2nd Christmas in the field

Hola!

This week has been wonderful! What a joyous time of year. Christmas we great and we were still able to keep our area moving at full speed. On Christmas Eve, the University elders (Elders Dunn, DeCow, Smith, and myself) went over to the Wade's home to spend the evening with them. We had a wonderful dinner and ended the evening with watching the polar express! It's great being a missionary because you pick out all the gospel references while watching movies (i.e. Polar Express teaches great lessons on faith).

On Christmas morning, Elder Dunn and I went to the homeless shelter to do a couple hours of service. We helped in the kitchen with a Jewish church group (they were volunteering cause they don't celebrate Christmas so they relieved the other volunteers so they could go celebrate). It was so fun to see the great Christmas dinner served to them and some of the volunteers were playing Christmas songs on various instruments. It was a memory that I will cherish for years to come. 

Then later that day we got to talk to our families (awesome!) then in the evening we went over to our Bishop's house to celebrate Christmas with him and all his extended family. While we were there we got to watch "Frozen" in their theater downstairs (So Legit!).

This week we will have the whole day off on New Year's day so that will be nice to recuperate from Christmas Break.... :D

Love you all and hope you have a great week!

With Love,

Elder Young

This made this mama pretty proud! :)

OH! I almost forgot! Mother, you would be proud of your boy. I have been singing in our ward's choir (they have a really musical ward and it has a good choir). And in our christmas program we sang this arrangement of Still Still Still and several other awesome Christmas songs.

http://media2.ldscdn.org/assets/first-presidencys-christmas-devotional/2014-first-presidencys-christmas-devotional/2014-12-0011-still-still-still-256k-eng.mp3

Also, there was a group in the ward that sang yesterday for sacrament meeting and on Saturday (the day before) their tenor got sick so they gave me the music and a recording and asked me to sing with them the next day (no group practice before the meeting) and so I practiced like crazy for an hour before I went to bed. When I woke up my voice was strained!!! So in the shower I was praying for Heavenly Father to heal my voice. It was so cool cause after my prayer, I had the distinct impression to drink several gulps of the hot shower water and as I did that my throat felt much better. And when I got to the musical number, I was able to sing just fine! Isn't that so cool!? The Lord can do anything He wants, we just have to trust him :) The song we sang was "Out of the Orient Crystal Sky" here is a link you can watch to hear what it sounds like!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Lgk24t4BLHY

Pictures yo!

1-2. Elder Smith and I at the IU stadium.

3-4. Manning the anti-aircraft guns.

Merry Christmas you Beautiful Multitude of Humans!

What a week of miracles! Holy lowing cattle! 

So Elder Smith recovered from his sickness just in time for the new week, so we were fired up to go out and find the elect of God and bring them into the fold of Christ. We had a very surreal day on Friday, where we went to a small town about 15 miles out of Bloomington called Trevlac. It was a puny highway town out in the middle of nowhere and the only people who lived there were from "Merica!" (they were all rednecks) :) We had set a goal to find 3 new investigators and teach 8 lessons while we were there. After knocking on the first door, Elder Smith got the brilliant idea to tell everyone that we were "ministers" from the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints instead of "missionaries." Oh how rednecks LOVE authority! Almost every door we knocked that day we taught a lesson and some even let us come in. We left Trevlac teaching 5 lessons and getting 5 new investigators in about an hour and a half! We had prayed and exercised much faith before and during out adventure out to Trevlac and it was so cool to see that the Lord provided awesome new ideas to help us have success! :)

We are going to be having our "cookies and caroling" tonight with some member families and we are so excited! We have about 6 people to go and visit who are either lonely this Christmas, struggling, or both. We are excited to bring Christmas cheer to those who need it most.

There is a part of my testimony that has significantly grown these past few months, and that is that the Lord's servants "shall not be confounded before men." Yesterday we went out to another small town called "Bean-Blossom" and knocked several doors without much luck. When we were heading down a country road back to our car, a college aged kid drove into the driveway of his house. We said hi to him and he responded back positively and so we approached him and offered him a "He is the Gift" pass-along card. When I proceeded to tell him that the video "He is the Gift" explains that Jesus Christ was the first gift of Christmas, he snarkily replied "Is he? Is he the gift? What has he done for anybody?" and instead of replying to his derogatory question, I immediately responded "oh! Do you have a belief of your own then?" and he told me he didn't believe in God so I said "oh ok, so your an atheist then." and then that lead into another teaching moment! I said "So what we do as missionaries is we help people find out if there really is a God and help them get answers to questions they can't seem to get answers to. Would you be interested in us meeting with you?" In a defeated tone he said "I am lazy and don't care if there is a God so no thanks." So we thanked him for his time and wished him a happy holidays. That whole contact though I truly felt the Spirit leading the conversation. I was completely happy and felt love for this guy. It was really interesting.

