Email January 5, 2015

Hello and Happy New Year! First off, I come home this year!!! AHHH! Nooo! That's so crazy and weird to think about. I'll be home to celebrate Halloween, Thanksgiving, Christmas, and New Year's at home! Ah, that's so weird to think about. But that's a long time away and I don't want to think about it haha. So this was another hard week, investigator wise. Everyone was STILL out of town. And no one wanted to have us back, because of the holidays. We are really hoping and praying that those who have asked us to come back after the holidays are really ready and really interested. Most likely not if they asked us to wait, but I still have faith in them! We were, however, able to make contact with a few new less actives who are wanting to come back to church. One of them who has been wanting to come back to church for a while hasn't been able to because his wife is pregnant - on a side note, his wife is not a member but she went to seminary with him all 4 years and she was always the one awake and listening, and he was the one asleep on his desk - and so he has been safety-fying his house and working and has just been too busy. But like I said, he wants to come back and his wife might be another perfect investigator! So hopefully we can get working with them really soon! An update on an investigator is that she supposedly went to church with her less active boyfriend in another stake. But that's okay because he is actually trying to move down here into our ward and so that would be perfect! She isn't sure about meeting with us because she has questions about things that she's not sure if we can understand and answer, but we still are really hoping the member can persuade her into meeting with us. I may not be able to answer the question or questions she has, but I would be able to help turn her to the people who would be able to answer her questions or help her find peace concerning them, Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ. As for the less actives we were able to work with this week, a few of them said they would be coming to church yesterday but they ended up not coming which was disheartening. A few less actives we are working with did come and they are coming back strong, but the ones who didn't come need it so badly and they would be able to find what they need. And as for the title story, we had a service project with a less active (due to health) to move some things around in his house. We took the Nevada City missionaries with us to help out. So some of us started to work on cleaning and a couple of us went on a rampage to clean up the cobwebs. 90% of the cobwebs had these MASSIVE behemoths of spiders. It was terrifying. We went around with one of the long vacuum heads wrapping all the cobwebs on one end and the other went around spraying Raid, the bug killing spray, on the spiders. Literally after spraying the spiders for 5 seconds with the Raid, they would still move!!! So another set ensued and the nerves would still twitch, but a couple even lived after that. Nightmares. It was an adventurous service project!!! To continue on, a couple days ago we were cleaning our apartment after we had gotten in for the night and I wanted to move the 4 bed set up we had. No one else wanted to, but we all decided to try it for a few days. Thank goodness we did because when we moved the beds, there was black mold all over the walls from the bed frames down. It was sickening. I was nauseous for a few seconds. The beds that were covering the mold had been there since way before I got there so I had no idea it was there either, until we moved it all. We had another epic battle against the single-celled organism that is mold. It really wasn't that bad though, just drowned it in Clorox and wiped it all away with gloves and a paper towel. Then washed our hands. Many times. The worst part is now I'm probably going to get some terrible disease from living here for so long. Hahaha. They were all mad at me for having to move the beds but then I turned it back on them telling them "You're welcome for finding it so we could clean it up!" Hahaha. Missionary apartments are gross. :) Well, that's really about it. Other than yesterday at Church I had a lot of prayers answered. Which really filled my heart with gratitude and love for my Heavenly Father. I am so grateful that He is so mindful of His children. He truly does love us way more than we can imagine! Don't ever count yourself unworthy or unimportant or unloved before Him! He ALWAYS loves you and will never stop!!! I know that this is true with all of my heart. :) Love you guys, have a great week!!! Elder Cevering