Chris typically sends home two handwritten letters each week. One is my personal letter, and the other is the daily updates for his blog. On April 22, he mailed the week's letters but they never arrived. We've had great luck with all other letters and packages so hopefully this is the only slip. And, I'm incredibly grateful that no photos were lost. Chris took the time to review his journal and re-write the week of April 15th for the blog.
Weekly disclaimer: parenthetical and/or italicized font comments are explanations of things Chris mentions. Thanks for being patient this week, and more importantly, thanks for enjoying the journey with our family!
-karen
April 15, 2013
P-day (preparation day) was lots of fun! We went hiking down to the "beach" and that was pretty fun.
We had a fun dinner with the Taulbee's: Lasagna, salad & angel food cake with strawberries & whipped cream! Ironically the same dinner as on the 13th but with a different family. Crazy, and still delicious! Had a great lesson that night about prayer with Sam & Heather! The scripture that went along with it is Doctrine & Covenants 9:8 - 9. And another scripture I have recently found is Jacob 2:18 - 19. I really like this one! You can change the word "riches" with "worldliness". It is so true: do the things for God before the things of the world!
(More pics from the past month can be found at the following link:
You do not have to be a facebook user to view them)
We had a fun dinner with the Taulbee's: Lasagna, salad & angel food cake with strawberries & whipped cream! Ironically the same dinner as on the 13th but with a different family. Crazy, and still delicious! Had a great lesson that night about prayer with Sam & Heather! The scripture that went along with it is Doctrine & Covenants 9:8 - 9. And another scripture I have recently found is Jacob 2:18 - 19. I really like this one! You can change the word "riches" with "worldliness". It is so true: do the things for God before the things of the world!
Jacob 2: 18 - 19: http://www.lds.org/scriptures/bofm/jacob/2?lang=eng
(Click on each link, then scroll down to get to the correct verse to see the specific scriptures Chris shared)
April 16, 2013
Lots of tracting today. GREAT lessons with Troy and with the Moli family! We taught the Moli family about prophets and Jesus Christ again...sort of a review. Our meeting with Troy was around the same topics, but more focused toward him and his personal situation. Scripture today that hit me was Matthew 10:14 "Shake off the dust on thy feet." We had lots of slammed doors and "not interested", but this can apply to all. Shake it off and just move on. Don't dwell on the bad!
Matthew 10:14: http://www.lds.org/scriptures/nt/matt/10.14?lang=eng#13
Definition of "Tracting": Door-to-door contacting is commonly called "tracting" because missionaries in the past often left printed tracts with people as they called on them. As the number and influence of Church members have grown, missionaries have come increasingly to rely on referrals from members to find people to teach. In the latter half of the twentieth century, missionaries have had the benefit of standardized lessons, usually referred to as missionary discussions, to assist them in teaching the gospel.
April 17, 2013
So to start out 1) today was a pretty crazy day and 2) the quote of the day in my journal is "To trudge: the slow, weary, depressing yet determined walk of a man who has nothing left in life except the impulse to simply soldier on". So, I will use this term in my day today. We did our usual studies in the morning and had a District Meeting. After that, we went on an exchange with the Mays Pond elders. I went with Elder Petersen. We went to a trailer park. We started knocking and after the first two doors, who didn't answer, we got a potential & return appointment. I didn't think much of it until the next 2 or 3 doors wanted return appointments and on the same day an hour after each other! Crazy! It was a total miracle since not a lot of investigating of the church is happening in Mays Pond. Well, we got to the back corner of the trailer park and this guy with a limp comes screaming at us and escorted us out of the park. Extremely rude, but whatever! :-) So we decided to "trudge" to where the other elders were, and they were not there! The van had broke down, so they had already started heading to the shop. The bad part about this was we had a lesson with Jason in 30 minutes, but it was a 50 minute walk from where we were! Luckily our Zone Leaders picked us up and drove us there. After that, we were late for dinner! Anyway, the scripture today is Matthew 11:28 - 30. Come UNTO Christ. He is here to help!
