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3/20/17
Hey everybody!!
I hope everyone's week was a good one and you all had a fantastic St. Patrick's Day!! We had a great day and wore green ties that my mom sent us. We were told why we celebrate St. Patrick's Day by a drunk man in Olde Town Arvada!! Apparently, we celebrate it because "St. Patrick was a Christian" :)
The week was really good! Lots of stuff happened, so I think I am going to do the highlights like I did last week.
So on Monday was our zone P-day!! Elder Eldredge and I were in charge! We got everything set up for our Quidditch game and then waited for everyone to show up with their brooms. It turned out to be super fun! And super tiring. Everyone in the zone seemed to really like it and I think it will be pretty memorable for them, so we were happy about that.
On Tuesday, we went on exchanges with the Elders in the 3rd ward. I was with Elder Holtry in the 3rd ward area. We had a really good day together. Elder Holtry is super funny and an awesome guy. We did a lot of walking, because they don't have a car, so by the end of the day if felt like we had done a good days work. That night when the two companionships came back together, we all talked about our day. Elder Edlredge and Elder Wagner had had a good day too, in our ward area, and had set up some good appointments for Wednesday.
On Wednesday, we did a lot of contacting and tracting. That morning, we were able to meet with this really awesome investigator named Less, who broke his toe and now had ample time to meet with us! We taught him about the Plan of Salvation. After seeing him, we held a meeting with the District Leaders in our zone. We talked about things we could do to improve and keep moving forward, and it felt pretty effective. We bought Little Caesars for all of us afterwards and had a quick "lunch party."
The big event on Thursday was at the end of the day, where I actually had my very first baptismal interview! [Someone who wants to be baptized is "interviewed" to make sure they really want to be baptized and that they have a good understanding of our beliefs and will commit to keeping the commandments] It was with a really sincere investigator named Anthony, who had actually already gone through 4 other baptismal interviews, but was unsure of where his testimony stood of Joseph Smith and the current prophet. As we first started talking I took some time to get to know Anthony and see what his story was. Then he brought up his concerns I guess that he always had had. I tried to work with him through all of the questions and save the questions he had concerns over until the end. When we did get to them, we talked a lot about them and I bore my testimony of Joseph Smith as a prophet, and of Thomas S. Monson as the current prophet. The spirit was very strong in the room. At the end, we decided to postpone his baptism again until he could receive a more solid answer and a stronger testimony. It was tough to postpone it, but I was super happy with how the interview went.
The biggest event on Friday was again near the end of the night! We taught a guy named Tyler, who is in the YSA [young single adult] ward. We were able to have a great conversation with him about what his concerns were moving forward and were able to set some goals to help him work towards baptism! It was a great lesson!
Saturday was a pretty packed day, but the biggest thing that happened was a lesson we had with the Gabaldon family, who's daughter Julia was scheduled to be baptized next Saturday. We taught them about prophets, and then were trying to set things up with them about Julia's baptism. Well Angel, the mom, told us that she didn't think Julia could be baptized on Saturday! Nooo! She told Julia that she had to be living all of the commandments more in her life, and she thought Julia was struggling being a good sibling and child with commandment number 5 [honoring her mother and father.] We were all bummed, but hopefully this will make Julia work harder towards the commitment of baptism. The other fun thing that happened on Saturday was tracting in (we didn't realize it until later) a retirement community for 2 hours!! We talked to a lot of sweet, but not super interested, older people. They were super fun though! That night, we had dinner at the Chili Bowl for our ward.
Sunday was pretty standard. We were able to see Julia and another investigator at church, who we totally didn't expect to come. We had a solid block of church all the way until 4:30pm, had dinner, contacted some people, then we came home and ended for the night.
Overall, it was a pretty great week! We are super excited for the upcoming week as it is the last week of this transfer.
I hope you all have a fantastic week moving forward! I love you all!!
Elder Bird
Elder Eldredge and I made quick work of the puzzle my mom sent
3/13/17
Hey everyone!!
I hope everyone has had a great week! We definitely did in the "St. Arvada" zone here in Denver!!
We had a great week. My companion and I are trying to get set up for an awesome "zone p-day" today, so I have only a little time to give an update, so here are the highlights!
We had a car fast on Tuesday [this is where they don't use their car for a day]. It was weird to go without our truck for a day, I have gotten so used to it. But we did some good work on our bikes! Elder Eldredge's helmet made him look like a "Goomba" [a character from Mario Brothers].
