District Daddy

 First, I wanna apologize for the title of this email, but it's what the Elders in my district sometimes call me, haha. And second, it has to do with the responsibility a district leader feels for his district. Cause man, there a quite a few people in your stewardship, and it's your job to seek revelation to help them. To find ways they can succeed in teaching or finding, or baptizing. To give them courage or optimism where the work is slow. To help them become the disciples of Jesus Christ that they need to be. So it's kinda a bit of pressure at times cause you care about these missionaries so much and are praying for them. To highlight this, I have a story....

One day this week me and my companion got home at around 8:30 or so. At 9 we were like "haha, our roommates are late, unless they have a lesson." At 9:30 they still weren't home, so I did our district prayer and hype call without them. By 9:45, I'm starting to get worried cause I haven't been able to get ahold of them. So i give the zone leaders a call cause that's who they are supposed to reach out to if they aren't getting home before 9:30pm....and they were like, "Nah, they haven't messaged us, are they not home??" And we were like, "Nope!" By now, I'm thinking dang, where are my beloved brethren. They aint here. And here is when the parental worry started to sink in. Cause first, these Elders are top notch, and Elder Kendall specifically is one who would totally let us know if they are going to be home late. And so now, I'm like where our my awesome roommates?! And I'm like, you know what, if they aren't home by 10:03 I need to call president. Then I had the thought to use my DL powers and signed into their area book. And from 8:00 to 9:00 all it says is tracting so I'm like, it doesn't look like they are in a lesson....And then 10:03pm rolled around, and I'm like okay they HAVE to have messaged President cause that's who you need to call if you're going to be home past 10pm. So I call him and he's like, "Woah, no I haven't gotten a message from them. Are they not home?" By now, I'm like, holy cow, are they okay?? (Cause they are Spanish Elders and not to stereotype or anything, but they do most of their finding in the sketchy getto areas to find more Spanish speakers). And I say, "No President, I'm kinda worried about them. Do we have a way to track where they are at? And he said "we can ping their car, but let's not resort to that yet. Please keep me updated." So now I'm losing my mind cause I'm like, "what if they got kidnapped or something?!" And I was getting a bit paranoid too, going and checking the window for their car to pull up, but it never diddddd. But FINALLY at 10:16 after 30 min of anxiety trying to stay calm I got a call from the Spanish elders who were in an impromptu lesson with their friend on Baptismal date and committed him to keep the word of wisdom. And I'm like bruh, elders, you could have messaged me mid-lesson. But oh well. I stayed up till they got home at 10:43pm, and I gave them both a big hug and said to never do that to me again haha! 

However, I now understand what I've put my parents through, lol!! Like, oof it sucks, haha. My understanding has opened though to it, and I shall endeavor to do better from this time forward to not make my parents worry like that haha. It aint fun. 

Went on an exchange with Elder Grow. He's brand new, and we had a great exchange. He's a king and we had a cool opportunity to give someone an impromptu blessing for a young couple who were in our ward for a couple months. The husband twisted his ankle the day before all these big military tests, and it was way swollen. And if he failed, he'd have to restart all his work and redo like 9 weeks of training. And so we got to give him a blessing that night, and BAM! He did great the next day:) Power of the priesthood, baby!!

Right now I'm grinding on getting our 2 wards to become more missionary minded and seek opportunities to love, share, and invite. We have been pulling all the stops on this. We are talking to members and giving them challenges to make plans for friends they know and pray NIGHTLY for revelation and inspiration concerning them, inviting leaders to make announcements at Sacrament meeting to invite people to activities, having all the classes begin with speaking of missionary experiences as well as setting plans or idea to have more experiences that coming week. We are trying to get more activities that members can also invite people to and focusing on the youth since they are tanks at inviting friends. We are making sure that members are joining lesson and these members want to be there. It's so awesome. Anyways, if any of those ideas are things y'all like, apply them to your own wards y'all! Be the driving force to make a change in your home ward. Help make disciples of Jesus Christ and do as Christ directed. To FEED HIS SHEEP. Y'all got this, it's HYPE. Love y'all! 

Hurrah for Israel!!!

Elder Higginson