Well this week was bitter sweet. Found out Monday I was leaving Mankato to go to Rochester and so that day I started to pack and did some other stuff and then we biked around to our appts that we had and I said goodbye to Peter Tut. Ya it was good and then Tuesday I spent most of the morning packing and ya said goodbye to a few people and had Institute that night which was a good way to end my time in Mankato! Ya Wednesday at 8:30 me and another elder who was getting transferred headed off to Bloomington and ya then we got all of the stuff switched and I took off with two other elders down to Rochester in my new minivan so that is cool. I am happy to have a minivan to drive. But ya we got down here and did a bunch of dropping stuff off and then there are a set of sisters who are white washing into our ward and opening a new area so that night we had dinner with a member and a less active who made some Fried Chicken and it was good. Then we went and met with the ward mission leader and then we went and met with the Relief Society and that was good but ya this is a different place it is a bigger city so different then Mankato so it is an adjustment! but ya highlights for the rest of the week there was this workout app that got approved called 7 min workout and it is good it is a great workout. It is nice it helps me get much better workouts in the morning for sure! But ya we were really busy this week meeting with all kinds of people
On Thursday the Cambodian elders came down from Bloomington for the day to help us out with some Cambodian people down here and we went to this less active Cambodian family and he made us so much food. I have never eaten so many egg rolls in one sitting in my life, but they were super good. It was great and then we went round with them the rest of the day. It was good. The rest of the week was busy we had all kinds of stuff to do with the zone and paperwork that was done before it had to get done and then we had lessons with people and it was good. I am still trying to grasp this area but it has been a good week. We had one investigator to church and that was good and I bore my testimony and this is a really good ward we have two sets of missionaries here and each of us has a dinner this week everyday. It is awesome! I have never seen that happen so that is cool everyone lives so close it is nuts compared to Mankato where our ward boundary was like 6 times or more the size of it, but it is good.
In my studying this week! I don't have a scripture to quote but there is a member who gave us this paper from her mission that is about becoming a sacred missionary and it had 3 sections, social missionary, honorable missionary, and sacred missionary. Then a bunch of different aspects of missionary work and a description of how each missionary acts and it was really good. Right now we are focusing, as the leadership in the mission, on changing the culture in the mission and this helped me. It was good. He says at one point in the paper that people rarely live above their commitment level of their mission and man that hit me because your whole life is a conversion process so if you don't try now then you probably won't be trying much harder later in life. It is very possible, but not super likely. If you try your hardest now to fulfill your purpose and to come closer to Christ you will have those habits for the rest of your life. You will just continue to grow closer and closer all your life and will become even more converted. But ya it is great I know I have changed on my mission, but I cannot be content with just those changes I need to push myself to grow and change even more then I already have. So that I will continue to change and progress for the rest of my life! I love this gospel and the endless possibilities of growth it presents to our lives. Well I hope you all have a great week! That is all till next week.
Love
Elder Howe
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| me and Peter Tut |
So this week was just an absolutely great week we had a ton success! Highlights from the week on Monday we had 3 lessons that night so that was great and we found two new investigators. Tracting the guy who let us in name is Papis he is from West Africa and he let us right in and then went and got his roommate Nick and we taught both of them and got a return appt with them. Papis is Muslim so that will be interesting, but super nice guys college students. They have potential. Then we had a great lesson with our investigator Marcus about prayer and at the end of the lesson he prayed out loud and so that was fantastic! It was great. That was the first time he had done that so it was great! Ya then Tuesday we found 2 more new investigators who names are Debbie and Shannon we tracted into Debbie a few days before and got a return appt and brought a member so we could get in. Then we taught them Tuesday and it was a great lesson and we got a another appt with them for Friday so that was good! Then we went to dinner we biked over there and then we ended up not having rule of 3 and this was at 7 at night and so she gave it to us To Go and we didn't tell her we were on bikes so we just put all the food in our bags and then biked to Institute which we weren't planning on doing, but we did and then ending up eating dinner at 8:45 at night. A long day, but a good one!
