Hello Family!!
I sure do love you guys, and I hope everyone is doing well today! I am doing great as always.. it was so fun to see you guys this past week, it by far was the most normal one for me, it just was fun! Plus sometimes I don't even know if you all exist anymore! Thank you so much for everything, all of the presents that were sent we're awesome! I greatly appreciated it! Happy New Year!! Here we go:
Monday - P-Day we played basketball, we didn't get to play for very long.. due to getting our haircuts at the apostate barbershop! We have go to come up with some more P-Day ideas, I am open for suggestions? It is raining here today, so I think we are headed for a lunch date at the mall with the APs. Gotta love the mall! In the evening we had dinner with the Delp's! After dinner, we had to run and grab a coconut and pineapple from Walmart for our christmas festivities... and it was hilarious all of the campus missionaries were caroling outside of Walmart, just funny. So then we got out and we were knocking doors in the darkness, we didn't have much success, but we were able to talk to some really really good people, and had long conversations with them... one dude named Joe gave us some fruit, he was feeling the Christmas spirit, I guess.
Tuesday - Crazy day here... where not much was accomplished! We had our district meeting in the morning. And then after that we met with the Sister Trainer Leaders and had a little pow wow to discuss our plans for Zone Training, it was supposed to be tomorrow for us.. but we moved ours to Friday... we have some good stuff planned, we have invited the Stake President and the Bishop in 4th ward to come and speak to us. So we got all of the agenda figured out, now we just have to plan! So it was crazy weather.. and we had planned to do some finding, but due to the weather and no appointments we hit the phones and we started making all of our phone calls, in hopes that we could get us a successful end of the week. And then we get a call that Sister Lopez's house is flooding, so we go over and we start to help her out, so we started vacuuming and mopping up all of the water, not too much! But the rain was absolutely nuts... the waters were seriously like rivers, there were roads flooded and the gutters, which are huge deep holes dug, were like raging rivers.. so it was a good time! And then we ordered everyone to be inside, so that was that!
Wednesday - Christmas Eve!!! So we just started calling members and seeing if they would allow us to come share a short little Christmas message with them.. and the Porter's invited us over for breakfast in the morning with their family, so that was super nice of them, and we had the chance to share a message with them, I love the Porter's! We came home and we did our studies and then we were able to go and share a message with Bro Kelly and his daughter, which led to us getting a Christmas dinner invite from them. Then we visited with Otia Nash, she is a member, she is 18 years old, and the only member in her family.. so it is hard for her to come very much, based on her circumstances.. Then the Tew family had us over for some dinner, and they had all of the campus missionaries and the 4th ward missionaries over for dinner, and we packaged up, packages of cookies.. and then we went around caroling to all of their neighbors and giving them the oh so classic, and terribly outdated church DVD Stories of Christmas... I am sure people are dieing to watch Mr Kruger's christmas, right? :) So we went out caroling, which that was a good time! And the Atchley's who I told you about, it was their oldest son that passed away.. they hydroplaned and crashed into a tree, so really really sad! Then the Davis's had us over for some dinner, which was fun, and that is where we got to act out the Christmas story.
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| Elder Hintze & Elder Peterson |
Thursday - CHRISTMAS DAY!!! This Christmas was great.. it was so much fun! We had the big sleepover in our living room, around our tree and all of the presents.. so we all woke up in the morning and went around, one by one, and we all opened up our presents! I think that I came out on top... some of their families, wrapped up packages of gum, and tic tacs... so I count myself a winner! :) Then we went to Breakfast on campus with all of the missionaries.. super fun, I wooped up on some people in Ping Pong.. Elder Cooper is the only one that has beaten me... and we went back and forth. ;)
We came home did our studies! And then we got to eat with Bro Kelly. Then we went to the Knudsen's, which is where I was able to talk to you all!!!!!!!!!!! Highlight of the week by far!!! After that we headed over to Pres and Sis Smith's home for dinner
and then we got to watch a little movie called An Ordinary Shepherd, it was like 20 minutes long about, this boy, who's father was a shepherd when the angels announced the birth of Christ, so his father told him all about it.. his father ended up passing away and the boy left crippled due to a falling rock. In the end Christ appears to him and heals him, and the little boy shares all that he has with this man, who he did not know was the Savior. I loved it! It made me think a lot.. the small boy all he knew was of the story his father told him, he had never met the Savior, he has just heard of His works and His miracles, yet that was the center of that boys thoughts, that is all that he focused on. But we know infinitely more about the Savior than just the Christmas Story, but I don't think He is the center of each of our thoughts enough!
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| Christmas morning at the Institute Building. |
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| Elder Welch, Elder Fredericksen, Elder Funk, Elder Peterson, Elder Hintze, Elder Sorensen, Elder Milne, President Smith. |
Friday - We had our weekly planning in the morning! And then we taught a man by the name of Curtis Bauchmann, he is a guy, probably in his 50s, turns out he is actually pretty awesome, seems fairly solid! We taught him the Restoration and it went really really well, he agreed with everything, and he seemed to feel the Spirit, he calls himself a "traveler." So we will see! And then we tried to chase down some of our potentials and do some finding, we talked to our boy Dennis, and he said, "Are you guys ready to drink some beer?" "Well alright then, don't come back until you are ready to drink beer!" Uh... ur... okay Dennis! Then we ate dinner at the Bell's home, they as well, are one of the favorites for sure! And then the evening consisted of popping around and trying to see potentials again!
Saturday - We did some zone work in the morning, we have had to adjust all of the areas in the zone, and help them set their baptismal goal for 2015. Afterwards, we went to the Gray's, for a short visit. Then we were able to visit with the Markham's for just a short time, it was a good visit, got to share a little though, but the spirit was really strong. We then taught T.R. with Dean Delp and we were able to read with him out of the Book of Mormon, 1 Nephi 13 and 14... we are going to teach him all out of their now, really get him into it. He has not been praying, so we whipped him into shape on that! Then we taught Eric Erickson, and we taught him the plan of salvation, and he is going to now come back and he is going to teach us the plan of salvation next time, Eric is still just kind of floating on, he didn't come to church because he went back to the other church for some service.
Sunday - We had Curtis and T. R. at church on Sunday, church was really good today! T. R. is still kicking it off great with the ward! We had to teach Gospel Principles and the topic was... Exaltation, hahahahahaha. So here we have a first time investigator, and we taught him how we can become like God. :) Always fun! So we did a really good job of teaching it I think, we basically taught the Plan of Salvation, and worked our way up there.. but the first question that was asked a member popped up and started talking about how we will create our own planet and have our own spirit children.. and after she said all that, I said, "You know what, I really liked that you said how much Heavenly Father loves us." Just moving on from that one! So then after EQ lesson.. our boy Curtis, starts like grilling into me about this and that, about different thoughts that he had about the lesson. Afterwards, we taught this guy named Webster Emmanuel, we did some family history with him.. We were able to visit the Whisnant's who are active members. Then were able to see Sister Daniels, great visit with them, we are getting all of the kids involved. Then in the evening probably another highlight of the week was teaching Mark Davis, he is a new investigator, apparently he has had many interactions with the church, they have helped him out, so we got a chance to teach him the Restoration, and it was awesome, he totally felt the Spirit, he told us.. and we said a kneeling prayer with him right at the end, where he asked to know if these things were true, he is super awesome! So we are excited for what is to come with him.
Love you like crazy!!!!!!
Elder Hintze
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