December 2, 2019

I didn't get to talk to Elder Trezise today - you will see why from his email.  I felt so bad for him and can't wait to hear if they found the keys.

I have to email from my phone this week which is really hard so I apologize for it being short. But this week has been interesting. It started off really strong, and was a lot of fun. But Sunday Elder Brown locked the keys in the house, and we had to call for help which wasn't my favorite because I like doing stuff myself. I wasn't too mad though because we had a ton of success that day and it was pretty great.

But then yesterday rolled around. I was just getting frustrated at little things throughout the day, which was already not cool. I don't know why my patience was so low, it was just a tough day. Then Elder Brown lost the keys in the snow. On the key ring was our apartment keys, our car keys, and our keys to the church buildings. The church building keys all together cost about $100,000, so replacing them wasn't an option. So we were told we had to ask different members like Bishops that had keys to come and open the church buildings for us whenever we need to get in. Which is often. We searched in the snow where he dropped them for over 4 hours. I swear I dug up every inch of the snow where it could possibly be. I prayed about 30 times. It was probably the most faith shaking experience I've had on my mission. I just got angrier and angrier as I dug. My legs hurt, my bad knee was on fire, and when I had the keys for 5 months I never once lost them, and now within a week and a half Elder Brown lost them twice. I was so mad. The Assistants came to the rescue with a spare set of car keys... at midnight... guess who stayed up waiting for them while his 2 companions slept? Me. We woke up at 5 and went to the temple a little after 6. 

I am so, so grateful for the temple. I prayed so much yesterday, and with so much faith that we would find the keys, and we got nothing. But in the Celestial room of the temple I continued my prayer. I asked why. Which is the wrong question. The right question is, "What do I need to learn from this, and how can I learn it?" Well I had a very spiritual conversation with my Heavenly Father and I learned a lot. But mainly I learned to love. It wasn't Elder Brown's fault he lost the keys. And everything is going to turn out all right in the end. I just needed to let go. The three of us had a great conversation in the car ride back to Ammon. I could explain in more depth what I learned, what I felt, and what I heard. But honestly, that defeats the point. The point is for each of us to learn lessons in our own way and in our own time. 

I'm doing much better now, there's no need to worry about me. I love you all so much. I'll talk to y'all next week. 

-Elder Trezise