Christmas Eve

Well, not a whole lot happened this week.  Our shower broke so we had to go to a members home for a couple of days until that got fixed but now our pink shower is up and running again!  But besides that we wen't to Don's house last night for a Christmas party.  Don is some one we are teaching right now.  He is a super nice older guy and he had a bunch of people at his house so we had a bunch of people to talk to and we didn't have to go out in the cold!  We were super surprised though when he started bringing out gifts for every one.  He even got us something.  I got a giant container of popcorn and E. wise got a bunch of pretzels.  We also got 2 dinner appointments out of the deal, with non Members!

We did some service this week.  We helped a friend of ours named Jim get all of his wood down into his basement so he could heat his house.  Jim is the funniest guy you will ever meet and he is an expert in redneck science.  To move one of his trailers he put a hole in his bobcats lifting forks about an inch wide then drilled a hole in the trailers receiving hitch then put a 3/4 inch bolt with washers and nuts through both of those and called it good.  Look at the pictures for a more detailed description but it was pretty creative.  I just wanna know how he drilled the holes in every thing because they were giant for one and they were through supper thick metal but when there is a will their is a way!

One more thing on service.  I have really grown a testimony of service out here.  there are times when I have felt like people have been taking advantage of our kindness but 99% of the time it has gotten us in doors being able to teach people.  Service can soften the hardest of hearts!

And last fun story, we were up North in rose city and we had 10 minutes until a member was going to come and pick us up and I saw a trading post so we went in and looked around.  They had furs from every animal you could think of, knives, air rifles, fishing lures, and anything else you could think of.  But behind the counter there was a raccoon skin coat and E. Wise asked if he could put it on.  My jaw Dropped because the price tag on that coat was 950 bones!  After we gave the store clerks some light the world cards and headed back to the car I asked E. Wise, "did you see the price tag on that coat?"  He said no so I told him it was 950 bucks and he said I'm sure glad I didn't rip that thing! 

One Week Before Christmas!

It was a solid week.  Last p-day after we got home from proselyting I was bored so I grabbed my screwdriver set and took apart my electric blanket controller to see what was inside.  E. Wise wanted to know if it still worked all taken apart so I plugged it in and turned it on.  I don't know what I touched on the circuit board but owww did it shock me and let me know it was there.  After that I unplugged it and put it back together but I'm proud to say that it still works!

We had a multi-Zone conference this week.  We had 4 different zones there.  It was really cool to see just how big the Michigan Lansing Mission really is.  There were 94 missionaries there and that was only about half of them but we learned a lot.  I loved what our mission president said about traditions.  They will either save you or they will damn you.  He went on to talk about the traditions of praying every night personally and even someday with our family.  Basically what he was saying is make traditions that will make it easier to live the gospel!

We picked up a new investigator this week down in Standish.  We have been running out of things to do here in West Branch so we have been making the half hour drive to Standish to do some stop byes and door knocking.  We knocked into some really cool new people that haven't been door knocked before so we're hoping to pick up a couple of new people to teach this week!

Hot Chocolate at the Light Parade

On Saturday we had a last minute idea to set up a table and give out hot Chocolate at the light parade here in West Branch.   I thought an hour or two would be good to prepare, but nope we spent all day getting ready.   It is amazing how hard it is to find supplies as missionary's, but we managed to find a table, a cooler, cups, and coco mix.  To make the hot coco we boiled about 3 gallons of water then mixed that with 1 gallon of warm water.  We thought one giant container of mix would do it.  Nope we ended up having to go to Walmart and buy some more.  It ended up taking 2 and a half containers before we had enough!  We headed over at 6:15 to setup every thing and we ended up being out there until 8:30.  It was freezing.  It was 19 degrees out that night and I wore exactly what I usually wear out door knocking, but when you're just standing there you get way colder.  By the end of the night we had frost on the table and the spilled hot coco was frozen.  All that being said, we got to talk to a lot of people and they came to us!

