Fun Facts: My bike got ran over this week

Onto the week!

   Tuesday Morning is when I learned that I was going to be transferred to Syracuse. Honestly, I was not excited at all. I had progressed a lot in Roy West, I loved the people, I loved my companion, I finally got to know the area. Just picked up 2 new investigators the night before. Now I go to a new area and leave all that behind and start up new. We went bowling later that day and my new companion was there, Elder Simpson, so I went up to him and brightly exclaimed, "I'm your new companion!" He looked puzzled for a sec, looked at my name tag and then went, "OHHH, Sweet!" Then we hugged and fireworks went off, and rainbows appeared, and confetti came falling down from the heavens. First impression of him was that he was a pretty chill dude, I got to know that he has only been out for 6 months. So we were both fairly new, and this was his 2nd area as well.

After bowling, I had to go and pack up all my stuff, while Elder Berg cracked jokes about him staying and me leaving... Meanie! Then in the evening, I made all my rounds to say goodbye to everybody. Everyone was really surprised, including me lol.

   Wednesday: Transfer Day! Oh man, I don't like transfers, we went to the transfer point, and waited there for about 40 min for Elder Simpson to finally show up, because they got lost. Then we were going to ride back to Syracuse in their car, because they did have a car in the Syracuse area for us, however, at the transfer point, they gave it to some other Elders. So we had to cal someone up, and it took them 1 1/2 hours to get here. So we just sat there pretty much waiting.

We finally got to our area, and were able to work. I learned that we don't have anyone set for a baptism date, (Which is really not good, you should always have at least 1) and we had no lesson set for the day... Oh man, I did not like that at all, I just came from an area where we were doing about an average of 5 lessons a day. On top of it all, Elder Simpson did not have an inch of enthusiasm, he looked down when he walked, he talked like he was bored. And he didn't have a really good idea on what we should be doing. I was missing Roy very much to say the least. He asked me my thoughts on the area when near the end of the day, and I kinda unloaded all my thoughts, nevertheless, that offended him that I felt like he had no drive. So one thing lead to another and we practically hated each other. Yay!

Also, we were not fed on thsi day because we had nobody to schedule our dinners

   Thursday: We had our studies in the morning, and during companion study we did Companionship inventory, and thus we were able to clear the air, and we didn't hate each other anymore. His drive significantly improved, and was a lot more optimistic. He must have just had a bad day on Wednesday. We had Zone Study, I got to meet out ZLs, whom are super cool! And our DLs... not so cool, he is really inappropriate, makes vulgar comments all the time, and brings up not very virtuous things. I am supposed to go on exchanges with him this week, and I don't know how I am going to tell my "Superior" that he needs to change his ways to be more like Christ.

No dinner again.

   Friday: I don't even know what happened on Friday. Taught some lessons and stuff. No scheduled dinner, but a member that we just walked in the house fed us :) 

   Saturday: Taught some lessons and stuff. I finally got the dinner schedule up and running so now we have dinners!

   Sunday: Lots and Lots of meetings... then some lessons and stuff.

   Monday: Today was a very good day! We had 6 lessons, just today, we got a lot of refferals and a lot of return appointments too.

Overall, my relationship with Elder Simpson, has most definitely been a roller coaster ride. He is a good teacher (except, he says some things that I would consider to be really, really offensive)  though, he wants to improve the area. Has a drive to do the work.

He does not like to plan... at all. Random days he is super tired, because he hardly eats anything, some days he eats a bag of popcorn and that is really it. I've told him he needs to eat more. Those days, he is just a complete bum. 

He is really impressed with how well of a missionary I am, he is constantly giving me compliments on what I do well, and also gives me ways that I can improve. he thinks I will be in a leadership position shortly. Like in 2 transfers or something.

So this transfer has been really difficult, however, it gives me a lot of experience, and I will be able to build up this area's work. Though I do miss Roy West a lot, and Elder Berg. But the Lord gives me these trails that I can grow from them.

Fun Facts:

-My bike got ran over this week.... bent up the wheel pretty bad. Member is fixing it for me :)

- A jogger running by yelled, "2 Nephi 32: 4" ( I was just like, "Only in Utah")

- There are two small streets in this area that both have 2 Bishops on each of them.

