Work Picking Up in WA

Hey Family!!!!

It was good to hear that the move went well.  It sounds like it was another close close call from being in a cardboard box.  It sounds like a beautiful piece of property.

McKay, to answer your question from several weeks ago, right now we have 91 companionships in the mission.  We just received news this past week of the huge amount of missionaries that have sent in their mission papers since the change 3 weeks ago in general conference.  Usually an average of 300 missionaries send in papers each week.  In the past 3 weeks there have been over 4,000 to send in papers!!!!!!  Yikes, like McKay, I have honestly no idea where we will stick the new missionaries.  It is amazing though.  President Larkin told us that was enough to fill 65 missions completely full!!!

My companion and I are getting along great.  Since I already pretty much knew him it wasn't too bad of a change.  Haha.  He is great and we get along just fine. He goes home in a month now but is still working hard so I am thankful for that. One thing I will not put up with is a trunky missionary.

I had a pretty good week.  I was able to have an excellent exchange with a brand new missionary in the mission and in our district.  He came to my area and because he doesn't know any Spanish was pretty lost in all of the teaching situations. Haha.  We had a great time and he seems pretty cool.  He already knows multiple people in the mission because they all went to high school together.  He has been having a hard time adjusting to the mission because right as he got here the rain hit and they put him on a bike.  What a fun way to start your mission.  We had a great miracle happen when we were together though. That day I had called a investigator that we haven't seen for about a month and a half.  He is the man that just walked into church that one Sunday.  We lost contact with him because he has been working crazy hours up in the mountains 4 hours away cutting firewood for a company.  He gets up at about 3:30 a.m. every morning to drive to work and then doesn't return home until 10 p.m.  Not a very good schedule to see the missionaries.  When I called him he said he was still super busy.  That night at about 7 he said that a miracle happened and he got off work early!  He asked us to meet him in 10 minutes at the church building!  During the lesson we read in the Book of Mormon, and he said that he already believes it is true and knows that he needs to work towards baptism.  He also wants to come to church and get to know the members better.  The only thing holding him back is his work.  He has applied for another job that will give him regular hours and hopefully he gets it so we can start teaching him again.  It was great to see him again though.  He still has a strong desire to learn.

We also received a great referral for a family that we have taught once and are going to teach tonight as well. They don't know too much about religion at all, but said they have been to several christian churches in the past and they were all weird.  Not sure what happened in those experiences, but we are going to try and work with them so they feel comfortable with us and coming out to church. We only talked with the dad briefly because he was working on a car.  We got along well with the two kids and the mom though right away.

To answer a question from Grandma and Grandpa, we are not sure why the sisters were taken out.  I think the main reason is just lack of hermanas right now to keep all of the areas open.  I am sure that will change really shortly and that they will be back within several months.  We have taken over their investigators for the time being, but some of their main investigators have been a little tricky to contact because we dont know their days off work or anything like that.  Looking at the teaching records some have really good potential and one even was one date for baptism for November.  I think they may have taken a week long vacation though because their son has been home but the parents haven't.  We have some really good potential that we are working with and we have high hopes for the coming weeks.  This is such an exciting time to be in the mission field.  There is so much excitment in the work right now.  What an great time to serve!!!!!!!!!!!

Love you all,

Elder B.

 

Work Picking Up in Gainesville

Hi Mom!

Glad to hear that you found a new place to live and are not living in a U-Haul truck. That's pretty remarkable how you were able to load  the truck in faith and sign for a new place that evening and move in. God will always provide a way!

Hurricane Sandy passed us by without too much more than a lot of clouds and some cold weather.  I don't remember it getting this cold until December last year and I was 250 miles further north in South Carolina. You're right though, people are telling us that it will be pretty bad when it hits up around the D.C./New York area tomorrow. Lots of flooding, lots of damage.  A good time for people to be humble, remember God, and repent.  Also a good opportunity for lots of love and service and opportunities for hearts to change.

This week has been a lot of fun.  I was on companion exchanges in the 3rd Ward with Elder Lisonbee and they've really been struggling lately with finding new investigators and not having anyone to teach.  We headed out on bikes and just started contacting everyone.  By the end of the day we had four new investigators - a single father looking for a better life; a young woman who has never known peace even though her dad is a Baptist pastor; and a great couple where the wife had grown up in Ogden, had gone to seminary for four years, and already believes most of what we teach!  God is good.  The next day I went on another exchange with the Zone Leaders and had a blast re-uniting with Elder Grant in the 5th ward. He's one of the best missionaries I've ever known - down to his last 3 weeks in the mission and still 100% focused on the work.  We stepped it up a notch and had several back to back lessons that brought the Spirit so strongly and were able to set 3 baptismal dates that day alone. Great day.

Elder Chadwick and I were able to start teaching a young man last night who had gone through bad experiences with missionaries in the past. Apparently they had pressured him a lot and he threw up a lot of barriers.  That was last year.  In the past few months, he read through the entire Book of Mormon and had a change of heart.  He's still not entirely sure, but he approached us with the idea of being baptized in December around Christmas, so we take that as a positive sign.   ;)  Once again, it shows the power that is in the scriptures.  The Book of Mormon changes lives!  (Or more accurately, the Spirit changes lives and the Spirit testifies as we read the Book of Mormon!)