Another experience similar to that that totally made my day was when I was on exchanges with Elder Dunn in his area. We were knocking college housing and we knocked on a family's door and the dad came to the door. We talked to him and he informed us they didn't have a belief in God. So we gave him a card and their little boy came up to the door and we had a fun little conversation with him. Well after we gave him the "He is the Gift" card his wife came to the door and in a defensive ton said "You want to know what I belive?" and Elder Dunn and I both energetic and happy said "what?" She told us that she believed in being a good person and treating others with kindness and that was it, no God involved. We were pretty sure she wasn't expecting our response cause we totally threw her off when we replied "Hey we totally agree with you! It is so important to be good people and treat others with kindness. We really respect your belief!" She kind of sat there stunned and we wished them a happy holidays and turned to leave and as we were leaving I think she finally remembered that she believed in being nice others and wished us a happy holidays. haha I love that the Lord helps us in those situations. :) I know that the Lord is in charge and he is preparing His children to receive the gospel.

I love you all and am happy that you guys are all a part of my life. You make me a better person and I look forward to seeing you all again soon. Hope you all have a wonderful Christmas!

Sincerely,

Elder Young

Hello, Hello!

Hello Hello!

This week has been a good week. Anthony and Heather Syke's baptismal date was dropped due to them not being prepared. They failed to come to church and they couldn't go one day without smoking (even when we kept them busy throughout the day). So we are going to continue to help them prepare for baptism and help them build a better foundation because as we have been teaching them I have realized that they know the church is true but they don't "nourish" the good seed that has been planted within them. So we are going to help them read daily and get in a habit of drinking from the living waters daily.

We have been focusing on finding new people this past week and due to lots of stress and attention given to Anthony and Heather and other various activities we haven't gotten much time to go out and proselyte. Regardless of that, the time we did spend finding was most rewarding! Elder Smith and myself came up with an idea to find "the mystery person" each day as we go out finding. We set a goal to find a certain number of new investigator, pray to reach our goals and find our mystery person, then we go out and exercise faith and courage on the streets and on doorsteps to find the person the Lord wants us to find and lead to baptism. We are having some good results! We have noticed that our proselyting skills have increased as we focus on having great faith and showing courage even when it is hard.

Radonna and Kayla Chandler are doing wonderfully! We are teaching them the new member discussions with their visiting teachers and are helping them with their family history. They have definitely caught fire on family history, they are eager to get names ready for the temple. Something else that is exciting is that Kayla has expressed a desire to serve a mission!! We are super happy about her desire to serve and are going to work with her on that.

We are also continuing to work with a blind member in our ward who recently returned from inactivity, Brother Kral. He is our favorite person on this planet! He has become super active as of late and participates in all that is available, including his family history which we help him with weekly. I have got to admit, I am seriously addicted to family history... like it is no joke better than video games, by far! :) As we have found Brother Krals ancestors I am pretty sure I am the most excited person in the room... no joke.

Well I love you all! Thank you for the good examples you set. I know God lives and He works by small means to bring about His great purposes. He loves us and respects our agency perfectly.

Sincerely,

Elder Young

More news from Bloomington

Hey Everyone!

The Lord has been kicking our area into overdrive this week! There has been so many miracles (both with investigators and members) this week we have truly felt the Lord's work hastening in the Bloomington University ward. For the first time since I have been here we have had more than one investigator come to church.... we had FOUR! It was so awesome. Our sacrament meeting program was amazing and spirit-filled. On of our investigators who goes to the Evangelical church just down the street from our building started tearing up during the talks, and his wife was taking diligent notes the whole time! That is not even the big news...  THE LORD LED US TO OUR FAMILY WE HAVE BEEN FASTING FOR! It is totally Anthony Sykes and Heather Monroe (they are married and have a month year old boy named Zaden). The great thing is is that we live next door to the church and they live right above us so they can just walk out their front door and into the church! They came yesterday and loved it, we have several young couples in our ward that are in the MBA program at IU so they had a ton of excited fellowshippers and our gospel principles class was HUGE! We had a fun time in there :) 

After church the young couples invited Anthony and Heather to come over that night and have a game night and desert with them and they went! Things have been going so good this week, we are so grateful for the Lord's loving hand in this area. It is completely Him and we can just work hard and have faith in Him.

Something else cool that has been happening too is we are teaching a middle aged lady named Radonna and her daughter named Kayla (in her 20's). The daughter was meeting with the sister missionaries from a different ward and was doing really well and Elder Coles tracted into her mom (Radonna) on exchanges and she wanted to meet. Well now Radonna is on a baptismal date for November 29th and her daughter, Kayla, called the sisters and put herself on a date to be baptized the same day! So we are super excited for them, they are hungry for the gospel and they are progressing super well. Also because Kayla is in our area and in our ward she was handed off to us, so now we will be teaching both the daughter and the mom about 2 to 3 times a week.

