Zip Nada

What happened this week? Nothing. Zip. Nada. Zilch. Zero. Nothing. Zymurgy.

In reality, I know plenty of things happened. I just can't think of any of them right now. I knocked on a lot of doors. Just like every week.

Just to give you a little bit of insight on the Washington Tacoma mission, we knock doors a lot. It's our staple, our trademark, our backup and our first choice. It's rather interesting. We knock doors every day from 5-7 pm. Obviously, my favorite thing to do is teach people, but we are encouraged to do a lot of knocking in order to find people to teach. Lately, we have been asked to try and incorporate a little bit more member work in our work. We have been trying to do that in our area, but there are a lot of missionaries out here who are rebelling against member work.

"Let's go knock!" They say. "This is the Wa-Tac! In the Wa-Tac we knock! We don't want to figure out how to do member work!"

I find it rather funny. Most missionaries try to have a good balance of knocking and member work, but every once in a while you just find someone who wants to knock all day and ignore everything else. I hope that was good enough for you.

Another tidbit this week: The weather is changing. We are passing the season of unrelenting rain and cold and are in the incipient stages of the bipolar weather season. It goes something like this: You are hot because the sun is beating down on you. You take off your coat. Suddenly, a cloud maliciously swoops over the sun and the winds pick up. Rain starts pounding you. You fumble with the coat around your waist, your stiff, frozen fingers trying to undo the knot you tied it in. Finally, you pull the coat over your sodden figure, relieved that you have some sort of protection now. A few seconds later, the rain and winds cease, the meddling clouds give you a sly smile and disperse just as quickly as they came. The temperature increases 40 degrees. You start thinking "Gee, it's getting a little sweaty. Holy casserole, it's hot! I'm just going to leave my coat on  because I know it will start raining again soon.

30 minutes later you are dripping sweat, and you finally decide to take your coat off because it is way too hot and you are convinced that this time it will stay warm. You take your coat off and tie it around your waist, when suddenly, a large cumulo nimbus cloud blocks off all sunlight. Rain and sleet start pounding your face as temperatures drop below freezing and........ blah blah blah.

I actually like the weather this way, though. It keeps you on your toes, and makes things interesting. It's better than having it constantly rain, anyway.
We are teaching a man named Scott, and every lesson he just absorbs the truth we teach. He is so much fun to teach, because as we talk with him, he gradually realizes that he believes the same things as us. It is amazing.

This week I am working on being a better teacher. They key to that is being humble and following the Spirit. I am learning so much. I am grateful for Preach My Gospel, and I am grateful for the restored Gospel that we have on the earth. I am especially grateful for the sacrifice of Jesus Christ. I invite you all to study a Christ-like attribute this week and set goals to improve yourself in that regard. I know that God can help you to change for the better, and it will be a joyous occasion in your life. Make the choice now. Trust me, you'll be grateful later.

With love and warm figurative hugs,
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Elder Benge

Double Revenge

​One of my companions, Elder Conner "Scott" "Double Revenge" "Magellan" "Bood-hey" Budge

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Elder Benge

Martin's Pictrure

​Me holding a picture of me, drawn by Elder Martin, one of the Elders in the zone. (Those pictures in the background of the picture are of Elder Pisciotta and Elder Payne)

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Elder Benge

Zero To Hero Part

For some reason not all of my emails get posted on the blog when I send them. Sorry for any repeats. Things are just confusing sometimes.

Sometimes if I just write a lot of random things at the top, then it works better when I send pictures. Here are some random words I know in sign language:

Abandon, accomplish, abolish, act, actor, abbreviate, above, around, also

Part 2:

​One of my companions, Elder Conner "Scott" "Double Revenge" "Magellan" "Bood-hey" Budge

Click here to Reply or Forward

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Elder Benge

Zero To Hero

I really don't have much time this week, but suffice to say: 'Twas a wonderful week. We started out the week with zero people on date to be baptized, and now we have four people on date for baptism. We are way excited about it. We had another fireside this week in Olympia (it just so happens there were firesides two weeks in a row in different stakes), and I played the piano at that one, too. 

I really love the mission out here. I don't really have anything else to report on. We went on exchanges with the Assistants to the President again. It blew our miles out of the water, but it was really fun and I learned a lot. I was with Elder Turley all day, and he was amazing at teaching people right as we met them.

Our miracle for the week happened when we had no appointments set up, so we decided to go and knock doors in an apartment complex. As we started walking up the stairs to one building, I noticed a man sitting on his porch, and I talked to him and invited him to hear our message. He gladly accepted and let us in, and we taught him for a while and put him on date for baptism. By the time we finished, we had to go to our next appointment and hadn't even ended up knocking on a single door. It just goes to show that God prepares people to be in our paths. Our appointments may have fallen through, but as we went out to work, God had set up an appointment for us. Anyway, have a great week, my friends.

​Toilet Paper? Why do I even have this picture on my camera? I don't remember taking it...