Wednesday was good we found another new invigilator whose name is Levi so that was good! The Next big day was Friday we taught Bernard in the morning and that was a great lesson we left him a talk to watch by President Monson and then he watched like 3 or 4 of them and he loved it. So that was cool but he is way ready and set for the 5th of March! Then we did paper work and calls. That night we taught Shannon and Debbie again and had a great lesson with them and then booked it over to our next lesson after them with our Hispanic guy investigator named Chyanne! It was good with him we had a member with us and we talked about the Sabbath day and got him to commit to church hopefully for every week now and he won't let homework get in the way of coming to church! Ya then that night we stopped by a Less Active and got in with her and her son who is 9 who isn't baptized so that was great and they accepted weekly appts with us, but we are giving them to the other elders because they ended up living in their area not ours so that was good!
Ya Saturday we had soccer and Bernard had his baptismal interview so that was great! He passed! Then we did some stuff and that night we were all having dinner at a less active's house that we usually alternate having dinner at on Saturdays, but they had all the elders and the bishops family and the sisters and the relief society president and her husband over and it was good they made some really good pulled pork so that was good! I have eaten with them pretty darn near close to every Saturday in this area so I said goodbye to them because I was told that morning that I was getting transferred just not to where yet. It was good. She always gives the elders who they get close to something to give to their moms so I have an odd trinket to give to mom from her, but it was good! To top off a great last week in the area on Sunday we had two investigators to church Chyanne and Bernard so that was great! Then Peter Tut who we have been trying to get to stay for all 3 hours of church stayed for all 3 hours so that was great it was a great last Sunday in this ward I love! But ya it was great week probably the most successful week I have had in a long time. Here is our final tally for the week!
It was a great week. A great way to leave this area I am glad I have been able to make a difference in this area and help it grow to become better it is great!
This week I was doing the Christ like attribute activity in Preach My Gospel and decided I wanted to study more about Charity and love and increase my charity and love and I read they Bible Dictionary definition and I liked it a lot. It says:
"The highest, noblest, strongest kind of love, not merely affection; the pure love of Christ. It is never used to denote alms or deeds of benevolence, although it may be a prompting motive"
So that hit me the highest noblest kind of love. That just described it perfectly to me because it is the pure love of Jesus Christ and what can be more noble and high then that nothing really and so I have focused a lot on my mission on Charity toward everyone because I want to have that Christ like love for all that I meet and all that I lead and teach! So I continued to study why charity is important and read Moroni 7:46
"46 Wherefore, my beloved brethren, if ye have not charity,ye are nothing, for charity never faileth. Wherefore, cleave unto charity, which is the greatest of all, for all things must fail"
So I realized 2 things from this one that hit me this time reading this scripture
1. Without charity I am nothing if I don't strive to have it I am nothing so I need it almost more then anything else, I need it!
2. Charity never faileth that means never. If we have it and are consistently striving to have it with us and continually pray to have more charity then it won't matter what happens in life because that will never fail us and we will be happy because no matter what other things fail, and it says all things must fail, it won't fail us we will love the people around us and still be happy. To me that meant that no matter how many doors are slammed, no matter if we get dropped by our investigators, no matter if we aren't having any success if we have charity we will be happy and we will have success eventually! So I am striving even harder to have more charity. I am praying for it with all energy of heart. I am glad for the PMG attribute activity and how it allows me to continually improve and everyday become more like our Savior Jesus Christ i invite you all to do the attribute activity in chapter 6 of Preach my Gospel and then pick one that you want to work on and improve on and become better at and then do it! It is great.
Well this is my last time emailing from Mankato I will miss this place a lot. It was great being here I have grown a lot here and I have grown to really love the people here, but i will go where the Lord needs me to go and be what he needs me to be. It is onward to new experiences! It will be great I can't wait!
Well that is all till next week
Love
Elder Howe
So this past week was a great week. So highlights from the week! On Monday we actually had some time to relax so that was great and we had dinner and an FHE at a members house the Bairs and we had just heard earlier that day that you could pierce a Ballon with a wooden stick from the bottom and the top so we tried that there and it worked. I have two videos of it I will send home it was cool! and they have one of the sister's investigators over every time as well so we taught her and then after we went and picked up a YSA in the ward to come Joint teaching with us to our investigator Marcus at 8 and we went and it was a great lesson with him! On Tuesday went down to another district's district meeting it a town called Fairmont and after the meeting we exchanged with the elders there and it was good we went around their small town and it was a good day we sat in this hard core smoker's house for like an hour and I was glad I had my rain coat on so it could soak up most of the smoke smell from his house. It was bad, but it is all good. I am used to it now.
