Yesterday we had lunch at Betty Jo and James Jones' house with 20 of their family members. Every Sunday afternoon they have all the family come over for lunch, and let me tell you, Betty Jo knows how to cook. We had chicken and pastry (its like a chicken soup kinda thing and has big flat noodle-like pastry in it, and it's super good), We also had her famous home-made biscuits and molasses, and some real good country ham (it's salty not sweet) and lots of other good southern food too.

         Their son is on the stake high council and owns his own construction company. His company put the Angel Moroni on the Raleigh, NC temple back when it was first built, and for 2 weeks the statue was in their back yard! Not only that, but at their house they have a forge in their workshop where they make their own custom knives. One of these P-days he's going to let us make our own! His son is a returned-missionary as of the last 2 years and he wants to take us bow hunting. We were debating if we are allowed to. . . .  there's nothing in the handbook that says anything about bow-hunting--haha.

         On Saturday we had to find a way to get to Mt. Olive (its a 50-mile round trip) so I could give another one of their investigators his baptismal interview. We tried everyone we could think of, but no one could give us a ride, so we called the ward mission leader. He was sick, so then Elder Grow had the inspiration to ask a less-active member of the church who we are working with to drive us, and he agreed. It was perfect because he wasn't supposed to be home, but his wife also got sick so he got home right when we called him. When we got to the Mt. Olive church building (which is on Mormon Church Road) the interview went great. The man was very ready and prepared to be baptized. While I was interviewing him, the brother who drove us and Elder Grow pretty much taught his older daughter who came with him. After the interview was the baptismal service for the person I interviewed last week, so we stayed and at the end of the service the guy's daughter went up to the sister missionaries who serve in that area and asked them if they would teach her (! which is amazing because up until then she hadn't showed much interest in knowing more about the church)! Then at church the next morning that less-active member actually came to church! So it was a great weekend for us, and for him.

         Other adventures this week include, but are not limited to: teaching two drunk people, getting bit by a massive doberman, and having our neighbor give us a tour of his house. The drunk people were kinda funny, butsad, especially because it wasn't even 11am yet. One of them asked us something about Joseph Smith wearing purple while riding Haley's Comet in outer space, which was odd! No one has ever asked me that one before.... I really have no idea where he got that one from. Getting bit by the doberman wasn't that bad. He was a huge dog and he had no parts missing (MOM assumes that means typical huge dogs would be missing a limb, or something??). He was mean, but when he ran up and bit me he lunged at me with his mouth open and bit my hip, oddly enough, and his teeth didn't go through my pants, believe it or not, and then he backed off and left me alone. It just left a few teethmarks and bruises, so I'm all good. Our neighbor is a member and he's like one of those doomsday-prepper people. He showed us where his guns are hidden in his house, including his 50 caliber sniper rifle, and more than 3,000  rounds for everthing from .223-.50 and his barn that has a 2-year supply of food for 10 people. 

     We taught Shelly about the Book of Mormon. She is thinking about joining the church and she was amazed that there is another book of ancient scripture out there. What most people don't know is that there are actually many ancient books of scripture that we don't have. There are around 60 missing from the Bible, including at least 2 epistles of Paul that we don't have. The thing is, though, if people don't quite understand why we, along with 75,000 other young church members, are serving full-time missions, they need to read the Book of Mormon. If people would faithfully read and pray about the Book of Mormon, they will understand exactly why we serve missions. For those who haven't read it, it's about 530 pages of reading that will change your life if you will let it.

         ‘Twas a good week over-all, besides the fact that our furnace stopped working and it was about 40 degrees inside last night, but either way, it'll get fixed soon. Until next time, I hope y'all have a blessed week!

--Elder White