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.)

Transfer Week!

Hey Everyone,

How is everything going?? Well this week is transfer week. President Jensen called this morning and called me to train a new missionary. I said yes of course. I am not sure how I feel about it but im glad to give it a try haha! Things have been going pretty well. We are working with a lot of investigators now its time to decide who is ready to except the gospel and who is not. I had the strong feeling we need to spend more time finding and less time with investigators who want come to church or change. It is very hard though when you grow to love someone like Christ would love them.

Anyways so Elder Sessions will be getting transferred this Thursday. Im sad to see him leave. We had a really good time together. He is a great guy!  We have to be in Iowa City at 8:45 a.m for the Trainers meeting on Thursday. Iowa City is about 115 miles from here or 2 hours. I am curious to see who my companion is. There are only 4 new Elders coming to the mission so I have a 1 in 4 chance of guessing my companion haha!

This week we saw a miracle or an answer to a prayer. Coreana is an investigator who is preparing to get baptized on March 7th. She really wants to join the Church and get baptized. She hasn't missed church in 4 sundays which is a blessing by itself. The only thing holding her back is that she lives with her boyfriend and she has to be living the commandments for 2 weeks before baptism. She said she wanted to fast to make the decision of whether or not to marry him or break up with him and kick him out. Well we were hoping she would break up because we think he is abusive because sometimes we see her with bruising and we know he isn't leglally in the country. Well this week we tried calling her and she wouldn't answer. We were worried that she was going to drop us. But the Lord was watching out for her. Her boyfriend and her got into a fight. SHe kicked him out and he stole her phone. SHe was scared to live at her apartment so she spent a couple days with her Brother. We finally got in contact with her on Friday and she came to the ward game night on Saturday and then church sunday. Heavenly Father loves all his children and I would be an idiot not to recognize his hand in missionary work. Things get tough when I try to do things my way and not Heavenly Fathers way. Im so grateful to be a tool in Heavenly Fathers hand. I am about 100 pages from finishing the Book of Mormon for the 3rd time on my mission. I Love the Book of Mormon. It answers so many questions. Conference is only a little more than a month away and im excited for that! I love conference! I love you all! Have a great week! Sorry for the longish email!

-Elder Lords

I cant believe I have been out for 7 months!

Hey Everyone,

How is the weather back there in Idaho? Its been a little cold the last few days. For Pday yesterday we went bowling. It was pretty fun to be out bowling. We weren't in shirts and ties and it felt so weird. My first time in Public without a shirt and tie in 7 months haha! Then we went and played basketball at the stake center. Pday is always a pretty good day.

We had a good week last week. A lot of walking. We figured we averaged about 10 miles of walking each day. Its hard because we have scheduled appointments and then any free time we spend walking from place to place. Its okay though because we have the car this week so we should be able to see more people. Its crazy at how easy I took things for granted back home. A warm car is such a blessing.

We were able to see some fun people this week. We are teaching a man named Doug. He is 24 years old and is really intelligent. He is a great guy with a lot of questions. One nice thing about Doug is he isn't trying to prove us wrong he is just honestly looking for the truth. Usually people with lots of questions are trying to prove us wrong he isn't. He asked a cool question this last week. He said "If Joseph Smith was an inspired man and a prophet wouldn't he have found the errors in the bible and corrected them?" We were like yeah that is exactly what he did. So we showed him the Joseph Smith translations and he thought that was cool. Its great to see how the spirit can work on people to convert them. If you get the chance listen to a talk by Dieter F Uchtdorf "Come, Join with Us". Im so grateful for the opportunity I have to be a missionary and serve people here in Iowa. Transfers are coming up next Thursday February 26th and chances are Elder Sessions or myself will be getting transferred, but who knows! Have a great week! Be safe and Love you all!

-Elder Lords

Hello Everyone!

Hey Everyone!