Wednesday we went back to Mankato and had our district meeting and that was good and then as a district we went to this Mongolian grill and it is a way good place to eat. It was good then we went and helped someone move some stuff into a u-haul storage unit and it was good! Then the rest of the week Thursday night we met with this guy named Chad who we met with twice before last month and he called us and we went and saw him that night and it was a really bold lesson we just testified about Jesus Christ and his Atonement and how it is the only way. I was thinking of what we could leave him to read and I scrolled down through my Book of Mormon and Enos stuck out to me and so I was going to say and leave that one. So I said can we leave a chapter with you to read and then my comp said I will mark one for you and I didn't tell him what it was that I was thinking and and then he gave him Enos to read so I know that Enos is what he needed to read and the Spirit was really working through me!
Friday we met with our investigator Bernard in the morning and we talked about his baptism date and we had to move it to the 5th of March and he is committed now. He knows what it takes to be baptized and we taught the Word of Wisdom and he told us he had been living it his whole life and not even knowing it. He said he has never wanted to put something in his body that would harm it or become dependent on. He is the most prepared person I have met on my mission he just knows it is all true and loves it and it is great to see! Friday also had a ton of planning to do and paper work and it was busy and we had to get the oil changed in the car and we were just super busy. We met with our investigator his name is Chyanne and we brought Bro Bair in the Ward and we taught him the Word of Wisdom and it went ok. He has been drinking coffee since he was 3 so that will be a hard thing to give up, but ya hopefully he can do it! We had dinner at the Cosper family in our ward that night and it was good they are a cool family. We are trying to start teaching the active members the lessons because there was a general authority who came to the mission in the Anoka stake and he said that if you have the missionaries over to teach you the lessons by the second lesson if you are thinking of people who you can share it with you will have a name come to your mind! What a great promise. So we are trying to work more through the members now it will hopefully go great!
On Saturday we had our usual meeting in the morning and then we played soccer and it was good! Then we went on an exchange with the other elders in the ward and I went to their area so I was biking for the day and it was good we talked to a few people and ya it was a good day. Sunday was good Bernard cam to church and that was great! Then we had an ok night that night! but it is looking to be a great week we have a lot of things set up already we will hopefully have one of the best weeks I have had in along time. The work is going great in this area and I am grateful for the chance I have had to see it grow from virtually nothing to lots of teaching. It is great to see this is the last week of the transfer and so it could very well be my last week here in Mankato so i am trying to make sure it will be my best, but I only have 6 months left on my mission and it is crazy that I only have that much left because that is less than I have been here in Mankato. I was reflecting on my mission because I was doing an interview with a newer missionary and I was talking about how we need to let our missions go though us and not us go through our missions and I was thinking how I have changed on my mission and I was thinking of a talk that since I heard it has played a huge role in my life it is the "What Lack I yet" talk given in conference the principle of asking the Lord what lack i yet has been in place since Christ was on the earth the young ruler asked in Matthew 19:20, 'The young man saith unto him, All these things have I kept from my youth up: what lack I yet?"
I had made changes to myself before i heard this talk and really grasped the principle, but once I learned how I could use this I have really made some more changes and I am grateful that I can ask the Lord how i can improve and he can tell me because I am just constantly trying to improve more and more every day. I still have 6 months left to grow and become who the Lord needs me to be and it won't stop there I ask the Lord every night what can I do to be better. "what lack i yet" because I want to continually be improving every day of my life for the rest of my life. This is what the gospel is all about! I love it and am grateful for the corrective council of the Lord! Things are going great here and I love it! I hope everyone is doing good and I invite you all to have the missionaries teach you the lessons and try and think of who you can share it with and take it with great prayer! You will find people for you and the missionaries to teach we all have people prepared for us to find to help teach and baptize. Not just the full time missionaries. So find those people who are prepared for you with the missionaries help!
till next week have a great week!
love
Elder Howe
So this week was a cold one but good one. On Monday we had a normal but busy p-day like I said last week we went to Pizza Ranch to compete in eating and we tied at 28 pieces each so ya I was full and then we had all kinds of stuff to do and I got a haircut because I was tired of my bike helmet messing up my hair and making me look bad. So I buzzed it all off before our bike week started so ya and then that night we had to go to the church to do paperwork and that was good. We had all kinds of stuff to do so it was good to catch up on all of it. Then we biked home form the church which was fun it is down a big hill then back up the other big one that we live on so it was good!