I'm down to my last 3 weeks in Gainesville (I suspect) and Elder Chadwick and I have some bold plans to finish up his training.  We're hoping to have 2 baptisms (possibly 3) before I leave with the progressing investigators that we have.  One of them is named Gabriel.  I contacted him on Facebook about a month ago (he's an online friend of a recent convert) and we started talking online. Two weeks ago he randomly called us and said, "Elders, I need to change my life.  Can we meet?"  YES!  So we started meeting at a Burger King and have taught him a lot about the Atonement and Repentance.  He's been heavy into drugs and various other sins for most of his life, but that night after our first lesson, he dumped out all of his narcotics and flushed them away and has been clean for the last 10 days.  I've been very surprised and overjoyed with his comprehension of total repentance extending to all aspects of his life.  We hadn't even taught him the law of chastity yet, but he told us that since our first meeting, several women have tried to hit on him and he flat out refused telling them that his life is given to Jesus now. Whenever he feels tempted, he turns to the Book of Mormon and finds great strength from it.  He was blown away by the Spirit as we read Joseph Smith History with him and that's when he told us he wants to be baptized.  We have his date set for the 11th of November.  I've really gained a witness as a missionary that no matter what a person has done or been in life, if we truly want to repent, Christ allows us to change and takes the burdens of the past away.  I've seen it time and again.  "Though your sins be as scarlet, they shall be as white as snow. Though they be red like crimson, they shall be as wool" (Isaiah 1:18).

God is great, missions are amazing, and I love being a part of this!

Elder M.

New Companion for Ben

Family!!!

A new week has dawned yet again in the mission.  Last week nothing too exciting happened to report.  We keep on sifting through a bunch of people every week as we continue to find potentials and receive referrals.  We honestly don't even have a big enough mileage allowance on our car to drive as much as we would like to contact all of the referrals.  Our zone (stake of Renton) is huge and we have a hard time being everywhere we would like to be.  Seriously, you might be able to fit around 25 Utah-sized stakes in just this one.  We had a stake conference this last weekend and in it our stake president was released after 10 years of service!  The Hermanas did leave last week and that automatically gave us several new investigators, though we weren't able to get their area book until just two days ago and so had no idea where any of them lived or how to contact them. They have been teaching a couple for several months now and they both love the church.  They come every week that they can, and the only thing holding them back from baptism is a smoking habit. Although they are coming along really well on quitting as well. They are working towards being baptized in November, and we have high hopes that that goal will be achieved.  We still have yet to contact the rest of them and tell them that the Hermanas have left and that we will be teaching them.

We have been trying to work with a couple of less active families in the branch. It is slow going for some of them, but we did have a family night at the church this past Friday night and several of them showed up to play volleyball.

I am really glad that my companion is Elder Haro right now.  His dad is from Mexico and his mom is American, but he still has the Spanish appearance and so people automatically trust him more and let us talk to them even though he didn't know Spanish before his mission and grew up in Utah his whole life. It actually makes a difference to the work, I feel.

The work continues. Hasta la proxima semana mi familia

Elder Howell

 

100 New Missionaries Going to FL

Thanks for the photos, Mom!  It was fun to see Gabe and Joe as unhappy about pictures as I ever was.  Hahaha, I think that's a Howell family trait to evade the camera.  Garret and Courtney were looking fabulous!

This week was somewhat eventful.  I spent half of it in Jacksonville at a Leadership Training Meeting and had an absolute blast!  The Spirit was strong as we discussed the Doctrine of Christ (always do), obedience, and revelation through church attendance.  On Wednesday night while we were up there, I was assigned to work in the St. Johns area.  It was rather interesting returning to my old area, visiting with some of the people I taught a year and a half ago and looking through the area book at all the formers I had with Elder Summers and Mcfarland.  It was a productive evening though!  In 3 hours, we had 4 church tours lined up and committed two people to baptism!

We also had a stake conference this weekend here in Gainesville and were able to get several of our investigators to come. President and Sister Barry had been invited to be there, so they came down and spoke on the need for teaching the youth to live the Doctrine of Christ (faith, repentance, etc) in order to prepare them for missionary service. Just before them, we had a recently returned missionary speak and share his experiences of a mission in Peru.  One of our investigators who has been reading for a long time but holding out on any other commitments was overwhelmed by the Spirit during these talks and gained a witness that it's true!  YES!!!!

Well, that's about it for this week. Elder Chadwick and I are still plugging away.  President Barry was told by the church mission department to expect an additional 100 missionaries in the next few months; from 150 that we're at right now to 250-280.  I have no idea where we'll put that many missionaries, but I suppose most wards will be doubling up.  It's an exciting time to be in the work for sure!  Anyway, everyone that's already out here is gearing up to train this monster tidal wave of incoming elders and sisters.  Hopefully we'll be ready for it.

