LOOKIN' FOR SOMEONE TO LOVE IN SELKIRK!

Hey Friends and Family,

First off, I didn’t get any e-mails, other then Dads, so I cant really write back to them, but things are good here in Selkirk. This was definitely one of the hardest weeks of my mission! We have honestly tracted ourselves silly! I really, really miss street contacting! haha Things are coming along though! We found 14 new investigators this week. Last transfer they only found 5 the whole transfer. So it was definitely an improvement! We will actually have some appointments this week! The downer is that we, once again, had 0 people to church! I was not happy at all.

My comp is great, but he’s just okay with the fact that we didn’t have anyone come to church. It’s kinda driven me crazy! He is a great kid, but this week has done him in! haha When we get home, he sleeps and he sleeps through workout time every morning. I don’t know what to do or say though because with everything else he is obedient and willing to do.

Missionary work is sooo weird out here! We are the only missionaries out here and it seems like a ton of pressure. We are working so hard and we have found some good new people but a lot of the people are kind of flakey, and a lot of people here aren’t nice! haha I’ve heard more cussing here than probably anywhere else! hahaha The members are really good though. I don’t know what more to say. . . . we have worked our tails of this week! I’ve heard so many funny excuses when we’ve knocked on people’s doors! The funniest had to be from a 30-ish year old guy a couple days ago. He opened the door and before we said a word he said, "I’m born again Christian and I’m having sex with my wife." It was one of the first times on my mission that I really had noooo idea what to say! haha We laughed a lot about it though!

I am really excited about what could happen here though! We talked to the branch president and went through the whole ward list. We have some reactivation plans and we are gonna work with some part member families. We also went to Stonewall this week and found a couple really good investigators! Stonewall is about 30 minutes away and it hasn’t ever seen missionaries before! It seems like everyone in Selkirk knows about us or they think we are Jehovahs but there are tons of jehovas here too that we run into a lot! haha But Stonewall is pretty untouched by any kind of missionaries. We are hoping to get more kilometers so we can go to Stonewall a couple times a week! So hopefully that will workout! I’m so excited to see what happens here, but man it’s hard! In Agnes, if you had a bad day it was okay because you always had at least one solid appointment with a good investigator, that you loved. Here I don’t have anyone that I love yet. haha We are sure looking hard to find some but man it’s tough!

Juliet’s baptism is this week though and I think I’m aloud to drive in for it so I’m excited about that!

It’s funny because it’s been a slow hard week but I’ve learned sooo much! I’m sooo grateful for the chance that I have to serve here! I read a quote that I loved! "No misfortune is so bad that whining about it won’t make it worse." haha Now as you can see I’m still working on this! haha But it’s so true!! Whining accomplishes nothing! And it does make things worse!

Also, dwelling on the positive makes things so much better!! So heres the positive. . . we more than doubled the investigators found last transfer and we did it in a week! We had a lot of good things happen in Stonewall! I have a lot of funny tracting stories! My comp is great and he knows how to work. The branch is great! We have some people to teach now! I’ve learned sooo much! I have great friends! I have an amazing family! I’m safe and happy! I’m on a mission! We have the restored gospel of Jesus Christ and life is great! haha It’s funny because when you look at what you’ve got you really feel like a PILE for ever feeling sorry for yourself! Life is so great! I’m so excited about this area and I really think that if we keep working hard things will turn around here in Selkirk!

I love all of you so much and hopefully you send those other emails fast! haha If not, just send ‘em next week. I only got Dad’s, so I wanna read the others! I love all of you so much! Stay smart and safe!

Love, Elder Smith!!

WELCOME TO SELKIRK!

"charlie the catfish"

Hey Friends and Family,

WOW! What a hard week!!

First off thank you so much Aunt Jill and the rest of the Jones family! I loved the package! You guys are great!!

Aright, so this week was sooo hard! I had to go say all my good byes and it was horrible! I got a lot of great notes from investigators and it was great, but so hard! Then we got asked to go out with the new missionaries on their first night! This was a blast, but it started out rough! haha They only asked me and my companion to go, but we had to take out four missionaries. So they gave me the assistance car and cut me loose with two brand new missionaries! I hadn’t watched the way we had taken to the mission home and I hadn’t driven in quite awhile so I’m sure they were like, “Who did President send us with!!” But once we found the Agnes area we tore it up!!! It was soooo much fun!! I really hope I train at some point because that was a blast!! We went all over street contacting and it was so fun! It helped me to see that I really have improved. The new missionaries were so nervous, and they were trying so hard to impress! It brought me back to my first night with Elder Neff!! Man he is a stud!! He promised me he’d go see you mom. His report should be great! So that was so fun with the new guys, though!

Two Idaho Boys!

