Some of the things we love.

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What is a missionary?

A missionary can be all ages, all colors, all personalities, and they all have weaknesses and insecurities that they bring to the mission field. However, we all have one thing in common - our purpose. "Our purpose is to invite others to come unto christ by helping them receive the restored gospel through faith in Jesus Christ and His Atonement, repentance, baptism, receiving the gift of the Holy Ghost, and enduring to the end." It is a pretty tall order! President McKay said "Every member a missionary." Service is one of the keys, and loving our fellowmen. It is exciting to be here in the mission field and see how the gospel of Jesus Christ helps the investigators to want something better for themselves. We had three baptism's last Saturday. Kristine, a single mom with one child. Jackie, a single mom with two children, and TJ, a nine year old boy that lives in a part-member family. It was definitely a day of rejoicing. Ramona was baptized in November, and has improved her life so that she is able to take back her children. Then there is Johnny who is preparing for baptism. He cut his long hair, got a job, and is down to one cigarette a day. He wears a smile on his face and is a happier person since he has found the gospel. The church is about serving others. It is a joy for us to start the day out with early morning seminary, and learn of Christ, and to see the dedication of our teachers. It is a joy for us to teach Institute classes to these precious youth, who are struggling to hold fast to that iron rod. It is a joy to see our children at home helping each other in their trials and tribulations. It is a joy because of the associations that we have with good members of the church that truly love and appreciate us. It is a joy to serve this mission together to reinforce our love for one another. In Mosiah 2:17 it says "And behold, I tell you these things that ye may learn wisdom, that ye may learn that when ye are in the service of your fellow beings ye are only in the service of your God." We love you all.

Happy New Year

We had a great Christmas with the Elders and a recently baptized couple, and our neighbor across the hall. We went to Bismark to attend the temple. It was uplifting. We attended two sessions. It is a 12 hour drive total. We just felt like it was a good way to start out the year!! However, it was freezing there, and a lot more snow. So, were glad to get back to "warmer" South Dakota. We are getting back into the swing of things, volunteer and the Elem. School on Monday's, make visits to the Seminary classes, teach two Institute classes, go with the missionaries to teach investigators, and do our office work. We are starting a free tutoring class on Thursday evenings. We'll see how that goes. Our love to all of you. I want to leave you with a quote by Elder Corbridge that he gave at general conference. "Life is hard, but life is simple. Get on the path and never, ever give up. You never give up. You just keep on going. You don't quit, and you will make it. There is only one way to happiness and fulfillment. Jesus christ is the way. Every other way, any other way, whatever other way is foolishness."

Love of God

I John 4:7-11 "Beloved, let us love one another: for love is of god; and every one that loveth is born of God, and knoweth God. He that loveth not knoweth not God; for God is love. In this was manifest the love of God toward us, because that God sent His only begotten Son into the world, that we might live through him. Herein is love, not that we loved God, but that He loved us, and sent His Son to be the propitiation for our sins. Beloved, if God so loved us, we ought also to love one another." At this special Christmas season may we all feel of the love of our Heavenly Father and share our love with all those around us.

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Thanksgiving Daily

Alma 34:38 That you contend no more against the Holy Ghost, but that you receive it, and take upon you the name of Christ; that ye humble yourselves even to the dust, and worship God, in whatsoever place ye may be in, in spirit and in truth; and that ye live in thanksgiving daily, for the many mercies and blessings which he doth bestow upon you. I love this scripture, because it says wherever we our in our lives that we should give thanks daily for what the Lord has given us.
Highlights of the last two weeks: 1. We had a big mini youth conference on the 22, that we were in charge of the morning activities. We played some fun games, had a motivational speaker, and the seminary teachers planned scripture mastery games. We all enjoyed ourselves. 2. My Dad came for Thanksgiving and we loved having him here. It really helped the homesickness. We had fun volunteering at the school on Grandparents day, went to a baptism, he came with us to our Institute class, went to Mt. Rushmore, The Badlands, Hot Springs and ate a lot of good food. We also took turns giving out pass along cards. We talked in three sacrament meetings this month, Gordon, Nebraska; Young Single Adult Branch in Rapid City, and Sturgis, South Dakota on living in Thanksgiving Daily 4. Mark and Susan, the investigators that we have had the opportunity to help teach with the Elders were baptized on Nov. 29. What a joy that was. Now, we get to follow their growth in the gospel. Mark is excited to get the Priesthood. It is such a blessing for us to be here! Our love to you all!

