Email - November 1, 2011
On Tuesday the first thing that we did was lock ourselves out of the apartment! It was pretty crazy because we were kind of joking about how if we had enough faith then the door would just be able to unlock itself. Although that didn't happen, after some praying a lady walked by and asked us if we were locked out. When we told her that we were, she informed us that she was the one who had the extra key to our apartment! We were so lucky because we didn't think that there was an extra key so we were contemplating getting a ladder and trying to break into the window. haha That would have been an adventure. Other than that, nothing too exciting happened. We did a lot of going through the GPS and seeing old potential investigators and less-active members because we didn't have any set appointments. On Wednesday we had what we call a Preach My Gospel conference as a zone where we get together and go over different points from PMG in order to improve our teaching skills. It was pretty good and I got to meet the rest of the zone. I found out that Sis. Hawkes, who was in my MTC district, is in my zone so it was good to talk to her and see how she was doing. After that, we went and gave a member of the ward a blessing for some weird, painful bug bites that he had all along his leg. He told us that the day after they stopped hurting. The priesthood is so amazing! I know that it is so real and can really bless lives. The Miner's fed us dinner until we had MCM with our branch mission leader. Actually, he isn't technically called as our ward mission leader, but he is in our ward and he is the member of the high council in charge of missionary work so he has been serving in the capacity as temporary branch mission leader until a long-term one is called. He is awesome and he is super gung-ho about missionary work because he has both a son and a daughter currently serving a mission. The next day we did some service with Brother M helping him clear some brush and trees to make a fence on his property. I wielded the camp axe and the machete, both of which very fun! After that, we went and taught Bro. L. His wife is a less-active member of the church and he is a 7th Day Adventist. He likes to meet with us and to learn, but he is having trouble getting past his concern about what day should be observed as the Sabbath. Hopefully we can work through that with him and help him find the gospel and help his wife be reactivated. That night we went and saw a less-active member, Bro. Lo, in his shop on the Lake Ozark strip by our house. He is a very talented artist and he has a store where he sells his art and does airbrushed tee shirts. He is struggling with quitting chewing tobacco and so we shared an uplifting message to encourage him. On Friday, I went to St. Robert because we went on exchanges with the Zone leaders. They are currently in a "tri-panionship" and so I was there with Elder Syme (one of the zone leaders) and Elder Rieske (the third wheel non-zone leader) and it was pretty fun. They cover Ft. Leonard Wood, a military base and so we saw a couple families in there that they are teaching. We also took a break during the day and went to a thrift store where they found a sweet electronic basketball game like the ones they have at lagoon except smaller. It keeps track of your score and everything! Needless to say, they bought it, took it to their apartment and we played it that night and in the morning before I left. On Saturday we went to the branch's trunk-or-treat party and got free dinner there. (score!) Then, that night we went and saw two of our investigators that I had not yet met, Daniel and Michelle. Also with them was Daniel's daughter Chassidy she is not always with them, but we are teaching her when we can. They are great and they are so ready to be baptized, but they have some complications with pending court charges that they are hoping will be dropped. We keep them in our prayers and I know that they will be baptized someday.On Sunday we went to the Wilson's place like we did last Sunday and we taught Daniel and Michelle, Chassidy, and Jarod there. They live far away, so the Wilson's always drive us there and back. Well, on our way back I was sitting in their large van behind their 12 year-old son, Isaiah. They have new puppies so they had a bucket of dog food in the car. He turned back to me and dared me to eat a piece. Joking around, I told him that I would as long as he ate two first. He totally did it! So, I proceeded to keep up my end of the deal by eating mine (I swallowed it whole like a pill so I didn't have to taste it or anything, otherwise I probably would not have done it.) A few seconds later, I look up to Isaiah puking off to his side, right onto my shoe! It was pretty gross, but luckily we were able to head to the church and my shoes are water proof so they cleaned off easily. Beware! I took a picture of my shoe first Yesterday, we went and helped Bro. Campbell, a former member of the branch who is back in town for a while, put some things in boxes from his old house that he is wanting to take back to Tennessee. After that, we went over to Bro. Miner's house to teach someone who he had invited to meet with us. His name is Tyler and he is Bro. Miner's younger brother's friend and he is a senior in
high school. To our surprise, Tyler had brought his friend Jake and his girlfriend Nicolette! The lesson went really well though and the spirit was strong. All of them agreed to take Moroni's challenge and read the Book of Mormon and ask God if it is true. The Spirit was definitely there in the lesson and we have a return appointment set up with them for next week. Jake even said that we should teach his family and said his mom would like what we shared. Later, we found out that his dad is a deacon in an Assembly of God church here in town! That would be so cool to be able to teach his family. Well, that's about my week! I hope that things are going well back home! I love you all and thank you so much for your love, prayers and support. I know that the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints is Christ's true church restored to the earth. I know that Jesus Christ lives and loves me as well as all of you.
