South Carolina

Hey Everyone,

So these first few days in Walkersville have been jam packed, so I'll give you some of the highlights.

When I got there, we decided that we needed to share the car with the Frederick 1st Elders, instead of their previous arrangements with the Sisters in their ward, which only allowed them to swap the car every other week, as opposed to every other day which we can do since we live so close. Which means I get to ride bikes. I could've ridden them in Savage Mill, but I opted to walk most of the time, but here I don't have that option. That made Friday interesting, because we had a meeting in the morning, and it was our first day on bikes, so naturally, it was pouring rain. But we zipped up our coats and hit the road. About a half an hour later, we got off our bikes, soaking wet and cold, we walked over and knocked on our appointment's door. He wasn't there, so we started walking to our next plan in the area. We started talking to another guy and found out that he was our appointment. He said he couldn't talk very much, so 50 minutes later, we walked away from each other, him doing most of the talking. It was a great conversation on how important it is to learn as much about our Savior as possible. By that point, there felt like there was more water in my shoes than should be possible, and my pants were clinging to my legs. But we persevered and kept working. During dinner, I threw my socks and pants in the dryer for a few minutes to try and dry them out, and we set back out for the evening, thankfully by then it had stopped raining. 

 Thursday, we had a lesson with a semi new member to the church. It was a very rousing discussion, he had lots of questions, we were trying to field them as well as we could. He brought up concerns with the Word of Wisdom, with certain people in the church, then he asked a question that I honestly loved. In essence, he asked why our modern day prophets don't prophesy like the prophets of old do. By this point, we had figured out that the best way to help him understand was to use the scriptures, which could be difficult for modern day prophesies. But as soon as the question left his lips, two distinct words popped into my head, South Carolina. For the first half second, it didn't make sense, then I remembered that Joseph Smith had prophesied the beginning of the Civil War, and even it's starting place of South Carolina, 30 years before the event. And it just so happens to be in the Doctrine and Covenants (Section 87 if you're interested). After I showed him that, the Spirit washed over the room and he just sat there, then nodded and said, "Ok." He told us a few minutes later that he has asked that to every companionship he's met with since he's joined the church, and we were the first ones to show him that scripture. 

We have a bunch of people we are teaching here, so as things happen with them, I will try and keep you updated. We ended up spending a bunch of time this morning cleaning up our "backyard", we live in a townhouse with a backyard about the size of my yard in Virginia, but no grass, just cement and at least a years worth of weeds. So the Frederick 1st Elders came over and we borrowed some tools from our Bishop, and we cleared that yard. So now we can actually open the gate to park our bikes back there. 

As with all of my areas, this will be a learning experience, but I'm looking forward to it.

Love you all, 

Elder Howell

Here's my new address. 

7992 Windsail Ct, Frederick, MD 21701