WEEK 3 BELLA VISTA (WEEK 5 OF MISSION)

Hello friends and family!!!!

Mikey's Neighbors

Mikey got his haircut at the "Elite Black Barbers Hair Salon!"

The 479 is good and I had another awesome whacky week haha first on the list of things to tell you guys is about an exchange I went on with Elder Thompson. He is my zone leader and grew up on an indian reservation and is awesome and it was so fun. On this exchange we went to teach a guy from his area with the stake patriarch, Patriarch Stout. While in the lesson the guy we were teaching was super cool and had been investigating the church for 2 years!!!!! Whoa huh? He had read all the standard works and like everything Mormon haha and he had prayed and said he received the answer that no the church isn't true. He said this looking right at me and you can imagine the fear as I had no idea what to say or why we were even really there. And then, Patriarch Stout spoke up and asked the man why he even cared to talk to us then? The man’s answer was that he still was seeking truth. Patriarch Stout went on to teach this man (and me) a thirty-minute lesson of how to truly pray and find truth. I was amazed and so glad that such a great and knowledgeable man could be there to pick up where I lacked in knowledge. After Patriarch Stout had brought the man to tears with his spirit he turned to me and asked me to bear my testimony for this man. My heart was racing and after this beautifully worded lesson this man had just given I felt so inadequate. However, I was reminded of Enoch in the book of Moses and how he felt too young and inadequate but the Lord provided. So I opened my mouth and bore the most powerful and humble testimony to this man I ever had, and I have never been so grateful for the spirit than in this moment, as I cared so much for this man's salvation. It was an awesome night.

Mikey got to confirm this cute 8 yr. old girl
named Emmaleigh (pronounced Emily)

Next on Thursday of this past week while doing some service for Sister Currie with Elder Hess, we were cleaning out the rain gutters on her roof and I got something in my eye. I itched and itched but to no relief so I just finished the job as fast as I could. After saying goodbye to Sis Currie I went to go drive and noticed I couldn't see out of my itchy eye. I pulled down the mirror to look at it and ahhhhhhhh!!! Haha there was a huge brown bubble forming on my eyeball haha elder hess saw it and freaked out too. So we asked Sister Currie, who is a nurse, what it was and she said ahhhhhh!!! at the sight and we rushed to urgent care. At urgent care they didn't know what to do so they laid me down and stuck this huge plastic contact thing in my eye, which was almost unbearably uncomfortable, and they flushed out my eye with water for 20 of the longest minutes of my life. I got up after and I was feeling kind of worse haha the guy then scraped off the remaining brown bubble and we left haha kind of weird he didn't say much more but my eye has recovered completely and no further complications haha maybe I should get some goggles.

I love my whacky spiritual mission and love all you back home

love Elder Green

Celebrating Mikey's One-Month Mark

Maybe these two should stay away from fire!!!

"Hess Daddy" Grubbin on the Deck

So happy to get his bedding!!!

WEEK 2 BELLA VISTA, ARKANSAS (WEEK 4 OF MISSION)

WASSSSUPPP friends and fam back home!!!!!

I hope you guys are all doing awesome back in the 801!

Groupie Selfie back at Provo Temple

Some funny stuff first that happened this week. One night me and Elder Hess were working super hard and had a late baptism and everything so we never got a chance to even eat. So a member got us a pizza and we drove back to the place to grub before bed. So the pizza was too cold and we wanted some good food and so we thought we would just throw the pizza and breadsticks in the oven real quick. Elder Hess threw it in and we both went back to the bathroom to get ready for bed. I had a weird impression to go and check on the pizza. I walked out to a flame coming through the oven hahaha. I started yelling elder hess!!! elder hess!!! He came running out all startled and started freaking out too. He then cracked open the oven a little and I heroically threw a bucket of water in and dowsed the flame!!!!! haha We didn’t salvage much pizza from the fire and our house has smelt like smoke the entire week haha it has sucked. hahaha

Now a cool spiritual experience. 