Elder Nef & Elder Smith

Then it was transfer day!! Elder Turner is a stud!! He is definitely a follower though!! Which is so wierd. He is older, he’s been out longer, he knows the area, but I’m senior and he expects me to call all the shots. It’s been a blast, but its weird too! I feel like there is so much pressure on!! This area is DEAD! I don’t know what they have been doing the last six weeks! There is like one and a half investigators that they were working with! I guess all they did last transfer was drop by people that weren’t progressing! It’s ridiculous! They hadn’t found one new investigator in the last three weeks, and there were ZERO investigators to church this week! It has been such a shock and really so hard for me! I got a call from Elder Leonard and Open’s family all finally set dates the day after I left! So all together there are seven baptism dates in Agnes right now and Akon and others are close! I honestly have been sooo homesick for Agnes! I feel like I did the first week in Agnes! And the pressure is on because President is expecting a lot! I’ve been thrown into the fire for sure. It’s a downer but at the same time its super exciting! We have no where to go but up!

Since I got here, we’ve found seven new investigators, which is more then they found all last transfer. My knuckles are all bruised up! haha I miss street contacting!! People here are nice, until they see the tag and then they can get nasty. And yes it feels like Firth!! I am so excited about it though! Like, I miss the people at Agnes so much!! I never thought I’d be so homesick for Agnes!! But it’s really just because of the people that I loved so much there! I’m sure that once we start finding people to love here, it will be good!

The branch is amazing but I can tell they definitely don’t like the missionaries, like what I’m used to! I felt like I couldn’t even look any of them in the eye on Sunday because we had no investigators there. I didn’t know what to do. It was so ridiculous and I hope it never happens again!! It has been such a huge shock, but I know it can turn around!! It’s gonna take some serious faith, though. Iv’e realized that all the success I’ve had has purely been a blessing. This last couple days have been super humbling for me because I’ve “found” every day strait and we really haven’t found that many people. We have made plans to literally tract out all of Selkirk! And we are already well on our way! We also have some good ideas for workig with less actives and part member families. We scheduled a meeting with the Branch President to see if he can help and see how he feels about our ideas! I’m so excited but we are gonna have to work this area to death! I wanted a mix-up and something that would push me, but WOW this is gonna be interesting! haha WELCOME TO SELKIRK!!

Oh and I really, really, really miss black people!! Oh and those members that emailed you about the library being closed on Mondays are amazing!! They have an amazing conversion story! They were baptized and put into a four person branch and they were put in charge of it and the missionaries left! They were told they would get missionaries back if they converted more people! haha It’s a crazy story! I’m gonna have them put it on my tape! But they are great! I honestly am embarrassed almost to be a missionary here though! It’s so sad that this amazing little branch has had such little missionary work success! I sure hope that things turn around!! They deserve it!! And yes, being in a branch on Sunday was crazy! It was like 30 or 40 people! Definitely not home! And I thought Waverly Ward was small!! It’s so funny because now I love Waverly more than anything!! When at first I hated it! I’m sure I will feel the same about Selkirk soon enough!!

I just want you to know that I love and miss you a ton!! Sorry if I come off sounding discouraged. I really am excited for this new area. It’s just definitely been a hard change but it’s gonna be great!! I love you all so much and I am doing great!! Hopefully I’ll have some news next week of some new amazing investigators that we find!! I love you a ton!! Good luck with everything and tell Al happy belated b-day! He’s the best! You are all the best! I love all of you so much!! Talk to you later!!

Love, Elder Smith

THE INEVITABLE TRANSFER!

Friends and Family!!

Wow, I have a ton to tell you!! First off, missions are horrible! haha I’m getting transfered and I feel like I did in the MTC again! Now I have two places to be homesick for! aaahhh!

I got a great letter from Grandma Smith!! It was really good, but tell Morgan I am jealous out of my mind! Tell him that I am Grandpa’s work buddy and he better understand that the second I get home I get my spot back! haha Tell him to enjoy working with Grandpa while it lasts. Also, thanks a ton to Jay, Payt and Alex! The letters were great!!

Alright, as for transfers, here’s how it went!! This week was amazing and I DID NOT AT ALL want to leave! Juliet has a firm date for the 20th of March. Martha has a firm date for the 27th and Akon could decide to get baptized any day! Akon got her car fixed so she now drives to church and Martha’s family and Juliet have solid friends and rides in the ward! All of our lessons with them this week went great and we found a ton of new great people!! I was sooooo hoping to stay! Church was amazing and the week and day was just going great and then President called.... He said, "Elder Smith, I’m sorry but good things don’t last forever." haha It was downhill from there. He said that I am going to Selkirk (a small town 45 minutes outside of Winnipeg). It has a branch and it was where Bishop Baronins was found and baptized. I’m going to be serving with Elder Turner, which is crazy because Elder Ewell trained him before he trained me!! I’m going to be senior companion, and he’s served in that area for a while already. I’m way excited and I couldn’t have asked for a better place to go because I’ve wanted to go to and out lying branch. But it still stinks sooooo bad!! I wish I could be more excited about it but I don’t want to leave this area!!

