3/4 of the way there

Hey Everybody!

Nothing to exciting happened this week. We had some exchanges that we went on, I stayed in the area with Elder Cook. He’s a super fun guy, he’s from New York. We were finally able to meet again with an investigator from Ukraine named Anton. He’s going to school at UVU. It’s been hard meeting with him since he’s been in Ukraine over Christmas and super busy with the beginning of the semester. Also we had an Investigator named Edmound who asked how he could get sealed to his wife! And another investigator named Ken came to church, for all three hours too! It’s been hard for him to get to church because of a lot of health problems. He wants to get baptized though so he can baptize his son, and he has a date set for baptism! A lot of the people we are teaching are making some great progress! It’s exciting seeing them all come unto Christ! Now we just need to find more people to teach. On another note, I hit my 18 month mark this last weekend. I’ve officially served a full Sister mission, haha! It’s crazy to think I’m already 3/4 of the way done. People say it flies by, and they aren’t kidding! I hope everyone has a great week!

Elder Orchard

30 minutes for lunch isn’t enough time, so we multitask to make up for it

Sweeto Burrito: Guaranteed to make you regret your decision to eat there

God Speaks to His Prophets

Hey Everybody!

This week has been great, we finally got some snow! Like 5 inches too. The best part was that I was in a different area on exchanges on Saturday when it was snowing, so I got to walk around in it all day and suffer like a missionary should. Its about time I feel what its like to not be pampered all the time! Haha mission life is great. On our exchange I went to a Spanish area, so I had no idea what was going on half the time. The dinner was mostly them and my companion for the day Elder Mata, talking to each other in Spanish, and me sitting there smiling and not having any idea what was going on. It was great though, I had a lot of fun! I’ve stayed strong with my study schedule, so I’m pretty proud of myself for that! I just finished the book of Ruth last night, so I’m actually a few days ahead.

I wish I had a cool story to share with y’all, but our area is struggling a bit. We have one guy we are teaching named Ken, he has a date set for baptism for the 20th of February, but he has a hard time making it to church due to tons of health problems. If you guys could pray for him to have the strength to make it to church that would be amazing! I did see a miracle this week when we got to watch the announcement of the new first presidency and the press conference that followed. The miracle is that I was able to receive a witness that President Nelson, President Oaks, and President Eyring have been called of God to be the chief governing body of this church and to lead God’s children on the earth during the rest of their mortal ministries. I can say that with 100% surety I know that President Nelson is a prophet of God. I know that this church is true. I hope you all have a wonderful week, you're amazing people!

Elder Orchard

Trust in the Lord

Hey Everybody!

This week has been fun, and we’ve been working hard! We spent a lot of time in some of our wards trying to get to know the leadership and find more people to teach. We haven’t had a whole lot of success, but we’ll keep trying! We did have interviews with our mission president on Wednesday, that was a nice experience as always! We have a lot of things planned for this coming week, hopefully they don’t fall through. This morning we played basketball with the group that we usually do for almost 3 hours since it was MLK day and a lot of them had the day off work. Right after that we had our zone activity for the transfer. We ended up playing volleyball as the main activity, and then had people splitting off in smaller groups to play basketball and other games. It was pretty fun overall!

This week I’ve been making a more meaningful personal Study. As part of that, I’ve made it a goal to finish all of the standard Works from where I am now by the time I finish my mission. Currently that has me reading in the Bible, in the oh-so-exciting book of Deuteronomy. While I haven’t retained a whole lot of what has been said, I do have an idea of the general theme and have actually learned a lot. In Deuteronomy, Moses takes a lot of time to pretty much recap a lot of what was written in later Exodus, Leviticus, and Numbers. Two things I’ve noticed are 1) The commandments and processes the Lord gives to the Israelites to get clean (mostly through sacrifice) and stay clean, and 2) the requirement for the Israelites to trust wholly in the Lord. Although those aren’t expressed in the same way today, I think the principles are just as important now as they were 3500-odd years ago. We don’t get clean through animal sacrifice, we repent and are clean through the ultimate sacrifice, Jesus Christ, and it’s important to try to stay clean. Being clean is so crucial because we “can inherit the kingdom of heaven” (Alma 11:37). And I cannot stress how important it is to trust the Lord. Paul taught us that we “see through a glass, darkly” (1 Corinthians 13:12), which means that we have a really limited perspective. It’s easy to see trials, questions, and other misconceptions and wonder why they happen or what they mean, but our limited perspective keeps us from having a full understanding. We need to, absolutely need to, trust in the Lord and turn our will over to Him. There is no other way to have true and full happiness.

I hope everyone has a great week! Keep being amazing!

Elder Orchard

 

Having a little fun at dinner

Signs it’s a mild winter: our neighbor was watering his lawn

Back in my Area

Hey Everybody!

This last week has been great, and with a few exciting changes! Elder Carvahlo came to the area with me on Wednesday morning. It was nice being able to sleep in my own apartment and my own bed instead of just a cot in some other Elder’s apartment. It was a pretty fun two weeks with Elder Singleton and Elder Holland though, and I’ll miss the good people of PG! A lot of the week was spent getting Elder Carvahlo acquainted with the area, as well as setting up for Chris’s baptism on Saturday. The baptism went through and was an amazing experience! I'm so glad I was able to work with him and help him prepare for and be baptized. I can honestly say that I’ve grown to love that man and his family! Not too much else exciting happened, but it was overall a great week. I’m looking forward to continuing in the service of the Lord this next week and in the months to come. I hope everyone has a great week!

Elder Orchard

Chris’s baptism and all the squad that helped out (minus the former Elder Campbell)

Some wicked fog that rolled in Sunday morning

Apple TV + iPad Camera = Infinity Picture

Happy New Year!

Hey Everybody! It’s been a good week, some good stuff happened. We saw a Ferrari. I’ve been sleeping on a cot for almost 2 weeks now, but I just sat in a massage chair for 15 minutes so it’s all good. Transfers are coming up on Wednesday so I’ll finally be able to get back into my own apartment and full time into my own area. I’m getting Elder Carvalho and we’re Zone Leaders together. I haven’t really thought too much about New Year's resolutions so maybe not a new me but we’ll see. Not too much time this week, so this one will be short. Have a Happy New Year everyone!

Elder Orchard

Last time as a district

Last time as a district

Ferrari