There are so many amazing miracles that have happened this week. We have some other investigators that have great potential but it is still a waiting game for them right now, but we definately have faith that they will "catch the wave" and surf right into the font :)

One interesting experience I had this week was we taught a lady in her early 30's named Stephanie. She is a scientist who studies human behavior and used to be catholic when she was younger but now is Atheist. She is really funny and sweet but man she is messed up as far as beliefs go. We sat there and debated over the concept of God and Jesus Christ for quite sometime while Elder Coles and Brother Tew kept giggling whenever she dropped the f bomb.... She said it a lot... It has been so interesting to me to think about having the belief that after you die there is nothing else and that there is no God and we are just here by happenstance. She agreed with me that that is a bleak way to live and doesn't bring a lot of happiness but it is better than feeling guilt from believing there is a God who is damning you for your sins. It was a good intellectual discussion but it made me very sorrowful to see this young mom who has this huge void in her life and is being strangled by the chains of Satan. You wish you could do something about it but because of agency there really isn't much you can do except show your love and bear testimony. We are going to meet with her again so hopefully we can help her out more.

Well I sure love you all, thank you for your love and support. Hope you all have a great week!

Sincerely,

Elder Young

Staying put in Bloomington

Dear Beings of this fine earth we live on,

Transfer calls came and Elder Smith and myself are staying! My first 6 month area, WAHOO! This is the best area to stay in anyways :) Things are going good here in B-town. We are working with our good friends Anthony and Heather Sykes and are trying to help them prepare for December 13th for baptism. 

Other than that, Elder Smith and myself are going to really focus on the key indicator of New Investigators. Elder Smith was being a spiritual boss and praying to know what key indicator God wanted us to focus on and he felt that it was said indicator. 

Now that we have had some baptisms we really need some new people to teach so we are going to hit the frozen pavement and find some elect souls of God to teach and baptize! We have great enthusiasm for this area and are positive that there are people that God has prepared to hear the gospel.

Radonna and Kayla are doing amazing. Kayla sent us like a 15 page text about how elated she was that she was a member of the church and how she just wants to help everyone now and feels so much closer to God... we pretty much told her to go on a mission... she can get all of her spiritual wiggles out there :) For their new member discussions we are having them teach us more and so for this week they have been studying the Plan of Salvation out of Preach My Gospel and in our lesson they will have to recreate the plan using my homemade Plan of Salvation cutouts! It is going to be wonderful.

I just want you all to know that my beautiful cousin Porter Young got him last week and is some kind of spiritual stallion or something. So all you single ladies, there is some more prime real estate in Rexburg Idaho ;) haha

Well I love you all and hope you have a blessed week.

Sincerely,

Elder Young

It's a short one.

Dear Humans,

Due to a large shortage of time I will keep this brief. We had the baptisms of Radonna and Kayla Chandler this past Saturday. What a joyful day that was! They are such amazing people and I am more than happy for them. They have so much potential and without a doubt they are going to do great things for the Lord.

This week we are hitting the streets again to find new people to teach. We are still working with Anthony and Heather Sykes but they are requiring some professional help for their marriage and Anthony's addictions first before they can get baptized. They still have a rock solid desire to be baptized and they have a strong conviction of the truth. We are also teaching a girl named Ellen. She is in her 20's and is agnostic. We have been working with her and she is just great :) Her desire to know God is there is increasing and she has been keeping all her commitments, the only thing that is lacking is the right mindset but we are helping her with that.

The district is doing good, we are setting records in our areas and bringing people into the waters of baptism. I have a great district and I sure love them.

Thank you all for your love and support, I hope to hug the crap out of each one of you soon. Until then!

Sincerely,

Elder Young

Greetings Peeps!

Greetings Peeps!

This week has been great! Our investigators are feeling the fire of the adversary as they approach baptism but they are the elect and are making great strides to overcome his fiery darts and enter the waters of baptism. Radonna and Kayla (mother and daughter) are getting baptized on the 29th of this month and are warriors as they move towards baptism. 

The Lord is truly working miracles in their lives. Last week, before we even taught the law of chastity, we were teaching them both and Kayla (who is single and 22) said "Guys, I am just so excited to get baptized. Like you have no idea how excited I am!" and we asked her what was the sudden change and she told us that the day prior she went and got surgery on her arm and had her birth control patch taken out of her arm (so cool!!). When the doctors asked her what method she was going to use to keep herself from getting pregnant she told them "Abstinence." and they were all shocked! Isn't that just the coolest thing ever!? Her Mom was blown away but very happy about her decision.