So I’m headed to Selkirk and I should be so excited, but its so hard! President said, "You two have been a great companionship and you have done so much with this area and so we are going to split you up so we have two good areas instead of one." President’s funny because he just makes everyone feel so good. If he ever didn’t talk you up it would be a shock. He’s so nice and such a good guy, but I’m pretty sure he could tell that I wasn’t to happy. haha But I asked for permission to drive in for the baptisms and he said I could, so that was really exciting!! The worst part was that I got my call and I already wanted to cry and mostly just whine to somebody about it. haha But then I had to go and tell both Akon and Martha, who we had appointments with! That honestly was the hardest thing on my mission so far! They took no mercy! Akon was pretty mad and really sad! She said all kinds of stuff that made me feel horrible, like "Nyandeng is gonna cry all week" and "I don’t know if the new missionaries should come this week because it will be to hard on us" and "Why don’t they just leave you here so you can keep teaching our family". It was sooo hard!! Martha said, "I want to sneak in your bag and come with you." I just tried to make them feel good and talked up Elder Leonard, but they wouldn’t have it! aaah! It’s so hard and it made me feel guilty too! After that, I decided it’s definitely the right thing!! I want to stay so bad, but it’s for me! The best thing for them is for me to leave! I worry that they like me too much and not the gospel enough! I know that they have strong testimonies, but with me not teaching them anymore I think it will definitely be best for them and their conversion! It is soooo hard because I love all of them so much!! But it’s what is supposed to happen and I’m gonna do my best to stop whining and make the best of it!! I’m way excited to serve in a branch and to serve with Elder Turner! And any area that converted a Bishop Baronins has to be good!! And no more city! I thought I’d be excited to leave city life but man it’s giving me a gut ache just thinking about it!! It will be an interesting change for sure!! I wish I could skip the next couple days though because it’s just gonna make good byes that much more painful!! I am amazed at how fast my mission is passing!! It’s so scary!! It feels like I just left home and now I am going to be senior companion in some area I’ve never heard of! It’s so crazy! And really scary! Everything is going too fast!! It’s weird because the gut ache I get about leaving this area is the same, if not worse, than the gut ache I get when I think about home!! I’ve decided that missions are just one big gut ache! haha I hope I don’t get moved too much throughout my mission because it’s so hard!!

But I am loving it!! Everyday is so great and I learn so much!! I am so blessed to have this opportunity!! Missions are the best, even thought they really stink a lot of the time!! haha I love and miss you all a ton!! Keep up the great work with everything and be safe!! I’ll look forward to telling you more about Selkirk next week.

Oh, and don’t write to Agnes anymore, I won’t get the letters for weeks, if I even get them at all! haha I’ll send you my new address next week! I should be able to write more letters because on P-days in Selkirk you don’t have to drive all over.

Oh and my comp is staying and training!! aaaahhh! Him staying with a good comp makes me nervous, let alone a greeny!! haha He’s really excited though and I know he will keep working hard!! It’s what the Lord wants, so it will go great!

What’s the weather like there and when do the ski hills close? I forgot and everything here is different because they say the snow won’t be gone until April or May and some years even June! But it really has been great weather the last couple weeks! You hit 0 celsius and people are out in t-shirts!

Can you get me updates on all my friends that are out on missions? I’m curious how they are doing! Things have been so weird lately! Time is flying by!! The more I learn the more I feel like garbage! I need to improve so much on so many Christlike attributes that it’s ridiculous! It’s funny how you grow, and get cocky, and get cut down, and then grow even more just to be cut down again with more weaknesses that you find!! It’s also funny how much easier life is when you aren’t thinking about yourself! Days that I think about me and my problems or me and how good I am, seem to be the hardest days! But days that I am worried about everything but myself fly by and go great! The thing is that it’s hard not to think about myself!! haha But I saw a neat quote the other day. It said, “Humility isn’t thinking less of yourself, but it’s thinking of yourself less”. haha I like it but it’s a lot easier said than done for sure!

So I get to drive again because I’m senior! No more worrying about my companion from Seattle who had never driven on snow. Now you can just worry about me!! I’m gonna be in a branch!! haha How crazy!! And I thought Waverly was small! If we get ten investigators to this branch we will really double the branch. I’m getting excited, I just want to leave now though because it’s hard being here!

Payt, tear up the slopes and lift hard! I expect some great football stories!! Go Canada Hockey!! It’s because I’m here! Just kidding.

I love you all so much! Love Elder Smith

I DON'T EVER WANT TO LEAVE AGNES!

Friends and Fam!

