I Love Serving Others--Service fills hearts with joy!

Letter #39
May 26, 2014
Area: Humble, TX
Companion: Anderson

This week was quite different than the past few weeks that I have had with Elder Anderson, we had many chances to serve the ward. We are very grateful that the ward members are able to trust us in serving them.  They really showed it through calling upon us and asking if we could help. We did about 12 hours of service with ward members, especially part-member families and recent converts. I love serving others, and especially seeing what that service does for them. One of the sisters from the ward was coming out to a lesson with us on Wednesday, after  we cleaned up their yard on Tuesday, and she had great news for us. Her non-member husband, who has a very busy and stressful work schedule, got home from work Tuesday evening and was filled with joy. She thought something happened at work that day, but it was because of the yard, and she was able to tell him that we helped her do it. We had offered multiple times to help because he is so busy and doesn't get the chance to work on the yard much, but then we took the extra step and went to his wife to figure out a day to do it, it had a huge effect on him.

We had really fun experiences to get loose a little this week. We got to go to mutual and we participated in celebrating our bishop's 50th birthday party! The mutual activity was a BBQ and sports/games night at the park, so we invited 2 less-active families that have youth age kids to come! We got there a little late because the second family was taking a while getting ready, but one even brought a friend, so it was really fun and I got to play volleyball, soccer, and ultimate frisbee again. :) And the birthday party was a surprise party--he thought he was going to talk at a young womens' fireside thing on Saturday, but he got there and we were all in the gym--we all had a lot of fun. We had food, a huge "timeline" thing of our bishop's life, and then a DJ, and at the end, a mariachi band. It was really fun!

This week we didn't have many lessons according to the numbers, but we feel that every lesson counted and it helped the people grow closer to Christ and the church, especially because we took the effort to get members out to every set lesson.  Also we took the time and care to think of which members would be of benefit to help the investigator and to fellowship them. We were excited to bring a new person to church again for the second week in a row.  A few more people would have come, but things came up and they couldn't make it. We see miracles happen every day, and we really feel like numbers don't have the capacity to represent everything that happens and how the people are growing. Especially this week, we feel like we came to understand that numbers don't matter, people do!

By the way, I got the package and I am really enjoying the new bag, I already like it more than the first. And, we are about to start using the GPS, thanks again :)

We are also getting a new companion, we are getting Elder Strong back in the mission. He came out with me, but had to go home because he had a really bad bike accident that caused damage to his ankle and the ligaments in his knee. He has recovered, so he is coming out and joining our companionship this Thursday.

I love you guys,

Elder Stanley Scott Dye