July 1, 2012
This week was quite exciting! Our investigators are all doing pretty well and we have found a few more people to potentially begin teaching. Also, I got my new companion on Tuesday! The Masters drove us up to the transfer point in
Mt. Vernon to drop off Elder Peterson and pick up Elder Gulbranson who is here fresh out of the MTC! He is originally from British Columbia, Canada which always catches people off guard when they try to guess where he is from. haha He is ready to work hard and is great at depending on the spirit. He and I are getting along quite well and I know that some great work will result from him being here. I'm so excited to be a 'daddy' again! One thing that I really love about training is that it helps me to refocus on the 'basics' of missionary work and I really feel that it helps me grow immensely as a servant of the Lord. Sister Golden is definitely living up to her name! We were able to meet
with her a couple times and one of those times was for her baptismal interview! Elder VanRoosendaal, the new zone leader, came
down to do the interview and so we went on exchanges with them at that point as well. We shared a message with her about prophets and apostles and then we watched a really great movie called "Special Witnesses of Christ" that was put out by the church around the year 2000. It is all of the First Presidency and Quorum of the Twelve bearing their testimonies of various aspects of Christ's life. It definitely brought in the Spirit and Sis. Golden definitely indicated that she could feel the power of the Holy Ghost in the testimonies born. I'm so excited for her baptism coming up this Saturday! A really great experience that I was able to have this week was that I was able to perform my first baptismal interview! Sis. Kaminski from Mountain Home is going to be baptized this coming Friday. It was a really great experience to talk with her and hear about her conversion and her testimony! I hope I get to perform plenty more interviews before the end of my mission. This week marks the beginning of the "reign" of President Shumway. President Merkley will definitely be missed and his service is greatly appreciated. I look forward to meeting Pres. Shumway this Friday at the Shumway family mission tour/Zone Conference. (which also happens to be my year mark) I'm excited to see the wonderful ways that I'm
sure the mission will grow with a new presiding authority. Speaking of it being my year mark this week, I can't believe it is halfway
already! It seemed to go by really quickly and I know that as I continually serve the Lord, the second half will go by quickly as well! I hope to have no regrets at the end of my mission! I do love this work and hope that I can continue to learn, grow, and improve in my role as a missionary. Love you all! Thanks for all that you do :) Love, Elder Holmes
with her a couple times and one of those times was for her baptismal interview! Elder VanRoosendaal, the new zone leader, came
down to do the interview and so we went on exchanges with them at that point as well. We shared a message with her about prophets and apostles and then we watched a really great movie called "Special Witnesses of Christ" that was put out by the church around the year 2000. It is all of the First Presidency and Quorum of the Twelve bearing their testimonies of various aspects of Christ's life. It definitely brought in the Spirit and Sis. Golden definitely indicated that she could feel the power of the Holy Ghost in the testimonies born. I'm so excited for her baptism coming up this Saturday! A really great experience that I was able to have this week was that I was able to perform my first baptismal interview! Sis. Kaminski from Mountain Home is going to be baptized this coming Friday. It was a really great experience to talk with her and hear about her conversion and her testimony! I hope I get to perform plenty more interviews before the end of my mission. This week marks the beginning of the "reign" of President Shumway. President Merkley will definitely be missed and his service is greatly appreciated. I look forward to meeting Pres. Shumway this Friday at the Shumway family mission tour/Zone Conference. (which also happens to be my year mark) I'm excited to see the wonderful ways that I'm
sure the mission will grow with a new presiding authority. Speaking of it being my year mark this week, I can't believe it is halfway
already! It seemed to go by really quickly and I know that as I continually serve the Lord, the second half will go by quickly as well! I hope to have no regrets at the end of my mission! I do love this work and hope that I can continue to learn, grow, and improve in my role as a missionary. Love you all! Thanks for all that you do :) Love, Elder Holmes
July 9, 2012 - Email
Well, this week was interesting. Sister Golden, the investigator we had scheduled for baptism this past Saturday decided that she wanted to postpone for a while. Fortunately though, she didn't postpone because of doubts that she had or anything. It was really important to her to have approval from her father to join the church and after talking to him she agreed to his request that she read
the Book of Mormon before her baptism. I would be lying if I said that I was not a bit bummed about that when she told me but I have come to accept it a lot better. So, we are focusing as much as we can on helping her develop her faith and helping her read through the Book of Mormon. One thing that we found to be really helpful was showing her where she could listen to it on lds.org. I know
that God knows what he is doing and I am hopeful and prayerful that something good will come out of the situation! I know that it is cliche to talk about the weather, but her I go anyway! As many of you undoubtedly know, the weather has been really hot with virtually no precipitation in my part of the country. It had been pretty worrisome to a lot of people and caused a fire hazard throughout the state of AR which actually did result in a couple of fires. Well, our prayers were answered this last weekend, at least for Harrison. We got some decent storms that put out some good rainfall. The more the merrier of course and we will always welcome more, but it was definitely an appreciated blessing to receive some moisture. One thing that I have learned to love as I have studied this week is teaching younger children. Elder Gulbranson and I have been "raiding" the primary room for visual aids and we have some pretty sweet coloring pages to help with teaching Sister Brandenburg's two children. We are teaching them the first part
of the Plan of Salvation tonight and I'm pretty excited. haha Maybe it is just because I am a child at heart. Well, we met the Shumway family this Friday and that was great! I love President and Sister Merkley and they did wonderful things in the mission and,
after meeting President Shumway, I am really excited to see the kinds of programs that he implements in the mission. He is constantly receiving revelation for the mission and I definitely felt the Spirit with him as we met him. I love you all and thank you for your support of me! This has been a great year and I know that I have grown so much! I hope that the next year is just as
amazing of an experience!
