Proud Supporter of Crime

September 19, 2017

We had the chili cook off and C came! We've been working with C a lot recently and she is progressing soooo much! She asked for a priesthood blessing for something that she felt only God could fix, and lo and behold her faith made her whole! She is awesome to work with; she said she's gonna come to church this next week and then she's probably gonna be baptized! She already has an awesome testimony and is super excited to continue to learn. 

On the subject of other investigators:

We dropped pretty much everyone else 🤷🏼‍♂️

We're going to try again with N and A in a month or so, and everyone else just kinda fell off the face of the planet. But! We found an awesome family in Springbrook who are now investigators! The mother and the daughter have some awesome potential; we taught them the restoration and the daughter was super excited. Apparently their family had been going to a bunch of different churches because their oldest daughter has a lot of questions and nobody seems to know the answers, so she asked us how she can know if God exists, so we said she should ask God if He exists. She paused for a second then looked at her Mom and was like "I've been wondering that for SO long!" So yeah, we're excited about them.

It's been super awesome here. Next week is transfers and we're thinking Elder S is gonna be booted out to Yellowknife or something. Though if its me that's being transferred, then it will probably be outlying again, unless they want me to be able to do street contacting, haha.

September 26, 2017

It's been a pretty average week, I suppose; we went tracting, stopped by some people, taught some lessons, almost got eaten by spiders, etc...

Though C didn't come to church last time because she was busy, she is most definitely going to be at the church for General Conference!!! Both days!!! Also she said that she feels God is pulling her towards baptism, so she's just doing super great.

Also transfer calls happened, and Elder S is going to Edmonton! And I'm staying here 😁 which is awesome. My new companion will be Elder B; he's also from Utah, and I met him up in Edmonton before. I don't know a ton about him, but he's a hard worker from what I've seen and heard, so it should be awesome. I'm just really happy I get to stay here for a bit longer; I'm not done with these people, haha.

I can't think of anything else super interesting, but since conference is coming up, I'd like to invite y'all to go into it with a question you want answered. It's a great time to receive the answers to questions, and it works awesomely, so do it.

I can't wait for winter to come destroy all the spiders 😁

P.S. I probably should explain the subject line, and maybe even the spider thing... so I'm gonna do that.

On the windows of some houses there are stickers that say different stuff like "security"or something, but we have found a lot recently that say "Proud supporter of CRIME" on them. It's like a neighborhood watch program or something, but the word choice makes my day every time.

Also spiders are in season this time of year, it seems. We tracted one house that had somewhat of a spider issue on the outside, and I didn't realize it until it was almost too late. So Elder S stopped at the steps and watched me walk straight into the scene from Harry Potter 2 with all the spiders surrounding me, slowly coming down to eat me. I don't think I've ever felt more uncomfortable in my life. 🕸🕸🕷😨🕷🕸🕸

Missed the Eclipse; 😆😃😊☺🙂😐😑😮😫😱 - Life Without Electricity

August 22, 2017

On the subject of the eclipse... I missed it. 🤷🏼‍♂️ I'm pretty sure we were doing language study or lunch or something at the time and totally missed it, haha. But hey, it sounds like y'all had fun, and there are some awesome pictures of the temple during it going around.

Also I haven't really used Facebook as much as I thought I would, we only have one guy who uses it and it's the guy who likes to bash with us soooo yeah... but we will probably find someone else soon.

Speaking of people, we have some investigators who are really progressing! It's exciting.

A and C have both changed so much from when I first met them.

Innisfail is cool, the church is true, and I'm better at soccer than I thought I was. 😁

August 29, 2017

Today was probably the most boring p-day ever. We had things scheduled to do, but they all fell through. So we just stayed at our place and mentally died while studying.
But! We had some cool stuff happen. We went on exchanges with the district leader and his greenie in Three Hills. I was with Elder W (The great green one) and we had an awesome day! Though it's super weird to work with people who have less time here than I do, it's crazy! I almost feel old. But seriously, I just have to do what I just did 3 more times and my mission is over! That's too fast!

In other news, we have been meeting with C twice a week studying the Book of Mormon with her and helping her understand it, and she is making huge progress! Though she still doesn't feel comfortable coming to church yet, but hey, I'm totally cool with the pace that she's going at.

We haven't been able to meet with A at all since the last time, but he does seem like he really wants to meet, so we're gonna figure it out.

We've been dropping a ton of people in the area book after stopping by them. But we're also getting a lot of people to call or visit, so I'm happy.

