Dec. 28 2015

Skype

Opening package from Elder Condie

I just want to start out by saying how great it was to see all of you and to hear from you on Christmas Day. You all look really good. You really do. I think mom looked the best in that outfit that I got from Banff. Mom you should wear that to the airport when I fly home! hahah jk 

It looked like everyone had a wonderful Christmas! Everyone except Harvey. He looked very traumatized and harassed with that diaper that you guys put on him. Poor poor dog. I feel bad for him. :(

But the new carpet looks good. I’m sure the refinished wood floor does too.

Thank you so much for the wonderful gifts that you sent up. I really enjoyed reading all of those letters that were in the box of crackers. There were some people that I have not heard from for a while. It was good to hear from them. I want to reply to most of them. I will write a letter and send it home. Dad if you can get them to the right person that would be great. Thanks. 

Thank you Grandma for the shaver. I was able to shave my beard before I called home! ;) The only problem is that it’s from Germany, and the plug that goes into the outlet is foreign, and it will not plug in to any outlet in North America nor Canada. So I will get on adapter for it. They have them at the mission office, so I will be able to charge it and use it again to shave my beard when it grows  back. ;)

Our numbers have been lower this Christmas season, we moved apartments! we now live in a members basement suite, we went able to meet with all of our investigators. 

Fred is going well, we have not seen him for a while, he gets back from Edmonton today and we will try and get with him this week. We have a new investigator, he is a pass off, the sister missionaries in our district were teaching him and it turns our that he lives in our area. His name is Modest, he is African, we will be meeting with him on Saturday, he has been taught two times by the sister missionaries, this Saturday will be the first lesson that we have with him. 

We also have two more new investigators, they are the sons of a LA member that wants to get back to church we taught them the first lesson and we have not had another lesson, they are really hard to meet with.   

After this week we will be in a new year! 2016! I dont know about you but 2015 flew! With this new year set some new goals and focus on the Eternal things in life, that the dinner message that we have been focusing on this last week. 

Thank you for all of the love and support that everyone of you have given me. 

happy new year! 

2016     

Dec. 21 2015

Lots of things happened this week, it was really busy because of transfers. And we moved too! Saturday night we took two trucks and moved most of the stuff that we needed. We now live in a member’s basement. I really think mom would have liked our old apartment. Our heater did not work. We had to heat the house by turning on the oven and blowing the heat out by a fan. There were some mornings that got really cold in our apartment. 

It will be hard to live with these members because they will be feeding us every Monday and we have to taste eveything that they make like cookies and stuff. ;) So wish us luck haha..

So with skype: We will do skype in the morning around 9 or 10. We are skyping at the members we live with. If they have two computers for us to use then I will call around 9-10 if there is one computer then I will call around 12 noon. 

If I can’t text you their email then keep an eye on your email because I will send it that way.

Last week was transfers. I got a new comp. I’m still zone leader. My comp has not been ZL so I’m in a way "training" him to be ZL. His name is Elder Owens. He’s from Idaho.  

All last week, from Sunday night to Thursday morning I was in an old companionship. We were on a three leg, working in both wards. One of those elders was getting transferred. So we said good-bye to some members. After morning transfers I had to wait for my comp coming from the south. So did two others in the zone. There was another zone leader that was also waiting for his comp, so the 4 of us went to his area (my old area). We had lunch there and saw some members and we also did some tracting. We went back to the church after that because the missionaries coming from the south were there and they finished transfers. That is where I got my new comp. 

I look forward to seeing all of you in 4 days. 

