Dec. 30, 2013

It was good to talk with you on Christmas day.  It was much needed.  This week ended weird.  Saturday evening the zone leaders came and talked to us and told us that we are loosing the trust of the members here in the ward.  I'm not sure what we have done to have to have them loose our trust.  The zone leaders told us to continue to work hard and to work with the members.  It has been slow lately because of the Thanksgiving and Christmas, but we have still been trying to find those who are wanting to hear what we have to say.  Hopefully we will be able to fix the problem soon.  We will be attending the temple next week so that will be a good time to seek for extra guidance in how to regain the trust of the members.

I don't have a whole lot to say since I told you most everything on Christmas day.

I love you.

Love,
Scott

December 23, 2013

This week has been ok.  The beginning of the week was great.  My companion and I had a great time last couple of days that we were together.  Wednesday we had transfers.  I went with an elder up to Leavenworth, which is a cool little town that is kind of like a German town.  There are lots of lights and cool little shops to look at.  I got my new companion Wednesday night and things kind of went down from there.  He's been our for 3 transfers.  I don't think he realizes that I'm here to help him.  We don't talk.  I've tried to have a conversation with him but not much get talked about, so I'm not sure what to do.
As for our investigators, we haven't been able to really meet with any of them.  For the most part we just do whatever to find new people to teach.
I did find out that the family that is housing us are trying to find us a new place to live.  The missionaries were only suppose to be stay here for about 6 months and it's been a year now, so it looks like we may be moving soon.
I finally got over my illness and neither of my companions got sick so that's good.
It has warmed up a bit so we aren't freezing all the time.  It did snow the other day while we were out so it did get a little chilly.
Our ward mission leader told us that we can Skype from his house on Christmas so I think we will try and do that again.

That's about my week.  I love you and look forward to talking to you Wednesday

Love,
Scott

Dec. 16, 2013

Well this week has been a busy one.  We had a Zone meeting Tuesday which was interesting.  During our Zone meeting we were going over our goals for the zone and while we were setting a goal for baptism, the zone got into a stand off which lasted about an hour.  Our mission goal for the month of December was to have 65 baptisms for the whole mission.  The goal for the zone was 15 (which I think is pretty reasonable).  The zone leaders wanted to change the goal to something a little higher.  Some people got talking and they came up with 40 people for our zone alone.  The sisters and the some elders were all for it.  Then one of the zone leaders asked me what I thought about the goal and I told them that I thought 40 was too high.  The past couple of months we have only hit the teens.  So I asked them if they are going to just baptize less active members.  I told them about a lady I ran into who the missionaries pushed her to be baptized and now she is less active and won't come to church because she doesn't believe it's true.  So I told them 20 would be a more realistic number.  Some of the sisters went off saying that we didn't have enough faith and that if we test our faith then we will see miracles and we could reach our goal of 40.  Then one of the zone leaders asked my companion what he thought.  He was on the same page as I was.  He did mention that we could have all the faith in the world but it is still up to Heavenly Father as to when people join the church and that we need to make sure that it's something that the investigator wants and that they will be lifelong members.  There are too many times where he has run into less active members who joined the church because the missionaries said it was a good idea.  After while we were able to come to the agreement that 20 was a more reasonable number and could be reached.

Wednesday was a fun day.  We had our Christmas Zone Conference, where 6 zones got together and we had a musical program and then we were able to watch Monster University.  I was also able to see some elders from other areas as well.

Thursday and Friday we tried to contact people from our area book that we put together but had no luck.  By the time I got home Friday night I wasn't feeling too good.  My face was hot but the rest of my body was cold.  Saturday when I woke up I didn't feel good at all.  My throat was sore, my left ear hurt and my tonsils were red with little white flakes on them.  A couple of other elders come over and brought me some Benadryl and 7 up.  I ended up sleeping all day.  Sunday I felt a little better.  I went to church and did all the usual Sunday things.  Sunday night we got our transfer call.  My companion is getting transferred Wednesday.  Neither one of us was happy about that, but life goes on.

Today my throat and ear still hurt but not as bad as it was.  It's more of just an annoying pain.  I've been gargling salt water which helps some.

Well, that's about my week.

Love, Scott

Dec. 9, 2013

It's been rather cold here.  The high one day was 17.  One night it got down to 3.  It's suppose to snow Wednesday.  We will have to see what happens.  We have been putting on 5 layers of clothes to try and stay warm, but we still get cold!!

The work is pretty slow but we are trying to find people to teach.  We aren't having much success there.  We just need to find something that works. 

Transfer calls are Saturday which means that transfers are next week.  My companion and I are hoping that we both get to stay.  We will have to see what happens.  I'm hoping to spend Christmas here.

Rhett and Paul, from Pasco, came up to see me, Elder Tubbs and Elder Greenwell.  We had lunch together then walked around and talked for a little while.  We did help the Lutheran Church down the street hang up some lights in their church.

We are meeting with the Methodist family tomorrow night.  We plan on showing them the "Prophet of the Restoration" DVD.  We will see how that goes.

Saturday we ate lunch at Red Robin and I was able to see the score of the OU/OSU game.  That was pretty cool.

Dec. 2, 2013

This week was a tough one.  All of our investigators went out of town so we ended up walking around on the streets trying to find people to talk to.

We did have lesson with the Methodist family that we are teaching.  We discussed who God was.  They believe in the trinity.  That was interesting having them explain it me.  To me they made it sound like God is an alien.  I brought up the scripture in Acts 7:55-56 where Stephen gets stoned and he sees God and Jesus right before he dies.  I had them explain they scripture to me and they said that it was like an apple.  So it made no sense to me.  We will have to see what happens.  We do have another appointment with them.  We are hoping we can stop by and talk to them before our next appointment.

For Thanksgiving we had lunch with our host family, then for dinner we had Ramen soup.  The rest of the time we walked around town but no one was out.

I did send a package home today with some things that I don't need right now, like my long sleeve shirts and some jackets that have been given to me.  I also sent home a binder of letters that have been sent to me and journal full of notes that I have taken.

It's good to hear that Kristian almost has his papers filled out.  Zane has been asking how he is doing.  I'll have to let him know.

I hope all is well at home. 

I love you.

Love,
Scott