Surprise baptism and a new companion

Hi Family!!!

What an awesome awesome week! Let me just start by saying that we kinda had a surprise baptism on Saturday and I got to baptize him haha it was awesome! The Sisters in Corbin have been teaching a man named Adam for a while like 4 weeks ago I interviewed him to be baptized but after the interview I felt impressed that we should wait and put off the baptism until the next week. So we did. Well that week the sisters found out that Adam was still smoking and chewing Tobacco... so, we reset his baptism date to the 13th. His health is super super poor and honestly we were worried that he would die before he got baptized. So last sunday he didn't come to church because he was sick but that week on Wednesday I interviewed him again and then afterword I spoke to President Brough about Adam and we both felt like he was living up to D&C 20:37 and so we decided it was time for him to be baptized. And he asked me to baptize him, so, another wonderful blessing to baptize someone again. Great week.

 

On Tuesday we drove to Louisville early in the morning to go to transfer meeting where I picked up my new son Elder Peck, who is from Pocatello IDAHO!!! And of course he is taller than me. Anyways, he is an awesome missionary and he is going to become an amazing missionary. He's humble and willing to learn and is very obedient. New missionaries are like soft clay (if they are humble) and you can shape that soft clay into an obedient, diligent hard working missionary. He's soft clay. We've had some great first experiences together and some really funny moments so I am excited for this transfer.

 

We got to go to Lexington twice this week and we will be going again on Thursday for interviews. On last on friday we went for a zone meeting, which was great and we learned a lot.  And then we went again Saturday after the baptism to go to the nativity event going on at the stake center. Its a huge program that they put on for 2 days and it goes from like 3-8 in the evening. They had a great choir and good refreshments and they had tons of different nativities set up around the church in different rooms. Lots of non-members come for that.

 

Oh on the 22nd of this month we are driving up to Louisville again for a big Christmas devotional/party thing for the whole mission. Its going to be fun. We've had to do sooo much driving this month. We are only given a certain number of miles to use each month and so with all of these meetings that we have had to go to it has eaten up everyones miles. We are given 1300 a month for our area. Pretty sure everyone is going to go over this month.

 

Oh and just for everyones information, gas is $2.19 right now. Super super cheap here. Its nuts. Costs like $25 to fill our car!

 

Love y'all!!!!!!!!

 

That nativity in this picture was carved out of a pumpkin...awesome.

The others are of the baptism.

 

Merry Christmas!!! See y'all soon on Skype!!

Quick update on transfers and 3rd son (trainee)

Hey fam!

President said we could send a quick email to update you on transfers today! So my new companion is Elder Peck and he is from Chubbuck Idaho. And of course he is taller than me! I will send pictures of the whole "mission posterity" haha

In the picture from left to right is Elder Peck, me, Elder Jensen#1 and then Elder Jensen#2 and then his greenie Elder Sorensen. (Which is my grandson!) Pretty excited to be training again!

Anyways, just wanted to give you a quick update. Love y'all so much! Have a fantastic week!

this is from September 29-

Hello!

Wow, so many great things to tell about this week! It was amazing! My explanation of the week might be a little scattered so bear with me as I try to remember everything.

So we had a goal this week to talk to more people because we are in finding mode right now haha we have a couple of great people we are teaching right now, Libby & Donielle, but we definitely need more. So, that's what we did, we talked to a lot of people and man oh man we found a lot of people to teach. This weeks totals were 14 new investigators and 20 other lessons and we had a total of 29 lessons for the week, it was amazing. We found a little family in an apartment complex and they are really nice and we had a good first lesson with them. Its a really good sign to see a new investigator waiting outside for your first return appointment. Half the time people don't remember our appointment or just don't care too much. Anyways, so they are cool and I will let you know more about them as time goes on.

Now here's the big miracle of the week:

Elder Burns and I were going to a mans apartment for a first lesson, his name is Joe Smith (go figure haha). As we are walking up to the place we see 3 people standing by a car and 2 people inside the car. So we decide to go over and talk with them. Our approach was a usual one that we do, "We're representatives of Jesus Christ and we are going around offering the Saviors peace and comfort through prayer, could we say a prayer with you?" That's a great way to start talking with people because most people down here are accustomed to praying. Anyways, we start talking with them about who we are and what we do and this lady in the car told us that as they were driving to this place, her grand-daughter had said that they all need to get baptized and join a church. And lo and behold, who shows up right after she says that? The Lords very servants!:) So right from the start they knew that we were truly put at that place at the right time just to talk with them. So, we got the address and phone number of the couple that were in the car and set up an appointment with them for sunday night (last night). Their name is Barbra and Jessi. 

