Wednesday, May 28, 2014

More salutations from Chino, CA!  This week is the last week of the transfer and I always find it to be a time of reflection.  This has been one of, if not the best transfer of my mission.  I've had an absolute blast.  It's always a non-stop party here in Walnut Park when Elder Robertson and I are together.  Not since I was trained have I ever had this much fun with my companion.  It's always great to form those mission friendships that'll last for far longer than the mission.

C is being baptized this Saturday!  We're super excited!  She's still progressing really well and her testimony grows stronger each and every day.  She has so much faith in Jesus Christ and we're so proud of her!  Her baptismal interview is today and we've already gone over the questions with her and she passed with flying colors!  We're super excited to see her enter the waters of baptism.  Our ward mission leader will be performing the baptism and I will be performing her confirmation in Sacrament Meeting the following day.  I couldn't ask for a better way to end the transfer!

And as if things couldn't get better, we have ANOTHER super solid investigator and she's great!  She's very religious and has a sincere desire to know the truth.  She says the doctrines of the Restoration, prophets, and the Plan of Salvation were like the missing pieces of a puzzle in her life.  She said they cleared up so much about God's character and put such peace in her heart!  She came to church this Sunday and told us in a text afterwards that she had a fantastic time and she can't wait to meet with us this Wednesday!  It was amazing!  She wants to learn all she can about prophets and she constantly reads the Book of Mormon to find out it's true for herself.  It's so cool to watch her progress!
One of my good friends, Elder Bringhurst, just got his visa this week.  I'll be sad to see him go, but he's really excited to serve in Brazil.  I'm the eternal visa-waiter over here.  Oh well.  If it's the nature of my calling to labor all my days among the saints of Southern California then I shall consider myself highly favored and blessed.

We had an AWESOME district meeting today about the Savior.  Well, we almost always talk about Jesus Christ but this one was especially powerful.  Our district leader, Elder Tyler, did a great job with it.  I'm so grateful that I have the opportunity to devote all my time, talents, and energy to proclaiming our Savior's name wherever I go.  I even have the opportunity to wear his name over my heart every day.  How cool is that!

Read your scriptures, say your prayers, go to church.  Honestly, you'd be surprised how hard it is for some people to do that.  But trust me, it works wonders.  Do those things and God will always be able to help you along the strait and narrow path.

Your friend,
Elder Carter David Morgan

Monday, May 5, 2014

"How to Find People to Teach"

Holy cow.  May already.  How the time flies.  I can't believe I've been out for almost nine months.  And the best part?  I don't even want to go home!  I'm loving it out here!  Elder Robertson and I have been tearing it up in Walnut Park!  We've had a lot of miracles happen this week and it's been absolutely fantastic!

So, we've been trying to find new people to teach, like we always are.  So in order to find new ways to find people to teach I turned to Chapter 9 of Preach My Gospel, conveniently titled, "How Do I Find People To Teach?"  I then proceeded to take out a highlighter and highlight everything I wasn't doing as a missionary.  I found 37 things, haha.  There's room for improvement.  So we set out this week to apply the principles that we learned in Preach My Gospel and find new investigators.

Our first miracle began with a text message last Monday.  It was a referral from Mormon.org for a woman named C.  She had put in her information to meet with missionaries and wrote that she had recently gone through a loss in her family and was interested in LDS beliefs.  So we go to contact her on Tuesday and her husband answers the door and tells us that she's sleeping at the moment and that we should come back later.  So we're about to unlock our bikes from her house when we realize that one of the 37 things we weren't doing was to work in the neighborhood after contacting a referral.  So we decide to leave our bikes there and knock a few doors and help people put up their trash cans that had blown over since it was a windy day.  Well, while knocking doors we got a return appointment which was awesome, but that's not even the best part!  The best part is when we went to get our bikes we found C. sitting on her door step waiting for us!  After her husband told her that the missionaries had come looking for her she got up out of bed and looked outside where she saw our bikes.  Well, she figured that we had to come back sometime soon to get them so she sat down and waited for us to come back.  When we met her she told us about some of the trials she was having and asked who she had to talk to get more information about our church.  Uh... you're looking at them, haha.  We set up an appointment for the next day.  That appointment went over 90 minutes because of all the questions she had!  Then she set up an appointment for the next day!  She said that she believes that God has led her to our church.  She committed to read the Book of Mormon, pray about it, pray about baptism, and come to church!  She came to church this Sunday and asked tons of questions in class.  One of her concerns is that her sons don't know how to do laundry and she's worried about how that will affect them when they serve their missions, haha.  That's a a concern we can work with.

Along with C, we were able to get two of our investigators and their two girls to church for the first time this Sunday!  They've been investigating for a bit but have concerns about Joseph Smith and the Book of Mormon.  The dad really lights up whenever we talk but the mom is a little apprehensive about some things.  They've been going to a born-again mega church and said that they want to go to church where the feel the closest to God.  We told them that they would only know if they felt closest to God at ours if they came and they did!  They almost got lost and went home but we stood out on the corner while sacrament meeting was going to give them directions.  When we brought them in through the chapel doors the ward was so excited!  It was a cool sight to see the missionaries bringing in a young family.  And they loved it!  It was fast and testimony meeting so the spirit was so strong!  They especially loved how a girl about their daughter's age was able to bear her testimony over the pulpit to the whole congregation!  The mom loved Relief Society and their daughter loved Primary!  The dad said he felt really welcomed!  We're hoping they continue to come.

Those are just some of the cool things that have happened this week.  With my new companion I'm finding that I have a lot more stories from my mission than I realized I did.  The problem is that we're so busy that we hardly have times to tell these stories so I find myself saying things like, "That reminds me of the time that my companion got hit by a car.  But that's a story for another time."  Then I realize how weird my mission CURRENTLY is.  For example, I'm currently teaching an old lady with a one-eyed Boston Terrier who has a drag queen son in San Francisco.  That doesn't happen everyday.  Oh wait, it does in Southern California.  Man, California.

It's great being able to serve out here everyday.  I hope that the rest of my mission continues to be like this.  Elder Robertson is awesome.  He has so many strengths and is helping me to be the best missionary I can be.  We're really hopeful about the progress of this area and we hope to be better missionaries than we were last week.  The work is true, the Atonement is real, and I'm so glad to be a part of all of this.

Until next time,
Elder Carter David Morgan