Stop Smoking...take 2‏

Hi Family,

The computer just randomly restarted as I was finishing my e-mail, so here's trial #2.This past week was great! We didn't get to spend a whole lot of time in our area, but the time we did spend was very successful.We went on two exchanges; one in Stillwater and one in Enid and both are pretty fun places to go work. In Stillwater I spent the day with Elder Evans and spent a lot of time biking place to place without accomplishing much. Appointments cancelled and people were gone. I don't think it helps too much that it was spring break, but it was still fun to be there. We did manage to see one investigator, but it was our very last stop of the day. After all you can do God will give you a blessing.The other exchange was with Elder Whitaker in Enid. Enid is a very different place compared to the rest of Oklahoma. Just being in Enid has a very different feeling, but its a good place. People reject our message just as often as anywhere else, but people will still sit and talk. One person wouldn't stop talking and we had to go somewhere else because it wasn't going anywhere, but the conversation just went on and on and on. Elder Whitaker is a good missionary. Right now he's with the former Assistant, Elder Carlson, who is training him to be a leader in the mission. It was a good exchange.In Guthrie we just started the stop smoking workshop with Jim. He's a great investigator and wants to do what it takes to get baptized. He has a really strong desire to do what it takes and this workshop that we reviewed with him guarentees you to be smoke free in seven days. Basically you swap out the bad things, smoking, drinking alcohol, coffee, and tea and replace them with good healthy habbits that turn off the nicotine bell that tells your body its time for another cigarette. He was really excited to begin, so we should continue to see him progress to his baptism next month. He's really been loving church! Last Sunday he started walking up to people and introducing himself to people and telling them that he is learning about the church and just started coming. The ward has been very welcoming to him too. We also taught a black guy. Amazingly, all my time in Oklahoma, I haven't taught many black people and I've only seen one come to church and he was visiting from Florida.Brian is the guy we taught and he was pretty excited to hear what we had to share. He said other missionaries have talked to him before, but none had presented it the way we did and it struck his interest. He's a teacher for a Baptist church and wanted to share the Book of Mormon with his class...that's cool! He's also pretty excited to hear the prophet speak in a couple weeks. Things are really good. There is a lot to do and sometimes its hard to accomplish everything, but hard work and letting the Lord stretch you brings a lot of happiness.Love you all! -Elder Osness