Email Received May 24, 2006
Thanks for the great email. This has been an intense week.
First of all, the Boren’s time is really running out. Their house is packed. The last of the mission conferences happened Monday and Tuesday. They will be out of here before we all know it. The Searle’s get here on the 30 of June, and the Boren’s are gone on the 1st of July. President Searle will have about 1 week to do interview every single missionary, and do transfers before the end of the next cycle.
So, this week has been a lot of ups and downs. As always, we are looking for some good people to teach. We have been doing a lot of street contacting, tracting, and member work, trying to find some quality investigators. We have a few people that we were working with, and one, A____, who we thought was going to be really good, but nothing is working out so far.
Apparently, that is the trend in the mission. So, President Boren challenged each of us to pray with our companions in order to find a “new way” to work the area. I have definately been pondering that for a while, since White Plains/Scarsdale is a very unique area and certainly the techniques of the Bronx and Danbury may not apply. So, I’ll be thinking and praying of a new way to do missionary work here. Any suggestions would definately be appreciated.
Andy, I want to address Running Start vs. Eastlake. I honestly think that Running Start would look better on an application vs. AP classes, since Running Start is actual college class (the teachers don’t know if you are a RS student or not). Also, AP classes are college level, but not college pace, which makes a difference. For example, 12 weeks of Math 124 is equivalent to (1 year of AP Calc 1 + Passing the AP Test), so, in my opinion AP looks better. It will be interesting, you are catching up to me in education. If you can, try to graduate BCC with an Associates degree. That will open a lot of doors for you. That would be my advice anyway.
So, lets see, we worked hard this week and none of our investigators came to church. That was a little bit of a bummer, but it happens. As I said, we are really trying to find high quality investigators - people who will come to church without too much prodding, and who are actively investigating the church.
I am thinking of some way to hold an open religious seminar or forum and how to advertise it here in Scarsdale and White Plains. We could hold it at the church, and even invite people from the local churches and synagoges. That would be fun. I’m not sure how successful it would be.
I went on a split yesterday with Elder Hinds in his area, Mount Vernon. He has been out almost a cycle now, and his companion, Elder Johnson, is going home. So, we did the spilit and I let him direct everything, to see if he had a good handle on the area. He did. Elder Hinds is pretty special, and he is kind of in his own world sometimes, but he has what it takes to be a good missionary, and I have faith that he will develop well.
The weather has been pretty good here lately, hovering around 70 degrees. It rains hard when it rains, but it hasn’t been too bad this week. Just one or two bad days.
On Saturday, we helped the Yonkers missionaries tract in their area. I was with Elder Bostwick, and we found some good people. A young Ukrainian man who was interested in learning more about the church, and learning English. Also, a Jordanian Catholic who had been an investigator several years before. Hopefully the Yonkers Elders can help them to progress.
It was so great to talk to everybody on Mother’s day. It is interesting all the things that are happening in the ward. Our ward is a great ward though. The ward here is really good. It is interesting, because there is a huge amount of economic diversity in the ward. There is a very high upper class - wall street business men, investment bankers, etc, and then there are some poorer people who live in Yonkers. There are a handful you young student families, in some form of higher education (medical, legal, etc). We are trying to focus on finding people like them, young families that are just starting out. So, to do that, it would be best to work with those members and find out who their neighbors and friends are. That has been one of our approches. We have also been working with the Scarsdale members, and the White Plains members that we know. Hopefully a referral will come soon. We just have to work and pray for it.
Alright, I better get going. Dad, thank you so much for the check. I really appreciate it. I will deposit it today. And we have had some good meals in the last few days so that is good. I hope you have a great time in Scotland and England. It must be cool to see all the old buildings and stuff. However, it will be nice to be home.
Alright, I love you so much. I’m off to go look in to some college stuff.
Please take care. Be careful. I love you all with all my heart.
Love,
Elder Stephen J. Barr