-The stake I cover, has 8 wards

- Our Landlord (Sis. Seigwick) Is quilting me a quilt! :)

Love,

Elder Wrathall

 

That baptism was so strong with the spirit

That is awesome week for you! I'm glad you had a good one, I had a pretty good one as well! That is pretty interesting visit with that guy. I have ran into a few people that don't believe in God, and it is pretty dang hopeless, all we can do is hope they become more humble. Concerning sending me packages, you can send them to my house, the only reason they don't want you to do that is if I get transferred, then it will go to the wrong place, so just don't send packages when it is coming close to a transfer. Speaking of which, I’m being transferred to Syracuse! Crazy!! Nobody gets transferred when they are being trained! Our trainers are considered our "Dad" so I will have two Dads.

 So from down on, I wrote during the week.

This was such a crazy week! So different!
Well I'm going to start with Saturday, because it is the one most in my mind. Anyways, we had a baptism with Tim. His family was less active before we started teaching him, but we got his father to be worthy for him to baptize him. That baptism was soo strong with the spirit. Again, we taught the Restoration to everyone there while Tim and his Dad were getting changed. It is such a great message and the spirit is so much stronger right after the baptism. So later that night, we had a lesson with Braxton, who's bulldog's name is "Ugly". The lesson went really great, we got to know him a lot better. But throughout the whole lesson, Ugly was wobbling to each one of us to pet her haha. It was really funny.

After that lesson, we went to a Ward activity, they had a ton of food, but I was already full. However, they did have frog-eyed-salad, so I did have to have some of that! But at the Ward activity I was called up to play in family feud. One of the questions was, "What do dentist put in your mouth?" I said toothbrush and got it wrong! Like what? Bridges and fingers were answers but not toothbrush?

Later that night we went and visited a Ward Missionary, when they answered the door, they said their dog was having puppies at the moment, and something was going wrong with it. Luckily The Lord guided us there because Elder Berg's Dad is a vet, so we had them call him up for help. Elder Berg was so excited that, that had happened!

Sunday:
Gave two talks over the Plan of Salvation. We were told about one of the talks on Saturday. The topic was the same for me, but not for Berg. They went pretty well though, I think I have gotten a lot better at public speaking already. I gave a 17 min talk.

Had a lesson with Jesus, he is 17 and his parents are Catholic. Jesus has come to gain a testimony of everything about our gospel, however his parents haven't really known that he has been meeting with us and going to church. He has been going to church and meeting with us through his girlfriend Kelsey. He is an awesome guy, and I know he is doing it for the right reasons and not just because his girlfriend is Mormon. We talked with him today about how he told his mom, and his mom is approving, now he just has to talk with his stricter Dad.

Went on Splits in the evening, and I gave the smoothest lesson so far with some less actives named Sam and Jessica Carter. 'Twas a big stepping stone for me.

Did a door approach where when I asked him (He is a less active) if he prays, he responded, "Well that's a rather personal question..." I've never had anyone else say that, nobody really gets offended by that question. After he said that, he continued saying, "If I have a change of heart I'll let you know." As he was slowly closing the door. He seemed like a normal guy. But was just a strange door contact lol.

Friday We played racket ball with a member, who completely owned us. That game is hard! I was dead tired at the end of it. We had lesson with the Jessens, they are a family that Margo, the mom is like 40, but she literally looks like she is 20, it is crazy. She has 7 kids, who are all super cool. Each one has his/her own handshake, and it is impossible to remember them all. I'll have to make sure that I get a picture with them next time.

Thursday, nothing really exciting happened, but we had breakfast for dinner. Word has gotten out that Elder Berg and I love breakfast for dinner. So we get waffles like 2 times every week. I really wish they would make French toast though :( Almost every night we were double booked in lessons, we had 26 lessons this week, which I'm pretty sure is a record for the zone by a long shot. We did splits almost every night.
Wednesday, again, not much different, or I don't remember lol. I had a lesson with Pam, she is a Recent Convert, and we are trying to get her to go do baptisms for the dead with us. But lately she has been struggling with the Word of Wisdom. Sad :(

Tuesday, our P-day! One of our Elders in the zone left today (when you're reading this today) So on his last full p-day we threw him a BBQ party, and we played Rugby too! It was really fun, however, it would have been more fun if we knew what we we're doing better lol. I wanted to eat lunch at Zaxby’s, but Elder Berg didn't want to, so I didn't think about it much, but later at the BBQ, Casey Clark told me he went to Zaxbys and say Patrick Rhodes there! I was soo sad! Apparently Patrick was visiting up here before he went into the MTC the next day!

