Week 66- and thy confidence shall wax strong..........

Well, another week come and gone! And this one a busy one too! I'm to the point where I'm thanking the Lord that I'm still on my feet and still have energy! But, that's how I've always wanted my mission to be, so I'm okay with that. :) As long as He does keep me on my feet ;) haha
Today for PDay, we're doing more music rehearsal, then us and some of the Elders are playing that zombie board game again.  NEXT week, however, we're going to the Manassas Battlefield :) I'm really PUMPED for that :)
So, mom asked about car wrecks, since there have been so many around here lately.   In short, here's how it works. If someone gets in an accident, there's a report they have to fill out for the mission. They usually call us and ask us to walk them through the process (though sometimes *cough cough* they know how the process works from previous experience haha). They call Sister Riggs (our medical go-to) and our Car Zsar (currently Elder Harris, from one of the office couples). Sister Riggs tells them to go the ER for medical clearance, D.r Dunn (our over-the-phone mission doctor) is contacted if from there more needs to be done. The missionaries also have to appraise the car and include that in the damage report. If more than $1500 of damage is done, they will usually lose driving privileges for the rest of their mission. So, it's a pretty long exciting process! haha

We're still getting many influxes of missionaries! We're getting blitzed! It's awesome! And kinda stressful! haha We're averaging 30 missionaries every 6 weeks. The next group his the ground on the 22nd!

So, this week was crazy busy! We had Mission Leadership Council again, which I always love, and tons of other meetings and paperwork to take care of, and amidst all of that, we got work done! We set a new personal record for me! This last week, we taught more lessons than any week of my mission! We were so busy! It was a BLAST!
By particular mention, L, the former rLDS man we are teaching is growing so much! He is being fellow shipped by some wonderful families in the ward, and he's loving the gospel and the doctrine that we share with him!
This week, MLC ( missionary leadership council) changed my life! Well, it does that one way or another every month, but this month will be one I remember for the rest of my life. I've been feeling a lot recently like I've been plateauing: as a missionary, as a servant of the Lord, and as a person in general. I haven't noticed the growth in myself that I wanted and that scares me! I ALWAYS want to be growing! And in MLC, we found a way to do that. We read "Thy Confidence Shall Wax Strong in the Presence of God" by Robert Quinn and talked about it. We are now doing the challenge that he explains in the talk. Our entire mission, having now built “a wall” as we learned from Nehemiah, is now going to dedicate that wall. We're consecrating ourselves over the next 40 days so we can more effectively enter the presence of God in our work. Yesterday, we started by fasting, and while fasting, we made a list of the things we needed to fix in ourselves. Now, day and night, we review that list with God and share with him our successes and struggles, and each day, we recommit to fixing those things about ourselves. I'm SO EXCITED for this! It's only day 2 and I'm noticing progress. It's amazing.
Another fun part of this 40-day effort we're doing, is it ends on September 13th. The Virginia Day of service that they used to do out here (and in other states) is now becoming a national day of service. The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints has spearheaded a lot of this effort, and in response to that, the Washington D.C. South mission has been invited to represent the church at the kick-off ceremony for the national day of service, which takes place at the Nationals game that day!!! So, we're getting to improve ourselves SOOO much in these 40 days, and at the end of it, we get a little celebration. It's amazing.
So, one problem with this. We usually do zone training the next week, but with a fast starting yesterday, we had to do zone training before then! So we had to fit it in Friday or Saturday, which proved difficult! We ended up doing two sessions! One Friday morning and one Saturday morning! The Spirit was so strong at each though, it was WORTH doing twice! I loved it!
Speaking of Saturday, we spent the whole day in our suit pants! We left halfway through studies to go to Zone Training (which we arrived at wearing neck braces just for fun ..with all the car wrecks we have been helping with[pictures to come next week]), then went from there, taught lessons all day, and didn't make it back home even to change until the night was over! We just collapsed! .... Then got up and planned for the next day... Then collapsed again!!! haha I LOVE days like that.
Well, I'm running out of time, but i love you all! Talk to you all soon! I can't wait to hear about your week! It sounds crazy! :)
-Matthew