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Thankfulness

I can't believe it has already been three weeks since I wrote in our blog. Time flies when you are having fun. I guess one of the highlights of the last three weeks was our coordinator, Brother Fisher and his wife Liz came to Rapid City to see how we were doing. They live in Minneapolis. We had a nice visit, they liked our apartment, and then we drove up to Hill City for dinner at the Alpine Inn. They went walking with us the next morning at Canyon Lake Park, not far from our house. Before we left on our mission, a lady from St. George called and said she was going to the Rapid City, SD mission also. However, she was not coming until November. We had the opprotunity to pick her up from the airport, and since her companion was not here yet, she stayed with Elder Hinton and I for the weekend. Her name is Laura Cooper. We had such a fun time getting to know her. She is so strong in the gospel and will be a great missionary. She has had a difficult life, but has overcome many challenges. Her son served a mission and was sent home early because he had cancer. He died at the age of 25, that was when Sister Cooper decided to change her life around. It is amazing how people touch our lives for good. Sister Cooper will be serving in Fargo, North Dakota, so I don't think we will be seeing her much. Meeting and getting to know her made me realize how quickly we judge other people. In Alma 41:14-15, it says, "Therefore, my son, see that you are merciful unto your brethen; deal justly, judge righteously and do good continually; and if you do all these things then shall ye receive your reward; yea, ye shall have mercy restored unto you again; ye shall have justice restored unto you again; Ye shall have a righteous judgement restored unto you again; and ye shall have good rewarded unto you again." For that which ye do send out shall return unto you again, and be restored; therefore, the word restoration more fully condemneth the sinner, and justtifieth him not at all." We are in Chadron, Nebraska at the moment. We had a rewarding spiritual day with the good people in Gordon, NE. We spoke in their Sacrament meeting, then had a potluck dinner, then went to their home and had an awesome lesson on the parables of Christ. We will go to and early morning seminary class tomorrow, then drive to Alliance and go to another one, visit a home study class on the way. We love our job!! Have a good week. We love you all!!!!

Real facts of mission life

We have had a busy two weeks. We went to Nebraska last week and visited most of our teachers there. What a blessing they are to the youth of the church. Each with there individual strengths and personalities. I had to laugh in one of the early morning classes in Chadron. The teacher was giving an excellent lesson on the parables in the New Testament. Most of her students were answering her questions and looked like awesome perspective missionaries as they were bearing their testimonies, but there was one girl who had her blanket wrapped around her and the hood to her sweatshirt pulled over her head. When she was asked a question her reply was, "I don't know." Pretty soon she was asleep. After class, I asked, "does her parents make her go to seminary?" The teacher's reply was, "yes, they do, and she is my daughter, and we are worried about her." She is a senior in high school. I just thought isn't that the way life is. All you can do is laugh. We also gave the Nebraska teachers an inservice lesson on Thursday night. Three out of the five showed up. We have one teacher in Alliance, that is single, and is a foster parent. She takes these children and cares for them, and also works with the parents, so hopefully they can get their act together and take their children back. She has a three year old and a three month old baby. The baby's parents just wants her to have the baby, because they can't handle any more children. I am amazed and the love and compassion that this person has. We enjoy going to Nebraska! We came back just in time to find out that they had changed Alleshia's baptism to Friday evening instead of Saturday. Alleshia is a single mom with two little girls. She is what missionaries call a "golden contact." The sister missionaries taught her. I was able to go a couple of times. Her baptism was super. We also had a baptism this Saturday. Tyler, one the Young Adults in our Institute Class was rebaptized after a year and a half. He is 26. We are so proud of him and the choices he has made. This week we volunteered at the Elementary on Monday, the first and fifth grades. We love working with the children. We visted our teachers in Hot Springs, and Spearfish. What a neat way to start a day, with lessons about the Savior. After the lesson, we usually go out to breakfast, then take the long way back to Rapid City. We have seen a lot of the Black Hills National Forest. We found a hidden waterfall, Roughlock Waterfall, on the way back from Spearfish. It is a tough job! ha ha. The facts of mission life as I see it are: That this is Christ's Church, the scriptures have become delicious to me, that God and Christ loves and cares about us, and wants us to succeed, God and Jesus created a beautiful world, My companion and I have the wonderful opportunity to experience these testimony building experiences together as our love for each other deepens, the youth of the church are beautiful, prayer is the souls sincerest desire, grandchildren's letters are the best, we do not fully understand the whole picture, but if we follow God's plan we will be able to return to Him, if you eat too much food, you will get fat, exercise is good for the mind and the body, your favorite missionaries will eventually go home, or get transferred, (they are all my favorite), our apartment and the laundry will always need to be cleaned and washed, we need to get dressed up everyday with nylons and a tie. We love our mission. We had Stake Conference today, and Pres. Dunn had some good things to say about faith. Faith involves determination and resolve. We are in the Lord's debt. We must continue sacrificing, for we owe the Lord everything. Put faith in the Lord, and He will move the mountains for us and part the sea, we don't have to. Faith is necessary for us to succeed. He wants us to have all of the blessings that He has to offer. Exercise your faith and improve our lives. Be upon your knees and ask how we can improve ourselves to enjoy all His blessings. Have a great week, we love you all soooooo much.

