Being Bold

 

 This week has been pretty dang great. This time around with my new companion, I find myself taking initiative more than I did in my past companionships. A lot of the time with my past comps, usually the split for how much each of us teach is about 50-50, which is great. But some times my comp will take over and teach a little bit more than I did and that's usually because I would be a little reserved. Well, that situation is sort of reversed where I'm at now, sometimes I lead out and teach a bigger portion of the lesson and Elder Jaszkowiak loves it. He says that he feels like in a lot of his companionships he has to do everything, and it he says that it's super nice having someone who can hold their own or even beyond that. Definitely a great compliment to receive, I guess you could say I'm becoming more confident and more outgoing. 

 I don't know if I mentioned in my last email that my companion, Elder Jaszkowiak, is going to complete his mission this transfer which means I'm going to "kill him off." That means I'll be getting a new companion, and I'll get a bunch of his extra stuff. 😎 I had an interview with President this last week and he actually told me I'm going to be training either this next transfer or the one after that. I'm super stoked for that because I know I'll grow so much. There's things I want to change in my missionary skillset and I feel like training is the best way to do that because I want to show the best example for my trainee so I'll need to become that and I'll want to become that if that makes any sense.

 I did something pretty bold this week. We received a training from some old guy named Brother Donaldson who knows Preach My Gospel like the back of his hand. He taught us (more like reminded us) about teaching lessons through questions and even more specifically he pointed out that we should be asking people to be baptized more often. First visit if you have to. So that's what I've been trying, I asked two referrals to be baptized and one of them said yes. Other one, well he was hesitant, wants to feel ready which is fantastic because that's what we are there for. Let me tell you guys, it feels real good to be bold, so much adrenaline. 

 Well, that's all I got for now. There's probably more to write but I was late to write an email and I'm being peer pressured to go to Popeyes right now. Gotta go. 🍗

 

Love y'all, 

--
Elder Batman

New Area, New Comp

 

 It's about time I get sent out of Foley to go experience elsewhere. I lived there for almost 8 months and I was definitely ready to leave. The area is amazing, I'll miss it dearly, but I felt like my growth was at a peak and it was time to get going. I kind of figured I was leaving too. As soon as I found out that my recent convert, Kristina, gave us an engagement announcement and told us she had plans of getting sealed when she could, that's when I figured my work is probably done in Foley. It was basically mission accomplished for her, I've been working with her since the very beginning of my mission and now she's making the big covenants and ordinances with God and I couldn't be happier. Sealed for time and all eternity and I was apart of that, surreal. 

 Now to the new area; Northport. This area is very cool. Our apartment is way nice, two separate bathrooms which is always a blessing, a nice big study area and my new comp is fairly clean so it all looks great in here. Oh and the bed... yeah I've been sleeping really well. I don't know what brand my mattress is but I love it and sleep like a baby when I'm on it. My new comp, Elder Jaszkowiak, is super dope. His name is spelt really odd, I'm not even gonna try to explain to you how to pronounce it, but most of the time I call him Elder Jazz for short. He's 6'5" which in interesting since I'm not 6'5", like at all. He's from Ogden, Utah and him and I get along really well. Very chill guy, only has one more transfer left so I am going to kill him off and get a new companion. He is the Zone Leader for this area which would probably make you think that I'm a Zone Leader too but that is incorrect. Depending on the area, we either have one or two ZL's but this area does not need two. So I'm what they call the "zone chump" or just the Zone Leader's companion. It's kinda nice actually, basically I experience all the benefits of being a Zone Leader like going to private leadership meetings and doing exchanges with the AP's, but I don't hold any of the responsibility! So, yeah, that's pretty great. This area is beautiful, it's right next to the University of Alabama so I see a lot of attractive women while driving around here and I'll never complain about that. Speaking of driving, our car situation is interesting. We drive a 2019 Ford Ekko Sport which basically is a roller skate. Super intimidating looking. But hey, it doesn't have a TiWi (the driving buzzkill that yells at us if we go too fast) since it is a rental vehicle. We still are definitely supposed to monitor our speed, but if I ever am almost late to an appointment, I now have the option to not be late if you know what I mean. Oh and I was definitely joking about it being intimidating, it's actually pretty pathetic looking. I kinda just feel like a soccer mom while driving it.

 The work in this area is interesting. It for sure feels like the ward is on pause due to COVID which isn't good so we are working on getting this ward going, trying to make them realize they can still function even if they can't meet. I'm very stoked to be here because Elder Jaszkowiak definitely wants to grind it out for his last transfer and I'm happy to help in doing that. 

 That's all I got for this week, til next time.