Elder Holmes
Email - July 16, 2012
A couple cool things happened this week. One was that we found a new investigator! Brother Hallenbeck was a man we tracted into a while ago and we were able to go and see him this week. He seems to be pretty deeply rooted in his current beliefs but fortunately, from what we were able to tell, they don't contradict ours that much. His biggest issue is with the necessity of a prophet in these days so hopefully the spirit can work in him and testify that Christ's true Church has been restored.
Speaking of tracting, one thing that we plan to really focus on this week is finding! Nothing happens in missionary work until we find people to teach and so we are really going to work on building this area up. Finding through our own efforts is one way that I feel will really help this area. The members here have been great and, of course, we will continue to work with them as well. We received a few referrals this week and so we hope to be able to work with the members to set up meetings with their friends soon!
On Wednesday, we were able to go with the Masters during the day to see a performance in Branson, MO. The family is the Duttons and they are members. Actually, quite a few of the performers there are members and so the missionaries get to take people to see them sometimes. Actually, while I was there I saw a member whom I had met in one of my previous areas so that was pretty sweet!
Well, not too much else exciting going on. At least, nothing more exciting than the usual awesome missionary work! Thank you all for your support of me! Love you!
Elder Holmes
Speaking of tracting, one thing that we plan to really focus on this week is finding! Nothing happens in missionary work until we find people to teach and so we are really going to work on building this area up. Finding through our own efforts is one way that I feel will really help this area. The members here have been great and, of course, we will continue to work with them as well. We received a few referrals this week and so we hope to be able to work with the members to set up meetings with their friends soon!
On Wednesday, we were able to go with the Masters during the day to see a performance in Branson, MO. The family is the Duttons and they are members. Actually, quite a few of the performers there are members and so the missionaries get to take people to see them sometimes. Actually, while I was there I saw a member whom I had met in one of my previous areas so that was pretty sweet!
Well, not too much else exciting going on. At least, nothing more exciting than the usual awesome missionary work! Thank you all for your support of me! Love you!
Elder Holmes
Email - July 24, 2012
Well, we had a few meetings and stuff this week and so I feel like I didn't
get as much done as I would have liked but I did learn some great things at
the meetings and I know that as I implement them into my missionary efforts
that I will be blessed! One thing in particular that I was instructed on by
President Shumway at a meeting for trainers and district leaders was about
how no matter what someone's concern or life situation is, there is always
a story in the Book of Mormon that can address their concern and
specifically pertain to them. It has been really cool as I have been able
to test that promise and implement that principle in my missionary work! It
is totally true and it has definitely reinvigorated my desire to study the
Book of Mormon! In fact, we also received instruction at a zone meeting
yesterday that was largely centered around the Book of Mormon and then we
went as a zone and saw a musical group called SIX perform in Branson. That
is why I am sending this email today instead of yesterday.
Our efforts with investigators seem to be progressing slower than I would
like but I am learning to be patient with them and have a greater
Christ-like love in helping their progression in the gospel. Sister Golden
has been reading the Book of Mormon and is about through 2 Nephi which is
awesome. We go over and see her every so often to encourage and support her
as well as help her with her reading of the scriptures. We have been
working with a part-member family for the past while and we had a really
good discussion on what the Bible teaches about the Book of Mormon. The
conversation ended up with talking about the temple which is really cool
because that is what we had planned on teaching them going into that
lesson. It was a nice build-up to our next lesson about the temple. I'm
hoping to show what makes the Restored Gospel so important and eternal
families is definitely one of those concepts that makes it so.
