WEEK 6 ROGERS (WEEK 87 OF MISSION)

HELLO!  How are you doing? 

So this week was transfer week which meant a whole bunch of office work for me and Elder Henderson but that is okay it was still a lot of fun and we still got to teach in the evenings.  It was pretty complicated figuring out the transfer loop and everything.

 

Oh us??? Nothing much just chilling in islanders' homes.  WBU?

The District.

Well anyway a couple of cool updates.  Mely is doing awesome and she is leading the islanders as well as her family, and her son and daughter-in-law have really started taking the gospel seriously and I see great things in their future. 

 

Carl :)

The Squad.  Castie, George, Carl, Mile, Nev and Elder Henderson.

Carl's Haircut.

Carl is going to be baptized this Saturday!!!  So awesome.  He is going to be baptized by one of his good friends in the ward that recently came back to church his name is Dusty and his family is one of my favorite families and they are one of the coolest stories.  Long story short their family consists of a single dad with 9 kids all within the ages of 1-18 and they all have decided to come back to church and they are just awesome.  Carl is leading all of his Marshallese friends and has one of the most sincere hearts I have seen my whole mission and he is only 15 but he is determined to be at church every Sunday and mutual every Wednesday and to also make sure his friends are all going.  Most of his friends were baptized in the Marshall Islands and haven’t been to church since they have come to America.

Also I got to be with Elder Roberts this week as well as Elder Degooyer.  I love them both and it was so good to be with them!!!  They are both such leaders and good examples to me I am grateful for them both.

Mikey and Morgan DeGooyer his buddy from BHS football.

Look at this guy in my car.

Look at this guy in my apartment.

Mikey and his old comp Elder Roberts.

Bittersweet news, Elder Henderson will be transferred to Branson and Elder Leavitt will be coming in to take his place.  Elder Leavitt is one of my closest friends in the mission and I am so excited to be with him.  Elder Henderson will be missed.

 

New Comp Elder Leavitt, Degooyer, Henderson and Mikey.

I have been reading the Book of Mormon a lot and a quick thing that I learned this week was that in all our life what matters is our intent.  Having full purpose of heart or real intent will unlock the powers of heaven.  I really like a scripture from Jacob: "But before ye seek for riches, seek ye for the kingdom of God.  And after ye have obtained a hope in Christ ye shall obtain riches if ye seek them.  And ye will seek them for the intent to do good.  To clothe the naked and to feed the hungry and to liberate the captive."

Insert whatever you desire into that scripture and then see if it is taking place of your seeking the kingdom of God and realign your will with Heavenly Father's.

Love you all,

Elder Green

Healing Process!

WEEK 5 ROGERS (WEEK 86 OF MISSION)

HELLO!!!!!!!! Hope you all had a very hoppy easter and had a great time thinking about our living lord and also spending some family time!! 

Well, we had a great week with two exchanges and a lot of events and a lot of busy people because of the easter season. All the big mega churches put on big events etc. and a lot of people doing family things and so it was a very busy week. 

We continue to work a lot with the islanders in the area and we really love and appreciate their sincere and believing hearts. The members have been very key in this as well. This past week we had 8 investigators show up to young mens haha it was so awesome the young men in our ward are such a great group of kids and the coolest thing is is that a lot of them just returned back to activity a couple of months ago and are already sharing the gospel. We even had some of our investigators go on scout camp this past weekend and have a blast and they are very excited about their baptismal date for the 29th of this month! 

Mely is doing so awesome and their was a really cool even this week at the church where families from the community could come and have some fun family time, playing games, eating lunch, and learning about building strong families and family history etc. It was called FAMILY STRONG and we helped with jumping rope for the kids a bean bag toss blowing bubbles etc. It was a great day. 

It can be kind of weird because with all the exchanges we are always on sometimes I wont be able to go out and even meet some of the investigators and it just so played out that an investigator I had never even taught before came to church this sunday. As well as quite a few Less active families and we recently had some more islander families move in and it was such a special moment to hear them opening up the overflow so that people could fit in the chapel. That is always a good sound as a missionary.

I am super excited because this next week Elder Degooyer and Elder Roberts will be coming down to go on exchanges and it will just be a blast as well as an opportunity to learn from them.

I have had a lot of time to reflect this week about the savior and what his life means and how it applies to me. Something I really love that we have started doing/saying is that before we talk about church or joseph smith or anything we first teach about the savior. My favorite thing to teach people here in the bible belt where the death of jesus christ is well known and talked about I love to share the less talked about truth that christ lives today, the tomb is empty, his voice is again heard on the earth!