Love y'all 

--
Elder Batman

 

Shingles

 This last week has been quite a drag honestly. Our success has been very inconsistent, we set up like 9 different appointments this week and only 2 went through. A little discouraging forsure. We already are struggling with finding things to fill our time but then when people don't answer or can't meet up, that just adds more time to the 'what the frick are we supposed to do' category. We had a plan of putting 3 people in the same family on baptismal date this week but they had to cancel which is unfortunate. 

 Sorry, I don't have much to report on this week so I'll just give you some unneeded filler information real quick:

 Since we have a lot of extra time, I've kinda just been deep doctrine diving from any church source I can get my hands on. I read a lot of responses to Anti-Mormon material so I can best combat those attacks myself. Also recently just got into reading Saints which is fantastic, loving that book so far. We also like to make Facebook attempts by going into Bible Lover's group pages and asking thought provoking questions and then message the people that respond. There's a lot of other things that we do, mostly call the people on our list of referrals and nonmembers and just annoy the heck out of them until they get baptized. 

 Oh yeah, I have the shingles now. What a joy that is. I don't even know how I got it, I wouldn't say I'm particularly very stressed at this point in time, I've been vaccinated, I don't think I've been around anybody who has had it recently. I got no clue. All I know is it kinda eats rocks. Its all over my left arm going around my back. The worst of it is just the joint pain which makes it so I can't lift anything with my left arm without a lot of pain. The shingles themselves though, all the red blisters things, they don't really hurt all that bad. Just an annoying pulsating feeling. I do have to take 5 pills a day so that's not so fun but it's okay. I've heard a lot worse situations involving shingles and pain. Mine is just super inconvenient (like it could ever be convenient) because I'm on my mission. I'll be alright though, I'll just bite the bullet for a little while. 

 That's all I really got. Of course there's the service we do at the thrift stores and puppy barns, but there wasn't much that was interesting to note there. Just the same old. I do apologize for this email, its lame for sure. Count on next time to be better, because I definitely am.

--
Elder Batman

Actual Interviews For Once

 

Can you believe that we are finally able to do mission meetings IN PERSON now? We were told that about a month ago, yet for some odd reason we still did Zone Conference two weeks ago over Zoom. 🤔 I got no idea, I guess that rule is still inconsistent. Anyway, we did get to do Interviews in person, got to have a 3 minute heart-to-heart with the man himself President Allred. He's a scary dude yet super loving. Honestly a very good combination for a mission president. Our interview was mostly about how I'm doing with my new companion (it's going fantastic by the way) and he also said he's very proud of the new light he sees in me. I was a bit lost in the beginning of my mission, still turned to my old teenage behaviors in certain situations. But I've grown out of a lot of them, starting to channel the real ''Jackson Batman'' you could say. My mission president says I'm super close to being an amazing missionary, just a couple of kinks need to be sorted out. He has high faith in me and I believe in myself as well. 

   We got bashed again, that was fun. One of our most recent converts, K, invited us over early Sunday morning at 8:00 to just give them the sacrament and that was it- or so we thought. Keep in mind, we did have a 9:00breakfast appointment so this little get together really needed to be quick. Anyway, we get to her house and apparently one of her old friends who she used to minister with in another church for a long time was staying for a couple days just to spend some time with K and the others. Well, K said that he usually sleeps in til about 9:00 or 10:00 so they most likely won't interfere with our sacrament meeting. He definitely was awake for it, he intentionally woke up earlier than usual just so he could see us and bash us. We actually did the sacrament with him, we thought the dude was pretty cool and chill. Well, as soon as it's over, he completely questions some of the most deep doctrine in our church. He goes, "Go on, tell her about how you're gonna have your own planet." The spirit of contention was very much present so it wasn't a productive learning environment so we kind of gave them a simple answer and had to leave before we were late. My companion was fired up for sure, I had to calm him down because he was so ticked. Its whatever, that's the life of the missionary. It really is like that sometimes. 🤷‍♂️

   We had a fantastic lesson with a Bible referral who we eventually got to take lessons. It was wonderful, she invited her two kids (ages 7 & 16) to join on the discussion of the Plan of Salvation. They were engaged, super interested in everything we had to say. The little one probably asked the most questions, and you would think someone as young as that would ask some not-so productive questions, but you'd be wrong. She was hitting us with some heater questions. Caught us off guard a couple of times. But yeah, we're going over there tonight for another lesson. Very excited for that, we're getting close to potentially asking them to be baptized. 👀

   Well the life of quarantine is sort of over, but it almost seems like its about to make a comeback for a sequel. I spent 82 days in that church building staring at my hand and attempting to contact people using Facebook. Holy heck was that a trainwreck at times, but there was some small miracles here and there. I don't really want to go back to that self-isolation again but if we have to I'll bite the dang bullet. 

