Sleep Deprived

 

I am doing better mom, and I have been transferred. I am now serving in the Mojave Narrows ward in Apple Valley, I will most likely have to do a LOT of off roading. I was 6 months chaffed out of Maple, and Elder Low was 6 week chaffed there too. Elder Low is now a Zone Leader serving in the Tongan ward in Victorville. I am now serving with Elder Muhlestein, he seems to be pretty cool, and chill with getting a new companion and working with me. I have been doing great. Oh, and there were some Part members that were wanting to look at the photos of our family on Facebook, and they made the comment that Dads Facebook is LOCKED DOWN. Could you send me the J. Golden Kimball tape that I like to listen to, it should be in one of my totes, and could you have dad send it as an audio recording, not as the cassette.

 

I am well and when I was in Maple I'll give you the rundown of how the last week went, we were busy as heck trying to get everything ready for the transfer. We had a lesson with a couple and they were at each other throats, poking each other with things in the past, and they were going to drop us and I knew I had nothing to lose because I was leaving. So I told them what I thought of what they were doing, and told them to grow up. It was funny because they are in their 60's-70's and started to laugh, because I was a youngster telling them to Grow up. We were able to keep them as investigators. We had another lesson with another investigator, we found out why he has been meeting with us, as it turns out the member that the investigator is living with, told him that if he was going to live there that he had to go to Church and take the lessons, but now he is actually interested and wants to know. Unfortunately, now the ward has been whitewashed so the missionaries there, I hope, they are able to keep them and help them come unto Christ.

 

We were planning for our next week in case we weren't being transferred and so we did it the day before we were going to get our calls for our Transfer. We found out we were being white washed and that we had 3 days to get our Crap together and to clean our apartment spic and span. In those last 3 days, we were slammed on appointments, and after we had all of our appointments, we usually had dinner with a member and they would keep us until about 10 at night, even though we were on our bikes and were ready to leave. When we would get back we packed for an hour then would pass out and not wake up till 6:30 am, and that was every day. Members refuse to let their missionaries go. I mean we would say we have a lesson in an hour, and they would be like I'll drive you, and we were sitting in the car for about 30 minutes to go 1 mile, because they wanted to talk to us. I found out that I was one of the longest missionaries in that area, I was there for 6 months and only one person before me was there for longer, 9 months. I was sad that I didn't break that record, but I do get to try a different area and learn many new ways of teaching and learning. Today was crazy, we got to bed LAAAAATTTTTTEEEE and we had to wake up early to go to my new area and to meet my new companion. How is life at home? I apologize that I am not very coherent right now, I am very tired and haven't had an opportunity to sleep.

 

I love you all,

Elder Van Engelenhoven

 

P.S. we will get to the area tonight and discuss it then. My new companion seems cool, and funny, and I think he is a hard worker, I don't know, I haven't seen him in action, and yes he has a strong testimony.

"That's Why God Gave Us an Immune System"

Dear Family,

I am sorry about the cut off in my last letter but we had to leave we were given 30 minutes and I found the 1st opened computer and emailed all that I could but then had to leave.

 

Monday, was crazy and we were able to finish weekly planning and we weren't able to go outside but we were able to get out of the apartment and get some walking and talking done.

 

Tuesday, we had District Meeting, in which it was awesome. I was asked to give a training on seeking the spirit, and I went overboard on time I only had 10 minutes but I went 20 minutes over and it was awesome. In it our district was giving me crap for starting, as bad as knocking doors and having people not listen to you, its worst when the missionaries don't want to listen to you. Before, I wrote the training for a cry unto repentance for them, but I was told to keep it toned back or else, but I just let it loose on them. I was tired of their crap so I didn't hold back, and I got several apologies from the members of the district and they started to listen to the rest of the meeting and was told that it was needed. After we had district meeting we got to go email you guys and ran out of time, We then had 20 minutes to prep for an impromptu lesson with our Investigators and we got to teach them about the Gospel of Jesus Christ and got them to solidly come to Church that Sunday. We visited some potentials after we had dinner with our ward mission leader, and we haven't found success yet, but we are working towards it.

 

Wednesday, we helped out at Bishops Store House and got to meet a lot of people from all over Hesperia. We had lunch and additional studies, and then visited some recent converts and they were supposed to meet with Bishop to get their interview for their Patriarchal Blessings. We then had dinner at IN-N-OUT and I have to say that I love ANIMAL STYLE. We then had a member come to a lesson and we got to know him (investigator) and teach him again about the Gospel of Jesus Christ. Our scripture study class failed and no one showed up so we then decided that we were going to talk about the importance of scripture study then invite them to the study class if they can't read on their own. We visited a Less active who served a mission to England and was teaching us the money value, and some of his missionary experiences, and we then did the same as he did in his experiences and invited him to church. He didn't show, his family is being crazy and stupid and refuses to not call him on Sunday before Church and they talk for hours on end for each of his kids.