Saturday our ward celebrated Pioneer Day with an activity at the church. We
had some outdoor water games and some food and stuff. It was really great!
Sister Brandenburg and her two children (investigators) came to the
activity and had a really great time! We also had dinner with her and her
family that evening and had a really great lesson. They are so ready and
willing to be baptized and confirmed, but unfortunately they have some
pesky life situations keeping them from doing so right now. I have faith
that the Lord knows what he is doing and that it will all work out in the
end. Love you all and thank you for your support of me in my service to the Lord!
Elder Holmes
Email - July 30, 2012
We had a few pretty cool experiences this week! The Masters family is moving
away this coming weekend and so we were helping them with their yard sale.
Friday, we were helping them haul stuff from their storage unit over to their
parents' house and we met their friend Steve. He has had contact with
missionaries before and after dinner that night we were able to share a message
with him from the Book of Mormon to help him through some struggles he is going
through right now. He said that he really felt the Spirit and we have a return
appointment to teach him again this week! He is really sincere and loves the
idea of eternal families. The gospel of Christ truly blesses families and so I
really look forward to blessing this man's life! The next day, they had the
actual yard sale and we helped them with that in the morning as well. We decided
to use it as a finding activity and so we talked to a lot of people and actually
set a few copies of the Book of Mormon out on one of the tables. A few people
took some and we got to talk to one family about it (the others took copies
while we were gone) but they weren't really interested. At least we got to sow
some seeds though!
Okay, now for a story about how my mind works. So, we
were out tracting and we came upon a house with a US mail vehicle parked in the
drive way. Missionaries love mail so as we knocked on the door I was going to
explain that to them and thank them for the wonderful service that they render!
haha Unfortunately, nobody answered the door, but I think that would be pretty
hilarious and awesome to teach a mail person.
We had a really great
lesson this week with Sister Brandenburg and her two children. They all three
have a desire to be baptized, but a life situation that is out of their control
is keeping them from doing so. So, we shared a story from the Book of Mormon
about the people of Limhi and how they desired to be baptized but their
situation kept them from doing so as well but because of their faith and desire
the Lord delivered them from bondage and enabled them to make the covenants they
so desired. It is so sweet how applicable the Book of Mormon is to everyone with
whom we come in contact!
I love my Savior and I truly appreciate this
opportunity to serve him! One thing that I have been working on is doing better
to actually work to achieve the goals I set instead of them just being random
numbers that I have to guess at each week. I feel like this will be a skill that
will benefit me my entire life and definitely out here in my service!
Love you!
Elder Holmes
away this coming weekend and so we were helping them with their yard sale.
Friday, we were helping them haul stuff from their storage unit over to their
parents' house and we met their friend Steve. He has had contact with
missionaries before and after dinner that night we were able to share a message
with him from the Book of Mormon to help him through some struggles he is going
through right now. He said that he really felt the Spirit and we have a return
appointment to teach him again this week! He is really sincere and loves the
idea of eternal families. The gospel of Christ truly blesses families and so I
really look forward to blessing this man's life! The next day, they had the
actual yard sale and we helped them with that in the morning as well. We decided
to use it as a finding activity and so we talked to a lot of people and actually
set a few copies of the Book of Mormon out on one of the tables. A few people
took some and we got to talk to one family about it (the others took copies
while we were gone) but they weren't really interested. At least we got to sow
some seeds though!
Okay, now for a story about how my mind works. So, we
were out tracting and we came upon a house with a US mail vehicle parked in the
drive way. Missionaries love mail so as we knocked on the door I was going to
explain that to them and thank them for the wonderful service that they render!
haha Unfortunately, nobody answered the door, but I think that would be pretty
hilarious and awesome to teach a mail person.
We had a really great
lesson this week with Sister Brandenburg and her two children. They all three
have a desire to be baptized, but a life situation that is out of their control
is keeping them from doing so. So, we shared a story from the Book of Mormon
about the people of Limhi and how they desired to be baptized but their
situation kept them from doing so as well but because of their faith and desire
the Lord delivered them from bondage and enabled them to make the covenants they
so desired. It is so sweet how applicable the Book of Mormon is to everyone with
whom we come in contact!
I love my Savior and I truly appreciate this
opportunity to serve him! One thing that I have been working on is doing better
to actually work to achieve the goals I set instead of them just being random
numbers that I have to guess at each week. I feel like this will be a skill that
will benefit me my entire life and definitely out here in my service!
Love you!
Elder Holmes