  Alright, I'm gonna stop talking now. Didn't get hit on by any gay guys this week, but hey, maybe next week? You never know what's gonna happen when your dressed so classy all the time. 

Love y'all, 

--
Elder Batman

Was

Getting Hit On

 It's been a crazy last two weeks, allow me to elaborate. As I mentioned in last email, we are now able to do service at whatever place allows us in. Luckily for us, that's all the places we were doing service at before; Salvation Army, the Waterfront Thrift Store, and the Animal Shelter. But, this week, a member asked if we could mow their lawn. Sounds easy enough, right? Well, we get to this place and it was about a 45 minute drive and it's a beach house. The yard is huge, and they warned us of this bumpy roots that stick out of the ground that screw the lawn mower up. Well these roots were everywhere so we were constantly having to maneuver our way around these things so we don't destroy their beloved mower. They also warned us that on the trees that were all around the yard, they have these caterpillars on them that'll bite you if you tick them off. The way to tick them off is to get too close to the tree. Yeah, I have no idea, it was freaky. Luckily I was not bit. I wonder what that would feel like. 

 Okay, I'll go over what I titled this email. Yes, I got hit on. A member invited us out for dinner at Cracker Barrel. He asked us originally for a suggestion of where to go and we said Lambert's but the wait turned out to be two to three hours so that was a big no. So we compromised for Cracker Barrel. Anyway, we have dinner, its going great, our waiter was kinda chatty, very interested in taking extra time to talk to our table and me specifically. You would think that would be the person who was hitting on me. Boy was I wrong. We walk out of the restaruant after paying and as I'm walking out, a girl who works there hands me a little note and said "I think you dropped this." I read the note and come to find out that the note was from the DUDE that showed us to our table. Yeah, I don't swing that way man. Nor do I swing anyway on my mission. I guess I have to respect the courage. What a weird night. 

 It was also my new companion Elder Daw's birthday on the 20th and as his comp I'm supposed to make his day special or whatever. Luckily Elder Daw's mom hooked me up with some cake making ingredients in the mail, but I've never baked in my life so I was sort of anxious. Fortunate for me, these little cakes were super tiny and required very little effort to put together, and also Elder Moore helped. He actually ended up doing most of it... I may have planned it that way. 🤷‍♂️

 One of our most recent converts, Kristina, actually has hopped on to the Mutual app. You don't know you exciting that is for the missionaries who baptized her. I was ecstatic. It is so dope to see that the people she finds attractive on the app are the usually the ones who have pictures of them with missionaries because she knows that means the guy is a good person a good member. My fricken heart man. She is actually hitting off with one dude and she wants us to call him with her present so we can interrogate the guy. In this situation, we definitely feel like parents in a way, so next week with her is going to be hilarious. 

 I got bible bashed for the first time on my mission the other day, that was interesting? We got a referral from a guy who requested a Book of Mormon, so we were just doing our duty and dropping off the sacred blue book. Well, we go to the wrong house because the lot of houses in that area was a little confusing. The nice couple who answered the door helped us realize where it was and we said goodbye, but as we are walking away, the man comes up to us and says "Actually I got a few things to say to you guys real quick." He just immediately dips right into the most deep doctrine most profound questions in our church and says that it's insane and that we should "really evaluate the church you choose to believe in." What a crazy canoe. I tried to speak and explain ourselves a little bit, but he would just cut me off immediately. Bashers love to just ask a like ten different questions, give you three seconds to respond, and then interrupt you and call it leaving us 'dumbfounded' and stumped. Congrats dude, you won. I should've walked so much sooner, I just never had that before so I tried to cooperate with the uncooperative. Woops.

Alright, that's it for now, til next email. 

Love y'all, 
--
Elder Jackson Batman

The End Of Quarantine

   

I'm sorry for not writing an email last week guys, just completely spaced it. Now that we have officially been let out of quarantine, missionary work as I once knew it is still a lot different. No way in heck will our mission go back to the old fashion door-to-door Book Of Mormon sales pitch and just get an hour of slammed doors in our face. No no, we have grown far from that from this 81 day long quarantine (we had a big tally marking on the chalk board). Facebook is for sure the play now. I don't know if you guys saw, but we try and make little videos now and try to get the social media channels flooded with good stuff, and there is no better good thing than the gospel of Jesus Christ. Also calling people on the phone instead of driving to the end of our area to their home, that is now the play. Moral of the story; tracting is wack and we are not going back. 

   I'm currently sick while writing this email, but that's okay. We went to the beach today for pday and I think I may have had too much sun and not enough water. Also taco bell didn't hit the stomach very well, not our best idea after a lot of activity. I just took a fat 2 hour nap and I'm feeling a little bit better. At least enough to go to the church and go watch a movie. Oh yeah, we can still do that, kinda nice even though quarantine is over. Anyway, we'll see how I am tomorrow after a good night sleep. 