Anthony will not be getting baptized for a while, sadly he is still chained down to his addictions and does not have a strong enough desire to rely on God to quit his addictions. Heather on the other hand is getting there. We had to move her date back because she relapsed on smoking but still has a very strong desire to get baptized and she is shooting for December 13th to be baptized. Please keep both of them in your prayers and hearts. They have a little boy named Zayden and our goal for them is to one day get sealed in the temple as a family and see Zayden head out on a mission (Heather hopes he can one day)!

Well I love you all! This week has been another week of lessons learned and experiences gained and cherished.

Last night we had FHE at the Tew's house and Radonna and Kayla came over. It was great fun! We taught the lesson then we had pumpkin chocolate chip cookies (my favorite!) and played Mao. No one had played it except me so there were lots of laughs and people wanting to destroy the Mao master (me..).

Well I love you all and hope you are all doing great things out in this big world. Go share some of your great spirits with a person you don't know this week, it is quite exhilarating! :)

Sincerely,

Elder Young

Some news from Bloomington...

Dear Family and Friends,

Things are continuing to move forward in Bloomington University ward. Satan has definitely kicked it into overdrive with our investigators though. They all have super high motivation, desire, and drive to be baptized but they are really struggling to live the word of wisdom. Many of them are lying to us about living it cause they don't want to disappoint us. We are going to have a come to Jesus lesson with them today to hopefully get things set straight. We also are going to get them into the addiction recovery program at the church building to give them the strength to quit. I have a testimony that Satan is real and he tries desperately and with much enmity to destroy all that is good in this world. Please keep Anthony and Heather Sykes, and Radonna and Kayla Chandler in your prayers.

A really cool miracle that has happened this week! So Radonna watches her niece's daughter regularly because her niece (Cara) works so much. Well Radonna has been doing some missionary work with Cara and Cara said she wanted to read the Book of Mormon. So after we gave her a copy, Radonna would text her scriptures to read (so boss!) and when she sent Helaman 5:12, Cara told her that the Spirit had confirmed to her that the Book of Mormon was true! So we met with her and she is going to get baptized on the same day as Radonna and Kayla!! The Lord definitely prepares his children. Radonna is so awesome. She has such a big love for the Lord and does all she can to follow Him.

Well I love you all and hope you all are doing well and have a great week.

Love you guys!

Sincerely,

Elder Young

Here is a picture of Elder Smith (my companion) and me today.

Things are blooming in Bloomington

Dear All You Beautiful People!

Things are continuing to rocket forward with great excitement. The new district is wonderful. We have great elders and sisters. Elder Decow's (pron. DeCou - it's french) voice is spicing up everyone's lives. It sounds like the announcer for General Conference :) 

Our investigators are moving along amazing. Anthony, Heather, Radonna, and Kayla have such a zeal for the gospel it is inspiring. The Lord has been preparing them and there is going to be sorrow and despair in Satan's kingdom once they are all baptized. Radonna hasn't smoked since we committed her to live the word of wisdom and she is starting on 2 Nephi. We had a lesson with her and Kayla at a member's home and the spirit was starting a riot in there! It was such a good lesson and when we left our investigators were ecstatic. It has been amazing to see the miracles taking place here. To help Anthony quit smoking, he is coming to work out with us at the church every morning at 6. He is a super star! The ward is doing great. They have been a huge help to the work and have been getting really excited with the new investigators coming.

I have such a strong testimony that God is mindful of His children, and that He is such an intimate part of each of our lives. He loves us, and cares for us. He respects our agency perfectly. He will only come into our lives if we allow Him. I love my Father and my Savior. They live, I have seen an endless string of experiences that manifest that they are real. As we put our complete trust in Them, They will guide us safely home and make sure our journey was well worth it.

I love you all and hope that you all have a great week this week. Go and share what you believe with someone you love!

Sincerely,

Elder Young

Something's Brewin in Bloomington Part 2 - He's staying put this transfer but his comp is leaving and he is the new DL.

Hello All You Lovely People!

Holy Cow! This week has been jammed packed with miracles! We have four investigators (Anthony and Heather, Radonna and Kayla) who are all progressing at an alarming rate! 

Radonna and Kayla both already have a testimony of the Book of Mormon and are really excited to get baptized, in fact, Kayla put herself on a baptismal date! Anthony and Heather have been completely socially converted and now they are quickly becoming spiritually converted. They are in love with the ward. The members are doing a perfect job with them! Yesterday I barely even saw them because the members were with them and talking to them the whole time! 

Yesterday Heather brought a struggling friend (named Alex) to church and she loved it! We taught her that night at Anthony and Heather's and she is also committed to baptism! The coolest thing was was that Anthony and Heather are already doing missionary work and Anthony helped us teach Alex! They are so prepared it is ridiculous. Anthony really wants to give up smoking and has confided in one of his member friends that he had only started because of a bet and he really wants to quit. 

