Halo🤘🏿 (June 27, 2016)

The Zone

Hello All! Yet another pday and the week's come and go. It's been a good week and all is well. It's good to hear all is well there also, in the midst of summer vacations and all. We have transfers tomorrow and Elder Brock and I are staying here in Vallejo for another one. Which means that's I get to finish training him also! To answer your questions, Mom, it's about 50/50 if trainers leave after one or not. And yes we do 12 week. All that basically is, is another hour of comp study each day. We follow a guidebook and watch videos from 'The District' and it's fun. It's tedious sometimes but we try and have a good time. It only started a couple years ago, but its intention is to prepare missionaries when they come right off the plane. It's said that if it's done right, the greenie should be prepared enough to train by the end of his first 12 weeks! That's fun ya?

This week was kind of the same pace as the last couple. We did have some lessons with Maria that we think helped her understand a little bit more about wanting to know which church was true. She also came to church yesterday, which makes four whole times this last transfer! That's amazing for us. We are always striving to get more, but the fact that we have one consistent one makes us happy. Actually, with transfers and all, we will only have four missionaries in the branch now (whereas we have had six) which means that we are getting part of a new area. That's kind of like what happened in Napa a couple months ago. It should give us some more work to do and such over the next six

weeks. Also with transfers, president has called me as a District Trainer, which basically means I'm the District Leader (again) who is also training a missionary. Should be fun!

Other than that, we had service this week doing yard work for a lady. We found her about two months ago just knocking doors and asking if we could help. She said yes and that her back yard was crazy. We didn't think it could be that crazy, but then we got started and realized it was a big job. We called a bunch of missionaries in our zone and we have been working on it every Thursday for the past couple weeks. It's fun to help her out and see that transformation of her yard! Always remember Mosiah 2:17!

After many weeks of not, here's the scripture Hermanita Chose:

1 Kings 6:16  "And he built twenty cubits on the sides of the house, both the floor and the walls with boards of cedar: he even built them for it within, even for the oracle, even for the most holy place."

This scripture is talking about building temples. But I want to focus on how specific the diction is here. I was recently reading in Nephi when he was commanded to build the boat. He received specific

instructions on how to build this boat and as he followed those instructions he was able to finish the task at hand. Just like in this scripture, there are certain dimensions and measurements for this temple. God gives us certain specific commandments and as we follow them we are blessed immensely. Just think if someone built that temple (or in Nephi's case the boat) just a little bit off, how it wouldn't be stable and structured. We have the commandments to keep us safe from falling into temptation. What a blessing!

I love hearing your emails and stuff going on. Keep me updated! I love and miss you all. Take care and have a good week!

Con Amor

Elder Alexander Scott Joyner