"Bits & Pieces" from December 2014

December 1, 2014....
 

I'm glad to hear y'all had an awesome Thanksgiving! I wish I could have been there. But next year I will be:) Thanks for the package.  We loved it and all the elders say thank you.  I'll send the picture of the tree, and the pies did hold up. They were a little smashed but they were sooo good. I've missed them so much. It has been too long since I've had some soda cracker pie. And it was funny when we were sitting on the Marta Elder Lanier and I were talking about our families and what we did and the one thing that stuck out in my mind was "up the river down the river!" I can't wait to play it again and just beat you! It'll be good.

I spent my Thanksgiving with two families. The first one was the Hinkle family, which was so good. She invited her daughter and her kids so it was really fun. We just hung out with her two boys and it was good cause the daughter really wanted a blessing so we were able to give her one. Then our second one was sooooo good. Sis Reams, who was in the Carrollton ward when I was there recently moved over here to Atlanta, so when she saw me at church she invited us over and all her family came so it was good to see some old faces. She is just an older lady that lives there by herself but she makes the best food!!! We had  a smoked turkey with duck, the best mac n cheese, and some real good collard greens.  We had so much food, and then she sent us home with like half of her kitchen!! She is so funny, I love her. We did have some cool miracles this week. We found a family of 6 that were open and willing to learn more! but transfer news, Lanier is leaving and I am getting a missionary who is 6 weeks old! I'll be 2nd training him so it'll be a blast and I know who it is because he is serving in college park which is still in the ward. His name is Elder Clarke. He is from Grantsville.  I am staying in the apt with Elder Clarke and they are white washing us into Elder Marriott and Elder Hansens area so I'll be in a different proselyting area and they are white washing them down to college park. Then they are bringing a trio into our apt. and one of those will be the DL and another Elder will be training as well so there will now be 5 in the apt! Crazy, I know. 

 

 

Thanksgiving with Sister Reams

 December 8, 2014....

I'm glad to hear y'all had a great stake conference. The scriptures have been my favorite since I have been out. I never thought I would like to study or anything like that but I wish I could do it for hours. I hope I stay the same when I get home and that I don't let other things distract me.

The new area is pretty good, a lot more run down and ghetto than my last area:) but its still nice. We are just lucky at least one of us is half black and big cause if not it might get a little weird. But I do love it and we are working with some incredible people. A few of them are on date. One guy is so open and wanting to learn. He was taught when he was in DC and moved down here and wants to be baptized. Another man, who is an uncle of a member who has been taught for awhile now.  He needs to work on the Word of Wisdom and he'll be dunked. Then this week we were knocking and found a family of at least 3. We were talking to them about coming to church and they said that their aunt went there and she is an awesome member who is just getting back into activity!! It was so cool and the 2 young ones have already been to our church so we were pretty stoked on that miracle. So we do have a lot of great families we are working with right now.

My new companion is Elder Clark from Grantsville UT. He's a great kid with a good heart. I'm excited to work with him. And the new five man is awesome. Elder Webster is the DL. He was an assistant to the President for like 9 months. He only has 6 weeks left and then Elder Meservey who is one of my homies of the mission are training elder Kalosi who is super chill so its fun. We are both training. and Elder Webster is my new running partner and we have been hittng it real hard since he is going home. But everything is going good I'm excited to get more familiar with the area and get things rolling.

 

Elder Anderson and Elder Clarke

December 15, 2014.....

I'm sorry this email might be a little short. We don't have to much time to write today. That's so cool y'all get to go to Virginia!! And y'all are going to be in Atlanta!! Just think when your'e in the airport you will be about 10 miles away from me!!! How scary is that! You could hop on the Marta train and be to me in 4 stops! haha JK don't do that...

Thanks for the early Christmas present with the 12 ways of Christmas!! Its super cool. We enjoy it and we read it each night before we go to bed. I have opened the Increase, Shelter, and Rescue ones. I really enjoy it so thanks. This week was pretty good and ya we did teach that family and they are super cool and want a change in their life. They were supposed to come to church this week but 2 of them were isick, so they all just stayed home. Everyone else is doing good. We are just trying to make sure everyone we teach are keeping there commitments. I love being here in Atlanta, we get to see some crazy stuff everyday that I'll never experience again so its fun. I'm just soaking it all in.

I hope y'all have a great safe trip to Virginia and back. Let all of the family know I say hi and love them and to write me so I can get to know them better.

 

 

 December 22, 2014....

So I know you said that this cant be a short one but.... it might be:)

I can't believe its already time to skype again. And to think when the next call comes it will be time for me to come home! It's crazy! 

The week was pretty good. We got the usual "hit me up after the holiday" thing which I hated, and the family wasn't able to come cause the mom got sick. But we will keep trying on them. A lot of people here have been catching the flu bug which is aweful cause it makes it tough to get in to the homes. But we are still working hard. We have a lot set up for Christmas Eve and Christmas so I'm excited for those days. On Christmas we are seeing one of our solid investigators at lunch, then going to Sis Reams (the lady from Carrollton) to eat, then going over to the Bishops house to eat, then going to the Cottrells:) so it will be a good Christmas, I'm excited. But I can't wait to see y'all I'm so excited!

 

 

December 29, 2014....

 

 

Elder Anderson showing off his Christmas present to himself

Christmas dinner, Southern Style!

 

 

 

"Bits & Pieces" from November 2014

November 3, 2014.....

