Success and not so sucesses

Baptism

Guess What one of our investigators is getting baptized this Saturday, Lois Stein she is really excited and doing really well she is going to be a great member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints. We are know going to start teaching two of her kids that seem interested in learning. Yeah I am staying in Orange, Texas for another six weeks and my companion is staying with me and this is his last transfer than he goes home to Idaho.

Seeds

We had three appointments in a row with Andre Powell because he wanted to be baptized and really wanted the Holy Ghost but we got a call from him and said that something has come up and said that he wont be able to see us until January but it seems that he still wants to learn but at least we planted a seed in his heart.

Finding

We rode are bike alot we rode like tweny five miles in a day and it was a really windy day but it was fun to get out and enjoy the nice weather and to be in the fresh air. yeah we are trying to find more people to teach so we are going to try to get referrals from members to get people to teach.

6 months already!

Investigators
We met with Andre Powell he is one of our investigators and we watched with him the restoration DVD with him its about 20 minutes long and he said he felt something really good something that he has not felt in a long time. We told him that was the Holy Ghost and that it testifies of truth and you can know it by the feelings you get and he said he wants that always with him. We told him that he has to be baptized by the proper authority to recieve the Holy Ghost. He said he wanted to be baptized next saturday. we told him that is really great that we still have to teach him the rest of the lessons and that he has to come to church. which church he has a problem with because he has had bad experiences in other churches before so we are going to take him on a church tour this thursday and it is going to be great. He is progressing really well. We told him that we can come over more so we can finish the lessons with him so he said to come over this Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday, I am so excited.

Last night we met up with another investigator Shannon Lewis and she is the one that does not want to read the Book of Mormon yet because it is new and she wants to become familiar with the Bible, but we told her that the Book of Mormon will get you closet to your Heavenly Father and it testifies that Jesus is the Christ. We told her jsut to read the first two pages and she finally committed to read them, I am so happy that she is taking a step of faith.

Todd Daniels is a less active and he is reactivated and he stopped chewing and he is been studying his scriptures, praying, reading talks from general conference and doing missionary work constantly he is on fire and he loves and enjoys it but I am sad that he is leaving tomorrow up to North Dokota to do work. He is a really great wonderful guy. His girlfriend Lois Stein is doing really well she has been reading her scriptures and praying and her testimony of this church has been growing and she now knows that this is the true church and she loves the members in the ward. we are going to set a baptismal date with her pretty soon. She her children are coming along too.

6 months

Guess What I hit my 6 month mark this Thursday can you believe that, Its going by so fast I can not believe it, its crazy that I am 1/4 done with my mission but I have learned so much on my mission and I have grew so much and I am so glad that I went on a mission it has blessed my life immensly. but there is still a lot to learn and improve in a lot of things. I have seen so many miracles throughout my mission and have seen his hand in so many lives. I want to thank you all for Y'all support and prayers. Yeah we get transfer calls this Saturday and if we are getting transfered than we transfer on Monday. If I do get transfered and depends how far it is I might not have time to e-mail on monday but i will e-mail on Tuesday. If i am not getting transfered I will e-mail on Monday. Y'all are in my prayers and love you all.

Becoming the Lord's Servant One Day at a Time

Monday and Service

On Monday we had FHE with a family the Evans and Todd, Lois and her kids came over too. we had dinner had a lesson on the word of wisdom around a campfire played hide and seek with them all. we had desert afterwors it was really good. We did a service at a members house we mowed the lawn and we started to weedwacked his big huge backyard with these old weedwackers one he nicknames it the man killer to use it you swing like a golf club at all the weeds it is pretty cool. he had this other ax thing which looked pretty cool.

Interviews with the Mission President

we had interviews with our mission president they went really well and they are really awesome and while everyone else was getting there interviews done sister Crawford taught us how to lead music and we started to memorize some scriptures so it can help our teaching. we need to know the reference and kind of the general idea it contains in it which is all the scriptures in the five lessons. we met some missionaries that served in our mission ten years ago and they told us some pretty funny stories. they are married and have kids. one lives in Vidor, TX and I think the other one lives in Mapleton, UT but i forgot there names but they said they live by the mapleton elementry school.

Exchanges Finding the Elect

We did exchanges with the zone leaders and Elder Backman came to Orange with me and Elder Jackson went to Vidor with Elder Hunt. We went to try to get to know all the less actives in the area. one of them a dog jumped up out of nowhere and scared me so bad that it almost broke through the screen door. We went to see Tiffany Adams she was a member that we just found and she told us that her boyfriend said to her what do I need to do to become a member of your church? she got out her preach my gospel and her book of mormon and gave it to him to read and told him that missionaries need to meet you and so he started to read and could not put it down and I think he wants to be baptized.

we found this other person from tracting her name is Sandra and she said she wants to be baptized sometime and said that she is open minded and is willing to listen. she told us her mother died in December and that she got in a car crash and has brain damage and know she has seizures and she fell down once and has a bruised eye. She is not mad or upset but she is grateful for all the things that she has like her house that she can walk, talk, see and hear.

