A Rainy Week!

Hello everyone! This week things went pretty well. We didn't have a lot of appointments scheduled so we did a lot of finding. I think I knocked a million doors. Not really. We knocked a lot but it was pretty fun! We met an older couple (in there late 80's) Tom and Erma. We knocked on there door and this little old lady comes to the door and yells to someone "its the Mormons". In my head I was thinking oh no here it comes she is not going to be happy to see us. She swung the door open and smiled and said "Come in" before we could get a word out! We taught them the restoration and invited them to be baptized. The declined which happens a lot. Then we tried to address there concerns and asked them to pray about baptism. They wouldn't even commit to praying about baptism. It was sad. Tom and Erma are the first people I have taught that wouldn't even commit to praying about baptism or to know if the church is true and has been restored to the earth. It was very sad to see. We continued to talk with them. We asked if there was anything we could do for them and they asked us to help them fix there hand rail. We quickly undid some bolts and showed them that they need to buy some parts. Then as we were saying good bye I noticed a small hand gun by Tom. I said that is a cool .22. He said thank you. I thought for a half second I was going to have to shoot whoever was at my door but then we saw it was the Mormons. Then we all started laughing because he obviously was joking.

The last experience I want to share happened yesterday. We again found ourselves knocking doors. We had been knocking for about an hour without anyone letting us in. Then we knocked into a family from Liberia. THey were a really nice family and REALLY hard to understand! We taught them the Restoration right as we started talking about the Book of Mormon there was a knock at the door. Two other ladies from Liberia walked in that knew the wife, Patience, when the lady that walked in Mable saw us she said Ive been looking for the church! She had been baptized while she lived in Salt lake City. She instantly started testifying to the family who was struggling understanding prophets and the Priesthood authority. All of there concerns were resolved. It was an awesome miracle! I love seeing and recognizing the miracles we see EVERY Day! It is awesome to be a missionary of Jesus Christs restored church! Have a great week!

I hope you can all understand my email. Sometimes they don't make sense to others like they do to me so sorry! haha Also I was able to go on exchanges with Elder Burtenshaw. He is from Mud Lake, Idaho and I knew him a little before the mission. He is a great missionary. We were in the MTC together! Attached is a picture of Elder Burtenshaw and myself! Sorry for the long email!

-Elder Lords

Coreana was confirmed!

Hey!

Well this week went pretty well. Coreana who was baptized several weeks ago finally got back from Texas and got all settled in. She was confirmed by Elder Cox sunday at church! It was awesome that she was finally confirmed! She is doing well. Her daughter loves church and so that helps motivate her to come!

We also had the opportunity to watch "Meet The Mormons" with 2 of our investigators. They both really enjoyed the movie. I love meet the Mormons it is a great film. I also had a pretty cool opportunity yesterday. I interviewed Dwayne for baptism and it was my first interview. I was pretty nervous because I kept thinkin what if he isn't ready and I have to tell him he needs a little more time. Well I sat down and got to know him. He likes to watch baseball and football so we talked about that and his family. Then we started the interview and he knew his stuff. He has such a strong desire to get baptized and I knew without a doubt by the power of the holy ghost that he was ready for baptism. It was awesome! The weather has been great this week! It rained like crazy on Thursday but other than that it has been good! I love the warm weather! But it makes me want to go camping haha! No camping for me for a while. I wanted to volunteer to go with the scouts but we aren't allowed to go camping. Our job is missionary work haha! Have a great week! Love you all!

-Elder Lords

Conference Week!

Hey Everyone,

Things are going good from over here in Iowa. Today we received our transfer calls. I knew that I would be staying in Easter Lake(South Des Moines) with Elder Cox because we have 6 more weeks left of training then I will probably be transferred. By then I will have been here 6 months!That is crazy! I feel like I just got here yesterday! . President Jensen also called me to be the District Leader here in Easter Lake. Im a little nervous for that but it will help me grow as a missionary im sure.  

We had a pretty good week. Things were slower than usual but we were able to teach Kayla who is Korys wife. Kayla and Kory are a sweet young couple. They both just graduated college and Kayla is an auditor and Kory is a computer programmer so they are both really smart. It has been fun to teach them and on Wednesday we will be watching Meet the Mormons with them I am really excited!

This week we are hoping to find a few more people to teach. I loved what I learned from conference. Im so grateful to have a Prophet and apostles leading and guiding our church with Christ as the head. The apostasy was so real. I would encourage everyone to study the apostasy. It will build your testimony of the Restoration and that we have the Priesthood authority restored to the earth! I hope you all have a great week! Love you!

-Elder Lords 

P.S that is our new mission car haha! I wish! That is Elder Roberts our ties had matching patterns on Easter and so we took a picture. That is supposed to be my Easter looking tie!   

 

 

What a Life!

Hey Everyone,

Well this week was pretty good. Life as a missionary can be so strange. We were blessed to find a couple of new people to teach again this week. We met an awesome family named Ryan and Chastity. They are an African-American family from Illinois. They are really cool! I am super excited to continue to teach them. We also met a pretty cool guy named Blake. we taught him and he had a lot of questions. He asked about Gays and the church. It was one of the more awkward lessons on my mission but it was great!

