Week 31: Great Falls, VA "Strange Things are Afoot at the Circle K!"

Hello hello, everyone!!!

I hope you all had a great week, and enjoyed the company of the Spirit! He's kinda the best ;)

This week was pretty nuts!!!!! Lots to talk about!

First of all, Neil, Gisella's non-member husband, has been coming to church a lot recently! Like every week for the past month and a half! We've kinda taught him before, but he's just been so busy with his work. But early this week, we went by and sat down with him in his office and had an awesome discussion about what he thinks of the church and such. He said the church is great, and that Gisella's influence has been interesting him more and more recently. So he said he wanted to have more discussions with us! So we went back yesterday and had an awesome lesson with the Stake President! Neil said that he thinks he's on the path to baptism, and is going to be 100% in! No reservations! Pretty neat! He's super solid, and he has a solid influence at home with his wife, 2 baptized daughters, and Marianna, our recent convert!

Marco is still Marco... ☹ He's coming to church every other week becuse of work, and is still struggling hard core with smoking, and life in general... But we're gonna get him going again and get his enthusiasm back!!

We had Stake Conference this week, which was amazing! It was all about gathering Isreal through ministering missionary work. Gisella gave a talk about her experience with helping Marianna and it was awesome! Neil was there and the Stake President and President Caplin came and talked to him and Gisella. It was great! I'm super excited for that family!!!

So the big news!!!! I'm getting a big assignment change! President called me on Friday and asked if I would accept a call to become an ASL missionary!!!

So next Monday, my new companion, who is deaf, will be coming from the Independence Missouri mission to help me start an ASL program in the mission! We'll be covering part of an ASL branch which is half in our mision, half in the D.C. North mission. We'll cover our side so that the missionaries from the North mission in that branch don't have to leave their mission to come into our mission.

I'm crazy excited! But also freaking out a ton!!! Elder Poulsen will stay here and get a new companion, and I'm probably gonna move farther south into Alexandria area where more of the Deaf members live. But ya, super exciting!!! President told me to study ASL for 2 hours everyday this week till my new comp gets here next Monday! I'm definitely gonna need it! 

I hope you guys have an awesome week! Keep reading, keep praying, keep loving the Lord! Love you all!!

-Elder Duke