The Day After Tomorrow.....

Hey Yall,

I dont even know where to start! Well i guess well go with what Alabama has been callin a state crisis! One which they had to call in the National Guard, im still tryin to figure out what that would do. But this is as my title says, The Day After Tomorrow! It all started out as a nice cloudy day, the air was crisp an everythin was silent. We got up and got ready for an apt at 9 in the AM. We walked to the door, said a prayer and opened the door. My comp was still lookin at me as I screamed, "SNOW!!!" hahah it was really just little flakes that were gently fallin from the sky as harmless as a baby bumblebee. Man has this been such an eventful week! Here is Dooms day in Bama:) 

So as we are walkin along to go get the car from the sisters, we are takin pics and videos of the Bama snow. All was fun and games at that point. What we really didnt realize at that time is how bad things would get..... We went over to the church and had an apt with an investigator. (I will tell ya a little about that later). Then as we came outta the chapel, we looked outside and it was a winter wonderland! The snow was stickin and boy was there a lot of it! Well as we made our way back home we got to experience the ciaos, crazy, dont know how to drive in snow Alabama Natives. Haha well it snowed for a few hours that day, and everything started to shut down. There were crashes, over 2000 cars that got ran off the side of the freeway all throughout Alabama. People in Birmingham were stuck in traffic and most just abandoned there cars and left them there. Everything was shut down, as we walked down the main highway later that evenin it was a ghost town. Really the only store we found that was open was Hobby Lobby. As we walked in the only worker there said, "No we dont have any milk, bread, or eggs!" hahaha just jokin around with us. But everyone was freakin out and lost control. I will give them one thing though. The cars here are not meant for snow at all. Especially the tires and brakes! They dont work at all! But other than that at least everythin in Northport shut down for 2 or so days! It was crazy i couldnt believe it! So thats a little run down of the crisis that happened here in Alabama. The scary thing is that there is expected to be a bigger storm to roll through here in the next couple of weeks. Haha lets hope we make it through this one. One cool thing is a lot of people were sayin that this is the most snow they seen in there entire life! Just dont tell anyone I was the one prayin for it to come. I might have an angry mob come after me;)

Here is me tryin to look like a new missionary with all the new dress codes and what not...  The next cool story really quick is that of a new investigator I forgot to mention last week. The single adult rep in our ward has been on fire with missionary work here recently and she asked a man she came into contact with to come to church. His name is Charles, he is single and has a son and daughter, his mom went to tons of churches so he has been baptized many times, but says he feels the spirit so strongly in our church! Well we got talking with him and wanted to teach him on Tuesday. Thats the apt we had when it started to snow. Well we taught him with a member, and at the end set a baptism date for him for Feb 18th!!! Then yesterday he came to church again, he loves it and says he never wants to leave haha. The only problem we were havin is that his home is down Meridian Mississippi. He works up here in Bessemer and is a truck driver. He is only down there one day a week to see his daughter. But with his home down there we would most likely have to baptize him down there. Well throughout the week we found out that him and the single adult rep, April started datin haha which isnt bad, just a tad awkward. But we also talked with him and he said that he can only attend our ward on Sundays because he cant be down in Mississippi til Tuesdays anyway. Well we basically got it cleared to baptize him here. Also we taught him yesterday after church! We went over the Plan of Salvation and Word of Wisdom. He loved both of them and really everything is clickin in his head. All day Sunday I was listenin to the spirit to see if we should push his date up. We came to the conclusion that he is ready so now his date is for Feb 11th!!!! I cant wait:) Its so cool to see the Lord and how he really does prepare people!

This week I also conducted 2 interviews for baptisms. In our district this next week we are gonna have 4 baptisms! Its so cool to see this many! Ive never in my mission seen so many baptisms all at once in different areas! We also got to meet a referal named Stan. He is a little different, but that doenst matter. He loves what we taught him about the restoration and were gonna teach him again in a few weeks! Its crazy to watch an area go from absolutly nothin and start to boom with investigators and baptisms. Most of it is the Lord and the members. They are a lot more involved in missionary work and love to help now! Almost all our lessons are with a member!  Heres my shoulder bad, murse, whatever yall wanna call it:)

This is a dinner i made the other night for a few missionaries. I was pretty darn impressed with myself for makin all this alone! 

The last thing real quick was a special conference we had with L Tom Perry. It was for all the stakes down in the southeast region. Elder Perry talked alot of hastening the work and how members really do need to get involved. How we need to constantly be lookin and openin our mouths! It was great! I know that we can do this by doin one simple thing that Elder Perry taught and its something ive been studyin a lot this week. Its an act of faith, which is prayer. As we pray for missionary opportunities sincerely we really will get them. That should be in every single one of our prayers. As we do that we show Heavenly Father how much we really do want to work and find those that need the gospel. I have seen so much in missionary work how prayer really does work! There have been times when I pray all the time, by myself, with comps, and in every lesson. The work goes so much better. When i dont pray its a lot harder to find people, to feel the spirit and be prompted. Now as we pray we need to be lookin for the opportunities. We need to help Heavenly Father out and act on our prayers. He will answer us! A short quote, "Our prayers answered are faith promoting, our prayers unanswered are faith perfecting!"

I love yall so much! Have a blessed week! Remember to be happy in such a great time:)

Love Elder Hall:)