Josh's Hurriedly Written Letter Dated 9/30/2013

(I think he accidentally erased some of the first part of this letter before sending it.)

Well this week was crazy! We spent so much time helping other missionary companionships in our district.  I think we ended up spending 15 hours total doing things for other missionaries.  It was tough, but it taught me a lot though!  When we help other Woohoo! Elder Ehninger has been teaching them for the past couple of weeks and they haven't kept any of their commitments.  This week we read the Book of Mormon with them and talked about Christ and invited them to General Conferance next week.  It was a good lesson.  The spirit was there and I know they felt something.  We followed up with them later in the week and they told us they had been reading the assigned chapter we gave them and that they had some questions for our next lesson!  I was happy.  Sunday was crazy and awesome all at the same time!  Testimony meeting was so good!  Everyone bore their testimonies on missionary work and the spirit was so strong!  My comp. and I bore our testimonies as well and while I was talking I saw Korihor (Adrien) in the audience.  It was weird.  I don't know if I told you, but he looks like a vampire.  No joke.  It's kind of funny.  He is always dressed in all black and he is balding with greasy, curly, long gray hair.  Anyways, ya he came to church.  After Church we ate at the Bishop's house and taught them the Gospel of Christ.  After that we went to a Baptism for the Stevenson Ranch ward at the Stake Center.  After that there was a Stake boundry change meeting for the whole stake.  It was crazy.  Everyone has been talking about this meeting for the past two weeks.  The Stake Presidency have been working on changing ward boundries for over a year and this was the meeting where they announced the changes to the wards. These changes meant that we had to change up our areas.  Parts of wards were put into other wards and such.  Most of our areas are based off of ward boundries.  They made a lot of changes and they were big too.  The Valencia 3rd ward, my ward, gained a large chunk of area and lost only a little bit.  After the boundry meeting we had a meeting with President Hall to discuss the changes in the boundries.  Since the area's changed, investigators have to be transferred over to the missionaries in their new area.  We inherited Valencia 2nds investigators that have a baptismal date for the 19th of this month.  Their names are the Crosby's and I'm really excited to meet them!  The rest of the meeting we just talked about how we can use these changes for our benefit and for emeber missionary work!  It got me pumped!  Member missionary work is the greatest!  So that was my Sunday.  On another note, Elder Miller went home this week.  He was in my district here and my MTC zone.  It was hard to see him leave.  I don't know exactly what he went home for, but I know it was for something that was unresolved at home and that it was the best choice for him.  We had to help his companion Elder Baughn a lot.  He is now in a trio with the V2 Elders and we drove them around a ton this week.  Sometimes I wish I didn't have a car, cause we have to give people rides everywhere, but then when I think about not having a car, I'm grateful I have a car haha!  Anyways, we found some potential investigators this week.  We didn't get a lot of finding time in as I said earlier, but the Lord blessed us with the time that we had.  One of the potentials we found by knocking.  When she opened the door, we introduced ourselves and told her about the Book of Mormon.  She told us that she had one and that she really wanted to read it, but that she had never gotten around to it.  She said that it was good we stopped by because she had been pondering over life and that we reminded her that she had a Book of Mormon!  It was so cool!  We are going to meet with her some time this week.  I'm really excited!  She is a middle aged mom who is Catholic, and she is interested!  So cool!  Oh ya, I ran into my first Bible basher this week!  Most of the Bible Bashers live in Newhall, but we knocked on this one's door.  He opened the door and I told him that we were missionaries and he just started telling us all the problems he had with our church.  He was trying to tell me what I believed and what not.  I told him what I did believe, and he was all "That's against your doctrine!"  He just kept going on and on.  Everything he said was just dumb.  It wasn't good.  He was from the Masters college.  Anyone from the masters college down here tries to bible bash with you.  I didn't really say much cause I didn't want to get in a huge argument, but my trainer did.  I felt bad for the Masters College guy.  He was just so shut down to the gospel.  Most people in our area are super nice!  They say that their not interested, but they'll offer us water a lot.  Most people say that they don't want to change and that they're content with their lives.  Nobody is all that mean.  I have only been yelled at like 15 times since I got here haha!  I got to go on a mini exchange with Elder Forsyth, my MTC comp. this week while our comps went to leadership training!  It was awesome! We saw miracles during the 5 hours we were together!  Our zone went on a hike today!  It was fun, but it reminded me of home which was sad.  It's ok though.  I took some pictures.  It was a cool hike.  Well thanks for all the emails and letters!  I love hearing from you all!  I promise that I will get back to all of you!  I just need to write handwritten letters because I don't have enough time on the computer to email everyone, so send me your addresses!  I love you all and thank you so much for your support!

 

Elder Nelson