton of role playing, which he doesn't like to do. But he said the meetings were insightful, though really nothing new. He said any smart and good missionary should have been doing this stuff already. Some of the lessons focus on teaching people and not lessons, basically just being personable. Another focused on teaching people to receive personal revelation through prayer and scripture study.

Two of their referrals are really cool stories. When he was in Kuna, he got a referral for Annalyn, but she moved two days later, and he thought that was the end of it. But another missionary called Nick and told him to contact her in Boise. The other one is Toni's sister. He baptized Toni in Buhl and she is now a student at BYU. She recently wrote to him thanking him, and was wondering how the mission was going. Then she wrote again and thought it was a miracle that he was in Boise because her older sister is there. The sister hadn't been interested, but they recently had a deep discussion and now she's asking the same questions that Toni once asked. So she told Toni it would be okay if Nick stopped by to talk to her. He thinks it's really cool that things from previous areas are coming back around.

On a sadder note, a missionary that Nick is really close to had his sister pass away. They were together on exchanges when the other missionary got the call. He didn't want to go back to his area yet, so they spent a few days together on exchanges before he flew home for the funeral. Nick said he wasn't all there, but he was handling it like a champ.

He was excited to have Thanksgiving Day and the next day off. They got Friday off because he said they would just annoy people if they tried to work. Some of the plans were to go part way to a ski resort and go sledding, go in the sauna that two missionaries have in their house, get a lesson in sushi (and eat it) from Cassie, a girl they are teaching, and check out the black Friday sales. Plus they were invited for two Thanksgiving dinners!