Hey! ha ha It’s been a pretty great week! First off, you are all amazing!! Dad, I loved your email!! It’s soooo true and it’s crazy because I had a long talk with a girl about agency the other day. We talked a long time about the Plan of Salvation and one of the things that I said that made me laugh was, "You signed up for this." haha And it’s so true! It was one of those lessons that really strengthened my testimony because I truly know why we are here, where we came from and what’s gonna happen next. When sooo many people have no idea!! I love it when the gospel just clicks! It just makes sense! But all of your letters are great! Mom, if you could email Sister Baronins and tell her the connection it would be really good, she misses her boy! She reminds me of you. She’s amazing! but she doesn’t come close to you! haha I’m pretty sure that everyone in the mission now knows that your the best mom ever! And they know I have the best family!! You guys are the best!!

All this skiing Payt and Dad are doing is making me miss you a ton!! When I get home we better go a bunch!! All I get here is sliding on ice!! Payt, tear it up! Dad, don’t tear anything!! haha just kidding. I hear you’re ripped now!! I want you to get a business card like Uncle Doug with your shirt off and send it to me!! haha Man I miss you guys!! Mom, the choke cherry syrup was gone weeks ago. It was amazing!!

Oh and as for the Olympics, I forgot to tell you that I went down where the torch came through because it was in our area! We sprinted down during supper, got a couple pics and got out! We did it in under an hour and we didn’t see anything OR get supper! But I have pics to prove I was there.

Also, I got a great package from Heather Hill! You will have to tell her that it was soooo great and I was die-ing laughing about it the whole week! haha She cracks me up!! Send her a big thank you if ya see her! As for everyone else that was writing me.... I think they don’t think I’m that neat anymore! Letters are farther and farther apart. hahaha I think it might be because I have no time to write anyone back!

As for this week, it was great!! I never want to leave this area!! It is honestly the best!! We found another family from Sudan and they are amazing!! The mom’s name is martha and her baptismal date is the 27th of March! I love her!! After all of the people I have met from Sudan, I honestly want to marry someone from Sudan!! They are the nicest people! She is a single mom of 2 kids that are 1 and 3 and they are adorable!! She came to church this week and it went great! Akon made it too and they know each other!! It was sooo great! Juliet was also there and her date is the 20th and she is so good! She came to the baptism this week and when the kids ran up to the front to watch, she ran and sat on the floor too! haha She is soo great! And Dad, the advice for Akon was great and it’s what we decided to push for with the Bishop, too! The Holy Ghost is a huge help with running life and a family and we are going to talk to her about it this week! I DON’T WANT TO LEAVE AGNES!!! I’m so worried that it will fall apart when I leave, and that’s horrible of me because I know what happens will be from God, but man am I nervous! All of these baptismal dates are coming up and I’m stressing!!

This Sunday was a mad house and my comp is a great kid and I love him, but while I’m getting kids to their parents and lining up rides and getting people into interviews with the Bishop and things are going insane, my companion sits there oblivious!! aaahh! I am having some serious patience issues and I don’t want to leave him here in charge of stuff! Now I feel horrible, but I don’t know what to do! The area is doing sooo good right now and my comp is a great kid and teacher, but I’m way nervous about leaving!! I love the members and the investigators so much here!!

We just keep finding new great people and the old ones are still progressing! Open’s family and Barnaba’s family are still being taught and they are progressing, but very slowly. Sacapo’s family is good but they aren’t progressing as much, but they are still borderline. Martha, Akon, and Juliet are amazing and should be baptized next transfer! We are going to have to find rides for 20 something people this week and I don’t know what we are going to do!! I used to check out nice pickups and corvettes, but now I check out Calvary Temple Buses!! It’s frustrating to though, because at first the ward loved all of the investigators, but now they aren’t as excited because it’s the norm and so the new investigators aren’t getting the love that they should! At least that’s how I feel! At church it’s so hard to make them all feel loved!! This ward is amazing and they do so much more than any other ward, but I just wish they could do a little more! I wish that I could focus on just one family, but I love all of these families and people so much!! It’s just hard!! There are so many amazing people out there and there aren’t enough missionaries and members!! aahh!

But I pretty much told President that I never want to leave...... multiple times. I asked him if I was going this transfer and he gave me the reasons why I would stay there and the reasons why I would leave and then he said, “Does that help?” haha He’s a great man!! But I will know next week what’s gonna happen so I’ll let you know! Any hints on dealing with my comp? Because he is so nice, so smart, so hardworking such a good teacher and he loves the work, but when it comes to some common sense things and just doing things he’s a little slow. It’s frustrating because he really is trying hard but he can tell that I get frustrated. Maybe I’m the problem! I don’t know.

