February 8 - Letter

So to start it off, I will tell you about the trip we took to Notre Dame on Monday after I got to e-mail you. So we go to Southbend and park our car in downtown and eat at Five guys, but I got Chipotle instead, so that was good and then we walk over to Notre Dame. There stadium is under construction so to get to "Touchdown Jesus" we had to walk through there school and classrooms with all the college kids. So we sneak in and we're walking around until we get to "Touchdown Jesus" I sent you a picture but I have a lot more that are better quailty that I'll send to you when I get them. Touchdown Jesus is a big painting that is directly behind the field goal posts for the Football Stadium. After we took pictures by the stadium, Touchdown Jesus, the cathedral and the main building I said "Lets go to the fieldhouse" When we got to the fieldhouse we found our way to there trophy section and as i'm standing in the hallway their head basketball coach Mike Brey walks out of the Pit (where they practice) and I asked if he was the Head Coach and he said "Yeah, I am" and I asked if I could get a picture with him and we did and he asked me what i was doing there and I said i'm on a mission and he said oh you're getting business done and then I told him good luck and I walked down to their practice court and watched them practice, and work out, all there players were looking over at me, I had a camera in my hand, and they were preparing for a huge game against North Carolina who they beat on Saturday and then one of their coaches came over and kicked me out haha. After that we walked to their Hockey Arena and then to their Bookstore. It was fun.

On Tuesday we went to the Museum in Plymouth and did service for them. It was fun they have way old stuff. After that we went and had lunch and then we went and saw some potential investigators. We went to see Jeremy but he wasn't home, his wife said he'd be home in 20 minutes and we were going to go back and talk to both of them, when we went back he was asleep and the son said she was gone. So we went to see Sean, his daughter said he'd be home at 6, and when we went to try by again he said he couldn't talk right then. We also went to a lady named Shaleese, we went to her house and right as I was going to knock on the door a guy opens and wasn't that pleased we were there, he was Jehovah Witness, and so we left after talking to him for a minute and we went to go see a lady named Yazmin but she wasn't home either. After trying to go see some people, we went to a couple whose last name is the Zehr's. Brother Richhart, told me to go see them, it's his daughter who used to be a member, who married someone who is pretty anti and now they go to another church and they're worldly and care about money and drink. So we went to see them and I said "We heard you guys are good people and we just wanted to come meet you guys" the husband was counting the seconds till we left and so we left and now me and Brother Richharts son, Ben Richhart, were working together on them. Ben Richhhart served his mission in St. George and he just got back pretty recently. After that we went to Dinner at the Reeds. The Reed family is the family that Brandon Cleverly converted. They're a good family.

On Wednesday we had district meeting, that was fun. It was good we worked on Church tours and played a game to work on it. After that we went to lunch, after lunch we were driving behind Bob on our way to go do some missionary work, and he stopped and got out of his car and told us to meet him at Dairy Queen. He's hilarious. Bob is an investigator that has been investigating for 35 years, he is a non member, he used to be a pentecostal preacher but he comes to church as much as a member. He is the only non member that does missionary work haha it's hilarious I love it, he'll go to his other apostalic church and he told the preacher "I want you to know, whenever i'm not at church, i'm at the mormon church. He knows it's true, his wife is the one that is holding him back from being baptized. But she said she is going to read the Book of Mormon and she is reading a book called a Book of Mormons, and she is finding out all the good things the church does, she used to be contentious and now she asks us about all the good things are church does. Bob is trying to convert her, and they would be kingdom builders, he already talks to everyone about our church and he said to us "Bunny said she's read the Book of Mormon, just give her some time" and so anyways we're walking into Dairy Queen, and since he's a non-member he's not supposed to buy us food, so this is what he does, he throws all his money on the ground and then says when we walk in, "Look at all this money I found, I'll buy you guys a ice cream" and so he goes to pay and when the lady takes his money she writes a check on it to make sure it's not counterfeit and he says "Don't write on that I just printed it out" Hahaha and then we talked with him and drank a smoothie and ate ice cream, and then we went and tried to see some people. That night Brother Timm took dinner to the church for us and we had Italian Beef and that was good and we had a good time eating and talking with him.  

On thursday we went to the Coloring class in culver, and then we went back to Bremen and worked and we found a 77 year old man named Cleo and taught him the Restoration and we invited him to be baptized and he said yes. After that we went to dinner at the Richhart's oh boy :) Brother Richhart pulled up and I helped him carry in pizza's. He said he had to grab something out of the backseat and I asked him if he needed help carrying that too. He said, Oh you don't want to carry this. We had pizza and raccoon for dinner :) On the way home from getting pizza he saw a dead raccoon on the side of the road so he went to the gas station and got trash bags and picked it up, he said it was freshly killed, i'll send you pictures :) Hahaha im jk we didn't eat it but everything else is real. It was still bleeding when he got it and he makes his grand kids raccoon caps.

