This week was awesome. So last week as I said, we had a guy named Ty show up to church and we were able to meet with him 5 times during this week. He is doing awesome and we are looking for a baptismal date of June 27th! :) Elder Allred is awesome. I love serving with him, he is so sincere and has such a strong testimony. We really do love being companions and are having a blast in Kalkaska! :)
•We went out with President Hoover on Tuesday evening. We had our lesson with Ty. We taught the Restoration. We committed him to be baptized and he was a little hesitant but then Pres. Hoover shared his experience on how he decided to be baptized and it helped Ty to understand and he committed to be baptized! Then we drove up to Rich's place. Rich has the mind set of being a bad reader and learner, so Pres. Hoover, who spent his career in education, built Rich up so much, it was awesome.
• We had a powerful district meeting this week. We discussed how we can strengthen our faith. There were many powerful testimonies borne and the Spirit was so strong. One thing that I came to realize in that meeting is that those people who exemplify Jesus Christ just by being themselves, help other to grow in their faith in Jesus Christ. As a missionary and striving to be Christlike, each door I knock on and each person I meet I hopefully help grow in their faith in Jesus Christ We can all have that impact on those we meet. We again taught Ty and he had read 12 chapters in the Book of Mormon!
• We helped Virginia's nephew Dennis do some gardening. He's the one whose house we go to each Sunday for dinner and Bible study. He met with the missionaries in the St. Louis area in the late 90's and from talking to him we are going to start teaching him the lessons again, so we are super excited about that.
• We taught Ty again on Friday and he has already read both 1 Nephi and 2 Nephi! He is so prepared! :) He said something that I thought was super cool. He said, "Everything you teach makes sense and is pretty easy if you aren't looking for something to be wrong." It's so true. The Gospel is so simple and plain if we have open hearts and minds. It's easy to love and understand.
• The first time we met Ty, he told us that we'd need to explain how the Bible and Book of Mormon go together and explain coffee to him because as he says, "Nobody loves coffee more than I do." So, after teaching him on Saturday the Gospel of Jesus Christ, we planned on teaching the Word of Wisdom. But before we mentioned it, he asked, "So what's with the coffee thing?" We began to beat around the bush a little bit, (we shouldn't have) and he said, "I already stopped drinking it, I just want to know why I have to." So we explained and he said, "Makes sense." The Lord is preparing people! :)
My spiritual thought comes from a talk that our district president, Doug Thomas gave yesterday. He spoke on covenants. He gave Joshua 1:8 as a pattern to keeping covenants and Joshua 1:9 as the promise of keeping our covenants. Covenants, such as baptism, put us in a place to act. They get us off neutral ground and are the means of opening the windows of heaven for us to access greater spiritual power. Do we love the Lord enough to keep our covenants?
This week has been such a great week. Kalkaska is the place to be, Elder Allred is the companion to have, the Church is the place to worship, and Jesus is the Christ!
Love,
Elder Chalmers
HAPPY FATHER'S DAY June 22, 2015
First of all, Happy Father's Day to all of my Father figures, especially my Dad! Thank you for all you do. This was a solid week for Elder Allred and I in Kalkaska. We got to have a lot of really cool lessons with Ty and his baptism is this Saturday at 2:00. He will be baptized 20 days after we first met him, he's so prepared! Also, I love Elder Allred, he is so humble and great to be around. He helps me to be better everyday. I'm so blessed to be with him and be in Kalkaska, so many blessings! :)
Monday: We had a sweet lesson with Ty. We had both the Piatt's with us on the lesson and it was Debbie's first time. (She was sitting on a chair behind the table and read in the Book of Mormon the whole time, she was so proud. :)) At the end of our lesson we had some concerns with Ty's baptsim, but we felt really prompted to bring it up, so we did and we were able to overcome the concern, being really open. It was something that we would normally be pretty nervous to do, but the Lord made us up to the task!