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Elder Benge

I really don't have much time this week, but suffice to say: 'Twas a wonderful week. We started out the week with zero people on date to be baptized, and now we have four people on date for baptism. We are way excited about it. We had another fireside this week in Olympia (it just so happens there were firesides two weeks in a row in different stakes), and I played the piano at that one, too. 

I really love the mission out here. I don't really have anything else to report on. We went on exchanges with the Assistants to the President again. It blew our miles out of the water, but it was really fun and I learned a lot. I was with Elder Turley all day, and he was amazing at teaching people right as we met them.

Our miracle for the week happened when we had no appointments set up, so we decided to go and knock doors in an apartment complex. As we started walking up the stairs to one building, I noticed a man sitting on his porch, and I talked to him and invited him to hear our message. He gladly accepted and let us in, and we taught him for a while and put him on date for baptism. By the time we finished, we had to go to our next appointment and hadn't even ended up knocking on a single door. It just goes to show that God prepares people to be in our paths. Our appointments may have fallen through, but as we went out to work, God had set up an appointment for us. Anyway, have a great week, my friends.

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Elder Benge

The Ivories Have Been Sufficiently Tickled

Sometimes, I feel old. Not old in the way that more than half of the Centralia ward is, but old in a missionary sort of sense. I feel as if I have entered into some sort of dimensional bubble that is its own pocket of time away from the rest of the world. Here I am, in Washington. I love it. I feel I am changing. Time seems to gently coast by at a semi-rapid pace out on the mission, while it seems time at home is passing in a blur. It is like being on a mystical train. I will call it the WaTac Express. Here I am, walking around a beautiful passenger car. I am eating yummy food, and sipping hot cocoa. The atmosphere is warmly lighted, and life continues on at a normal pace. Then I look out the window into the dark night and everything is rushing past in a blur. I seem to be in my own little bubble. That is how I feel. So many things are happening at home. My brother is home. We have a dog. My sister is now 4. Out here, however, I just get to do the same, wonderful work every day. It is easy to focus on my purpose. My purpose is clear. It can be summed up in a single, easy sentence: My purpose is to invite others to come unto Christ by helping them receive the restored Gospel through faith in Jesus Christ and his Atonement, repentance, baptism, receiving the Gift of the Holy Ghost, and enduring to the end.

Not much happened this week. The coolest part was when we had a missionary musical fireside for our stake. I was asked to play the piano for it and I was way nervous, especially for one of the songs. I practiced the best I could with a missionary schedule for the week leading up to it, but when the time came, I was still nervous. As we started the practice two hours before the fireside began, I made some pretty egregious and obvious errors on the easiest parts of the song that I hadn't ever had trouble with before. Things weren't looking good. Well, I did my best, and I prayed that God would help things work out. And guess what? He took care of it. I did my best and worked my hardest, and I still wasn't good enough without his grace, but he enabled me with his power, and the fireside was wonderful and spiritual and one of the best I've been to. So anyway, that's all I have to mention today. (Although please keep praying for Rose, because she is struggling)

P.S. I am learning Sign Language. I really enjoy it. It is a lot of fun. 

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Elder Benge

Fwd: Like

Me playing the piano after one of the firesides sitting next to Elder Jocelyn, one of my companions. The one in the back making the crazy face and pointing is Elder Drubay. I haven't been companions with him, but he is really cool anyway.

It Was The Best Of Times, It Was The Worst Of Times

Hello, everybody! This week definitely had some wonderful things in it! It also snowed last night and we were tromping around in slush all night trying to find people to teach, like Lewis and Clark playing freeze tag with Sacajawea in a swamp.

Cameron was baptized this week, so we are all very excited. When we asked him who he wanted to baptize him, he started doing something similar to "Eenie Meenie Minie Moe", only he said "Boy Scout, You're Out!" and gradually eliminated candidates until he was only left with one. That is how I ended up baptizing Cameron. He is a very quiet and sober child. He listens very well, but he doesn't speak up much. This makes it very easy to teach him, but it's also weird because he almost never asks questions or comments on anything.

We have also become good friends with a crazy homeless lady named Janie. She is funny and always drunk and roaming the streets. She is hilarious. 

The only sad part of the week is that we are all sick. Elder Budge got sick first and now all 4 of us are very sick (except Elder Budge is basically better now). It's okay, though, because we aren't crippled and we still go out and work every day. The work is doing wonderfully here, and a few sniffles and aches aren't going to stop that.

I love the ward here. They are awesome. I have come rather close to quite a few members here.

Our recent convert, Rose, is still very faithful, but her family has been very anti and she is having a lot of health issues, so please pray for her.

I know that this work is true. I know that God loves each one of us. I know that the power of the priesthood is real. I feel it each time I give or participate in a blessing. The priesthood has been restored, dear friends. God speaks to man on earth. So, shall we not go on in so great a cause? Farewell.

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Elder Benge