 

Thursday, we were able to visit another Less Active family, and they said they would come to church but then didn't show up. I was tempted to go over there and drag them to church. We were able to visit some families that have been taught for the last 15-20 years by missionaries and we were asked to give their son a blessing because of his health, the family knows the church to be true, But they haven't had time to come to church or be baptized.

 

Friday, we weekly planned and we got to go and teach 3 of our investigators within 2 hours. You want talk about biking like mad?! When we finally got back to the apartment, we crashed and slept like the dead, except that it was close to like 11 when we finally got back to the apartment, because we were so tired biking appointment to appointment. We forgot that we had Exchanges and we were really late and the missionaries called the Zone leaders to get a ride to our apartment and they were disappointed in us for not keeping the schedule.

 

Saturday, was exchanges and I was in my area , and we had the whole day planned out, and I was sick. I had a sore throat and it was really hard to talk, my companion that day doesn't like to talk to people that he doesn't know, unless he gets to know them. We had a member dinner and it was awesome, but the rest of the day, I was feeling like crap inside because I was sick and couldn't go out and do missionary work. The members were cool with me being sick, they said, "That's why God gave us an Immune system" and we then exchanged back on time this time.

 

Sunday, we had our meetings as usual, and it was a missionary Sunday meeting. We gave all of the talks, prayers, and special musical numbers, during Elder Low's Talk a guy came in and started to disrupt the meeting. Our ward mission leader got up and asked him to sit and listen and at the end of the meeting that he would meet with him and answer the questions the man had. The man has LOTS of mental conditions but he sat peacefully for the rest of the meeting and we got to "Answer" the man’s questions because our Ward Mission Leader wanted "To have the spirit with him as he answers his questions.” It was awesome the way he answered and invited to come to Gospel Principles and he stayed the rest of the Sunday. We then had a lesson right after church with a potential investigator, who was not there, so we went home and were invited to go to dinner with the 1st counselor of the Bishopric. We then went home after that and had to open our apartment for the Zone leader to have a Language study session, while the laundry was going. We were asked to take the Flag down at the Church and then go to a Less active and talk with him, and we found out that he is back on the dating scene, which is awesome because he is in his 60's and is trying to find a wife.

 

This is how crazy my week has been and I have time to Email :)

 

Ammon

Missionary Moving Club Encore

Dear Family,

They gave us a short window to email to day, and we have to cut out early, I don't have time to tell  you of what has happened this week because we got to leave to get the car back to the missionaries, but I have time to tell you 

I love you all,

Love from,

Ammon

Oh, and I am alive... for your sake mom

Dear Family,

As it turns out, we have managed a ride with our zone leaders, so we can talk for a little while longer. Well in this past week, I have been busy, we have been trying to stop our investigators from dropping us, we barely were able to get them to not drop us. We managed to get some members present for our lessons, and man, the lessons have so dramatically improved we have investigators keeping their commitments, meeting with us more often than not at all. So, if the missionaries need anyone to come to lessons, go and do.

Monday, we got nothing done. We literally went and shopped and then we went to zone activity and played Foosball but with the gym, it was fun. After, we had to stay home because my companion Elder Low is district Leader and he had to basically had to sit down to Missionaries in another ward fight over what is what. It got to the point that I was just like "If you don't work this out now then it will never end" that is a word for word quote of what I said and it has been the rest of the week.

Tuesday, we had District meeting and they were taking shots at each other the entire meeting. I was ready to tell them to leave, I feel bad for Elder Low because he has had to deal with this for the entire week. We got some members to a lesson and they made the lesson all types of better. They were going to drop us but we have been working with them and they now have a soft Baptismal date but they already are struggling with it but they are making leaps and bounds to progressing. We got a new investigator and he has been coming to Church. We set another baptismal date with him. We managed to meet with them 2 times a week for both of these investigators.

Wednesday, we managed to help some people at the Bishop’s storehouse. They had some surplus, they gave us 11 gallons of milk for 2 Elders. We did a gallon challenge and I almost did it. I was 1/4 inch of milk away from finishing and not throwing up, but at last, I didn't. We taught some Recent Converts and we are helping them to get to the temple. We talked about Patriarchal Blessings and they want one. The Missionaries in the other ward were at it again and we left while they were arguing, they didn't even notice us getting up and leaving. We went to dinner and were late getting there, and late leaving there to our Book of Mormon Class, and they were still at it. So we told them to take it outside while we had a lesson, which didn't happen because our investigators called and said they couldn't make it. We talked to the members that are moving still and set up to help them move.

Thursday, we helped the Members move from 8-3 pm, which was a task. The mom is a 1st Class Hoarder she wanted to keep every scrap of paper and she is so bad that she will go through the trash until she finds something to keep. We had a lesson with our investigator, he fed us dinner and the rest of it was dealing with the missionaries.

Love you all still,

Ammon