We also had exchanges with the Zone leaders this week. I went with Elder Roberts he is from New Port Beach, California. We had a nice time on exchanges.

This week on Tuesday we had Zone conference. Zone Conference involves a little over 1/3 of the mission. It was fun to see a lot of the missionaries that I know. I have made a lot of great friends out here. Zone Conference was such a spirit filled meeting. It was also a little long. It was from 9 to 430. It is divided into a morning and afternoon session with lunch in between at about 12. I was grateful for the meeting. It really gave me a boost. I had been feeling pretty crummy and that meeting somehow just picked up me up and refocused me on what is important.

I am so grateful for the chance to serve a mission. It is so hard sometimes because you grow to love people so much and want to see that happy but they don't always understand the happiness that comes from living the gospel. I hope all is well! Have a great week! Love you all!

-Elder Lords

 

 

Hello!

Hey!

Things are going pretty well out here. The weather is warming up and that is so nice. Today the high is 80! That is pretty exciting! I am enjoying being here in Des Moines. We have the opportunity to meet so many different people and see so many different cultures. It is a pretty diverse plays comparatively speaking to Rexburg, Idaho haha! This week we knocked into an apartment complex of Muslims it was very interesting.

We knocked quite of few doors this week which can be such an interesting experience. You never know who you are going to knock into. We were in a very interesting neighbor hood/ apartment complex and we met very interesting people haha! The picture attached below is from the neighborhood haha! We have been able to keep in contact with Coreana while she is in Texas. Ive been a little stressed about that because she still hasn't been confirmed yet. We have a lesson with Jackie tonight and she is Progressing really well towards getting Baptized on April 11. I hope all is well. Have a great week! I love you all!

-Elder Lords

What a Week!

Hey Everyone,

What a week it has been. The stress in missionary life can be stressful haha! So last week I talked about how Coreanas date was going to have to be moved back. Well during Pday we got a call from President Jensen. He had heard about Coreana and her date being moved and he said to do everything we could to get her Baptized. I thought it would be impossible. We went to work anyways. President Jensen wanted her to get baptized so she could have the gift of the Holy Ghost when she left this week to go see family in Texas. So we meet with her everyday this last week helping her prepare for Baptism. She passed her interview on Wednesday and we announced the baptism as best we could. Usually we announce them the Sunday before but we didn't think she would be getting baptized.

It ended up being the most spirit filled baptism ive been apart of or seen on my mission. Coreana was so excited to get baptized. She was sitting in the gym before the baptism listening to the prelude music and she just cried and cried from then until after she was baptized. It was cool to see her get baptized. She almost didn't come because she was feeling to sick she texed and told us that. I was stressing out!

The only sad part to the story is she didn't show up to church sunday to get confirmed before she left to Texas! She texted and said "im too sick to come. ill see you when im back from texas." Well immediately I went into thinking like my Dad. The thoughts going through my mind are things my Dad would say to me on Sunday. "If your too sick to come to church then your too sick to hang out with your friends next weekend!" haha then I really wanted to tell her that if she was to sick to come to church she was too sick to go to Texas haha. I didn't tell her that. We just told her the blessings that would come if she came to church and how important it is. She didn't come and I was so sad, but Heavenly Father gave us our agency. She choose not to come and will have to wait 2 weeks to receive the gift of the holy ghost when she is back. This week we also knocked into a Ton of Muslims it was very interesting. That is a very interesting experience and the church has strict rules on teaching them because their lives can be endanger if the return to there homelands.

Anyways we had a good week. Things are going well and Elder Cox is doing awesome! He is really working into the swing of missionary work! Love you all! 

 

 

Happy Monday!

Hey Everyone!!!

I hope everything is going well. We had a crazy/busy/good week haha! We got a call from our vehicle coordinator Elder Shelley telling me that he got us a car! I was so happy! It is so nice having a full time car and not walking all over! We got a 2013 Subaru Impreza. Its a pretty nice all wheel drive car!

Well my new companion is Elder Davis Cox. He is from Kaysville, Utah. We have been having a good time together. He is a nice guy. We have a lot of the same interest. I.e Football, Baseball, camping, fishing, outdoor stuff.

We had kind of a hard week. Coreana was supposed to get interviewed this week so we could announce her baptism for next Saturday. So Elder Cox and myself went over the interview questions with her the night before and she couldn't remember any off the commandments. It broke my heart. Then she told us that she drank tea and so we had to move her baptism date back. Its been really hard/sad because she wants to get baptized so bad. Plus she leaves to Texas for 2 weeks and so we will have like no contact with her other than over the phone.

Im grateful for prayer and being able to turn to our Heavenly Father for help. This week I was having a lot of feelings of inadequacies. I have been feeling some mission stress and I turned to my Heavenly Father in prayer and felt comforted. I hope all is well! I love you all!

(Pictures-The picture with 3 of us my new companion is the one on the right. The other picture is me and Elder Hatfield he finished his mission this transfer and is one of my good friends.)