28 Sept 10

We have a baptism tonight! 

The second baptism I've had in this area! A mother and a daughter, Gabriella and Rebecca Barron. Gabby is 22 and Rebecca is in her 40's. We've been teaching them for about 6 weeks now and have gone through alot with them. They are amazing. Rebecca's husband is a member but is less-active. We were referred by the Bishop who is there next door neighbor. We knocked on their door and said "Hey your neighbor said that we could come over and share a message about Christ with you." And they said sure. So we taught them, they read, they accepted everything. No problems with Word of Wisdom or Tithing. They were ready. And we did nothing except go where the member told us to go.

 Now we did run into a problem were Rebecca's husband, Marco. He wouldn't let her get baptized because he didn't think she was ready. Gabby doesn't need his permission to be baptized. His whole side of the family, who are all members, was not happy with him. We went over Sunday night to finalize "Gabby's" baptism and got Marco to come out and we talked with him, and got his permission to baptize his wife. A lot of prayers were answered that night.

 A great story on how member missionary work, works. Sometimes all you have to do is point, like the Bishop did, and others will come unto Christ.

 The contacts cost $45 for a box which would last me about 3 months so the total cost for each eye it cost $90. That's why my account seems so low. No need to be in a rush to put money in, I'm fine right now. Actually I have more money at the end of this month then I know what to do with. Usually I run out on my card.

 For next April, that's fine, I don't want you to feel like I don't care about everyone else, I do, but the only person who really matters in all this is Mom. That's why we call on Mother’s day. Dad had a part in helping me along spiritually and I don't know where I would be without Dad giving me those long talks over the phone about my grades and about my church etiquette and my Eagle Scout and my Duty to God and my summer school classes and keeping me going in marching band... anyway. That's why he gets to come, beside the fact that he's attached to Mom at the heart. Everyone else are great supporters and loved ones and I know they want to be a part of this. But, the truth is they have been a part of it the whole way. It's not the end that matters but the journey. Not everyone will be able to come, but that's not important. I can feel their love anyway.

 Love you all!

TTI

21 Sept 10

I know I've been a little neglectful in my posting. But, this was such a good letter, how things can come full circle in the gospel.

"This week was a pretty awesome week! It was crazy! So first, we had P-day on Monday, then Tuesday-Friday was 7 hours of Leadership Training and then I got sick for Saturday and Sunday. Needless to say our numbers last week were not so good. The only stat that stayed the same was TTI's of which we got 49 last week, and we tried hard to maintain that. Elder Richards was hardly in our area this week during Leadership Training, he was with other missionaries who's companions were also at the meeting. So he had to work in 3 areas this week including the American Sign Language Missionaries who cover the entire state of Arizona. So, it was a little rough.

But the meetings were awesome! I was completely drained afterward, but they were awesome! We learned how to better focus our teaching to what our investigators need and bring them one step closer to baptism. Nothing new or spectacular just more practice. It was great. Now if I could just get over my allergies to apply it to my area it will be great.

That's right I have Allergies. It all started when I got to the MTC and I lost my voice for a morning, then I started to get congested and when I got to Arizona it never went away. So the doctor down here who sees all the missionaries gave me some stuff to take care of all that. So I'm allergic to Arizona! Yeah!

I went to a baptism in my 1st area last night of a guy that I taught who was waiting a very long time to get baptized. His name was John Delpp. He had been on parole for a very long time and last night he was able to enter into the waters of baptism. Elder Tackett flew out from Virginia to baptize him. I have never seen a more packed baptism then John’s. They had to hold it in the chapel there were so many people. He was converted 5 years ago in prison and came to the Riverview ward for a year before he could get baptized it was such an awesome baptism. What made it cooler was that Johnny and Rayleen Avachuco were there and they are strong in the church. Rayleen gave the opening prayer and Johnny did the talk on the Holy Ghost.

It will be a full year on the 26th of this month when the Avachucos got baptized. I don't think they want to go to the Temple just yet. But they are awesome and as strong as ever in the church.

We went to the Temple this morning, 6am session, It was cool. I felt like it was the last time I would be going to the Mesa Temple. It was weird. I still enjoyed it.

My check up on my eyes are tomorrow so we'll see how those new contacts do.

Love you all.

TTI

Elder Morgan

8 Jun 2010

We've hit the triple digits. I saw 111 yesterday. Because we're hanging around the Spanish missionaries alot (there on bikes) they call us for rides in this heat in our air conditioned car. 

Attack of the Bed Bugs!! Elder Forkner and I are getting bit by something. Elder Forkner has about 50 bites I don't have as many, maybe 12 but we've been sleeping at the Spanish Elders place for a few nights. The bug guy came yesterday and didn't find anything but sprayed anyway. We might have to move. 

As for the post mission plans, for the last 14 months I've told everyone that asks that I'm going to go to the Art Institute in Seattle. But in order for me to do that I need to take the ACT. So I was thinking (1) get a job, (2) prep for and take the ACT (3) get some credit. That is the extent of my post mission plans. 

One other thing, when I was doing my Eagle Project I was only obligated to do one set of horse shoe pits. Bro. Deehr told me that there needs to be 2 sets for it to be a proper game. Michael Barney was supposed to do the other set but he didn't. So I told Bro. Deehr that I would do the rest. Richy is a Life Scout he could do the other set and he could start today. 

We missed the Temple this transfer, but the Temple is very important. I plan to attend more often than every 6 weeks after next Spring. 

Other missionaries are getting impatient with me. Got to go. 

