March/April News

Elder Tyler Doyle

How are u all? I totally forgot about Easter. Yeah, here, all the Catholics here worship their idols and carry big statues of Mary and Jesus on their shoulders. That's about it. It's way awkward to see. The kids usually laugh and ask us to help them carry it.

This week went great. The work is way slow. My comp didn't even get to know the members when he was here with his last comp, so we did that a lot this week. I know most of them already. There are a lot of ex-missionaries in the branch. Some are apostate. The ones here in the branch do the translating in Kekchi, since they know Spanish as well. That's way cool. The members are way cool.

We have a cook so we eat well. The house is way small. The shower sucks. I use rain water (the water is in a tank and at night I bet you there are fat snakes inside, but I shower any ways). I use a little bucket and I dump the water on my head. It's way cold so I hate to shower but I have to do it.

The mission is great. I am starting from scratch here in this area, but i will pick it up. Ya, so thanks for everything. All the support and the emails. u r great. Conference is coming up. I can't wait. I am fine here. Don't worry about me. See ya later. Elder Doyle

Sister Teresa Hall

...so you're always asking and I never have time- so here is some info
I am teaching.. Zack he is 10 and just got set for baptism, on my
birthday might I add. That will be a sweet gift and a great memory that on
my 22nd B-day I had my first baptism! He is sweet such a good kid. I
love him dearly and cant wait to see him grow up and go on a mission!
His family is not LDS, but we're teaching his mom with him and we feel
with some time that she will join too.

I love to teach, I see some strange stuff
but most of the time I just laugh about it when we get in the car and
my companion laughs with me. But I love it, I like it and I know that
I am doing the Lords work. It is not always easy; things have at times
been rough. But I am on the Lords side and he see's my struggles and
knows my heart. Even when I am not doing all the right perfect little
things he still stands by me and helps me.

Elder Keenan Harris

Well just the normal here. We have no investigators, but we have a lot of inactive, we got an inactive family to come back last Sunday and it was awesome, they hadn't come for over a year! Then we got this one awesome lady who is like 60 years old to come back also, she got baptized way back in 1961 and she is a police officer, she came back also. We had the wonderful ability of giving her a blessing, because she is about to go have surgery, and she said she had been really stressed out, then we came and that really helped her out a whole lot. She hasn't been to church for a long time until Sunday. She was really worried that no one would remember her, because she hadn't been in such a long time. So that was really exciting. Out here in Taiwan almost any holiday isn't really celebrated except Christmas, so nothing special for Easter. They didn't even mention it in Sacrament meeting. My birthday was too special; we didn't get our monthly money until the next day so then I got some blueberry Cheese cake that was just amazing. I have not gotten my Flight plans yet, but I'm happy that mom told me. Oh I will just keep e-mailing your old e-mail address, because it is just for another little while. I'm also talking to Adrain about getting a place to live, up at the Y, cause He's said people are already starting to sign up for places to live. But I really don't know what needs to be done.

Elder Scott Haycock

Things are going great here in Iowa just as usual! Today is raining really hard but the next
couple of days should start heating up so thats good. The weather here is wacky...and i
miss back at home when weather would usually be about the same all the time...here you
never know what to expect. But anyways the days and weeks continue on going faster and faster. Just a reminder next week is transfers..can you belive it?...and so i wont email till wednesday... I really dont know what to expect this transfer i hope i stay here but the more and more we look at it its looks like ill be leaving...but thats ok too i'm excited to meet more people too. Well anyway...this week was pretty interesting. Yesterday at church i was translating for these English people and it was fast sunday because of next week, but yea sacrament went really long. Here in the branch they dont really look at the time. They will continue going until they are done so sacrament went until 12 and church started at 10. So yea that was pretty interesting...almost every single member went up there and said something so it was pretty interesting. Hahaha but yea translating for 2 hours while fasting is not such a fun thing but it is an experience i guess. Hhahah well another interesting thing that happened this week was we were invited to go to a members house for dinner i think it was on wednesday. Well anyways we get there and we sit down at the table and the wife(hermana Azucena) puts this huge metal(i guess you would call it a pot but it looked more like a bucket) anyways...so after she does that Hermano Tono says in english 'Sea food...YUM!'....so yea so pretty much that consistansy of it was a some kind of soup with fish in them....it was odd and
while i was trying to grab one of these fish one of the heads of another fish pops through the soup....hahah it caught me a little off guard so yea...pretty interesting...but it tasted good once
i got all the bones out of my mouth..:)

Sister Nikki Hydrick

I am here in the Tri-cities area (in Kennewick…the Kennewick east stake). We have people on date for baptism already and are teaching loads of people. Our companionship has responsibility for three wards which is an immense amount of people. We had 9 hours of church yesterday and about 4 more of meetings. Wow.

