Email Letter - March 26, 2012

First off thanks everyone for the birthday wishes! You're all great! This week was great. We did quite a bit and ran into some very interesting people. I think we ran into someone from just about every race, religion and denomination that's available in Roseville while we tracted and talked to people. We had a guy tell us that we could murder or commit adultery and still live in Christ's presence as long as we accepted Him and  that was it. That case, with many others, made me really see why missionary work is so important. Not to degrade any of these great people but they're absolutely wrong and need to hear the Truth and His message. Sadly most of them won't.
We're doing well with the people we're teaching. We're getting ready to hand off Maria and her daughter to some other missionaries. We found out she doesn't live in our area so she isn't within our stewardship. It's a bummer but it's the right thing to do, and needs to be done. We're still searching and trying to find those "seekers of truth" as Elder Maynes put it a few weeks ago.
Transfer calls came in last night. I'm staying and my new comp is Elder Warren, a missionary that came out the same time Elder Thueson did. From what I understand he's a hard worker and is in the good habits of working hard from his last area. It'll be good. I'm excited to have him. He's from Idaho, so I'm on a no Utah companion streak of 4. Not one from the home front. It's kind of different from most missionary's experiences I think. No big deal, I love them all anyway. Besides, if the Utah vs Idaho conversation comes up again, all I need to say is Idaho touches Canada.
Love you all, take care, and have a great week!

Email Letter - March 19, 2012

Hey there everybody! This week was a good week. It rained a whole lot which made me happy. I started riding my bike really really fast through the puddles like I did when I was younger and it was so exciting!
In other news, we have transfers next week, on the 27th and things are looking like Elder Vergara will be leaving. And the big joke is that Elder Roley my mtc comp that lives in the same apartment and myself with be training, and we're going to train two that were comps in the mtc as well. But you never know, it could happen. Probably won't though. Mostly I'm just excited for some change. It'll be good to have a new comp and get the work going again.
Things are going well with our current 'gators. Just doing our thing and helping them progress towards baptism and the such. We're always looking to add to the teaching pool too though. We knocked about 200 doors this week. We had a pretty good ratio of people inviting us back too! 1! That's one more door than the last 200 doors so we're pretty excited for that as well. Things are looking good!
Again another short letter. Things were pretty monotonous this week so there isn't anything very exciting to say. But take care, I love you all!

Email Letter - March 12, 2012

Hey everyone. We had a much better week this last week. Sorry about my lack of writing last week as there wasn't much to say. But this week we had a nice treat that I didn't mention anything about last week. We were very privileged to hear from Elder L. Tom Perry and Elder Richard J. Maynes this last week in a bi-mission conference. Us and Sacramento Mission. It was really cool to be in the presence of an Apostle of the Lord. We talked about a lot of different things, about how to work better with members, and how to better share the Gospel, things like that. One thing that sticks out to me is the comment that was made by Elder Perry saying that we're where we are because this is where we're the most effective. Mission, zone, area, companionship. That was something that was really emphasized. At least to me. Another thing that was emphasized was keeping our temple covenants and also "The Rescue" which is the Church's big thing right now under President Monson. Needless to say there was a  lot of very good discussion and it was very well enjoyed.
We had an amazing lesson yesterday. While we were at church we get this text from a member saying something along the lines of "Elders call me as soon as you can, I have someone for you to teach." This member and her family are converts of a few years and one of their good friends had some stuff happen that made her, and her daughter, super prepared. It's interesting how that sometimes it takes an event to happen to prepare someone for the Gospel, kind of like the Zoramites that were 'compelled to be humble'. This was one of the best lessons I've been a part of and the spirit was super strong. We're meeting with them again on Wednesday and planning on committing them to baptism then as well.
We had a good lesson with our other investigators as well, Kristian and Vitta. Vitta told us the reasons she wasn't baptized the last time she met with missionaries up in Chico, and we feel we can settle her concerns. She feels that us calling out to her husband before we could even really see him and striking up a random conversation is a sign from God that she needs to join the church. Which it is, and she needs to do.
Anyway family, I love you guys. Take care! Have a wonderful week!
-Sean

Email Letter - March 5, 2012

Hey everyone. This week was tough, probably the hardest so far. Even the earth itself seems like it wants us to fail. The wind has been awful and it's always at our head, adding on average about 10 minutes of travel time to any given destination, then when we get there people are too busy to keep appointments. In order to keep our spirits up we've been telling jokes, but we've both run out of jokes. Anybody have any good ones?
As for the work, every single appointment dropped or fell through. Enough said. I really don't have much to talk about today guys. This week was long and hard and I'd rather not look like a whiner and complain about it all. Just know I feel your prayers. we're setting some personal and companionship goals to help not have another week like this and we feel like it'll never happen again.
Love you all, take good care.