Also Akon has had serious issues this week! Turns out she snuck a niece into Canada as her daughter and that girl went rebellious and got into trouble, left the country and now she is back accusing Akon of all kinds of crazy stuff so the child services people are coming to her house tonight! I’ve been stressing this all week and I made some calls and got her to meet with an attorney in our ward and the bishop and they are gonna be with her when the child services comes! Hopefully all goes well tonight, but keep her in your prayers! She has been stressed sick all week!! She is so worried they will take her kids or something! It’s way crazy but the bishop thinks all will go well and he will be there, so hopefully it works out!

Things are all good and I love and miss you all so much! That’s all I got for now! Love you all a bunch! You’re the best!

Love Elder Smith

I LOVE MY MISSION!

Friends and Family,

Mom you are the most amazing woman in this world!! Like wow, you are soooooo great. I love and miss you so much!!! You are so thoughtful. I am missing you so bad because everyone here tells me how amazing you are, as if I don’t know!! You are the best!! I am so blessed!!

First off, this week was insane!! Mary, Open’s wife, started breast feeding while we were teaching! Then Steve Green walked out of the room when we were mid-prayer! We looked up and he was gone, so we just left! haha Then we found two completely wasted natives that kept falling on the ice, so we had to call 911 to get them help. We stayed with them for 30 minutes. While we were waiting, one ambulance passed us after only ten minutes. My comp was like, oh that wasn’t too slow. Then it hauled passed us! haha We couldn’t help but laugh. Someone finally showed and we didn’t get a thanks or nothin’ haha They just walked by us and started working on them all calm like. This town is crazy, but sooo amazing!! Missions are so hard, but man do I love my mission!!!!

We broke the “investigators to church” record again this week with 20-something. I don’t even know how many, but the Bishop said we broke it again! 16 were from our area and 11 were 8 years or older! It was amazing and we had another 7 that we were counting on but 6 of them dropped at the last minute. One of them, the member forgot to pick up! He has a date for the 20th of next month so this was really disappointing! President Paulson was mad at the member and he said if he would have known he would have just given us permission to go get him! President is so great and really funny.

The Bishop had us over for supper and told us that we are teaching more Africans than his son who is serving his mission in Africa! hahaha This gave us all a good laugh! We have some dates coming up next month but I’m super sad because I’m worried I won’t be here. One of them is Juliet and she is amazing! Her date is the 20th and she is so solid! I love her to death, but I’m super sad I might not be here for her baptism!! This area is amazing!! I never want to leave!!

Me and my comp are working a lot better together and we are sooo busy! Things are going so good!! I love it here and get this, I talked to Akon’s husband in Texas!! I got permission to call him and I talked to him for about 30 minutes! He is a great man, but he has really strong beliefs.

He believes very strongly that his kids have already been baptized! I tried to teach but he wasn’t gonna have it, so I just talked with him about his amazing family! He said that he loves what the church is doing for his family! He was against the church, but now he thinks its good that his kids are going to church and he likes that we come and teach their family, but he said he doesn’t want the kids to get baptized until they are old enough to decide for themselves! He said, as for Akon, she can make her own choice but he doesn’t think she should get baptized. But he will give her his permission to do it, if she wants to. I was kinda happy, but mostly sad. I thought for sure that if I talked to him, the problem would be solved. But it didn’t go as planned. But Akon said she doesn’t feel right about being baptized when she knows her kids should be baptized too. So we are trying to figure out what to do. Any ideas??

But back to you Mom! You are amazing!! Sister Baronins and Akon love you so much! Akon wore here necklace and earrings you sent her to church and she was showing them to everyone! She wore them at our party too! haha She told Sister Baronins, "Sister Smith is such a beautiful lady, Elder Smith looks so much like her.” haha I wanted to cry!! We came in for the party and her house was spotless and it looked so good! Now on her mantle instead of just her family pictures and the picture of me and Elder Willardson, there is also the picture of our family right at the front. My family is on Akon’s mantle! haha I was sooo happy! The meal she made was amazing!! It was all African food!! It was crazy weird, but crazy good!! All kinds of spicy gravy stuff! One had pork, one had beef, one had chicken. And there was salmon, cooked in this crazy way that was way good!! And there was homemade like crepe things, accept thicker that you put the gravy stuff in. There were salads and homemade bread and a bunch of other stuff!! It was soooo amazing!! The Baronins, the Shroens (ward mission leaders) and me and my comp were all there! And then Akon did like a speach for everyone about how much she loved the missionaries and the families and the friendships she was making and then she started talking about you Mom! haha About how amazing you are and about how she hopes the friendship will last forever and then she and the Baronins just went off about how amazing you are and how lucky I am! Then they talked me up and it was embarrassing, like they just went off!! It made me miss you so much!! When Akon was talking about you and me, Sister Baronins was tearing up and aaahhhh!! IT WAS JUST AMAZING!! I LOVE MY MISSION SOO MUCH!!