The people here are very humble and there is a lot of poverty. Most of the people we teach live in trailer parks and several women we teach are waiting for their husbands to return home after serving time. Drugs are pretty rampant as well. It’s made me feel exceptionally blessed. There are also some refugees we are teaching. We had to procure an Arabic Book of Mormon this week because one of our progressing investigators is Sudanese and her tribal language is extremely obscure. No one we know of speaks Arabic, but she speaks a little English and expresses how she loves what happens to her when we come into her home. We also tracked into a man the other day who’s from Iraq and whose wife and children are in Syria now after violence broke out in their neighborhood. Also, we see a lot of the developmentally disabled and the elderly and help them in some of the day to day things they can’t do on their own. It fills a 16 hour day pretty good.

Elder Doug Kelley

Today is a good day. I had really good studies. I studied about the God-Head the whole time. I learned that no matter where you read in the Bible, if you keep going, and look more into the context of the scriptures, then you will see more and more plainly that God, Jesus, and the Holy Ghost are separate with the same purpose and mission. Its so obvious now. In John chapter 14,
we see over 10 references to God and the God-Head being separate. And its just amazing! We had an investigator Matt B. Run into anti material. Its so sad, he was really progressing, really
loving everything he was learning and his mom and ex-girlfriend gave him anti stuff and now he is full of doubts instead of faith. I feel bad for Robyn, she is one of the fellowshippers, who is the reason he is being taught. Matt has admired her over the years and seen a light in her. That is
what he wants to know about. Its soo cool! But now he is in a different attitude. We fasted for him Sunday and expect miracles to happen, I know the Lord will help him. Robyn was really upset
when she called us a few days ago because of this info, she told us about it all. By the end of the conversation she felt calm and the spirit was there, I had prayed in my mind for that to happen. I am really glad. She said she appreciated how we always opened with a song and a prayer, and how it set the mood and invited the spirit. We have already gone over all the information he has questions about, in previous lessons. This is the reason I studied the God-Head this morning, because I want to make sure I know where the scriptures are and not just say its in the Bible. In Ch 5 of Preach My Gospel, it says that we are not obligated to answer every concern or question, it comes down to
"is The Book of Mormon true, and is Joseph Smith a prophet?" That is what must be answered, if those things are true, then the Church and all its doctrines stand firm, Gods hand backing them up. Anyway, I am glad I am a missionary and feel the Lord when I have to answer questions of people, sometimes I don't expect to say what I said, it just comes out and they ask how you are so smart, when in reality its not me. It's a pretty cool thing, but if you don't pray and thank God every time it happens it tends to go away. :-)

Elder Kevin McGuire
I had a cool experience with finding this week. We streeted a guy on Tuesday and called and
set up an appointment for Sunday. He ends up being renatas (the one we just baptized) next
door neighbor! Really nice family with 2 kids. Funny thing is that renata says that the kids are
little devils and always pound on her door early in the morning and that the mom is always
flustered and yells at the kids but they don’t listen. renata said that after her baptism that was
one of the first times she felt the influence of the holy ghost because one morning as they were being unruly, she started to get mad and was about to go out and yell at the kids, but she then
had that thought of the mother and how stressed she must be and she said that the anger left
and she was going to offer to watch the kids for a little while every now and then so the mom
could rest a little. renata is sooooo solid, it is exciting to see her progress.

Elder Alex Morgan
This last transfer, Alex got called to serve in the mission
home as one of the assistants. He's enjoying working
closely with Pres. Yardley, and he and his companion,
(E. Peters) have so much fun together that they're planning
on being roommates when they go to BYU in the fall. Alex
will be working with 3 Boise State wards and thinks that
his cousin Bryce, who recently returned from his mission
to Russia, is in one of his wards so they will be able to go
on splits together. It's a small world isn't it? . . .

