Elder Sighting 11-28-2013

Text: "Your sons have serious style!"

Elder Sighting 11-26-2013

Just home from getting groceries, a member texted this picture.

Letter 11-26-2013

Transfers are coming up tomorrow - Elder Mintey and I are staying again for a third go at things here in the Bennion East Stake! We're really excited and because of all the work we've done with members we know we'll be able to see a lot of success in the next six weeks.

Berry and Keelin are both super awesome. They caught a bad sickness over the weekend though, and weren't able to come to church on Sunday. They've both been reading the pamphlets and the Book of Mormon we gave to them though and know that everything that is taught is good. They're going to be baptized in December.

We had a mission temple trip on Thursday over to the Jordan River temple. That was awesome as always. Nice to jump out of our little area for a while (and out of the "world") to experience what goes on in the temple. Thursday also continues to be anti-mormon day... so many apostates show up on Thursdays to give us grief. The end of one was, "so what you're saying is, you've rationalized yourself out of feeling the spirit?" "yes."...................some people :|

More funny things... a little more than a week ago we helped this very drunk guy, Steve, unbend his fender after he ran it into a pole and his front tire exploded. We went by his apartment two days later, and after a while answered the door in boxers and slammed the door on us. On Thursday as we were talking with an apostate lady (who happened to be the door next to Steve), Steve randomly came out and asked us all if we wanted some chicken he had just unthawed cuz he wasn't going to be able to eat it all. The next day we saw Steve again and he gave us three referrals, including his native american girlfriend who seems pretty interested and a couple new move ins who have potential.

So yes things are still going good,

Elder Chandler

Elder Sighting 11-25-2013

Email from a Ward Mission Leader in Bennion:  "Elder Chandler and Elder Mintey with their bikes and 4 Calling Birds as part of our filming for our ward party. We assigned each organization one of the phrases from the 12 days of Christmas. The ward mission invited our full time Elders to participate and have fun with us. Unfortunately Elder Mintey had his bike stolen last Saturday. We just received word that these two fine Elders will be remain here in our ward for another 6 weeks. Steve (Johnson)"

Then this report from Grandpa Lewis about spending time with this gentleman the night before: "We had our  annual cabin planning meeting this evening with Wendy’s family, including Bonnie and Steve.  The Elders have eaten at their place at least a couple of times  since last reported and done other things also with them.  I am not quite sure of the meaning in giving the Elders the Calling Birds role.  Bonnie just called as we were traveling home and reported that the Elders had just texted them the message that they had just survived the transfers and would be in their ward for 6 more weeks.  I think this made everyone excited and happy."

Elder Sighting--

A text from a member in Utah who solicited help with Christmas Lights.

Letter 11-19-2013

Weeks are turning more and more into huge roller coasters. At the beginning of my mission, weeks were like Bulgy the Whale. Slow, small, but excited to be on the ride. Now it's like riding the Titan or something. Fast all of the time, tons of helixs and twists and ups and downs!

Example: Eric was going to be baptized on Saturday! We've been working with him for the whole time we've been in the area! All was great, until Saturday morning when he woke up with shingles, he was on doctors orders to not get out of bed, and isn't looking so hot to be baptized this Saturday either. ?!?

Example 2: Barry and Keelin are a couple that have been living together for a very long time. We found them on one of our first days in the area after street contacting a random old lady who said there was a couple living next to her we could try and stop by. Yesterday, we were finally able to have a sit-down discussion about life and they're very interested to learn more tomorrow about how to help their spirituality. And they're willing to be baptized.

Example 3: Christopher Senn comes from a really rough background. Really rough. Even though he's only 12 he's had experiences no -adult- should ever have. Consequently he has some behavior issues. Since we started working with him 3 months ago he has improved in so many leaps and bounds it is awesome! He has a goal to be baptized on December 14th, and he knows what he has to do to get there. He takes one day at a time and is able to put a check each day on his baptism calendar to show that he is making changes that will constitute a "great check in the land" (Alma 15:17).

Oh and we've officially decided Thursdays are "returned missionary anti-mormon" days. They seem to come out of their caves and attack us for some reason on Thursdays. We've also had a lot of Jehovah's Witnesses tracting out our area recently. I feel sorry for them... they always choose the streets that are "former stake pres -> bishop -> former bishop -> stake pres -> former mission pres". haha lucky us and our maps that give us insight into every single home in our areas.