I don't know if you heard, but here in Georgia it has been a frozen tundra! The past 3 days in the morning has been like 30 degrees! And the high is at most 50. With the wind it has been real bad! But we haven't let it stop the work from progressing! But this week was awesome! We taught some amazing lessons. The first one we taught was a former investigator that we found who had been on date before but they just lost contact with her and she was so excited when we came and saw her.  We taught her the plan of salvation because she had some questions and it made so much sense to her and she was really excited and accepted a date to be baptized. Now, we just have to get her work schedule changed so she can come to church. Another guy, who actually used to be a professional golfer let us right into his house and fed us (which never happens!) But he sat us down and said "I'm going to ask you a question and depending on how you answer it will determine whether I'm going to listen to you or not.." ( gotta love some pressure) but he asked about why there were so many races and languages and and why God divided us. Elder Lanier jumped in and gave a great detailed answer about the tower of babel. It was good. Then he looked at me and said do you have something else. And this is why I love being a missionary, cause during the time Lanier was answering I was getting a huge prompting from the spirit to focus on faith. So I said, "it all comes down to faith. We honestly don't really know. All we know is God's ways are higher than our ways and he has a purpose. And all of our messages that we want to share with you come down to faith, and praying to come to know it to be true. We dont want you to take our word for it." And he looked at me and said "that's exactly what I wanted to hear   Now I can listen to you, so share with me your message!" It was so awesome! We had an awesome lesson with him and he's gonna read and we will see him this week! One more cool story, we had a really smart member with us on a team up and we went to see a lady we met a few days earlier and we showed up the same time they did and went in and got to know them a little more. Her boyfriend was there with them and he is so prepared for the gospel. He looks like a thug but is so smart and knows a lot about Jewish and Egyptian history. So while we were sharing our message and the member finds out this guy knows his stuff he just went off on how the Book of Mormon is so key and how it came about and they connected so well but it was such a spiritual lesson because this guy at the end was like "I feel this burning in my chest and it feels so good!" We all started laughing and brought out the scriptures and showed him that that was the spirit testifying that this is true!! It was a very good week with lots of awesome things happening. Oh and during the lesson with them, they have a pet cockatoo, and I taught the whole lesson with it on my shoulder!! haha it was cool. But the Atlanta ward is still crazy, you can always feel the spirit with them!

Josh and his new companion

November 10, 2015...

 

This week was pretty good with a great ending! We found some pretty cool people this week, one of those being Big J. He reminds me so much of Tyrus, its scary. but he said 2 weeks ago that God was leading him out of his old ways ( hustling) and trying to show him a better life and then he said and then ya'll came up and talked to me. God had something to do with it! Sadly he lives in a different ward, but he works in our area so we will be keeping up with him. The great ending was K and her 2 daughters came to church!! They loved it and they stayed all 3 hours and the girls were saying they loved their classes and the kids in there and K had a great time. She said she learned a lot but we had a member pick them up and take them home and after he dropped them off, he called us and said that she is so ready to be baptized! He said that she was saying that she loved the church and wanted the change in her life and knew that this is how she could do it! So we are super excited for them. Oh and I also got to go to the temple which was great. But this is what I am really excited about and I want to let you know what I'll be doing with my studies for basically the rest of my mission or however long it takes mixed in with all the other stuff that I have to study. But you sent that blue journal to me and I wanted to use it as my own personal study/doctrine and covenants where I receive my own revelation But I wasn't using as much as I wanted to but I received revelation a few days ago when I was reading over my favorite talk from the last General Conference, "The Reason for our Hope" by Boyd K Packer. Through the whole talk he bears testimony of the Savior and what he can do in our lives. At the end he talks on how the most important thing in the church and how we know we have "true succes is by the spiritual strength of its individual members" which is so true, but in the beginning of the talk he talks about going to Oxford University to find an ancestors name, but he went back to give the University a set of the Standard Works. and at first he said "they were a little confused not knowing we were really Christians, but before he handed them over he opened the Topical Guide and showed them one subject: 18 pages, very fine print, single spaced, listing references to the the subject of 'Jesus Christ' One of the most Comprehensive compilations of scriptural references that has ever been assembled, a testimony from the old and new testament, Book of Mormon, Doctrine and Covenants, and Pearl of Great Price."  So I received revelation on what I needed to do. I am gonna go line by line, scripture by scripture, showing all the references and seeing how each book fits perfectly together and seeing that the Church really is the only true and living church on the earth today! I am so stoked! I'm hoping to gain just a pure sound testimony that Jesus Christ is my Savior and the Savior for the entire world! and learn more about his life his teachings and the his atonement. and whats cool and I didn't realize this till yesterday but my Patriarchal Blessing states many times that I need to become learned in the scriptures and to come to know the importance of the Savior Jesus Christ in my life and in the lives of those I will come in contact with and it will prepare me for my future tasks and responsibilities. I think its cool how the Holy Ghost can work to lead you exactly to where you need to be or what you need to be doing at a certain time in your life! but im so excited! 

Elder Anderson & Elder Hansen

 November 17, 2015.....

Sorry for how late this email is but we just had an awesome p-day! We went to midtown and walked around and a member in our ward got us into the Aquarium! It was sweet. A lot of cool stuff  is in there and there is a sweet dolphin show we got to watch as well so it was worth the waiting email. This week was pretty good. It was slow at times cause we had a lot of things going on. They took our car so we are now just on the MARTA and bike.. which isnt bad but it just takes a lot longer. On Tuesday I went on exchanges down to college park and had a great day. We helped a member build a green house and then we did get to see one of our investigators. He is doing great. He's been reading a little bit but we had a great lesson with him again and hopefully we get him to church. K and her kids couldn't make it this week to church because she had to go to work but they are coming next week and we are seeing them again tomorrow. They are awesome and so easy to teach. but on Sunday this week was super cool.  We had a HUGE surprise for sacrament meeting.  Sis. Soares, Sis Kopischke, and Sis. Zwick of whom all of their husbands are in the first quorom of 70!! They all were there and spoke to us! Then President and Sister Harding were both there and spoke. It was soooo sweet and we did have one investigator there and he really enjoyed it! But it was super spiritual and this week we have Elder Kopischke taking a tour of our mission so we have a big conference with him on wednesday. I'm so stoked for that. 