We picked up and started teaching a new investigator this week! His name is Matt, and he is dating someone in the church. He was a referral that we got from a member in Utah. The interesting thing is, Elder Eldredge and his previous companion had actually accidentally tracted and ran into this guy before he was referred...and he was not interested. And now, we are teaching him because he is dating someone in the church. How crazy is that??
On Friday, we started teaching a guy named Keith that we had tracted and found a while back. It was such an awesome lesson! We were out with him while he was walking his cat around his apartment complex. We walked with him and his cat, and ended up in some "wooded glen". We talked about the Book of Mormon a ton and how it helps us learn about Jesus Christ. He told us not to "spoil it" for him, and so he doesn't know where Lehi and his family will land after thy build their boat (spoiler alert, it is America). It was so awesome!!
On Saturday, our zone volunteered at a city event for St. Patty's day that they asked us to help out with. We went, and were asked to stop people from leaving the event with alcohol (it was good Word of Wisdom work!) It ended up being pretty fun as we talked and laughed with a bunch of people. Some guy was even super nice (he had worked with missionaries before) and gave us some money! We used it to buy some ice cream at the festival, and Elder Eldredge bought a flavor called "Leprechaun Poop." He said it was pretty good!
Finally, the last cool thing was a zone leader meeting that we went to last night. Our Mission President gathered the zone leaders together and we discussed what was going well and what wasn't in the mission. And then what we could do as leaders to help the missionaries. We also talked about the administrative work that we have to do, which was awesome. During the meeting, I was asked to bear my testimony on anything that came to my mind. I felt impressed to speak on humility. I said a few words about how much the Savior could have done with the power he had, but instead had the greatest impact on the human race through his meekness and humility and ministry to individuals, one by one. It has been cool to be a leader in the mission and to see how much we could do with the power given to us, but have to humble ourselves, to be beneath the missionaries we serve, to have a greater impact on them.
Anyway, that was pretty much the big moments from our week! I love it out here and am so happy to be serving and feeling the support from all of you back home. I hope you all have great weeks moving forward!!!
Thanks so much!!
Elder Bird
3/6/17
Hey everyone!!
Happy March! I hope all is going well and that your last week has been a good one! Elder Eldredge and I definitely had a good, but interesting week!
So the week started with a pretty good P-day after emailing! We went from emailing at the library to sports. We had most things prepped already for the week and Elder Eldredge and I started brainstorming for the "Zone P-day," which is next week. This will be a P-day where the whole zone gets together and does something super fun, and we are in charge. We had gotten requests to have a game of Quidditch, so we were trying to figure out how to play (because neither of us really knew). We played some volleyball and basketball and then a game of (my homemade version) of Settlers of Catan. A sister missionary from our zone got into a little fender bender that day, so after dinner we went over to their apartment to give her a blessing. She was okay aside from being shaken up. She asked me to give the blessing, which I did, and then we headed out to work for the night. We tried to visit with a bunch of different people before heading home to end for the night.
Tuesday was spent mostly tracting and trying by some people we hadn't seen in a while. We met a nice guy named Kyle who said we could come back! He was even YSA age, [YSA = young single adult 18-30] which was pretty awesome. Later that night we met with some investigator teenagers who were coming to Mutual [youth activity]. They enjoyed mutual, and then after we met with them and talked to them a lot about baptism. Julia, a 13 year old girl, said that she wanted to be baptized! Micheal, the 14 year old, said his only hang up was that he liked drinking coffee too much. After some discussion on it, he told us that if we got him some hot chocolate, he would switch over (easy peezy!). We set a goal for both of them to be baptized on the 25th of March, which is the last week of the transfer. We are super excited for them!!
On Wednesday, we went on exchanges with another set of elders in the zone who are kind of struggling with the work. Elder Eldridge and I wanted to see if we could help them with it and give them some training. So I went with one of the Elders from the Standley Lake Ward, and Elder Eldridge went with the other. The Elder I was with, was a little quiet and apprehensive about talking to people. He also was struggling with staying motivated to tract or street contact. So I was excited for the exchange and to see what I could to help! That morning, we went We talked about as missionaries how could we help people attend church and prepare for baptism. WE tracted for about 4 hours before dinner that night, with an appointment in between with a less active member named Harold. Tracting was great! This Elder was a bit shy at first, but by the end of our time together he was participating and leading in door approaches! Our appointment went well too. After dinner, we tracted, even more! It was a solid day of work. I ended the day talking with him about how things were going for their companionship and why we had gone on exchanges with them. We talked a lot about his companionship and things that were happening with them. I asked him to commit to working hard and to push themselves, as hard as they could, to achieve their goals. I am excited to see what happens with them moving forward!