I would like to close with the words to a childs hymn that was sung in sacrament that has now become an all time favorite

Jesus climbed the hill
To the garden still
His steps were heavy and slow
Love and a prayer
Took Him there
To the place only He could go

Gethsemane
Jesus loves me
So He went willingly
To Gethsemane

Mikey didn't send us this picture of his swollen ankle, but Aubrey texted it to me.  He hurt it at a trampoline place.

WEEK 4 ROGERS (WEEK 85 OF MISSION)

Mikey in Elder Henderson's "Country Boy" clothes haha.

Elder Henderson in Mikey's "City Slicker" skinny jeans and Vans.  He said that the skinny jeans were not a super pleasant experience!

Elder Henderson went half a day like this before Mikey realized and told him his clothes didn't match!

Mikey "riding his bike."

HEYYYY! What’s up everybody?  Hope you had a good week! 

This week was super good!  Things are going so well and this week we had some really great success.

1st the biggest highlight was this Saturday we went to the Oklahoma City Temple with all the youth and we also got to go with Mely!!!  What a blessing it was to be in the house of the Lord with our recent convert.  It was such a blessed day and plus we went to Cicis pizza after which was almost as satisfying as the temple!

 

The beautiful Oklahoma City temple.

Temple Selfie.

At the temple with Mely!

Exchanges with Elder Bedolla.

Exchanges with Elder Joplin.

We have seen some really awesome things happening with the ward and today was a super special Sacrament Meeting.  It was fast and testimony meeting and all these youth that have recently been reactivated, like probably 10 of them, got up and bore their testimonies and things were getting pretty emotional up there and the whole ward seemed to be pretty moved.  We had 2 youth that are Marshallese come to church that day too and a lot of their friends are the ones that got up and bore their testimonies. We set a baptismal date today for April 29th with one of the Marhsallese kids named Carl.

The exchanges were super good and I got to go with Elder Wilcox this week and Elder Grey.  I had some awesome spiritual experiences with both of them as well as when I was in the temple this past week, and when I was being interviewed by President and Sister Loveland. 

In reading the Book of Mormon this past week, I have recently restarted it again, and I am marking it in a special way but anyway a cool insight that I feel like I learned this time around was something that Sister Loveland shared with me and that is that the reason we learn different things the more times we read the Book of Mormon is because light attracts to light just like in D&C Section 50 that says, “That which is of God is light; and he that receiveth light, and continueth in God, receiveth more light; and that light groweth brighter until the perfect day.”  She told me about how when we continue to gain spiritual light the things we pick up on will continue to build line upon line.  Think about that if you ever feel like you are hearing the same things over and over in church.  I feel that way sometimes when I teach the Restoration over and over all day but I have realized how much deeper my understanding has become!

Love you all have a great week.

WEEK 3 ROGERS (WEEK 84 OF MISSION)

Meetings!  Michelle Conover texted me this pic during the week :)

Hello everybody!!!  Hope you all are having a great week! We had another fun and exciting week!

General conference was super awesome this week and I really loved all that was shared.  I have been trying to think of what I felt like the over-riding theme was and haven’t really been able to come up with anything so far!  But I really liked a lot of the talks, some cool emphasis on religious freedom and tolerance etc.  Just was a really good conference and we had some people come to watch it with us which was super cool.

Updates on some of the things that went on this week.  We had exchanges with the West Plains and Fort Smith zone leaders and both of those were really awesome and a lot of fun.  I learn a lot on those exchanges from the leaders of our mission and I really appreciate all that they help me learn.  We had MLC this week which was really awesome and President Loveland and Sister Loveland knocked it out of the park as usual and the spirit was strong and it was a blessing to be in that meeting. 

Our investigators are doing really well and let me tell you about a tender mercy!  So we have been trying to get in to teach a large section of Marshallese people that live in a complex of apartments in our area and they are some of the coolest people and nicest and some are even members already.  So anyway, we have had a little bit of a hard time I think getting them to trust us.  Well this week we had a chance to stop at the park when we saw them all playing basketball.  We walked up and they asked if we wanted to jump in kind of jokingly, well you know me and Elder Henderson shed the suit coats and untucked the white shirts and after 20 minutes of oohs and awwws from the crowd of kids we had won their love and trust haha.  Last night we taught four awesome people Mev, Mile, Daniel, and Carl.  What a blessing! 

Love you all hope you all have a great week!!!!

Elder GREEENNNIE