Washington Everett Mission
August 2007 - 2009
Looka me. I made the front page! Woot! So things are great here in Redland (Kirkland/Redmond). I*m senior zone leader, I have a new companion and we*re also training a greenie. We*re working hard and we*re seriously busy. We now have four people on date. Watching as our investigators learn and grow and experience the spirit is so great. I have had a testimony for a long time about how God has a hand in everything that happens. I also have had a testimony that the Lord will use others to convey the message He wants to share with us but for some reason, I*m always a little surprised when amazing things happen. A really cool thing happened this last week. We were in the bank parking lot waiting for our greenie to finish up some bank business. As we were looking around in the parking lot, I looked across the street and saw some apartments. I knew that a former investigator lived in them. My old companion and I had tried to get a hold of her about 40 times. Well, what*s the harm in checking again, right? We went over and knocked on the door and we pushed our greenie up front. He was freaking out but she opened the door and before we could really say anything to her she said it was weird that we had just knocked on her door because she was just reading her scriptures in D&C and *(I*m thinking, I*m sorry? What did you say? Did I hear you right?) Then she told us about how she had already picked out her baptism date. As you can imagine, I was a little flustered. I asked her if she had been working with missionaries in another ward. She said she hadn*t told anyone except for some guy she knows at BYU who she said was going to fly down and baptize her. So*no missionaries, no bishops, no ward mission leaders. She just decided to get baptized and picked out her own date all by herself. We told her that she needed to be taught by missionaries before she is baptized and she also needs to be interviewed. She said that*d be great and then asked if we needed dinner. It was the best Sunday ever. She*s on date for April 25th. I*ve recently been reading Jesus the Christ and studying about His examples of faith, desire and diligence. I*ve learned some really cool things. I love the Lord, Jesus Christ with all my soul. I know that He suffered for us so we can live with Him again. I am so thankful for this opportunity to serve Him and help bring about His work. I am humbled at what He has done for each of us and I glory in His grace, truth and mercy. I know that He leads this church today through a prophet, Thomas S. Monson. I can*t wait to hear from him this weekend. General Conference is probably one of my favorite times of the year. I*ll keep prayin* for you guys. *Elder Crandall
Elder Mike Kleinman
Well everything is going good here in Libertador! Yes conference was amazing as usual, and Im glad a few of our investigators were able to attend. We have high hopes for them to be baptized in the coming weeksWell, we just got done with a zone conference and it was great. The President talked about how important personal management of all things entrusted to you (such as your family, finances, church callings, work) is in having a sucessful life. In these harder economic times, its especially important to manage what you have.
Everything is going great with my trainee Elder Hidalgo; we are now on our way to teach a really cool new family that said they wanted to get baptized. The father apparently is a construction worker that builds all our chapels here in Argentina, so he has been to many meetings and realy likes it! yeah! Well, I'll let you all know how that goes.
I was really excited to hear that I was drawn for Bull Elk!!! this year. I know what I'll be doing for Thanksgiving . Can't believe how fast June 10th is approaching.
Well until next time my friends.
Ciao, Elder Mike Kleinman
Everything is going great with my trainee Elder Hidalgo; we are now on our way to teach a really cool new family that said they wanted to get baptized. The father apparently is a construction worker that builds all our chapels here in Argentina, so he has been to many meetings and realy likes it! yeah! Well, I'll let you all know how that goes.
I was really excited to hear that I was drawn for Bull Elk!!! this year. I know what I'll be doing for Thanksgiving . Can't believe how fast June 10th is approaching.
Well until next time my friends.