K so now for the even better part! We went to our appointment with them at 7 last night. They live about 5 miles out in the country from us in a trailer. Well after looking for the address we couldn't find it so we called Jessi and he guided us there and was waiting on the porch for us and Barbra was waiting inside. Side note, their trailer is super nice and clean and they have a huge, really nice yard, not super common for out in the back hills of Kentucky. So we get inside and sit down and we just dive right in with the first lesson. Words cannot describe the spirit that was in that room last night. We taught from the bible and Book of Mormon in such clarity, and they saw that and they understood everything about the primitive church and the apostasy. When it came time for the First Vision we gave Jessi a pamphlet and had him read Joseph Smiths account and we told them to wait in silence for a little bit after he finished reading it. The room was just FILLED with the spirit as he read from the account. It was just thick and warm and powerful. We saw tears in Barbra's eyes. And after sitting in it for a moment, to let it testify of the truth of what we had just taught, we testified of the spirit being present in the room and told them that that was the Lord telling them that this was true. After that moment we committed them to be baptized on November 8th. They were very excited for it and they didn't want us to leave haha after being there for over an hour Jessi was like "Your not leaving yet are you?" haha he just loved us and we love him. They are both so special  and awesome. You wouldn't totally think that by just looking at them but they are really good people who are changing their lives from drinking and smoking. We left them with a promise from 3 Nephi 13, that their family troubles would be solved and they would be closer with their kids if they seek God first.

31 Therefore take no thought, saying, What shall we eat? or, What shall we drink? or, Wherewithal shall we be clothed?

 32 For your heavenly Father knoweth that ye have need of all these things.
 33 But seek ye first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things shall be added unto you.

Praise the Lord! (That's what a lot of people say down here haha even in our ward, oh and Amen!)

 

So, family and friends, trust the Lord with all of your hearts and keep moving forward. Satan was working on Elder Burns and I for a couple of days before that amazing lesson. I was struggling really bad for some reason, but we kept moving forward with Faith and look what happened! Never give up and never give in.

 

Mosiah 29:20 But behold, he did deliver them because they did humble themselves before him; and because they cried mightily unto him he did deliver them out of bondage; and thus doth the Lord work with his power in all cases among the children of men, extending the arm of mercy towards them that put their trust in him. 

 

I love you all so much!

Back hills of Kentucky. nice nice house. She's a beauty!

Chicken meal from the chicken festival! It was right down the road from our house

We were out tracting and the sky looked amazing. I bought a nice new camera up in Louisville so I could take pics like these!

This is what all of the road look like driving places. They just go all over the place around the mountains and there are tons of trees.

Having a fire at our ward mission leaders house Bro. Johnson

Hanging with his horses

 

Library ride, Spiritual Meetings, Staying and training #3

Hi fam!!

Found out this weekend that I am going to be training another missionary! #3! I'm excited and nervous. Going to pick him uptomorrow up in Louisville.

This week has been awesome. So we dropped the car off to get worked on and sow e were on bikes until Thursday evening. And it was raining every single day haha had a few hors here and there that it stopped. Had some dang fun adventures. We live on the other side of a small mountain from the Library but there are no roads or trails that go up and over to it. they just go around. We rode our bikes to the top of the mountain through a neighborhood and got to the top and looked down and we could see the Library but there was no way down except to go back down the way we came and to go around. We got to the Library just in time. Just as we locked up our bikes it started to pour super hard. So after we did our hour of Mormon.org time we went outside and it was raining lightly. And so we decided to ride up to the base of the mountain as far as we could ride and then to just hike with our bikes up to the nearest road at the top. That was an adventure carrying our bikes, walking in church shoes up a steep, muddy hill. But it was worth it. Once we got to the road it was an all downhill ride to our house. So that was fun.

On Friday this week we went up to Lexington to the stake center for a meeting with Elder Kopischke of the seventy. We got to sit and talk and listen to him for 3 hours. It was so cool and spiritual. There were about 100 missionaries there and we just sat in the chapel and had a Q and A with him about different topics of missionary work. 