Last p-day we weren't really sure what we wanted to do so we headed back to the apartment and I found some ping pong balls.  We were looking for ping pong paddles but we couldn't find any.  We were about to go to Walmart then E. Wise got an amazing idea, just use some small frying pans.  So we played a couple of rounds of sting ping using frying pans.  I can only imaging what the neighbors were thinking when they saw us running around the apartment with a frying pan in our hands and ping pong balls flying every where!

It's Christmas Time

This Sunday we had an activity where we invited everyone we could think of to watch the First Presidency Christmas devotional at the church and enjoy hot cocoa and cookies!  I was in charge of setting up the stream!  So we showed up an hour early to get the water hot and set up the t.v.   We ended up only getting 2 or 3 families there but we got a nonmember who came with a member friend.  Goldmine!!  We talked to him before the devotional and he said he had a lot of questions about our church and he said he didn't understand why there were so many churches.  He said he thought there should just be one true church.  Me and Elder Wise were smiling from ear to ear saying ya, we know one! 

After that, we watched the devotional and I set up the video so that is was coming through our Roku box so we could get HD video and it worked great up until halfway through president Nelson’s talk when the internet went down.  So with my heart pounding, I switched over to the crummy satellite audio/visual but because of that everyone in the branch thinks I'm a miracle worker when it comes to technology.  So that makes things interesting.  But the nonmember said that it [devotional] answered a lot of his questions and he wanted to meet with us.  So me and Elder wise were pretty stoked about that!

On Friday we went to the Atchison’s home for dinner.  After doing some stop byes we went to their house and oh my gosh they had a dog that was just like my dog Sadie from home.  Personality was the same,  same size, and clean.  The only difference was the color of her fur.  I made sure to get some doggy hugs and kisses in before we left.  Sister Atchison also made the best dinner I've had since being out.  She asked on Sunday what food I missed from home and I said, Mexican, and she went all out and it was all homemade it was amazing!

I don't know how to explain this but here in Michigan it will be pitch black out at 8 and the clouds will be glowing in 360 degrees and keep in mind the closest big city is Saginaw 50 miles away I couldn't get a picture of it but just believe me!

Thanksgiving

For Thanksgiving, we went to 3 different dinner appointments with only an hour and a half in between so I made sure to be real careful not to eat too much at each place.  We started at a family called the Wither's and enjoyed some really good smoked turkey and a million sides.  Then we headed over to the Butler's and had some more turkey and gravy and we finished off at the Steelman's and long story short we were stuffed beyond the mind's imagination by the end of the night we didn't need a late night snack that night!

Besides that not a whole lot happened this week we got some snow did stop-bys and that was about it!

Light the World poster we made

Crazy snow plow

Thanksgiving Dinner

I Have an Accent?!?

On Thursday we went down to a small little town to meet with a recent convert that had moved into our area from Bay City.  A little fact about Michigan, there are a ton of dirt roads that don't get plowed in the winter time and Bob happened to live on one of those roads and it had snowed that morning.  So it took us forever to find his road because it just looked like the rest of the ground.  But fortunately, there were only 2 or 3 inches of snow on the ground so our Chevy Malibu made it just fine.  But onto Bob, the sister missionaries in Bay City called us and gave us Bob's information and told us to plan for an hour and a half because he wanted to tell us his story.  So we took their advice and it was a good thing because, no exaggeration, he talked for 2 and 1/2 hours and I think me and Elder Wise said a total of 15 words between the 2 of us.  But it was okay because he had some really cool stories to tell us about his life and everything from A-Z.

On Wednesday we went to teach Judie who was referred to us by a member she was visiting.  Judie is from Colorado and it was really cool talking to her because she was from Colorado and I could relate to her really well.  She was talking about the San Luis Valley and I'm like ya I've been there too!  But we had a lesson on the Plan of Salvation and it was really interesting watching Judie starting before the lesson and then after the lesson because before the lesson she wasn't very enthusiastic but after the lesson, we all felt the spirit and she was all bouncy and enthusiastic.  The only bummer is that is the only lesson we will get to have with her for a while because she is going back to Colorado this week.  The missionaries will have to pick up where we left off! 


