Branch is Now a Ward!

I am no longer serving in a branch. As of January 3, the branch is now a ward. It was an amazing switch, and the bishop is experiencing a lot more responsibilities than he had when he was a branch president :j. It is awesome.

Missouri and Arkansas have HUGE firework shows on New Year's Eve...because there are next to no fireworks banned...so we had some crazy fireworks.

We have also had some crazy flooding. I won't go too much in detail, because it REALLY floods down here. I drove for a week straight week because my companion lost his wallet for a time. That was fun having to do 1000 point turns on dirt roads because the area before us was submerged by three feet or so.

We were able to get a less active member to church recently...and he wants to keep coming to church. That makes me so excited.

Interesting Visit...

We OTMed an old guy in his yard. He let us inside the gate, and we talked to him.  He prayed a prayer with us...a specific prayer that he said would "gain us salvation". We started talking to him. Turns out that he's a hardcore priestcraft guy. It was crazy. He said that God has been given him 11 churches to pastor. He says that he's one of the only priests in the world and that the line of authority goes from Jesus to priest to prophet. He thought that every time he entered into a church that Jesus would tell the pastor of that church to turn the church over to him. Well, he shared some "walking on water testimonies" (his words), of which, we know that not a single one of them was true, but one. 

On Sunday he came to our church!!! It was really weird. He prayed his "salvation prayer" with two teachers in our ward. They tried to hold a class, but this man shared these exact same "testimonies" to them. He then went on about the financial stuff of different churches. Well, the teachers tried everything they could to show him what awesomeness this church brings, but he wouldn't listen. He kept on thinking the bishop would turn the church over to him! Anyway, obviously, that didn't happen, but he now thinks he has 12 churches to pastor (which, we found out Sunday, he's been kicked out of at least 10 of them.).

New Area = New Responsibility

It's been a little stressful to be senior companion, but I'm doing great. We're doing a lot of tracting, finding a good place to OTM, etc.

Our "new" ward covers half of the stake. We have a large area, and a small stake. 

My companion is awesome. I've been teaching him how to play chess in the nighttime. It's great.

The "Work" is Moving Along...

We started getting the Young Single Adult (YSA) missionary work moving along, and we are going to work on getting the ward missionary work moving along now, also. It's going to be fun. My companion and I are trying our best to be more obedient, prayerful, etc.

An Elder on Elder Road!

The ward is doing well. We have more investigators there than we do in the YSA Branch, but we are still in a major finding phase. I'm so glad we get 1300 miles on a car this month...and I'm also glad we carpool with the Spanish elders a lot because we need to save miles as much as we can since one of the places we cover is sixty or so miles away from us.

I love being a missionary!

Serving in a Ward and Branch!

My new area is amazing! In the ward we are serving in, we're close to the corner of the boundaries.

The Young Single Adult (YSA) branch we are serving in is a lot more centralized. We have a ton of members (by a ton, I mean, 99% of the branch). All of the members live in Missouri.

We cover two stakes. We stretch all the way into Kansas.

We usually stay in our city, though. We call some of the other elders for investigators/members in the YSA branch, though. Speaking of which, we called some other elders this week, and it was great to speak to one of the elders that trained in the Mission Training Center (MTC) with me.

Working Hard in New Area!

My new area is awesome! There is a place called Fidelity in our area, and Diamond, and Sarcoxie....and, in the Young Single Adult ward there is the whole Joplin Stake and half of the Monett Stake, so we have everything everywhere in the northern part.

I'm serving in two wards right now :j....well, a ward and a branch. There are not a lot of Young Single Adults in this part of the mission, but we're planning on going to Kansas to find some of them.

We're trying to work as hard as we can because neither of us know anyone in our area. We put the ward/branch roster on our GPS, so we know where every member lives. We don't really have any investigators right now.

We hang out with the Spanish missionaries a lot. It makes it easier with the single sisters in our areas because the Spanish missionaries cover the same area as we do and we become able to enter into a single sister's house. It's nice. The Spanish elders have the same ward mission leader as us.

The members are feeding us a lot! They have my birthday covered already. The best thing about this area is...we have unlimited popcorn!!!!! I love popcorn! It's delicious.