Yesterday, it started off as a pretty terrible day, it was super windy and cold, and we had bike place to place, and we did some tracting. When they opened the door, I had a hard time speaking because my mouth was like frozen. I was having a pretty terrible day. Elder Berg went to Leadership training, so Elder Andrus was my companion. But in the evening, that's when the blessings came. We went on splits, and I was going to the Taylor's whom like never keep the appointment. However they kept it this time! And had a good lesson. Then I went to April Ortega, whose lesson canceled, but turns out it was for a good reason, because I went to go contact the Young Woman's 2nd counselor, and their neighbor was moving in some furniture, who we ended up helping. She just moved from New Hampshire, she was super nice. We taught her the first part of the Restoration. Also set up a return appointment.

So my first transfer... Not gonna lie. I am really sad. I love this area and everyone in it. I was not expecting it at all. I was told I was going to stay in this area for around 6 months. Then I stay 6 weeks. However, I do know that God has a plan for me, and has work for me to do there. Everyone in our area thought Berg was gonna go, like we kept getting texts, "Berg got the boot huh?" nope. Elder Wrathall. I wish I was given more notice to say goodbye to people, and pack that is.

Sorry for not many pictures again. I don't understand how Allison does it, she gets like 20 pictures a week!

 

Elder Berg will send me some pics, then I can send them to you. This one is of our Landlords, whom I'm leaving tomorrow sadly :( 

 

I like the thrill of almost getting hit by cars!

     That is awesome that Jacob (His cousin) came over to do an interview for the NFL, is interning to like play? or what? That would be pretty cool if he lived close to us! Family in GA!!!  I have learned so many things from Jesus The Christ. It is fun learning new things about the gospel. Elder Berg and I go into deep doctrine quite often. Latin is definitely a pain :(, Day Light savings didn't really affect me a all. I just went to bed an hour early.

 

     This week was great! We are getting some great miracles! Andrew's (Baptized a few weeks ago) Dad has been coming to church and felt great for it, we met with him twice now, and have set up a date for him to be baptized. He really wants to! A Dad!!! From what I have heard, that is pretty rare in the mission. So i'm pretty grateful for that. We also have two new potential investigators, however one of our investigators is not committing and not meeting with us. So that is sad.

 

       I have been having a hard time contacting, but now I feel that I am a lot better at not being awkward at things such as door contacts, or contacts in general. Elder Berg has helped me a lot with that through role plays. We have been also going on a ton of splits. A lot of the times I don't like splits because I don't get to meet with the family that Elder Berg visits, and I love them! However I know that we get a ton more work done when we do split. Yesterday we taught 5 lessons in 3 hours.

 

     In our zone we have a worksheet that each companionship fills out throughout the week, it is called Exact Attack. There is a list of things that we should do, concerning obedience (ex. Wake up at 6:30, Start Personal Study at 8:00, ect.). The highest score possible is 70, Elder Berg and I were able to achieve that last week! :)

 

     We saw a cat catch a mouse, that was pretty cool! lol

 

     Oh we also had dinner with the Williams, your visiting teacher companion back in California. They are a super nice family, they fed us Asian Take out food lol. Their son has a super cool motorcycle! Brother Williams is super smart scientist engineer guy. lol.

The Williams were nice enough to send me a picture.

 

 

     I also meet someone who was friends with Grandpa Wrathall, their names were, "Marvin and Coletta" I don't know their last name... lol They said they were super close though.

We rode our bikes a lot this week, super fun! I love riding bikes, especially down hill. I ride in the middle of the street, because I like the thrill of almost getting hit by cars!

Well that is all I can think of about this week.

 

Love,

Elder Wrathall

 

This is the weekly picture I get from a member who feeds them every Wednesday.

 

It is crazy that it is March already! And only 22 more fast Sundays now!

Hello!!!
     So I am writing this the night before therefore have more time on p-day for shopping and other stuff. So I will respond to your email at the bottom.

     Also! Thanks for the package! However, I did have to pay $12 for it because the fee for forwarding it to me. They said if you paid $1 more for priority mail, I wouldn't have to pay for it. Good t-shirt choice though!! :)
This week was really good! We are having a pretty hard time at finding new people to teach though. We are teaching a lot of less actives, but the zone and president pressure us to get our numbers up for baptisms and lessons with non-members. So we need to hand the less actives over to the members to teach.
Right now we are really focusing on the members doing the finding for us, and giving us referrals, and even helping us teach. We have a meeting to train the Ward Missionary Leaders next Sunday.

