Mid Mission Crisis

Sounds like everything is going well at home!  Happy Birthday Grandpa, Ryan, and Jordan!  Thanks for making a rock for grandpa for me mother!  I'm excited for the package.  It sounds awesome!  How's Emily liking High School?  What classes is she taking? Alec Crosby is going to New Hampshire!?  That's so sweet!  He'll love it!  Sounds like Christopher is getting ready to go to the MTC soon!  That's exciting!  He'll be a great missionary!  Jackson is coming to California!?  He's going to freak out.  Oh well.  Weird I hit my year mark last Thursday.  I'll probably go through a mid mission crisis or something!  It doesn't feel like I've been out a year.  I don't even want to be out a year!  I still have so much I gotta do!    

Anyways, we had a pretty good week this week.  We taught Ivan again this Tuesday.  He was as gangsta as ever.  He told us he read through the Plan of Salvation Pamphlet 3 times since we saw him last and he taught us the whole plan of Salvation from beginning to end.  It was so cool!  He's great.  We taught him more about the book of Mormon and the Priesthood and Keeping the Sabbath day holy.  We committed him to baptism and he promised to come to church this Sunday.  We haven't been able to keep in contact with him though.  He wasn't home for our appointment on Friday and won't answer his phone and didn't come to church.  Ya that's how it goes most of the time when I commit someone to baptism.  They fall off the face of the Earth, but we'll keep trying by because he really does feel the spirit everytime we come over and when he reads and prays.  He told us himself he knows its all true.  

Later on Tuesday we had interviews with President Hall which was great.  I was going to ask him if I could have lunch with Lindsy since she's 10 minutes away.  I got in the interview and I immedietly knew his answer would be no, but I asked him if its okay if I see her at Stake Conferance since that is in 2 weeks.  He said to not seek her out, but that if I do see her, I can talk to her and give her a hug.  I then just asked him questions on how I can help my district. It was so good to talk to him and see him.  Interviews are like the one time that I actually get to talk to President 1 on 1 since he's so busy.  It was great.  

We also taught Lillian and Jose that night too.  Elder Blumel found them before I came in.  Lillian has been reading the Book of Mormon though and she told us she knows this gospel can help her and her son.  We taught her the Plan of Salvation and committed them to baptism and to come to church.  They didn't come to church. No one came to church, except for recent converts that we're teaching which is good. This ward has a lot of recent converts that have been starting to go less active.  The ones in our area are still going strong though and we visit and teach them regularly.  

All of our Baptismal dates dropped.  Princess Clemente is just not interested right now.  She just refuses to participate in the lessons we teach and keeps telling us that she is already going to church with her friend.  We did go on exchanges with the Zone leaders this week and she asked a ton of questions on the temple apparently, so thats good.  She'll get there one day.  She told us she knows the Book of Mormon is true.  For right now, we'll keep going over to teach her Dad the new member lessons.  Esperanza and Lluvia dropped too because I have actullay never met with them since I've come into the area.  Elder Blumel says their solid, and I beleive him, but they keep canceling appointments and are going through a lot of financial and emotional struggles right now, so the missionaries are not their top priority now.  As with Princess, They'll get there one day as well.  

We did start teaching an Armenian family this past Thursday.  Jorge and Lili.  Jorge is about 15 and is really interested in learning about other churches.  We met him on the street.  He's part of the Christian club at his school.  His mom Lili and him go to an Armenian church, but they're super nice and open.  There are a ton of Armenians here and they are super prideful about being the first christian nation in the world.  They're usually pretty closed off, but Jorge and Lili are open.  Lili didn't really understand the Restoration.  She felt the spirit though.  She doesn't speak very good english, but Jorge does.  he told us he'd read and pray.  1st Armenian investigators of my mission so far.  

Friday we went on Exchanges with the zone leaders.  I went with Elder Dahlke to his area.  it was an eventful exchange.  We taught a pretty good lesson to an investigator, and after the lesson, the member that we had with us saw his friend in one of the rooms that he hadn't seen for a couple years.  Turns out his friend used to live with a Mormon family and went to church with them.  He said that he'd sit in with them next week.  Miracle!  We also taught this guy who's father tried to bash with us in spanish.  It was quite the adventure.  It was the first time I got bashed in spanish.  His son translated, and we just said a closing prayer and left because all they wanted to do was argue.  90% of the people we talked to the whole day were Latino.  It was great!  Also at 2:30 in the morning, the fire alarm to our complex went off and we stood outside for 20 minutes while everyone in the complex just stayed inside their rooms.  Someone just pulled the fire alarm.  It was an interesting experience.  it was a lot of fun though.  Elder Dahlke is from Idaho and reminds me a lot of Jense Gray.  He plays Trombone and Jazz is one of his passions so we connected really well and had a great time.  

