23 Jun 2009

When I was in Bountiful, Elder Anderson lived an 1/8 of a mile outside my area, along with Pres Uchdorf and Pres Eyring. I didn't see any of them while I was there.

This week I baptized K[...], our last progressing investigator at the time. It was nice doing that.

Then later that day we found a new investigator and gave her a baptismal date for July 11. She had "some questions" about the church like how could Joseph Smith see the face of God and not die and those other dumb questions. We answered her questions and the spirit was so strong she started crying and left the room. The fellowship came back in the room a couple minutes later and was way happy. She wanted to be baptized. Good experience.

Love, E[...] M[...]

16 June 2009

Yeah, I played the piano for the baptism last Saturday so I still get some use out of it. I also bought this Paul Cardall piano book that has arrangments of hymns that I have used for prelude. It's not hard except it always wants you to play the left hand in the treble clef or the bass clef an octave up and that confuses my brain sometimes.

Sarah said you wanted a "real letter" so here it is. I attached a picture of me eating a dragonfly.

We baptized a kid last Saturday. He had ADHD so he was very amusing to teach. A miracle that we found him though. He had already gone to church a bunch of times, wanted to be baptized, but was going back to his mom's house the next week. We talked to the bishop and he said he wanted him to be baptized asap, so we taught him every night that week and baptized him on Saturday. A crazy good miracle that we found him at that time and everything. It just shows that it's not just me working, I don't do much good, the Lord does all the real work.

Love, E[...] M[...]

9 June 2009 Letter

Ok, so my comp has been in Washington Terrace his whole mission, and yes I'm senior.

Just keep the adaptor to the memory card so you can just send the micro chip back and forth and we won't have to worry about the adaptor.

A new stake--that sounds great. It just shows how much the Lord's work is progressing--the stone cut out of the mountain without hands that crushes everything. I'm glad our ward is the same, there isn't any ward up here quite like it.

The work up here is going great, slow at first, but we're working on it. When I got there only one person was preparing for baptism, and now there's 3. We didn't have any new investigators for the first two weeks, and not from lack of trying. Yesterday we knocked on a door the bishop told us to and committed the son for baptism right on the spot. This boy J[...] had gone to church all growing up until he was 8 and his parents were divorced and stopped attending church until the last few weeks. The Lord just handed us this one and I know He wouldn't have done that unless we were working like slaves. The area is turning around and we are steadily making progress.

Love, W[...]

2 June 2009 Letter

Dear Family,

[E W sent some beautiful photographs for Mother's Day. You'll see them when you visit our home] Yeah [the photographer] is from Bountiful. He is ranked #1 in the world for the kind of photography that he does.

So on Sunday I spoke in another sacrament meeting (its becoming a habit) and afterwards some people came up and talked to me. One of them was one of T[...]'s missionary companions and another was the N[...] who apparently had dinner with Grandma and Grandpa the night before.

It's weird being over only one stake, the Washington Terrace East stake. There is not as much going on, but I guess thats all right because we ride bikes.

My companion is a cool guy. He's from Washington and has only been out three months. We're making it all work out and the work is just increases since I made it into the area.

Love, E[...] M[...]

24 May 2009 Member Letter

Dear Sis. M[...],

We live in one of the wards that your son is serving here in Bountiful. We wanted to let you know what a wonderful missionary son you have. We have enjoyed his visits to our home since he first arrived here on his mission. I have been able to work with him while serving as our ward mission leader and he has given us a lot of help and encouragement. We have also enjoyed hearing him play the piano in our home occasionally.

Today he and Elder E[...] spoke in our Sacrament meeting. They both did a wonderful, inspiring job. You would be very pleased to know that your son shared a very uplifting, spiritual, articulate testimony. I was proud of him. He told of the first time he read the Book of Mormon all the way through and finished New Year’s Eve, the year President Hinckley challenged us to do so. I had to smile because I was doing the same thing that night.

Early this morning our missionary coordination meeting ended early so they took advantage of the time by working on a piano/organ duet of
Praise to the Man. A counselor in our bishopric and I heard it and asked them if they wanted to play it in our sacrament meeting.

E[...] M[...] thinks that he may be transferred this week and this might be their last and only chance to perform it together. They did a wonderful job and the whole ward was touched and excited for them. Elder E[...] says it was the first time that he had ever played in public. It was great for our young men and women to see their great example of developing and sharing their talents. By the way, it was your son on the organ and he even used the foot pedals.

We pray that your son will stay with us a little longer, but we know that the Lord is in charge. Our oldest son is now serving a mission in Australia. We send our young sons and daughter out and know it is going to be a great experience, and we have found that the Lord blesses, guides and uses these young missionaries to do wonderful things that exceed our good expectations by a long ways.

You have a great son. Thank you for sharing him with us and our neighbors.

Love, T[...] & B[...] G[...]

28 May 2009 member letter

Dear Brother & Sister M[...],

Your son stopped by Tuesday night to and told us that he was being transferred to the South Ogden/Washington Terrace area. We have enjoyed him so much. You have a great son and a great missionary. We would love to have him transferred back to Bountiful again.

Your son served 3 different stakes in his area, which is probably close to 27 wards. Early Sunday mornings they would skip from one stake missionary coordination meeting to the next. It is a little hard for all the ward members to get to know them because they didn’t see them every week. If we did a better job at having investigators in our meetings we would be able to see them more often. We all love to have them over for dinner.

Thank you again for sharing your son with us.

Love,T[...] & B[...] G[...]

19/26 May 2009 letter

19 May 2009 Letter

I totally called the new stake president. I knew it would be [C...] [T...] (Our new Stake President is our former Bishop).

This week went good. One of the guys I have been teaching we gave a baptismal date and he was way wishy washy about it. He didn't know if Joseph was a prophet or not. Last week we stopped by and asked how his prayers were going and he said good..... actually not at all. Then he told us he would have to pray if he wants to be baptized. Then later he is just more and more excited about it. He stood up in elders quorum and announced that he's getting baptized. We even got to move the date earlier because he is in the national guard and couldn't get baptized in June. We are very excited.

Transfers are coming up next week and I'll probably leave. That's all that's new.

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

26 May 2009 Letter

Well, I'm getting transfered to Washington Terrace East in the South Ogden zone. My new companion is E[...] S[...] and he's only been out for 3 months. It will be fun to serve in a new area, but I will definitely miss Bountiful.

Last week we were tracting and ran into someone who knew J[...] S[...]. So we went to his house. He wasn't home so we went back later and caught him,. His family was having a family council which was just like back home. Arguing and all that fun. He played a song for us and it was amazing. It was "all of me." He even uses his forearms to smash the keys during some parts. He's amazing.

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