September 12, 2017

So I had this idea in my head that I would never go a week without emailing people, but destiny had other plans. Last week was crazy! In a good way. We had to get the car fixed from when some other missionaries ran it into a snow man, so we got to do a lot more biking😁 and also the power went out a few times. 😁

But after all that crazy stuff we got to have the traveling elders over here for a day! Elders K and P. We learned more stuff from them about Facebook and the digital area book that we're now using to do some awesome stuff. 

On the subject of investigators, we haven't seen many of them recently due to jobs, sickness, and gravity issues. But we do have a lot of people that we've been finding that seem to have quite a bit of potential. One if them we found on Sunday night said he really wanted to meet with us and asked us for our phone number! Usually it's the other way around! We're also starting to almost teach people entirely through Facebook! We won't even need to go to their house or anything! It's weird, but it will let us have more contact with people and have more time to do stuff.

One of the people we found is actually an administrator at the high school in Innisfail. His name is N. He said he had some questions about the Book of Mormon, so we met with him recently and explained it more. He said we can come back and also that he would read it and pray about it, so I'm excited. 

And finally we have the chili cook off this Saturday! We have invited so many people to it it's not even funny, so hopefully we'll have a good turnout. Also the people in this ward make really good chili, so there's that to be excited for as well. 

Shout out to my bro back home who is now officially an adult 😲 which is weird.

💣It's fine don't worry about it: Dance like the rising sun

July 25, 2017

Last time I didn't explain what I meant about the "Fire". Well what it was kinda metaphorical, but I guess also literal with all the forest fires we've been hearing about over in British Colombia.

Also, it's funny, our last dinner appointment last night told us to find a pioneer story for the after dinner thing that was happening. So I looked at my family history for probably the first time seriously, and found some pioneer stories to share, but I also found a Hannah Dustin or Duston, it has both. She was captured by some natives and brought to a certain island, then during the night she took one of their hatches and slew 10 of them escaping with some other prisoners! I was like ?? family history is cool?!?! So yeah, they later named the island Dustin Island, and I think they do tours and such. But it was kinda cool to see family history in a different light. It is a great source to learn from other people's actions and the consequences of them.

August 1, 2017

This last week was pretty normal, we had some lessons and found a lady who really wants to come to church! So that's exciting, but I think the biggest surprise here is what's going to be happening this next week.

We have interviews with President Pattison tonight at 8, so we get to take a 2 hour drive up to Edmonton, then the next day we will have zone conference, and the next day we will have a training on how to use the new smartphones and Facebook stuff for missionary things, and to end it off we get to have another 2 hour drive back to Innisfail! What a week! I still think the concept of me using Facebook is weird, pretty much everyone back home encouraged me to not get Facebook ?? so what happens? I go on a mission and get Facebook! Weirds me out.

In other news, gravity still works. I have dedicated part of my knee to this scientific display of pain. We were riding around on bikes, and I tried to make a corner way too sharp, so now I have the battle scar of a champion (or just a guy who fell off his bike, but champions are cooler.)

Oh, also, I forgot to mention that we are going to be staying with the Spanish elders up in Belmead for most of the week, so that will be fun. Everyone will know Spanish but me!??
I'll just practice my gibberish or something.

I know that this church is true; I know that Heavenly Father is helping us to have His work progress in every way He can, and I know that there is nothing else I should be doing right now.

August 8, 2017

First of all, we have Facebook. Or to be more specific, I personally have Facebook. And it's weird. To establish some rules first, I can be friends with family members and actual friends back home, and people can follow me around on it, but it is still recommended that the social interaction between me and anyone back home is limited to emailing on p-day as usual.

The purpose of using Facebook is so that we can teach people who don't have a lot of time to meet, or they live far away, etc. It is also used to interact with members and get referrals and fellowshippers for investigators in a more organized manner.

For those that don't know, I have never used Facebook before, so I have no idea what I am doing most of the time??. But it has already helped a lot of people (in other areas) to meet with missionaries and such, so it is a good tool. The problem is, none of our investigators have Facebook, and the one who does is the guy that likes to bash with us ??????? so not a lot of success with it yet, but we are still trying.

In other news, we still haven't had any investigators at church, and everyone is on holiday so we can't meet with them. So naturally we have been tracting our hearts out! Yay! Tracting is such an interesting activity. Something weird happens every time, and it can be both awesome and dreadful, depends on the day, I guess. But now that the holiday is over, we should start teaching people again.