November 24, 2014.....

 

That's great y'all are keeping it traditional and getting together at home! It'll be nice to sit around the dinner table again with the whole family! Such small things that we take for granted every single day. That's been what I'm so grateful for, my Heavenly Father blessing me with such a great family and leading me in the right direction to lead me where I am today without me even knowing it. And for my Savior, Jesus Christ. This study has been awesome so far. It's going by slowly but surely I probably won't finish it till right when I finish the mission, but I couldn't be more grateful for what I have in my life! And yes, you don't have to worry about me getting fed. We are gonna be playing in the turkey bowl in the morning!!! Then we are going to the Hinkles house and then a big surprise, a member in the Carrollton Ward, an older lady named Sis. Reams who is sooo amazing just moved to the Atlanta ward so now we have 2 dinners! Hopefully we get some more this week! haha I finally feel like I can splurge myself cause I'm getting back in shape so I'm happy I can enjoy myself! But Elder Kopischke was awesome!!! We all had so much revelation in those meetings it was crazy! At the start of the meeting he said that it would be a meeting full of revelation and invited every missionary to write down 3 questions they wanted answers to and promised they would get answered! and it was so cool that when you prepare yourself to receive revelation and are listening for the Holy Ghost to give you that answer you will always get it! All of mine were answered. He talked about some amazing stuff that this mission really needed to hear about faith and about Form vs. Power (JS-H 1:19) it was so cool. We were missing Gods power in the work so I cant wait to see where the mission will go now! But the investigators are doing great, sadly no one came to church on Sunday due to the stupid huge rain storm that came in the morning. No one wanted to go outside... and a lot of our people have to take Marta so they didn't come. But its all good, we had great lessons with Kesha and her family and with Royce and we are seeing him again tomorrow night.My new family that we are working with is so sweet!! It's a part member family. They had us over for dinner last Monday. She has been a life long member and he is not a member. They have had 10 kids! and I think half are members. but the husband played in the NFL for a few years for the Falcons but he has been a coach in the NFL for 28 years!!! So sick!! You know me and him connected real well! He was telling me a lot of his stories, one cool DYK(did you know) is when he was the defensive coordinator for the Jets, he has been the only person ever to shut out Peyton Manning in his whole career! He has the game ball and I held it! He still works for the NFL a an appeals officer or something like that. He works with the players who get fined..  The wife's big goal is to get them sealed. They remind me a lot of you and dad. So pray for them.

But I love you so much and miss you. I hope y'all have a great thanksgiving!! Don't miss me too much. and I'm so grateful to be able to call you my family!

 

"Bits & Pieces" from October 2014

October 6, 2014.....

I loved hearing what you thought about conference! It was amazing for sure. But ya, I really
enjoyed that one on the Patriarchal blessing and making sure that our lives are in harmony with the blessing promised to us in the blessing it made me want to be better at studying it and making sure I'm doing everything Heavenly Father wants from me. Elder Bednar's talk was pretty legit telling everyone why we do what we do. It's so true though cause once I felt the atonement in my life and when I focus on what the gospel has done for me in my life that's when I want to share it with everyone else and I think once we realize that nobody can take part of the Atonement without being baptized by someone holding the priesthood authority and if we believe that its only in our church where you can find that then how more important it is for us to share that with everyone! But, sadly we didn't have anyone come and watch conference with us but I know we had a part member family that we are now starting to work with watch a session the dad is the only member and they have 5 kids! So we are excited to start working with them more and hopefully getting them to start coming to church. And with Syndi and Durran we have been communicating through text all week. She has been super busy with her work. Her husband does something with the military and he lives in Arizona and I'm pretty sure they are thinking of moving out there next year some time. But she still really wants to talk but doesn't get home till super late so hopefully we'll see them this week! I did get to see Tyrus on Monday! He came down but Anthony was sick so he couldn't come to lunch with us but he took us out to lunch so it was great to see him and get to catch up. He is still doing great and going to church and he is helping the misisonaries out a lot. I was super happy to hear that. And I heard back from Josh Johnson last week. He wrote me and said he is doing great as well and still preparing for his mission! So I'm happy to hear that they are still going strong. I  guess the sisters in Carrollton have been killing it and they have baptized like 5 weeks in a row! I'm happy for my "home" ward! But for the rest of the week, it was pretty good just been hitting it strong with those bikes! We found quite a few new investigators this week and some seem very promising so we are excited to start teaching them. One of them was named Sherrell.  She is kinda crazy but when we were talking to her about the church and what it does for us spiritually she started opening up to us about her past and how she needs to get a stronger relationship with God and actually do what he wants her to do and she had been holding grudges from some things about her daughter and what she had been doing. She hasn't seen or talked to her for 6 months but she said she was going to forgive her and put it behind her and move on and be happy just cause we stopped by and talked to her and prayed with her. So we were happy we made some what of a difference. Then the next day we got a call from her and she said you need to come over now so we headed over there and she was very happy cause that morning her daughter showed up at her door wanting to make things right and to strengthen there relationship! She said it was all because we came and prayed with her. That was our little miracle for the week. But my 2 favorite talks this week were probably Elder Packers and Elder Christofferson. Elder Packers with his pure testimony on the Savior and the atonement were so strong! And how we as individuals need to have a sure foundation of the gospel and gain our own witness of the truthfulness of this message and then we will make the unity strong. And Elder Christofferson talking about our agency and the importance of our choices. I just felt like the theme message of this conference was we need to focus on our own personal conversion and then we need to focus on the family and how important it is to have the priesthood keys restored back onto the earth and to have a Prophet. But I enjoyed it highly. Oh and I get to go to the temple tomorrow cause we are having zone training meeting and the crazy thing is President Harding is doing this new thing where the zone leaders go on week long exchanges with the district leaders and this week is my lucky week...so I'll be with Elder Urchanbrek the whole week! We'll see how that goes. 

