A few months into our mission, we realized the young Mescalero boys were great candidates to be misionaires in the future. We gathered them together to teach them how to use their scriptures and work on the Duty to God award. They were so excited. We started with two young men and now have five. They have been praying and reading the scriptures. They have even given tqalks in sacrament meetings and they just completed their first service project.
We gathered together on Saturday to clean out the branch shed, which by the way has not been cleaned in many years. They worked hard filling a truck load of junk, rat droppings, cobwebs and organzing the shed. We carried out a lot of boxes from our little chapel and extra chairs that have been taking up a lot of room. We actually had a lot of fun!!!! One of the members brought a non-member who helped us as well. They had a lot of fun acting like ghost buste3rs, (which we called "Goof Busters"), chasing each other around and getting acquainted. Lots of pizza, root beer and ice cream brought shouts of joy. They most fun part for the boys was playing basketball, each team fighting valiantly to win. We too the young missionaires that live with us up to help with this project. Side by side we watched as our Missionairews and our Mescalero Warrios worked and played together as brothers. We stood with pride on the baksetball court outisde our little church as people from the village drove by watching Native American boys playing basketball with two missionaries in white shirts and ties together. They couldnt believe it!!! It was a wonderous sight!! The next day in curch, I overheard the boys taling about how much fun they had. They asked us if they could get together again this Wednesday to work some more on their Duty to God Award and again on Saturday to play basketball. How can you beat that? They have a campout planned for June 17, which we are calling a Father and sons's outing.
We are working hard to get this little branch to fellowship and feel good about themselves and their little branch. It is great to see them grow.
