Nov 26 Update - Faith Promoting, Miracle-Filled Week, Happy Thanksgiving!

Hi Everyone!

This was a fantastic week in Fredericksburg!  The University of Mary Washington went on Thanksgiving Break this week, so we got a little more creative in our finding efforts and saw great miracles!  God always provides.  Here it is laid out in detail.

We had dinner with Brother Bowler last monday and breakfast this morning at IHOP.  Dinner was his famous 10 minute spaghetti.  It's super good!  I need to get the recipe.  We also had a great time at Family Home Evening, and had a good chat with Jon (a member) and Mark (who we are teaching).  Mark seems to be sticking with his doubts for now.

We had a great exchange with the Fredericksburg Elders on Tuesday, and I was with Elder Berger!  We taught Amani the restoration, and she had a lot of really good basic questions!  We had a great fellowshipper there who invited her to church, but she seemed a bit hesitant.  I don't think she has had good experiences at church in the past (spoiler alert:she didn't come).  It's ok though, we will keep working with her.  We also video chatted with Ellie, and she is doing ok.  Still really looking for an answer, and feeling a bit conflicted between what we teach and her catholic roots.  She firmly committed to come to church this week though.  We saw some sweet miracles tonight tracting together, and helping people connect more with their family history.

We went to Fredericksburg's district council on Wednesday, which went well.  We talked a lot more about family history, and then we stopped by a less active at his work place before blitzing with the Chancellor Elders.  I love ministering!  I got to spend a couple hours working with Elder Schultz and it was a great time!  We found some neat people this evening, and one lady in particular was very interested in Family History!  Her granddaughter had just asked her about it earlier that day.  Tell me God doesn't put us where he needs us!  The little girl already had the pamphlet partially filled out by the time we left!

Thursday was thanksgiving, and we had district council, a meeting with the district leaders, and a planning session with the sister training leaders.  We also had a brief companionship study before heading to the Caldwell's (the family of a super cool member named Chandler) for thanksgiving dinner, and they fed us well!  They had a bomb variation on pumpkin pie: turtle pumpkin pie!  It had pecans and whipped cream and caramel!  We didn't talk to a whole lot of people tonight, since most everyone was with their families for thanksgiving, but we still had a good time.  We also video chatted with Valerie.

Friday was most excellent!  We met a guy named Dustin, who's in a bit of a financial crisis, and appreciated the support a lot.  We couldn't do much to help him temporally, but we are giving him hope in Jesus Christ!  We also had a really good fellowshipper who has been a great source of moral support.  We blitzed the Spotsylvania sisters area and tracted a street for them for the rest of the afternoon.  We started an exchange with the Fall Hill Elders that evening, and I was with Elder Young!  He is hilarious!  We made some sweet contacts that night, and had one of the funniest lessons I've had in a while!  It was with a new person named Devin, and he likes to muse a lot, and has a lot of funny thoughts.  Just very honest and open, especially in his prayer at the end!

Saturday was pretty packed.  We did some service, had another lesson with Dustin at the church.  We gave him a church tour and taught the restoration, ending with a very powerful priesthood blessing.  We also had a great meeting with a less active fairly recent convert.  We read Alma 6 and 7 with him, and he had some sweet comments, and committed to come to church!  (He didn't show)  We then went to chick fil a, and elder young used some gift cards to get a 64 count nugget tray.  We ate the whole thing, yum!  We ended the exchange looking for Hispanics in a richer neighborhood in the rain.  That was a lot of fun!  We had a great joint lesson with Ellie and the Fairfax Sisters (in the DC South Mission) to prepare her for church.

Sunday was a day of miracles!  Dustin and Ellie both came to church!  Church was perfect for Ellie in Fairfax!  There were so many converts up there with catholic roots (like her) who bore powerful testimony!  The talks and lessons were all perfect too!  Dustin came to the branch, and got some great fellowship and definitely felt the spirit too.  He wants to keep coming and also come to all the activities!  We finished the street in Spotsy this afternoon, and knocked in some more apartments that evening.  This week definitely built my faith!

Have a great week, all!

Elder Brown

Sweet exchange pic (yes that is the Chick Fil A nugget container and sauce we are holding)

The results of thanksgiving (Elder Larson)

District Picture

Nov 12 Update - Extremely Busy Transfer Week!

Hi Everyone!

This week was great!  Very busy, and very stretching yet revelatory.  This was transfer week in the mission, and Elder Larson and I stayed together, so rather than packing up, we continued as usual and got an early start on planning all the things that need to be planned in preparation to lead the zone into the best transfer yet!  This is an extremely important transfer in the mission, as we are currently at 218 baptisms, and our annual goal is 280.  We have 7 weeks to baptize an additional 62 converts, and we can do it!