The new bike!

 

Elder Anderson's new buddy

 October 13, 2014....

This week was really good the exchange went well.  It was different than what we were both used to so it was hard getting used to it but we got a lot of work done and saw some good things so overall it was good and we survived.  He came to my area, so we got a lot of good things done and got one of our other investigators on date so we are excited about that. But nothing really crazy or new happened this week.  Pretty same old same old stuff.  Last night it was pretty crazy, we had a 2 pipes burst. One in our apartment and the other from the apartment above us and it was like 11:30 so luckily one of the maintenance guys lives below us so we ran and knocked on his door and the guy above us and our apartment got soaked there was water dripping out of lights and vents and the ceiling and we were filling up buckets and had towels going everywhere, hahah it was a blast!! Not really, but we are all alive and we got everything taken care of in about an hour so it was a late night for us last night but it was a fun way to finish the exchange. As for zone conference, it went great. I always love going to the temple with all the missionaries and getting to see everybody. And the cool thing is we got to watch "Meet the Mormons" while we were there so that was good. I thought they did a really good job and I think that will be a great missionary tool. But I don't have too much time this week to write cause we have a lot of things to get done before we exchange back but I love you and miss you so much and I hope you have a great week and I'll talk to you next week.

A week of exchanges

 October 20, 2014....

We had a really good week this week and had a lot of success finding new people and as well seeing a lot of our people that we have been teaching.  One of those families being a part member family are doing really well and are progressing. A cool miracle was that one of our investigators; we gave her a Book of Mormon like 3 weeks ago and because she has been out of town we haven't been able to get in contact with her too much but we saw her this week and she had read all the way to 3 Nephi 18!! We were so shocked.  And she loves the Book of Mormon, the only problem will be getting her away from her other church that she loves so much. Its a huge mega church in Atlanta... like 20,000 members.... nuts right?!? But now for the big news... I'm being transfered!!!! Who would have thought. I didn't think I was leaving. I figured Talbot would.  I'm going to the heart of the city!! ATLANTA! I'm stoked. It will be so sick so I'll be on my bike and I'll have Marta(the bus) but it'll be way sick!! and I think I'll be in another 4 man too, which I have loved so I'm stoked for the new experience and the elder I'm going to is actually one of the ones that came in with Elder Hamilton from Sierra Leone! But I'm excited. I was shocked when I heard I was leaving cause I've only been here 2 transfers but I'm ready for another chapter of the mission.

The Fayetteville District

Moving on...to new adventures

October 27, 2014....

 

The city is amazing! Its awesome!  I love it here! But my week has been pretty fun and different than what I'm used to. Every single door that I have knocked into, they're black! Now I don't want to sound racist but its amazing!! I love it. We stay on the west side of Atlanta so I'm not right in mid town but we travel there often so I see it all the time. My area is great. It has a good mixture of all the social classes which is great! We have the low middle and upper. There are some of the biggest houses here! But I have loved it.  There is always someone to talk to and that wants to hear the word. The trick here in the ward is being able to find someone who is self seficiant and will stay active. Because we could find, teach, and baptize all day long if we wanted to but that has already happened and it has ruined the ward. By the way, the ward is amazing! 70% black 30% white! And every time someone says good morning over the pulpit everyone says it back and I hear fast and testimony meeting is legit! But overall the ward has over 1000 members in it!! and only 150 active... So there is a lot of work to be done here, we just need to figure out where our priorities need to be and how to best help the ward and our investigators. But the fun thing is that we white washed into our area. Elder Lanier was serving in a different part of the ward so we are both new to the area. Which I guess isn't new to me, I've done it in every single one of my areas. But its such a good area. We are on a car/ marta and bike share so one day we have the car and the other we are on Marta with our bikes!

Elder Lanier is great. He is from Mackay, Idaho and has been out for 1 year now. The other two in the apartment are Elder Marriott form Arizona, he has been out 2 transfers ahead of me and Elder Hansen from Idaho and he has been out just 1 transfer less than me and they are pretty cool.  Elder Hansen and I get along great. He is super funny. But I love being in a 4 man, they're legit. This week the ward had its fall festival/trunk or treat which was fun. We had one investigator come to that but not church. I think the sickest part of this ward is President Sullivan. He is the Stake President over the Atlanta stake and his home ward is our ward. He is the one in the movie "Meet the Mormons" as "the bishop" he is so cool! We got to talk with him for a long time at the party as well at church so its cool to be in the ward that was in the movie. So if you have seen it or you go and see it that building is ours and where he lives is in my area! That will be fun to say after the mission. But I'm excited to be here. It's gonna be a fun transfer. Oh and another cool thing we have 7 companionships in the ward!!! So there is plenty of work here to be done! 

 

 

 

 

 

"Bits & Pieces" from September 2014

September 1, 2014....

This week was great. We saw some great progress with some of our investigators.  Sadly, none of them made it to church, but they are reading and understanding our message and they want to act on it which is some good progress.  I had a great lesson with a lady named Mimi.  She is an older lady, super sweet, she was in the formers area book and we went and saw her with an older couple in the ward and they hit it off and had an amazing lesson.  She loved and understood the restoration, she is a Sunday school teacher for her church so its gonna be hard to get her to come to our church. But my district is killin it right now which is amazing to see and its great for our ward.  One companionship, the STL's, they are baptizing 4 people this week a family of 3! and a grandpa part of a part member family and they are all amazing people so I'm stoked to be able to interview them and then next week I get to interview another guy who is super solid as well! So, the work is definitely hastening here in Fayetteville! Now I just gotta find those that are prepared as well, but I have loved being around such great missionaries and being able to interview so many people for baptism. It is such an honor and blessing to be able to have that privilege! Yesterday we worked hard all day and tracked for like 5 hours in the super hot humidity to find as many families as possible cause they were home and we found 4 new families. It was awesome.  Found a great place to find in with great people so me and Talbot are stoked.  We just need to keep working hard and following up with people. But the Lord will provide as we just keep working hard and being obedient the blessing will come. I get to go to mission council with all the Leaders tomorrow so I'm excited for that but sorry its short this week not too much to say.