It went so good, and then I got my package and I thought you couldn’t make my week any better, but you did! I haven’t even got to look through it!! You’re the best Mom!! Even when I’m in another country, you find a way to make me happy!! It was a great week!! We are teaching Juliet again tonight and she is so good!! She has had a hard life, but if you can get her to smile it’s worth a million bucks! haha So the whole lesson I was just doing anything to get her to laugh. haha She called us!! She is way solid and I hope I’m here for her baptism next month!!

Open’s family and Barnaba’s family are still coming along, slowly but surely!! They will take a while yet until they are ready for baptism because you have to teach so slow!! Their kids are ready though, and they love us and church!! They are great!! We found another couple of families this week that are way good and one of them is white and has a car! haha Which means we need to convert them fast so they can help us get people to church!! As for baptisms, I don’t think there will be any this transfer because we’re out of time but I sure hope I’m here next transfer!!!

Alex Baronins, the bishop’s son, is on a mission in Africa and his mission president is Bill Taylor. His wife is Jenavieve and they were from the Osgood Ward in the Eagle Rock Stake!! haha crazy!! Find the connections and fill me and Sister Baronins in!!

Last thing you have to read "Unleashing the Dormant Spirit" by F. Enzio Bushe!! It is so good!!! Mom and family I love and miss you sooo much! Dad, I am eating good and I’m pumped to come home to a new fly rod! Make some good ones and get Payt out this summer! Payt, tear up the sloops!! I love and miss you all so much!! You are amazing! Thanks for the package! I’m excited to go look and see what’s in it right now!! You are all the best!

Oh and thanks to the Doug and Lisa Moss family for the package!! You guys are great!! And thanks to Nicole for the letter!! It was really good!! You are all the best!! I love you all a ton!! Be safe and smart.

Love Elder Smith

HAKUNA MATATA

Friends and Family!

Mom, Dad, and Payt, I loved the emails! You are the greatest!! Tell Uncle Kellan, I’m super worried about him and that he is in my prayers and tell Grandpa I love him a lot, and I’m sorry to hear about Uncle Reed.

This week was surprisingly pretty normal! No cars towed and only a couple drunk natives that said they wanted to knock me out! None of them even took swings at me or nothin! haha I’m hoping I’ll get hit, so I can have the story. haha just kidding.

New news for my companion! His parents have been called to be Mission Presidents in the St. George Mission, which I guess is a new mission that they are opening! So he will be going home to no family! If I were him I think I’d be a little down, but he seems pretty excited!! My comp is amazing! He is the most loving, patient missionary I have met! At first I was mad that I had to do everything, but I realized it was because I was doing everything! hahaa I love teaching and doing everything, so he just lets me! I’m trying really hard to let him do more and teach more! It’s just so hard because I love the people and the work so much! It was hard for me to realize that I was being a bad companion because I was just taking charge!! He is a great teacher, if I let him teach! haha It is soooo hard though!! It feels like playing half of a football game! But if I were in his shoes I’d be mad! It’s funny because he wouldn’t have said a word all transfer about it! I just had to finally be humble enough to see that I was messing up!! This has been so hard!! I’ve really got to the point were I think I’m pretty good and its soooo BAD! Humility is tough out here because it has a different definition, it seems like!! I’ve turned into a bit of a ball hog and I’m working on getting better! haha It’s been a great transfer though! It’s going so fast! Every transfer seems 2 times as fast as the previous!! It’s such a blast being a missionary!! It’s hard to share the love with a companion, haha

Akon is amazing and it was so fun to have her tell me all about her call to you! haha She was so excited to call me and tell me everything! I wish you could meet her kids! They are amazing!! Next time she calls, have Addison talk to Nyandeng. She is so cute and fun!! Akon gets her to leave school by lieing to her and telling her that Elder Smith will be at home. hahaha They are the best!! Her husband still won’t talk to us though! It is so frustrating!!

As for Open’s family, they are doing so good! We reactivated Pious, who is now the most amazing member ever!! He has school and work and so he gets a couple hours of sleep in the day and he gives up some of that to go translate for us!! He is an amazing teacher and he hasn’t missed a day of church in months now! I love him so much and he says after my mission he wants to come visit me in the states!! haha I told him he can stay as long as he wants! We took him out to lunch this week and I introduced him to Mexican food!! haha I love Pious so much! He is amazing! As for Open’s family, they are great and I think that by this week we will have set dates with them! Last lesson was the best and Pious threw down a baptismal invitation in Arabic! It was so neat because I can kinda follow what’s going on by their body language and some of the words. We teach the kids and then Pious translates what we say to the parents! If there are questions Pious usually just answers them! He has such a strong testimony!

