Transfer news and he is actually staying put!

Transfer NEWS!!! Elder Nielsen is going up north, serving as a District Leader, 

and I am  getting my Son Elder Ichin who is from an

Island off of Guam. Exciting times!

Wednesday: Sister Haines (The mission office secretary) called us,
letting us know that she had our stuff! (The stuff that was stolen last
week) Turns out the robber after thieving from us went out for
lunch, then left the bag that he stole from us (Which said "The Utah

Ogden Mission" on the bag) on a table at a restaurant. The manager got

it, and gave it back to the mission office. Pretty sweet! God looks
out for us, we didn't think we were every going to see those things
again.

Thursday: Eric always told us his reason for not being able to quit
smoking was because of his surroundings. So we had good news, Eric was
getting out of that house and moving into his Mom's house. We helped
him move, and had a lesson afterwards, he was so gun hoe (I think
that is how you spell it?? haha) about quitting after that.

Friday: Aaron, who was an investigator in my last area. Got permission
from the first presidency to be baptized!!! He is so excited, he met
with the missionaries for over 2 years, and he has been waiting for
permission for like two months. Good to see him to be baptized.

Saturday: We had a lesson with Eric, he is still struggling with the
Word of Wisdom. And this time, he seemed to take a turn for the worse.
Usually he is pumped and telling us that he is never going to smoke
one again, but this time he didn't seem to have the desire, he just
made a lot of excuses for not quitting to smoke.

Sunday: We went to one of the new wards that opened up because of the
people moving in. This ward was a Man's best friend... Haha. This ward
had around 75 girls in it, and 5 guys. It was so weird to see! We
helped pass and bless the sacrament, never thought I would
have to help in one of these wards up here with that. Eric our
investigator came to church!

Monday: We had MLT today, it was held at the Mission President's home.
I like the home feel that the meeting had, but it was certainly
squished at times with all those people in there. During MLT we
had Eric (Our only investigator) text us saying that he doesn't want to
meet with us for a time. He wants to come to church still but to take
a break from the missionary discussions. :( Sad. So now we have no
investigators... This is rough. I feel really bad for my Greenie who
comes into here when it is like this. Though school is starting up,
people are moving in, so we should be good.

Love,

Elder Wrathall

The safest city in the USA?

Wednesday: We started to tract, we were knocking doors, none of them
were opening, finally, after like 30 min, one opens. So excited I say, "What's 

your name!?" He replies, "I'm the landlord, nobody lives in these apartments 

right now." It was so sad. Seems to be the case for a ton of the apartments in 

our area right now. We had a lesson with Eric at the Temple! That was really 

cool! We didn't got home because we went up to Clarkston (45min drive) and 

served at the Martin Harris Pageant. Stayed over the night with Alsterberg up in
Preston.

Thursday: We had to get a ride down from Preston to Logan,  we were going to take the bus, but learned that the bus only goes there early morning and late

afternoon. We already missed them all, as soon as I learned of that though, 

someone drove up to us, and offered us a ride. That was super nice :) When we got back to the apartment, our door was open, we both thought that was 

strange, but kinda shrugged it off. Had lunch, then I noticed my watch box was gone, then Nielsen noticed his ipod was gone. We first thought it was just other missionaries playing a joke on us. Called around, nope. Called 911 and they 

took fingerprints and whatnot. Yep... Got robbed in the safest city in the USA. 

Dealing with that took a long  time.

Friday:  Because of the lack of students around right now, we decided to start 

prepping up for big wave of work, we made maps of our area that we can place notes on, and got more organized with splits and correlations.

Saturday: Met with Eric again, he is struggling really bad with the smoking, and this time I went to his house, and it all made sense. Everybody in his house 

smokes, and it stenches with it, He did tell us that he bought 2 puppies to help him get over smoking, keeps him more busy, and makes him more happy. The miracles of puppies! Haha

Sunday: 7am-4pm. Church!! Haha, afterwards we met with Eric again, he
decided that he needs to get a new place if wants to be able to smoke, sad, 

because that usually takes a long time to move, so he won't be able to be 

baptized very soon, but very good for him to get out of that terrible place. He is such a good guy, he doesn't deserve to live there.

Monday: Had a lesson with Riley, a Less-Active, he is wanting to get back 

active, maybe the reasoning is that his girlfriend is a active member... but any 

reason is a good reason. He is working with the bishop to become worthy to 

partake of the sacrament, and the bishop suggested that he meet with us, the missionaries! He is a really cool guy, I like him a lot. I feel like if I didn't serve amission that is where I would be at, so I can sympathize. Lately have been 

running into a lot of guys who love motorcycles, this is why God wanted me to

ride motorcycles before my mission, so easy to get a conversation with them.

Well these next two weeks is moving times, people moved out pretty much 

already, Freshmen will be moving in on Saturday, everyone else, next Saturday.It's about to get busy!!! :)

Thanks for the email, 

Love you Mom!

Elder Wrathall

For the Sake of Other Areas Day

Wednesday: I think it would be appropriate to call this day,
"For the sake of Other Areas day!" We had two lessons with people that

were going to be moving into other areas. We invited both to be baptized. So
those missionaries are walking into something pretty good! Also, we talked to a
random guy, without us saying anything about the church yet, he says,
"I've actually been really interested in the church, and I want to meet
with missionaries soon." I thought it was a member just joking with us...
Nope. completely real desire. He doesn't live in our area, but gave him the
number for the missionaries where he does, he was going to give them a call.