Thursday was a good day! That morning we tried to contact some people in our area and then did some tracting. In the afternoon, we went to our district meeting, which was about planning effectively. It was great! After district meeting, we contacted a few YSA people and tried to set up some return appointments with them and get some phone numbers. We had a good dinner, and then went out again that night. We had a pass off lesson with a guy named Tyler in the YSA ward, and then we went to someone's house we had met while tracting. We taught her and her daughters about the Plan of Salvation! It was so awesome! Then we headed in for the night.
Friday, I woke up to Elder Eldredge throwing up in the bathroom. It turns out that he had gotten food poisoning when he was with the other elder on exchanges. So I narrowly dodged that bullet. I stayed in with Elder Eldredge all day while he rested. I didn't have much to do, so we watched church movies and I got caught up in my journal. It was a pretty boring day of staying home.
We were hoping Elder Eldredge would be feeling better by Saturday, but he was still out of it. So, we decided to go on exchanges again with the Elders from the Standley Lake Ward. The sick Elders stayed home, while the healthy Elders (me) went out teaching. We had 5 appointments set up, but only two actually happened. They were both good though! The first was a lunch with a recent convert who is now a ward missionary. She was going to go out with us and we helped her prep for the lesson she was going to help us teach at 1pm. We met with Michael and Julia's family. This is the family with 7 kids. We taught about fasting for answers. It was a little crazy with all the kids, but we got through at least 2 scriptures. Michael and Julia, and their 11 year old son said they would come to church on Sunday!!
Finally, Sunday! Elder Edlredge was feeling better! Our day was full of church meetings, but Micheal, Julia, and their son came to church! YAY! We also had Tyler, the YSA guy, come to the YSA ward! After church, we had dinner, and then tracted for a bit before heading in and ending the week.
So it was a crazy week! So much happened, and we felt like we really made progress with some people! Even though we didn't get to work for a day and a half and got food poisoning, we were still able to get a lot of stuff done. We are super excited to work all week this week!!
I hope everything is well back home!! I love you all and am super grateful for all of the support!!
Elder Bird
Playing my homemade game on P-day at the church
Burgundy sweater day - haha
2/27/17
Hey Everyone!!
What a week we just had! I feel like it was just P-day a few days ago!! The week really zipped by, and there was a lot that happened.
Tuesday was a pretty solid day! We had a district meeting in the morning, a really good one. Then because of the holiday, went to the library for an hour to check our email and write our letters. After that, we went out to lunch at a really great (really cheap) Chinese place that Elder Eldredge found. After lunch, we hit the streets and tracted!! We were tracting in a kind of tough area because we kept on running into people who didn't speak English!! They either spoke only Russian or Spanish. We thought about moving to a new area to tract, but we decided to stick it out. Then, before dinner, we found 2 new people who were super kind, told us to come back, and gave us their contact info and everything!! Then we had a good dinner and a good night trying to meet with people. At the end of the night we headed to the AP (assistants to the president) Elder's area to go on exchanges with them the next day.
I was with Elder Wood, one of the assistants, in his area for all of Wednesday. It was super fun! He is a fantastic missionary, and really taught me a lot. We mostly tracted and street contacted all day, with Elder Wood getting around 30 or 40 phone calls from tons of missionaries in the mission. I didn't realize how much the APs do! Sometimes he would even leave me at a door by myself to answer a call and say, "This one is yours!" It was a little nerve racking, but super fun. Then we had lunch with Elder Eldredge and Elder Gray (the other assistant) and got back to work. That night, we taught two great Plan of Salvation lessons. We taught one to an investigator named Randal. He had tons of questions, so it was a great lesson. At the end of it, he even committed to be baptized! Then, later that night, we taught a recent convert couple who are working on being able to go to the temple. It was a great way to end the exchange, and Elder Eldredge and I headed back to our own area at the end of the night.
We had a fun Thursday morning! We woke up to snow, and a phone call from some Elders in the zone who needed one of us to go out with on of them to a lesson, while the other of us stayed behind with their sick companion. So I went out with Elder Melchin, while Elder Eldredge stayed behind with the Elder. Elder Melchin and I taught a great lesson on the Book of Mormon. The investigator, Mike, had a lot of questions about the historical evidence of the Book of Mormon. We tried to tell him that we were more spiritual guides and we bore sincere testimony about the Book of Mormon and how it has brought us closer to Christ. After that lesson, we had another district meeting in the other district, and then got back to work, in the snow. Luckily, we found an apartment complex in our area that was mostly covered, so we just tracted in there for a few hours, meeting some really cool people. After dinner that night, we had a great lesson with one of our busier investigators. I hadn't met him yet, and Elder Eldredge had only taught him twice in a 3 month span. So I got to meet him and see where he is at with everything and why he is investigating.