Ciao, Elder Mike Kleinman
Elder Blake Smith
Well I received my first transfer this month. I left Bermejo and I am in San Juanino, in the Province of San Juan. I will have my second Latin companion. His name is Elder Cubilla (Cu-bee-sha) He is from Bueno Aires and is 24 years old. This is the biggest mission in the area but has the fewest baptisms. We are really working hard on changing that. This last Sunday we had our 5th baptism. It was great. We are teaching a sister that is in a wheelchair and have been trying to figure out how we will get her in the water for baptism. The work is great. I can't believe I have been out for 7 months already. I really enjoyed General Conference. My favorite talk was by Elder Holland. I loved his testimony of Christ. We spent two days in the stake center. It was great, and I loved the whole thing. Well all is well and I hope you are all doing great too. I look forward to the news letter and hearing from all of you. Elder Blake Smith
Elder Grant Huish
well my dear friends. the church remains true, just in case you were wondering. even in oregon, the most godless state in the nation. it seems from the newsletter that all are doing well wherever they may be. i'm very glad to hear that. i find it joyous that just the few of us mesa boys have been able to see the gospel bless so many lives throughout the entire world. if by now you are thinking this doesnt sound like grant, well you are right, i am very tired today and not myself. probably a good thing. well i think i am going to finish there so that i can email my mission president and then hopefully go take a nap or something soon. love you all grant
Elder Garrett Jones
Hey everybody,I'm sitting here writing from the middle of the Bronx. Every once in a while it hits me that I actually live in the Bronx and walk around it every single day.Its a very interesting place and not really one that I would love to live in for the rest of my days and raise my family in. So things have been good lately. I honestly feel like I've never had more people to teach or more investigators that I love and would do anything for. I don't know if its Steele and I working together, if its the area, if their is something in the water, or if the Lord is just straight blessing us right now more than in other times for some strange reason but we are teaching like crazy. Yesterday was such an unbelievable day that its hard to believe it since we sat down and taught six lessons (which is a new record for me), found three awesome new investigators, and were able to hear Grimilda explain how much she loves the church and how much she's been sharing it with everybody. Things are going awesome. I'm out of time once again, I love and miss all of you over there in the west. Enjoy the weather and get that pool warmed up for me! Love,Garrett
Elder Jeff Stoker
The weather has changed so much the last couple of days. For example, on Thursday we recieved 6 inches of snow, rain, and hail. It was one of the strangest things that i have ever seen. You dont know whether to go outside with a beanie, an umbrella, or a helmet. Things are drying out now though. my companion and I celebrated our first time of the year going outside without a beanie. I felt kinda naked. So, i think that i can finally saw that i have endured, and conquered the terrible Russian Winter! So enough about the weather. My companion and I taught a missionary classes for the 5th sunday. It went really well. We invited Elder Reshednikov (a member of the seventy) get up, and he gave an amazing talk. It just so happens that missionary work is his favorite topic. He gave us all a guilt trip. It was needed though. I can see good things in the future for the church in Russia. It has been a pretty good week. I was able to o on exchanges in my old area, and talk with old investigators. We had a meeting with a guy who is a biologist. I thought he wanted to hear the discussions, but He decided to give us the discussion. He went off talking about biology, and all the stuff that entails. He then tried to explain the fourth dimension. i am not quite sure what in the world he was talking about, but i somthing to do with 3-D and stuff like that. I would fall asleep if someone tried to describe it in english, but this was all in russian. I would catch every other word, and he used scientific terms like we had been studying russian science all of our lives. I just spent the time looking at him nodding my head saying ya...ya.... of course....i understand. I felt like it was day 1 again. I was able to witness another investigator get baptized. There is nothing better than baptism. Everytime you see it, you feel the spirit. This week, i also hit my year mark in saratov. Offically giving me the title Mr Saratov. I also bought 2 shopkas. They are sweet. One is fox fur, and the other is rabbit fur. I think that they just lied and told me that just to make me buy them. They are probably both wild dog fur. I still like them though. Oh yea, Good news! American missionaries should be arriving this month. It will be good to see some greenies for the first time in about a year. I just hope i dont have to train :]. there are about 60 missionaries in my mission now, and 45 will be going home in the next 3 transfers. I am not sure what will happen, but hey it will all work out. I am glad this is God's work, and we GET to participate. I love being a missionary, and i know all of you are tearing it up in your "fields". Love and Hugs! Lets keep it going. Like always, have a great month. Elder Stoker
Elder Chase Judd
Hey Friends,I just would like to say I have officially completed a year! Time goes by so fast when you are enjoying what you do. Well i have had a lot of wonderful experiences in my mission and one is of a family in my first area who we were teaching but we baptized his wife but the husband couldnt be baptized because he did something really bad that we had to send a letter of permission to the first presidency well after 9 months of waiting we got the letter. It said that he could be baptized! So my mission president gave me permission to go tell him then he let me baptize him. I know that the atonement is real that and that anyone can repent of their sins. I love you all and i am grateful everyone you and that all of you are doing well in your missions. Have a great and wonderful time enjoy it we are all decreasing in time now!