     This week we have given many people priesthood blessings. One kid we are teaching, Dylan, has something that started on his leg, that builds up a lot of scar tissue and is spreading to other parts of his body. It is attacking his joints and limiting them so he can't move them as much. It is really sad. We gave him a blessing last night, so hopefully it is in god's will for him to get better, or else his whole body could be attacked and get stiffened.
We picked up a new investigator last night, he is set to be baptized the 29th of March. This is the first time I have met him, however, Elder Berg says that he has had a baptism date 3 times before this date. He keeps just stopping meeting with us. He seems very prepared by the Lord to be baptized, he knew all the fundamentals, and has a testimony of them, such as Joseph Smith, and the Atonement. He used to be a drug lord, and was put on death row. But he read the Book Of Mormon and a book about Joesph Smith, and for some reason, they let him go. Pretty cool miracle. I have faith that this time we'll be able to get him, he knows everything very well, we just need him to make commitments.

     This week, the ward that feeds us for dinner. The ward mission leader assigned dinner to the less actives in the ward. So far they have just dropped off food at our home, rather than letting us in. Sad that we can't get to talk with them. Also having food dropped off at our house 3 times in a row, we get tons of left overs. On Monday we got a whole pan of lasagna that feeds like 7 people. Our landlords are helping us out though. They especially like to help us when we get pie, which we have gotten three pies in three days. 1 coconut cream pie, then 2 Apple pies. Whenever we tract and find a member, or visit a member, 90% of the time they offer us food, 40% of the time they force us to take food with us. Last night, a member gave us 2 boxes of peanut butter Girl Scout cookies. We just gave it to the person who was driving us around places. Haha. I know what you are thinking, "Have you gained any weight??" I don't exactly know as of right now, I have yet to see a scale. I think I probably have gained a little.

     My favorite time of the day is probably Personal Study. I am reading "Jesus the Christ". Learning tons of stuff. Even though the basic fundamentals is all we need to know. Learning deep doctrine is soo much fun! Lol. There is a member here that is super smart in doctrine, or in everything in general. We asked him how the great flood was possible (Noah's Ark). He told us we weren't ready to know, but he gave us a hint saying, "Saturn is a strange planet..." Haha.

     Today we are going to work on our bikes to see if we can get them working. It will be super nice to have bikes. We could get soo much more done, rather than walking. Today we are also going up to Hill Air Force Base, we are teaching a less active whom does law enforcement on base! He asked us if we would want a tour of base. So we said sure why not! Oh last P-day we went bowling again, and I Scored a 146. I was soo close to Turkey 3 times in the game, it was maddening! That was also the first time that  I beat everyone. However, midway game, some other elders came in, and when we were leaving, they were on like frame 5, and had over or close to 100, haha. They are soo good.

      Okay, as far as pictures go, sorry I'm not as photogenic as Allison is! I didn't even think about pictures until last night lol. The puzzle of the plan of Salvation we use for  lessons, made by our wonderful landlord Brother Jones. And me showing all the food that we have! Oh, we also went to Zaxbys last P-Day, it made me soo happy :) I missed it so much. It just opened last Monday. Everyone else that went with us loved it!

      Okay, now writing in response to your email.

 

     It is crazy that it is March already! And only 22 more fast Sundays now! Time is going fast! Good job mom being fit!  The rec center that we were going to, we got a letter from the mission president saying we shouldn't go to public gyms. So we didn't go this week. However, then our ZL asked about it, and he said that this one we go to is fine, because no women really go to it, and there are no T.v's in it lol. I guess somewhere else in the mission they were having problems with those 2 things.

 

     I haven't gone to the temple yet out on the field, however that will change next week. We are going to go do baptisms for the dead, with one of our Recent Converts, for her family :) Super cool! And statistics show that recent converts who do baptisms for their family are 98% more likely to stay active. Super cool! I do miss that old film... lol. 

 

      I have gone on exchanges, I'm pretty sure I told you about that right? From what it sounds like here, the only reason you would do exchanges more than once a week, is if they don't like each other, so that could be the case. I hope not though! That is soo lame that the Sisters are being fed more than the Elders! It should be if you feed the sisters, you need to feed the elders sometime too!

 

     Nope, I don't think we'll have to buy bikes. All mine needs is a bolt, and Elder Berg's just needs a stopper for the brakes. I have not gone to restaurant and someone pay for me. From what I have heard, that is actually really rare. We have gone to the Gas Station to get some candy, and a member paid for it. That was really nice of him, felt kind of embarrassed, because it was like 3 bags of candy haha. Yeah, of course there are bad members. We have to constantly be telling less actives that. Most of the less actives are less active because people offended them. So we say, "The gospel is perfect, however, our church does consist of people, and people are far from perfect." As that is the truth.

 

     I believe that is all I can think of for this week. Glad to hear from you! Love ya tons!

Love,

Elder Wrathall