Barnaba’s family is coming along great too! Barnaba read all of First Nephi and he’s booken’ through 2nd Nephi! He said he prayed about it and he wants to be baptized! Now he’s trying to convince his wife! It’s so neat because he speaks Swahili, which is actually what the language is on The Llion King! haha Simba is lion and Rafiki is friend! haha and hakuna matata is no worries! He loves teaching us Swahili! I’ve learned a lot just from listening! I’m so glad that I didn’t have to learn a language! It was neat though because I shared a scripture that talked about how no unclean thing can dwell with God and he said, “hakuna matata” haha But their family is great and we are hoping for a family baptism there soon! We found a Muslim man that is amazing, but we had to turn him over to YSA (Young Single Adults)! That was sad, but we have found a lot of new solid single people, but no more families. Which is sad, but how can I complain, we are working with 3 amazing families!

We have gone through the less active records and taken like a ton of people off the list! Some people are on the list that moved away over 5 years ago! Church percentage attendance has gone way up though, and we have a lot of people that want to start coming again, but they have no ride! Because of the shortage on rides and all of the people coming to church lately, the ward members talked to the Stake President about a downtown branch or a church bus! haha I don’t think either will happen, but I totally wish there was a bus! I can see myself driving it yelling out the window, "Come on everybody! Hop on the Church Bus! It’s for freeee and it’s lots of fun! Salvation is just a 30 minute bus ride away!" haha If only that dream could come true!

I love it that Payt loves skiing!! Tell him to be carful and tell him to go to school for a year so we can be ski bums together when I get home!!

I’m pretty nervous that I’m gone next transfer! haha But President told me that if I keep up the good work he might have to leave me here one more. haha But it would be amazing to spent 6 months in Agnes!!

Please tell Jay to write me and tell him I miss and love him! I love you all a ton!! Keep up the great work with everything and please be safe!! Love you a bunch! You are the best!

Elder Smith

22 TO CHURCH!

Barnaba's Family

Friends and Family:

Mom, Dad, Payt, Alex, and Addison, you are the best! The emails and letters revive and re-pump me up every week! I love and miss you all so much! I wish I could have been there for the first ski trip! Sounds like a great time!! I can’t think about snowboarding or I start twitching and stuff, haha. I get to slide on ice a lot here though!

Let me just start by saying, you can’t imagine the week we had this week! It was the craziest, saddest, hardest, funnest, most fantastic-ly miserable week of my life!! haha It started out with me pretty well just exhausted! Every week you kill yourself with the huge build-up for Sunday! You work hard all week, and then Sunday is so stressful! Especially with a companion who is learning to be a District Leader, who knows nothing about the area, and who thinks that getting 3 people to church is a big deal! I love him to death, but Agnes has definitely been a shocker for him! haha I feel like I’m all alone with a lot of the stuff we have to do and he’s content to let me do it! Don’t get me wrong, he is a really hard worker, but if you’re willing to do the work instead, that works for him too! ha ha, especially when he doesn’t know what’s going on! He’s a great kid though! I’m sure this area and being a District Leader is stressing him out! I guess he just doesn’t show it the way I do! ha ha ha ha.

But the week started rough with a lot of not so great stuff happening. So I was a little down, but then the week pretty much jumped of a cliff and just got insane!! We went on exchanges with the Zone Leaders and so me and Elder Farr took ysa. They have the whole city of Winnipeg and he’s only been a Zone Leader in this area for a week and some days, haha. And my comp stayed in Agnes with the other Zone Leader, so I had to give him directions for everything and set up the day, so he could know what he was doing. So me and Elder Farr go to street contact for an hour while we walk to an appointment. So we park the car in a spot that says we have just over 2 hours before we have to be back. So we get busy finding and all is good! We get to where the house is supposed to be and the address doesn’t exist, haha so we start finding! We get carried away and get a bunch of new investigators and all is going good! So we head back for the car and about 40 yards from the car, we are walking and we look up and see that our car is in the process of being lifted up on to a tow truck! So we take off running and screaming, going crazy. And then we meet Jim! haha He says, “68 dollars ‘el put ‘er on the ground, cash or visa?” Elder Farr, in his kind, soft spoken voice says, “Can I call my Mission President?” And our buddy Jim says, “I don’t care what you do, you got three minutes to give me $68 or I pull away.” haha So Elder Farr pulls out his Visa and hands it to Jim and Jim cheered right up and said, “Alright, I’ll lower ‘er down and you hop on in there and getr’ warmed up!” haha So he goes to the tow truck with the Visa and Elder Farr hops in the car and I say to myself, “I gotta get a picture of this to send to the fam.” haha So I whip out my camera and start taking pics and Jim busts out of the truck and storms over cussing and screaming all kinds a crazy stuff at me saying he’s gonna bust the camera into a thousand pieces and how you don’t take pictures of a man and his truck and how everything he was doing was legal. So I shove my camera in my pocket and start telling him how I just wanted to get a picture to send to my Mom! haha If I wasn’t in Canada and I wasn’t a missionary I totally would have pulled the my dads an attorney, I dare you to take my camera! Come on Jim, do it! See what happens! haha But I’m not in Idaho or even the states, and I’m a missionary, so I just took Jim’s lecture! From what I caught, I learned a lot! haha I figured out what long suffering means.... I think?? So anyways, while I’m getting chewed, Elder Farr hops out of the car to listen in and shuts the door. Somehow, the doors locked, so now we have a started car with the keys inside and Jim wants to rip my head off and we are still hooked up to Jim’s tow truck and he has Elder Farr’s Visa! So Jim chews me and goes back to his truck and Elder Farr breaks the locked doors news to me! ha ha So Jim comes out all mad and gives us the Visa and a $50 ticket from the city. So right now we are about $120 in the hole! Then Elder Farr and I apologize some more and break the locked car news to our buddy Jim! So he says, “Well I woulda dun it fer free, but because of the camera it’s gona cost ya $40” haha So now we are $180 in the hole! He gets his tools and does it and says, “I’m a nice guy, so it’ll just be $20.” (Jim’s such a pal!) haha But then he says, "It has to be cash cuz this is under the table, me doin’ you a favor." So we say we don’t have any cash and he says he needs collateral, so he takes my camera! So we go and get 20 bucks and meet up with our buddy Jim in a parking lot downtown. He hands me the camera and says, “That’s a nice camera ya got there. Have a great day!” Then he took my 20 bucks and drove off into the sunset! haha I don’t know if I’ll ever get to see my buddy Jim again.