Friday was a busy day! I had another doctor's appointment early in the morning and so we headed downtown. I met with my doctor and she removed the continuous glucose monitor. I had it on for a week so that she could gather the data of my glucose levels from the week I had it on. She says that my diabetes is being well controlled! There are no problems whatsoever, and so we scheduled another appointment for July. One funny thing was, they weighed me at the office, and I have gained ten pounds since coming here!! It must be those second dinners! I asked her if that was bad, but she said I was still on the smaller side of things, so I guess it's a good thing!
After the doctors office, we went to the mission office real quick to grab some things for people in the zone, and drop them off. Then, we did some service at a food bank downtown and grabbed some lunch at the Chinese place again. Next, we came home and planned for the upcoming week, and evaluated our previous week. Afterward, we tracted a lot, and had dinner. Then we met with someone who is wanting to come back to church. We set some goals with her and had a really good discussion. Later that night we did another exchange, this time with the district leader, Elder Wagner in Arvada 3rd ward. I went to the Arvada 3rd ward area with Elder Wagner, while Elder Eldredge and Elder Holtry worked in our area.
Saturday was fun with Elder Wagner. These Elders are in a biking/walking area, so we had tons of fun walking around all day. He showed me the work they usually do and we were able to learn from each other as we street contacted, taught a few lessons, and then tracted a bunch. It was super fun! Elder Wagner is very good at connecting with people quickly. Anyway, after walking around all day, we came home that night and exchanged back with our companions.
Finally, Sunday. We Had a long day at church, going from 9am and finishing with both wards around 4:30pm. It was really good, and we had an investigator there! Super exciting! I was asked to give a brief testimony in Arvada 2nd ward, so I told them my mission story so far and how much it has strengthened my testimony. Anyway, after church was all done, we met with a potential YSA ward member and invited them to come to an activity sometime. Then we had dinner, and finished the night by trying to contact people and doing a little bit of tracting. We had a great Restoration lesson with a potential investigator we had met named Ed. He is possibly considering baptism, which was a great way to end the week!
Anyway, a lot is happening out here in the zone of Arvada. I am loving every minute and loving how much we are able to help people every day! I hope things are well at home and people stay safe from all the rain!
Much love,
Elder Bird
Me bugging Elder Eldredge while he makes zone leader calls
2/21/17
Hey everyone!!
I hope you all had fantastic Valentine's Day!! It was super fun/ kind of weird / to be out as a missionary for Valentine's Day, but we all had our one true love on the forefront of our minds: the gospel!
Anyway, things here this week were super fun! I am continuing to learn how to be an effective Zone Leader from Elder Eldredge. There is so much to do, and remember!! But, hopefully I can learn it all quickly, so that I can do a good job moving forward!
I don't have a ton of time to email today, but I will try to give a brief summary of everything that happened in our big week!
P-day was fantastic last Monday! We were able to get tons of stuff done and then spent a lot of time playing basketball and different other sports that we could think of with all of the Elders in the Zone. It was a relaxing day to get prepared! Then that night, we met with the whole Zone and had dinner at the Stake President's house. He fed us dinner and gave us a little devotional at the end. It was super awesome and great to see the leadership in the Stake in Arvada. The Stake President has a love for the people and for his flock here. That night, we tried contacting a few people and then met with a man in the YSA Ward named Jordan. We were able to express to him our purpose in helping him follow Christ and he agreed to read a part of the Book of Mormon and maybe be baptized in the future, in order to follow the Savior! After that lesson, we went on exchanges, with a District Leader in our Zone who went with Elder Eldredge to work in our area, while I went with Elder Tonga, to work in their area.
Tuesday (Valentine's Day!) was a great day with Elder Tonga. He is a younger missionary, but has a lot of fire and likes to work hard! So we did. The day consisted of a lesson in the morning, a District Meeting in the afternoon, and then a lot of tracting in the late afternoon! It was really cool, because we were able to find three people who seemed really interested in investigating the church (and I learned on Sunday that someone we had found is now set for baptism in March!!). We had a great dinner that night at Red Robin with some members of their ward and then went back out knocking. We didn't have too much success, and then realized that it was probably because it was Valentine's Day and people didn't want to see us. But we kept trucking on, and met another great guy who ran out after us to give us the correct address to meet him again!! It was so sweet! We thanked him and then headed back to swap companions back and turn in for the night.