So first we have this man named Marty who has a baptismal date for October 7th. His job has been making him travel a lot and we hadn’t been able to see him in forever. However, last night we got a text from him asking for us to come meet up with him at his place. So we sped up there both pretty pumped to get this guy baptized here soon. When we got there he was being so cool and I love him so much. However, he was really not sure about baptism as we got talking. As soon as he said that a scripture I had been studying popped into my head and so I just asked if we could all read it "Alma 32:21" As I read it and explained that we all are imperfect and none of us know this gospel completely anyways, so if he will just be proactive and act on his faith God will bless him. I didnt really expect or pre-meditate to say any of those things and I know they were exactly what I needed and now Marty is sticking to his date and I hope we can continue to get him feeling of God’s love. 

I love all the people we teach, the faith of the saints out here is so strong and we have a lot of investigators and stay super busy. Which is good Heavenly Father knows me and knows my weaknesses and I am becoming so much stronger and love it here!

I love you guys and I love my companion, it’s all good out here in the 479.   

Study Time at Bella Vista.
Rocking the Destroit Lions shirt Parker sent him
while on his mission in Michigan!

WEEK 1 BELLA VISTA, ARKANSAS (WEEK 3 0F MISSION)

HEYYYYY everybody!!!!

I made it safely eventually to Arkansas after a lot of flight delays etc... but my first area that I have been serving in is called Bella Vista it is in Arkansas and super close to Bentontville. Specifically where I am is a zone called Pea Ridge and Metfield. It has been really good and also really weird. I will tell you guys some quick stories from the week.

So when I first got to the mission home my anxiety was quite high as you can imagine. There were 30 new missionaries there and we weren't sure where we were going or who our trainer would be and I was super stressed and worried that I would hate it out here. The people are all country and have accents and everybody was loud and talking and I was just stressin. So I sat down in a room where I could find some peace and said a prayer to help me feel comfort. In that moment I got the answer instantly that it would be okay and my companion was meant to train me and it was all okay. Right then President Loveland grabbed me for my interview and he was super loving and just made sure I was okay and then told me that my trainer would be Elder Hess!!! So much relief came over me as I knew that he and I would get along so well. He is from Bountiful Utah and is super sweet and he and I would be close friends even if we weren't companions. I know Heavenly Father is in our day to day lives and cares about our stresses and worries.

Mikey and his Comp/Trainer, Elder Hess

Now a short description of where I am. It is freaking the craziest amount of trees you've ever seen and super humid and there’s no such thing as a neighborhood. 

The road leading to Mikey's "dope crib!"

The people here are super cool but also super mean haha door knocking was rough this week. Unfortunately a lot of people here are really old and have lived in their own little house in the woods and don't really appreciate us coming to their doors. But here’s a little story about Saturday that I had. We went to the town famous Squirrel Cook-off in downtown Bentonville. haha and yes... I ate Squirrel hahahhahaha it was okay except for the fact that it was like chewy and I couldn't get like the picture of Chip and Dale out of my mind as I chewed haha but so yes I have already tried roadkill.

Mikey and his ZL, Elder Wilcox, about to dive into some squirrel!

Our house is super ghetto and really quite gross haha there is like a film of spiderwebs and dust like everywhere haha we don't walk around without shoes on and nobody out here can drink the water!!!!!! haha don't do it! It is gross and will make you sick so we have to have bottles of water for everything hahah like brushing your teeth like everything haha but the crib is still dope hahah I will send pics haha but overall It is awesome and I love it haha. Hope everything is good for you guys here is my new address:

67 Westbury Drive

Bella Vista AR 72714

I guess this is a couch made out of two mattresses, oh my!

I can't even tell you how badly I want to
sterilize this sink right now!!!