So now our schedule is all messed up and we get lost in, who knows were, during our suppers time. Then we go to Jose's interview. He was the Zone Leader’s investigator and my companion interviewed him. But Agnes had an appointment and the interview went long and the Zone Leaders wanted to be there after the interview, so I went with one of the Senior Missionaries to teach Barnaba’s family! We picked up a translator and the appointment was amazing! We set baptismal dates with their whole family! Three people! Then we went back to the interview and Jose’ had passed, so we were all super happy!! I had taught Jose’ one time on exchange and he picked me to say the opening prayer and to be the back-up to baptize him. A member was going to baptize him and so he picked me before both of the Zone Leaders, which was so neat!! So that’s how the night ended, but Jose’s date was for the next day and President said to stick with his date, so the Zone Leaders had to throw together a baptism, that night!! So we got Barnaba’s family to go to the baptism and asked President to give him a ride! haha President was late and Barnaba’s family was even later! We were late to begin with because we had appointments all day so we are ALL way behind! We finally get them in President’s car and get on our way. Then Elder Yorgason calls me and says, “Where are you? The man that is supposed to baptize him isn’t here!! You gotta baptize him! Hurry and get here!” ha ha So we are booking, with President hot on our tail and I take off inside and President has NO idea what is going on! haha He just knows we are late!!

So I bust in and run over to Elder Yorgason and he tells me that the member that is supposed to baptize him just showed. haha So I’m of the hook there, so we run back to our investigators and sit them down and introduce them to the translator and everything. Elder Yorgason said that Jose’ said, Elder Yorgason, it’s time for the baptism and Brother_____ and Elder Smith aren’t here!!” ha ha It made me feel way bad, but it all ended great!! Or so we thought, Barnaba is now kind of worried about his baptismal date! So that was a dagger to the heart, but we can hopefully work it out!

As for Akon, she came to church this week and our ward broke the record again with 22 people to church! The Bishop was so excited! He ran over to me to tell me, as if I didn’t know! haha 16 of them were from Agnes and Barnaba’s family couldn’t come this week and half of Open’s family was sick! So next week hopefully we will top it again!

This week me and my companion had to speak, too. We walked in late, followed by half of the congregation - our investigators and the great members that drove them! They didn’t literally all come in behind us, ha ha But they came in throughout the first ten minutes Sacrament Meeting. Barnaba said he still wants his kids to get baptized but he doesn’t want to be baptized twice, so we have to work on that! Barnaba says he wants his family to sing in church on one of the up coming Sundays! He sang for us and he’s good!! Open’s family will hopefully have a date this week and Akon said, “Elder Smith, I really hope this all works out! I want to be baptized before you get transfered!” This made me want to cry! I love their family! They have been taught everything, we are just waiting on their Dad! She asked for your phone number, so I’m giving it to her tonight, so don’t be surprised if you get a call from Akon, Mom. You will love her!!

Things are sooo crazy, but so good! I love it here so much!! I just wish I could not deal with some of the hard days, but they make the good days so much better!! And the hard days give some of the best stories, and if something bad happens it always means something good is on the way!! I love my mission so much though! And when I get home, I’m totally making a movie called The Other, Other Side of Heaven! ha ha As for my spiritual thought, I don’t know what to say, life is so ridiculously insane! Love everyday!! I love and miss you all soooo much!! You are the best family in the world!!

Love, Elder Smith