September 8, 2014....

 Thanks for the birthday wishes! It's weird to think I wont be a teenager after Wednesday. It is flying by. Thats sick that Brandon did good, sounds like he and the team did really good. Tell him congrats and no he didnt write me. but this seriously is the hardest time of the year for me as a missionary and not being able to watch any games!! haha its kind of sad but this is what they meant when they say serving a mission is a hard sacrifice.. Only a sacrifice from football season! haha I miss yall too... :)  and I'm glad you enjoyed 2 Nephi 4.  I just love how fast you can change your attitude on anything and he just says "awake my soul" and to stop letting satan control him or his thoughts and that if we can just trust in the Lord forever he will guide us back home. And ya thats the hardest part for me to get through as well I wish Isiah wasnt so hard to read!
This week was really good though we kicked it off strong. Obviously on Monday with it being Labor day, many families were home and kept our finding pretty consistent throughout the week. I think our find of the week was a lady named Kimber we met her on Wednesday and said we could come back the next day and when we first talked with her she said she was agnostic and was confused why there would be so many christian denominations. So I kind of chuckled and said we have the perfect message for you and bore testimony that she really did have a Heavenly Father that loved her so much. So I went back on thursday with Bro Okonkwo.  We were on splits and we taught her family. Her husband is Casey and they have a 7 year old named Garren and being in the south and getting to teach a family who really doesnt believe in God is a blast! I love it. I think its so fun to watch them have a spiritual witness that there is a God and thats what we saw. We taught them the restoration and focused primarily on faith. What faith is and how we apply faith it in our lives. And to someone who really wants proof and can't rely on faith, that's when we need the spirit to testify to them so we said a prayer in the middle of the lesson to let the spirit work in them and progressively through the lesson they kept getting more and more interested and asking more questions and at the end they said that they really wanted to read and pray about the Book of Mormon! And they accepted a soft commitment to be baptized if they came to know it to be true. Then the rest of the week was a little slower for us at least but for the rest of the district it went great so that was good to see.
The interviews went really well. One of them, Bro Ironce Raymond was the grandpa of a part member family. I have never met a man who was more prepared for the gospel than this man! Our interview was like an hour and a half because of how much he was bearing testimony of the gospel and how it has changed his and his family's life! He said he was praying so long for God to send him to the truth and his whole life he thought God didn't answer him and then he realized that God works in mysterious ways and led his family there first and let him find it through them. He and a 3 generation family were baptized as well the grandma,, the mom and her daughter! So it was an awesome Saturday and Sunday to see! and Bro Raymond bore his testimony so many times through church it was so cool. even though he wasn't my investigator, he definitely has changed my life just to be able to see and hear his story. But me and Talbot are just hitting those streets hard and knocking on all the doors we see trying to find that family! We know it will happen in due time with our faith and diligence we'll see a miracle this transfer! My quote of the day "Adversity helps develop a depth of character that comes in no other way." - Dieter F. Uchtdorf

Elders Anderson & Talbot

September 15....

 This week was a great week.  We saw some great things happen and some bad, but thats the fun in missionary work. My birthday was great, we had a lot of fun.  We went out that night and went to a place called Twisted Taco! A place right in the square of Fayetteville and I did love the package and I will keep the bracelet close so I can where it when I come home. I like the turtles thing we got going as a Fam. But that day was a good day for me, everybody that we talked to shut us down haha we had very little success which is fine.  It happens and honestly it strengthens my testimony more when we have so many people wanting to yell and get angry with us cause it just makes them look dumb for one, and it shows how sad "Christianity" has become. We knocked into 2 different pastors that day that got so mad that we were on their porch and tried to anti us and said we don't believe in Jesus and all the good stuff that they try and throw at us.  We had one go open his door and when I started talking he leaned over with his finger pushed on my name tag and said "that says Jesus Christ.. you need to take that off now cause you dont believe in Jesus.." and then went off how Joseph Smith and the Book of Mormon is crap.. and is all fake. Now.. this was an older man but me being me, it took everything not to punch him in the mouth for hitting my name tag. But I love these experiences cause all you have to say is "Sir, have you read the book?" they say "no, who would read the devils book.."" well if you're too ignorant to read the book and pray about it, you cant say anything about my church.  Try it out and you'll see something like this could not come from the devil!" and it's just sad how all these people call themselves Christians and they put everyone else down for what they believe.. I'm pretty sure Christ wouldn't do that. It's just a small testimony builder for me knowing that we don't put down any other faith for what they believe, we just offer more. But I did get to interview another man this week for baptism. He is so strong in the gospel. He has been learning for awhile now and finally made the first step so it was great to see. We had zone conference which was great. Elder Jensen just got transfered into the zone so it was great to see him again.  I found out someone we started teaching and got halfway through when I left got baptized 2 weeks ago so that was great news!
That's awesome you got to speak in church this week and ya that is definitely something harming the world today with the youth we don't see things as black and white. The youth like to sit on the fence in the gray area and see what they can do to not harm themselves which is so sad. It just gives satan so much more ability to snatch them when they waver just a little bit. We see it out here in the mission field with other missionaries which sucks but I guess with the Lords work hastening Satan is making it even harder to find our way in this world. We have been talking about that lately in our mission. Our own personal conversion. That is what I am most grateful for in serving a mission, to actually know for myself that this church is true. I dont think I knew that before and I honestly think if any young man who doesn't know that and comes on his mission and can find that for himself and maybe not convert anyone else on the way but if he saved himself it was all worth it. Because later in life he will have a family and he will raise his kids in the gospel and thats how generations will change.  So I've just been thinking lately of what my life would have been if I didnt serve and it scares me what could have happened. Im so happy that I've converted myself.