Accents - I never thought I had an accent really but when we were at St Vinnies (thrift store) doing service on Saturday the owner said to me and Elder Wise that she could hear our Western accent and she said that she could hear it a lot more with me.  And to add to that, during our lesson with Judie I could hear her western accent and I'm thinking to myself I'm sure glad I don't sound like that.  Then I realized wait a minute, I do have that accent and everyone here in Michigan is thinking that about me.   Awwwwwwww!

Door knocking in 19 degrees that felt like 9

seeing sunshine cause the sun hardly shines in Michigan in the winter!

Sugar cookie mess

cooking some steaks some members gave us

A Trip to the Emergency Room!!

I thought I knew what cold was before I came on my mission.  I had no idea what cold really was til I came out here.  We got 3 inches of snow on Sunday and it stayed and it got cold here in Michigan the high this week is 35 and the low is 16 degrees and with humidity and wind it can make 35 feel like 10 degrees.  But on Sunday when it snowed that was my first time driving on my mission so I was driving in the snow in an unfamiliar place and in a unfamiliar car that tries to get control back for you which I quickly turned of because I could do better than the car could at keeping control in the snow.  We drove out on some country roads for a dinner appointment and they hadn't bean plowed very well and oh they were slick!  We didn't get above 25 miles an hour the whole time and we had to drive like 7 miles.  It took a while and at one point we were going up a big long hill and I accidentally pushed the gas pedal down too far and the turbo kicked in which spun the wheels which caused a little fish tailing.  But we got back going straight again and we made it safely to our dinner appointment.  On our way home we were headed downhill and a deer jumped out on the road from nowhere.  I thought we were going to hit that dear with the anti lock brakes going the whole way but fortunately the deer quickly got out of the way and we made it safely home!

We had an awesome week on Saturday.  We went to Chris' church service.  It was a small non-denominational service.  There were only 7 of us and I walked into there expecting to feel the spirit during the service but it just wasn't there.  I felt like I was sitting in a history class hearing about the bible and you could tell that no one else was either because everyone else just had a glazed stare.  But at one point the pastor's wife asked us some questions and it was really cool because the moment we started talking and asking questions everyone started to look like they wanted to be there and I started to feel the spirit.  We even got asked a few more questions from different people but the best part about this whole thing was that Chris agreed to go to church with us!  We were really worried that no one was going to talk to him because he is a little tough and gruff looking but it was the exact opposite of that.  Everyone loved him to death.  We almost had too much fellowship.  Chris asked a lot of questions and most amazingly of all he stayed for the full 3 hours his first time at church.  LETS GO!  He agreed to meet with us again!

Last P-day it was like 5 minutes until 8 and I picked up my Bluetooth speaker because we were about to have a Skype lesson with a member that is struggling.  I walked over to Elder Wise's desks and on my way I threw my Bluetooth speaker in the air and it just tapped the glass light cover and apparently it wasn't screwed on tight enough.  It fell down.  The first miracle of the night was when the light cover fell.  I remember I watched my Bluetooth speaker hit the light cover but when it hit my head and shattered I was looking down.  I don't remember looking down but it hit my head, shattered, and it cut just me above my right eye and my pinky finger and a few other minor scrapes.  So I ran into the bathroom and saw the cut and remembered what mom always said about head wounds look[ing] worse than they really are because of how much they bleed.  And of course that was very true, but I got the bleeding stopped and I got brave enough to take the gauze off and look at it and knew I was going to need stitches.  So we called up sister Brennan and she said to go to the ER.  Okay second miracle of the Night Elder Wise didn't freak out at all which was really nice.  He helped me get something on my finger and to the ER.  We showed up at the ER, gave them my information, and what not and I thought we were going to be there forever.  But after five minutes I got called back they took my heart rate asked some questions then took me back to a room were the doctor came and stitched me up.  I got 3 stitches just above my right eye and that was it!  Okay second miracle of the night we got in and out of the ER in an hour.  Sister Brennan said it usually takes missionaries 5 hours to get in and out of the ER.  Everything healed up nicely.  I got the stitches out on Sunday.  My pinky finger is almost done healing.  My cut right above my head still has some healing to do but it looks really good and is not infected.  We went to the ER to get my stitches out they did it for free and we got in and out in a half hour.  I could not believe it.  I definitely had some guardian angels this week!