Tuesday: Today we had a great day. We had another lesson with Ty. We went with "The Famous Steve Cole," we still don't know what he's famous for..." (That is how Steve refers to himself most of the time.) ha. We had another great lesson and he's doing great. Then we went up to Bellaire to see Rich. He told us how one of his neighbors was telling him how we're not Christian and how he told her off. He vented to us for like 45 min. about it, how we are Christian. Rich is so loyal. He also shared a really sweet experience with us. He said when he met us he was at the point where he didn't want to live but ever since we met him on the street he's gotten much healthier, gotten back into the scriptures, and he's happier. It really gave me confidence and courage to never stop working. You never know what one thing you do can mean to someone else. As we left, we gave him a hug and he kissed me on the cheek. haha. Rich is an old school farm boy. We had dinner with the Mundell and Robinson families. They made homemade ice cream and no-bake cookies, I barely made it out of there. :) We met some really cool people while we were knocking today, one guy named Emmanuel was super cool, and had a great belief already of the Plan of Salvation. At the end, he told us he only argues with the Mormons. So I just pointed at myself, and said, "that's us" ha. Then he told us his issue and we got through it. :) We are really hoping we can meet with him.
Wednesday: We taught Ty with Bro. Chowhan. It was a great lesson on the Priesthood. It's also Bro. Chowhan's first time coming out with us in a long time, he's getting better each day. It's a miracle! Then we got lunch at Subway with him. We spent the day door knocking in Fife Lake. It was a really nice day and we met some cool people then we had dinner with the Piatt's. We had a great scripture study with Virginia and the Coles tonight as well.
Thursday: We had interviews in Gaylord today. They were really simple, quick, but great. :) I got to see Elder Laing. It's cool, Elder Allred and Elder Laing knew each other at home! We also had district meeting, it was a great experience. We all shared what our purpose is and what it means to each of us individually, it was powerful. For me, it's all about joy. The joy the gospel brings me and the joy it can bring to others. Then we drove home which was a blast. We drove the Cadillac Elders, Elder Johnson and Elder Hoover are so much fun! We had our first real lesson with Virginia's nephew Dennis. It went well, he likes to talk a lot. But he's read the first 3 chapters of the Book of Mormon so far, so that's really cool. :) We also did some door knocking and met a few former investigators and made great contact with them.
Friday: We had a sweet lesson about temples with Ty. He kept wanting to know more. We had Bro. Chowhan with us. We went to an asian buffet and Bro. Chowhan was putting down a lot of food and dishing out the fist bumps, he is so fun. We got shined by a few people so we did a lot of knocking. It was cool, we weren't having much success, but on our last door we got a potential, it was awesome!
Saturday: We did a ton of knocking today. We had a really cool experience today. We were talking to this couple, who pretty much started attacking us and telling us to stop preaching the Book of Mormon and ranted about being "born again" (nobody understands what they are saying when they use that term they way they do). Every time they gave us a chance to talk, we testified of the Book of Mormon and the Restoration. That's what the spirit kept giving us to say, it was a really powerful experience for both of us.
Sunday: The sacrament today was amazing. If you really take it seriously and prepare the day before, you can get so much out of it. I learned a ton this week. We also had potluck today, which was great as always. We did call-ins then had our bible study/dinner at Dennis'. That went great. We tried by a potential tonight, and he let us in. We talked about how absolute truth exists and how the gospel has been restored, it was a great lesson but he didn't want to continue to meet. :( It was a good experience though.
My spiritual thought for this week came from the sacrament. I went into Sunday with the question of how I can become a better disciple of Christ. As in the prayer, the words "take upon them the name of thy Son" I realized that I need to represent Jesus Christ at all times and to everyone, including myself. We all need to be the same person in the dark that we are in the light. I realized that what I do when nobody else is around or when I'm just with my companion, define who I am as much and maybe more than how I act around others.
I love you all so much and am grateful for your support!
Love,
Elder Chalmers
D&C 6:36
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| love catching your comp in a real hearty laugh! :) |
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| Driving on the 131...ha! |
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