Celebrating "20" with a little confetti blast

September 22, 2014....

 Hey, I loved that scripture that you sent.  It meant a lot coming from someone else cause I just read that chapter this week and that didn't stick out to me... shows you how much I try to understand Isiah:) The zone conference was at the Fayetteville stake was so amazing.  All the relief societies in each ward for like 4 months were compiling a bunch of stuff from everyone and they had a missionary mall for all us missionaries serving in the Fayetteville zones! So we basically just got a bunch of free stuff! and there was so much stuff... your son was in heaven. It was like being at the DI but everything was free and nicer! So I picked up a new suit, 2 rain/cold jackets a bunch of ties and a bunch of hygiene stuff! It was awesome.
But about the week, this week was a lot better than last week! We had some pretty awesome miracles in finding families! One of these families was a mom and a daughter and 5 years ago they moved to Georgia but before they lived in New Jersey and met and learned from missionaries and they loved them. They called them the "Jesus Boys". And when they moved they told the missionaries to make sure ones in Georgia came and saw them and when they first got hear some came but they weren't home and only left a pass along card with no contact info. Then 5 years went by and none have knocked on her door since!  So when we knocked on her door she freaked out.. which made us super nervous cause at first it looked like she was going to attack us, but then she was so happy and started bringing up things like the Book of Mormon and Moroni and that she went to the Washington DC temple to check out the visitors center! We were shocked, she then set up her own return appt. and made sure we were coming back! So we are stoked to go back and teach them and get them coming to church! Our other miracle is that we got one of our investigators who lives in our same apt. complex on date to be baptized for October 25th! He is super excited. We just need to help him with his word of wisdom issues and he will be baptized! Elder Talbot and I were happy to see success this week with a few of our investigators and hopefully this week we will have a lot coming to church! and who isn't so excited for General Conference!!! 2 more weeks!! It'll be awesome!
 

A little P-day Golfing

 

Ran into Dad's old mission companion, Elder Handekamp

September 29, 2014....

So it was a really good week this week, we got a lot of stuff done. We finally got some people to church! Our investigator, who is on date came with his 2 little girls and he enjoyed it a lot and then we got a part member family that we have been working with for awhile now to come! The member has been coming for 3 weeks now.  He is like 70 and on Sunday he received the Aaronic Priesthood so that was awesome to be apart of.  Then his Daughter came who we are teaching and she brought her little boy who we will be giving a baby blessing to in the next few weeks. But there is a lot of potential in that family so we are excited for them.
I think the big miracle this week is we finally got back in contact with one of our investigators who was on date before but fell off the map because he had a lot going on but we went and visited him on Friday. We were talking more about what we do and he said that he found out that we cant watch TV or listen to music and can't talk to our families and he said there was no way he could do that. We asked him where he found that out and he said he was in Carrollton over the weekend and met the missionaries out there because he was taking them to get some shoes.  So we asked him why he was taking missionaries to get shoes and he said he wasn't but his really good friend was and he was just staying with him over the weekend. I got super excited and asked who the friend was and he said, Tyrus!! I was like NO WAY!! I baptized Tyrus! and showed him the pics on my camera so we were both shocked and then he called up tyrus and we set up a time this week to teach Anthony with Tyrus!! But how cool is that! What a small world it is.  But I'm pretty stoked for that. It was just a great week for us in finding new families to listen to us so hopefully we can be teaching more people this week and see many families coming to General Conference to hear the Prophets voice! We weren't able to see Cindy and her daughter this week cause they had to run out to Arizona to see her husband but we are seeing them this week and they are coming to conference! and Conference will be amazing its like Christmas for us missionaries! I can't wait to see what Holland throws down  this time!

"Bits & Pieces" from August 2014

August 4, 2014......

So this week has been crazy; so much stuff has been happening but I'm finally out of Carrollton! Its crazy to think, but it was super sad to leave and say bye to the members but I'm so excited to be here in Fayetteville! It's amazing here and my comp is so sick we are like twins and we are going to get along so well so I hope me and him can stay together for as long as possible. His name is Elder Vernon and he is from Coleville,Utah and he has been out just a transfer ahead of me. We are just so ready to work. Luckily we do have somewhat of a teaching pool that's pretty nice to work with. But this area is incredible!! There are so many people and so much to do. Ive been in heaven the past few days. It's way different that what I'm used to. It's a pretty big suburb right off of Atlanta. Most everyone in our area is middle class and higher but they are like all black! It's incredible, I'm not used to seeing black people being wealthy and being able to keep a job and raise a family and they are
everywhere here and they still love to talk to you. So I have been loving that cause that just leaves us with more people to be able to keep commitments. But yes, the ward here is so great and missionary oriented. They have one night scheduled when all of the ward missionaries get together with the 3 companionships in the ward and we go on splits and get a ton of work done and we usually have a dinner appt. every night and 1 or 2 team ups everyday and people are so willing to open there homes to our investigators!! We have 3 for next week already lined up with family bringing there friends to be taught!  So I've been in heaven for real! As for a cool story for the week, before I got here they found a mom and her daughter who are both teachers while they were store contacting in target but we went on Saturday to teach them with a member, Bro Attrice.  It was the sickest lesson cause the member and Bonitta (the mom) like hit it off and were being super black with each other, it reminded me of dad when he can get real black and its hilarious but it was a great lesson and they enjoyed it and understood the restoration and the apostasy perfectly. So we are excited for them. They'll most likely get baptized this transfer and we have a lot of part member families we can work with that we are excited for. I am super excited for this area and its gonna be amazing and we will see so many miracles!!
 