-Sean

Pouring Rain and Les Paul Guitar

On Wednesday we drove down to a lake about 20 minutes South of where we live for a lesson.  We showed up about a half hour early to go knock some doors and the first door we knocked on we talked to a lady for about 10 minutes.  It started to sprinkle a little bit and at our second door it started raining buckets.  I haven't seen that much rain in my life we ended up just waiting it out in the car because none of us brought any rain gear.  When we got to the address of our lesson the lady ended up not being there which was frustrating.  But keep in mind it's still raining buckets and being the Junior companion who doesn't have any driving privileges yet I had to back my companion up in the pouring rain.  He had fun with it.  He started driving slowly down road with me pounding on the window.  He thought he was funny and I thought it was funny too once I was in the car and warmed up

We taught a really cool guy this week.  We met him out doing service.  His name is Chris.  I think I've mentioned him before but we had a killer lesson with him on the Restoration of the Gospel of Jesus Christ.  He also had a ton of questions for us which is always really nice he had a really cool cabin.  He was completely off the grid and got his water from an artesian well and had a generator for electricity,  massive propane tank out back, and a wood fireplace for heat.  I also noticed he had a massive Marshall guitar amp in the corner and I started to ask him a little bit about it and he pulled out his Les Paul Gibson which was beautiful.  Then we finally talked him into playing for us and man between the Marshall amp,  his Les Paul, and an amazing musician he was ripping of Van Halen, AC/DC, Led Zeppelin just from memory and it sounded amazing.  He later showed us his music room where he and his buddies get together and jam.  He had a 3000-watt P.A. system.  I think he has a tone of potential

On Friday night we were walking up and down main street looking for people to talk to and we ran into this couple.  Usually, we’re the weird ones who start the conversation but all of a sudden they said hi and said thank you so much for what you do here in West Branch and asked if he could buy us a pizza and then he handed us his card.  Come to find out he was the mayor in West Branch.  Anyway, it was really cool.

Great Lakes

Nothing too exciting this week but we did a ton of finding.  We went door knocking, we tried helping people with their groceries at walmart, and we even tried walking up and down the mall trying to find people.  When we were out door knocking on Wednesday we ran into a very interesting guy.  We were talking to him and he believed in a God and he accepted a Book of Mormon and accepted for us to come back, but what we didn't know when we agreed to meet with him was that he is a flat-earther.  I am not even joking or exaggerating this-this isn't another one of Sean's stories.  This guy literally believed the earth was flat, that jet trails were metal particles the government was using for mind control, when 5G cell service comes out the government will be able to control all of us and what we do, and the West drying up isn't natural, it's the government causing it. I could not believe this guy after we were done talking to him and walking to the next house I was picking apart everything that he said about technology, Elder Wise was picking apart everything he said about medical things.  Anyway it was quite the experience

We did a bunch of services this week cutting wood for a potential.  He had invited 2 other guys to come out and help.  Chris was one of those 2 guys he is rock solid and is so cool.  He has a solid belief in God and Jesus Christ already he asked when and were our church meats and said he would come if he wasn't busy.  We didn't even have to invite him.  We also gave him a Book of Mormon, the restoration pamphlet, and the plan of salvation pamphlet.  We messaged him over Facebook asking if we could come over and teach him some more and he agreed and said he had some questions from the restoration pamphlet.  We didn't even ask him to read anything yet that never happens so we're praying for him that he will choose to be baptized!