THEN, the very next day we drove up to Lexington again because it was stake conference this week and so Elder Parker of the seventy was here visiting the stake and we got to hear him speak that night at the leadership meeting, the Adult session and then the next day at the main meeting of stake conference. Elder Parker is from Atlanta Georgia and he's on the movie "Meet the Mormons". He is a convert to the church and joined in 1980's. Listening to him speak was almost like hearing a Baptist preacher, but the main difference was that he was teaching ALL truth about the gospel and Christ. It was soooo cool. There honestly were times during his talks that I wanted to vocally out loud yell "Amen!" or "Praise the Lord!" haha. He is a spiritual giant. Got to shake his hand and talk to him. This weekend was just a huge spiritually enlightening weekend. Received lots of revelation. 

On sunday night we went to Jessi and Barbara's at 6 and cooked dinner with them and then watched the Devotional. We cooked some good ole fried taters and sausage! They loved the devotional. Haven't smoked since Saturday, please pray for them!!

Today, we are doing lots of cleaning in our apartment and Elder Burns is packing his stuff. The day is just going to be spent saying good bye to people since Elder Burns is leaving. 

Also, we have an appointment with a Reverend this evening at 6. He was a referral and he said he just loves the truth so he wants to learn. Our dream is to convert him and also his congregation!

Not much else to say about this week! It was an awesome one! Getting super excited for Christmas!!! And also to Skype with everyone!!! Hitting 16 months soon. Scary.

Love you all!!!

"I am not what I ought to be, I am not what I wish to be, and I am not what I hope to be; but, by the grace of God, I am not what I once was."

A pizza place we went to-  "Heavenly Pizza" it truly is Heavenly. Tastes dang good.

 a little building that we saw with Graffiti on it- Super cool

Part- member family that we visit

Jessi and Barbara's home- we gave them these pictures. I cut out the temple one out of an ensign and framed it for them. They also have a proclamation to the family on the wall.

Thanksgiving, Birthday, Miracles

Wow that was a really long week!!

Not saying it was a bad week, it was great, it was just a challenging week and a little stressful! It was awesome because it was thanksgiving and also I turned 20!! Feels weird to say that now. I feel so grown up all of a sudden. Where did my childhood go...? haha Anyways, Thanksgiving was awesome. Got to sleep a lot and then we went to a members down in Corbin and ate some bomb Thanksgiving dinner. That was basically the day, eat and sleep!

My birthday was fun. We did our studies as usual and then at 10 went out on our bikes and rode around for a while and talked with people and tried to make some visits. We found this HUGE hill to ride down and Elder Burns has a little computer on his bike and he got going 40 down it. It was awesome! I didn't dare go that fast on my bike haha I feel like it would break. Then at like 1:30 we went with brother Johnson up to his house to go and cut firewood for a member (who didn't prepare for winter like he should have).

But it was fun! I really enjoy splitting logs. Its a really good workout. And its nice to be out in nature. Then at like 6 Bro. J took us out to dinner at Cheddars. Which is like a really really nice Applebees. its dang good food. So that was fun! And then we finished the night out at Barbara and Jessi's! There really is nothing like serving others on your birthday. Its a great feeling. That's how almost everyday is. Serving the Lord is awesome!

Oh so Barbara finally went to the court house to look into getting her divorce and she found out that its only going to cost 170 instead of 900. So that's a miracle! And we also put them on a stop smoking plan so they can quit by the 6th of this week so they can make their baptismal date of the 27th. They are allowed only a certain number of cigarettes each day of the week and it gets less and less until Saturday and that's when they get down to zero. Please please please pray for them so that they can finally quit smoking. We gave them each a blessing so they could quit. They want to be baptized so badly!

Oh so today tomorrow and Wednesday we don't have our car:( We had to take it into the body shop to get some dents removed and it wont be done until Wednesday. So we are on bike and walking for now! Had to ride to the Library today! Hopefully by the time we leave it won't be raining!

This is the last week of this transfer! On Saturday we will be getting calls to see if one of us is leaving. Elder Burns is way more likely to leave than me but we will see. So I will let y'all know as soon as possible!

Oh and I got me a new watch for my birthday. Ill send a pic of it.

Learned a lot about prayer and how important it is! I've learned that the first thing that most likely causes people to leave the church or to become less active is that they stop praying. Our communication with Heavenly Father is spiritually vital. So, don't forget to pray!

