December 17, 2012

Hello Family,

 

This week has been pretty good. Yesterday I had an amazing experience. I told you about our investigator named Dolly Davis already I think. It was really cool though because yesterday E. Manwill and myself set a baptismal date with her. We planned on talking about the gospel of Jesus Christ that day which is faith, repentance, baptism, receiving the holy ghost, and enduring to the end. The first two went fine, but when we started talking about baptism you could tell that the spirit was really working hard on her and found a soft spot in her heart. We read Mosiah 18:8-11 and when she read verse 11 she was speechless and just stared at the book with the biggest smile on her face. We talked a little bit more about it and she explained to us that she was ready to change her life. Like the scripture said, she was ready to keep the commandments and come into the fold of Christ. The spirit hit us like a wall prompting us to extend a date to her. We did and she started crying so hard while covering her face. We sat there for like 5 minutes while she attempted to compose herself. Dolly went over to her calendar and marked the date wishing she had a brighter highlighter to make that day stand out even more. It was an amazing experience. Dolly has such a huge desire to be a part of the gospel, it's amazing. She still has a few word of wisdom issues, but she is trying extremely hard to get over it.

Oh, random thought. We tracted for 8.5 hours this week. The most I have done so far. Tracting is way fun. You meet so many cool people, but also some people that are super sketchy. One guy that we ran into this week was from England. He basically told us that he doesn't believe in god, because there is no scientific proof. He also told us to read some book by Christopher Hitchens. We pulled out our book and invited him to read it. Then we promised him that if he read and prayed about it he would know that god was there. He got super insulted by it and started talking about how Joseph Smith was a con-man or something. And talked about how the idea of finding the gold plates in a hole was an absurd lie.

Love you,

 

Elder Udy

December 11, 2012

Hello Family,

 

Sorry I didn't email yesterday we didn't have a chance to do it. So we are doing it today...obviously.

 

My week has been pretty good. On Sunday, one of the wards had an amazing musical number.  The guy sang the version of O Holy Night that we hear every Christmas Eve from Robert Breault (I think that's his name). He did an amazing job, but at the part when he is supposed to go up to the really high note he just stayed at the same one. It was sad, but he had an amazing voice. It reminded me of Christmas Eve.

 

Glad you were able to go to the Messiah fireside. That would have been way fun. This will be the first year in 4 years that I haven't performed the hallelujah chorus. Kinda depressing, but oh well. How do the madrigals sound this year chad? Sorry I won't be able to do the alumni numbers with you this year, I am going to miss out for sure.

 

There is a gospel essentials class that we go to with our less actives and our investigators. Recently we started teaching the Hunter family who is less active in the ward. It's amazing to see how they have grown in faith since we started teaching them. They have been to church the past couple weeks and the dad has started reading on his own. He never reads the things that we leave him, but he is reading and we talk about what he reads in our lessons. Because of him, his kids are getting excited about the gospel as well. The daughter has some sort of minor mental disability so reading and praying are hard for her. The dad said that he was going to work with her on learning how to pray and practice with her. I hope that next lesson she will be able to say the opening or closing prayer. Funny story that happened. Hopefully I didn't tell you this already. We were saying the closing prayer and the family was fighting about who was going to say it and the little boy wanted to, but the dad said that it was his turn. So we started to pray and we sat there for a little while in silence and the next thing we here is the little boy saying: "Do you remember how to start?" It was the funniest thing ever! We laughed for like 5 minutes.

 

Last night I also had a way good experience with our investigator named Dolly. We weren't able to find a member to go with us to that lesson so we couldn't go in to teach her. (we aren't allowed to go inside unless there is another guy home) We did go and say hi to her at least though and SHE had us say a prayer for her and asked us to thank heavenly father for everything she has and her kids and asked us to pray for her to have strength to do well in her job interview today. I was the one she asked to say that prayer and I did my best. When I said amen, she looked at me with tears running down her face and thanked me and us for all we do for her. It was amazing! Also, the previous visit to this one we gave her a blessing that her tooth would stop hurting and I did my first sealing. That was scary to say the least. I probably failed at it, but I will get better...hopefully. She said she was feeling better within the next day or so though so I must have done something right.