Mikey's Home Sweet Home

WEEK 2 SMOOTH CHILLIN IN THE MTC

Hello my dear friends and family I love you all so much and I am so grateful for all the help you all have given in preparing me for my mission. I had another really good week and leave for arkansas tomorrow morning at like 7 AM haha 

Spiritual experience from this week, as I was sitting in this computer lab earlier I was doing all these different learning assessments and it had been one of the longest and hardest working days ever haha. As I sat there a girl came running in and said Tanner Mangum threw a hail mary and BYU won. You might have expected me to jump around, and that is what I felt like I should do. However, as I sat there tears filled my eyes and I was overwhelmed with a feeling of sadness and homesickness. This is how the devil works. In this moment my companion for no reason at all just hugged me and it was super different but I know he felt inspired to do it, and like I dont even know how but he knew. He said to me, "Hey elder its okay you’re doing the right thing and it will all be okay and for the best." I love my companion he knew to comfort me in just the right time and I know it’s from all your prayers. Thank you so much.

After a another long day me and my companion sleep-walked into this meeting last tuesday night haha we sat in the very back and were fighting the droopy eyelids haha and then some guy walked up and said hey you two come with me. So we stood up and walked with him right to the front row and then an apostle walked right through the doors haha it was so sweet.  It was Dallin H. Oaks who spoke to us!

Another spiritual experience was me and my companion got one of our TRCs (actor investigators) to commit to baptism this week and it was the weirdest thing to get so happy over something so fake haha. I am so excited to have that real experience in the field even though they might be few and far between I am still so excited!

I cant wait to have a killer time in Arkansas, I love you all have an awesome week.

Elder green

WEEK 1 SMOOTH CHILLIN IN THE MTC

hello family and friends!!!!!! the mtc has been pretty good and Im going to kind of fly through these emails today because ive got a lot of laundry in the load right now haha. I miss everybody at home of course!

I will tell you about the MTC.  The first day I walked in and my escort had no idea what he was doing hahah and they gave me a nametag and let me drop off my stuff and I began walking up to my classroom.  I am all alone,  morgan degoyer got taken to another district and i was pretty devastated hahah.  And then a guy walks in and tells me I have to go to this orientation thing on the computer.  So I step out of my classroom only to meet face to face with who else but Starsvina Matthews!!!!! We both fought back tears in our embrace and with my dork dot (the thing on your name tag that shows its your first day) he started tearing up in telling me just to push through because the first day is hard and that he loves it now and his companion is elder or starsvina or whatever it is in croation haha but elder deluuw who is super nice and i see them nearly everyday and we fight back tears like every time haha its quite embarrassing.  But okay a few short things about me and the MTC.  First I hate the food haha I know I should be more grateful but I really hate it so much hahah  I have eaten cereal for like 20 straight meals now.  But its okay haha.  The basketball here is not the best haha and my room is -20 degrees at night haha so there’s my gripes and now I want to share a spiritual experience with you guys. 

So it was like day three or four and I was about ready to go home and I was being super selfish and feeling sorry for myself with everything and I had lost the spirit that day in my selfishness.  At lunch that day as I hung my head over my soggy cinnamon life cereal sister farley ran up to me and said elder green elder green! sister arrington is having an asthma attack and needs a blessing.  Naturally I got up and walked with her into this tiny room next to the cafeteria where sister arrington was in a chair gasping, like literally gasping for air.  I annointed her with the oil.  She was still panting, so i sealed the annointing and gave her a blessing.  I do not recall anything I said in that blessing.  I said amen and everybody was bawling over the blessing even my companion.  Sister arrington stood up and took just the deepest breath and immediately she broke down saying that the asthma attacks usually take hours to even calm down at all. 

I realized that I need to stop thinking woe is me all the time and from that moment forward there has never been a point in my life that I have grown more.  My entire experience has turned around since I’ve started trying to implement the character of Christ in all that I do.  That is looking outward when the natural man would look inward. I love you all and love this gospel.

love you guys back in sojo. 

Elder meek meek