Wednesday, December 26, 2012

December 12/10/2012 Letter Home

So this week has been kind of crazy with transfers and stuff because my companion Elder Mingo was ET'ed, emergency transferred, to be a zone leader. I was disappointed about it but you know you roll with the punches. So now I have Elder Thornton. We're getting along so far and I think he's ready to get down to business and work.

Our investigator Kathryn, the only one with the date, is doing awesome. She's went cold turkey with smoking and coffee which is AWESOME!!! We recently had the tithing and fast offerings lesson she did have a concern with it. But she was like there's blessings with it! And we were like YES! So she's progressing quickly and she's so very excited about it as are we.

Paul the other investigator in our area is coming around I believe and this week we're going to try and set a date with him. It's going to be pretty intense lesson but we're committing him to a date! Hopefully the Lord sees our faith and gives Paul a little extra dose of the spirit and he accepts. It's going to be quite exciting but we'll have the story of how that goes next week.

So crazy person of the week we talked to. His name is Al and he came up to us and started talking about UFO's and how they and the crop circles are the signs of the 2nd coming. He was a very interesting black man to say the least. He looked like he was homeless but said he had a radio show called the conversation or something like that he was very interesting person.

I would just like to let you all know I wouldn't want to be anywhere else. Proclaiming the restored gospel of Jesus Christ is the best thing for me to do. Every day I fell my faith growing. Every day I am enlightened by the spirit and everyday this gospel makes more sense to my head and even better my heart. The seed that Alma is referring to in Alma 32 is beginning to swell and it's becoming delicious to my soul. I know the gospel is true it's testified  everyday I go and preach it to them people I meet. I know Joseph Smith is the prophet of the restoration and it was through him the miracle of the gospel blesses our family and others around the world. I love this opportunity I have to be an ambassador of Jesus Christ. I love you all and love hearing from you!

Love
Elder Marvin

Beginning of December Letter

So as of right now I am companionless because Elder Mingo won't get here until Tuesday sometime. So I'm hanging around the zone leaders until then. So I'm excited and stuff for the change because I kind of like a little chance every now and again. So this past week was actually pretty good. Met with Kathryn our investigator and we set a date with her for December 22. She is so EXCITED! On Friday we taught her the word of wisdom and she asked if we could have soft drinks and were like yes we can. Because she thought we couldn't so she didn't buy a Pepsi because she said it'd be a temptation if she wasn't able to. But we assured her we could. It's awesome to see her chance from when we started and where we are now. The gospel truly brings peace to the soul and joy to the heart.

Another awesome experience we had this week were were able to have dinner with Paul and we had little lesson with faith in Alma 32 one of his concerns was why we couldn't see the gold plates. I read through Alma 32 and in verse 21 really stuck out and the words knowledge went BOOM in front of my face, and I felt I needed to say if we had a sure perfect knowledge of the plates it would almost condemn us if we chose not to follow the Saviors council and so that we have a loving Heavenly Father he in his infinite wisdom took them and had us walking by faith rather than sight. Paul then told me you know that has been the best way he's heard it explained. To say the least I'm glad that I was being led by the spirit I love feeling the spirit and I love being a missionary for Jesus Christ. I hope from our lesson with Paul helped him and moved him toward baptism and opened a door to help him feel the spirit. It was an amazing experience!

As well this week it's been raining cats and dogs an elephants. We had a lake in the front of our apartment complex. I got soaked. But it's warm here in California so I was still very warm I didn't freeze. But all is well over here in California the church is true even here so it must be true hahaha! Anyways I'm still in the same place I was at the beginning. Love to hear from you soon!

Love your son, brother, and whatever else you'd like to call me.
Elder Marvin

Some Other week in November

So this week has been pretty good, to say the least. So we were able to meet with our investigator Kathryn and her husband. The lesson was going fairly well when we brang up prophets he then said we told him that God was a man, he then got up and very juvenility and sarcastically said he believes God is a black woman and then left into the other room. Kathryn our awesome investigator said she was sorry for that and told to continue with her and her progression towards baptism. It was very upsetting, for him to do that but he's 65 years old and shouldn't have done that but he did and he has his agency. Turned out to be a great lesson with her as we strived to invite the spirit back into the lesson.

Another fairly cool experience is we were making so less-actives door the wife came to the door and said her husband wasn't home so she couldn't invite us in, but she had a referral for us. She continued to tell us about her neighbors downstairs and how they could benefit from a visit. By this time it was about 8 o'clock so we were like we'll get to it tomorrow. But all in God's timing we felt like we needed to go visit so we ended up going and knocking on the door. They answered and we introduced ourselves and said we were going around offering prayers on people and their homes. He was like sure come right on in, so we offered a prayer and talked for a minute after and he said we could come back and set up an appointment with him and his family. The next night we got a call from the family that referred them and they said they were interested in coming to church! It was awesome! So we're going to try to meet with them and start teaching the family!

This week has been great had zone conference and learned about the churches Christmas campaign. They're going to be advertising like crazy over social media sites the whole nine yards it's going to be a great tool to get people even more curious about the church than they already are. It's going to be a mormon.org/christmas and there's going to be some pretty cool things going on with this Christmas campaign. You need to check it out. As well as make a mormon.org profile to bear your testimony of Christ's restored Gospel as well as answer questions that people have. The work is hastening and Christ's message is of great importance. Anyway the work is continuing forward and I'm glad to be on the front-lines. Love you all! Love hearing from you!!

Love
Elder Marvin