OCTOBER 16TH

Me and Elder King

Dear Family!

Well this week was a pretty great one. There were only a couple of things that really happened this week work mentioning. 

We had the opportunity to go over to President Wolfe's home to help them paint the main floor of their town home. It's really the first interaction they have sent our way that's happened while I've been here. It seems like they are slowly starting to warm up to us. We painted their main floor a lighter tan color with the Behr paint that's only supposed to be one layer. I had the job of using the paint brush to get the cracks and crevices touching up what was missed. Overall it went well and they seemed to finish the second touchup layer later that day.

Thursday we went down to the Annapolis building for interviews with President Johnson. They were much needed for the Zone you could tell. It was also very nice to get everything I was wanting to talk about with him in and to council about the area. They are planned for 10 minutes, but they always are longer than planned because he wants to get to know us more and to make sure we are doing alright. That went over into the night and I traded a tie with Elder King.

Friday we had some service helping some guys from a Methodist church load up a trailer with food. We met them at the Maryland food bank in our area. We got there not realizing it was a little thing in the back and not a big event inside. But we are definitely going to be going down there to offer our service more often now we know it's there. Other than that this week it's been full of finding and talking to people.

Saturday was Baltimore's "Fleet Week," they had the U.S. Navy Blue Angels come and perform. It was out of the mission, but there's a spot at the top of our area at the hospital where hundreds of people gather to watch the planes fly over and around. We used that to talk to people about the gospel and to also watch some jets fly. 

That night we were out checking on some Referrals that we have. We received a new one where he was wanting a bible. His name was Ronald. When we stopped by he was gracious for his free bible and we asked if we could share some verses out of it. He invited us in not knowing we had an entire lesson to teach him! The spirit was strong and that was the miracle of our week! 

This week I learned more about charity. We had a lesson in Priesthood about it.  I took time to read the lesson this last week. I love the stories that it shares about loving our enemies. One of the examples that comes to mind however is in the musical Les Misérable. When Jean Val Jean tried to take the silver and get caught by the guards and taken back to the priest. He forgives him instantly and helps him realize there are bigger things in life. This one simple charitable act by the priest changed his entire life. How are our actions reflecting onto others? Are we being charitable? Do we love those who hate us? It's my testimony that as we develop charity, the lord will bless us with increased love towards others.

Love,

Elder Bentley