high school. To our surprise, Tyler had brought his friend Jake and his girlfriend Nicolette! The lesson went really well though and the spirit was strong. All of them agreed to take Moroni's challenge and read the Book of Mormon and ask God if it is true. The Spirit was definitely there in the lesson and we have a return appointment set up with them for next week. Jake even said that we should teach his family and said his mom would like what we shared. Later, we found out that his dad is a deacon in an Assembly of God church here in town! That would be so cool to be able to teach his family. Well, that's about my week! I hope that things are going well back home! I love you all and thank you so much for your love, prayers and support. I know that the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints is Christ's true church restored to the earth. I know that Jesus Christ lives and loves me as well as all of you.
Email - November 7, 2011
Wednesday was a pretty exciting day. We drove to District Meeting in the morning and it was Elder Nordine's first time as a district leader. He did a really good job though, we went over helping members prepare and qualify for baptism. After that, we had an appointment fall through, so we went and stopped by a few old potentials and unknown members from the GPS. We went and taught Maria, a recent convert, and when we got done and looked at our car, we discovered one of the tires was
flat! So, we put on a spare (which was a little tire that looked like it came from a wheel-barrow) and drove down the highway, at half-speed with our hazards on, to the nearest place to get it fixed. After stopping by a couple places that didn't have the right size tire, we finally found a car dealership that had what we needed. Then, we went to MCM with Bro. Alexander and taught Drake and Loren who are children of two active parents, but they are from a previous marriage and they barely got permission for them to be baptized. He is 12 and she is 9, so they are both technically converts. Of course, they already knew everything so we didn't have to do too much teaching, mostly just review. Friday, we were able to finally teach the Hildenbrands. Or, at least, Sis. Hildenbrand. She is a fairly recent convert to the church and her husband is not a member. We want to start teaching him, but he seems to avoid us.
Hopefully we can get him to open up and truly investigate the church. Then, we went with the Elder's Quorum president and Bro. Miner to help a lady move in. Well, when we got to the house that she was supposed to move into it was completely uninhabitable. We found out that it was infested with fleas and the store was house was filled with piles of feces and old clothes. Apparently, the
previous inhabitants had just abandoned it and it had been sitting there for a few months, wallowing in its own filth. Luckily for her, she had not signed any papers or paid for the house, so she didn't have to mess with that legal stuff. We were able to help her find a friend to stay with and a storage unit in which she could store all of her things. Saturday, we did a lot of driving. We drove clear up to the northern edge of our area (and the mission) to contact an old media referral. We put shortest route as the priority in the GPS because we are limited on the amount of miles we can drive each month, and it took us on some pretty sketchy dirt roads. There were definitely a few moments I was clenching and hoping that we didn't destroy the bottom of the car. We had dinner with Bro. McWhinnie and saw taught a less-active member about the Atonement using Alma 7, which is one of my favorites about that subject. On Sunday we went to church and did a whole lot of stopping by people who weren't home or cleaning up records of people who were not interested. Nothing too interesting. As always, I thank you all for your love and support! I know that Jesus Christ is the Savior and Redeemer of the whole world and me personally. Love, Elder Holmes
flat! So, we put on a spare (which was a little tire that looked like it came from a wheel-barrow) and drove down the highway, at half-speed with our hazards on, to the nearest place to get it fixed. After stopping by a couple places that didn't have the right size tire, we finally found a car dealership that had what we needed. Then, we went to MCM with Bro. Alexander and taught Drake and Loren who are children of two active parents, but they are from a previous marriage and they barely got permission for them to be baptized. He is 12 and she is 9, so they are both technically converts. Of course, they already knew everything so we didn't have to do too much teaching, mostly just review. Friday, we were able to finally teach the Hildenbrands. Or, at least, Sis. Hildenbrand. She is a fairly recent convert to the church and her husband is not a member. We want to start teaching him, but he seems to avoid us.