Elder Vernon and Elder Anderson ready to convert Fayetteville!

August 11, 2014......

Alright so are you ready for the craziest email that I've ever sent you, cause its going to be a good one! You wont even believe what I have had to go through this week. But first off it was great to see the Forsyeths again, they came up to me after church and gave me some cookies. It was nice, me and the comps enjoyed it! So I guess I'll start with the big news.  Elder Vernon and I are not companions anymore:( but we are still in the same apartment and serving in the same ward! So here's the long story... we were sitting at a dinner appointment and it was about 7:30 at night and we get a call from the assistants saying that President Harding was super sad to split us up but he had a strong impression for us because there were missionaries coming in from another mission that he was going to put with us and that they were going to be dropping them off that night around 9:30!! We were so shocked. We were super bummed too cause were just getting in a zone with things and getting our teaching pool up and now we were going to have to split the area, split up the members and split up investigators and we had like 1 day to do it... but we accepted and were excited for the challenge and so, that Wednesday night we were waiting for them to show up and they didn't come till almost 11pm But Elder Vernons new comp is Elder Hamilton and my comp for the day, was Elder Gebaur. They were going to put him in a different area the next day and I was going to get another missionary already from our mission. And when we showed up we started talking to them and they had a funny accent so we were like what mission are you from? They said the Sierra Leone Mission. The entire mission was shut down because of the Ebola disease that spread like wild fire there. The past week for them has been insane. Basically this is what went down. They found out about 2 weeks ago that they had to leave. But, they were quarantined for 3 days in their houses and could not leave, talk or call anyone and then they got word that no planes were coming in or out of Sierra Leone so the church hired an international S.O.S plane from Japan to get them out of there and they said the government said this was the most watched targeted plane by the government in the past 3 years! So they shipped out 186 missionaries and went to Ghana where they thought that was where they were reassigned but they got there and all the African elders and sisters stayed there and they took everyone else and shipped them out to Portugal where they were reassigned again to other missions around the states and Canada and so 4 of them got assigned to our mission and we are lucky now to have one of them staying in our apartment! Elder Hamilton, who is Elder Vernon's companion now. After they were in Portugal, they went to London and stayed there for 3 days and then came to Atlanta.  These guys were so freaking tired when they showed up with us. It has humbled us a lot cause hearing what their living conditions were like and what they had to go through. I don't think I could have done it and they loved it our there. It's been hard for them to get accustomed to the states again but we are happy to have them.  And so like I said I only had Elder Gebaur for a day and then on Thursday night they were going to put him in a different area and I was to get a new companion again and when we made the switch I found out my new companion is Elder Talbot!! He is a brand new missionary and has been in the field for 1 week! He was serving in the YSA of Fayetteville and they are having me finish his training, so I gave birth to a new baby over night! But I had met Elder Talbot when he first came in and he's dope.  We get along great. He is so ready to work and has that greeny fire so it has definitely been in a crazy week for me. I am now the District leader and 'Im training and I'm white washing the area!! How much fun right?!? haha Its great though cause we are in a 4 man in the apartment and Elder Vernon is there to help with the area and members so it's not to bad. We are now just in the phase of being at the bottom and having to pick everything back up but I'm used to that now.  I've had to do it in every area that I've been in. But as for the district we now have 4 companionships, me and Elder Talbot, Elder Vernon and Hamilton, Sister Sullivan and Sudweeks who are the sister training leaders in our Zone, and Sister Freeman and Alofipo. and Sister Alofipo is a greeny as well! And we all serve in the Fayetteville ward! Pretty crazy, 4 companionships in one ward and they still support all of us and feed us and come on team ups,so its amazing how much the members support us here. Its been fun cause Elder Nelson, my MTC companion is one of the zone leaders here. So its been fun to get to work with him again. But we did get to go to the temple on Tuesday. It was amazing there like it always is to feel the spirit of that place and we had a great zone training. I'm excited for this transfer! It has definitely been a crazy experience but a fun one for sure. This week I was studying about receiving personal revelation and how important it is to receive your own personal revelation for everything that we do. Joseph Smith said "Salvation cannot come without revelation; it is in vain for anyone to minister without it" and "This is the principle on which the government of heaven is conducted by revelation adapted to the circumstances in which the children of the kingdom are placed" and I have reflected on that the past week and knowing that every circumstance that we find ourselves in, if we can put our trust in God and know that he is in control and to just stay positive in every situation and make the best out of it we will be able to lose ourselves in his work and become more like  Him. If we can just all do what Moroni promised us  in the last chapter and deny ourselves of all ungodliness we will be made perfect in Christ!

I love ya'll so much and miss you everyday I hope you have a great day and a wonderful week, but you're right, there is no greater work than what I am doing right now! and I 

couldn't imagine myself anywhere else.  

 

Elder Anderson with Elder Talbot

 

August 18, 2014......