So ya!  It was a great week!  My district meeting went really well too.  The Kempfs  have been having a harder time.  They just barely hit their halfway point in their mission and all the people they've taught and baptized ahve gone less active.  I did my district meeting on receiving revelation for each of the areas your in and gaining a greater vision for your mission.  I related 1 Nephi 19:1-5 to missionary work and receiving revelation for each of our areas.  I learned a lot from it and afterwards the Kempfs thanked me for the district meeting and told me and the zone leaders that that was exactly what they needed to hear.  It was really good to hear that because I was really unsure if this was what the district needed going into the meeting, but it went really well and the spirit testified.  It was great!  

Well there ya have it!  That's my week!  I love you!

Elder Nelson      

Van Nuys

Wooooooo!  I'm in Van Nuys!  I knew I would come here at some point in my mission.  I'm not a fan of the car area.  Biking was so much more fun and energizing.  This area used to be a bike area, but they switched all the Van Nuys areas to car because people kept following the missionaries around on their bikes and stealing them.  The thing is, all the Spanish missionaries here are on bike, so I'm wondering how they don't get their bikes stolen!  The area is a lot like West Hills.  Its a barrio and there are spanish people everywhere.  It's fun though.  We cover part of Van Nuys, Panorama City, and North Hollywood.  It's a good area.  We have a lot of investigators and a lot of recent converts we're teaching.  My companion is named Elder Blumel from Orem.    He's a good missionary and we get a long.  

The district is all the missionaries in the Van Nuys ward and the Northridge ward.  Speaking of which, I'm emailing at Lindsy's church building right now..... weird.  The district is awesome though.  We have 4 sets of missionaries in Van Nuys, including a senior proselyting couple, the only one in the mission.  Northridge has two sets of missionaries as you know.  They are all just awesome hard working missionaries.  Lindsy you better go out with the sisters! 

We have so much work here!  We have about 14 investigators and 3 are on date.  It's awesome.  We didn't get to work much last week though because I had meetings up in Santa Clarita all week.  It was good though.  I learned a lot.  I had to go to a District leader meeting on Thursday for about 5 hours and then to a 6 week followup training for my new companion on Friday most of the day.  Tuesday we were up in Santa Clarita most of the day too because I had to stay after transfers for the new DL training.  All of these meetings were awesome though and I learned a ton on how I can halp my district.  

Our investigators that have a baptismal date are Princess Clemente, and Eperanza and Lluvia.  Princess is the daughter of a recent convert that was baptized about 3 months ago.  She is 14 and is the typical bratty teenage daughter.  They're from the Phillipines and she's still learning English, but its a lot better than her Dad's.  We taught her about tithing and the importance of church reading and praying.  it was good.  The problem with her is that she's only been to church once and her date is for the 7th.  Her dad would take her to church, but he's tight financially and doesn't have a job so he has to go to malibu to do work  and get money for his family.  He's solid though and reads everyday.  The Kempfs (Senior couple) are working on getting him a job so that he doesn't have to work on Sundays.  The mom however works on Sundays as well and won't let Princess go without her Dad.  So were praying that things will work out with that.  I haven't met Esperanza and Lluvia yet.  They have a date for Sep. 21st.  which they should make.  The concern with them is getting them to church since they haven't been yet, but they know everything is true, or so I'm told by my companion.

The ward here is great.  The bishop has a solid ward mission plan and we have a solid ward mission leader.  There are a ton of Philipino's in this ward which is great because they can help us out with people who speak Tagalog.  Anyways, I'm excited to work here and I know the gospel is true.  

Love you all!

Elder Nelson

Letter from a Member in West Hills

Sister Nelson - we again enjoyed dinner in our home with Elder Nelson who we absolutely love.   Our whole ward loves him - I think we all think of him as our son.  We are so sad that he has been transferred and will be leaving us but I know there are others who will be greatly blessed from getting to know him.   You should be very proud of him - he is a great missionary and a wonderful person.   Many people in our ward are all the better for having had him here.   Thank you again for sharing him with us. 

