Exploding with Pure Knowledge!

Fast Sunday was amazing yesterday, probably one of my favorite times at church and one of my best fast's ever! I'm stoked for the Eagles football, who is #1? I have mad props for Sarah and her mish, experiences. I wish I had some more experiences like that in school. I am missin y'all lots but things are goin sooooo good right now its crazy.

So this week was pretty much amazing, we committed a part member family to prepare for baptism on the 27th of this month and they are pretty much good to go! I was disappointed they didn't make it to church but they have been working with the missionaries for the past several years and for them to finally say yes and commit I can tell is a huge step in their progress and I'm very optimistic about their progress in the gospel. For sure the two boys R and S are going to be baptized, and when we taught we focused on them. The mom has a testimony and is amazing but is afraid that she wont be able to fully be committed and so doesn't want to do it unless she can go all the way. As we taught we didnt really commit her to baptism either, but the husband (a less active member) asked, "what about S(mom)?" and we opened the invitation for her if that was her desire and she said yes that she thinks she's ready for it. She was still a little reluctant, but every time before she would be flat out no way not yet, so just seeing her faith grow enough that she realizes she needs to step up was the most incredible blessing as it really opened my eyes and increased my faith just by her example. I can not get them out of my mind it is soo crazy! It definitely brings back my favorite memories and experiences from Newnan working with the P boys and the C family and it definitely gave me the experience and preparation for this family here in Cassville. My mind has seriously just been exploding with pure knowledge and intelligence from the Holy Ghost especially this fast Sunday seeing how the church truly is the only true and living church and seeing the church and its members grow, combined with all of my studies coming alive and linking together and our gospel principles class I seriously feel like Moroni when he interjects in Ether 12 and feels like his writing is inadequate and doesn't truly express all that he's experienced even though its one of my personal favorite chapters because the revelation and inspiration from those verses is priceless. I wish I had been given that strength in expressing myself and my feelings, and I almost feel like I'm rambling on and on but its because I know how true the gospel is and how it blesses people.

My time is up but tell grammy and grandpa how much I miss them and nanny and pappa too! Love y'all!

Transferred!

Well, I got transferred to Cassville this week. It is the farthest north I have been in the mission. My new companion is Elder W who is from Farmington Utah, he has been out about 9 months and is a way cool kid.

Last Saturday we got to skin a deer that one of the members in our ward shot hunting that morning, it was pretty sweet!

There is a ton of missionary work to be done here in Cassville, there are several part member families that are on the verge of being baptized, and we found three new investigators who have some serious potential, one of them met with missionaries in the past so when we asked if she knew anything about Joseph Smith she pretty much relayed the first vision to us, which was awesome. Unfortunately the couldnt make it to church like the said they would but we are meeting with them tonight so things are looking really swell. We live in a 4 man apartment with 2 spanish missionaries, Elder R and Elder N, which is a lot of fun. I don't really know what else to say, so later!

Kennesaw district

So neither of us got transferred, I'm still with Elder S in Kennesaw. We had a pretty awesome church service yesterday. Our ward had a "Friends and Family Sunday" and there were quite a few non members that the Kennesaw Mountain members were able to bring. We have an appointment with one of them on Wednesday, a guy who is interested in the stop smoking program, so it should be an awesome refferal.

This week I have another meeting about the simplified missionary training system stuff on tuesday and wednesday and I'll be on exchanges with two other missionaries from our zone. Our district is pretty darn young, I have been out twice as long as anyone else and there are two greenies, so hopefully I get some good notes so that I can pass down as much of the training in our district meetings this transfer.

The weather has been cooling down for us pretty nicely, and some of the leaves are starting to change colors. Fall is probably the best time here, or at least my favorite. Its just too bad I'll miss football, but its the last one so it doesn't really matter at this point :D I'm not gonna lie but Im getting a little trunky but we're gonna work super hard this transfer so it will take my mind off it. Well I love y'all and I'll talk to ya later!

Good Happenings...

So it has certainly been an excellent week for us here, I got to go on excanges with Elder O. in the beginning of the week so it was kinda weird serving with him again but it was fun. On Friday we had a zone conference and got to hear from Elder Richard Hinckley who is the executive director of the missionary dept. and it was great to hear from him and his wife.

Yesterday J.R. got baptized and it was awesome! He is a really great kid and I was glad to be there for that.

This is our last full work week before transfers wedesday week, and things are rolling. Our investigator L was able to come to church and as well attended the baptism, she now has Sundays off of work. Her and Brother W have been talking about marriage and want to tie the knot but haven't set any dates yet, but we're going over tomorrow night so hopefully we can get them moving along!

Good things are happening and its good to be here! hope y'all are still doin well and I'll talk to ya next week!

Transferred!