Heather has received some opposition from a friend who is part of another Christian faith. When she told him she was coming to our church he was frustrated and said "Do you even know what their core belief is?" and he told her that we believe we can become God.... haha she was annoyed at him and just ended the conversation but she asked us if that was true and we told her that we can become like Him but we can't become Him. She was like "Makes sense!" :) Anthony also has been telling everyone that he is getting baptized and has been getting some negative feedback but he told us that that just makes him want to join us even more! Such a boss!! The Lord is preparing this area for something great and he is gathering His elect to fill the world with His good news.

Transfers have come and Elder Coles is leaving and becoming a Zone Leader. I on the other hand am staying in Bloomington (thank goodness) So I continue to teach all our sweet peeps. President Cleveland transferred almost nobody last transfer so this transfer he transferred almost the whole mission! There are a number of areas that are completely whitewashed (everyone transferred). President Cleveland likes to move people around a lot and call and release leadership a lot :)

Well I love you all! Go and share you testimony with someone this week will ya? You guys are all beautiful!

Sincerely,

Elder Young

Something's Brewin' in Bloomington....

Hey Everyone!

The Lord has been kicking our area into overdrive this week! There has been so many miracles (both with investigators and members) this week we have truly felt the Lord's work hastening in the Bloomington University ward. For the first time since I have been here we have had more than one investigator come to church.... we had FOUR! It was so awesome. Our sacrament meeting program was amazing and spirit-filled. On of our investigators who goes to the Evangelical church just down the street from our building started tearing up during the talks, and his wife was taking diligent notes the whole time! That is not even the big news...  THE LORD LED US TO OUR FAMILY WE HAVE BEEN FASTING FOR! It is totally Anthony Sykes and Heather Monroe (they are married and have a month year old boy named Zaden). The great thing is is that we live next door to the church and they live right above us so they can just walk out their front door and into the church! They came yesterday and loved it, we have several young couples in our ward that are in the MBA program at IU so they had a ton of excited fellowshippers and our gospel principles class was HUGE! We had a fun time in there :) After church the young couples invited Anthony and Heather to come over that night and have a game night and desert with them and they went! Things have been going so good this week, we are so grateful for the Lord's loving hand in this area. It is completely Him and we can just work hard and have faith in Him.

Something else cool that has been happening too is we are teaching a middle aged lady named Radonna and her daughter named Kayla (in her 20's). The daughter was meeting with the sister missionaries from a different ward and was doing really well and Elder Coles tracted into her mom (Radonna) on exchanges and she wanted to meet. Well now Radonna is on a baptismal date for November 29th and her daughter, Kayla, called the sisters and put herself on a date to be baptized the same day! So we are super excited for them, they are hungry for the gospel and they are progressing super well. Also because Kayla is in our area and in our ward she was handed off to us, so now we will be teaching both the daughter and the mom about 2 to 3 times a week.

There are so many amazing miracles that have happened this week. We have some other investigators that have great potential but it is still a waiting game for them right now, but we definately have faith that they will "catch the wave" and surf right into the font :)

One interesting experience I had this week was we taught a lady in her early 30's named Stephanie. She is a scientist who studies human behavior and used to be catholic when she was younger but now is Atheist. She is really funny and sweet but man she is messed up as far as beliefs go. We sat there and debated over the concept of God and Jesus Christ for quite sometime while Elder Coles and Brother Tew kept giggling whenever she dropped the f bomb.... She said it a lot... It has been so interesting to me to think about having the belief that after you die there is nothing else and that there is no God and we are just here by happenstance. She agreed with me that that is a bleak way to live and doesn't bring a lot of happiness but it is better than feeling guilt from believing there is a God who is damning you for your sins. It was a good intellectual discussion but it made me very sorrowful to see this young mom who has this huge void in her life and is being strangled by the chains of Satan. You wish you could do something about it but because of agency there really isn't much you can do except show your love and bear testimony. We are going to meet with her again so hopefully we can help her out more.

Well I sure love you all, thank you for your love and support. Hope you all have a great week!

Sincerely,

Elder Young

More pictures...yeah! :)

Chillin' in the woods on P-day

Another stadium shot

P-day activities

Morning Workout Crew 

(check out Jake's shoulders!)

District Conference

(including Elder Willie as the District Angel)

Still Rollin' in B-Town

Hello Everyone!

Wow, what a week! To imagine when I got here this area was really in the pits and now it is like a flowing river a progression! This past week Elder Coles and I believe we have found our family we have been fasting for... and they live right above our apartment :) 

So on Friday we went out on a normal day of proselyting and we were on bikes. On our way out of the parking lot we saw a man walking with a stroller and a new born baby in it. On our way out we said hello and he asked us if we were going on a bike ride. We told him yes and asked if he would like to join us! He laughed and said no thanks. So about 5 hours later we got back from proselyting and he was there at the parking lot again but with his wife and baby this time. He asked us if we had just gotten back from our "bike ride" and we said ya. Then he came up with his wife and asked us what church we belonged to and when we told him we were Mormons he told us he was interested in learning more about Mormons and wanted to meet. We tried to set up an appointment but he said to just come by that night! After talking to them for a few minutes we found out they lived above us and that gave us a good laugh. So we met with them that night and the lesson went awesome!

