African Dreams and Pitbull

African visions:

I'll let you in on a little secret: "I had a vision," is something we hear at least once a week. The first time I heard it I was so surprised and excited the entire time it was being explained (even though it was all in French and I needed it to be translated) I sat on the edge of my seat. But then it kept happening and I started losing interest. 

Here's an example of a typical "African vision":

I was 3 years old in my vision. And then, suddenly, I was an adult  eating a raw pumpkin in a corn field. Then, my pumpkin disappeared and I walked through the cornfield until I found a cake. And I ate the cake and I was really happy because it was vanilla flavored and that's my favorite flavor, like, I really really like vanilla. Especially when there's frosting in the middle. I also like carrot cake. Chocolate cake however, is too sweet for me. Anyway, I was eating this vanilla cake and I was so happy and my hands were covered in frosting because I was eating with my hands because I hate using forks. And I was laughing and dancing and cake crumbs were spewing out of my mouth. Then I was being crucified next to Jesus except my body was made out of cake and the Roman soldiers were all gingerbread men and it was raining milk. Then I was laid in a tomb and there were all these bats flying around eating my cake corpse. Then I woke up.

AND THAT'S HOW I KNOW THE DOCTRINE OF THE TRINITY IS FALSE AND THE FATHER, SON, AND HOLY GHOST ARE ACTUALLY THE SAME PERSON.

You're tired of hearing it that you dont even bother telling them that the doctrine of the trinity is that the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost are the same person. So you kind of just sit there until the guy stops giving examples that his pastor gave him. And of course since everyone has the same pastor we hear the same examples every time.

This week, however, we had a welcome change the the visions. We taught this guy the Restoration and when we finished he held up his hand and said that ever since he went to Stake Conference (he started going to church before we started teaching him) he had had the same vision every night. 

There was an Island, surrounded by dark water. It was cloudy. On the Island were three trees being gently moved by the breeze. And then, it started to rain and the wind picked up.It rained harder and harder and the trees got blown over one by one. And the Island was then drowned in the sea. 

I was waiting for the accusation or the claim about something to do with the trinity, or that Brenham was a true prophet and Joseph Smith wasn't but, it never came. 

Instead he told us, "The meaning of this dream is that there must be a Restoration; with Prophets, apostles, and revelations. I believe your church is the restored church of Jesus Christ." 

We were stunned, apparently he had been reading the Restoration pamphlet over and over since we gave it to him on Sunday. He knew all the basic doctrine of the Restoration. 

After the closing prayer he asked when he could be baptized. Again, shocking. Not wanting to rush in to anything we told him he should probably read a chapter or two from the Book of Mormon before he committed to baptism.  

Pitbull:

Everyone in Texas has a pitbull. Like, about 70-80% of the dogs are pitbulls. Mostly they're pretty chill with us knocking on their owners door and petting them. Then only time a pitbull has ever bit me is when a small pitbull puppy was gumming on my shoelaces. 

Wednesday we were walking back to our car when this 90ish pound pitbull trotted up to us. It seemed pretty friendly so we let it follow us back to the car. I let it's head and told it to go home. It turned around and I opened my door. Instantly the dog flipped around and jumped into the car and sat down on my seat licking Elder Alleman's face. It was funny at first but when I tried to pull it out it growled at me. Not wanting to be known as Frodo for the rest of my life I tried to passively coax it out but that didn't work. Eventually, a frustrated Elder Alleman shoved it aggressively out of the car. It whimpered, licked my hand and walked away. And that's possibly the closest I've come to losing my hand.

Love y'all,

--Elder Murdoch