Highs and Lows

The highs of the last two weeks helped us remember why the gospel is so important in our lives. We went to the baptism of the Fisher family. It was the mom and her two oldest daughters that were 9 and 11. We weren't involved with the teaching of this family, but their baptism touched my heart and spirit. The happiness that showed on their faces was truly touching. We had a wonderful day on Sept. 30. We attended our first district meeting, where we were uplifted and the joys of serving the Lord. That evening, we taught our Institute Class on Dating Standards, then again last night on Chastity. The course is Eternal Marriage. The spirit is there and we discuss these important priciples to the youth of the church. Two members of our class are in the Air Force here. The girl has been to Irag. Some of them have grown up with each other. One has been in the church for about two months. There is a couple that is dating, and are serious about each other. We have about 12 students. We really enjoy teaching them. We are setting up an Institute Class on the campus of the School of Mines this week. We will be teaching The Pearl of Great Price. Also, I had a visit with the Sinus Dr. again. It has been 5 weeks since I saw him last. I have had no medicine, they wouldn't give me an antibiotic or Predisone because they said that it only makes me worse. So, I have taken nothing, because the medicine they prescribed my Insurance Company didn't want to pay for. Dad and Pres. Beau gave me a blessing at the beginning of my sickness. I told the Doctor that I was better because of prayer and that blessing. He said, "I'll accept that." He wrote "remarkable recovery" on his sheet. We went with Elder Wallace to see an investigator, Mark. Mark was scheduled to be baptized on his birthday, the
10th of Oct., but he somehow had his feelings hurt by something he overheard, so we went with Elder Wallace to see what we could do. We had a wonderful discussion, the spirit was in that room. We ended with Elder Wallace and Elder Hinton giving him a blessing. We had an appointment the next day to meet with his wife. We went to that appointment and no one was there. We have not heard from him since. (disappointment) We loved General Conference. My favorite was the Saturday session. I went on splits with the Sisters while Elder Hinton went to the Priesthood Session. Alleshia is a single Mom with two of the cutest girls. We made arrangements for her baptism this weekend on the 11. She is so excited. She has been to church serveral times and wants to make some changes in her life. The little girl's father, not her husband, didn't want to stay with her anymore. We started volunteering at the Elementary School that is close to our apartment. We work in two 5th grades and two 1st grades. One girl in the 5th grade came up to me and pointed to my badge and said, that's the church I go to. We only go on Monday's, but we will enjoy it. Another joy was that we have received mail from our grandchildren. Emma, Elijah, Drake, Makenna, Ty, Aaron, Jennica, Larissa, & Ashton. We have them all hung up on our wall by the kitchen table. Thank you, we love them. Another joy was that we received a phone call from Amber telling us she and Jeremy are going to have a baby in May. Like Grandpa Leavitt says, you can never have enough grandchildren, or great grandchildren in his case. We are excited. Another disappointment is Pine Ridge Home Study Class is having a struggle getting started. We are going to speak there this Sunday. It is two hours away. Pray for us that we will know what to speak about. Because of trials in our lives, I have chosen this scripture to share with you. D&C 58:2-4 For verily I say unto you, blessed is he that keepeth my commandments, whether in this life or in death; and he that is faithful in tribulation, the reward of the same is greater in the kingdom of heaven. Ye cannot behold with your natural eyes, for the present time, the design of your God concerning those things which shall come hereafter, and the glory which shall follow after much tribulation. For after much tribulation come the blessings. Wherefore, the day cometh that ye shall be crowned with much glory; the hour is not yet, but is nigh at hand." I love you all. The Lord loves you. The gospel is true.