Jan. 5th 2015

Hey Family,

How are things going?!  Things here are going good.  Lovin it out here. 

So this week is not going to be a long email because right now we are in Cranbrook,  The drive here was so sketchy because it was snowing and the roads had about 4 inches of snow on them and the roads were not plowed.  Also here in Canada they do not salt the roads!  They just use sand and gravel.  Lots of gravel!  So you will get so many rock chips!  How would you like driving here Dad?  Hah! I know how much you love rock chips!  Haha! 

Anyways, transfers are coming up next week!  And to be honest I’m way excited for that and also I kinda want to stay because Amanda is going to be baptized and I think she will ask me to baptize her.  But even if I get transferred and she wants me to baptize her then President will let me drive down from wherever I am and baptize her.  She has come a long way and it is so amazing to see how the gospel can change anyone!  She is so ready for baptism and she is excited for that.  We have been teaching her for 3 months and from day 1 she has come a long way and has changed.

So this last week we went tracting in the snow and we were way successful!  We handed out 4 Books of Mormon and I gave a Restoration Pamphlet to a Jehovah’s Witness!  That was way cool! But that is another story for another week.

So we have one more lesson to teach Amanda.  We are going to teach her L5 on Wednesday.  We are going on exchanges when we drive back from Cranbrook.  I will be with our DL.  He’s a cool guy, way fun to be around and I’m way excited for that.  So that is what went down this week and hopefully we will have a baptism this Saturday. 

Love you all. Thanks you for the love and support. J

Elder Condie

Dec. 17, 2014

 A few days after Christmas, Tanner received this in the mailbox along with a copy of this talk:

Tanner,

‘Sup Bro! How are things going?

So in response to your email, here is that talk that I was talking about.  It is called “The 4^th Missionary”.  This has helped me so much on my mission so far.  It makes me want to become a better missionary.

I love being out here serving the Lord and inviting others to come unto Christ by helping them receive the restored gospel through faith in Jesus Christ and his atonement, repentance, baptism, and receiving the Holy Ghost and enduring to the end.

In your email you asked how to better prepare for you mission.  My answer is Preach My Gospel.  You will be using this every day so it is critical to get to know it.

My second answer is:

Read “The 4^th Missionary” and decide now what kind of missionary you want to be.  As for me, I want to be the 4^th missionary.  

I love being out here. I love my mission.  I love the Lord.

I hope you have a good Christmas. Love you.

Elder Condie

P.S. Read this with Dad 

December 29, 2014

Well this week was probably one of the slowest weeks of my life. We were not able to do much because it was the Christmas season and it was Boxing Day after Christmas and there are not a lot of people home and they are not interested at the time.

I just want to say that I loved Christmas! It was amazing and I loved Facetiming you guys. It was so good you see all of you. It looked like, by the pictures, that you all you a good Christmas. Tanner you need to smile more! :)))))))))))

So this Sunday our investigator Amanda came to church. She is the one who lost her kids because Brendon was not allowed in the house or to be around the kids. So he is gone living in Cranbrook with his mom and brother. The missionaries there are teaching him. So there was A LOT of emotional problems. This experience has brought them closer to God and has strengthened them as a family, because of what happened and the experiences that she had.  Her kids notice it and Amanda and her kids want to be baptized. They are not afraid to stick up for what they believe in. I do not know for sure if I told you about the experience(s) that Amanda had, but I think I did. Let me know if I did tell you guys.  

DEC, 8th 2014

 

So this week was transfers and I am still in Trail. I will be here till the beginning of January (hopefully). Being in one area for 6 months is too long, and also it does not happen that much.

 So this week was a week of packing and saying good bye, and driving to Lethbridge, Alberta. It is crazy driving in Alberta. And then I got a new comp. His name is Colton Simpson. Lybe went to Calgary somewhere as a Zone Leader. And that is about all that happened this week. 

Elder Bednar says some good things about missionary work and how it blesses the lives of others, and that it is a priesthood responsibility. He says

 "All of us who have received the holy priesthood bear the sacred obligation to bless the nations and families of the earth by proclaiming the gospel and inviting all to receive by proper authority the ordinances of salvation. Many of us have served as full-time missionaries, some of us presently are serving as full-time missionaries, and all of us now are serving and will continue to serve as lifelong missionaries. We are missionaries every day in our families, in our schools, in our places of employment, and in our communities. Regardless of our age, experience, or station in life, we are all missionaries.
Proclaiming the gospel is not an activity in which we periodically and temporarily engage. And our labors as missionaries certainly are not confined to the short period of time devoted to full-time missionary service in our youth or in our mature years. Rather, the obligation to proclaim the restored gospel of Jesus Christ is inherent in the oath and covenant of the priesthood into which we enter. Missionary work essentially is a priesthood responsibility, and all of us who hold the priesthood are the Lord’s authorized servants on the earth and are missionaries at all times and in all places—and we always will be. Our very identity as holders of the priesthood and the seed of Abraham is in large measure defined by the responsibility to proclaim the gospel." 

