Seren's "Sick" Submersion

Friends and Family,

This week absolutely flew by here in Daytona. There were a lot of good

times and miracles seen this week! Taking a step back, it's unreal

that this week we will hit the half way mark for the month of August.

Times moving so quickly!

So we had a great start to our week Monday night after P-Day finished

up. "Grandpa" took us up to a restaurant called "Top of Daytona." The

circular building is 29 stories high with condo's on the first 28

floors. The 29th floor is a restaurant looking out over all of Daytona

and then out to the beach. "Grandpa" definitely spoiled us with a nice

dinner. 

Tuesday Elder Scott and I pushed ourselves by meeting with a lot of

our investigators. We met with Mrs. Jackson and she is looking good

for her baptism this upcoming Sunday the 16th! We are pumped to see

her enter the waters of baptism. She's so excited for it! We finished

up the night by finalizing Serena's baptism for Sunday and made sure

all was in check! We got it approved to watch "17 Miracles" which is a

movie about the early days of the Saints heading west out to Utah! It

was great to look around to see her and 11 other non members watching

that movie. Definitely something I'll never forget!

Wednesday we had another solid day meeting and finding some less

active members of the church. We saw one of the coolest miracles

Wednesday night! We received a media referral which definitely pumped

us up. We went to visit him and his name was David. He has 3 kids and

is looking for a church to go to! Doesn't get much more golden than

that! As we were walking out of his home on cloud 9, we had a middle-

aged guy say something to Elder Scott and I in the thickest country

accent I've ever heard. I wouldn't be able to do it justice if I tried

to sound as country as possible! We had no idea what he said, so we

had to ask him again, after some talking back and forth we found out that him and his wife want to find a church to raise their children in. We asked him about his family and he has 13 kids!!! We were blown away! We met them all! There are 8 kids under the age of 8. Those parents deserve an

award. They invited us in, and we were able to meet the entire crew!

Hahaha it was one of the craziest things I've ever seen. It took about

5 minutes going around the room to just hear their names. They invited

us back after discussing the Book of Mormon and thy sounded really

interested. How cool is that?

Thursday was our big ZTM (Zone Training Meeting.) It was a great

meeting as we had a deep heart to heart with the missionaries in our

stewardship. We talked about having a long lasting conversion for

ourselves, then to have that motivate our efforts. We feel like it

helped missionaries understand they are accountable to our Heavenly

Father which is truly our deepest motivation. After the meeting we had

to get the classic Tongue Tacos from our favorite ghetto restaurant

with the Elders in the Zone! Thursday night we finished up with some

Elders Quorum basketball!

Friday morning I woke up feeling pretty sick. Throughout our weekly

planning it continued to get worse. I was hoping it was just a common

24-hour cold and it would go away the next day. We were able to drive

up to the Bunnell area for a baptismal interview for one of their

investigators. These interviews are one of my favorite things to do as

a missionary. It's inspiring to see individuals make such a big change

and are ready for the sacred promise at baptism.

Saturday we had exchanges with the assistants and I felt just as

crummy. After calling the mission nurse, it ends up I have a sinus

infection... It stinks, but what do you do?

We powered through the day seeing a lot of people prepare for church

the following day. I spent the day with Elder Tucker from Highland,

Utah. After talking for a little bit we made the connection that he

was good friends with my cousin Adam for most of his life. They've

played on the same teams and have been buddies for a long time. It's

crazy to see how small the world is... Especially in the Church!

Sunday was the big day for Serena! The baptism went really well and

the spirit in the room was great. We had a couple investigators attend

and they loved the service as well. We've been working with a less

active young adult since I've been here and 2 weeks ago he received

the Aaronic Priesthood. This week he was able to participate in a

baptism. It was definitely something I'll never forget!

Well, I'm having the time of my life here at Daytona Beach. As the

weather is cooling down, the miracles are rising. School starts back

up for some of our investigators this week, so this will free up some

more time for us to find some more people! Thanks again for all of the

support. I couldn't do it with out you all.

With love

-Elder Doman