Hopefully we can get him to open up and truly investigate the church. Then, we went with the Elder's Quorum president and Bro. Miner to help a lady move in. Well, when we got to the house that she was supposed to move into it was completely uninhabitable. We found out that it was infested with fleas and the store was house was filled with piles of feces and old clothes. Apparently, the
previous inhabitants had just abandoned it and it had been sitting there for a few months, wallowing in its own filth. Luckily for her, she had not signed any papers or paid for the house, so she didn't have to mess with that legal stuff. We were able to help her find a friend to stay with and a storage unit in which she could store all of her things. Saturday, we did a lot of driving. We drove clear up to the northern edge of our area (and the mission) to contact an old media referral. We put shortest route as the priority in the GPS because we are limited on the amount of miles we can drive each month, and it took us on some pretty sketchy dirt roads. There were definitely a few moments I was clenching and hoping that we didn't destroy the bottom of the car. We had dinner with Bro. McWhinnie and saw taught a less-active member about the Atonement using Alma 7, which is one of my favorites about that subject. On Sunday we went to church and did a whole lot of stopping by people who weren't home or cleaning up records of people who were not interested. Nothing too interesting. As always, I thank you all for your love and support! I know that Jesus Christ is the Savior and Redeemer of the whole world and me personally. Love, Elder Holmes
Email - November 15, 2011
On Tuesday, Elder Rich and I cleaned up the apartment in the morning. There was an old metal track for a sliding glass door that was
still on our shower even though our shower now only uses a curtain. So, we decided to take that track off, scrape off all of the caulking and throw the old track away. It's nice to have a companion that likes to have a clean organized apartment and he says that I'm about the only companion he has had who is the same way and does stuff like cleaning the fridge. It's funny how missionary apartments are so boring that we resort to finding cleaning/repair projects in the apartment to keep us company. That afternoon, we taught two of our investigators named Daniel and Michelle about the Holy Ghost and how it works and helps us in our lives. The place that we met to teach them was in a Taco Bell! The reason we did so was because are actually homeless and so they move around staying with different friends of theirs until they can get back on their feet. The weather was a bit chilly that day and so we couldn't meet them outside like we normally would have done. The Monday before this one, we had had a pretty sweet lesson with some teenagers. Tyler, his girlfriend Nicolette, and his friend Jake. We taught them again and we found out that Nicolette's father had banned her from meeting with us and that Jake couldn't make it. Hopefully we can still meet with Jake in the future but our lesson on the Plan of Salvation lesson with Tyler went really well and he is really feeling the spirit in his life. Then, that night we taught Drake and Loren who are going to be baptized on the 26th of November. We also went over the Plan of Salvation with them and they were interviewed for baptism by the District Leader, Elder Nordine. The 9th we had Zone Conference an hour away in St. Robert. We
learned about and discussed, among other things, making sure that investigators understand the importance of the Book of Mormon and making sure that they really understand the storyline of what is actually in the Book of Mormon. Also, we talked about making sure that our investigators are comfortable with prayer and that they understand that it is a two-way communication with our
Heavenly Father. We played a game that tested how well each of us knew our companions. Certain companionships from the zone were chosen and Elder Rich and I were one of them. They would send one of us out of the room and ask the other one questions and had them determine the answer that their companion would give, then after that round the other companion did the same thing. Elder Rich and I were tied for first place with one other companionship at the end and the tie breaker was just picking a number between one and ten and we lost that. We should have won though! That day, they also put these baby-sitter things in our cars. It is called a tiwipro and it monitors acceleration, speed, location, whether or not our seatbelts are on, and it can also be used like a phone I think someone, probably President, to talk to us in our car to tell us to slow down or whatever. Thursday we went and did more brush clearing with Bro. Miner. We were clearing around an old abandoned house on their property and one time when I was going in the house I hit my head really hard on the front porch that was partially collapsed. I had a pretty good bump and I found out that it was scabbed over, so it must have started to bleed. haha Good times. After service, we went home and cleaned up before an appointment that night with Sis. Sapp. The missionaries had not had an actually sit-down lesson with her for at least a couple months and so it was really good to be able to do that with her. Bro. Miner came with us and we discussed the Plan of Salvation and also ended up talking about temple work and Celestial Marriage. Brother Miner bore powerful testimony and the spirit was really strong in the lesson. I hope and pray that she will be able to progress and receive the blessings of the temple for her and her family.