 I know that this is true. We all can be missionaries even though we do not wear the tag. We should all be acting on missionary opportunities because they are everywhere; School, Work, Store, Vacations, EVERYWHERE. We are all brothers and sisters of our loving Heavenly Father. If that is the case then wouldn't we want them to have that same happiness, joy, and salvation that we have?     

Dec. 2 2014

Hey guys,

Happy Thanksgiving and Merry Christmas! My Thanksgiving went super good, just like I’m sure yours did too. I did not eat that much pie or potatoes at all. For American Thanksgiving we had dinner at our WMLs (Ward Mission Leader's) house. We had Ham, Potatoes, and Stuffing it was really good. After that, we drove to a members house and had some pie there. I had a piece of home made pecan pie! It was the best pecan pie I have ever had! So that was our thanksgiving. At first it was kinda hard not being home for that, because for 18 years it has been at grandmas house or grams house. It was different not doing that. But in the end it all went good. I got your packages that you sent me! Thank you so much Grandma and Fam. I can’t wait to open them for Christmas.

Today is transfer week, so that is why I’m emailing today on Tuesday our Pday and not Monday. So with transfers this week we found out that I am NOT being transferred. I’m staying in Trail, and Lybe is going. He’s being transferred somewhere south, so Calgary. So this week he will be packing up and we will be driving to Calgary. 

On Sunday we had another church open house, and we knocked, and knocked on doors handing out flyers inviting people to it. We probably knocked on 100 doors and we were hoping for a good turn out of at least one non-member. But that did not happen. We just got more members, which is good but non members would have been better.

We got a new investigator! He was also baptized this week too. So I got my first baptism this week! He is 9 years old, he invited us to his baptism at the church open house, and then we realized that he is 9 years old. That means we have to teach him before he can be baptized. His family is all members but they lived in a place with no church/ward/branch when they moved there was a LDS church (the one that they are going now) they wanted their son to go to church before he was baptized. But in that time he turned 9 so we had to teach him all 5 lessons first. One day we taught him lessons 2and3. That went great! We felt the spirit, and Weston (9 year old) did too. He was laughing and crying, two days later we taught him lessons 4-5 and he was interviewed by our DL the same day. They had family coming up for the baptism and for American Thanksgiving so they were not going to change the date. I will send that picture today.

We also did a lot of service this week which consisted of snow removal, people were really grateful for that, stacking wood for a member, and helping a member move in. They moved into a nice place. Nice house, 20 acres and it is 7 clicks to the US Border. 

So this week I will be getting a new comp, and we will be driving up to Calgary. And with the investigators that we have there has been a lot of things going on, a lot of things for the worse. Nina has decided to take a month long break from the BoM and read only the Bible, and see what fruit will grow just from that, meaning New World Translation Bible which happens to be the JW bible. We asked her if this was an idea from her friend Lina who is a JW, and she said yes. Nina said that she knows that there will be something missing, but she is doing it anyways. 

And then the Grieves. We met with them that other day and that went great, there are still a lot of things going on. They have to find a new place to live because the Landlord is going to sell the house.

So that is just great! So that is all the things that are and have been happening. Thank you so much for the Christmas Packages. That is just so awesome! It will be a great Christmas this year for me in Canada. 

Also the Church is doing this HUGE thing for Christmas. It is called the Christmas Initiative. The Church will be doing a YouTube Takeover like they did with Easter last year. So this month we will be giving He is The Gift pass-along cards along with DVDs. So if you get time watch that video, and if you get the Ensign there are He is The Gift pass-along cards, the some ones that we will be handing out. So if you get your hands on them then I challenge you hand them out to people. 

Thank you again for the Christmas Packages.

Thank you for the love and support .

Love you all and have a great week! 

Elder Lybe's birthday dinner at Parslow's

Nov. 17 2014

Hey Fam!