Matthew 11:28 - 30: http://www.lds.org/scriptures/nt/matt/11.28,29,30?lang=eng#27
I bought Chris a journal before his mission, and then typed up, and glued a quote on every page. The quotes alternate between faith-driven and favorite movies. Today's quote was from A Knight's Tale, and became faith-driven!
April 18, 2013
Had a doctors visit today! (Not sure if it was Chris to the doc, or his companion) Found out that the doctor we were seeing was ONE mile from the finish line of the Boston Marathon. He told us his crazy story afterward of walking around trying to get to his hotel! Later that day we had 3 lessons! One with Taitus & Juliana's family on Spiritual CPR - Church, Pray, Reading. It was pretty good! The next one with with the Moli family! We had an AMAZING lesson on the Restoration! So good! Then, we had a sweet lesson with Wendy & Alex, some less-active LDS people. They are so AWESOME! Funny people!
I hope this explains what the "Restoration" is, as mentioned above. http://mormon.org/restoration
April 19, 2013
Good lesson with Sheryl, 50, and Taylor, 10. We had a good lesson on Authority & Priesthood. I think she sees that this is the Authority of God on the earth. I wish I could send home all the scriptures we used, but all are in the Bible. It's SO good. We also saw a potential named Jack. He is a huge Boston fan! He has tees and hats for Bruins, Pats and Red Sox!! He is so chill! If we could just set an actual lesson with him. He would be a great investigator. Kind of a bummer dinner tonight...we had raw chicken that bled when I cut into it...and it was not great. Ew. "Diet Mt. Dew...ew" HAHA.
Here are some scriptures from the Bible about Authority and the Priesthood.
The "ew" reference is one of our favorite videos...and completely NOT LDS or Mission related! It's a video of Jimmy Fallon & Channing Tatum:
April 20, 2013
Redeemed at lunch today with Brother Goodwin. (Bro. Goodwin is the owner of the crossfit gym where the missionaries get to work out every day at 6:00 am!) REALLY good steak and veggies! Nothing much happened until dinner with the Shepherds! 2 great lessons today: one with Gail and another with Aaron (who is a recent convert to the LDS church). We answered Gail's questions and she is truly opening up to us and our message. She is still searching for information. During the appointment with Aaron we watched the John Tanner story. Aaron has received the priesthood. So amazing!
Here are links to part 1 & 2 of the John Tanner story:
Part 1 - www.youtube.com/watch?v=NHXcOVCrzvA
Part 2 - www.youtube.com/watch?v=HKNCM69lcbk
What is the Priesthood? http://mormon.org/faq/purpose-of-priesthood
April 21, 2013
(Warning: LOTS of LDS lingo in this paragraph. Read on, and you'll find explanations at the bottom!)
Such a good Sunday! Taitus and his family, and Jason, were at church! So awesome! Good talks from the 2nd Counselor in the Bishopric and from one of the High Council members who has an assignment to follow up with all the missionaries in the Stake!
3 different miracles tonight: First, we met a man who wanted us to come back (he was getting his kids to bed). Second miracle was a nice Baptist lady who we just talked to for a while. The last was a woman named Margarette from Great Britain. She has been in the US for a while. The one thing that she doesn't like is that there are SO many churches here. We shared a brief lesson about the Restoration and it was awesome! AND, we set up a return appointment. So Good!
LDS Lingo:
A congregation is called a "ward". Approximately 10 - 12 wards make up a "stake". The ecclesiastical leader of the ward is a Bishop, and he serves unpaid for about 5 - 7 years. None of the clergy or leaders in wards, stakes, or church-wide are paid a salary for their service. The Bishop has two counselors who help lead the ward. The High Council is a group of 12 men who serve in other capacities within a stake. One of their responsibilities is to rotate in the different wards once per month and give talks. I don't know if the talks-in-other-wards process varies in remote areas outside of the US.
Love,
Elder Udall
P.S. This is a great message: "God sends his prepared children to his prepared servants". I know that's true! Have a great week!
Words cannot express how much I love that Chris enjoys life and truly enjoys every day as a gift. He has quickly grown to completely love the people he is serving!
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