Year Mark!!!

Hey Y'all,

This week has been full of so many things. New investigators, powerful lessons, zone leader council, my year mark and a massive amount of rain, lightning and thunder.
The weather here has gone crazy. Just like last summer, it rains everyday at about two or three. Well Saturday was different. There was six different storms all filled with lightning and thunder. The first was at 11:30 while we were playing basketball. The second was at 12:30 while we were helping Brother Ohlen move some stuff into a storage bin. A third one at lunch. The next while we were teaching Sis Simmons. The fifth while we were at Wesley's apartment. The final one came at about 8:00. It was by far the biggest one of them all. For 20 minutes strait it rained and thundered and rained and we saw some lightning with more rain. The parking lot at our apartment was completely filled with water. The trees were shaking and getting thrashed around (nothing like a hurricane though). The sky was filled with a show of lightning bolts. It was the first big one of the year. Florida is crazy. Usually it rains at about 2:30 every day. Well its been so hot lately that the storms start before noon. We have had a storm with lightning and thunder everyday for the past 2 weeks! I'm really glad that I'm not on a bicycle like the campus missionaries.
My year mark was this last week!! I am officially over the hump and on the down slide. Every week seems to be going by faster and faster. Zone Leader Council fell on the same day as my Year Mark. I got to celebrate with some of the coolest missionaries in the mission and President and Sister Summerhays. There were 3 other Zone Leaders who hit there year mark with me. They were just called to be Zone Leader last transfer. It is so crazy to think that a year ago I was in the MTC freaking out like Matt probably is. Hopefully he won't get sick. I took one of my MTC shirts, decorated it and started to have all the missionaries sign it. Its easy to get it signed when you see 20+ missionaries twice a week. Thanks to the 8 on campus and the 8 in our ward.
President Summerhays is going home soon. This will be our last Zone Conference with him. President Jensen arrives on the 29th of June, President Summerhays leaves on the 30th of June. There is going to be a lot of changes with a new mission president. There always is. We're preparing for him as a mission, taking down all the 'remember this' banners so President Jensen can use his own judgement and revelation to run the mission. President Summerhays is so smart. Think of if the President of the United States would prepare for the new guy coming in. Transitions would be so much smoother. I'm excited to meet and get to know President Jensen. To take everything I have learned from President Summerhays and lay it as the foundation for President Jensen to build on top of. Its going to be awesome, but scary at the same time.
This week Elder Tew and I met a really cool family. Scott and Stephanie. They are siblings from Perry, FL and are living in Tallahassee because their parents were no good. They moved out and are living together helping each other out. They are looking for a church when they met the Spanish Elders. They got referred over to us and we went by on Monday. It was a good lesson. Neither of them know a lot about religion in general. Stephanie is pregnant, but not married. She feels terrible about the sin and feels like she needs to find something to hold on to. Church is all she could come up with, so Scott and her are looking. We shared with them the Book of Mormon and invited them to read just a little bit. They agreed and we set up a time to come back on Thursday. We came right after Zone Leader Council, perfect because of the spiritual high we were on. We began asking questions about the chapter we gave them to read. They didn't read much, but they had a lot of questions. So many questions that we couldn't keep up and answer them as fast as they were coming out. We slowed it down and shared another scripture with them. Showing that if they had a sincere heart, they could know of all things. Maybe not lottery numbers, but they could know who God is and what they should do. This led to prayer. Stephanie felt that she needed to pray. That if she wanted to know, she should ask God. Perfect, right!
Stephanie asked us how we pray. We taught her about addressing Heavenly Father, expressing the feelings of her heart, and closing in the name of Jesus Christ. Sounds simple right? She couldn't do it. Stephanie knew that she needed to pray, she knew that if she prayed she would receive an answer, she knew that God would listen to her prayer, yet, she could not bring herself to do it. Elder Tew prayed first out loud, asking that God would give her the strength to pray. We waited patiently as Stephanie built up the courage. Going back and forth, deciding to pray, then backing out. "I can't do this," was all she could say. We waited patiently some more, giving her bits of encouragement, pleading with her to pray, explaining that God hears all prayers and loves the humble heart. Stephanie finally prayed. It took her three times until she felt comfortable with what she said, but it was simple and beautiful. Kind of like the King of the Lamanites who prayed after Aaron taught him. Simple, humble, sincere, with real intent and a desire to know. It felt so good to listen to her pray. She felt a lot better after. Trusting God isn't always easy, even when it seems like a simple thing to do. This I learned from Stephanie.
I love you all and can't believe I only have a year left. Time flies when you're having fun.
Love Elder Call