   It crazy how busy we've been as soon as quarantine got lifted from us. We have been able to visit everybody we were teaching in quarantine and bunch of other members that Elder Daw hasn't met yet. We're working on getting this older guy named N on baptismal date, but he's a tough cookie. He plays the organ at a Methodist church and still has an attachment to the place, yet he reads the Book of Mormon everyday and is active in our ward when going to church was a thing. We told him to pray about becoming a member of our church and he said he would, we'll see what happens. 

   I mentioned we went to the beach for pday today, it was super fun. This time around we actually met these two guys in their 20s who saw us playing two hand touch football and wanted to join us. One dude was named R, a tall skinny black guy who informed us that he was a little hungover from liquor the night before. It was pretty apparent because he was dead after the first 4 plays even though he looks in shape and is a gymnastic instructor. The other guy was named J who was super jacked even though he was only 19. He was super nice, he let us play spikeball with his buddies afterwards and spikeball in the sand is just a blast. They asked for our snapchats afterward and we had to inform them who we were and that we don't have that. They gave us their numbers and honestly sounded interested in what we do and what we preach. We'll stay in contact for sure.

   We are also allowed to do service again, so now going to the Salvation Army and the Animal shelter is a weekly thing. I missed the workers and the puppies, good to finally see it all again. Obviously during a time like this, people are still terrified about the whole Corona virus and getting close contact with other people, so we still have to be really careful and wise with what we choose to do. Our mission advised us to not visit people who are 65 or older, and if you know our ward that wipes out a good 85% of the people we can visit. And these old people don't really mend well with technology, Zoom is like a second language even though I think it's the simplest thing ever. Whatever though, we'll still give technology a go with them.

Alright, I'm gonna go back to writing emails every week. Now I got have a lot more to report on so emails won't seem like such a drag to write anymore. But if I forgot, Jesus Christ was the only perfect human being and I am not Him. 

Love y'all,
--
Elder Batman

Out with the Old, In with the New

  

 It was only a matter of time, but yeah, I just got a new companion. His name is Elder Daw, he's from everywhere in the world because his dad is in the air force, he's been out for about 20 months and he and I get along pretty dang well. We have a similar humor style, a lot of laughs, similar stories from our past, really not much to complain about here. He knows how to solve rubik's cubes so therefore I now know how to solve rubik's cubes because I asked him day one. I look forward to working with the man, seems like I could learn a lot from him since he's had much experience and is quite smart to begin with. Let's see what more work we can get done here in the sacred land of Foley. Oh, I didn't mention that. I stayed in my area so that's 5 months here. Guess the mission president likes me here for some reason.

   Our mission now does transfers every 2 weeks to accommodate for the huge amount of missionaries that are being reassigned in the world so we did just have transfers again yesterday. No surprise there, I'm staying with Elder Daw because I just met him. This new routine definitely keeps us on edge because we aren't sure if we are gonna stay in our areas or not in 2 weeks. Strikes a bit of fear because transfers within themselves is already stressful as is but now we have 3 of them in the time we usually have 1. 

   Not only did I get a new comp, but so did the Spanish Elders we usually quarantine up with. Elder Bobadilla is now with Elder Moore and I like the dude a lot. He's a very competitive basketball player. I like to think that I am pretty good I guess but I found myself this P-day being very humbled after losing quite a few games to him. He won the state championship for his high school and he was the main leader for that so he definitely gives me some competition. In trying to learn as much as I can from because I love basketball. Oh, and Elder Moore was actually a reassigned missionary after serving in Puerto Rico for 14 months so he's got some experience which I can learn from as well. 

   I heard that my old comp, Elder Peterson, just broke his foot yesterday so that's a kick in the teeth. It was tripping over a little rug that was bunched up out of all things. Now he's on crutches with a boot on, very unfortunate. Doesn't seem like he'll go home for recovery but he doesn't really know the answer to that just quite yet. 

   Yeah I don't really have much else to write about. I mean, we've had a about 3 lessons this past 2 weeks and 3 or 4 Come, Follow Me readings with people so that's dope. Our main strategy right now is just calling every member in the word to introduce Elder Daw to them and then asking them if they've been doing Come, Follow Me consistently as a family. Sometimes we also ask if they'll let us teach them or tell scripture stories for good practice. Other than all of this, a lot chess, cards games, learning piano, watching approved Disney movies and staring at my hand. Oh and studying up the wazoo, makes my head hurt reading prophetic word so often. 

 

Well, I'm gonna go take some ibuprofen, til next email guys. 

Elder Jackson Batman