Friday we had a sweet lesson on the storyline of the Book of Mormon and it was very spiritual. At the end of the lesson she told us that she wanted to start paying tithing, even though that was something that we hadn't even taught her about! It was pretty crazy haha I've never had something like that happen before. Saturday Elder Rich and I were both not feeling well, so we stayed in all day.
Missionary apartments, as I have mentioned before, are pretty dang boring. haha I was able to write some letters to some people though so that was good. It was kind of ironic that I got sick the day after receiving this month's care package of medicine and such! I think that my family cursed me! haha Or it was just good luck that they sent it to me at that time. I'm not sure yet which it is. Well, I'm running out of time. I thank everyone for their love and support! I hope all is well back home. I'm doing great out here so don't worry about me. I'm being taken care of. Love, Elder Holmes
still on our shower even though our shower now only uses a curtain. So, we decided to take that track off, scrape off all of the caulking and throw the old track away. It's nice to have a companion that likes to have a clean organized apartment and he says that I'm about the only companion he has had who is the same way and does stuff like cleaning the fridge. It's funny how missionary apartments are so boring that we resort to finding cleaning/repair projects in the apartment to keep us company. That afternoon, we taught two of our investigators named Daniel and Michelle about the Holy Ghost and how it works and helps us in our lives. The place that we met to teach them was in a Taco Bell! The reason we did so was because are actually homeless and so they move around staying with different friends of theirs until they can get back on their feet. The weather was a bit chilly that day and so we couldn't meet them outside like we normally would have done. The Monday before this one, we had had a pretty sweet lesson with some teenagers. Tyler, his girlfriend Nicolette, and his friend Jake. We taught them again and we found out that Nicolette's father had banned her from meeting with us and that Jake couldn't make it. Hopefully we can still meet with Jake in the future but our lesson on the Plan of Salvation lesson with Tyler went really well and he is really feeling the spirit in his life. Then, that night we taught Drake and Loren who are going to be baptized on the 26th of November. We also went over the Plan of Salvation with them and they were interviewed for baptism by the District Leader, Elder Nordine. The 9th we had Zone Conference an hour away in St. Robert. We
learned about and discussed, among other things, making sure that investigators understand the importance of the Book of Mormon and making sure that they really understand the storyline of what is actually in the Book of Mormon. Also, we talked about making sure that our investigators are comfortable with prayer and that they understand that it is a two-way communication with our
Heavenly Father. We played a game that tested how well each of us knew our companions. Certain companionships from the zone were chosen and Elder Rich and I were one of them. They would send one of us out of the room and ask the other one questions and had them determine the answer that their companion would give, then after that round the other companion did the same thing. Elder Rich and I were tied for first place with one other companionship at the end and the tie breaker was just picking a number between one and ten and we lost that. We should have won though! That day, they also put these baby-sitter things in our cars. It is called a tiwipro and it monitors acceleration, speed, location, whether or not our seatbelts are on, and it can also be used like a phone I think someone, probably President, to talk to us in our car to tell us to slow down or whatever. Thursday we went and did more brush clearing with Bro. Miner. We were clearing around an old abandoned house on their property and one time when I was going in the house I hit my head really hard on the front porch that was partially collapsed. I had a pretty good bump and I found out that it was scabbed over, so it must have started to bleed. haha Good times. After service, we went home and cleaned up before an appointment that night with Sis. Sapp. The missionaries had not had an actually sit-down lesson with her for at least a couple months and so it was really good to be able to do that with her. Bro. Miner came with us and we discussed the Plan of Salvation and also ended up talking about temple work and Celestial Marriage. Brother Miner bore powerful testimony and the spirit was really strong in the lesson. I hope and pray that she will be able to progress and receive the blessings of the temple for her and her family.