Karen Peterson

Goodbye West Hills

Yup I'm getting trasferred!  And I got called as a district leader to a car area, which means I'm either going to Castaic, Chatsworth, Sylmar, and Northridge since those are the district leader car areas in the mission that I know of that are opening up!  I'm totally going to go to Northridge!  That'd be so awesome!  I'll find out tommorrow at transfers.  My last companion Elder Smith is going zone leader and Elder Baughan is going to be training a new missionary.  So yes I'm way excited about transfers!  It'll be sweet!  

Kristopher is going to St. Louis!  That's so cool!  I'm so excited for him!  His mission is probably huge!  Every mission is huge when you compare it to here.  This mission is so small!  I got your package Jessica and Jordan so don't worry about that!  Mom they didn't have the package in the office and I still haven't get the other one you sent.  Kami Church is now Kami Hill!?  Oh my gosh that's crazy!  I'm happy for her though!  Congratualations to the new couple!  The cabin looks so cool Grandpa!  Those polygamists must be working pretty hard!  The shoes that I got from the missionary depot were Dunhams and they are great.  They are in good shape still so you should tell the guy that works there.  

Anyways, this week has good.  The work here is dying down a little bit, but we've been working hard.  We found some new investigators.  The first is named Gary Goodman.  He's in his fifties and is a super chill guy.  He has a sweet Amazon Macaw that he lets just hang out on his porch.  It was there when we knocked on the door and kept saying "hello" to us.  It was pretty funny.  We started to teach a former investigator again named Angelica.  She's really solid and interested in the Book of Mormon because she's part Apache indian.  Marisa is doing well and we're still teaching her the new member lessons.  No less actives or investigators came to church this week.  This coming week should be good for Elder Baughan's trainee because we have a lot of appointments with some solid investigators and people we've found.  I'm sure they'll have a lot of miracles. 

With transfers tomorrow I'm going to be in Valencia from about 9:00 to 3:00.  Transfer meeting is only an hour and a half, but we have to get there 2 hours early for a trainer training and then I have to stay after for district leader training.  Should be fun being district leader.  I'm excited.  I've learned a lot from the district leaders I've been with and hopefully I can implement what I've learned from being with them.  I have to conduct a 90 minute district meeting each week for the district which I'm looking forward to as well.  When I was with Elder Davidson he had me help him prepare and train with him and I learned so much when I did that.  Now I just get to learn more!  Should be good. 

Other than that everything is good!  I'll let yall know where I end up!  I'll have missionaries tell Lindsy and Ryan where I'm at if I don't go to Northridge!  I hope everything is great at home!  Love ya!

Elder Nelson

Happy Birthday!

Yay, I'm 19! I'm so old I can't stand it!  Ya the birthday was good!  I didn't do anything special, just tracted and street contacted.  We did go to Denny's with Marisa and Isaiah so that was fun.  It was a solid day.  Sadly I didn't get your package Mom and Emily.  I did get Grandma's package and letters from the Kings and Edlings though!  Thanks for that!  They were awesome!  Hopefully your package makes its way around to me soon!  Preferrably this week sometime because transfers are next week and I'm probably leaving.  It's not very common for a missionary to stay five transfers in the same area in this mission, but it does happen, and I have a weird feeling that it might happen to me just because I'm so ready to leave the area.  I love the area, but I'm just ready to go somewhere else.  If I do stay, it will be interesting, but I can handle it.  I do get to go to the temple this Wednesday for my birthday with Elder Baughan and I'm really looking forward to that. 

This past week was a little slower than usual.  We didn't find anybody new and didn't teach as much as usual.  The Nicklow family canceled their appointment with us and are going out of town this week to go camping, so we won't be seeing them for another week.  We did teach Bertha this past Tuesday.  She is still as prepared as ever.  We had a good lesson on the importance of the Book of Mormon and reviewed the Restoration with her.  She told us that she believes all of it. She had tried to read the Book of Mormon during the week, but she said she can't read the text because its to small, so we're getting a large print copy for her.  She is a little harder to teach because she talks a lot, but she's awesome.  She told us she wants her son to start learning with her too and to bring him to church.  She also said that the 7th day Adventist that she's meeting with is wanting her to be baptized in that church, but she said she won't do it, because she doesn't feel that its right.  That's good.  She told us that she feels right about us and that we should continue to teach her before baptism.  She also said that she would try to make it to church for an hour on sunday because she has to work.  She didn't make it though, but hopefully next week. 