How are things going!? Things here in BC are getting really really cold lol, and the hard part is that it is getting dark at 4:00. It’s so crazy, and it’s hard to get use to. So imagine Tanner, Dallin, Caleb, and Callie, getting home from school and it is already getting dark! Wake up, go to school, come home, and go to bed! haha

My coat is keeping me warm. It’s a nice coat and it’s doing its job. Also dad, I had to use my home flow bank card, I bought a hat and some gloves, I spent $40 using that card. I’m sorry. I did not want to use it, but I did not have enough cash or money left on the BA card. So how it works: the church gives you a Bank of America Prepaid card. Every month they put on $200 and it gets you through the month; food, clothes, toiletries, and so on. I withdrew money from the BA card (church card) from the ATM because its only one fee, instead of a fee any time I use the BA card. 

Last week was Zone Conference.  That was really good. On zone pday we played a life-sized game of Sorry and that was so intense. My team won! Thanks to me, I drew the card that we needed to get our guy back home. I Tebowed when I drew the card. We won. Then after that game all missionaries got dressed into pross and President took all of the missionaries out to dinner who did not have a dinner planned with a member. He took us to Dennys. Then we had more training after dinner, then we went back to the Zeds apartment. They have a nice apartment. its two stories and three or four bedrooms. most of us slept on the floor on mattresses. In the morning we got ready for the day, got ready for car inspections, had some training meetings, and car safety training. After that, when it was all over our district left together. We stopped at Creston to chill, use the washroom, and to kill time until the next Ferry, but to make use of time we went street contacting in the freezing cold. Most of us thought that no one was going to be out because of the time (8:50ish PM) and because of how cold it was. I was one of them haha. We went on exchanges for that night. So Elder Lusk and I were walking down the road. we see nobody! But all of a sudden we see this guy that crosses  the street and walks right in front of us. I’m the one that stops him and I talks to him. When I'm about to offer the BoM,  in my mind I'm thinking that he’s not going to except this BoM, but I ask him anyways and I accepts it!!!:) That was really really cool! His name was Ross. Then we met up with and left with the Nelson elders from Creston. We drove to take the Ferry home. That was so nice and fun, We ended up spending the night in Nelson and left for Trail that next morning. 

On Friday the Nelson ward had a bean bag tournament. We were invited to that and that was so fun. There was lots of food, candy, and pizza.  The Nelson ward has like 180 members but only like 10 are active. Its kinda sad.  I made it to the semi-finals but I lost after that.  

So the church open house that we had 2 weeks ago went great! Our investigator family showed up and we had some members show up too. So what happens in a church open house is: You start off in the foyer, I was the ""tour guide"" I told them what we were going to be doing and what was going to be happening, I showed a Mormon Message video, then bore testimony. I took them through some of the church building  walking by rooms and telling them what this room was and what  goes on in this room and that room. Then I took them inside a room and a missionary gave a quick talk about prophets or the Savior’s earthly ministry, (one of the points in lesson 1) and he bore testimony. Then I took them to another room. They sat down in front of another missionary that talked about another point in Lesson 1 and he bore testimony. Then I took them into another room where we had our WM (ward mission leader) talk about the Atonement and he bore testimony, Then I took them to the room right behind the chapel. There were no chairs and our WML talks about the 12 apostles and what happened to them after Jesus dies on the cross. All of the names of the apostles were on Hymn books and as our WML talked about them and about when they died he knocked down a book. When he knocked down 6 books, a missionary turned off one set of lights, and then once the other 6 were knocked down all the lights go off, state of apostasy, state of darkness. He then went on in saying something like "Because the Lord loves us he has called another prophet here on this earth and *light* was restored." When he said “light” two missionaries whipped open the big sliding fire doors (the same ones that are in your ward) that lead into the Chapel with all the lights on and the Restoration video ready to go. A missionary talked about the restoration and we watched it and then he bore testimony about it after the movie was over. Then last we had some cookies in the gym and some BoMs and other things that people can take. 

We are having another Church open house next week on Sunday, with all of the members that went to the last one. They said that they loved it!  And it was so good!  So hopefully we will have a better turnout, because every member was invited to bring a friend, and they did not do that but I bet they will with this next one coming up because of  all of the good things they heard about it.. 

Two days ago we went door-to-door in the cold (of course) in Castlegar and told everyone about the church open house and handed out flyers. We ran into a lot of nice people.  One of them invited us in to warm up and we stood there and talked for like 10 minutes. 

This week we will be doing the same approach about the church open house. 

So now with the investigators: Nina was not baptized. She gets a lot of "stuff" from her good ole friend that's a JW. And with the Grieves, there is a lot of stuff going on with them, mostly the husband. That is all I will say about them. Sorry I did not email last week. It won’t happen again. 

