I Really Wish Paul Didn't Say That Right About Now

Well hello again, everyone! Coming live from the proud owner of the “Robert E Lee” bridge over the old prison Island, it’s Elder McMullin! As always, if you would like to send me any petunias or spare charging cables, I will happily accept. But, without further ado, here we go!

     This week was better, but still kinda mid, for work. Cameron is an absolute trooper, and came to church despite the fact he ran out of gas and had to do a little bit of siphoning in order to make it there. Despite this, we had a great lesson, and he came to Glen Allen B’s baptism later that day, so miracles all around! Besides that, not a lot happened. There was still a lot of parking lot time, but no fish were really biting. There were a couple of promising leads, but none of them were able to keep their commitments. Doubly frustrating is the fact that the whole mission is being blighted by SIM problems. You see, a culture of “If nothing is happening, mass text all your friends” has been brewing, which in days of yore worked fine enough to see who was still interested. Then, it expanded to the grey dots, which in the early days of area books was not a problem. However, most area books have well over a thousand dots, and sending the same text to them ALL AT THE SAME TIME looks a little suspicious to AT&T. This, combined with how frequently we get blocked, means that most of our numbers are marking as spam automatically, a really great headache when you try to contact someone day one. But! It seems to be fixing itself gradually as we try to discourage carpet-bombing anyone foolish enough to give us their phone number. Besides that, things keep chugging along, and I know that with all this opposition, there must be something great just around the corner.

     In other news, the office continues to be the crown jewel in the costume jewelery of the mission. I say this because I am stuck in a rather strange position, as there is always “stuff” to do, but SML 1 tackles all the big problems while I manage the more mediocre stuff. This is all well and fine, except I have little idea what to do when big things start breaking and I have to start fixing it. Plus, my mediocre tasks are done earlier than the big problems by sheer nature, so I am left staring into space or desperately poking through code to try and find something to do. Thus, I feel the allegory of ‘costume jewelry’ seems to work especially well, because I can make anything look good with enough hot glue and stage lighting. Is my work actually valuable? Maybe not. Can I make it look as such? Absolutely.

      To explain the title line, people really like to scrap out here for some dang reason. I swear, they see a missionary, and like Daleks their vision goes red and a voice inside starts screaming “EXTERMINATE!” I say this because I have gotten into not one, not two, but three altercations in the past couple of weeks. The first, I absolutely toasted the poor fella. He was a pastor who decided arguing was best done about 6 inches apart, when he started heavily quoting the Pauline Epistles and the Exmormon reddit page. Using my unconquerable pride and his shallow church knowledge, we created the standards that prophets must A) see God, and B) die for what they believe. You should have seen his face when I told him that by his own reckoning, Joseph Smith Jr was a prophet of God. Flabbergasted, he retreats back to the reddit page and pulls the fantastic, bulletproof argument of “I’ve talked to a lot of Mormons before you who believed differently”. Glad you have, I’ve probably talked to more, but I hope you have a great day. The second was not so good, as Elder Morgan and I both got pulled into it.You see, I invited him to church and he asked where we went, and I responded. He goes “Oh nonononono, that’s a very bad church!” I shoot back with a smile on my face “I think it’s pretty good!” He took the most logical path and decided this phrase was a direct attack on all he held dear and decided to rail on us about how the Book of Mormon is nothing but a money-diggers fantasy filled with fake people and horses. We politely respond, to which he brings it back to horses and how they didn’t exist. Asking him if he read it, he responds with “I’ve skimmed it enough to know it’s not true”. First of all, impressive if you skimmed and found the whole 3 references to horses, and even more impressive you are able to dismiss it so easily. He then says he only believes in things that have evidence. I must admit, this is where Elder McMullin loses it a little bit and starts pointing out the rather large number of inaccuracies and contradictions in the bible, as well as what evidence could possibly prove it. He then, in his infinite wisdom, tells us, and I quote: “You don’t need evidence to prove the Bible. It’s the perfect word of God”. Double standard discovered, we make our way out as he continues to scream and I may have screamed back a “you have a great day” but that’s not important. This was after we got almost-banned from the Walmart here in Gayton, so emotions were running high and I was just about out of Christlike love. This marvelously segues into #3, when cleaning inspections were occurring. As the senior couple judges the deplorable state of our microwave, I hear a knock on the door- only to find out it’s the Jehovah’s Witnesses. I chuckle to myself as they share a verse and a pamphlet, and they laugh a little too as they see the tags. Overall it was a better interaction, but I am still a little tired of constantly being under fire and having to dish out a little fire myself. Luckily, the same God who lit the altar of Elijah and the Pillar of Fire works with us, so fire is something I do not have a shortage of.

     Well everyone, I hope you have a great week, and I will talk to y’all again soon!

From your favorite bible-bashing brother in Christ,

Elder McMullin

Photos!

1: we got a new car

2: an absolutely gas pizza I made

3: this is one of those "major problems" I was talking about

4: Praise

5: Nice scenic spot on the James River

6: RVA!