Following the Trials Come the Blessings

     Our calling here in Tennessee it to work with the less active and encourage them to return to church.  We were given a ward list and told who came regularly, but nothing more.  We then decided that we would just visit every member of the ward and talk to them and see for our self.  There are about 450 members with it split pretty much in half with half living in Tullahoma and half in Manchester.  We soon realized just what a big job this would be and try to break the task up by spending a day in Tullahoma, a day in Hillsboro and a couple of days in Manchester.  Saturdays we decide where to go by the week's progress or lack of.  Monday because it is P-Day, preparation day which includes laundry, errands and grocery shopping so we just get a few hours in and Tuesday because we do service projects here in town and we have twig meetings we spend in Manchester.  Every Wednesday either in McMinnville or in Tullahoma we have a district meeting which seems to take up the morning so we have decided that on the day we meet in Tullahoma that is the day we just
pack a lunch and spend the day there.  It may sound confusing and at first it was, but now makes sense to us. We are finally getting into somewhat of a routine. If you add in that Monday, Wednesday and Fridays we are at the pool from 7-8AM and Tuesday and Thursdays from 8-9AM and Friday mornings we are at a nursing home between 9-9:30 AM  our days are getting organized, which is something I like.  Calvin is liking it too although he wouldn't admit it.
   We had a zone meeting this past Wednesday, the 9th.  When we got back home that afternoon we decided we would go visit more families in the ward.  We still did not have an area map and we were doing lots of back tracking and zig zagging around the area.  After several hours and finding no one home or receptive we headed back to town.  We were feeling a little discouraged because we were wasting time with the extra driving.  We decided on the spur of the moment to track down our own area map. Our first stop was the Walgreen's.  No map.  When we got to the parking lot a man came up to Calvin and asked if he could help.  Calvin explained who we were and what we were doing and the man said he has been looking for a church that is family oriented.  Calvin told him some about the Church, gave him a Book of Mormon and asked if he would read it.  The man whose name is Duane said he would read it and gave Calvin his number and we will call him Saturday to set up a time to meet with him and invite him to church Sunday.  We ended the day with the blessing of meeting  Duane and introducing him to the church.
Friday we spent the day in Tullahoma which like the rest of Tennessee has lots of trees, hills country areas and very few street lights, house numbers or even street name markers.  We get lots of directions like, "go down here a couple blocks, turn left then go down a few more blocks then turn left again and it is the second, no the third house on the right".  And everyone in the country seems to have several barking dogs inside or tied up in the yard.  After about an hour of driving around in the country and seemed to be driving around in circles we finally located the house we were looking for, and the man who was not home from work was the member of the ward but less active.  His wife came out to meet us as soon as we drove up, never a good sign.  She told us, not to politely that her and the children were members of another church and that although her husband "used" to be a member of the church had not been for at least 10 years making him no longer a member in her view.  Calvin explained that he would be a member as long as his name was on the records of the church and as long as he was there would be times like today that people would come by to talk to him about the gospel.  He said he had his agency of course and that the only one who could remove his name from the records was him and he would have to write a letter to the Bishop!  She then dismissed us and we left.  As we were leaving and feeling bad for the husband knowing that there were going to be some serious "discussing" about religion going on over the dinner table, we passed a new house under construction we noticed a man heading to his car.  I thought to myself  "I want to find someone who will accept and read the Book of Mormon.  I know there was someone out there, we should just stop the car and give that man one."  What I did not realize is that I was not thinking to myself I had said it out loud and as soon as I finished, Calvin backed the car up. Before I knew what was happening I was out of the car, introducing ourselves and telling him about this wonderful book and message I would like to share with him.  He said he was on his way to pick up his little girl from day care, but would love to read the Book of Mormon and we could come back Monday to talk to him more about it.  What???  I NEVER do this.  Calvin does all the talking, he introduces us, explains what we are doing, and gives the message or whatever is needed.  Needless to say next Monday, P-Day or not we are going to make that long trip to talk to Purnell.  Yes, he said if we remember the old Bonanza show we would remember his name.  He was named after Purnell Roberts who played Adam Cartright on the show.  Again after another day of small trials we received the blessing of meeting Purnell.