***Also I don't think that we will be getting iPads any time soon, due to some missionaries that are somewhere in the states who are making stupid choices with their iPads. President says that he does not think that we will get iPads while he is still president, so that will be in July, That's when he leaves. And he inplied not to plan on getting them any time soon. So with that I was thinking that I should get another pair of dress shoes/snow dress shoes because the ones that I have now they are wearing out inside in the back. And if I keep wearing them the there will be no back (back of the heal) So I could use some Home Flow money and use the BA card that the church gave me. So what sayest thou? haha 

Also anytime even when I get transferred you can send anything to the mission home; letters or anything, that will be the best way to send things because I will be transferred soon. 

Also I am sorry to ask for things but there are some things that I need if possible can you send it to me, to that address that I gave you. I need:

My Black Winter Gloves  

Thermal Garments...........I can give you the size that I bought that fit. 

Warm Wool Socks  

Kenneth Cole Reaction white shirts........They are the ones that we got at Sams club, they are a thicker fabric then the other shirts that we ordered online they keep me warmer. Especially when I get transferred to Calgary in February, that's the months where it gets the coldest. Those Kenneth Cole white shirts can be the winter shirts and the others can be summer shirts. 

I heard that Harvey contributed to the package! haha that’s so funny! There’s a member in the ward that has two BIG greyhounds!  

Thank you     

Love all of you 

Nov. 10

Hey peeps! How are things going?! So I heard that Cade Baker is back now! Wow thats crazy! Good to hear that Halloween went good for all of you. Halloween was super good for me. The night before we drove to Creston to where our District Leader is and we traded comps and so his comp went with my comp and I stayed in Creston with our District Leader and went on exchanges with him on Halloween Day. The mission rule is that all missionaries have to be inside be 6:00. So after dinner we drove back to Trail, back to our pad and just partied and played games with the Nelson and Creston Elders. Also I have been approved to drive! So I’m driving the car now! Its pretty cool. Last week we got to watch an 87 year old man that is in our ward jump off the high dive and do flips and back flips and back flops, all of these crazy things! He is so energetic and out going. he’s a sweet guy. 

So our investigator Nina the one that I talked about before, she’s back on date again! This time its solid! This time we can see the difference in her eyes, she has stopped studying with the JWs once as she understood that Jehovah is Jesus and not God (Heavenly Father) which we told her and she also found out by herself. She said that this is no way that the JWs could be right, she also has a friend that is JW and she was kinda influenced her but Nina told her that she will never become a JW and her friend supports her. 

Also we were able to teach that one family that I talked about earlier. we had bishop come with us and that went just amazing! The spirit was there. The husband prayed before we left and that was so powerful, considering his past and the change(s) that he is making. Then after we left the wife texts us saying that he went back to his old self. Not doing anything that we challenged them to do like family prayer. He just went and slept on the couch she said. 

   As of yesterday the wife texted us when their whole family was in Cranbrook to see his family. he totally turned around. He was nice to everyone and he stood up to her when his brother was yelling and swearing at her. We are going to meet with them tonight. 

Last week we did some door to door and gave out one Book of Mormon. that was super cool. 

Well Ill let you know how the baptism goes this week, the next time I will be emailing I will be in Cranbrook for Zone Conference. President will be there. So maybe, just maybe that is when we will be getting ipads! haha

Love you all! hope you have a fantastic week. Good luck at school and work.    

  After not receiving a letter the next week, Todd sent a text to Sister Parslow to see if she knew what was up.  She said he had been out of town but she had just received a text from him and was expecting him for dinner in an hour.  A little while later, we received this text from Sister Parslow’s phone:

Hello this is Elder Condie.  Every thing is going very super good!:) We went to cranbrook on Sunday  driving up there was crazy! Because on the pass there was like three inches of snow and like ten feet of visibility.  It was so crazy! Pday was fun. we did life size game of Sorry and then President took us out to dinner. then we had some training . Tuesday we had some more training.  on the way home we stopped at Creston and during that time we did some street contacting  and I gave away a Book of Mormon  in the freezing cold.  Then we took the ferry. That was really  cold. we had a church open house. I will tell you more about that on Monday  and about the investigators.  thank you for sending me a Christmas package that is so nice of you guys. I look forward to Christmas. that's when I will open it!:) Sorry I did not email on Monday. Thanks for all you guys do love all of you!

Elder Condie

After learning of Glen’s death, Jaden wrote:

 “Wow! Is Tresa doing okay? Thats not good. If you do go to St. George tell her that I’m sorry to hear the news, and that I will be praying for her, and that I miss her and love her, and that I know that she will be able to see him again, and that everything happens for a reason. 

Isaiah 55:8-9, Proverbs 3:5-6  might help, I don’t know. Only share those scriptures if the spirit prompts you to.