I love you all! Happy Holidays!!

A baptism, a beautiful testimony and a package from Shannon!

Well Donielle got baptized on Saturday and was confirmed a member of the church on sunday! It was awesome. I will attach pictures of it at the end of this email. It was such an awesome experience to baptize her. It never gets old. It's amazing to have that opportunity and blessing to baptize someone! Before her baptism we asked her to write down her testimony and give it to us so we could type it up and print it out for her. We typed it up on Word and made it look really nice and then we went to Office Depot and had them print it on a nice tan piece of paper and laminate it. It looked awesome! We had it sitting on a table during her baptismal service so everyone could read it. Its a great testimony. I will copy and paste it so you can read it.

I truly believe that the Book of Mormon and the Prophets of God are real. I believe it with all my heart. I started believing in the Book of Mormon and the Prophets when I prayed to God about it, and asked him to show me a sign to tell me that it was true. He touched me with a warm feeling in my heart, and throughout my body. It was the most amazing feeling that I have ever felt in my life. I then took a huge step by reading the Book of Mormon, and praying about it throughout the day and night before I went to bed. I now live by the word of God and go to church regularly, to show my love and devotion to God and our Savior Jesus Christ, his Son. I’m also going to raise my children by the word of God, because our God is powerful, and wonderful.

In the name of Jesus Christ, Amen.

What an awesome testimony, right?

Lets see, what else happened this week. Barbara and Jessi are about the same. They still haven't gone to the court house to see about getting Barbara's divorce taken care of... So that's frustrating. 

We saw Libby last night and asked her if she even wants to get baptized, and she said yes. But we talked to her about how she isn't going to be ready for baptism if she doesn't come to church. She's getting kinda lazy on us... So we were bold, but loving, with her and I think she felt Godly sorrow, which is good. Hopefully she gets some more motivation to learn about the gospel and get baptized.

Oh so this next Monday we have to take our car into the body shop because a while before I got to this area the car got backed into twice and we finally got it approved through the church to go and get the dents fixed. But that means we won't have a car for 3 days... haha good thing I got my furry hat in the mail! I'm gonna need it to stay warm while we walk around a bunch.

Oh we got a piano in our apartment now! Some Elders had it in their apartment and didn't want it so they gave it to us. Its awesome. Ill send a pic of it.

Super excited for my birthday on Friday! I got a package in the mail from Shannon that was filled with a bunch of funny stuff and a birthday card.

Thanks Shannon! Oh also I never told y'all about the potato I got in the mail from Shannon haha. Well it got chopped in half somehow during the shipping but they put both pieces in a plastic baggy with an apology note on it! So by the time it got to me in the mail it stunk really bad! But it was really funny to get!

Also dang excited for Thanksgiving. We just have 1 invite to dinner. Which is fine and im grateful for that. The Elders over in the Beattyville branch don't have any invites to dinner cuz there are only like 2 active members in their area. Its kinda sad haha. But we get the whole day off for Thanksgiving so it will be nice to just relax and do fun stuff.

I love you all! Thanks for being such awesome family members and friends!

Back to New Albany for a Baptism!

Snowy day here in Kentucky!

Wow this last week was awesome! Do y'all remember Bill from my last area in New Albany? Well he got baptized on Friday and I got to go to the baptism!!! Since I was there when he first started investigating the church President Brough let me go to it. Bro. Johnson dorve us up to New Albany. It was a long 3 hour drive. But it was so worth it. It was super awesome to see a lot of the members in New Albany and also some of the recent converts that we baptized when iw as there! Such a great experience.

Also had zone conference on Tuesday up in Lexington. It was a super great meeting and I learned a lot of things. I wish everyone could have been to that meeting.

Yesterday was the monthly fireside up in Lexington so we rode with a missionary that just got off of her mission last week from Montana, and also with her brothers. We drove in their families excursion and it was super nice haha. The Fireside was really good and I always enjoy the testimonies of the recent converts that get up and share their stories.

 

Oh so Donielle had her baptism interview on Saturday and she passed it so she is going to be baptized this coming Saturday and she asked if I would baptize her!:) Dang excited for that! There aren't many things better in life than baptizing someone. It's a wonderful experience.