 

Um, This last week was my first zone conference. That was pretty fun. It was an 8 hour meeting. President Morby gave us a Book of Mormon for Christmas. I have 4 copies now. woohoo. President Morby also did a lot of instruction on repentance and why, how, and what we are supposed to teach about it, because really that's what we are asking people to do. Repent and be baptized. We can all repent though for the things we do wrong. That's what the atonement is for and that's what we are sharing with people during this Christmas season for a thought.

 

I gotta go now, but check out www.mormon.org/christmas. The church is pushing it hard.

 

Love you lots

 

Elder Udy

 

 

December 3, 2012

Hello family,

I think I know more people in the ward here than I do there just because missionaries have contact with all the ward members all the time. People always come up to us and say hello. It's like I'm important or something...weird.

I miss technology a lot. A member from the ward showed us his new iphone 5 that he got recently. It made me miss my phone, but oh well.

Lately, I have been working on teaching more simply instead of just talking about everything I know about a subject. It's really hard to do that sometimes, because I think of a topic and then in my head it's like I pull up a list of bullet points to go through. So sometimes I confuse people, because they don't understand one of the points and I move on and they get stuck on that point they were confused about. It's tough.

Did you have a chance to listen to the 1st presidency Christmas devotional? It was really cool and the music for that was way awesome. We took our investigator, Dolly Davis, with us and she loved it. As soon as she gets her kids back she will be baptized for sure. She has such a huge drive and motivation to learn as much as she can about the church, because she has been through a lot of crap in her life. Her husband is, for lack of a better word, a dirt-bag and is now in prison all the way in Texas. Long story how she ended up here, but I think heavenly father dropped her here with us for a reason.

Their are quite a few babies in our ward, but I would say mostly we have a lot of toddlers. They can be super funny sometimes. Also, here is the music we are singing in ward choir for Christmas.
The First Noel - Dan Forrest
If this child were born today - Poorman and Poorman
Baby, what you goin' to be - Natalie Sleeth
Star of Bethlehem - Natalie Sleeth
and the woman are singing: Were you there on that Christmas night?

Some good things are going on in the Willamette ward. Although, in the West Linn ward they want to do missionary work, but it feels like it is at the bottom of their priority list. They only have ward council once a month and nobody ever comes to our coordination meeting so nothing gets done. The last couple weeks we have reported all zeros. The Willamette ward is on fire on the other hand though.

Anyway, sounds like you had a good week. I love you all.
Elder Udy

 We did some service on Thanksgiving and found this mini bike cleaning out the garage.

What do you think of this suit?

November 26, 2012

Hello family,

This week has been super crazy. I went on two exchanges this week. One was with the zone leaders and the other was with some other elders. Both of the times I stayed in West Linn with a new companion. It was a lot more responsibility because my companion didn't know the area at all and I was the one that had to decide where to go, what to do, and how to get there. It was a little difficult getting around because we don't have a GPS. All we have are maps. I miss my phone that could just tell me where to go. You probably predicted that would happen right? so did I. The exchanges were a lot of fun nonetheless.

Sounds like thanksgiving was a lot of fun. I spent Thanksgiving at a members house for 2.5 hours. Longest dinner appointment ever!  The food was all really good though. The stuffing had celery in it though, unfortunately. I still ate it though, don't worry. The mom in the family doesn't know how to stop talking. It was pretty much her talking the whole time. The dad finally had to interject and give us a way to end the evening. Otherwise she would have kept talking. After that, we went and hung out at the Ward Mission Leaders house. His house is HUGE and is full of way nice stuff. He doesn't show it and isn't cocky about so that's good. He is the nicest guy ever. One day though he was talking and he said, "Don't judge me by this, but I bought a watch that cost more than this car" and we were in a brand new Escalade. He is such a great guy though and is willing to do anything for us.

I have performed twice with the ward choir. This Sunday we sang, "Look at the World" by John Rutter. It isn't my favorite song, but it's not too bad. We are rehearsing for the Christmas program. We are doing like 8 songs. Luckily this choir is good at sight reading. Sound quality is about the same as any ward choir though. Average age is about 40. We are doing: If this Child Were Born Today, The first Noel, and that's all I remember. Maybe next week I will remember more.

