Happy 4th of July

Friends and family!!

Hello hello how are all of you!? Happy 4th of July! I am so thankful
to live in such a wonderful and blessed country! Today I am thankful
for those who are fighting to protect our rights! This week was pretty
good! Had a lot of things going on! Last pday we didn't really do all
that much just kinda hung out and shot some hoops. That night we went
to FHE at the church. We brought our investigator from Sudan! His name
is Sam. He is a boss. We had a water balloon fight and played a game
called gator ball. It's a mix between handball and soccer. It was a
awesome night. Tuesday we had district meetings. Elder Merrill is our
district leader and he is my favorite! We had a nerf war after our
instruction hahah it was so dang funny. After that we had lunch with a
member Jon he bought us kabobs and they were mighty good. After lunch
we went and spilt some wood for the community and delivered it to all
the neighbors. We love going to spilt wood it's hard work but we enjoy
it! It was like 90 degrees and humid while we were spitting and we
were dying haha but all the neighbors in the area where very
appreciative! Wednesday was a pretty alright day haha we did a lot of
finding and had a few member visits pretty typical stuff but that's
the best! Thursday we went out to lunch with the itos a senior couple
in the mission and they return home soon. They are so sick!!!  Then we
went on exchanges with the assistants in ft belvoir. We taught so many
lessons! Elder rascon and I went and taught these two guys named Dan
and Brian. They are honor gaurd at ft belvoir about my age as well.
Super powerful lesson on the restoration. They basically taught
themselves! I can't even write how amazing the lesson was...it was
that good! The rest of the night we joked around with the aps. I'll
miss elder Blanchard when he goes home. He is so awesome. Friday was a
fun time as well! We had a zone service project for the McClean
community center. We helped set up a perimeter for a firework show and
also a little fair! It's going to be so awesome. I'm so sad we can't
go dangit! It was so hot outside but at the end they bought us some
pizza so we were happy. The lady in charge was asking about missionary
work and I told her about us and what we teach. She went through a
recent divorce and was sad I told her we would help her move out and
she lit up so fast! Ha I hope she embraces the gospel! The rest of the
day we tracted and people weren't home :/ Saturday we walked out of
our apartment and found fake poop at our door! It was so gross! We
didn't know who did it either. we had breakfast with our Ward mission
leader. He is a stud. We then helped a member in our Ward with a move.
It was fun spending time with the members. During our lunch break a
member from the leasing office came up to us and was like "you guys
need to call the cops for what happened to your door last night!" Ha
we knew it was missionaries and told them it wouldn't happen again. WE
FIGURED OUT IT WAS THE SISTERS IN OUR WARD! what the heck?! It was SO
FUNNY! Hahahahah sister missionaries made fake poop and put it at our
door....I'm still blown away. Our district went on a blitz and had a
fun time as well! Elder Murdock and I talked to a lot of people. It's
so sad how many people my age are atheist... We talked to this lady in
the street who was inactive. Her name was TK so we are going to try
and bring her to church some time soon. She seemed really nice. That
night we taught our less active gabe. We read from pmg about setting
goals and how if we have HOPE and FAITH we can accomplish them! He
wants to come back to church so badly. Saturday was just a good day it
was also super weird haha but probably one of my favorite days of my
mission. Sunday was good we had a lesson about enos in elder quorum.
Just so happens that enos is my favorite book in the Book of Mormon. I
love how many lessons are leaned in it. My favorite one I've come to
learn is that enos was an average joe who had a spiritual experience
and had his sins forgiven of him. It can happen to ANYONE! I love the
gospel and how simple it is! This week was great. I'm grateful for my
Heavenly Father and for my family! I hope you all have a wonderful
Independence Day! Love you all!
Elder Routsong