 

Jessi and Barbara came to church yesterday so that was awesome. They are going to be going to the court house today to see if they can get Barbara's divorce finalized so her and jessi can get married so then they can be baptized! If I could only have 1 thing for Christmas it would be for them to be baptized before the end of this year! 

 

Oh and at church yesterday the sister missionaries had 10 investigators at church and we 3 so we had a total of 13 people at church it was awesome. they are teaching this family that has 13 KIDS! The parents have 2 of their own and then they have just adopted the rest of them. They just keep adopting these kids that have come from drug homes or just from bad families. So the sisters are teaching them and most of them came to church yesterday! That would be a lot of baptisms! 

 

Love you all so much!!

 

First pic is of me and Bill.

Second is of both of my sons(missionaries I trained) they were both at the baptism.

Third is of me and a recent convert named Nic . I'm not sure if I mentioned a lot about him but he is really good friends with the bishop in New Albany and we started teaching him when I was there and so he got baptized like 3 weeks after we started teaching him. Him and I are like best bud's. We email each other like every week. He's 17 I think and wants to go on a mission when he graduates. So awesome!!

District meeting and triple baconator

It's crazy that another week has come and gone! Time is flying right now. The days seem to just blur together haha. This week was a good one tho! Had some close encounters with serious injury but the Lord was protecting us, I will talk about that later in the email.

On Wednesday it rained all stinkin day, we just drove around and tried to visit a bunch of people and did a little walking with our umbrellas  and talked to people on the streets. Oh and every Wednesday night at 6 we drive down to the church with bro. Johnson for coordination and they have a priesthood meeting that they have the missionaries come to.

 On Thursday we had district meeting like usual and then after we went to DQ because one of the senior couples were going home next week. I will send some pics of our group photos we took. 

After district meeting we went on exchanges with the McKee Elders. Elder Heslop came with me back to London and Elder Burns stayed in McKee. It was fun working with him. We went and cut fire wood on Friday morning with Bro. J for a member that needed it. And that evening we went to the Helms house down in Corbin for dinner. she makes the best food!

Oh! So awesome news! We have this awesome new investigator named Laura. She is a referral from a member in Nicholasville. They have been friends for like 30 years and she finally told Laura that its time for her to get baptized. So on Saturday night we drove to her house and had dinner and then we had a lesson and it went great. Set a baptismal date with her for December 13th!:) Oh and she came to church yesterday and loved it!

Barbara and Jessi sadly didn't come to church again..... They had been gone all week to her daughters hosue helping build some stuff and they said that they were way tired and Barbara has been having trouble with her Dialysis again and it keeps her awake. Donielle is still set for her baptism on the 22nd!:) way excited for that. Oh and do y'all remember Bill Lucas from my last area? Well he is getting baptized on Friday this week!!!!!! I am going to ask president if I can go. probably wont let me since I live so far away but its worth a shot.

Ate a triple baconator this week at Wendys. Big mistake. I'll send pics. Elder Burns and I just wanted to try one so we did. Don't ever get one. Way to much meat. It ruined us for the day.

We have a zone conference tomorrow up in Lexington so I am looking forward to that. They are always super inspirational and I learn a lot. Hopefully we will learn more about when we will be buying our new iPads!

Love you all!

Have a wonderful week!

Miracles wrought by faith and hard work

Hello everyone!!!

Sorry for not writing a group email last week. I kinda got lazy haha my fingers just weren't up to typing any more.

So, lets start with an update on investigators!

Jessi & Barbara- They came to church for the first time last week but didn't come this sunday:( Barbara said they felt lazy and they didn't get up... but they regretted it and next sunday they will be there. We are still trying to get them to quit smoking. They quit coffee really quick but the cigarettes have been a lot harder for them. We go and visit them every other day and read scriptures with them and watch conference talks on their lap top. We had to move their baptism date to Dec. 6thsince Barbara's divorce with her last husband hasn't been finalized yet. We love them so much and we know they will be Baptized!

Donielle Whitiker- She came to the chili cookoff at the church this Wednesday. She had a great time and the food was dang good and they had Halloween games and a magician. She also came to church for the first time this last sudnay and loved it. Her 2 year old son was being a big stinker and would stop screamin and being crazy so she spend a lot of time out in the hall during sacrament. And he wouldn't stay in the nursery so she had to hold him the whole time during 2nd hour. She left early from Relief Society but she said she loved it. We went over to her house last night and taught her the Word of Wisdom since she has to be living it for 3 weeks before her baptism. It was awesome teaching it to her because she doesn't do any of those things. She says she just drinks water and pop and crystal light. So that was awesome! She will actualy be moving to an apartment complex right behind ours!