Friday we had a sweet lesson on the storyline of the Book of Mormon and it was very spiritual. At the end of the lesson she told us that she wanted to start paying tithing, even though that was something that we hadn't even taught her about! It was pretty crazy haha I've never had something like that happen before. Saturday Elder Rich and I were both not feeling well, so we stayed in all day.
Missionary apartments, as I have mentioned before, are pretty dang boring. haha I was able to write some letters to some people though so that was good. It was kind of ironic that I got sick the day after receiving this month's care package of medicine and such! I think that my family cursed me! haha Or it was just good luck that they sent it to me at that time. I'm not sure yet which it is. Well, I'm running out of time. I thank everyone for their love and support! I hope all is well back home. I'm doing great out here so don't worry about me. I'm being taken care of. Love, Elder Holmes
Email - November 21, 2011
We had a zone outing that took all day last Monday, so we had to do some of our Preparation Day stuff on Tuesday. (as I'm sure you noticed from my email being sent on Tuesday instead) Later on that evening, we stopped by a couple people to set up appointments with them, Grace (an investigator) and Kevie (a borderline less-active member we are working with) and we talked to them for a while. Then, we went over to the Miner's for Elder Rich's Birthday dinner! Elder Rich turned 21 and so he was able to go and buy the alcohol for the party and bring it back to their house. (haha totally kidding) We had home made chicken cordon bleu for dinner and it was really good! Then for dessert we had Neapolitan cheese cake! that was pretty interesting but, as with almost all
cheesecake, it was delicious! On Wednesday we had exchanges with the district leader and his companion. I went to Osage Beach with Elder Nordine, the district leader and Elder Rich stayed in Eldon with Elder Jensen. They met us here in Eldon for the switch and for a few hours that morning/afternoon we did some service for Bro. Miner. Once again, we were clearing brush for him on
their property, this time it was around the fence line so that they could make some repairs on the fence. After that, we headed to Osage Beach, cleaned up and went to dinner. Our dinner was with an older man who lives in a retirement home. It was a Thanksgiving potluck dinner so we ate with some of the other residents there. There were a lot of older ladies just laughing the whole time haha it was pretty entertaining, and dinner was pretty good! Unfortunately for him, the appointments that Elder Nordine had made all fell through so, after visiting a couple of people, we headed in a bit early so that he could prepare for district meeting with the assistants the next day. District meeting on Thursday was the first in a series of instruction on the LDS Addiction
Recovery Program. It is basically the 12 steps of AA, but put into a more spiritual light and is more focused on the Atonement of Jesus Christ. We went over the introduction and the first step which is basically honesty, or admitting that we have put ourselves in a position where only Christ can help us change. It is a really great program and I know that studying it will help those I teach and myself as well. We also helped Bro. McWhinnie move around some washers and dryers. He was replacing the ones in his house with some new ones so we were the muscle to help him do that. The next day, we went and took the old washer and took it to a less-active lady's house because she needed one. She wasn't very interested in coming back to church, but we are showing her that our hands are outstretched, ready to accept her back and sometimes that is all that you can do. We were told by our vehicle coordinator, Elder Bond, that we needed to replace one of the tires on our car. So, we went around looking for anybody who had one. Apparently, 215 55 17 is a bad size of tire to have because nobody had any! I asked so many places that I even have the size of the tire memorized. haha Guess we'll just keep looking. We picked up Ronnie (an 18 year-old priest in the ward preparing for a mission) up from
school after school and took him to see and teach Sis. Hildenbrand, a recent convert, and Bro. and Sis. Reed, a less active couple. Ronnie is a really awesome kid. He is the only one in his family who is active in the church but we can always count on him and he is a really strong member. He even took us out to dinner after our appointments which always earns brownie points with missionaries
Lightning struck again on Saturday when we woke up and found out that Elder Rich was sick again! haha Something about saturdays doesn't work well with his immune system I guess. So, I did a whole lot of nothing all day basically. Good times... haha
Hopefully our illnesses are all behind us now! We went to church a couple hours early for meetings. WARNING: this next part will probably make mom have a heart attack. The meeting got out in time for me to... go to choir practice! That's right, I decided to lend a hand to the branch choir haha Sis. Miner is the director and I know that she was glad to have my help. We didn't have any adult-age investigators in church on Sunday, so we didn't have a Gospel Principles class. Instead we went to the other Sunday School class and