Love Elder Judd
Elder Jimmy Miller
Hey boys!Things are sweet here in the Bronx. Quick story. So the other day we were going to walk with an investigator to the church to give them a tour. Well on our way to their house we encountered at least a dozen anti-mormon people passing out flyers near the church. There was one guy in particular, their leader I suppose who was pretty aggressive when we walked by, he was yelling at us. There was no way around them. We knew that if we brought the family to the church we'd have to go through them. And when we got there they were insistant on going there. So we left and i was praying like i never have before. I was praying somehow they would leave us alone or be distracted. We decided to walk on the other side of the street from where the 'leader' had been but guess where he was. Lame! Right in our path. But we were blessed he was occupied talking to someone else. We made it though! SO amazing. But after a sweet tour of the church we knew we would have to go through them again..and so we tried the other side of the street..and again..he was there! But this time we weren't so lucky. He got a pamphlet into the hands of one of the daughters. But that was it. Nothing more and i was able to get it from her and they didn't ever realize what was going on. It was amazing. We've taught the family a few sweet lessons on they're coming to church. The Lord really does have his hand in this work. Also the Bronx is sweet but it has too many cats, i think i'm gonna start my days now by shooting cats too!! love you all!! LOVE ELDER MILLER
Elder Gary Chambers
Well hello fellas... I killed a cat with my pellet gun............................. April Fools! gwahahaha you probably believed me! Hahaha, that is the greatest. Yeah I'm still here in Buenos Aires going for 6 months! WOO HOO! It's cool though... really, it is. I mean, I get to eat as much Genoa Salami as I want kind of.... (p.s. that stuff is delicious). That... AND my comp is the same :) We're still getting along just fine though, so dont you all go grey haired over me now... you hear?! haha jk, you can if you want. Lucky for us, our lessons are starting to pick up (that was a pun, but seeing as only my compwould get it, there is no real need for this parenthesis.......). That was a pun by the way.... One of our new investigators' name is Lucky, and he is great... we're lucky to have hi----ok sorry I'll cut that out. He really is a great guy though,I mean, he even calls us his professors! And he almost ALWAYS picks my comp to say the prayer... I really like him. Another great tidbit of news is that we found yet ANOTHER cool house of investigators that also happens to be a family... we taught them only once, but man they are like a missionaries dream family of investigators! They are really interested and seem to ask all the right questions including... "Can we go to your church?" Can I get a Halslknfwoeuhfs?! I hope you guys are all having a great April month... and don't get trunky... work really duro! Love, Elder Chambers
Anziano Scott Ball
Ciao Ciao,
Everything is doing well here in Modena. I'm still here for a 5th transfer and I think I might be transfered this next transfer. We just had a baptism of a Russian/Ukrainian guy. We had his friend baptize him and it went great. The next day, during the confirmation, This guy brought 2 Ukrainian friends to church. They said that they loved it and are coming next week. We are excited because we were running low on good investigators.
Other news, My companion's bike was stolen 3 days after he bought it. They left mine and took the lock with them. I kind of feel like the times when the Gadiation robbers stole everything and God cursed the land that the people would find things gone if they laid them around. We roll with the good times and the bad times. I know the church is true and God blesses us in mysterious ways. Vi voglio bene, Anziano Ball
Everything is doing well here in Modena. I'm still here for a 5th transfer and I think I might be transfered this next transfer. We just had a baptism of a Russian/Ukrainian guy. We had his friend baptize him and it went great. The next day, during the confirmation, This guy brought 2 Ukrainian friends to church. They said that they loved it and are coming next week. We are excited because we were running low on good investigators.
Other news, My companion's bike was stolen 3 days after he bought it. They left mine and took the lock with them. I kind of feel like the times when the Gadiation robbers stole everything and God cursed the land that the people would find things gone if they laid them around. We roll with the good times and the bad times. I know the church is true and God blesses us in mysterious ways. Vi voglio bene, Anziano Ball
Elder Logan Wells
Dearest Brethren,
Well let me see it is April, not much more to be said. Our mission is doing really well. We are breaking records left and right, it is so rad. This past month has been good. Pres. Guldbrandsen showed up in my ward. Pretty weird, but great to see a familiar face. We have touched lots of hearts with the help of the Lord. The work is going well. I seem to be recieving so many blessings everyday. I am still a DL and a moving Elder driving my 15 passenger van, interesting to say the least. I have embraced my inner Puerto Rican, and it is great. TRULY, I am loving it so much. I love the people so much. My Ward rocks, and well so sorry for all of you, but I have the best mission.... what do you got to say about that? I love you all. Peace, Logan