Dec. 14th 2015

Well, this week was good, until it got to the end like on Saturday and Sunday. It’s been really hard!  On Saturday we went to Canadian Tire to get an oil change. That is the worst place to go and I don’t like dealing with them! Our oil change took forever! They did a 42 point inspection with it which our truck does not need because we just had one when they put new tires on. They were all done and they forgot to do something so that took longer. At Canadian Tire President called us asking if we can come to the mission home today. After our lesson we went to the mission home. President wanted to talk to Elder Christensen. After meeting in his office President called him as the next AP! Transfers are coming up this Thursday, I am staying in this area.  On Sunday night the APs came to the house to pick him up. Sunday night till Thursday I will be on a three leg. It kind of makes things a little harder and there is more anxiety too. President told me at the mission home that I will be staying, and that my next comp will be a new zone leader and he has not been out for too long. We had some stake changes. There will be some new/different wards in the zone.  It has been way fun to serve with him.  We had a baptism on Friday! There was a YSA girl that was being taught in Calgary West. Because of the change of the stake boundaries she lived in our stake. She was baptized into our ward because she lives in our stake. That was a really cool baptism. I could tell that the gospel has changed her live. I also think that the water was cold, because when she came up she was gasping for air haha. After the baptism we were asked to do a 10min first. We taught the restoration to everyone that was there, members and non-members, in 10 minutes, while they were changing.  After the baptism we got a lot of complements of how well we taught from other missionaries, bishop, and other people. That is one thing that I will miss this transfer. Every transfer we have apartment inspections. Our apartment was inspected. On a scale of 1 - 10 (10 being best) we got a 10.1.  We have an YSA investigator. She has been an investigator for a long time. She wants to be baptized but her parents won’t let her. One night she called us said that her mom will let her be baptized, but it will take awhile because her mom wants her to go their church for a while to give it a chance. Merry Christmas.  see you soon

Dec 7 2015

Christmas is getting closer and closer! It amazes me how fast this year went by! Next month will be a new year- 2016! 

We had a better week than last week. Last week was not too good. Our numbers were low. We were in Lethbridge for a day. 

We had this investigator named Diana, I have taught her once since I have been here. We kind of dropped her because she was not really progressing and it seemed like the more she meets with us the more involved she was with her church, the Baptist church. She came to this Church once or twice and she has had the baptismal invitation more than once, so she was not progressing. Just this or last month she started texting us saying that she would like to meet up again. So we scheduled an appointment. That one went well.  I asked her why she wanted to all of a sudden meet up with us again. I really liked her answer. She said that she likes the feelings that she feels, and it makes her week better. So that's good. It’s good that she recognizes it! Three days later we met up again. We had a plan to talk about the Book of Mormon and the importance of it. But instead we ended up teaching about the Plan of Salvation. I know that was instruction by the spirit, because during that lesson she had a lot of questions that we answered. I felt the Spirit really strongly as we were teaching about God's Plan of Happiness, the Plan of Salvation. The Spirit put words in my mouth that was not planned beforehand. Always being in tune with the Spirit is so important, as a missionary and at all times. 

As a missionary we learn to always be in tune with the Spirit, especially in lessons, because without the Spirit, the lesson will not get anywhere. The investigator will not get anywhere, and you will not get anywhere. 

This week we had lots of service. They were all moves too, which is kind of ironic I think, because the house just sold. The weather has been awful. It does not even feel like it is December! It’s been too warm. I think we have been in a Schnook this pass week. It’s been nice with the moves that we helped with, but I would like to see some snow, and not the snow that is on the ground already, that's been there for weeks. One of those moves was for a nonmember. Their house smells like marijuana. Walking up those stairs the smell hits you like a ton of bricks! We stopped early because of complications with their other Landlord. As we talked to the guy he starts rolling up a joint. He said that he has a medical card for it because he has a severe back injury. We left before he lit it up. haha

Last week we went on exchanges with the APs. It was a lot of fun. I enjoyed them. We got a lot of work done. 

Yesterday we had Stake Conference. All Calgary stakes were there. It was broadcasted via satellite. They rearranged the stake boundaries and they added a stake! That was really cool to witness. A new stake means a new zone, Next week is transfers, I am really interested to see what goes on.      

There was General Authority there, Elder Anderson of the Seventy. He gave a really good talk. He talked about the temples, and the importance of temple sealing. He said "Those who receive the sealing covenant in the temple, they will still be together in the next life." even if they make wrong choices. 

He talked a lot about faith. There are three principles of faith.

1. Believe in Jesus Christ, Have hope. Faith and hope go together. 

2. Set goals that are in line with Gods will. Conform desire with his will. 

3. GET TO WORK! Faith without works is dead. 

I am really excited for Christmas and for the New Year. Good luck with the move. Hope it all goes well.

Love you all