Tuesday, September 25, 2012

Ten is a 10

G'day people of Utah (and afar)

What a beautiful day we have today, no importa what day today is. We can make the most of every day. Well i am doing dandy right now. Tennessee is a ten right now. We are working real hard and having lots of fun. We got to go on three exchanges in the past ten days. I went to Knoxville with Elder Shoemaker and everyone is crazy about U.T. football down there. Its a pretty big city and that is where they have dollywood. (id say between size of provo and slc.) I also had Elder Warhurst come down. We worked out with Johnny and he did us hard. We were both hurting for the next 24 hours. He hadnt done anything for over a year so he was a lil sore. Finally i went with Elder Michael Snow to farragut. Thats a higher class part of town. He is from Pleasant grove, yes a bout 3 miles away. (just off artic circle) and he actually worked at walmart when i worked at subway inside walmart. We never met, maybe seen each other but thats pretty cool.

Lets see, we moved the smith family (larc) It took 8 hours. Which is pretty good for moving. It was cool. We ate pizza and got chatting with the neighbor. Hopefully we could teach him sometime soon.

Amazing lesson learned while moving the smith family. I thought that i was showing real love and doing good service with them. Until the appartment we were moving into was the one we helped an investigator move out of last week. I told Sister Smith i would had helped him move faster had i known it was her who was moving in. It really caught me after i said that. If i was helping them both as i would want others to help me i would had helped move both of them in and out faster. Charity is just what we need and thankfully i got a step closer to having it after this experience.

Deah and Rodger are still doing good. Rodger is gonna continue to go to church and he really likes it now. Everyone is nice to him. The whole branch loves us also. We got meal signed up twice the first three weeks of the month and the next three are full. (a. a new relief society president (sis wick) and b. we just had a baptism) so thats all cool. Its been a pretty quick week with not too much big things. But i got pics again so enjoy them (see below http://bit.ly/elder2me )

Although I have only been out here for 10 weeks we have done so much work. The fishers are continuing to do great work; feeding us, as well as other branch members, and teaming up with us. They are hoping we can come over and teach their neighbor. Lance taught them the plan of salvation a few days ago. Last weeks baptisim was so amazing. I cant be content. I need to keep working and find more peace seekers ready for the peace of christ.  (see John 14:27)

Cool music by Alex Boye: Its a remix of "Have i Done any good in the world today" This helps me on those days...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aIeA_5yYgB4

Much Love,

Elder Toomey

Monday, September 24, 2012

pictures:

Justin Harwood, Joe Carr, Steve Francis, Jim Elkins, Me
Luis Roman (romeo)

Monday, September 17, 2012

Fwd: Three more in his hands-

Good day to all; and what a good day it is!

This week has been great. We have been working really hard. Two hours after i emailed last week we received an text from Lance Dale Fisher, "Hey guys. We are ready to be baptised!" WOooooooo whooooooooooo as johnny would say. We were jumping with joy when we recieved that text. The entire week we were working on the plans and all that. We went over on thursday to teach the last lesson and go over everything with jacob. He knew it was true and will do good work soon. He has read the book of mormon. "its scriptures in a sence" haha. His dad said that when he was younger jacob wanted to join the military and lance said no your joining god's army. He wasnt so into that idea. Then a few days later he talked with president pulver and next time we saw him he was talking about how he was saving up ten grand so he could go on a mission!!! how cool is that. Jacob is legit.

The baptism was Sunday night at 6pm (9/16/12) Lance was baptized by president pulver then after the comfirmation and priesthood ordinance he got to baptize his wife, lisa, and jacob. When Lance came out he said "hallelua, Praise God" Soo sweet. The spirit was extremely strong. Especially as the 70 (yes seventy people came to the baptism) were singing hymns. It was louder than back home so that was peaceful. After Lance baptized his wife. He had to do it twice because he held her hand out of the water. We showed a few mormon messages (mormonmessages.com) they show alot of good things and talks but sinked down to 3 or 4 minutes. One good one about one boy who opened his mouth and his friend joined, who brought a friend and so on. They had 1 man then now they have 36. Wow. We are all missionaries and its good work.

My companion Elder Harwood comfirmed Lisa. Then i did Jacob. I went in with my mind completely blank. It was a good blessing i hope, i only remember saying he will be an instrument. Then lance gave jacob the priesthood and all was well.
 
Only been out here 70 days and we have been so blessed with this fisher family. The zone leaders said they will put in a word so harwood and i can stay here a little longer. I wouldnt mind that. The branch is good and our sucess is just getting started. If that happened i would be in loudon, Tn for 24 weeks of the 92. Im happy wherever i go.

As far as our other investagator, Deah, her daughter Dreama and the roomate Rodger are great. Some days are up and down but they also came to church and are continuing to read and pray daily. Deah is on page 240 after only having the Book of Mormon 17ish days. Nice job sister!