We did a lot of planning this week in preparation for District Leader Training, the zone goal, zone conference, companion studies, and all while we are in the midst of helping create a branch mission plan.

Ellie is doing well.  She came to FHE on Monday, and the branch just took her right in!  It was sweet!  We taught her the gospel of Jesus Christ on Tuesday and met again on Thursday, and had a great discussion about what kind of lifestyle members of the church live.  We also video chatted with her and some other members of the branch to read the Book of Mormon together, and it went really well!  She had some great comments.

We discovered that we have a crockpot this week, so we have been experimenting with that this week, which has been fun.  We also had a temporary trio Wednesday morning with Elder Lemmon during transfers, and had a great time!  We ended up getting caught in a conversation with some Jehovah's witnesses who felt very obligated to push their point with us on UMW.  We weren't able to cut it off without being very rude until about a half hour in.  We also saw Marcus again that evening, and he is doing well!  He definitely has potential.

Will decided to stop meeting with us on Thursday, which I was kind of sad about, but he has his agency.  I think he ran into some anti.  I hate that stuff.  We also did all our companion studies that day.  In addition we saw miracles that evening!  We found 2 solid people for the Fredericksburg Elders to teach, one right after the other!

We had an amazing Mission Leader Conference on Friday, where much revelation was received!  President Smith said it was one of the finest, perhaps the finest Mission Leader Conferences he has seen in his time here.  It was very powerful.

We had a very busy day on Saturday with District Leader Training being immediately followed by the hand-off lesson with the Fredericksburg Elders.  We also had to rush after that to help the Chancellor Elders with some service!  So we didn't have lunch, but that's ok!  We raked a TON of leaves for this lady, who was super grateful, and it was super fun!!  A good workout too.  We continued to see miracles that night as well, as we made several good contacts downtown!  One in particular was a girl named Heather and her mom Robin, who seems to have been searching for the fullness of the gospel and an assurance of truth her whole life!  We met her again yesterday, but unfortunately weren't able to teach her much.  She insisted on a tour of an admittedly really cool historic building called the Old Stone Warehouse in downtown Fredericksburg (where she volunteers, also where she told us to meet her).  It wasn't all bad though, we got an offer for a free tour for FHE and also heard about a couple service opportunities.  We also met a salesman who ended up giving us the hand warmers he was selling for free!  They are pretty neat.

Have a great week everyone!

Elder Brown

Nov 5 Update - Halloclean, miracles, revelatory planning, and Exchanges!

Hi Everyone!

This week was sweet!  We have some very solid people we are teaching, and are feeling very good about our area and zone!  Nothing feels better than knowing that you are doing exactly what God wants you to do.  Don't ask me how I know, it's just kind of a feeling.  It feels great though!  This week was most excellent, let me run you through it:

We gave a blessing to a member at FHE Monday night before heading out to Culpeper for exchanges.  Road Trip!

Tuesday was most excellent, I was with Elder Meyerhoffer for our exchange, and we had a great time!  He is a superb missionary, very knowledgeable about the gospel, and an excellent teacher.  It's no wonder he's training.  We attended their district council, and it was very spiritual!  I was impressed.  We had some solid contacts, especially from following a couple promptings, which, once again, feels amazing!  We also attended their ward Halloween party, which was fun!  It's been a minute since I have been in a family ward.  Culpeper has a lot of Hispanics, which also means lots of delicious taco trucks and an equally delicious Tienda (taco restaurant)!  All those places that say they are authentic really aren't.  These places were legit!  Best tacos I've ever had.  Excellent Horchata too!

Wednesday was fun.  Happy Halloween!  We had our district council, after which we had lunch with a recent convert.  Her dogs were hilarious!  We did a bit of finding before 6, when we had to be in for Halloclean!  We did a brief video call with the Stafford Elders to coordinate on the branch mission plan, and then jammed to some tunes while deep cleaning the apartment.  It was a great time!  We drew names out of a hat to determine the winner in our zone.  To remain unbiased, we dis-included ourselves.  The winner gets a steak dinner with President and Sister Smith and the AP's.

We attended Fredericksburg's district council on Thursday (3 in a week!) which was most excellent.  They did a really fun role play on teaching smoothly (with no filler words).  We had an excellent lesson with Will and another one with Ellie this afternoon, and they should both be coming to church!  Their fellow-shippers were key in this.  

