May 16 - Letter

Monday - So last Monday we went to the church in Plymouth to get our car so we could go to South Bend to play basketball. We tried to start our car but the battery was dead so me and Elder Eschler went knocking on doors to find jumper cables haha. We found some and jump started our car. We then went and played basketball and it was a good day. I'm going to start dunk training in the mornings for exercise, Elder Larson showed me it so whenever I can get to a hoop I'm gonna do it. That night we went back to our apartment and made calls to try and set up appointments for that week.

Tuesday - Tuesday we had a conference call, we then went out and worked, we had a good day teaching people, we tracted for 6 hours and we taught 7 first contact lessons. It rained all day and we got pretty soaked. As we walked up to this house, I saw these Budweiser camping chairs on the porch, and the people didn't answer so I left a Word of Wisdom pamphlet in the door. Haha. Later that night we had dinner with the Reeds, all 6 missionaries and that was a lot of fun.

Wednesday - Wednesday morning we looked for what we call the "Golden Paper" It contains all the information from when me and Elder Benson went with Brother Harrington for 2 full days trying to track down people that are on our records. It contains valuable things and we gave a copy to President Kelly, Brother Bollman, the Culver Elders, Brother Harrington had one and we had one, and everyone lost it. It's crazy, I swear the paper was taken up in Heaven. At 11 we went to an appointment we had with Clayton. We met Clayton the day before when we we're tracting, and we taught him and he wanted us to come back the next day. He is a Heroin addict so we are going to try and start him on the 12 Step recovery program. We taught him about the Restoration and then we went and taught him the Book of Mormon the next day. We had lunch after the appointment and then headed to Plymouth and we had to go to Sherwood tire to get an oil change. We were there for a little bit and then we went to the library and did what we call "Detective work". We searched for people that are on our Directory, but we have no idea who they are or where they are so we tried finding them so we can transfer the records. It was a lot of fun doing that. That night we had dinner at the church with Brother Timm.

Thursday - Thursday morning we Weekly Planned and cleaned, we had lunch and then went to the Museum and did service at the Museum. We washed there windows and did heavy lifting for them. We then went out to Jenny Hartwell who lives in the country and we talked to her. She is a recent convert and we needed to get her to church. She still smokes a cigarette once in a while and so we talked to her about completely getting off cigarettes. She came to church this week! Her husband just got out of Prison and he was in the yard doing wheelies on his dirt bike while we were talking to her haha. He's a nice guy, they are both addicted to Mtn Dew and he told me he "Went from Bud light to Mtn Dew" So I told him that's better haha. We then went to Dale Hartmans for dinner in his farm house. It was sweet. We got back to Bremen and the Zone leaders showed up at our house because they we're going to go on exchanges with us the next day, so they slept over.

Friday - So a month or so back we talked to a lady while she was walking her dog and taught her but then told her if she ever needs service done, to call us, so she did this week, and Firday morning we did a Humanitarian project called "Brush for Kindness" and helped her clean up peoples yards and take it to the dump. She was very happy we could help because everyone at her church couldn't help and so we we're her only helpers. Tonight we're going to her house for dinner which will be good, we're going to meet her husband and teach them. After that we changed into suits and went to District Meeting. We then had lunch at King Gyros in Plymouth! It was good. We had an appointment with Jeff so Elder Benson and Elder McLeod went and talked to him and me and Elder Campbell went and tried by Potential investigators. We then went to the church and changed into service clothes and went to Jim Smiddy's. He owns a big farm and has Draft horses that are huge. We helped him take out a fence that kept the Horses in, so he could put up a new one. It was a lot of fun. 

Saturday - At 8 am on Saturday we went and helped the Reeds do some moving. We then changed into suits and went to the church so we could go on splits with the members. Roy Kline took us out and we got to 2 houses and then his car was overheating, it started smoking so we sat on the side of the road for 3 hours altogether probably but finally we got to a gas station and got Coolant in it and it was good to go. That night we had dinner with Ben Richhart. I like him a lot. 

Sunday - Sunday we woke up, got to church at 8:30 for a meeting, but we didn't have a meeting so we waited haha till 10 and we had church. At 2 we had Anns Baptism. The spirit was strong. After the baptism we had correlation meeting and then we went to Bremen so Ben Richhart could pick us up. He picked us up and we went to the South Bend Stake center for a meeting with President Cleveland. It was all the missionaries in our stake and the Ward Mission Leaders. After the meeting with President Cleveland, we had Why I believe. Why I believe is a fireside and recent converts give a talk and their testimony on Why They Believe. I'll tell you Sister Padilla's story.

Sister Padilla - Missionaries in Bremen we're tracting, and a lady who knew Sister Padilla, told the missionaries to go to her house as a joke. She let the missionaries in, they taught her and came back a couple times teaching her, gave her a Book of Mormon and told her she needs to read it. Sister Padilla kept putting it off until one night she was watching the news, like she always does and the Book of Mormon was on her table and she kept looking down at it and she finally thought to herself, Ok I'll read it. So she did and she read for 3 hours and woke her husband up saying "This is true, you have to read this Book" I love you guys so much!

We've been teaching Samuel, he lived in Ghana as a kid and went with his grandma to an LDS church there, but since then he's bounced around from church to church, until he vowed he'd never go to church again. He told us this week, that when we knocked on his door, God whispered to him "Then I'll bring the church to you". He then asked if we could pray that he could be led to a better job. We said a prayer at the beginning and end and prayed for it. We left and 10 minutes later he texted us saying "The prayers were answered, a pharmacy on the East Coast called me for a job interview"

Another Miracle happened with Jeff. Jeff lives next to Samuel and we found him tracting the same day. Jeff let us in and we taught him, the last couple weeks we've been talking about how he's prepared and we were led to him and how he's one of the elect. This week we went by to see him, and he told us something he's never told anyone. So he's had some serious surgeries and he told us he died, God told him he needed to be baptized, so he started studying our church, now we're teaching, and everything we're teaching him, it's like he's heard it before, he likes the Book of Mormon a lot. Miracles are everywhere :)

 

Ann lives in Plymouth, the Culver Elders found her tracting, they gave her to the Sisters to teach, the reason was just because Ann lives alone and they weren't supposed to be teaching her without someone else there. So the Sisters started teaching her, she came to church 6 times. At first her kids thought the Sister Missionaries we're taking her away from her family and her kids were mad but then the Sisters talked to them, Ann told her kids she wants to be baptized and the Sisters would read the Book of Mormon with her all the time. She friends with people in the Plymouth Branch which is really good.