Elder Cameron Pettey
ok so this week went by a little bit faster, which is good. Saturday through Wed go by somewhat fast, and then its pretty slow the other days. It helps a lot to have gym during the week to break up the eating and sitting. We have gym Sat, Mon, and Tues. Then Sundays are amazing. I never thought I´d love Sundays so much in my life. I wish it was Sundays everyday. And Wed is obviously P Day. This last Friday we went out of the gates and into the real world. First time proselyting. It was a great experience. First of all to actually be outside the CTM and see the sun(I see the sun about once a week prolly), but also to be able to talk to real Brazilians trying to use my Portuguese. I gave away my 1st BOM and gave away pass along cards. All the people were very friendly and nice, well most people. At least willing to listen. I could not understand anything they said if they said something back to me so I made sure I learned I dont understand Portuguese very well and Im learning Portuguese. One person gave me a funny look and kind of laughed because I like rip out this thing about the church in Portuguese and then cant understand anything. Hahahah. He prolly couldnt understand me anyways. But it was a good experience and afterwards, our instructer, Irmão Suarez bought us all an ice cream cone from McDondalds. yes McDonalds. It was way good. He said prolly the best ice cream in Brazil. hahah.

Elder Andrew Pulsipher
The spirit of this place is amazing. I have learned so much about the blessings of obedience
along with the importance of missionary work. I've learned that I can't learn without the spirit
and I've found that I spend a lot more time on my knees than ever before...
The Preach My Gospel is fantastic. I wish I had used it more before I got here. I'm finally
beginning to really understand about the atonement. Use it at home. Make the kids teach
FHE with it. Mom, you always taught me that I need to witnesses for the truth, my heart and my mind. The gospel is true. Preach My Gospel and the scriptures really teach you, in your mind
and the spirit really does testify to your hear. Now I understand when you would say you know
the gospel is true in your heart and in your mind....

Elder Jared Roberts
We had some miracles last week. Our mission pres has really been working hard with us on meeting all of our goals, so we have to set them realistically. Well we had a goal to have 4
people at church this Sunday but our chances weren’t looking good. So when we had our
chance to change it we did, in our weekly planning session. Well towards the end of the
planning session I started thinking four again, and I told my comp "alright, let’s do an act
of faith, let’s put four, and do everything we can to get four people there, and then leave
the rest to the lord", so we did. So Saturday as the night was winding down we had no one
that would be going to church but we kept our spirits up and kept working until we had to go home, but nothing. We got up on Sunday morning and did the same thing before church at 9, anyway, we got to church and no one.

We have priesthood first, then gospel principals, and then Sacrament.  So priesthood ends and
gospel principles starts and a lady we are working with who hadn’t been home Saturday or
Sunday morning walks in with a big smile on her face, and then right after her, a lady from the
English class walks in... Then another lady who no one knows walks in. We ask her where she
lives, and she lives in our area, then we get to sacrament meeting and it turns out she had her
daughter there with her too, who is 11... Yeah, that’s four.  She said her English teacher is a
member and told her she should go to church some Sunday, she liked it, and she will come
back this Sunday with her son too. Pretty crazy...

Elder Jared Schmidt
This letter is going to be long so mom I hope you enjoy it. Well as you probably read in the subject this was prpbably one of the best weeks of my life. I had so many experiences this week it was unbelievable. Well as you probably know we have been struggling with teaching lately. Just having a hard time finding investigators. It has been really depressing for me because you work so hard and nothing comes of it. Well I have been praying for a miracle, somone to teach, not just for my own benefit but mostly for my companion so he can be happier. Well on Wednsday I got a miracle! On tuesday last week during P-Day we got a call from a woman who said her neighbor expressed intrest in meeting with the missionaries. So we set up a time to come and teach her neighbor at her house Wensday night. That was all the info we had. We arrived a little early so that we could talk to the members & get a little more infromation on this woman. They said her name was Asia Penton, that she just went through a divorce and had been coming to church because it brought her comfort. Well now we are thinking this is sounding pretty good. A few minutes later Asia came over. We had dinner and got to know her a little bit. She is a really neat lady. As we started teaching the first lesson the spirit was just so strong. As we got to the first vision, you could see that she was getting a little emotional. We asked her how she felt as we shared Joseph's experience with her. She said she knew he was a prophet of God. She had been born and raised in Utah and never knew he was a prophet. She said that she knew it was true. The spirit was so strong I felt prompted to ask her if she would be baptized this saturday. My heart has never beat so fast. Saturday was only three days away! She looked at me and said, " all these things have been happening in my life that I thought were so negative, but I realize now they had to happen to lead me to this point. Yes I will be baptized on saturday." Ok so about right then I think my comp and I were about to either hit the floor or scream halelujah. When we left that lesson I was so spiritually drained. We came right home and I prayed to the lord thanking him. I was so happy. I felt like Ammon where my joy was to the point of exhausting my strength. In the next two days we taught Asia three more times. She was so prepared and anxious for the gospel. To put the icing on the cake she asked me to baptize her! So I got to baptize Asia. It was incredible. We found and baptized her in a matter of 3 day's. It really was a miracle!

