The week of finding

So I can officially say I've talked to more people in a week than I have in a long time. We really didn't have many teaching appointments this week so when we weren't eating or doing service we were out on the streets talking to people :) I'm so glad that the Lord helped us out with this because we were able to make some standards of excellence this week in the finding categories namely Other Lessons and New Investigators. Standards of Excellence: noun A basis for missionaries to use to see if they're meeting the average requirements to have a baptism in a transfer. It was good. Hopefully my mom will edit and put a story about a guy that we met on my blog because I don't think I have time to write about it again.

Another fun thing that happened this week was we were able to go Ghost Busting again. A member asked us to do it this time but it was basically the same thing. There was some "supernatural" occurrences that were keeping her great grandchild awake so she asked us and the Branch mission leader to come help out with that. I could feel the spirit so strongly after I gave the prayer so I'm sure there won't be any problems there for a while :) 

Finally something that's going to happen this week. There is a Filipino member who's serving in the Vancouver mission right now who's going to be coming home this week. So that's exciting :) Basically Elder Peterson and I are going to be tripanning with him for a while :) Hopefully. For those of you who know the Watts that's the same mission that Josh went to. Small world ;) 

That's it for this week but I hope y'all have a great week till next time. Potatoes gonna Potate 

*from my email*

Things are going interesting with our investigators.. The investigators that Elder Stevens and I were teaching are having trouble progressing so we spent a butt ton of time this last week finding. It's been quite a growing experience for me but I'm really starting to enjoy being able to go up to some random person on the street and start up a conversation. So for the numbers technically we found 6 new investigators but since a few of them lunched us and such we only reported 5. Out of them there's one that really stands out to me, partially because of you and you'll understand when I explain. So while we were walking down the street talking to this Native girl about Adam and Eve and such there was this East Indian (from India so we don't confuse them with the Natives ;) ) guy called Elder Peterson over and asked him if he knew how old Noah was when he built the ark. He didn't know so A (the guy) told him he was 600 years old. He also talked about a few other things but we didn't think much of it. Elder Peterson actually started telling people some of the fun facts that A told him :D So, fast forward a few days and A had told Elder Peterson we could meet up with him some time so we call him up and set up an appointment. When we get there we have an interesting discussion and A knew the bible back to front and front to back it was wild :) But, he also told us to like "practice" our street contacting approach with him so he knew what we would say and such. During this time he was stressing going back to the roots of everything and looking at our own religion. He gave an example of the Free masons and how some of the roots is sketchy. During this we didn't really feel like he was being argumentative and we could still feel the spirit so we found that interesting so fast forward we brought out the Book of Mormon and showed him the prophecies about Joseph Smith in it. After he took a few looks at it his whole psyche changed it was as though he suddenly wanted the Book of Mormon. By the end of the lesson he was very excited about meeting with us again and I have high hopes for him :) I'll be talking about him more for sure. Also, when we invited him to pray at the end he almost gave a blessing in the sense that we give blessings. He was quoting a bunch of stuff from the Bible and he was also "binding hindering spirits from us" and blessing us that we would share the gospel with as many people in this town as would receive us. It was amazing. He also blessed us with the "Spirit of Jeremiah" I'm not sure what that means so I'll be doing more research on Jeremiah and what that could mean. Could you also do some research and report back what you found? 

Rain

So after not having rain for a very long time we have had rain. So for all of you who were worrying about a fire starting near me fear no longer. It's good the heavens have opened up again literally and religiously ;)

So now for the good stuff. Elder Peterson. He's quite different than Elder Stevens and any other companion that I've had. He's a retired zone lord. I never really have chased people down on the street until serving with him as well so that's fun :) I'm pretty excited to see where this transfer is going. He was also Elder Spells MTC comp tossing it back to the beginning of the mish with Elder MikeSpell. But yeah it's going to be an interesting 6 weeks and then I'll be killing him and he'll go home. Thus, ending my interesting pattern of serving with people who came out with him. 

I can't think of anything else to say off the top of my head right now but I've got some pictures to send so I'll probably say more then. I'm sorry that this one is super short but I honestly can't think of anything right now so you'll have to hear more from me next week. 

I hope y'all have a great week and for those of you who are affected by graduation I hope you survive that ;) Love y'all Potatoes gonna potate

With Elder Stevens

The district

TRANSFERS and Elder Renlund

So... The big news. First of all after this transfer every one of my companions will be going home except Elder Lee so that's going to be sad... But, Elder Stevens has got his dream transfer call and is going to be serving with an Elder down in Regina and I'm getting yet another Elder that came out with him and Elder Cox and Spell. His name is Elder Peterson and he's a retired Zone Lord. It'll be good :) I'm excited :)

So now for the good stuff. This last Friday we were able to visit with Elder Renlund of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles. It was unique and he pointed this out as well that 8 months prior he visited us and now he's coming back to talk to some of us. There were only about 4 Elders and Sisters that hadn't met him before at our meeting. It was such a powerful experience. One of the fun things that happened was he told us what happened after he got back to Utah from visiting us. He explained step by step how he got "told" to fill a vacancy in the Quorum of the Twelve. Basically it went something like this

At 9:20 in the morning he gets a call to go visit the 1st presidency of the Church in the north board room. He didn't even know where that was so he got instructions where to go and headed straight down there. After getting there he was invited in and President Monson, Eyring, and Uchtdorf were there and he was asked to fill a vacancy in the Quorum. At that point President Uchtdorf said "shouldn't you ask him if he is willing" to president Monson. He replied "I don't need to ask because the Lord told me he would" So that happened and he was to tell no one but his wife. So he gets back and looks at the clock and it's only 9:30. In that short of time his whole life changed. It was amazing to hear. Plus, we all felt like we should be upright and dignified the entire time until he started into what he wanted to say. At that point he started cracking jokes and was just so personable. The Apostles are real people with real people experiences they just have been called to bear special witness of the divinity of Christ. 