Going back to zone conference and training and such, Elder S and I were in Edmonton for 2 days and 2 nights staying with the Spanish North/Belmead tri-pan, and it was pretty fun. We decided that since there wasn't enough beds for everyone, we needed to build a fort out of the mattresses, blankets, sheets, and pillows that we did have. So yeah, that happened.

I didn't learn any Spanish though (Sorry, Lia). Elder S is trying to not use Spanish at all, and I pretty much just told them that "I am a pineapple" in French if they were talking in Spanish all together. So, yeah.

On a more spiritual note, in sacrament meeting, I feel that most of the people's testimonies were directed to me and the questions I had and the things I had prayed for. It was an amazing experience. I saw a quote somewhere that really sums up what I feel about prayer and it says "When I pray, coincidences happen. When I don't, they don't."- someone probably. I've seen this a lot in my life, and before my mission I saw a lot of miracles and treated them like coincidences. I had a "It was probably what was going to happen anyways, and it wasn't even that spectacular" attitude, but now I see that I pray for something, and it happens! Even if it was going to happen anyways it still answers the prayer. "By small and simple things are great things brought to pass."

About the subject line above: We usually just listen to "Motab" or Christian rock music, and one of the songs has the lyrics saying that they would "dance like the rising sun!" And I was trying to picture what that would look like, and I'd recommend y'all to do it too, it's a pretty funny picture.

Also I've been getting a lot of comments about my bike accident, it wasn't that bad, don't worry I'm fine, it's pretty much healed now, and I don't have to use a wheelchair anymore. 😁

So to summarize: Its fine, don't worry about it. 😁

Argentina, maple syrup, lessons, and fire: plant the plants, fight the good fight

July 11, 2017

Innisfail is awesome. Me and Elder S have been having a ton of fun working together. Also I spelled his name wrong last week, sorry.

We have had the opportunity to teach a bunch of people this week too. And also the last missionary that was here went home on Sunday night after bringing his family to church here in Innisfail. So meeting him was pretty fun.

I don't have a ton of time, but just know, I'm doing awesome, and we are seeing miracles!

July 25, 2017

Innisfail is awesome; we are teaching a lot of people, and we're having a blast doing it. Elder S reminds me a lot of my brother (Shout out to ya bro!) So we've been getting along fine. He is learning English still, but he is pretty much fluent. Also to give some background on him: he's from Argentina, he speaks Spanish sometimes, he loves the gospel, and he isn't a fan of Chileans, sorry sis😂. Though he is probably one of my favorite companions, definitely one of the top 3.

Area wise, we have a lot of people to teach. Some of the main ones that we're meeting with are: A and L, A is the son of L, and we have been teaching them or at least trying, haha. L is kinda an eternigator (eternal investigator), but technically pretty much their whole family is progressing, or at least they are reading the bible and praying about the Book of Mormon (we're working on getting them to read the Book of Mormon and then pray about it.) But they are on holiday right now, so we can't really teach them yet.

We also have C, she is progressing great, or at least she was until she told us about her ability to heal people with the energy behind her shoulders... We're working on it. 

We also have some less actives that we've been teaching a bit. R is one of them, we are having a tough time getting fellowshippers for her, but she comes to church on a semi-regular basis, so it's a weird situation.

One weird thing that happens here in Innisfail is when we go to R's house every other p-day to play dungeons and dragons with a nonmember, a potential, a former investigator, a less active, and one of R's home teachers. It's crazy! But pretty fun. And we get to sneak in some teaching while we do it, and we have a fellowshipper for all of them! 

We also have bikes! Well we do now, we kind of have a limit on how many kilometers we're supposed to use in a month, and when they brought the car up to Edmonton for transfers and when I brought it back with Elder G (never forget) we kinda destroyed our klicks for the month🤷🏼‍♂️ so some members are letting us use some old bikes of theirs! It's been awesome to ride a bike on my misssion! You always hear the stories of missionaries on their bikes doing awesome stuff, and I was kinda bummed that we didn't have bikes before when I was in Leduc, but now we have bikes! And it's awesome, I feel majestic. 

Transferring to Innisfail

July 4, 2017

Hey y'all! So, transfer calls happened today. I'm leaving good old Leduc and I'm going to Innisfail! That is actually where Elder J. got trained. I'm excited! It's probably as South as I will ever be here, so I'm expecting a really warm Summer. Also, my new companion is going to be Elder S. I don't know who he is, but President Pattison said I might pick up some Spanish while I'm there. He can't drive, so I'll be doing that the whole time.