Libby Hyder- Libby has gotten super sick lately. Has a bad viral infection. So we haven't been able to teach her much. Gave her a blessing yesterday.

That's basically it for our investigators. We have a few new people we are trying to work with. We have a referral that was given to us by a member up in Nicholasville, its for her friend that lives in London and requested that the missionaries come and teach her the Gospel haha so hopefully that will be solid!

Oh it snowed this week on November 1st!!! I was soooooo happy! We were studying and our desk is right next to the window but the blinds were closed and I looked out one of the cracks and I saw something falling outside and I ran to the door and looked outside and it was dumping snow! It was awesome!

Earlier this week we cut a ton of wood for a member that isn't able to do it on his own. Of course we did that with Brother Johnson haha. We went into the forest behind his house with his truck and he cut up some fallen trees with his chainsaw and we split the logs. Lots of work. Filled his whole bed full of wood.

On Halloween we had to be inside by 6 or be at a members. So...we went to Brother Johnsons haah! He had bought a bunch of fried chicken and biscuts so we went there and ate and then we just layed on the couches and Elder Burns played the Ukulele and we sand hymns and just talked until about 8:30 and then we drove home. It was dang fun!

Oh and guess whos house we are going to after we get done emailing and shopping? Brother Johnsons of course! there really isn't anything fun to do here except go to his house haha and he needs some help loading some more wood that he cut for another member. Brother Johnson serves the Lord so much. He is always doing something for someone. With all of his free time of being retired he just helps people. Its awesome! He's going to come visit us in Idaho when Im home. He want to see Idaho!

Ok so let me share with you the Gospel truth that I learned this week and want to share. This comes from the talk, "High priest of Good things to come" By Elder Holland.   

I highly recommend all of you watch that talk, it is amazing and it helped me so much. It made me reflect a lot on my mission and look at all of the wonderful people that I have met. It made me reflect back to myself when I was a struggling young missionary. And how I thought that my mission was a failure and I wasn't sure if there was anything good coming. But always, ALWAYS, there were good and even amazing things to come. A month and a half into my mission I thought we would never Baptize someone in that area, but we kept working at it in faith and we were blessed to meet and Baptize Gabriel. After working with Steve and Colleen for almost 4 months they still weren't accepting baptism and we were struggling to know what to do with them. But with persistent and patient Faith, they were both Baptized. When I was transferred to New Albany and after a few weeks of being there, we literally had zero investigators. I thought that we had done something wrong. But just around the corner of that trial, there were good things to come. Being blessed with 5 people to baptize while in New Albany and a few more after I left was more than just good things, they were miracles. Miracles wrought by Faith and hard work.  Ether 12:12 "For if there be no faith among the children of men God can do no miracle among them; wherefore, he showed not himself until after their faith."

I sincerely testify that God performs miracles in our lives, if we but have faith. Miracles and blessings from the Lord are always just around the corner. The night gets darkest just before the dawn. And the burdens and trials of life get heaviest just before the Lord intervenes and makes them lighter.

I love you all so much. May the Lord ever be with you.  

Fishing in a pond and seeing as Christ does

Holy cow I love being here in Kentucky! And I love our ward mission leader Bro. Johnson!!

So first I want to start with what we have done so far today. This morning at 8 we drove up to Bro. J's house with some Elders from Beattyville to go fishing in his pond. He has about 5 or 6 acres behind his house and at the bottom of the hill is a nice pond. Ill send pics. But before we went fishing he made us a huge country breakfast. Pancakes, eggs, sausage, bacon, biscuits & Gravy and Orange juice. SUPER good. I've started to love biscuits and gravy a ton. People make them a lot here. After breakfast we went down to the pond and started fishing for Catfish! For bait we would use chicken liver. They like that a lot. And you just toss it out there and let it sit on the bottom of the pond and wait. And man O man when they find that liver they take it and they put up a fight. I was able to catch 2 big ones. Elder Burns caught 1 and Bro. J caught a giant gold fish. It was sooooo fun! And then after the fishing we went up the hill to the fire pit and started a fire and then started to shoot marbles with sling shots at glass bottles that he had set up. His house is just a hill billy playground haha! And for lunch he made us fried catfish, which was pretty good! Being at his house is always a blast!