Friday was a blast as well. We had an excellent planning session that morning, and then Exchanged with the Chancellor Elders!  I was with Elder Replogle, and we set John on date!  He talks a ton.  We also had an excellent companion study in which I was able to give him some advice on a few things, and we did some sweet role plays, including the one from yesterday!  Friday night was so funny, it got a bit out of hand.  Exchanges are pretty much the best.

We had some sweet service on Saturday morning cleaning up a cold weather homeless shelter with the branch.  The Haderlies took us all out to Burger King after!  We had another amazing planning session Saturday afternoon, in which we received some amazing inspiration from Heavenly Father on how we can help the zone to achieve their end-of-year goals, and how to help the people we teach to progress towards baptism.  We also did transfer calls, and we are staying together!

Sunday was pretty legit.  Will came to church!  Unfortunately, Ellie wasn't able to make it as she was home with her dad, who was undergoing a medical procedure, so it was a pretty good reason not to come.  Will was unable to attend the YSA, so we went to Fredericksburg's sacrament meeting with him!  I really don't miss family ward.  It is a lot noisier, and the testimonies are often weird or drawn out.  We saw some sweet miracles this evening!  We followed a prompting to visit Nicole, and met her roommate Tamara!  We are now teaching her.  We also met an amazing man, Brother Theodore!  He is a very sincere follower of Christ, and already believes Jesus Christ visited more than just one group of people!

Anyway, it was a great week!  I hope all of yours were great as well!

Elder Brown

Dangerous ramen!

Elder Li and Elder Johnson

Who does it better? Stewie or Elder Larsen?

Oct 29 Update - Choir, Senior Stroll, Teaching Scattered Israel, exchanges!

Hi Everyone!

This week was really good!  We had all sorts of sweet stuff happening, with tons of miracles!  

To start, Monday night had some sweet miracles!  There was a political debate between two congressional candidates at UMW!  We felt a bit out of place, as campus suddenly got very political, but we still made some sweet contacts.  One of which was a girl named Ashley, who absolutely loved Mosiah 2:41, which we shared with her, so much that she wrote it down!  We also blitzed some nearby apartments with the Stafford Elders, and met 2 really cool girls named Leslie and Anna!  Leslie's friend Megan also took a selfie with us to send to her member friend in VA Beach.

We had our choir recording on Tuesday, and sang Angels We Have Heard On High, which will be played on a local radio station, 95.9, during the month of December!  We also sang a couple other songs for a mission Christmas CD.  We also exchanged with the Fall Hill Elders, Elder Knight and Elder Lemmon, which was a good time.

We had a service opportunity on Wednesday morning in which we pushed some senior citizens from a local nursing home on wheelchairs through the canal trails in downtown(ish) Fredericksburg.  It was a wonderful experience!  They really enjoyed it, and many of them were super funny!  We ran into Anna again that night, and met her friend Jordan as well!  We also met another wonderfully prepared girl named Ellie!  UMW is full of Scattered Israel!

On Thursday, we had a really good lesson with a guy named Will, who I found last week on exchanges, and also saw Alex again!  He's not doing too well, and his father isn't the biggest fan of us, but we just try to help him get through the stress he is experiencing, and he will definitely accept it at some point.  It's just a tough time right now.  We also talked with President Jenkins that night, and he is just way too wise.  I'm definitely going to keep in touch with him after the mission.

We had another lesson with Ashley on Friday, and also exchanged with the Fredericksburg Elders.  I had the privilege of going with Elder Li, and we managed to get a return appointment with a Chinese family!  We also had lunch with the Jenkins, and breakfast the next day!  Elder Li made us some spicy ramen for lunch, which kind of wrecked us.  It was straight up painful to eat.  We also had a bomb lesson with Valerie that night after exchanges!  It was on the plan of salvation, and she understands it way better now!  It was really neat to see the understanding of the genius and love of God's plan dawn on her.  She also fed us Bon Chon Chicken for dinner, which was bomb!

We fasted on Sunday for additional direction on how to best get the branch more involved, and also for guidance on how to better lead the zone.  We met yet another girl last night named Nicole, who we definitely believe to be scattered Israel!  We are so excited to see the hand of our omniscient and loving God pouring out his blessings on our area!

We had a lesson with Ellie this morning with Lydia there, and she loved the plan of salvation!  She is just so open to it, and she's coming to church!  Also, Lydia got a parking ticket, so we felt kinda bad.....anyway, that's all for this week folks!

"God is good, every day!" - Walter

Elder Brown

Exchange pics with Elder Li

Exchange pics with Elder Li

Sweet plan of salvation lesson with Valerie

Elder Larson's aunt sent me a flag!

Choir picture

Choir picture

Senior Stroll