had a really nice lesson on God's love and the scripture "God is love." After church, the branch had a "linger longer" which was their Thanksgiving get together. Of course, we jumped all over that because it was free food! haha It was pretty good. After that we went by a lot of people who weren't home. We were stopping by the few who were left of the old potential investigators and at one of them we found out they had moved, but met a man named Aaron who was moving in and said that once he gets more settled in that he wouldn't mind us coming by. I hope that he is able to start investigating. What was cool was that while we were visiting other places, I felt like we should go there. I know that it was the Spirit telling me that we needed to. Something that I forgot to mention last week was that President Koeppen, the branch president, asked me to speak on December 18th and the topic that he gave me is Christ's
Atonement. Quite the subject! I hope that I will be able to come close to doing it justice. I love you all and thank you for your love, prayers and support. It truly helps! I love being a missionary and this Thanksgiving I am so grateful for my opportunity to serve and for my Savior's love. Speaking of Thanksgiving, we had a few members invite us over, so don't worry about me getting fed! I'll probably get fed too much. haha Love you! Elder Holmes
cheesecake, it was delicious! On Wednesday we had exchanges with the district leader and his companion. I went to Osage Beach with Elder Nordine, the district leader and Elder Rich stayed in Eldon with Elder Jensen. They met us here in Eldon for the switch and for a few hours that morning/afternoon we did some service for Bro. Miner. Once again, we were clearing brush for him on
their property, this time it was around the fence line so that they could make some repairs on the fence. After that, we headed to Osage Beach, cleaned up and went to dinner. Our dinner was with an older man who lives in a retirement home. It was a Thanksgiving potluck dinner so we ate with some of the other residents there. There were a lot of older ladies just laughing the whole time haha it was pretty entertaining, and dinner was pretty good! Unfortunately for him, the appointments that Elder Nordine had made all fell through so, after visiting a couple of people, we headed in a bit early so that he could prepare for district meeting with the assistants the next day. District meeting on Thursday was the first in a series of instruction on the LDS Addiction
Recovery Program. It is basically the 12 steps of AA, but put into a more spiritual light and is more focused on the Atonement of Jesus Christ. We went over the introduction and the first step which is basically honesty, or admitting that we have put ourselves in a position where only Christ can help us change. It is a really great program and I know that studying it will help those I teach and myself as well. We also helped Bro. McWhinnie move around some washers and dryers. He was replacing the ones in his house with some new ones so we were the muscle to help him do that. The next day, we went and took the old washer and took it to a less-active lady's house because she needed one. She wasn't very interested in coming back to church, but we are showing her that our hands are outstretched, ready to accept her back and sometimes that is all that you can do. We were told by our vehicle coordinator, Elder Bond, that we needed to replace one of the tires on our car. So, we went around looking for anybody who had one. Apparently, 215 55 17 is a bad size of tire to have because nobody had any! I asked so many places that I even have the size of the tire memorized. haha Guess we'll just keep looking. We picked up Ronnie (an 18 year-old priest in the ward preparing for a mission) up from
school after school and took him to see and teach Sis. Hildenbrand, a recent convert, and Bro. and Sis. Reed, a less active couple. Ronnie is a really awesome kid. He is the only one in his family who is active in the church but we can always count on him and he is a really strong member. He even took us out to dinner after our appointments which always earns brownie points with missionaries
Lightning struck again on Saturday when we woke up and found out that Elder Rich was sick again! haha Something about saturdays doesn't work well with his immune system I guess. So, I did a whole lot of nothing all day basically. Good times... haha
Hopefully our illnesses are all behind us now! We went to church a couple hours early for meetings. WARNING: this next part will probably make mom have a heart attack. The meeting got out in time for me to... go to choir practice! That's right, I decided to lend a hand to the branch choir haha Sis. Miner is the director and I know that she was glad to have my help. We didn't have any adult-age investigators in church on Sunday, so we didn't have a Gospel Principles class. Instead we went to the other Sunday School class and