We taught Bill a recent convert on Friday.  Bill is a really cool guy.  He loves camping and the outdoors he is really fun to talk to.  He has a really cute dog named Joe.  I've always been a dog lover.  It usually doesn't get me in trouble, but this time it got me in trouble.  Halfway through our lesson about the Holy Ghost his little dog Joe comes over to me.  I reached down and gave him a pet.  I guess to him that was an invitation to come and jump up on my lap.  At first, I was like whatever then I realized how greasy this dog was.  I don't think this dog had ever had a bath in its life!  I felt like I had a fur ball of grease sitting on my lap then to make things worse Joe snagged his bone from off the couch and started chewing on it on my lap. I tried kicking him off but Joe was old and frail and didn't want to move but after we had a really spiritual lesson about the Holy Ghost.  I finally got Bill's dog off my lap.  I looked down to see fur and bits and shards of chewed up bone on my lap needles to say those pants when straight to the laundry when I got home!

Pictures
-The great lakes
-a dead fish we found down by the creek
-some of the firewood we cut
-Studying Lehi's dream during personal study its amazing the positions you can fall asleep in as a missionary

Talk at Zone Conference

After I finished emailing last week we went bowling.  When we showed up the lady at the desk said 3 dollars a game.  So we made the deal of elder wise pays for the shoes and I'll pay for 2 games of bowling.  We started our game and we both won so we had to have a tiebreaker.  Elder Wise said he'd pay for it so I agreed.  When we went to pay come to find out it was 3 bucks each for a game of bowling so we both ended up paying $13 bucks between the shoes and the game.  It was crazy expensive for 2 poor missionaries, but the important thing was that I won 2 out of 3!  Let's go!!!!!!

On Wednesday we went to teach a former investigator.  It was a really good lesson.  We read from chapter 1 of First Nephi with him.  We all learned lots and we all definitely felt the spirit.  Afterward, we asked him if he would like to say the prayer.  He kind of mumbled and grumbled for a second then all of the sudden he folded his arms and started his prayer.  He said,  "Jesus Christ thanks for sending these lads to me to take the evil out of me, amen."  After that we had a quick lesson on prayer then he proceeded to tell us all kinds of crazy stories from his life.

We had zone conference this week and everyone in the Midland zone was supposed to prepare a talk for zone conference but no one knew who was going to speak.  I figured that because I'm brand new out here and the first time at a zone conference I wasn't going to have to speak on my assigned topic.  Wow, was I wrong!  The first speaker called, Elder Compton!  So I got up there and gave the talk that I had written up.  I didn't realize it until I got back to my seat how badly my knees were shaking but I got my thrill for the day for sure!!!

In mission prep and on The District I remember them saying a mission is just 2 years of awkward experiences.  Yep, they were right about that.  Last night we went out to talk to a less active who lived out in the boonies 5 miles down a dirt road.  We went too far and missed their house and we had to back up and being the new missionary I am I had to get out and back my companion.  What I didn't know was that there was a lady out there going for a walk.  When I got out of the car I jumped out and ran cause it was cold and I wanted to get back in the car which caused the lady alarm.  The lady asked me if she could help us and I responded with, "oh, I just have to back my companion up."  She gave me the most confused look you would ever see and responds with, "can't he back himself up?"  I'm like it's mission rules.  On the awkward scale in this situation, it was about an 8/10