Soooo,we got the call last night and I'm being transferred : / I guess thats just my luck, but I should be able to go to the baptism on Saturday, as long as I can find a ride. I will still be a district leader in my new area, but it is going to be my first area that is on bike! so hopefully this giant sauna called Georgia can sweat a few pounds off me. I'll find out exactly what area I'll be in tomorrow at transfer meeting. hopefully I get a really sweet district.

I like being a district leader, I mean it's nothing special, but I'd rather just be a normal missionary and not have to deal with drama from other missionaries and have the zone leaders try to suck my blood like vampires. Missionaries world wide will be switching to a new system for the way meetings and trainings work and it begins this transfer so I will have a lot of info to pass on. One of these weeks there is going to be a 3 day meeting about all of the changes and I just want to take a tape recorder to it cuz if zone conferences already seem long and it doesnt even take a full day then I can't imagine what a 3 day meeting will be like. . . but ya just thought I'd give y'all a heads up, and I'll let you know more as I go! Love ya!

Awesome Transformations

SOOOO, sorry I missed writing y'all last week, honestly I didnt have much to write cuz that week pretty much stunk, BUT, this week was really good! We went over twice to the 'C' family home and they have a baptismal date for this saturday! all that is left on our end is to teach 2 more lessons and have the interview, everything else is pretty much taken care of already by the ward which is awesome and is really the way it should be. And, just as the icing on the cake, daddy 'C' had an interview with the Bishop and will be the one performing the baptism and confirmation It is pretty awesome to see those kind of changes and transformations in the lives of people and families that can only be brought by living the gospel. We have also received some pretty amazing referrals recently that would definitely be considered elect so there should be further baptisms coming up for Newnan in the pursuing transfers.

Speaking of transfers, tonight is transfer calls, tomorrow is packing day, and Wednesday is transfer meeting, so as much as I'd like to stay I dunno I'll let y'all know as soon as I can. That's about it, hope summer is still goin' great, have fun in the sun for me!

Member Referrals are the Best!

Alrighty ,well we had another exciting week here in Newnan. Of course Zone Conference was good, President and Sister Satterfield spoke to us and we had trainings from President and Sister Satterfield, the assistants and the zone leaders. Nothing new was talked about just getting us back to fundamentals, so it was ok, good to see a bunch of my buddies.

We had an appointment with a part member family afterwards and it was pretty sweet: So the 'C' family consists of the mom, dad, son(15yr old) who are all members, and the 2 girls (12 & 13) who are not members. Basically everyone but the dad is active in the church, the two girls have been wanting to be baptized for a while now but basically haven't been because the dad wants them to make sure they know what they're doing. They went to girls camp a couple of weeks ago and had a blast! The whole young women's group in our ward fasted for them that their dad's heart would be softened and that they would be able to be baptized. So we had dinner with the Cox's about 2 weeks ago and talked to them about taking the missionary lessons but their dad wasn't in the room and not much came of it until Thursday when we went over. We had a
good chat with the dad, he said that they could be baptized if they came to him and talked about baptism and what Christ means to them, so we didn't have a whole lot of commitment when we left but it was still really good. I was kind of worried because even though the dad is a member he is definitely not practicing and has some differing beliefs in doctrine, the big one being he has the "once saved always saved" idea and thinks baptism is important but not necessarily essential to salvation. So we didn't really know what to do next, because it pretty much felt like they'd be in limbo until the girls had their talk with the dad, and we had no idea when that would be happening. BUT Friday morning we get a call from one of the girls and she said that she talked to her dad and she could get baptized! We are super excited for them, I'm not 100% sure that he said yes to both of the girls, but for sure both will be able to take the lessons and once we teach them there will really be no reason at all that they shouldn't both be baptized at the same
time. When we reported what happened at PEC we got most of the room to cry. We definitely know that the ward has been working hard, especially with the young women, and that this is one super miracle for us here in Newnan! Our next step is to set a date for the baptism and crank out the lessons. So ya I'd say we have definitely been blessed.

We also had some random guy show up to church all on his own yesterday, and I think he had a pretty good time at church. I don't know if he is all there, he was super twitchy like he was on drugs or has been getting off drugs or something and it was pretty hard to understand him when he talked, but we have his contact info so we will hopefully get over to his place this week and teach him.

And, if that wasn't enough for us, we got a call from one of the priests in our ward and he wants us to come with him to give a Book of Mormon to his friend, which will be awesome because
that's like the only member referral we've gotten here in Newnan, and I think I could count on one had the number of referrals that I've received from members since I've been a missionary. So ya we' have definitely be
en super blessed.


Thanks for all of your prayers and everything y'all do, I definitely know it has been helping us! Well that's about it I suppose I'll talk to y'all later!