I really don't know what it'll be like, but I'm super excited.

There were fireworks on Canada Day, though we didn't stay up to watch them because they started at 11:00 at night. They also don't really let people have their own fireworks show like they do back home.

And, speaking of hymns, I can't really decide what my favorite song would be. I have a lot. Some of my favorites include: Battle Hymn of the Republic, I Believe in Christ, If You Could Hie to Kolob, and Come, Come Ye Saints. Also, Nearer My God to Thee and Be Still My Soul are pretty good, too.

I'll update ya more on what's going on next week. I gotta finish packing!

Also, those little plastic things that hold bread bags closed make really awesome ninja stars!

Let's Summer!

June 27, 2017

Well, Summer definitely happened. The sun doesn't really go down, the rainy season is past, it's like 21-23°C every day, and everybody knows how to rollerblade here.

Plus, there is a ton of stuff to go over.
First of all, the BBQ I mentioned last week: it turns out that nobody that we invited showed up. But! We did talk to the guy who made T-shirts for us and now we are going to "practice" teaching him. Which is kind of cheating I guess, but I need to practice teaching anyway.

Second thing, CANADA DAY?! It's on the 1st of July, this Saturday. I'm not too sure what's going to happen, but I'm excited.

Third, transfers are next week! Chances are really, really good that I am going to be booted out of Leduc soon. But with President Pattison, anything can happen.

Fourth! In July, we are going to be the first mission in Canada with smartphones and Facebook. That'll be weird. The smartphones I can handle, but I've never used Facebook before, so we'll see what happens.

Also, I went to the temple today! We only get to go to the temple four times a year, so I can hardly even imagine being in a place without a temple while on my mission. Today, I felt the Spirit stronger than I ever have in the temple before. I can feel myself becoming ever closer to God and the person who He wants me to be.

In reply to a question about languages: I have actually met people here who only speak French, or their first language was French. There are a lot of people here from other parts of Canada or from random places in Europe, so the languages are still fairly diverse. That being said, everything here still has French words next to the English ones.

Though, now that I think about it, I think the most common non-English language I hear would be Mandarin Chinese.

What do you call an alligator in a vest?

June 20, 2017

This was a pretty fun week. Not a huge number of things happened, but we did have zone conference! It pretty much obliterated companionship study, and then put it back together in a big ol' ball of [Insert Noun Here]. It was pretty fun, though. Afterwards, we had pictures and we got the whole Canadian MTC district back together! And also Elder L. was taking the pictures.

On the subject of investigators... well... we weren't actually able to meet with anyone. We almost got D. to church, but we can't actually seem to get into contact with him anymore. And then A. and J. are still pretty flaky, so they keep rescheduling appointments. But, we do have a ward BBQ coming up this Saturday and we invited a billion people to come to it. So, we are excited for this Saturday. 😊 Also, we went on exchanges with the Greenfield elders last Wednesday. Me and Elder T. had some fun in Leduc tearing up some flooring in a house that a member was renting out. It's been a solid week of tracting and service.

Happy birthday to my sister!

I've been thinking a lot about how to study more effectively as well, and I learned this: Earlier in my mission, I heard a story about a guy who was off work for a few days and had nothing to do. He had already read everything he owned, so he went to a friend's house and asked if they had any good books he could borrow. His friend was an awesome person and gave him a copy of the Book of Mormon. He took it home and tried to read it, but he really couldn't get into it. It was a drag to read. So he went back to his friend and tried to give the book back saying that it was too boring. His friend replied saying: Well, did you pray about it? As it turned out, he didn't. So he went home and "popped open a beer" and got on his knees. He asked God to let him know of it was true, then he sat back up and started reading again. He said that as he read the book from that point, he couldn't put it down! He was suddenly engulfed in the story. He cared about Nephi and his tests of faith, he felt bad for King Benjamin having to tell the people about their sins in front of the pure in heart. He could see the battles of Captain Moroni and the courage that they showed, and he saw Mormon's son writing in the record for the last time as his people were being slaughtered.

He read the whole book in three days, only taking breaks for the bathroom and meals. Once he finished, he got on his knees again and thanked God for letting him know that it was true. He got baptized three weeks later.

I heard that story and wanted to have the same experience with reading it. So, I asked God to help me read it as that man did. It didn't come all at once like it did for him, but I am at that point now. The only reason I was able to meet that goal was because I had help from our Father in Heaven.