We also taught James again.  Despite the impression that I got from him last time about being able to understand better, I was wrong.  He still can't understand.  He must have a learning disability, because he told us that its really hard for him to learn anything.  He is reading the Book of Mormon though and coming to church.  He is still holding on to all the Catholic traditions and what not though.  He can't let go of Catholicism, but that's okay considering he has a mental disability.  We'll continue to try to teach him and be as patient as possible, but if he doesn't come to be able to understand during this life, I know there are missionaries waiting to teach him on the other side, where he will be free from his disabilities. 

We taught the Indian family too.  They are still reading the Book of Mormon as a family as well, except for the Dad.  We taught them about how if the Book of Mormon is true, then there is only one true church and that church is our church.  It was hard with the language barrier, but the kids understood it and accepted it.  We think the Mom understood it as well.  We couldn't have put it in any plainer terms.  She told us she would at least try to make it church this sunday, but she didn't make it. 

We only had one other investigator lesson this week and that was with Soloman, our investigator from Kenya.  We haven't taught him in the last 2 weeks so we reviewed the Restoration and focused on the Priesthood.  he had been reading and he believes the Book of Mormon is true.  He came to the realization that what we were teaching meant that only our church holds that priesthood to baptize.  He told us that he "needs us now more than ever,"  and that he considers that we could be "messengers from God to help him attain salvation."  We were like that's exactly what we are!  He committed to come to church this next week and to continue to read and pray to know if the Book of Mormon is true.  This lesson was a lot better than our other lessons with him, because he actually stayed on topic, rather than go off on random tangents like he usually does!  It was great!  

We did have two less actives come to church this week!  Our Indian, Shiraz Verma and an older guy named Bro. Hurt whom started teaching a couple of weeks ago came.  It was great.  We also had zone conference on Wednesday for 8 hours!  it was amazing!  I got so much out of it!  President talked a lot about the law of Consecration and how we asm missionaries get to live that law closer than at any other time in our life!  We also talked a lot about tteaching lesson 5.  It was so so so good.  The mission is also piloting a new program called Just Serve.  Each companionship in the mission is supposed to try to get 10 hours of community service in per week.  It should be awesome!  I love doing service!  We're probably going to start volunteering at the Salvation Army and a bunch of different rehab centers around our area since we have a ton of those.  It should be fun.  Yup, that was my week!  It was fun! I'm loving the mission!  Thanks for all the Birthday wishes and everything!  Love you all!

Elder Nelson       

Asian Thanksgiving

Man it sounds like everyone's having a blast at home!  Too bad you can't have as much fun as me teaching anyone and everyone about the gospel! :) Thanks for the birthday wishes!  Kristopher is going on a mission!  That's so awesome!  My guess is California San Fernando!  That'd be so cool!  Wouldn't be the first time that cousins have served together in this mission. 

Well this week was a pretty good one considering I had the best dinner I've had on the mission so far last Saturday!  Bishop took us to this sushi restaurant called kabuki's and it was amazing!  We had so much sushi!  He got us these two boats full of meat and sushi rolls and whole bunch of other stuff!  He took all the missionaries in our ward.  It was like and Asian thanksgiving!  The bishop really likes us, at least I assume he does.  Otherwise he wouldn't have taken us to sushi!  I'll send pictures of the loads of food because it was crazy!  

On to the actual week.  We had a ton of appointments fall through this last Tuesday.  We had so many lessons set up I thought it was too good to be true. . . and it was.  It was still a great day though.  We taught this white lady from Mexico named Bertha.  We met her last transfer and she had kept pushing appointments back, but we finally met with her and she is super prepared!  She told us that she was raised Catholic and didn't like it.  She wants to come closer to God and the day we met her on the street, she was having a horrible day and asked God to show her a sign that he was aware of her and she met us!  She's super open to learning from us, but she's meeting with a 7th day Adventist every Friday for Bible study.  Hopefully that won't get in the way of things.  We also taught the Indian family again.  I'm starting to think the language barrier might be a bigger deal than I thought.  It's so hard to get the mom to understand and she just wants to keep going to her church.  The kids are awesome though.  We will continue to work with them until the spirit tells us that its not their time yet.  We need some Malayalam speaking missionaries!

We started to teach James again (the mentally disabled one) this past Thursday.  We ran into him while we were street contacting Tuesday and he told us that he wants to have us come over again to read the Book of Mormon with him. Previously we dropped him because we felt that he wasn't in the right state of mind to understand the gospel.  We went over Thursday and had a good lesson about the priesthood and he seemed to comprehend it a lot more than he had previously.  He came to Church on Sunday as well and stayed for all three meetings.  He's praying about baptism now and we'll continue to teach him.  Something seems to have changed about him.  He's very catholic and has pictures of popes and saints and shrines to them all around his apartment, but he said he feels different when we talk to him and when he comes to church.  He shared his testimony about how God answers prayers in Elders quorum.  He told everyone that He had been praying that he would somehow be able to run into the missionaries and start meeting with them again, then he ran into us on the street.  It'll be a process teaching him and will take a lot of patience, but I think he'll get baptized. 