had a really nice lesson on God's love and the scripture "God is love." After church, the branch had a "linger longer" which was their Thanksgiving get together. Of course, we jumped all over that because it was free food! haha It was pretty good. After that we went by a lot of people who weren't home. We were stopping by the few who were left of the old potential investigators and at one of them we found out they had moved, but met a man named Aaron who was moving in and said that once he gets more settled in that he wouldn't mind us coming by. I hope that he is able to start investigating. What was cool was that while we were visiting other places, I felt like we should go there. I know that it was the Spirit telling me that we needed to. Something that I forgot to mention last week was that President Koeppen, the branch president, asked me to speak on December 18th and the topic that he gave me is Christ's
Atonement. Quite the subject! I hope that I will be able to come close to doing it justice. I love you all and thank you for your love, prayers and support. It truly helps! I love being a missionary and this Thanksgiving I am so grateful for my opportunity to serve and for my Savior's love. Speaking of Thanksgiving, we had a few members invite us over, so don't worry about me getting fed! I'll probably get fed too much. haha Love you! Elder Holmes
Email - November 28, 2011
Tuesday morning, as we do weekly, we went and did some service for Bro. Miner. He was hoping to be able to use the chainsaw for cutting firewood but we found out that the new chain he had bought was the wrong size. So, we spent part of our service time driving around and looking for the right sized chain, to no avail. So, we just ended up doing what we often do which is clearing brush.
After that we had lunch and cleaned up before going into Eldon and seeing a few people. Later that night, we went back to the miner's for dinner. One of our investigators, Tyler, was there hanging out with Dallen (Tyler's friend and Bro. Miner's youngest brother) and so we got to spend some time with him which was good. He is 17 and we found out that his mother doesn't want to allow him to be baptized, but he has a strong testimony and says that he will just wait until he turns 18 in February to be baptized. The next day, we had a district meeting at which I had been asked to give a 20 minute presentation on chapter 6 of PMG which is the chapter on Christ-like attributes. What I spoke on was that the first attribute, Faith in Jesus Christ, is really what we are
working on when we choose to work on any other attributes and vice-versa. I managed to easily fill the time with some left over which is something I was concerned about before the fact. After district meeting, I stayed in Osage Beach with Elder Jensen for an exchange. I watched a presentation that they had about DNA evidence of the Book of Mormon which was pretty sweet! Thursday was Thanksgiving! Elder Rich picked me up from Osage Beach at about 6 am so that we could drive to St. Robert and play with the Zone Leaders in their ward's turkey bowl. Of course, it was just like any other. An hour and a half of the old guys cheating, of sliding around on a muddy football field, and of the old guys winning. haha Good times. After that, we went and picked up our zone t-shirts that the Zone Leaders ordered and we hung out with them for a while. Then, we went home, cleaned up, and headed to the Wilson's
for our first Thanksgiving dinner. After eating, we played some games with the kids for a while, kickball, 500, and such, but the most exciting moment there was when I got attacked by a bull! I think it was really just a cow with horns, but they called it a bull and it got out of it's enclosure. So, we were helping Bro. Wilson try and herd it back to where it belonged. It took me head on and it even got it's horns up under my shirt at one point. haha It was pretty extreme but we showed that bull who was boss! haha After we were done there, we went to see another family, the Schofields. We ate there again and hung out with their family. We played a game they called peanuts (aka nertz apparently) and it was pretty fun. It was like multiplayer, free-for-all solitaire. While playing that game, their son-in-law broke the chandelier above their kitchen table. haha When you win, you yell "peanuts" and he had been doing pretty
poorly the whole time. So, when he finally got it, he got really excited and when he yelled, he stood up and flung up his arms. Unfortunately, he shattered half of the light bulbs and all of their glass covers. The family was really cool about it though and they were just saying how they hated that particular light fixture anyway. Needless to say, the game ended right there and I'm pretty sure that I won. On Friday, we had a baptism! Drake and Loren were able to be baptized and their father performed the ordinance. The
only part I had in the program was that I actually made the program. haha the copier at the church was black and white and so it looked pretty ghetto, but that's okay. Also today I received the copy of The Action Bible that Brittany sent me! It is a graphic novel version of the Bible and it is way awesome! hahaSomething else cool that happened this week was that Tyler not only
came to church, but he also came to choir practice and sang with us in sacrament meeting! haha He is so cool. What is really sweet is that when we began teaching Tyler, Dallen was struggling a bit with his testimony but through his whole experience he has really warmed up to church and is doing really well. It's so great to see people's lives change like that. That is why I'm out here and I just love being able to see that change. I know that through Christ's Atoning sacrifice we can all come closer to Him and our Heavenly
Father.
