Bear one anothers Burdens = "DO stuff together"‏

I cant cook anything in my apartment without the fire alarms going off... It drives me crazy. Every single time we open the oven when it's turned on it goes off, it's not even a gas stove or anything. So we take them off and throw them in the bed room, shut the door when we need to cook.

I like being here alot, I get fed like nothing but my district is loads of fun. Elder S used to be a professional gamer and made big bucks playing Call of Duty in tournaments, when ever he would log into live and play a game people would screen shot and post about it on twitter that they were playing with him, his account would always blow up with notifications when he played on live. I told him I would own him with a riot shield and he had like a 10 minute rant ha ha. 

Elder F came out with me and he got special permission to bring a guitar on his mission and so we Jammed on p-day! It was healthy for me to hear music like that, He is way good!

Problem is though since we are on car rotations we had to be their slave child and drive them every where. E. S spent for ever shopping for new pants and belts, but hey when you drop 10 sizes I guess it's about time to celebrate and get new pants.

I went on a trade off to Western Michigan University with my zone leaders. That was a totally different experience of contacting then I have ever had before. Since people were walking from class to class to their dorms they didn't really want to stop walking so we walked every where with people to talk to them. It was fun because you had so much more time than you do when door knocking, I mean what are they going to do run away from you? Well some one did! ha ha! 

But I had to address things totally differently just because of how strong college kids are against certain words or "Kill words". I couldn't say church, Religion, God in the first 4 seconds or they would cringe. So we asked if people are spiritual, or if they believe in an energy which we could then relate to God. It was good for me and helped me with my finding quite a bit, especially with "atheists". 

I felt super cool doing it too; because how they do it is they will walk around campus and set up a appointment to meet with them in one of the study rooms that people could reserve through this touch screen terminal. So I felt like a Professor who was hired by the school to help the students with their spirituality! Thats how we made me feel anyways we wouldn't say we were hired though, because we aren't. That was a super cool lesson though that we had in that room of glass, it had one wall that was a white board so we would draw on the wall to emphasize the Gospel dispensations and the Great Apostasy. It was super cool Because I was able to do it all in a rolling office chair and I never had to stand up.=p

District meeting is a little different, my crowd is a little tougher than before I really have to work to get every one involved since I have several new missionaries and not Old returned missionaries who are here for round 2 who are dying to teach something. I used the email you sent me Hamilton that talks about magnifying your calling. After I sent my email I checked the district meeting topic on line and it was on Magnifying our calling ha ha. 

All of the missionaries are trying to coax me out of my MSF money...

We were walking down town which takes a long time to get their without a car to go to a lesson we set up with a less active. The good thing was there was a lot of people we could Pc on the way over there. So while we did that there was this lady who was just standing alone in the sunlight. It was rather odd. I let out a over enthusiastic Hi and then asked how she was doing. She responded, " I am doing terrible=("... I stopped dead in my tracks, and dropped my whole walk with swag past you and let you turn around and walk to me when I ask you a question. I asked her about it, to end up hearing this sad story. 

She was from Carry indiana and she took the bus up here to Kalamazoo to visit some one. After she explored this city she had never been in before she eventually made it to a bus stop where she found out she had no phone, no card, and not enough money to get her bus ticket back home. She was only 5 dollars short. She was in this city that she had no clue how to get around she didn't remember where she came from so she couldn't get help from her friend. She eventually was picked up and brought to the mission (a homeless shelter) for the night by a cop. Where they gave her clothes so she could stay warm and a meal. 

She was terrified in the mission (I don't blame her!!!! I have been in twice now and it seems more like a concentration camp) and spent the whole next day in some hobo clothes that were way beaten up and not warm, with one glove. She went from church to church begging for 5 dollars and was turned away several times. They would have helped her if she lived here and she couldn't pay her bills but since she had a husband with a good job back home and kids who were well off they wouldn't do anything for her. 

She got to the point where she did what she never thought she would have to do in her life and beg people on the street for money which was terrifying for her! She attempted  to ask for money from a mother and a child since she would be able to relate to her in her circumstance but she was turned away. All she needed was 5 dollars! She eventually was super cold and couldn't just stand in places for fear of being kicked out for loitering, and was determined not to go back to the mission. So what she did was stand on the side of the road in the only spot of sunlight there was to warm up and pray for help.

And then some funky tall skinny dude gives her a over enthusiastic "Hi!" and listens to her and watches her cry buckets of tears as she recounts what has happened to her in the past 2 days. She was super sincere! And she didn't look like she was prepared enough to be homeless, her thick hair was all over the place from not having a brush or anything  or being able to wash it. But was rather clean. She had the look of a mother and seemed to be healthy.

So from what I discerned spiritually and visually I couldn't find any fault in what she said. Not once did she ask for anything from me! So I opened my jacket and pulled out my 2 unopened hand warmers that I picked up out of our closet the night before, and gave it to her. She was super happy! and broke out into tears again in gratitude that some one gave her the time of day, just listened, didn't judge her, and showed they cared. That meant the world to her!

I felt it was the right thing to do so I opened my wallet and went for my 5 dollar bill, but when I opened it up I saw a 10 and realized that that will be a several hour trip back home and gave that MSF money to her. She quickly shoved it into a inner pocket in her original clothes (not the hobo ones) and then ran and hugged me and just cried. (No it is not against missionary rules to hug some one! Read Pg 33-34 in the white hand book). Then asked where the nearest bus stop was and I had no clue. But we gave her directions to the library so she could use the computers there. I then said "you probably will have some time until that bus comes... So you should go to this website and check out some of the videos on it." and gave her a pass along card =p. 

We were door knocking and had to go into one of the amazingly beautiful houses that a land lord ruined by making it into 7 apartments. As I walked up the stair case my mind flashed (I like to think of the tv series "Chuck" in circumstances like this) My mind flashed and a whiff of air swept into me and I realized I had seen this place before. I then walked where I knew the that the person would answer the door and knocked. They answered. And after dispelling his thoughts of me being  J.Witness' he then saw our name tag and told us all about how he used to be a foster kid in a mormon home 40 years ago. And was baptized.... Sweet! He said he wasn't gonna open the door since he saw us from his window but felt like he should.

I lost my library card and am out of time BYE!!!

Love you!

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- Elder Truman Rex Crockett