New Companion & Challenge to be Bold

Letter to Mission President:

2 I am still going to be working on diligence this week. I will do this by working on scheduling better. This is what I have the hardest time doing as a missionary
3 I learned that even if we are keeping the commandments we still have to do it with a willing heart and an open ear and not complain about it all the time. I thought this was cool because a lot of people including me do this and I need to work on loving the commandments and not just following them
4 To strengthen my companionship this week I am working on letting him take more part of the lessons. I have been taking over the lessons because he does not know any of the people. But this is not good so I need to help him to be able to take more part in the lesson so he can learn the people better. Elder Kuli is a great missionary. He knows the scriptures super well. That is so cool because that is one thing that I struggle with.
5 This week we were able to put 4 people on date and 2 of them are 90% on board. we have been teaching them for a while now but we finally got them to get a baptism date. Yay! I am so excited that they are following Jesus Christ's example. Also I am getting so much more out of reading the scriptures because of that mission conference.

Elder J. Walker and Elder Maddy

So Elder Maddy is gone :( I loved Elder Maddy but I will move on. The hardest thing about him leaving is that I have to lead the area. I only had 5 weeks to do this and you know how good I am with names.  I have a lot of work to do. I don't want to lose anyone in the change because I did not remember where they lived or what their name was. My companion is from Tonga, his name is Elder Kuli (which means flower) he is 220 pounds and was a rugby player in Tonga. He was really good.

He is going home after this transfer (so I am going to "kill" him). He extended so he has already been out 2 years. Crazy.

Elder Kuli and Elder J. Walker

I saw Kevin Pilcher. He was in my mission conference. He just came in. I did not get to say hi so he never saw me but it was still cool to see someone from home.

In my mission conference we had a former member of the 70 talk to us. His name was Jensen and he really knows how to study. He had some amazing tips that he told us that really changed how I study the scriptures  He said that when you mark something in your scriptures you need to only mark the important words or phrases because when you mark the whole verse it is saying that every word in that verse that you marked has the same power as all the words in the verse.

At the end, he told us about the new scriptures that are coming out. [Article can be read here.] I think that it will be so cool to see a new edition of the scriptures.

Dad/Robert I have a challenge for you. I want you to get all of the people you home teach active in the church. I now know that members are the best way to reactivate people in the church. Me and you could have done better on that, so I want you to visit active members 1 time a month and non active members 2 times or more a month until they become active.

This is for you too Robert. I want you to have that in your mind at all times. We were told, "How great your Joy will be if you bring, but one soul unto me." ( I don't know the scripture reference to this or if I quoted it right, but you get the picture) [The scripture is Doctrine and Covenants 18:10, 15-16]. I also want a report every week on the progress. (Dad I am learning to be bold to members because if you are not then a lot of the time they will brush you off, but I also don't want to come off too strong). I remember visiting the other people we home taught only 3 times. We probably did more but I don't remember ever doing it more then that. I love you Dad and I know that you can do this because your teaching allowed me to do this and now I do it 24/7.

This will also help Robert learn how to teach lessons better. You can use Preach my Gospel, it is very cool and I wished I had used it more. Mom I know very little about visiting teaching but I am sure you can do this too.

Monica look for people to teach and refer to the missionaries all the time. I remember several people that I knew and it never occurred to me to tell the missionaries.