This past week was pretty good I guess. Didn't teach a whole lot of lessons. Barbara and Jessi are doing alright. They weren't able to come to church because Barbara was having problems with her Dialysis through the night... And they are struggling with quitting smoking. They've quit drinking coffee but can't shake smoking yet. We started them on the LDS 15 step program for quitting smoking. Its a pretty awesome program. Please keep them in your prayers. They want to get baptized so so bad! I can't wait for that day!

We had zone meeting this week up in Lexington on Thursday. I gave a training to 3 different groups on Believing in Baptizing. It went awesome. In preparation for it we felt the spirit really strongly and were inspired with a lot of great things. We used the Bible video "Christ heals a man born blind" and related it back to seeing with our spiritual eyes and Blinding our Natural eyes. We asked the question "When you teach someone for the first time, do you look at them with your natural eyes and see all of their faults that might be holding them back from be baptized? Or do you look at them though the eyes of Christ and see them as what they can become?" The blind man in the video could not see with his eyes how to get to the pool to wash and be healed, but he went by faith on what Christ told him. He did not doubt or ask questions. He instantly went and did as the Lord commanded him. We can relate all of our lives to this man.

Other than that this week was just another normal one! I have to go to Richmond tonight to exchange with the Zone Leaders. Lots of driving to do down here!

Oh I totally forgot! This sunday I gave a talk in sacrament meeting! Theya sked me to speak on my conversion to the gospel. In my talk I talked about how it doesn't matter at what age you join the church, we can all be converts. There's a difference in believing the Gospel and being converted to the gospel. I started off with 1 Nephi 1 and changed Nephi's name out with my name. I talked about how it was my family and my parents that helped me to become converted to the gospel. I don't think I was totally converted before my mission but I did eventually when I understood the Atonement more fully. It's not enough to read the Book of Mormon and believe in Joseph Smith as a prophet, we must understand the Atonement. Everything is just an appendage to the Atonement. But you can't just read about the Atonement to understand it. You have to experience it. You have to use it. And being a missionary, you experience the Atonement A LOT. As Elder Holland has put it, "How could we ever bear a moving, lasting testimony of the Atonement, if we haven't ever felt a token of what Chirst has felt?"  This is true. The Atonement is wonderful and I love it!

I love you all so so so so much!!! 

This is the second one I caught. And yes I did kiss that fish! I am now a true southerner! 

 This is Bro. Johnsons giant gold fish he caught!

Word of Wisdom miracle

Hello Family and Friends!!!

So update on Jessi and Barbara! Had another miracle with them this week.On Tuesday night we went and taught the Word of Wisdom! (That's always a fun one to teach, "I can't drink tea???")

Anyways, we taught the lesson out of the pamphlet and then watched the John Tanner story. If you haven't seen it watch it soon, its awesome. At the end of the lesson they gave us their brand new can of coffee and all their Tocbacco and cigarettes! They just got rid of all of it! That's how much they know this church is true! Enough to give up all of that stuff and trust that the Lord commands us not to use those things. I'll send a picture of the stuff they gave us and of me smashing the box of Cigarettes.

Unfortunately they were not able to make it to church yesterday because Barbara is on Dialysis right now and she had to make a trip to the emergency room sunday morning:( Shes doing alright now but please keep her in your prayers.

Also Libby H didn't make it to church yesterday either... So we have to move her baptismal date back again. She was supposed to be getting baptized this coming Saturdaybut we are moving it to another week. Satan was working real hard to get her to not come to church. Her family wouldn't watch her baby during church and she doesn't have a car seat and we couldn't find anyone to give her a ride that has a car seat. It's hard getting people to church that live in London and that don't have cars. Its about a 30 minute drive down to Corbin, where the church is, and we don't have a lot of active members up here in London. Bro. Johnson, our ward mission leader, lives up here so that's nice. We ride with him to church every sunday, saves us a lot of miles.

On thusday I got to drive to Louisville to go to a leadership training meeting. It was amazing. 2 members of the mission department were there and we got to ask them a lot of questions. We were there from 9 to 4 with only a 1 hour lunch break. That was the best 6 hours ever. Most inspiring training I have ever received. They also talked about iPads for a little bit and let us know we will be hopefully getting them in December. And if not by December then definitely January. It is going to change missionary work forever. Can't wait.