Elder Backman went to pet this one dog and it seemed pretty nice but it sanpped its mouth at him and he almost got bit. We went to see a less active Harold Morris and we knocked on his door in the garage but no one answered. I pushed the button looked like the door bell but soon came to find out it was the button to close the garage door so it was closing in and i tried to open it back up but it soon did, my heart was racing but im glad that no one was there or that would of been a little embarassing and we laughed while we went back to the car.

People

Todd and Lois- we taught them the law of chasity which they said they are already living it but Lois only hold back is that she smokes and she is trying to quit so she can get baptized and Todd has quit chewing so he is doing really good. They really love reading the scriptures and coming to church.

Shannon Lewis- we taught her about faith in Ether 12 and she said she still wont read from the Book of Mormon because it is new to her but we will eventually get her comfortable with reading the book of Mormon.

Virgil and Cassie Segrest- we read them Moroni 6 on what is the most important thing we do at church which is partake of the sacrament. Cassie said that she wants to be baptized but want to take it slow. they said they would come to church but they have not come to church yet.

An Update from Elder Hickey

Finding

The Saturday morning session I watched it in Vidor at Bishop Moore's house and they have a huge flat screen TV with Elder Morgan. Becasue we were on exchanges. I watched all the other ones in Orange at the stake center and there was hardly anyone there because everyone was watching it at there house. After districtt meeting we exchanged and me and Elder Morgan went to start to tract and the first one we knocked on, a lady opened the door and said that two other missionaries had come by, so we talked to her and she just wanted to bible bash. she said that the other missionaries told her of what we believed and showed it in the bible and then she always had a comeback and the missionaries did not know what to say and got pretty upset and they came back with an answer and she stumped them again and the one missionary got frustrated. We gave her a Book of Mormon to read and told her to read it and to pray about it if it is true. with these kind of people the only thing you can do is bear your testimony and leave. we went to talk to some members. The other day we ran into this really nice lady and she asked us how many wives do mormons have? I said only one and then she said how many kids do you have? and I was confused and a few seconds I knew what she meant she thought I was married and asking how many kids I have and I said I am not married yet but after our missions we go to college and get married so we got all of that cleared up. They let us in and talked a little more and they gave us some cake and we fixed there freezer and they said it was a miracle. she said that we can come back if only we don't talk about politics, sports, or religion because she said they all cause contention but not our church.

Life in the mission

My companion is doing fine he has some struggling days because he is going home really soon. He goes home the beginning of December. The work with the inactives are going really great. we met with this one guy and he races really old cars like in the 30's. he said that one of these days he was going to take us on for a ride. we usually go see investigators that we are working with and go try to see less actives and get to know them and the stake wants all the members be taught the missionary lessons once a year so thats what we are doing.

Todd and Lois

They are doing really good. they talked with the bishop and he said that Todd has to move out of the house in order for Lois to get baptized but he said it is up to us and the mission president and we called him and he said that if they are living in seperate rooms in the house because Todd had no where to go and if they understand the law of chasity and keep the word of wisdom. they are keeping all there commitments, we have a member that is a nurse surgeon and he said that he taught people on his mission to stop smoking and when he got back he got people to stop smoking so he said that he would help them to stop smoking and chewing tobacco and then we are going to set a baptismal date with Lois. They wathced general conference and they loved it and was taking notes.

Work of a Missionary = People

Shannon Lewis

The Book of Mormon is new to her and she said that she doesn't want to start to read it yet so we gave her Hebrews 11 to read which talks about faith and we are going to reference it to Ether 12 which is a great chapter in the Book of Mormon that talks about faith. we are going to try to get her to church and get her kids to attend mutual on wednesday so they can meet the youth in the ward.

Todd & Lois

They are doing really great. they are progressing so much and coming to church every week. They are really trying to stop smoking and chewing tobacco. they are trying to get there kids taught about the gospel but there oldest wont really listen. Lois really wants to be baptized but they have to get married so they are working to get married. we taught them the plan of salvation and they had great questions which we answered them.

Virgil & Cassie Segrest

We taught them about revelation through prayer, scripture study and attending church. they said they don't have a great excuse of not coming to church and they said they would come to church this week but we did not see them there but maybe they went to a different ward so we are going to see them and see if they went or not. Cassie is very interested and wants to do it but we are trying to get them to church.

David

He is an former investigator and he is divorced and is retired. we went over to his house to see how he is doing and to see if he is still interested. he said that he is still interested but he is going to his old church and one of these sundays he will pop in. He said he has let go of the steering wheel and seeing where Heavenly Father needs him to do or to go. But when we go over next we are going to talk about that we need put our effort in it like reading the scriptures, praying, going to church and then he will direct you and tell you if it is right. we can't sit back and wait for him to tell what you need to do, you need to put some action ( your own effort into it.)