Farewell Pinehurst Hello GOLDSBORO

Well this week has definitely been amazing! I am so excited to share with you all the blessing and miracles that have been happening. Monday was great because I had the opportunity to have a great last meal with the Gilmores. They are so wonderful. Brother Gilmore is deployed but his grandfather is living with them right now. He isn’t a member of the Church and has a lot of great questions. We had a really productive gospel conversation. We are going to come over and explain authority more on Thursday because that’s what he is having trouble with. We then had a family home evening with one of the sweetest ladies I know. Sister Mooney has never had family home evening before so Brother Andrews, her home teacher, came and we had a wonderful lesson on the Saviors mercy. Her grandson was there and had a lot of great questions about the gospel. He isn’t a member and is about 10 years old. He is so intelligent!! He asked some really great questions like: What is the difference between grace and mercy? How do we know that it’s talking about God the Father or Jesus Christ when it refers to Christ as God? Well those were questions that I needed to look up myself. I was grateful for Elder Cline who is smarter than me.
I had a really great last night in Pinehurst. Elder Cline was really tired and I had to pack still so he went to bed. I stayed up way too late packing and cleaning the apartment for Elder Cline's new boy! I had a lot of time to reflect on my time in Pinehurst and there were some things I could have done better and there are things that I did good. I am so grateful for my Savior who makes up for my inadequacies.
Tuesday morning finally came. I was excited and nervous. I found out that I had a lot more stuff than when I came out. Trainer's meeting was great. President Cotterell is called of God and gave us some really great things to think about. I decided then and there that I wanted the best for my boy and I wanted him to be the best missionary HE could be. It was a weird feeling when he walked in the room. He just looked at me and started walking towards me as we sang “Praise to the Man!” He then gave me a hug and I knew that we were supposed to be companions. His name is Elder Clinton Jones. He is from Idaho Falls, Idaho. I thought that was really funny! He likes theatre and he likes to write. He went to a year of College at Utah State in Logan before he came out . He is shorter than me by about 5 inches. He is the youngest of 6. He is going to be a great missionary. I found out that he left a girl behind as well whose name is Mindi. I thought that was really weird. So he told me that we are going to be serving in the Goldsboro 1st Ward. Apparently what had happened was that there were missionaries in the 1st ward 6 weeks ago but President took them out and had the 2nd ward Elders cover it, so now we are covering it. This area is so great. It is kind of a country area. I love it. We are going to be on bikes the whole time as well which I am really excited about.
We have worked really hard getting everything under control and figured out. We saw a couple Part Member Families and are going to be teaching them. We have given 5 blessings already, two have been non members. We have been really blessed! We also had Zone Conference this week. Man it was amazing. We learned about how the spirit was the key in conversion. It definitely taught me many new things. I had the opportunity to role play with President as well and that was incredible. The questions he asked were exactly what our investigators needed. I am grateful for the Lord and him calling such an amazing Mission President. I truly love him so much and love listening to him.
Church was great. I love fasting and having testimony meeting. The ward is wonderful. It is a lot of older people. There are hardly any youth or younger families. Bishop Briggs is such a great Bishop. He is so humble. We are having dinner with him today. Our ward has a cupboard for us in the kitchen that they put food in for us. We always have fresh fruit as well. This ward is absolutely amazing. I am going to love it here. It definitely has been a great week. Hopefully our appointments will happen and we will find some new investigators. We are going to be working with the members a lot. Apparently we don’t have a lot of meals with members but we are going to try and change that. That is really the only time we get to interact with them. We need to build that trust! Trust is so important! They love missionary work and want to help us so much. It’s so wonderful.
I definitely got a piece of what raising a child is like. Training is hard work! I have matured a lot of these past 7 months. Its crazy to get a new missionary and see the things that you used to do and how they were so immature. I am grateful that the Lord continues to train me and mold me into what he wants me to become. I am grateful for the opportunity to serve in this new capacity. What a blessing it is. Thank you for all the support you give me constantly!! I love you all so much and may the Lord continue to bless you!
Love Elder Butler