Can't really think of anything else from this week! I love it so much down here. I love the ward and I love the people here.

It's kinda scary that I only have 10 months left... Crazy!

Love y'all!!! 

-- 

Elder Eastin

The Church Of

Jesus Christ

Of Latter-Day Saints

Lots of yard work and conference

Hello family and friends!!

Wow, conference was AMAZING! So many awesome things that I learned! I'm going to go through the awesome week we had and then I will tell you about conference!

K, so on Monday night I went on an exchange with an Elder up in McKee Kentucky. It's about 30 miles from here and its a tiny town in the forrest haha. So on Tuesday I worked the area with him so I could see how their area is doing. That's one of the responsibilities of a district leader. The McKee area is tough, they cant even ride bikes around because of how narrow the roads are and because everyone drives so fast. And there aren't many places that they can just walk around and talk to people because the homes are super spread out along country roads. So on our exchange we helped an investigator dig a ditch in his yard. This guy has an old tiller that's about 50 years old and it still runs (kinda) and so I went back and forth and back and forth along his grass tilling it until I got about 6 or 7 inches into the ground and then we dug the dirt up and put it in a wheelbarrow. Took about 2 hours but it was pretty fun! That was basically the highlight of that day haha it was a long day filled with lots of driving!

On Wednesday we drove down to Corbin to help out a member to do some yard work. It was the funnest yard work ever! They had just had someone come in and trim a lot of their trees and so now all of the branches were sitting on their lawn. So they had us start a fire in their backyard and we would constantly throw more and more branches onto the fire. We had a hose near by so we could spray it down for when it got too big. It got so stinkin hot, we couldn't stand very close. So that was a fun day!

On Thursday we had to drive an hour to Richmond for interviews. Usually, while each of us interview with the mission President, the Assistants give a training to everyone on a certain topic. But this time they surprised us with watching a movie! Guess what movie we got to watch?? Meet The Mormons!! We got to watch it a week before it even comes out! It will be coming to Lexington and Louisville on the 10th but they don't want missionaries going to movie theaters to watch it so they sent a special DVD to the mission President and they let us watch it early. It is awesome! Its my new favorite movie! You should all watch it when it comes out!! Anyways, so when we got done with interviews at about 4:30 we had to drive the hour or so home. But on the way back we hit super bad traffic. It was literally bumper to bumper traffic for at least 10 miles… 

My GPS said our average speed was about 5 miles an hour. We were in the traffic for an hour before we even got to the sign that said "Construction ahead, right lane closed 7miles". We just wanted to die at that point haha So anyways we finally made it through and got home. What was supposed to be an hour drive turned into 2 1/2 hours!

Oh and that night when we got home we went and saw Jessi and Barbra! Our most favorite investigators in all of Kentucky!!:) They are doing soooo awesome! Jessi told us that the day after our first lesson with them, they were able to find 4 of his boys that he hadn't seen since they were babies. In our first lesson we promised them that if they put got first their families would be stronger and happier. Well lo and behold, he finds 4 of his boys on Facebook and he talks to them almost everyday now!! What a miracle! So they are both doing amazing! On Saturday morning at 10 we went to their house and Elder Burns and I made them French toast and sausage and bacon and eggs with orange juice. 

And then after we ate we watched conference together on their laptop. They said that they liked it! And while President Uchtdorf was talking about how in our church we don't judge people, Barbra was like "Now that's a true church!" haha it was so awesome. They both know that these things are true and they want their whole family to get baptized!! Barbra has 4 girls that live within the ward boundaries and she wants us to teach them! Like I said, Favorite investigators in all of Kentucky!

The other sessions of conference we watched at a members house down in corbin. About 30 mins from our house haha lots of driving to do! It was so nice to watch it there. They had a huge flat screen tv and really nice couches! And Sister. Helm made us breakfast lunch and dinner! I didn't want conference to end! It was so great and filled with the spirit. I cant wait for next conference!

So as you can see we had an awesome week here! On Thursday this week I have to drive to Louisville again to go to another leadership meeting. Rumor has it that its about getting iPads because 2 members of the mission department are coming to this meeting. So I'll let you know about that next week!

I love you all!