April 7, 2014
Wow. I feel like I got up from emailing last week, walked outside, got destroyed (think the slow motion fight from the Sherlock Holmes movie, and in this scenario, I'm not Robert Downey, Jr. -- I'm the other guy) and ended up sitting back down at the computer emailing again.
Okay. This past week was a good one. Spring is wonderful. But, somehow, everyone is getting sick. By everyone, I mean EVERYONE. Now, I have a theory (some may call it a self-limiting belief, but it only encourages me to work harder). As missionaries, we make a certain number of appointments every week. If you have a goal to teach, say, sixteen lessons in the week, you can't just set sixteen appointments. Oh, no. My theory (which is less of a theory and more of an observation if I think about it) is that only 65% of all the appointments you set go through. So, if you want to have sixteen lessons, you need to set...more than sixteen appointments (my brain is too tired to do the math).
This past week, I would say about 30 something percent of our appointments went through. For many of those that didn't go through, we'd show up; the investigator would answer the door looking and sounding like they have some unholy sickness; we'd set a new appointment, and then we'd leave. And then I GOT SICK. I don't know what is going on here in Lelystad, but I'm a little afraid for the near future. Forget Robert Downey, Jr. -- I need to get my Will Smith on, because pretty soon Lelystad will be quarantined to stop the zombie virus. Okay, not really, but everyone is sick. (For those who were worrying, I've mostly recovered now. Don't worry.)
We were walking somewhere last week (after we'd just talked to a sick investigator...), and we came across this older man. Actually, he came across us. He was on a bike and was a little tipsy -- such a case of "drinking and driving" can be seen so frequently only in the Netherlands. He asked who we were, what we were doing. We told him. After a little bit, he was okay with us. He started talking to us about God, and how it's hard to talk to people about God, because we can't even comprehend how great God is! He said, "we don't even know! He's so, just...it's like that one song -- you know how it goes." Then he started to sing in English: "He's got the whole world in His hands, He's got the whole world in His hands." I look at Elder Goates, and then I realized that we were both singing along with this guy. And that is the story of how we sang "He's Got the Whole World in His Hands" with a drunk man on the side of the street.
There was a baptism on Saturday! It was a girl in the Lelystad Branch who had just turned eight years old. We were invited to attend the baptism. We showed up a little early, only to see that the baptismal font (which had been filled up just a little beforehand) was, well, pretty hot. Like, 65 degrees Celsius (that's about 150 degrees Fahrenheit, I think). We could have thrown some potatoes in there and had a huge meal instead of a baptism. Fortunately, they realized how hot it was, and they had brought the firehose inside to spray at the baptismal font water to cool it down. The baptism was a success, and nobody was boiled alive. Amen, hallelujah!
We had the opportunity to watch some of General Conference on Friday and Saturday! It was really good. We got to watch the Saturday morning and afternoon sessions in addition to the Sunday morning session. One talk I really liked was Pres. Uchtdorf's talk on gratitude, about how gratitude should just be a way of life. We have a lot of blessings in this life, but sometimes we're so focused on the blessings we DON'T have that we forget about the blessings we DO have. That's a fault I've made in my life. He encouraged us to, instead of waiting for the rainbow, be grateful for the rain. That's something I am definitely going to try to do -- to be a little more grateful for the things I have.
I've taken up enough of your time already. But hey -- don't wait for the rainbows. Be grateful for the rain. God sends it for a reason. He's got the whole world in His hands, you know.
Until next time. Stay healthy.
--Elder Bonney
PS -- I was going to send a picture, but this computer has no USB slot. Jammer voor ons allemaal. Volgende keer wel.