Elder Jared Shillingburg

We had 3 baptisms on Saturday. The Huel family got baptized. They are really cool. My roommates are really cool. Elder Hamblin and Elder Jewski. Elder Jewski didn’t really like me for the first little while. I don’t know why. They are all pretty cool. I saw 3/5 of my converts in this area at church on Sunday :D. It was awesome. Ashley growing and The Lehns are still going strong. My comp is Elder Jozef Mitchell. He is from Salt Lake City. He is really cool. But last transfer he killed off a missionary (His Companion went home) and now he is killing me. He didn’t have a very good transfer last transfer because his comp was dieing (going home) and he didn’t do crap. But we have been working hard. So I went over to a members house last week, he fed us pizza. I got info from one of my favorite companions and he offered me a job. The job is in Tennessee for 4 months starting in the 3rd week of May and we would be installing security systems. He is going to get me the info and we can talk about it more later. I would have to drive my car over to Tennessee. I just wanted to run it by you in case it does end up happening. Brandon offered me a job selling but I don’t want to sell. installing would be way better. I hope your shoulder gets better. my back doesn’t feel like it is getting any better. It doesn’t bother me at all while I am riding. Well that is about it.. Hope everything is well.

Elder Cameron Smith
We have a date! A baptismal date that is! This last week we had Luis, the brother of Guillermo,
call us, completey drunk and very distraught. Anziano Mckee was talking to him because I have a harder time understanding people on the phone. When he hung up he looked very upset. He told me that Luis was drunk and that he said that he was past saving and to not worry about him anymore. He still wanted to meet with us but didn't think that there was anything more that we could do for him. We scheduled an appointment for Monday, two days ago and he asked that his brother not come. We weren't quite sure what to do with that and so we just decided to plan a lesson of sorts on the atonement and to be ready to talk about whatever he wanted to talk about. We figured that he had done something that he felt was wrong and was past saving or something. We arrived early in order to be mentally and spiritually ready to teach him. I played the piano and Anziano Mckee probably prayed a lot and read his scriptures. We had just had our Zone Conference that morning and had amazing talks from the AP's and President about baptism and helping investigators get to that point and how everything that we do including the bus ride to our appointments should revolve around the investigators needs. We just prayed a lot. It was really nerve wracking because he was about 20 min late. But when he did get there he was really excited to see us. We asked if we could start with a prayer and he said that he wasn't feeling that he could pray. So we opened and continued to ask him why he was feeling the way that he was. He explained to us that he had just lost his girlfriend because her parents didn't agree with their dating and he had also lost all of his friends due to that same situation and things that occured. He was really sad and didn't think that there was anything that we could do for him anymore, but that he would continue to come to church. We weren't going to settle for that though. We were too pumped with the spirit. We said, No, Luis this is why we have the atonement and Jesus Christ suffered all so that you might receive forgiveness for those things. We told him that the first step to receiving forgiveness was through baptism. He continued that he was too afraid of God. That he might make a mistake again after baptism and couldn't face God after that. We told him that baptism is just the beginning and that he would make more mistakes. It is a constant journey to salvation, not an event that begins and ends with baptism. Which is sadly what too many people even in the church, believe. We told him, "Luis, you need to be baptized and you need to do it on April 5th." And then we said, "and you are going to pray about that date right now." We kicked out our chairs from under us and got down on our knees and said, "Let's pray!" He looked at us and said, "Oh, lo facciamo alla grande!" which basically translates, "Oh, we're doin' it hard core!" We just looked at him and said you know what to do. He said an amazing prayer and afterwards we asked him how he felt.
He said," I know that it is the right thing for me." SO WE HAVE A BAPTISMAL DATE! We are really excited for the work ahead. All of your prayers are welcomed and I thank you and love you all for all that you are doing for me and my family!