Their names are Anthony, Heather, and their son Zaden. They committed to read the Book of Mormon and a restoration pamphlet. We also invited them to come to conference at the church next door and they come to the Saturday Morning session! Anthony had lots of questions and it was a good time. We are scheduled to meet with them tonight. The Lord truly does answer prayers if we have faith. I was so excited to be led to a family and boy were we excited when they found us! The ward is also excited because several members fasted as well and were thrilled to hear that we found a family to teach.

Other than that great miracle, we are continuing to find more and more solid people to teach. I can feel that the Lord is definitely preparing people for baptism in the Bloomington University ward as we speak.

Conference was great! I loved the talk by Jorg Klebingat, who spoke on how to be spiritually confident. He was very bold and straight to the point. It was also an answer to one of my questions I asked prior to conference so I thoroughly enjoyed it :)

Thank you guys for all your love and support!

Sincerely,

Elder Young

Another shorty....but if you want to pray for his investigators, here's a list. :)

Hey Guys!

So this week has been great! Our area is doing wonderful, it is on the upward slope and just yesterday we had our mission fast to have each ward and branch find a family to teach and baptize so we are very excited to see the miracles come from that. So far we are still working on getting some of our investigators to be more committed so we are still praying and working with them. 

Birdy is probably our most solid investigator right now. I sure love Birdy! She agree to meet with us twice a week and wants us to help her understand the book of mormon better. She is going to be baptized on november 1st so we are very excited for that :) 

If you guys could pray for our investigators this week that would be much appreciated! here is the list:

Birdy Morgan

Mike and Balinda Johnston

Mike Inman

Sam

Angela

Ally

Gracen Yandt

Thank you guys so much! Love you all and I hope you all have a great week! 

Sincerely,

Elder Young

Some recent pics...

Me chillin in the IU stadium (I had no idea he was taking this picture..

This one was taken at the IU stadium for the Hoosiers outrun cancer run. We were volunteers for it.

 This is our dysfunctional zone picture. Like Elder Willie in the road construction vest? :)

We were taking a break while tracting in a neighborhood... It was hot and humid.

 Here is a box tortoise we almost ran over on P-day... close call!

Rollin in B-Town

Hello Everyone!

 This week has been a great week! We are continuing to see new people who are interested in learning about the restored gospel and reading the Book of Mormon. We still have three people on a baptismal date and If you could pray for Mike, Birdy, and Angela that would be awesome! They need all the prayers they can get. Other than that we are still trying to find more people and keep it a continuous flow of new people to teach so we have a better chance of finding those who are ready for baptism.

We had a interfaith "Ask me anything" night that was held at the Mosque over by campus just last night. One of our ward members organized it and it was so great! We was able to sit down with people from different faiths and we were able to exchange beliefs with each other and ask about each other's cultures. I sat down with a Muslim man and told him to tell me all the basics of the Muslim religion and then he proceeded to give me a thirty minute discourse on the Muslim faith. It was very enlightening! I could now tell you some of the basic beliefs that Muslims have :) We had a great time there and it was so cool to witness scenes such as an Atheist, a Muslim, and a Mormon all talking to each other and hearing the Mormon tell the Joseph Smith story to them. It was a great experience.

Well I love you all and I know that the church is true. This is the restored church of Jesus Christ. Joseph Smith is the head of the last dispensation of the fullness of times. The Book of Mormon is a witness of these things and one can get closer to God by reading and applying the teaching contained in that great book. I know Jesus is my Savior and Redeemer. God has a body that is glorified and perfect and He loves us with a love strong and more potent that we can conceive.

I love you all, and hope you all have a great week!

Sincerely,

Elder Young

Rollin in B-Town

Hello Everyone,

This week has been a great week! We are continuing to see new people who are interested in learning about the restored gospel and reading the Book of Mormon. We still have three people on a baptismal date and If you could pray for Mike, Birdy, and Angela that would be awesome! They need all the prayers they can get. Other than that we are still trying to find more people and keep it a continuous flow of new people to teach so we have a better chance of finding those who are ready for baptism.

We had a interfaith "Ask me anything" night that was held at the Mosque over by campus just last night. One of our ward members organized it and it was so great! We was able to sit down with people from different faiths and we were able to exchange beliefs with each other and ask about each other's cultures. I sat down with a Muslim man and told him to tell me all the basics of the Muslim religion and then he proceeded to give me a thirty minute discourse on the Muslim faith. It was very enlightening! I could now tell you some of the basic beliefs that Muslims have :) We had a great time there and it was so cool to witness scenes such as an Atheist, a Muslim, and a Mormon all talking to each other and hearing the Mormon tell the Joseph Smith story to them. It was a great experience.