Everything is going good. Here all the snow is melting. Sounds like it is melting about everywhere though. Well we had a pretty great week. We have been staying busy. We had the car this week and we always get so much done with the car. We teach a lot more lessons and see more people its great. We don't get to talk to as many people while walking and it gets us out knocking doors more if we aren't in the car. This week we met a guy named Doug. He is a super cool 24 year old. He is crazy smart but has to much ADD to go to college. We had a great discussion with him. He is from Cedar Rapids so me and him talk all about Cedar Rapids haha! He is like ever other Iowan he can talk for DAYS and he smokes like a chimney.

We also had another cool experience. We got a call from a man in Utah named Dan Bell. He was a missionary in this mission about 30 years ago. He still has had contact with a man in this mission named Maurie. He is a really cool guy. He has read the Book of Mormon a couple times. He lives with his Sister in the Winter and then he lives under a bridge here in Des Moines in the summer. He is a really great guy.

Carena also came to church this sunday. She is preparing for baptism on March 7th! We are really excited for her. I just hope i don't get transferred by then. But if i do as long as she gets baptized that is all that matters. I hope all is well for everyone! Be safe and have a great week! Love you all!  

-Elder Lords

Missionary Work

Hey Everyone,

Well this winter has been a change for me. It hasn't been to cold and there isn't snow on the ground. It is a mild winter here from what I understand. This last week we had 2 days in the 50's. That makes doing missionary work a lot easier because you don't freeze haha! This week we had a pretty good week. We had the car so we were able to see a lot of people. We were able to find some new investigators. We are trying to build up our teaching pool. That's always kind of the goal but we are scheduling times to go finding and knocking doors instead of scheduling lessons with people who aren't progressing. One of our really solid investigators Sylvia moved to the sisters area so we aren't teaching her anymore but that's okay cause the sisters are!

Next transfer we might be getting a car so that would be really cool! If I don't get transferred which I might who knows. The work is pretty good here though. There are a lot of prepared people so that is good.

We are teaching a lot of people who are very sad or depressed. I wish they would just live the gospel of jesus Christ it would fix all their problems but no one believes us "dumb Mormons" haha! Things are going great! Im grateful for the wonderful blessing I have of being a member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Later Day Saints. It is such a blessing! Are focus this year as a mission is to teach families. We were able to teach a young family the moms name is India and the Dads name is Cameron. They have a 2 and a 3 year old with African names that I cant say or spell but they are awesome! Have a great week! I love you all!

A Warm Week!

Hello Everyone,

We had a pretty good week. The weather completely flipped. This Thursday the temperature was 51 degrees! The following week it was -7 and then -17 with wind chill so that is a huge difference. We weren't wearing coats and it is January.

We can stay very busy scheduling lessons but our goal is to find people who are more prepared. Some of the people we meet with we cant get them to keep commitments or to come to church. We have found 5 new investigators in the last 5 days, so the Lord is really blessing us. Some days its hard to want to go knock doors but once we get out doing it, it isn't so bad.

One of the highlights of my week and mission was this week. The Sister missionaries in the Des Moines ward told us they met a lady at a Rehab center that was interested in learning about the church. They gave us her address and asked us to stop by. They told us that she might not be fully accountable. This always makes me upset when people say they aren't accountable to get baptized! If they have a desire we shouldn't stop them. Anyways so we stopped by and taught the first lesson on Friday. It went pretty well and she loved it. She asked for a Book of Mormon before we even finished the lesson. Usually we give it at the end and commit them to read it. She was so excited to have it. I didn't think anything of it and then we went back on Sunday. We had asked her to read the introduction to the Book of Mormon. We talked and then I asked "Did you get the chance to read the introduction?" She said "Yes I loved it". Then she said I just couldn't put the book down and I read the first 8 chapters. We were so excited because it had only been 2 days and she had already read 8 chapters. It was an awesome experience. Im grateful for the Book of Mormon and its truthfulness. Have a great week! Love you all!

-Elder Lords