TTI 

Jacob

02 June 10

We had our Zone Development Meeting for the transfer, yesterday, and because of memorial day we could not email.

Had my last interview with President Bassett, it was good. (sounds like President Basset is going home and a new President will be starting July 1) I never have felt good about being a snitch, and that's what I felt like when I was talking to President about Elder Forkner. Even though we are teaching effectively and setting baptismal dates we aren't doing our daily planning, we hang around with the Spanish Missionaries too much and I feel left out when we do that at lunch or at the end of the day. President told me to hang in there and keep pushing Elder Forkner. (We get along great. There's just a few rules that don't seem to be in his "white bible" that are in mine).

Well do what you need to do with financial things. I'm fine on this end I don't need any money right now. The Lord will bless us as we do our best. That means we need to hammer out the kinks and work on getting out of our ruts. The Lord can't bless us unless we fulfull a commandment.

TTI

Elder Morgan

25 May 10

It's starting to get warm here. We hit 100 last week and school is out in Arizona. We had a pretty good week. Our entire district has 3 transfers or less left except the District Leader and me who came out at the same time. So last week, by Friday our TTI's were the worst they've been in my entire mission, so we called Elder Geilmen and he had about 12 for the week. SO we made a little wager. Whoever got the most TTI's on Saturday gets to buy the other companionship a 75 cent fountain drink at the QT. So we ended up with 71 TTI's and they had 57. That is the most I've ever gotten in one day. It's not the proper motivation to TTI, but we have gotten a lot of potential Investigators because of it. So our final talley for the week was 83 TTI's which is still not so good. But we taught a ton of Investigator lessons. 21 total! And we've started off great this week with 29 TTI’s, 3 lessons and 1 new Investigator for Monday. 

We also had a great experience. One of our Investigators, Kenny, is having a hard time letting his pastor know that he is meeting with us and is considering joining the Mormon church, but he doesn't know if it's worth losing his friendship because he doesn't know if the church is true yet. He has been reading and is understanding everything. So we read 2 Nephi 33 with him, and after that he closed the book looked at it for 2 min and said "It's true. I have to do it." We literally watched a man gain a testimony of the Book of Mormon. It was been the single most spiritual moment of my mission. We're planning on setting a date with him next time.

Short on time again.

Love you all,

Elder Jacob

18 May 10

Good morning family and friends. It's looking to be a hot week here in the AZ. Last night was a long night as Elder Geilmen and Alcontara came and spent the night. Elder Geilmen and Elder Forkner have been friends their entire missions and since Elder Geilmen is going home in 3 weeks and Elder Forkner is going home in 9, they seem to want to spend every waking moment together. Geilmen and Alcontara cover the Spanish work in our area and are on bikes so we see them all the time. 

So we had a great week last week. All our numbers were great except TTI's. We found 8 new investigators and taught 14 investigator lessons. Combined with our less active and member lessons we got a total of 20 lessons last week which is exactly what Elder Parry has set for weekly goals. But we only talked to 64 people so our TTI's have been a little short, but the whole point of TTI'ing is to find new investigators. The mission standard for New Investigators is 4 a week. And we doubled that, but that dosen't mean we don't have to TTI. It's not the most effective way to find but it is effective. One of our new investigatores last week came from a member who talked to her friend at school and we're pretty sure she asked her if she wanted to get baptised, and here she is learning more about modern day revelation and the restored church. 

It dosen't take much just a little prayer and faith so we can help those who don't know they're looking for it. We know were the gate is. Lets help those them find it, so they too can be happy along with us. It's the best feeling ever to see someone progress in life. It's an even better feeling to see someone progress in the gospel.

TTI

Love

Elder Morgan

11 May 10

We had a great 79 minute conversation with him Sunday night. He's doing as well as he sounds in his emails. He mentioned that he'd been studying Cleon Skousen and some deeper church doctrine and so when I wrote him today I cautioned him to be careful and not stray too far from the first principles and ordinances of the gospel, Faith, Repentance, Baptism and the Gift of the Holy Ghost... (Mike)

"Thanks for the concern. You know what they say "If the church wasn't true the missionaries would have figured it out a long time ago. Actually these studies (which haven't been part of my morning studies) have helped me find answers to peoples questions and prepare answers to frequently asked questions that have helped others draw closer to Christ. But you are correct there have been Bishops, Stake Presidents and General Authorities that have lost there testimonies because of something they weren't prepared to hear or couldn't fully understand or just wasn't true. 

There was a guy in my last area who, on his mission, was called to look up all the anti material and find out how to defend using scriptures and talks by Apostles. He's a great guy, Bro Lowry was. I learned alot from him when we had an investigator who just wouldn't except the Book of Mormon and the investigator left us a little depressed and angry after many hours of arguing and trying to prove one thing against the other, but Bro. Lowry helped put us back in good spirits again. I know this Church is the absolute manifestation of the church Christ set up and no paper, salamander or stockmarket statistic can persuade me otherwise. Because all I need is Christ. 

Well, after you asked me if I had any bad times on my mission and I said I can't really think of any (I have a hard time coming up with memories on the spot, good or bad.) I've been really dehydrated the past few weeks but that is easily fixable. It's something I talked to President about and he told me to keep up the good spirits. I have had a few sick days on my mission. Those were probably the 3 worst days of my mission (next to exchanges with Elder Jenkins). 

But I tell you there is no better feeling as a missionary then to know you're working hard. Its hard to work hard. But hey, salvation is never easy, especially if you're working on other people's salvation too. 

Love you all, Happy 19th and 15th Birthday middle kids! 

TTI 

Jacob