Thank you for all your support!

Elder Chandler

Letter 11-12-2013

That's kind of a cool title this time around... 11/12/13.

This week has been an INSANE flurry of craziness. A week where you know you're doing the right things because things go so bad, then so good, and on and on. Thursday felt like a day and a half. We've found a ton of people to teach though so things are awesome!

On Sunday, Catherine and Eric came to church... but during the opening Catherine passed out into Eric's lap. It was pretty scary, so we moved her over to the couch and had one of the members of the ward that's a nurse come out and help us. She felt so strongly that Eric should be there for sacrament though that she wouldn't go until they had passed the sacrament (which is awesome since he had to be there to be baptized on Saturday). After they both had the sacrament, we carried her in a chair to a car, rode to her apartment, carried her up the stairs to her apartment, and then layed her down. We gave her a blessing and the nurse took care of the other stuff that has to happen, and bishop came. She's still recovering but they're so set on Eric being baptized it's amazing.

Also on Sunday, we had two lessons scheduled at the same time so for the first time on my mission I went on splits! It was so productive. I went with one of our ward mission leaders and taught the first lesson to a 20 year old, Kady, that the ward set up. It was really a powerful presentation. We focused the discussion (if that makes sense, since we still taught the first lesson) on past experiences feeling the Spirit, what it means when you feel the Spirit, and then recognizing the Spirit during the First Vision. It was so powerful, she told us that she knew the church was true! So she'll be baptized coming up as well.

The district also held 5 out of our 6 for this month. It's seriously a miracle what's happening as we focus on our silver bullets as derived from the mission president's handbook and Alma 26:22: faithfulness, obedience, and diligence.

Oh and it was funny to see that family history video with all of the cousins in it right next to Elder Nelson!! 

--Elder Chandler

Elder Sighting 11-01-2013

Text from a Sister Goodman. She said that they took the Elders to eat and then to the Church to play dodge ball. It sure is fun to see a peek into Ryan's pdays.

Letter 11-05-2013

We got our first real sticky snow of this year last night! Every day that there's snow on the ground makes me happy. snow snow snow

We had Elder Arnold of the Seventy speak in our mission on Thursday. It was really inspiring. He talked a lot about where our mission is, and where we are going. We have six missionaries online now doing an hour of facebook contacting a day. Basically they go and teach "finding lessons" where they invite people to write down every single non-member they know (pulling out phone contacts or facebook is ok), then star the ones that 1) are in the missionaries' area; and 2) that they feel inspired they should contact. The missionaries then contact people in their area or facebook contact those outside of their area. Yes, that means they teach people all around the country/world over facebook! I think it's pretty cool anyways. This is just for the Elders covering YSA areas for now in our mission.

Halloween in our mission isn't really any different than any other day. We found a couple potentials, contacted referrals, etc. But we do get a lot of candy while "tracting" :) As a result of Elder Arnold's talk, there seems to be a renewed energy in the mission to get things done. Everyone's faith is high, and where faith is miracles follow, which we're seeing daily.

--Elder Chandler

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We've run into a ton of apostate members lately (not that we don't run into them pretty much every day anyways here in Utah...). More than usual. So it's made me think a lot about how basic and important the knowledge given by the Holy Ghost is in our lives. Almost all of them leave because of "when they are learned they think they are wise".

In one specific case, a returned-missionary-gone-inactive told us that in order to find out the truth we have to "set aside our testimony of the Book of Mormon and look at the other facts for a while". And so I wondered for a while: Is there ever worth in doing that? Could you glean some facets of information that you wouldn't be able to otherwise?

To a mormon-gone-atheist the answer is yes, but to those of us who have felt and recognized the Spirit, there is no need to ever do so. We cannot deny that the Holy Ghost has touched each of our lives, and these experiences serve as a foundation for our testimonies (Matthew 17). This source of knowledge need not be questioned as a "false source of information", for each of us who have felt the influence of the Holy Ghost knows that the knowledge gained therefrom is not to be cast aside.

So just to finish up the story part, we stopped talking to this guy when I told him anti-mormon material was biased. He told me I was biased, to which I agreed. But he then told us that he had no bias, so in order to keep from laughing out loud in front of him Elder Mintey and I said goodbye and left. To have come away with a knowledge, though, that I will never deny, was worth the whole 15 minutes.