One thing that I thought about this week that I don't think that I have told you about yet is Tiwi. Tiwi is an annoying box we have in our car that yells at us when we go over the speed limit. It is connected to the electrical system of the car. It also gives you violations for speeding, driving aggressively, not putting on your seat belt, and for too many RPM's. It has a GPS in it also so it knows where you are and the mission office can see it and track exactly where we went that day. Tiwi also sends violations to the mission office. Depending on your driving record you can be a green, yellow, or red driver. Obviously green is what you want to be. I don't have driving privileges yet so I can't drive. Elder Manwill gets violations all the time though.

Now one funny thing that happened this week. While we were tracting we found this guy that tried to convince us that drinking H2O2 was good for you and can cure cancer. He also told us about some website called dinarguru.com where he buys money from Iraq and he is waiting for them to revalue their money so that he will become a millionaire and cure cancer. He also showed us and gave us this little bottle that you put into your car gas tank that will increase your MPG by 10%. It's only a 2 ounce bottle and he said it treats like 60 gallons. Also, he talked about drag racing and how it's a family sport and how everyone should start doing it at age 8. Also, he mentioned this guy he knows in Texas. He stated, "He is christian, because he prays" dumbest thing ever. There were a bunch of other things he talked about, but I am tired of typing. we talked to him for 1.5 hours in his garage.

Another thing that happened this week is that I had a double scoop ice cream cone from Baskin Robins for dinner on Saturday.

Today is the start of my second transfer. It's crazy to think that I have already been here for 6 weeks. Where did the time go?

Love Elder Udy

PS. Oh, before I forget. Thank you for praying for me. Something I learned this week is that when we pray for specific things we get specific answers. We are having both wards pray for us by name and some good things are happening because of it. Read 3 Nephi 14: 7-10.

November 19, 2012

Family,

Last week I had to mail on Tuesday, because the libraries were closed due to Veterans Day.

Good to hear that you are doing alright.  Something that I found out is that a couple weeks before I came here, one of the apostles came and spoke to the Portland mission and blessed us with good health. Way cool right?

Sundays are always really loooong. We are at church for about 8-9 hours. Two sacrament meetings with choir in between the two, coordination meeting in the morning, and every other week we have ward council before coordination. It's always a really long day, but this week we had three investigators come to sacrament. super cool. Sometimes the meetings are kinda boring, actually usually they are just like at home. They can be interesting when you pay attention though. After the first sacrament meeting I kinda get tired of just sitting there, but oh well.

I guess I should tell you about the baptism, because it was crazy! We showed up at the church to set up and we found out that the church got double booked with another baptism. Such a Fail! We had to sorta splice the two programs together and the room we did it in wasn't big enough to hold all the people that showed up. I felt really bad for Linda, because it was supposed to be her special day. She still cried for most of the meeting with joy, but still. I had to stand outside the room to free up some seats for others. I still heard though and the spirit was super strong. It was awesome because she wanted to be baptized sooo bad even though she has cancer and is recovering from chemo. Here is a picture.

Also this week we did companionship study with E. Call and E. Wilson at our apartment. My comp. and I had to leave suddenly and the other two elders decided to stay at our apartment to finish their studies. When we came home that night, they had taped a bunch of ties to the ceiling of our apartment. Also, they took a bunch of random pictures of them playing around inside while we were gone. It was funny to come back to. A few days later they came back and cleaned it up luckily. I'll attach pictures.

That's about all that happened. I'm excited for the package. Mail is the best here!

Love you all

Elder Udy

November 13, 2012

Hello Family,

I'll start by attaching some pictures since I remembered my cable.

This is of  Elder Manwill, my current companion, and me sitting in our apartment.

This is me sitting outside our apartment door. Those pumpkins are the ones we carved a few weeks ago. Mine is the one with only one face.

The next one is of our baptism day. Emma is so cool. The adults in the picture are her grandparents. We taught Emma at  their house. Her parents are divorced. and her mom is less active. The dad isn't a member, but after the baptism he came up and thanked us for helping teach her.