Zombie Cat

On Tuesday we were out door knocking.  We came up to a house and there were cats walking around.  I have had enough cats claw at me so I kept my distance and didn't pet any of them but Elder Wise saw a cute harmless looking kitten and he cornered it picked it up and started petting it.  The kitten was not having it so he bit elder wise on the middle finger.  After he dropped the kitten he showed me where the cat had bitten him and he had blood running down his finger.  I'm like ouch! Shoot, we gotta get this thing cleaned out.  We don't know if that cat had rabies or something and Elder Wise responds with I'll be fine anyway.  I finally talked him into going back to the apartment to get it cleaned up and on our way back a lady stopped us because missionaries had previously done service for her.  We got to talking and Elder Wise said something about being bitten by the cat and the lady then proceeds to tell us how cats are feral in West Branch and how we should not pick up a cat unless it's in a house.  After that Elder Wise was a little more accepting to go get his cat bite cleaned up.

Yesterday we went out door knocking for three hours and we hadn't had any success until the last two houses where we gave out two Book of Mormons in a row.  That never happens!  Besides that, we found a new person to teach.  Her name is Geri we asked if she needed any help.  She said that she needed her deck paint scraped so we agreed to go ahead and do it the following day.  At first, I felt kind of used because she had her sons there and they were great supervisors and Geri wasn't even there.  But she showed up late and we got to teach her a little bit and she agreed to let us come back and teach her a little bit more

we had interviews with the mission president this week and we had to drive down to Midland an hour and a half away.  While we were there waiting around they were giving us some tips for driving in Michigan and one of them was don't veer for dear, the reason being there are tons of dear out here.  You see them in the middle of town in the country everywhere but they are really small so you're better off hitting the dear than veering off the side of the road trying to miss them and rolling your car or something of that nature.  But on our way home from interviews with President Brenan, the GPS took us on some country road and we ended up driving on a muddy dirt road for 18 miles before we got to the freeway but that's Michigan for you lots of country roads.

A Missionary for One Month!

It was a great week.  Lots of rain but it actually warmed up because of the rain.  Besides that, we had a pretty cool experience outdoor knockin.  We walked the half hour to were we planned to go.  I was worried I was going to be freezing cold like every other day so I put on thermal bottoms, long sleeve shirt, a sweater, and to top it off a down jacket.  But like I said it started to rain.  It warmed up to 60 degrees and I was dying it was so hot but we carried on.  We probably walked up a half mile road with 10-15 houses and not one person answered so we headed back dying of heat and defeated.  On our way back we saw this super tall guy wearing "Lebrons" so we went over and talked to him and come to find out he used to be a former running back for MSU. He was drafted by the Dallas Cowboys and was lined up to get the Heisman trophy, but [he]got injured. That was the end of all that but the miracle was he accepted a Book of Mormon and we got a return appointment and he was the only person we talked to all day.

For conference the branch president wanted us to set up the T.V. at the church so people could watch conference at the church but no one showed up so in between sessions on Saturday we ran to Walmart and grabbed some snacks.  [Then we] grabbed the branch president's and the [ward] clerk's chairs and sat in those, ate Cheese-Its, and watched conference.  That was one heck of a conference!  2 hour church so we can focus on personal/family study at home. I also thought president Nelson's talk on the church's name was incredible.  He said something along the lines of if we use the proper name "The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints" we will receive blessing never before seen and we will prepare the world for the second coming of Christ.

Besides the actual conference part we went to the Wither's for lunch and it was amazing.  They fed us steak.  It's been so long since I have had a good steak I ate until I was sick then we headed back to the church where brother Steelman walks in about a half hour with a pizza.  I thought I was going to die and on top of all of that right after that session of conference we went to the Butler's where they fed us hot wings and ham.  But the garlic bread they were going to feed us caught on fire which was a tender mercy for us missionaries.  Needless to say, I didn't need a late night snack on Sunday night.

The fall leaves are just starting to turn and they are a 100 ]%] better than any Fall leavesI'vee seen before.  I'll put some pictures down below.

Garlic Bread on Fire!

My Study Desk with a Squirrel Tale

Pictures of Elder Compton from President & Sister Brennan