On friday we came to Plymouth and did Family History and after that we had lunch. After lunch we went and saw some people and then we helped Bob stack wood, and then Bob and Bunny his wife (they call her Bundo) they fed us a huge dinner. And then we went to another dinner at the Ogilvie's, a member and it was a good night. We slept over at Culvers that night.  

On Saturday we woke up got ready and met at the church at 10:30 to go out on Splits with the members to see less actives and members and talk to them and see how they're doing and invite them to church. We did that till 4 and it was good. We drive a lot, a lot of people live far out and so we drive through the country and it's fun. We went and saw Sister King, and the Hills, the Hills are members but it's Brother Timm's ex-wife and she is married to another guy now and she says it's hard to come to church because of the divorce, and President Kelly wants us to tell her "Is that going to hold you back from the Celestial Kingdom" so we're gonna tell her that and talk to her about it. We met with the Jacksons, she's reading the Book of Mormon and we assigned her to read even more and had a good visit with her. We met with Brother Mcliver, and we talked to him about a lot of things. He told us that Gordon B Hinckley said that there was going to be a temple in Southbend! And the church owns land there right by the church building there, so that would be sweet. He's smart, he reminds me of Grandpa, he told us about his family history and how his grandpa was the 2nd best Us Navymen next to Bligh and him and Bligh sailed from England to Tahiti. We also met with a non member and had a good discussion with him. It was a productive day. That night we slept over again at Culvers and we watched the Cokeville Miracle. It was way good.  

On Sunday, we went to church, and Allena Rust, a less active came to church. We had Sister Flory pick her up, she was a less active, and we got her to church and she met with our Branch President and he found out how her records were never transferred and Salt Lake City lost where she was because she moved a lot, but we found her and she came to church! Also Bob told us he was going to dinner with Bunny to one of their friends houses and he was going to try and get them to our church, he's a non member and he does missionary work hahaha I love it. It was very good day at church. After that we had correlation meeting and then Brother Timm took us out to go see someone we were fasting for but they weren't home. We tracted after that and then at 6:30 we went to dinner at Sister Lee's. It was sweet, the superbowl was on and we had superbowl food, and got to watch a little bit of it and then after dinner we went home and watched Ephraim's Rescue! It's the other side of 17 miracles it is good. A lot of people this week couldn't talk to us, or were asleep, or weren't home or didn't answer, so we had little success. But this week is going to be a good one, mark my words :) I love and miss you guys so much!

Oh ya and I forgot to tell you about this morning. So this morning, we woke up and went and worked out at Culver academy and then we came home, I ate some bad bacon, that was gross and then I read some out of the Book of Mormon but then we listened to this talk. It's called "Conversion of a Catholic" by Bill Carpenter. So we only listened to the end but this is what happened. So Bill carpenter and his companion, met this lady when they were on their mission. They were sent to a place in Iowa, and the place didn't have a ward there, or a branch, it didn't even have a member in the area. And they found this lady, they gave her a Book of Mormon and assigned her to read 3 Nephi 11. She read it and then said "The Sermon on the mount makes more sense in the Book of Mormon then it does in the bible" and the missionaries said "Exactly, the Book of Mormon clarifies the Bible" she then talked about 2 boys who rebelled against their brother and an angel came to them and the missionaries are realizing she is reading a lot more then just what they assigned her to read. So they talk about all that with her. She ends up getting baptized and then as they talk about the next steps and what she can do next, they tell her she can get a patriarchal blessing, and they explain and say "It's kind of like a blueprint of your life, on what God has planned for you" So she called them a few days later and says "Are you boys planning on coming over today?" and they say "Ya around 2" and she says "No you have to come now" and they ask why and she says "My blueprint came" so they say "Ok we'll be over at 9:30" and they get there, she opens it up and says "Here read it to me" and the missionary "No this is between you and God, this is personal, you need to be the first one to read this" and she says "No just read it to me" and after going back and forth she says "You guys don't get it, I can't read, I haven't been able to read words off of paper for 20 years" "When I opened the Book of Mormon, I finally saw words, God gave me power to read to the very last page of it and now it's taken away again" So they read her, her patriarchal blessing and in it, it said "You are one of the elect of God, you would have been converted 25 years ago but the person that was going to convert you didn't accept his mission call" You guys should listen to it! It was very good. It talked about the importance of a mission and how you change people lives and salvation.