These last two are of our area a little bit. This week we didn't have a car, because it was in the shop for repairs. We did a ton of walking and around here there are so many hills that I have to climb it wasn't very fun. One of our appointments was a 1 hr 40 minute walk away. That was fun. We got our car back on Friday though luckily. Those pictures I took during that walk. As you can see there are a ton of trees everywhere just like that. All different colors really close together like that. The picture that is of the valley sorta. Our appointment was across the freeway that you see there.

Oh, duh something cool that is happening right now. I'm actually on an exchange with Elder Wilson right now. I am serving in Wilsonville just for today. We are going to be teaching two lessons to some of their people. It will be cool to get a new perspective on how teaching can be done. I found a way cool scripture the other day that I highlighted a lot. Ether 12:27...Look it up. That's something else that you can send me also. I am tired of only marking my scriptures with my boring red pencil. I known that they have fun colors at Deseret Book. Could you send me some?

I can tell you about this week also. Something fun that I am doing Saturday is having a BAPTISM!!! Her name is Linda Compton. She is 62. I'll tell you more next week.

As you know, we are only allowed to listen to hymns and Motab. I have been introduced to some awesome songs that rock bands have made with the hymns. There is this sweet group called Eclipse that has an amazing version of God is Love and All creatures of our God and King. Chad would love them! You should definitely look them up.

Also, for chad, I was at dinner and when I got there the two kids were totally playing WoW. I was going to talk with them about it, but I decided it probably wasn't the most spiritual topic to bring up.

Next week I will send pictures of other things, but I can only send so many in an email.

Love you all,

Elder Udy

November 5, 2012

Hello Dad/Family,

This week was pretty cool. My companion is the district leader so on Thursday he went to a special meeting and I had the chance to be with the zone leaders (E. Davis and E. Perkins). They are way cool guys! I went and taught three lessons with them to some of their investigators/less actives. We were in a three-some. Also, I have some of the greatest news ever! Yesterday (Nov. 4) I had my first BAPTISM!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! YAY!!!! We baptized a little girl named Emma. She is so cute and has a heart of gold. She was the first person I ever taught. The baptism was super awesome and the spirit was super strong there. I loved it so much and want to do it a million more times! I have pictures and I brought my camera, but I totally forgot my cable today. So next week I will send pictures.

Also, this week I had dinner at a members house and made an awesome connection with her. The mother there went to elementary school with Aunt Margaret. Her name is Amanda Capener (pronounced Cape-ner) I didn't ask for the correct spelling. Way cool to, because she pulled out a picture of her.

Those are basically the highlights of the week. So I'll answer your questions. Yes I wear my raincoat, but only when it's raining noticeably. Meaning that there is constantly mists of rain here when you walk outside. You can't get away from it.

Our primary programs were the first week I was here. This last week was stake conference. We listened to Quintin L. Cook speak. Apparently everyone in Oregon has stake conference on the same day. Weird right?

Our investigators are in different spots right now. There is one couple that I will tell you about. Their names are Kasey and Eva. They live together, but aren't married and have two kids. Kasey isn't baptized and Eva is a Less active. Kasey wants to be baptized really bad, but he can't because he is breaking the law of chastity by living with Eva...way sad! Kasey wants to get married also and said that he received his answer to marry Eva. Eva on the other hand says she is still waiting for a sure sign that she should be married. She has been married before and got a divorce and she says the reason she isn't married now is, because she thinks it's easier this way if things go wrong. We told her to pray about it obviously and explained how to receive answers, but she is still waiting. We also read the conference talk called "start moving" with them that talks about how if you start on a path god will correct you if it's wrong, but if you just sit there and wait god can't direct you.

It's true, we have been very blessed as a family and I know that is, because we have been faithful to the teachings of Christ. When we do what he says, we are blessed.

I haven't eaten all my candy yet. I have to ration it, because I didn't get any on Halloween. It's alright though. I can only imagine how many people came to our house this year. We are in one of those flat, highly populated areas. I bet you were happy to have smarties left, right dad? Nobody came to our door cause we are in an apartment.

Anyway, Love you all. Bye

Elder Udy