 

So it was  a pretty great week this week! Definitely a lot slower than last week, but we did get a lot of stuff done which was good. We have just hit the ground running trying to find new people to teach and we have found some good success with a few people. One of those being a guy named Anthony who is in his 20's, super interested in the book of Mormon and coming back to church. He had never heard of the church before and is soaking up all the information and is excited to come to church next week. He couldn't come this week cause he had to go out of town. But he accepted a baptismal date for September 13th and was super excited about it. He just wants to get right with God and what better way to do it than in his true church!  We have been working with some part member families which have been going well, one lady, Varieta is so ready to get baptized. She is an older lady and her husband has been a member for like 30 years but she suffers from bi-polar issues and is afraid to come to church so we are just working on getting her ready to come so she can get baptized. One more we found was a man who is an apostolic Pentecostal which is taking Pentecostal and adding more craziness to it. They love that speaking in tongues, but he had never heard of the book of Mormon before and when we came back on our return apt he had read the 2nd half of 2Nephi and stated our doctrine right back to us which was super cool and he believes everything we shared, he just wants to learn more about Joseph Smith but he should be a great candidate only bad thing is he lives with another family and the other family's dad is the preacher of his church... but hey let's just convert the entire congregation!

other than that we just have a few potentials here and there,nothing to exciting, that's what we are going to be working with, a lot this week still is finding some new investigators. I get to go on exchanges this week with Elder Nelson,  my MTC comp, so we are super stoked for that. But a cool thing we do each Monday is there is a  family in the white water ward; the Perkins, and they have a huge house with  everything you could ever want and each week like 20 or so elders go and play ball over there and they feed us and it's super fun. Ill send the pics from that. But its a blast living in a 4 man. Sometimes it gets a little hectic with so much stuff everywhere and dishes getting piled up really fast but its so much fun but, don't worry we don't pile out and we still work hard all the time! Fun fact about my companion, he is a crazy good juggler! He can do everything from 5 balls at one time to juggling knives, clubs, flaming torches, its crazy!! So we have created our juggling team, me, Talbot and Vernon juggles all the time back and forth and passes them around the house and its so fun. I have decided how to get new investigators, we just have to go to Fayetteville square and have Talbot stand on a chair and juggle some flaming torches while I preach the gospel to everyone watching him! Its gonna work! Elder Vernon and I went on exchanges though this week and taught an investigator who is very knowledgeable in the Bible and this was the first time I have ever taught him but Vernon and I have gotten pretty good at our Bible teaching and fixing anti-material so we felt strongly that we had to teach him about the apostasy. Which is my favorite topic to teach. And it was the most perfect lesson I have taught on my mission and definitely one of the most spiritual.  We prepared pretty well for the lesson but it was so cool cause it flowed so smoothly and we were going back and forth point to point scripture to scripture answering all of his come back questions and this was in a members home so the spirit was definitely there and then he asked the perfect question,  if God always called a prophet why didn't he call one after the apostles died, which lead into a conversation we were having before we started the lesson. He and the member, our history junkies, and they were talking about the founding fathers so it was amazing to swing it back to Gods timing and he had to wait for freedom of religion and it was the perfect time to bring back the gospel and he was kinda shocked how well everything fit together. It's just a testimony builder of mine to be able to teach the restoration so much and watch it grow in people's hearts. They see that there had to be a restoration and that God really did call another prophet on the earth!

 

Email sent from a member during the week......

 
Hey Im Kadee (the one that nominated your son to do the ice bucket challenge) and here's the full video!! its just from the start and thought you'd enjoy it!! Elder Anderson is amazing and we are SOO happy he came to Fayetteville. Like he's a life saver and has it down!! ​

https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B4hLP6EO7VIySF9YLXFnWFVpSEU/view?usp=sharing

 

August 20, 2014.......

 

 This week was pretty good, nothing to crazy. We did pick our pool up a little bit. We are just struggling to find those people that are going to progress. We are keeping our spirits up though and having a great time. Elder Talbot has that greeny fire that just keeps us going.  He is going to be a great missionary. He's already mature and know a lot about the doctrine and is now getting used to approaching people and talking with everyone and so I'm basically done training so that's super nice! We get a long great though and being in the 4 man is even more fun! The ice bucket challenge was really fun and now yall have to do it! That story about us getting those helping hands t shirts out and cutting out those trees out of the road was so much fun nothing better than at 9 o clock at night its pouring rain and we got chainsaws going with us just hauling logs away, it was pretty sick. The Sultans are a great family.  Their son just left on his mission to Phoenix Arizona. And as far as teaching went this week it was slower than usual. We had struggles getting to people when they could meet cause something would come up but we have good plans for this week. I did go on exchanges with Elder Nelson (mtc comp) this week and that was amazing to get to serve with him again. He's doing great and killing it out in Griffin as a ZL. But yesterday, we had a cool experience,  a member in our ward put on a  fireside for the whole community and for us to invite anyone we could to. It was about the history of Christianity, or as we like to call it,  the great apostasy. She has been studying it for months now, getting facts and details as much as she could to fit into an hour and a half. But I thought it was amazing! The apostasy has been my favorite topic to study since I've been out here cause if you can have an understanding of the Bible and what Paul taught in all his epistles and how there would be many false prophets and heresies coming about to change the doctrine. And if you can see how the doctrine Jesus taught was obviously perverted and changed for the convenience of man. and the steps that took place from Plato to Constantine to all the reformers like Martin Luther and see how much was really changed from the time Jesus Christ was here teaching the people and how not only on that side of the world was apostasy starting around 200 AD but we see it was a world wide apostasy because in the Book of Mormon in 4Nephi verse 24 its states that in 201 AD the people started getting lifted in the pride of their hearts and very quickly everyone, Nephites and Lamanites fell away and were in darkness! How everyone reviled against Gods true teachings and changed them and for many many years the world was in darkness and people like the reformers were trying to get out of it but it wasn't the right timing. It wouldn't have worked. There needed to be a place of freedom of religion  where God knew the church would be able to stand one last time before the 2nd coming of His Son. and I have grown  to have a  love as well for history, more specifically of this amazing country and what it was founded upon and how we are losing the site of that today. But it really was founded with Gods hand involved. He needed this country, so a young boy in 1820 could question all these different churches and seek personal revelation and answers and to be able to receive that personal witness from our Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ and for him to Restore that Priesthood Authority which had been lost and then to bring back that same organization that Jesus Christ had when he was here and we have the Book of Mormon as evidence of it. It truly is the work of God and I know it to be true. I love this Gospel so much!

 

Elder Nelson and Elder Anderson together again!