Letters from July

July 21, 2009 letter

Well I hope everything is good back home. Up here everything is normal. We're teaching a few people that are progressing and the rest aren't really keeping commitments. We have two looking at getting baptized in August. They are both single moms of three kids each. They both are pretty religious. One of them has us coming over and also the Jehova's Witnesses teaching her. We'll see who wins. The other one goes to a different church with her sister every week. She intellectually believes in Joseph Smith but hasn't had a spiritual confirmation yet. We need to get her off the cigarettes and out to church.

Thats all thats been going on here.

E[...] M[...]

July 28, 2009 letter

Dear familia,

The weeks here are going by pretty quickly. Pioneer day just happened and I was in the parade. A few zones came and marched and we sang hymns. It was pretty good. I am sending a picture with the Budweiser horses. Those things are enormous.

We had one of our investigators lose their baptismal date because she physically can't go to church. She fractured her leg and is on bed rest for a week. So next week she'll go to church and the baptism will go on.

I've almost finished Jesus the Christ. That book is pretty sweet. There are a lot of things that I didn't pick up on just reading through the New Testament. Studying the scriptures and other church books is something I have really learned to love to do.

E[...] M[...]

August 4, 2009 letter

The only comment on my smile because thats the only good thing about me. I agree that there isn't much like baptisms to bring the spirit really strong. I hope the Primary calling isn't too difficult, but from what I understand most of it is taking care of 8 yr old baptisms, making sure all the Primaries run right, and just having the responsibility over everything.

[...]

As for the terrace, the work is progressing, but kind of slow. The investigators we have right now all have one similar problem. they all smoke. We are working with them and most are giving decent effort to quiting. That's the real hang up right now. We also are having trouble finding new investigators, but I've seen way to many times in Bountiful that when I work hard good things happen. We wouldn't find new investigators through our own efforts very often, but miracle phone calls would happen with referalls when we were working our hearts out.

Love

E[...] M[...]

August 11, 2009 letter

I'm sure [someone from our ward] served a good mission. It sounds like everything is well there. Up here we are getting some teaching done. We're working with C[...], a Southern Baptist, and preparing her to be baptized. She seems to really like the lessons, but her biggest concern is she can't deal with the fact that if this religion is right that makes the rest worng. Her concerns have all been pretty easy to resolve.

J[...] is still smoking and has cancelled the last few lessons. We think she is avoiding us because she is embarassed she hasn't been able to kick the habit yet. We have a lesson scheduled with her tonight so we'll see what happens.

On Sunday we were at church and C[...] didn't show up for the first hour. We were way nervous because she would lose her baptismal date again for not going to church. We said a bunch of prayers and called a bunch of times but she didn't pick up, so we got our bikes and rode to her house to drag her to church. When we got there her friend A[...] was there and told us he just dropped her off at church. God answers prayers, but not till we do our best to make things happen.

Love

E[...] M[...]