I am attatching pictures.
people in pictures are
Me: The cool guy.
My companion: Elder Harwood from Mesa.
Brother Qualls: works at cannery, first to make contact with fishers.
The Fisher Family. Lance Dale Fisher, Lisa Michelle Anderson-Fisher and (15) Jacob Craig Anderson.

Much love to all.




Monday, September 10, 2012

May is quick.

Buenos dias hermanos!

first a joke.

There is a Latin man at the store and he asking for some "calcetines" (spanish for socks) the clerk holds up different items but cant figure out what calcetines means. finally he holds up a pair of socks. The man jumps up with joy and says "Eso Si que es" (that, yes, thats it!) in which the clerk replies "you could of told me you could spell"

haha. good one i thought. Also the missionaries here say "lechuga orar" which means "lettuce pray" haha :)

Now with the real stuff.

This week has been a little slow. The fisher family is still doing strong, altough they missed church. I know they are going to be baptized real soon. That will be packed to because they are more active than most members of the ward. They go to church, ward activities and service projects. Their son, and his friend are going rafting with the ym this weekend.

David Key, zulie's friend, isnt really to into the gospel. We had brother roman, a spanish fellow from DR pick him up but no one was home. We helped david move and are real nice to him but its hard to see progression in that area.

Speaking of Hermano Roman he has been a real good help with the spanish. We have been finding spanish people at doors but no really good return appointments. Although we teach maybe three lessons a week in spanish between larcs and investigators.

The entire branch is really supportive, we dont get dinner every night like other areas but we get a lot of help on team ups. Last week we had 10 teamups. The support in this small group of followers is amazing, unfortunately most of our lesson fell through this week so the numbers were not that good.

And while im on the subject of bad news one of our top investigators Deah was really up and down this week. She was so happy saying this was the first time she felt joy in 5 years and was working hard on the word of wisdom. She gave up coffee in a day and smoking was coming. then everything fell through and she said that mormonism was not for her and she like having "fun". Many other walls were put up due to the big changes in her life. She said that the only reason we were allowed in was because she had a crushon my companion. But of course that isnt the case. She was working so hard. She read over 200 pages in 10 days. Went to church with strangers and her prays are so good. Not to mention the dream she had talking to God about this church and how she was going to recieve many blessings including a "calling" (didnt know what that ment) and that a man would come into her life. So i dont know where we will go from her but yup.

A pretty down week but that the best part of the mission. We got another week that starts today and we are going to make the most of it.

Loveeee
Elder Toomey.

PS. Take a look at 1 Corinthiens chapter 13. Its a real clicker.

Monday, September 3, 2012

Week 17 in the mish.

Bullet points for those who dont like to read.
- Tennessee is doing good.
- Crazy Rain.
- 10 Lessons with a member present (double the norm)
- 7 investigators at church.
- 4 will be baptized this month (fingers crossed)
- We knocked into a naked man.
- We are taking 1 Investigator to teach another.

Hello to y'all's smiling faces.

The mission is going great here in Tennessee. We are working really hard; actually its not bad. But its turning into good thing. There is a good talk by elder bednar, given at byui, called "character of christ". You should google it. (your gonna have to read it, no video/audio) but its cool. Cool meaning really uplifting and insightful.

So yea, we were blessed enough to ride our bikes twice this week. That went well. Its great to be a lil billboard for the church. Especially with how good romney is doing. There is a lot of attention around mormons.So the lady we met last week, Diedre (dia) cooxey, 27, she is reading an hour a day. after less than a week she was on page 160. dang girl. She knew we were sent by god and has really been chaning her life around. She turned down her old boyfriend and felt really about not giving in to the temptaion. She was doing everything she should and it was so happy. She went to church with a neighbor and it was all good. Testimony meeting, usually crazy here. (zulie and steve) but it was spirituall and all that good stuff. Then in sunday school the teacher decided to go ham about the word of wisdom, tithing, chastity and food storage and it overwellmed her, we hadnt taught the word of wisdom yet. so ya she freaked out but our other investigator calmed her down and its cool. We are taking one investigator to teach the other. nice job i'd say.

Other note of interest. We were going around and one door we were gonna knock. Door was open with glass door there. and the man walked across the room butt naked, luckly he didnt see him. We just waited a few minutes and ended up sharing a message with him for an hour. jaja.

Lance and Lisa are doing pro.Lance has always wanted to be baptized and now lisa is just about on the same boat. she was the one fellowshipping. They seem like lifelong members at church, fit in real good and can comment for everything.

Its been almost two years since they have had a baptism in this branch so everyone is really happy that the work is going great. We will just take it a step at a time and befor ya know it...

Thats pretty much it for this week but check in again.

Paz fuera.
Elder Toomey.