After that we had lunch and cleaned up before going into Eldon and seeing a few people. Later that night, we went back to the miner's for dinner. One of our investigators, Tyler, was there hanging out with Dallen (Tyler's friend and Bro. Miner's youngest brother) and so we got to spend some time with him which was good. He is 17 and we found out that his mother doesn't want to allow him to be baptized, but he has a strong testimony and says that he will just wait until he turns 18 in February to be baptized. The next day, we had a district meeting at which I had been asked to give a 20 minute presentation on chapter 6 of PMG which is the chapter on Christ-like attributes. What I spoke on was that the first attribute, Faith in Jesus Christ, is really what we are
working on when we choose to work on any other attributes and vice-versa. I managed to easily fill the time with some left over which is something I was concerned about before the fact. After district meeting, I stayed in Osage Beach with Elder Jensen for an exchange. I watched a presentation that they had about DNA evidence of the Book of Mormon which was pretty sweet! Thursday was Thanksgiving! Elder Rich picked me up from Osage Beach at about 6 am so that we could drive to St. Robert and play with the Zone Leaders in their ward's turkey bowl. Of course, it was just like any other. An hour and a half of the old guys cheating, of sliding around on a muddy football field, and of the old guys winning. haha Good times. After that, we went and picked up our zone t-shirts that the Zone Leaders ordered and we hung out with them for a while. Then, we went home, cleaned up, and headed to the Wilson's
for our first Thanksgiving dinner. After eating, we played some games with the kids for a while, kickball, 500, and such, but the most exciting moment there was when I got attacked by a bull! I think it was really just a cow with horns, but they called it a bull and it got out of it's enclosure. So, we were helping Bro. Wilson try and herd it back to where it belonged. It took me head on and it even got it's horns up under my shirt at one point. haha It was pretty extreme but we showed that bull who was boss! haha After we were done there, we went to see another family, the Schofields. We ate there again and hung out with their family. We played a game they called peanuts (aka nertz apparently) and it was pretty fun. It was like multiplayer, free-for-all solitaire. While playing that game, their son-in-law broke the chandelier above their kitchen table. haha When you win, you yell "peanuts" and he had been doing pretty
poorly the whole time. So, when he finally got it, he got really excited and when he yelled, he stood up and flung up his arms. Unfortunately, he shattered half of the light bulbs and all of their glass covers. The family was really cool about it though and they were just saying how they hated that particular light fixture anyway. Needless to say, the game ended right there and I'm pretty sure that I won. On Friday, we had a baptism! Drake and Loren were able to be baptized and their father performed the ordinance. The
only part I had in the program was that I actually made the program. haha the copier at the church was black and white and so it looked pretty ghetto, but that's okay. Also today I received the copy of The Action Bible that Brittany sent me! It is a graphic novel version of the Bible and it is way awesome! hahaSomething else cool that happened this week was that Tyler not only
came to church, but he also came to choir practice and sang with us in sacrament meeting! haha He is so cool. What is really sweet is that when we began teaching Tyler, Dallen was struggling a bit with his testimony but through his whole experience he has really warmed up to church and is doing really well. It's so great to see people's lives change like that. That is why I'm out here and I just love being able to see that change. I know that through Christ's Atoning sacrifice we can all come closer to Him and our Heavenly
Father.