Much Love,

Elder M. Howell

Ben's Permanent Comp Goes Home

Family,

Well another week has come and gone.  I drove Elder Wilkins and another elder from the zone who were leaving yesterday to the mission home.  It is weird to see him go home after knowing him since day one in the field.  We had transfers today and I will be staying in Renton.  My new companion is Elder Haro.  We actually served together for a brief amount of time in Renton at the end of last year.  This is his last 6 weeks of the mission, and so yet again I am with a companion who will be going home soon. There is a new Spanish elder that came in today though. Pretty cool.  Elder Henderson (my old comp) will be training him.  Only problem is he also goes home in 6 weeks and the new training program is 12 weeks.  Not sure how that will work out.  A little bit of a surprise to us today was that the Renton Hermana area was closed down.  It really puts us in a pickle, because now we have a bunch of women that we will have to start to teach. This will require us to work really close with the ward so that we can have fellowship and be able to teach them.  They had juggled the thought around of closing the Renton Spanish Elders area down because the Hermanas have actually been seeing a tad bit more success then us.

Not too much to report about last week. The last several days was Elder Wilkins packing and deciding what he was going to take home and what he had to leave and saying goodbye to a lot of the members.  We did have a great lesson with a new investigator though.  He has been reading the Book of Mormon slowly by slowly.  He seems to be interested in the history of the church, how the church was started, pioneers moving west, etc.  We have still to see if this will lead to him actually investigating the church or if he is just a history type of guy.

Well that wraps up my week in a nutshell.  Thanks for keeping me in your prayers.

   

Elder Ben

      

Adrian Baptism in FL

Hi family,

This weekend was very nice. We had the baptismal service for Adrian, our investigator from Puerto Rico, and it turned out very well with lots of support from the ward.

We had transfers this past Wednesday.  Said goodbye to several of my former companions and a lot of good friends - 17 went home! Elder Fuller, Elder Marquez, and myself had a blast singing "Faith in Every Footstep" as a trio at the transfer meeting.  I'm not sure why, but my voice has gotten significantly higher in the last couple years.  As a senior in high school, I sang bass/baritone, now I'm most definitely a tenor and can't even approach those notes I used to hit with ease.

Benj, I loved your story about reaching that mission goal of 100/month!  Very inspiring.  Our mission could probably use something similar - we've plateaued for the last couple years and our goal is currently 60/month.  How many missionaries do you have in the Seattle Mission?

Since I didn't get an email from Mom this week, I'll assume that the family is in process of moving again.  Good luck; God bless!

--
Elder M. Howell

Washington Update

Family,

This week was another crazy week.  We had a lot of non-fun and fun experiences and I think that is just missionary work.  We haven't been able to teach the daughter of the member yet.  We went by several times and they were either gone or the dad was out of the house so we couldn't enter and teach.  We are going to continue and try and work on getting a good time to teach her along with the whole family present.  We were unfortunately dropped by the mother and her three kids this weekend.  She loves what we teach her and was looking forward to coming to church and having Sunday school for the kids.  Her husband though heard something bad about "the mormons" from his friend and told his family that they couldn't learn anymore.  The wife has been talking with him about what good things she has learned and we invited him to learn with his family so that he would know what the church was all about.  The wife said she was going to try and read the Book of Mormon with him, and we are going to go back in several weeks to see if his heart has been softened any.  That was our only investigator that was really interested in learning though, and now we are in a 100% searching and find mode.  I think the finding new investigators could also become a little harder as the presidential election draws closer.  With Romney's immigration laws that he wants to pass many Spanish people don't like him...and then don't want to listen to us, even though the church is a completely different thing.

 On the great note we had a wonderful zone conference on Thursday.  Because we reached the 100 goal in September President Larkin hiked Mt. Si (a tall mountain in our mission) to put an ensign to the mission at the top.  He wanted all of us to get the opportunity to hike part of it, so on zone conference we spent half the day hiking up this mountain, having a testimony meeting for all the departing missionaries (my companion included), and hiking back down.  We didn't go all of the way to the top, but it was great to get out into the mountains again.  It was the first time I have been hiking for a very long time and I loved it! 

Also we had general conference this weekend which was a huge spiritual boost as well. There was a pretty big shock wave that swept through the missionaries when President Monson announced the age changes on on when both the Elders and Sisters could start their missions.  I can see pros and cons of both of them.  I don't think it will be as big of a change for the elders as the sisters. Many elders already leave shortly after graduating high school because they are close to 19 anyways.  Some of my friends left 3 months after graduation, so the new rule may only cut off several months of those with birthdays later in the year.  We will see how much of an effect 19 year old sisters make though.  I am sure that we will see a huge increase of sister missionaries in the future, but I don't think I will even see an effect of this new rule in my missionary service.  This general conference was really powerful and I especially liked the first 2 sessions along with priesthood.  I loved President Uchtdorf's talk on enjoying what you are doing and not looking forward to the end and living so that you won't have regrets.  Part of that maybe because Elder Wilkins is really looking forward to getting home in a week.  We didn't have any investigators out to it (conference) which was a bummer.  We did try and round up some of the less active members to come and watch, but most of them were busy working and couldn't make it either.

Well it was a great week.  Sorry I don't have time to write more.  Thank you for everything.

Love ya,

Elder Ben