I went on an exchange with Elder Hansen on Friday one of my zone leaders.  He's from West Jordan Utah.  We had a good exchange and we contacted and knocked all day with little success.  It was fun though.  It's starting to get super hot here in the valley.  It got up to like 108 this past Thursday and has been in the 100's the last couple of days. It's great.  

We found and taught an amazing family on Sunday!  The Nicklow family.  We found them knocking.  Kaye, the mother of the family answered the door and told us that she has family in Utah and that her Nieces and nephews served missions.  She said that she had been waiting for 20 years for missionaries to knock on her door and we were the first ones to ever knock on the door!  We set up an appointment for later that night so that her husband could be there.  We ended up teaching her husband Shaun and her daughter Emma.  Shaun was raised Catholic and the whole family is Catholic and goes to catholic school, but that he loves Mormons and knows a lot about them.  We shared the message of the Restoration with them and they loved it!  Shaun told us that he agrees with everything, but that its hard for him to believe in the Book of Mormon and the church with regards to issues that its had in the past like polygamy and blacks and the priesthood.  Those can be over come though.  Neither of them had read the Book of Mormon, but they both want to read it and pray about it.  It was a sweet lesson and the daughter even told us that she would read and pray about it too!  They have at least 3 other kids that didn't sit in on the lesson.  They're a solid family and I hope that things go well for them.  

Well there's my week for ya!  I love you all! 

Elder Nelson      

Sikhs

Well this area is wearing on me.  I love it, but lets just say that I'll be happy when this transfer is through.  I've been here a long time and I'm ready to go.  Its not stopping the work though!  Not one bit!  We found some pretty cool new investigators this week.  One of them was named Mike.  He's 17 and we found him street contacting.  The other is named George. He's somewhere in his 30's and we had a great lesson with him.  I found him on exchanges with Elder Ehninger.  It was good to be teaching with my trainer again.  We taught really well together and the spirit was strong when we taught.  We went on exchanges this past Friday and I really needed it just to get out and work hard.  We had a good time.  We talked to a lot of crazy people (They're everywhere!) which was fun and we met this family of Sikhs!  It was so cool!  We were just walking down the street and some guy wearing a turbin calls out to us from his house.   He told us he wanted us to talk to his kids about what we do.  He called his family outside and he set up chairs for us and they just bombarded us with questions about why we were here on the mission, what we believe in and what we do etc.  The father told us that the kids go to a school owned by a Mormon in Orange County and that they know a lot about Mormons and have been to a lot of church history sights.  They weren't interested in being taught or anything, only asking questions.  They told us about what they believe and do as Sikhs.  They don't cut their hair ever and all the men have to where turbins.  it was interesting!  I've only talked to one other Sikh on my mission.  That's the cool thing about this mission.  There is so much diversity!  I've talked to so many people from all over the world of so many different faiths.  Armenians, Persians, Russians, Hindu's, Sikhs, Vietnamese, Koreans, Syrians, Iranians, you name it!  Its sweet. 

Anyways, we had a lot of less actives come to church this week!  It was great!  Most of them stayed just for Sacrament though, but hey its a start.  We had a frustrating time trying to get one of our investigators to church though.  We told her that we were going to provide transportation for her and we rode with the member to pick her up.  We pulled up to her apartment complex at about 9:10 and told her we were outside.  She said she'd come down.  We ended up waiting for 20 minutes and we called her twice and she never picked up again, so we just left.  Church starts at 9:30, so we were already late.  We got halfway to church and she called us and asked us where we were.  So frustrating!  We had to tell her we just left because she didn't come down in time.  We were super late to church and barely even caught the sacrament.  Its all good though. 

We taught the Indian Malayalam speaking family again.  It was an interesting lesson.  We found out why the other missionaries stopped meeting with Josie and the family.  Its because they can't be baptized because their family won't let them.  it took a while to get that out of the mom since she can't speak English very well, but it happened.  They had actually started to read the Book of Mormon as a family!  So cool!  They didn't come to church though, but they're doing well and we will continue to teach them even though they can't get baptized.  The kids love us and are always so excited to see us. 

Well those are pretty much the highlights of the week.  Till next time!

Elder Nelson