Elder Kyle Smith

We have a lot of really good work right now, some really strong referrals, so there will be defiantly enough to keep me and my greeny busy. The mission is getting ready for the change in leadership that will be coming soon. Our new mission president is coming in June and with that 14 missionaries will be going home at that same time. So that means there is going to be a big change in our mission this coming summer. So I don’t know why but now the branch thinks I can sing. So now they ask me to play the piano and sing, sometimes at the same time, which is really difficult. Yesterday us four missionaries sang “If you could hid to Kolob” in Spanish in sacrament meeting. It was the first time I have ever really had to sing in such a small group, and you all know how horrible my voice is, but luckily the other missionaries drowned my voice out. We are teaching a couple now that came to the Easter Pageant in Mesa with a member family. We gave them a Book of Mormon before our first lesson and when we went back they had read a lot of it, had a bunch of really great questions and had scriptures marked. I get so excited when that happens because that actually means that they really care and want to know for themselves. They understood everything we taught them and you could really see the light go on inside of them. Everything is going so great. I guess I will have a whole lot more responsibility from now on.
Have a great day.

Elder Nicholas Takis
"I dont want this to sound weird, but I’m really not home sick. I’m family sick a bit but not home sick.
I’m not worried about this short two years because we get to spend eternity together, you know
what I mean dude??.. It's sweet out here though, I’m loving it. I just had my meeting with president
last week and he said he was impressed with me as a greeny.. he said I’ve been doing very good
work and being a good companion.. man that was good to hear! I’ts been crazy here, we just set
about 5 baptismal dates last week and the zone leaders came down for team-ups Wed, and then
the Aps came down Friday for team-ups, its been freakin nuts! Oh and two people from my last
area got dunked. I was way excited. They called and told me how they felt and stuff, I cried.. man
this is the best work ever, its crazy.. But man I’m lovin it. Some of the families here are amazing,
there’s this family named the Selanders, and they treat me like there kid.. haha But I think I’ve
talked about myself enough.. how areyou ??, do tell..

Elder Tyson Wheeler
Tyson entered MTC on April 11, 2007. He is currently serving in  
Winston-Salem, North Carolina. He has been there for four months. The  
city has a Spanish branch who's members are about half from the  
Dominican Republic. In his mission he has met people from all but a  
couple of the Spanish speaking countries in the world. His first five  
months were spent serving in the Asheville area nestled in the Smokey  
Mountains. This area was rural and all together was about the size of  
the state of Connecticut. He didn't get much time on his bike except  
for when they ran out of miles which sometimes meant riding in  
thunderstorms which he described as taking a cold shower outdoors. His  
last two companions have been from Mexico who's families have  
relocated to the United States. He has loved his time with them. He  
loves the food and most of his emails contain information about the  
latest great meal. This week was empanadas with a young Columbian  
family made with beef, eggs and potato bits and deep fried. He is  
expecting two baptisms next week!

Elder Carter Zufelt

He has been serving seven months and counting. He served in Capital Hill East Area right in the heart of Denver for the first six months. He loved all the "kind, black people who were willing to listen". He loved the diversity of the city. He said it was pretty exciting as he heard many sirens each day and saw massive amounts of graffiti. His first serious investigator passed away before he was able to be baptized. He had taught Chuck about 4 months. He was ready to be baptized when he went into the hospital and wasn't able to attend church the one more time he was required before baptism. Carter is looking forward to going through the temple in one year with Chuck. Carter enjoys hitting his brakes when he hits ice and skidding across it for a quick thrill. Carter had his first baptism two days before he was transferred to Grand Junction. He became a trainer and was given the opportunity to "whitewash" a new area. He is enjoying Grand Junction as the ward members go on exchanges with them often and they also get dinner appointments, but he misses the "black people who will listen". Carter enjoys occasionally seeing his friends Shelby Burton and Allan Boberg who are also serving in the Denver South Mission. Carter was just made district leader. He is nervous.