Tuesday morning we had a tri-zone meeting up in Lakeville so we had to leave at 7:15 and it was good to go back up to Lakeville that is the building we met in in Farmington so it was good. That is an area where I really started to change a lot and grow so it was cool to go back. It was great to see other missionaries again. We gave a training on the fundamentals of missionary work. Mainly on our purpose of being a missionary and inviting people to be baptized and it went well I think I love giving training now it is fun. I enjoy it a lot! I like studying for them and then giving them to everybody! Who would of thought those words would of come out of my mouth! It was a good day we got back and then did some stuff and had dinner and then biked around. We had some appts fall through, but then we went to institute which was good. We got a ride back to the apt so that was really good because then we didn't have to bike up the hill! But ya hmm so highlights for the rest of the week because I feel like going through day to day might get a little dry. We had a Stake meeting on Wednesday night and that went well we had a new sheet to fill out and it laid out all of our key indicators from Sept when we opened the Zone to now and it is awesome to see how much progress we have made as a zone we have gone from the most "dead zone" to one of the currently most progressing it just shows it doesn't matter where you are God prepares people for us to find teach and baptize as long as we put our faith and hard work in! It is amazing I love it! Thursday we went on an exchange with some elders in the zone I left our area and went to a small town called Waseca and it is a small branch probably average attendance of 20 max and like 60 people maybe on the records total. So a small area that struggles a little, but those elders just reopened the area and it was good. We got a lot of service set up for them and the Elder I was with has only been out 1 transfer and has had some issues and we had a really good interview together. I love being able to help people out and help them enjoy their mission more and use it more to the fullest extent and love it for what it is! But it was good. Only notably thing on Friday is we had long planning day and we went out to bike it was only to be for an hour and a half and I forgot to put thermals on and it was cold my legs were freezing never again. It was probably like 10ish degrees without windchill so ya never again. but ya.
Saturday was good a day we had coordination meeting and played soccer! Then we had a productive day we had 3 appts at 6 7 and 8 that all came through and we committed one of our investigators to a date on march 12 his name is Chyanne and to come to church. the other one Marcus we had a good Law of Chasity lesson and he committed to live it and to come to church. Then at 8 we had an appt with a new less active part member family we met and had a good lesson with them and they said we could come by weekly so that was great! We got 2 new investigators there. It was -8 windchill while biking so that was fun it wasn't too bad I had thermals on this time so ya that was good . Sunday was great we had 2 investigators to church so that was awesome and a less active we are working with came as well! So it was great and the sisters had people to church so it was a great day at church! That night was ok we got one appt in so that was good. The work is going great right now. I love how far this area has come since I got here we had no one when I got here now we have 7-10 investigators to teach and like 6 less active we are working with so it is awesome!
This week in my studies I was reading in Alma and I was in Alma chapter 43 and the Nephites and Lamanites are fighting and the Nephites push them back and then they chase them and meet them again and it says the Lamanites started to fight like they never had never before with confidence "like dragons" and they were starting to have success and then verse 45 says this
45 Nevertheless, the Nephites were inspired by a better cause, for they were not fighting for monarchy nor power but they were fighting for their homes and their liberties,their wives and their children, and their all, yea, for their rites of worship and their church.
Although the Nephites at that moment were being beaten it didn't matter because in the end they were fighting for the righteous cause which means God will be on your side and he will strengthen you in the end. Captain Moroni reminded them of their cause and they win! While studying this I realized how well it relates to the world today. If Satan is the Lamanites right now he is fighting more powerfully then he ever has before and has had some success, but we as member of the church know our purpose and have a greater cause and soon no matter how hard Satan fights we can overcome him because our cause is greater and God will strengthen and up lift us in our battles as long as we are continually remembering our cause and applying it in our lives! I love this gospel and know it is true. The Book of Mormon is scripture and it will strengthen us in the crazy world that we live in today.