It was such a wonderful experience especially because of his connection with this mission. I'm so glad that I was able to be a part of that and I hope y'all get a chance like this. It's amazing to hear the testimony of Christ from one of his Apostles. 

I think that's all i've got for now but by next time there'll be plenty to talk about. I love you all and I hope you have a wonderful week 

Love, Elder Mikesell

So this was after Elder Stevens and I cleaned the church building in preparation for ELder Renlund coming. We and Meadow Lake got Voluntold to do that but Elder Peck and Mccoard decided to peace out (not really) and Elder Stevens and I got to do that by ourselves (with some members). While doing that I found some sombreros and decided to properly celebrate Cinco de Mayo.

Mother's day!!

So the big news of this last week like every other missionary on the planet is that they got to call home for mothers day :) :) It's good :)

For those of you not familiar with world news I've got some first hand experience with an insane thing that's been happening within the next province to the west and north a few thousand Ks. In Alberta near Fort Macmurry (Fort Mac) there has been this forest fire that's absolutely devastated everything. I'm so close that we were completely overcast by smoke for two-three days this last week. I doubt this is going to happen but if it does you can't say that I didn't see it coming: I could be displaced if the fire gets any further over the Saskatchewan border towards us. Like I said I'm doubtful that it will happen. But there's been quite a few people come through here on their way out of Fort Mac. Everyone in the city has been evacuated which is roughly 88,000. It's quite the disaster. I've heard that it's the worst fire Canada has seen for hundreds of years. Other than that the peace is being held throughout Canada. 

On other news, for those of you hoping to hear stuff about a baptism this next Saturday it's likely that it might be pushed back indefinitely. Hopefully we can move forward and I'm optimistic that it'll work out :) 

That's been some fairly glum news so on the bright side we were able to go visit our investigator who is an Elvis impersonator and bring a member with us :) we had a good time with him and were able to introduce him to the restoration which having our member there was invaluable. He is very fluent with our doctrine and was able to reach to our investigator in a way we weren't able to :) So now we're going to be bringing him to a members house and teaching him the full deal. It's going to be good :) Plus we got a poster about an event this saturday where some Elvis impersonators are going to be coming from Vegas and performing at the Casino. It's good :) 

I think that's it for mass emailing. I've got some pictures to send so be expecting them :) I love yous and I hope yous have a great week :) Potatoes gonna potate

 

So this is what real poutine looks like. (generally I like more gravy in mine)

 

 

 

The River Valley

 

 

Service

So because the weather decided that it was time to be spring we've been doing a lot of service this last week. One of those service opportunities was unlike the others. Last week I was talking about how we sent a package down to the states. Well we got to come back out to the farm to do some more service for them. It was a blast. His whole family is moving back to the Battlefords area from Alberta and they were all there when we went and moved some more furniture. One of the better parts was he has twins that are about 6 years old and they do everything together. It was pretty wild :) They're going to be such a blessing to the branch when they finally move in.

This next story is probably one of the weirdest things that has happened on my mission. Elder Stevens and I were in the church doing our online proselyting and we hear this thud from somewhere in the church. Elder Stevens goes out to investigate by looking out all of the windows. We couldn't find anything until we heard some crying. It was so faint that we didn't even think that it was happening. Both, of our brains go to panic mode because we were both thinking someone got abused or something and was hiding behind the church. So we step outside to investigate and we find this lady sitting behind the church crying and we don't know why. She was probably in her 20's and just looked like she was done with life. We talked to her for a bit and she told us that her family disowned her and just a whole bunch of terrible stuff. We offered to say a prayer with her but she didn't tell us her name so it was kind of awkward but that's besides the point. As we're finishing the prayer this guy walks over to us and we both stand up because we're still in panic mode. He then tells us to not worry about him and says some things to this girl that he could've said a lot nicer. At this point Elder Stevens and I both realize that he's probably part of the problem because she quiets up real quick like. So I offered to her to let her into the church so she could clean up a bit and they accept. We get into the church and we have some small talk with this guy who tells us he's Pentecostal after grabbing a pamphlet on the testimony of Joseph Smith. It was a weird conversation. After all of that they leave and Elder Stevens and I look at eachother and were like "what just happened??" We made sure to give her a card with our number on it and tell her if she ever needs help to call us so we'll see if anything ever happens from this. 

Overall it was a good week and it had a great end with Sunday. Thank you for all of your prayers. I know that they help. Have a great week :) Potatoes gonna potate

 

*from my email*

 

Our investigators are doing wonderfully. What was great was yesterday during our branch huddle the branch was very supportive. We also taught C the Word of Wisdom and he took it very well. He's looking like he's legitimately working towards this life and that makes me very happy :) We're now calling him and visiting him each day to help him overcome smoking. It was pretty great yesterday to ask him how he's doing with all this and we asked him how his drinking coffee was coming and he just said "oh I had a glass of milk instead" Haha it was great :)