Wednesday morning we went to the southern half of the Mission, to a Zone Conference, where we did car inspections. They asked the Zone Leaders to check all of the cars being used to make sure they have been cleaned and are in proper working order. It was cool, because I got to see my old Toyota Corolla that Elder Olson is still using, and leave a note for him saying that "Elder Bird was here." haha
Later we tried contacting people by calling a lot of people in YSA Ward, setting up times to try and meet, and then went out tracting. We had a few "fun experiences." One woman told us she wasn't too interested, but let us sit on her porch and gave us a glass of water and some bananas. Then another woman on the same street answered the door asking us if we were "kidding." We didn't know what to say, so we said no! She kindly told us to never come back. And then still another woman on the same street answered the door angrily without a shirt on yelling at us...we got out of that situation ASAP. So it was an interesting afternoon! When stuff like that happens now, we take it all in stride and think it is kind of funny, and we don't get too phased by it. Most of the times we just laugh it off and move on! We had a good dinner afterward to make up for it, and then a lesson with a girl in the YSA Ward about setting goals. It was a good way to end the night.
Thursday was our Zone Conference! It was all about the Book of Mormon and our experiences with reading it these past 65 days. It was our goal to read it in as many days as it took Joseph Smith to translate it. I had it mostly finished, and a lot of us (myself included) were able to bear our testimonies. The Book of Mormon is one of strongest parts of my testimony, with a lot of things relying upon it. It contains the gospel of Jesus Christ and I am so glad that we have it. So we had a good long meeting and then headed to dinner. We saw a man named Chris that night. Chris is a super great guy who knows the truth of everything we teach him, but has a hard time overcoming smoking and has some laziness to act on the things he knows he should do. We had a great discussion with him and he said he would come to church on Sunday!
Friday was a full day. I started the day off with an Endocrinology (diabetes) doctor's appointment in downtown. This visit was about hooking a continuous glucose monitor to me so that my doctor can see how my diabetes did during the week. So they hooked me up to a tiny little system that they shot into me, and now I can check my blood sugar every 5 minutes on a little thing that looks like an Ipod! I will go in again next Friday to talk about the results. Anyway, after the visit to the doctor's, Elder Eldredge and I planned out what we were doing the following week with appointments and goals. Then, we got out and did some work that afternoon and had a great dinner that night with some awesome members. After dinner, we had some appointments lined up, which all seemed to fall through. So we tracted that night and had some good conversations. Then we saw a less-active woman named Nicole that night and shared with her how much reading form the Book of Mormon has helped us find peace in life. She goes to another church, but hopefully reading from the Book of Mormon will help her find some peace that she is looking for right now.
Saturday was a booked day! We had an appointment in the morning, then lunch, and then a bunch of appointments in the afternoon. A lot of those fell through, but the coolest one that we had was with the Gabaldon family. They are a super cool, super huge family. We were able to meet with the mom and some of the kids. We were drawing out the plan of salvation for them. The kids were all kind of going crazy and the mom wasn't paying attention, but the cool thing was that the 9 year old was engrossed and even asked for a picture of the plan after the lesson!! It was so cool! She was really interested in "what God had for her", in her words. Then that night, we went out tracting and tried to contact people.
Sunday was a full day with church. We went to church at 8:30am for ward counsel, and didn't finish with meetings until 4:30pm with the two wards!!!!! How crazy is that? But, Chris did come to church and was with us for Sacrament meeting, which was awesome for him. And, one of the Gabaldon kids and his girlfriend came to Sunday School class. It was so cool to have them there with us! After church, we didn't have too much time for appointments, but had a great dinner and then were able to meet with a really nice guy that night. We found that he wasn't too interested, but really appreciated the work we were doing to help people come closer to Christ. He thanked us and we headed home for the night!
Anyway, so it was a super cool week with a lot happening! There is so much to balance here, with being a zone leader and trying to help out all the other missionaries, trying to keep my health a non-issue, and helping people in both wards come closer to Christ! But, I have felt the stress from it all dissipate over the last couple of weeks as I've tried my hardest to do a good job and have asked God for help. It has been so cool to see Him make my burdens (not that these are burdens, but responsibilities) feel lighter.
I hope you all have great weeks moving forward! Thanks so much for all of the love and support that I feel!!
Sincerely,
Elder Bird
This was me & Elder Holtry having fun at the Army surplus store last P-day!
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