Well I love you all and I know that the church is true. This is the restored church of Jesus Christ. Joseph Smith is the head of the last dispensation of the fullness of times. The Book of Mormon is a witness of these things and one can get closer to God by reading and applying the teaching contained in that great book. I know Jesus is my Savior and Redeemer. God has a body that is glorified and perfect and He loves us with a love strong and more potent that we can conceive.

I love you all, and hope you all have a great week!

Sincerely,

Elder Young

Quick Update!

So I don't have a lot of time, but this week has been really good! We have gotten two investigators on a baptismal date for October 11th(Mike and Birdy). They are awesome, they definitely have real intent. We are also teaching some other great investigators and the area is picking up. Love you all and hope you are having a great day!

Sincerely,

Elder Young

Hello Everyone!

This is a short update today! Things are going good in Bloomington! We have been finding people to teach and the area is starting to come alive! We are very excited to see what the Lord has in store for this area. We taught a guy named Mike last night and he is on a baptismal date for October 11th, so that is exciting! Well I love you all and am grateful for all your love and support!

Sincerely,

Elder Young

College has just begun in B-Town

Well Hello There Everyone :)

So basically I have been spoiled with great weather my whole mission... until this week. It has been so hot and humid I am melting into a puddle everyday! I feel like we are on a survivor show every time we go out. It has made this week one of the longer ones on my mission, but I still very much enjoyed it :)

So you know how missionaries generally have one of those great missionary stories they like to tell everyone? Ya, well Elder Coles and I just got ours this week :)

There is an old lady named Donna Michael (in her 80's) who we have been teaching for the past few weeks and we have taught her about 5 times now. She is definitely a hoosier and she loves to tell us the same stories about her atheist neighbors every time we come over. Well she was committed to a baptismal date by the third lesson and she had some concerns and was pretty defensive on the fourth lesson so we thought we might have to drop her. So we decided to go over a week later to see what our verdict would have to come to.

When we got there she answered the door and we said "Hi Donna! How are you doing today?" and she said "This isn't Donna, this is her twin sister..." She then proceeded to tell us that she was watching Donna's house with her husband while Donna was in Kentucky with her girlfriends. We were so shocked that this innocent old lady would pull such a ridiculous move that we just decided to mess with her and go with it. I said "Well I didn't introduce myself, I'm Elder Young. What is your name?" and she said "Donna.... I, uhh, I mean Donnetta." Then Elder Coles said "Donnetta, have you talked to missionaries before?" and we continued to ask her if we could sit down with her and share a 5 minute message with her... she accepted :) We asked her how she came in contact with the missionaries and she told us that she was gardening in her yard (she pointed to Donna's yard) and continued to tell us the same story that she told us when we first ran into her. We asked her why she was gardening in Donna's yard and she paused for a second then said she help's Donna out a lot. When we talked about the Book of Mormon we asked if she had heard of it and she said "Oh yes, I read from it everyday!" and we asked her how far she had read and she said about halfway. Then Elder Coles asked "So what book are you in then?" and she said "oh.... like in psalms." So at the end of the lesson we asked her if we could come back and teach her more and she said that would be fine. Then I asked her "Donnetta, where is your husband at? Would he be interested in learning about the gospel?" and she said "oh yes, he probably would, but he is so busy. He works at the CVS up the road." She said his name was Claude, and we told her that we would stop by after the lesson and say hi to him. Then we said a prayer and were on our way.

Pretty good right? :)

Other than that we are just trying to get the area moving farther forward and find more people to teach. Well I love you guys and thank each of you for your love and support. If you guys would please pray for Gabriel Saleh, Lynne, and Chance that would be much appreciated. They are investigating and they just need to find their testimonies.

Sincerely,

Elder Young

 The first picture is of my companion Elder Coles (far right) and our two campus missionary buddies.

The second picture is of a sick building on IU campus. It is the coolest building ever!

The third picture is of the "main entrance" to the campus (the campus is huge).

also here are three more pictures.

 the first is of me holding a pancake that Elder Coles and Elder Palmer made me.... it is suppose to be a "Y" but it failed.

The second is us just being goofy :)

The Third one is of me asleep in the car.... apparently I fall asleep in the car all the time (I do, they aren't lying) so they thought they would get a picture of it :)

Week 4 in Bloomington!

Hey all you wonderful people!