We live in a duplex :D. It's nice, big, and comfortable. We have two bathrooms, a large study room, etc. No mountains....it's actually pretty nice.

I love this mission. It's amazing!

The Beginning of the End...of the Oklahoma Tulsa Mission!

This week has been absolutely spectacular!

I am no longer going to be in the Only True Mission (effective July 1st). Before I get into the details of this, let me start at the beginning (or rather, a little closer to the beginning.

Our outgoing mission president has set some mission-wide goals for his last ten weeks. We are on week 4 right now. The goals are as follows:

Week 1: Two new invitations for Baptism including a "Map to Baptism" in each area (180 new Baptism dates in the mission. The record is 300 in a week).

Week 2: Use the "My Family" booklet at least 3 times every day (1,890 uses in the mission this week)

Week 3: One Active Member Lesson/day + 2 referrals/day (630 AML and 1,260 referrals)

Week 4: Three new investigators this week. (270 new investigators. Record: 300)

Week 5: 100% Member Present Lessons + Two new Baptismal Dates (180 dates set)

Week 6: Five OTMs daily. Finding Hour: 4pm-6pm (3150 OTMs for the week)

Week 7: Standard of Excellence in EVERY AREA (20 lessons, with 12 of them member present, 4 RCLAs, 4 Others; 2 baptismal dates; and 2 new investigators)

Week 8: Three Investigators at church (270 new investigators at church....it would break the record.)

Week 9: Two New Baptismal dates for the week.

Week 10: Double the Standard of Excellence in your area.

We are working A LOT to try to prepare for these next 6 weeks. It is intense! It has been very fun, too.Our ward is doing very well.

Our outgoing mission president is going to end his mission very strong, and with enough momentum to help our incoming mission president with the mission.  BUT not only that, our outgoing mission president is going to end the OTM mightier than it has ever been, and the Only True Mission is going to begin Almighty's Best Mission with a fantastic start.

I am so glad to be able to end the mission strong, and I am going to begin this new mission even stronger. The Arkansas Bentonville Mission is going to be a new beginning for each of the 200 missionaries here. It is going to be magnificent.  I am so excited to be a part of this. So excited.

My companion and I are trying to work together to become more united to end this mission, and it is going to be so cool. I cannot wait for the Arkansas Bentonville Mission to begin.  To add to my excitement, I saw my first fireflies in the mission yesterday!!!!! It was so amazing :D.

I am so excited for this whole thing.

Active Ward, Small Area, Flat Terrain, Tornado Warnings!

I am now serving in a ward that has a 90% member activity.  The chapel is actually pretty packed on Sundays. 

We're the smallest biking area (the smaller areas have zone leaders or sister training leaders, so they have cars :p).

My new area is very flat. We have had a TON of tornado watches and tornado warnings. We even saw the sky turn purple (Purple equals a bad storm. Green equals tornado, from what I've been told.). 

The elder I replaced is in Kansas right now, so he is probably going to see a couple tornadoes (Kansas is notorious for them.). I really want to see a tornado.

Transfers...New Area Information

My companion is being transferred to serve near our mission headquarters.

I'm being transferred to a ward in a city directly east of our mission headquarters. I'm replacing one of the elders who was in the MTC (Missionary Training Center) with me.  My new ward covers a very tiny area because the church is really strong in that city.  I'm also excited because it is more likely to get tornadoes.

My new companion and I graduated from the same high school, but in different years.  He is about a year ahead of me in the mission.  His mom and grandma have worked alongside my mom in community and/or church responsibilities.  (It is a small world!)

Final Recap of the Area

1. We were able to get the "Non-prayer" guy  I told you guys about, to pray 3 times this transfer. He is going to pray for us again because we are both leaving, and he is going to pray for the next missionaries, too! It is awesome. 
2. We were able to come back into contact with an investigator, who we thought had dropped off of the face of the planet. We weren't able to contact him for a while.
3. We are making wonderful progress with another investigator.

Ward vs. Branch?

I am excited to go to a new area/district/zone. It is awesome. I'll be serving in a branch instead of a ward (that'll be weird). It will be smaller than the ward in which I have been serving, which has gotten way bigger in church attendance. We had 130 people there last Sunday.