Serving in Kentucky: Crazy Transfers!

March 21, 2016

Dear Family,

Yes! Elder Gough will be getting a new companion tomorrow. Here's the transfer news. I'm staying, Elder Passmore is leaving to be a district leader in Clarksville, IN. Elder Gough is staying and getting a new companion. Owensboro will be split between two sets now. Elder Gough and his companion will cover most of the inner city and my companion and I will cover the rest of the boundaries.

My new companion's going to be Elder Salazar. He's from Mexico. English is his second language. He's actually from my group. I didn't meet him until I was at the mission home though. At that time he didn't know ANY English. He's had to learn it out here. It'll be interesting working with him. Elder Passmore used to be companions with him. He said he's good and that his English is good, too.

Just like the first week in Owensboro, this last week was pretty crazy. This transfer has easily been the craziest transfer of my mission so far. I had a lot of fun, I learned a lot, and I was able to see the Lord work His miracles more than ever before. I had a lot of fun in this trio. I'm a little sad it'll be over. I'm also sad I was only with Elder Passmore for 1 transfer.

Here's the breakdown

Monday
During our weekly frolf (frisbee golf) practice, each of us lost a disc. Where we play there's a few creeks and lakes that you can easily throw your discs into if you're not careful. For some reason, golf discs don't float. They sink really fast. Unfortunately, we threw our discs into the water. Afterwards we went and bought more to replace them. We also got ice cream to drown our sorrows in.
Later that night, we met with the Sc family and showed them the Easter video. They liked it. For being baptized back in November, they're doing great. I enjoy teaching them. During our visit they all had their guitars out.

Tuesday
We did some biking on Tuesday. It was super nice outside here. We taught a man named Mr B. We first met him back at our Stake Conference last week. The Evansville sisters introduced us to him. Recently, he started dating an active member who lives in Evansville. He started taking interest and had the missionaries over. The sisters taught him a couple lessons in Evansville and then referred him to us because he lives in Owensboro. We had a great lesson with him. We taught the Gospel of Jesus Christ. He took genuine interest in it. His girlfriend gave him a replica of the original 1830 BoM for him to read out of. He reads consistently. He said he tries to read 4 chapters a day. Every commitment we talked about, we found he had already committed himself to it before we taught him, like pray, read, and come to church. He told us he and his GF searched out the church here and drove by it. He's such a cool guy! We set another appointment for Wednesday.
Later, we went out on splits again. Elder Gough and I went with Bro Emmert. We helped him with some of his home teaching. I enjoy helping members out.

Wednesday
We met with Mr B again. We taught him the Word of Wisdom and found out his GF told him about it a while ago and that he committed himself to live it 2 weeks ago. The only thing he had to give up was tea. It was crazy to have a WoW lesson like that. Every other time we teach that, we get crap because almost everyone here violates it in some way. Everyone smokes. Later we had a lesson with Miss Al in the library. We went over the 10 commandments. It was another perfect lesson as always with her.

Thursday
We went on exchange with the Tell City Elders. Elder Thompson came here with Elder Passmore and me. We did service for a senior couple who's going on a mission to Washington DC. They're selling their house so they had us over to help move stuff. This service took most of the day. We had two member meal appointments at the same time that night so we had to split up. I went to the Swope's, a part-member family. Bro Swope first investigated early last year and was baptized about the same time I started my mission. Since then he's been a super strong member with one of the strongest testimonies in this ward. When he was first introduced to the BoM, he used it to quit smoking and drinking.

Every time he got an urge, he read it. He finished the whole book in 3 weeks. Since then, missionaries have been working with his wife to get her baptized but she's had a few issues that have been keeping her from it. When I went over on Thursday, I started off teaching the first lesson and surprisingly, I found the reason. She didn't understand the apostasy and why Joseph Smith was important. Of the many times she's received that lesson, she kept missing that part. I taught everything simply to make sure she understood. She had a lot of questions that bothered her that I answered. I've never had to do a lesson like that. I felt the Spirit so strongly as I was teaching. I feel like she's even closer to baptism. Bro Swope was really grateful for the lesson. He would be super happy if his wife gets baptized.

Friday
We had district meeting. Later we met with Miss Al again. She wasn't feeling too good so we just watched a Mormon Message movie with her. Later we ate with the Gomez's. They're a really nice family. That about sums up Friday.

Saturday
There was a University of Kentucky (UK) vs. Indiana University (IU/Hoosiers) game on Saturday. And UK lost. Kentucky started burning. We didn't have much success getting in with people. We also found out transfer news. There were many curveballs this transfer all across the mission. Elder Passmore described it as "President Brough took the mission, cut it in half, and shuffled it." We finished the day at Bro Emmert's. He fed us country ham. It was heavenly.

Sunday
All 3 of us had to give surprise talks on the Atonement because the assigned speakers went to the ER the night before. We all did surprisingly well. We ate lunch at the Fuqua's. Bro Fuqua gave Elder Passmore some of the most "grandpa-looking" shoes I've ever seen. We ate dinner at the Abel's. They fed us fish. We finished the night meeting with Miss S, a LA who has a crazy life. Her daughter happened to be going through stuff when we arrived so they asked for a blessing. As always, I love giving blessings.

I liked this week. I really liked dinner and the lesson at the Swope's. I felt good helping her come closer to baptism. I also loved to see the progress I've made as a missionary. When I first came out here, there would have been no way for me to teach a lesson and answer
questions like that by myself. The Lord truly has been turning me into the person He needs me to be.

Unfortunately I won't be seeing Miss Al or Mr B anymore. Both of them are in Elder Gough's area. They will be taught by him and his new companion from now on. There aren't really any solid investigators in the car area so Elder Salazar and I are basically reopening it.

Thank you all so much! You're the best family! Loves!

-Elder Benjamin Kohkonen Cox (GKLM)