Well that is all this week till next week remember to open your mouth and share the gospel!
love
Elder Howe
This week was a good week. One good reason was because it was our car week yay! But ya Monday we had a good p-day I need more pants and I got 2 pairs for 8 bucks at a thrift store so that was great! We had dinner that night and the next day we were supposed to be going up to Bloomington for Mission Leadership Conference and we heard that there was a storm coming in, but we figured we would be good. We had a lesson with our investigator Marcus that night at 8 and it went well he has a really hard time understanding the Book of Mormon when he reads so we read with him. It went well. He is slow moving, but he has potential! Then after his appt we got a call from one of the APs saying we would have to Skype into MLC because of the storm and that was a little frustrating. Skyping into meetings is not that good because we don't have access to great WiFi at all. So ya it wouldn't be super great! But then we were told that we could just call President at 7 in the morning and see if he would let us go so I exercised faith and woke up early so I would have time to shower and eat before we called President just in case he said yes. I got out of the shower looked at the phone and we got a text that said the meeting was canceled all together. So ya that was too bad and then that day it snowed a ton. It was a blizzard. Good winds and lots of snow it started at 9:30ish and was going hard until like 1ish and at that point it was still snowing just lighter with less wind. We did as much as we could in the apt with the phone and area book and then suited up and went out in the snow which was falling decent. I have a video, but we chose a place to walk to and we started we hadn't even left the parking lot yet when I slipped twice caught myself once not so lucky the second time, but I was fine we talked to 3 people and had some good interactions and shoveled a lady's walk who was a her mom's house and then got her address to shovel her walk. She hasn't been to her house for 3 months so it will be a lot of snow we will see how that goes! But ya we didn't even get to where we were planning on walking to, but it was good time spent before we had to turn around to make it back in time for dinner. We set an appt up with this former investigator name Chad and we called the APs and got are car ungrounded so we wouldn't have to bike out to his place and we went and there was some way deep snow drifts in front of his house like almost above my knees I have a a pic but it was crazy and it was an interesting lesson he is a guy that is gay(we found that out about halfway through the lesson) and he just kept complimenting me and telling me how smart I was and saying I was intense it was super weird I am pretty sure I got hit on by a gay guy it was a good lesson, but weird. I don't know what to do about that one.
Tuesday was a crazy day full of snow! Wednesday we had our district meeting and it had stopped snowing so that was good! Not a ton happened that day, but we met with a new less active we hadn't met with before or anyone in the ward had met before and it went well and after we had left he called us and said he wanted to come to church so that was awesome! He seemed like he is ready to come back! Then we played basketball that night. So the MLC which was supposed to be on Tuesday got rescheduled for Thursday so in the morning at 7:15 we took off for Bloomington and it was good I love going to mlc it is just great we are talking a lot about changing the mission culture right now and how we as leaders set the tone for that and what ways we can more effectively do that. So I know there are a lots of things I can do better so I am trying to be the most consecrated I can be to help our mission be the best and the work progress the best possible. The meeting is great and then after we went on an exchange with the Fairbualt elders and that went well. I went to their area and it was good!
The rest of the week. On Friday we found a lost sheep Hispanic guy. We found him and then we went to our appt with him and he told us he was baptized and that was crazy and then ya he had to think about whether he would let us find his records. So ya, but then Bernard are investigator came to soccer, but then not church. The less active we met with came and enjoyed it so that was great! It was a good week. Today we have a lot to do and the greenie elder thinks he can eat more then me so today we are going to Pizza Ranch, a pizza buffet, so i can show him how to really eat!
A scripture I really liked this week actually came from my studies today!
Alma 37:41 Nevertheless, because those miracles were worked by small means it did show unto them marvelous works.They were slothful, and forgot to exercise their faith and diligence and then those marvelous works ceased, and they did not progress in their journey;
So he was talking about the Liahona and Lehi and his family and how it is by the small and simple things that it works and then later in the chapter he says this,
44 For behold, it is as easy to give heed to the word of Christ, which will point to you a straight course to eternal bliss, as it was for our fathers to give heed to this compass,which would point unto them a straight course to the promised land.
So the scriptures are our Liahona and all we have to do to get eternal bliss or eternal life. Then all we have to do is the simple things we have to do CPR (church pray and read) and as we do the simple things we will be able to stay on the path and it isn't hard it says it will be easy. If we are doing the simple things it will be easy it won't be hard to obtain eternal life!
Well I hope that all is well and you all have a great week remember to not be afraid to open your mouth!
love,
Elder Howe