Thursday: We met with Zac, and sadly he still didn't pray. He read

the scriptures, and came to church, but didn't pray at all. We felt like we
weren't making any progress so we decided to drop him as an investigator. We
told him that we wouldn't meet anymore. Turns out, right after that lesson he
went to our Ward Mission Leader, Zach Jensen, and told him that all the concerns
that he brought up, aren't his real concerns, he wants to be baptized, but that
he just feels like he isn't ready yet. So he doesn't want to set a date. But
that was really cool to see his development in the gospel that came from dropping
him.

Friday: We were able to help 2 people move into their houses. One

of which was a college girl, after we helped her move in, we asked if she would
like to learn more about the church. She said, "Maybe...." She was
just one of those girls who can't say no, we finally milked a no out of her.
Then continued on trying to find the elect, for people like that though, we
tell the ward to invite them to activities and what-not.





Saturday: Turns out there is a fair in town, and we decided that

we would go to it, because it is in our area, and also, we had no lessons for
the day... The Christensen's joined us, there was a booth called, "Are you
a good person? Pass the test, Get $1". It was a bashing booth of non-denominational churches, they guy I had that gave me the test was super nice. I got a dollar.
Now, Sister Christensen's guy was not nice at all. So she got a bit of the life
of how it is to be persecuted for her faith. I felt bad taking them to the fair
after that :/ Throughout the fair, we had people stop us, and sometimes give us
referrals, it was pretty sweet!

Sunday: We had a lot of people come to church! He had 3 less-actives

that we were working with come to church, we only have 1 real investigator, and
he came, but we had like 4 non-members come to church besides that. Met with
some more Bishops that are excited for the missionary work that will be rolling
in come school time. Man, I really wish School would come already! Haha




Monday: Started the day off with service! Helping a senior couple clean

up their yard and garage. Then... we actually had a lot of lessons for the
day!!! We had 7 scheduled, and 5 went through. Not too bad of a ratio! We met
with Ian, who Elder Norris found in his area, but is YSA so he turned it over
to us. However, the lesson went a bit sour. Norris said Ian was super
interested, but Ian's brother, Jordan, completely hijacked the lesson and took
it on a downward spiral. Jordan is not interested at all, so now comes the chall-enge of trying to meet with Ian alone.

Tuesday: Got to go to the temple today :)))))




Thanks for the email!! Have a wonderful week!

Love,

Elder Wrathall 

Happy Week!

Waiting for the bus!

Happy Week!!
Tuesday: I normally don't write anything about this day,
because generally nothing happens besides P-day stuff, however, this time something fun happened. After P-day, we wereboth contemplating on how we could get our hands on cigarettes, because we needed to get some to soak in milk and let dry for our investigator to smoke, that way he never wants to smoke again. When no later than 2 minutes, we walk into
a guy who is smoking!! I tell him what's up, "Hey!! We werejust talking about how we could get some cigarettes, and wecame across you! Can you give us a pack?" He looked kinda
shocked and said, "Wait, aren't you Mormons?" Haha, so we 

explained ourselves, had a good contact, then at the end, Ibartered with him for some cigs. He started off saying he 

wanted $5 for 4. Ended up buying 5 for $3.25.
Cigarettes are expensive!!!

Wednesday: We had DM (District Meeting) and we went 

tracting a lot. However, the grand finale of the day was 

Eric smoking those Milk/Mustard soaked cigs (He told us he wanted more than just milk.) He started to smoke one, whichhe felt super sick with that one, but being so dedicated hesmoked 3 at the same time. He threw up a couple of times. 

It was painful just to watch him.

Thursday: Eric didn't smoke all today!! It worked! He used to smoke 20 a day. We had a lesson with our other 

investigator Zac, who is trying to fight homosexuality. He has been lately talking how " Even if God came down and told him that homosexuality is wrong, he still wouldn't
believe it." We got him at the end of the lesson to say 

that he would be willing to change if he got an answer. It was a super spiritual lesson. However, he hasn't been 

keeping commitments. When an investigator doesn't keep 

commitments, it doesn't matter how great the lessons are, 

because they forget that moment, and go back to their old
ways. So we were worried he might not keep them again. So 

we text him everyday for a reminder.

Friday: Went on exchanges with our District Leader, Elder 

Norris, I've known Elder Norris since I was 'born' in the 

mission! SO it was super exciting and fun to be with him. 

He is a surfer dude from San Diego, California. Sadly, we 

didn't have a single lesson on this day, All we did was 

knock a ton of doors.

Saturday: We had 4 lessons scheduled, but only 1 happened, we were trying hard to fight the discouragement that was
coming along with that. And we are getting pretty sick of 

tracting. Just have to keep enduring till school starts up!

Sunday: I didn't do so well at planning the meetings that 

we had scheduled... So we were building hopping all
throughout church. And we were excited to this week becauseit is fast & testimony meetings, so it is a super good way to get our faces out there, and people know us. The first 

meeting we went to, a bishopric was getting released,
so no testimony meeting, then the 2nd was good, but then 

the 3rd was jam full of people baring their testimonies. Ohwell, that's a good problem.

Monday:
Elder Nielsen was told to go to MLC from 1-4pm, He didn't 

know why, and when he returned he didn't know either. Haha,however, I feel like that is a tale-tell sign that he is 

going to be in Leadership this next transfer. While he was
about doing that I was with a Member of the ward for a 

lesson in which I invited the investigator to be baptized 

the 5th of September, he said he would work towards it, but
he is moving to Roosevelt, UT. on Saturday... :( Happy for
him, sad for us! Later we met a girl from Brooklyn that 

doesn't know much about the church. She was a little stand-offish because she is black, and she thought because of 

that she is cursed. Once we hopped that barrier it went
well, and we set up a return appointment.

Love Elder Wrathall