Update from B-Town:

This week we have been continuing to find new people. The work here requires much dilligence, obedience, and faith. The area we are in is known for the high level of diversity in religions and a extremely large population of agnostics and atheists. Because it is a huge college town, it is uber liberal and about half of our area is university staff or students. So all in all we have some fun times tracting and street contacting :)

Yesterday, while Elder Coles and I were tracting we ran into a lovely guy who highlights some of the other wonderful people we run into in this area. When he opened the door we introduced ourselves and shook his hand. When I asked what his name was he hesitated then told a his name was Bob... we both could tell he was lying. We asked if he had talked to any Mormon missionaries before and he said "Ya. I actually think you guys are pretty crazy." and as he began to close the door Elder Coles scored some brownie points by saying "Hey Bob, is that your real name?" and he said yes just as he slammed the door... :) It made my day! 

Our recent convert, Clive Fisher, is doing great. We had our first new member discussion at the Grant's house and you can really tell that he has received the Holy Ghost. He was definitely speaking with "the tongue of angels." He has such a electric testimony, it is exciting and strengthening to hear. We watched the restoration video with him and he teared up. We gave him the video and he was very excited.

I hope you all are doing good and staying true to the gospel of Jesus Christ. We need Christ's Atonement in our lives at all times and in all things and in all places. I hope each of you find joy in following Him, if not then learn more about Him. You will find as you learn more of Him and try to be like him, your life becomes more enriched.

Love you all! Thanks for your love and support.

Sincerely,

Elder Young

Greetings from B-Town!

Hey Guys!

This is going to have to be a shorter weekly letter this week, we don't have as much time to email as we did in Plymouth.

Good things are happening here in Bloomington University ward! We have been finding new people to teach in response from our finding fast. We have been very blessed from the Lord and I am so grateful for his mercy and love he shows me. I know God lives and that He loves us all. He sent His son to earth so that we could have second chances. 

I love you all and hope you all have a splendid week!

Sincerely,

Elder Young

First Week B-Town!

Hello Everyone!

Transfers have come and gone and I am now a district leaders' companion in the IU university ward in Bloomington Indiana. We are walking distance from IU which is a ridiculously large. My companion is Elder Coles from Salt Lake City, Utah. He is the district leader over the university ward and the campus missionaries. From what President hinted at pretty bluntly and what some zone leaders have told me is that this transfer is training for me to take his spot next transfer. So we will see what happens there! It is so weird going from senior comp to junior comp, it is like taking a vacation. I feel like I am being trained again, it is so great!

So I just have to say the contrast from Plymouth (my previous area which is clear up north in the boonies) to Bloomington (at the southern end of the state and is a big college town) is huge. I feel completely out of my element here. Everything has flip flopped and it took me a few days to adjust to. Here are some differences.

In Plymouth, almost all people have an interest in religion or at least believe in a higher power, in Bloomington most people we have talked to are either Atheist or Agnostic and more people than I would like don't believe in God and don't care to know there is a higher power.

In Plymouth, most people are lower class and don't have a higher education, in Bloomington almost everyone has a degree or several and thinks that their opinion is truth and there are some sketchy opinions down here...

In Plymouth, the elders and sisters are all pretty far geographically from each other and are all generally hard workers, and In Bloomington we are all like 3 miles apart and the elders and sisters flirt with each other and they deal with lots of lazy and disobedient missionaries down here (by the way, President Cleveland fixed that this transfer with the disobedient missionaries so that is for the most part taken care of).

In Plymouth, there is so small of a population that it is mostly white Hoosiers and they were for the most part all Christians, In Bloomington it is very diverse with all different kinds of ethnicity, religions, and races (including tons of Chinese, Jews, and Muslims).

In Plymouth, the missionaries get pretty out of shape because we all drive everywhere and don't play sports at all (no single adult activities, no sports groups that meet, our branch didn't even have a basketball hoop), in Bloomington not only do we go to the gym every morning to work out but we also have different sporting events every night of the week besides Sunday... I am definitely getting into shape down here :)

In Plymouth, our branch was tiny with lots of older families and old people and the ward missionary work was moving faster than I have ever seen, and in Bloominton we have a huge ward with tons of young families and our bishopric got called 5 weeks ago and when the bishop was called he said if he had to choose to go back to Vietnam or be a bishop he would choose Vietnam.

Haha... get the difference? :) I sure love it though, and I am definitely not bashing on Bloomington. The ward is great here and things are already looking up in our area. We were able to teach 18 lessons in 3 days so things are definitely moving forward and we are striving to do our best. I am going to love it here and am excited to see the Lord work miracles in this great town of Bloomington.

Quote of the week:

Our Ward Mission Leader is super funny, he is in school and has several younger kids. At dinner his little girl Anna (who is about 4) only wanted the dark croutons and not the light ones and when she started to fuss a little bit about it Brother Crocker (our ward mission leader) said " Quit being a racist and eat the white ones!"

Hope you all are doing good, I sure love all of you and want to thank you for all you do.

Sincerely,

Elder Young