Email Letter - February 27, 2012

Another week in Roseville. This one was much better than the last few have been though! This week we found a family to teach, Kristian and Vittatoria and their kids. Which is pretty freaking awesome! It's interesting though, because they've met with missionaries before up in Chico and already know a lot. I don't think the missionaries there actually taught what they were supposed to though, and there's a lot that needs correction. For example, they have read through the Pearl of Great Price and Doctrine and Covenants already, which isn't normally something we talk about too much. We try to stick in the Book of Mormon and The Bible. But it's pretty great anyway. I'm super excited to meet with them again and really begin teaching them. We just got to know them for the most part this last appointment, found out what they already know and what they believe and the such.
Things other than that have gone well too. But not too much to report. My bike is mostly fixed and rides a lot better. I post-poned a few things because 1) I was able to get a few things from the scrap bikes we have and 2) the bike shop has a tune up special this week and didn't last week. So I figured I might as well get it done for cheaper. Right?
Anyway, I love you all, take care!

Email letter - February 20, 2012

Hey everyone! Things went well this week. A lot like the last few though, with a lot of doors. We did find someone to teach though. His name is Taylor, and a funny fact is that his best friend's name is Sean. Coincidence? Yes, I think so. He's pretty great though, we had met with him before but we actually had a lesson with him this time. It went really well, we feel that he will do well.
Since I got to Roseville I have been having bike issues. In the last 2 days, I've managed to pop 2 tubes, one of them twice, and break a spoke, plus in the week prior I managed to pop two other tubes. Who would have thought that possible? Not me, I didn't have any issues in Yuba, at all. It's been a real pain. But whatever, we have good members who take care of us. It's been a real pain though. It's super frustrating when you bike 15 minutes into your area, and something goes wrong with the bike, and walk 45 minutes back to your apartment, because you've already used your spare tube. That's been the biggest trial lately. Nobody to teach and bike issues. It's a good thing it's helping me grow right? And develope my tire changing skills.
Anyway, that's all for this week. I love you all and take care!

Email Letter - February 13, 2012

Hey everyone, it was another really slow week. Slower than the previous one. It's been a bummer not having a lot of work to do but we're still trying hard to change that. There really isn't much more to say there than that.
We got our transfer calls last night, as tomorrow is transfer day, and though neither Elder Vergara or myself are going anywhere I'm really excited about who is coming into the area. Elder Roley my MTC comp is coming to the neighboring ward and will be living in the same apartment as I am. And Elder Netane, also from my MTC group, is coming to be our district leader in one of the other wards. With the three of us, plus another elder that is in our district we have one person from every ward in the district from my group. Plus another elder from my group also in Roseville. Making 5 in total. This will be a lot of fun and I'm very excited to hang out with these guys and enjoy a good time with them.
So even with the lack of work that's been going on I'm still happy to be out here, I know it's stressful and frustrating but I also know I'm blessed. This is the Lord's work. No doubt about it.

Email Letter - February 6, 2012

Hey everyone. It was another one of those longer weeks this week. It's been frustrating. I think when people tell us a time to come back they intentionally tell us a time that they won't be home. It's been super annoying. So I don't have much to talk about because I'd rather not vent about all of that stuff.

Aside from all of that things are going really well! Elder Vergara and I are working well together and we've developed a few different ideas to help get the members involved in missionary work. That seems to be the one thing members won't do for us, is give us referrals. We're working closely with the ward missionaries now too which will be good. As part of us trying to get the members more involved we feel that extending the commitments will hold a bit more of an effect when they're extended from an adult they know and trust and not some punk kid missionaries like me and Vergara. It seems to be a good idea.

Well that's where we're at right now, there isn't too much else to say. I love you all, take care.
-Sean

Email Letter - January 23, 2012

This week was exceptionally long. I attribute it to the lack of sunshine. It's been raining almost non-stop since Thursday. There was a break Thursday but that was not enough. Welcome Winter! But not really, rain and missionary work don't go together very well.

The rain has slowed the work too. The people are depressed, they still don't like missionaries, and Elder Vergara doesn't like the rain either. It's been a struggle the last few days. We do have a baptism this week though! Our friend Elyssa, she's 12, and great. Her mom decided she wanted to make all of the children wait to be baptized until she thought they were old enough to really know and decide for themselves. That's not the Lord's way, but whatever, she's chosen to be baptized and it's happening. Which is great! Plus, we get fed really well whenever we go over to teach them. Her dad went to Japan on his mission and always makes us some food he learned how to make over there, and it's typically pretty good. Nice people.

I'm also going to the temple in the next couple of weeks. I'm super excited for that, I miss the temple. That's going to be a highlight for sure. It'll be great.

That's it for this week, there's not a lot to report this week. I love you all, take care!

---Elder King

3rd Nephi 5:13

Email Letter - January 16, 2012

Hey everyone. Things went well this week. That's usually how it goes though.

The work in this area is tough! The people are a lot less receptive than those in Yuba City, probably because of the higher amount of wealth here. Sadly that's how it goes sometimes.

Despite that though, the work is picking up really quickly. We should have a few new people to teach starting this week, we've been working really hard and there have been a couple of people invite us back.

A fun story behind one of which: we were out tracting, probably at the worst time to tract the entire week, the last minutes of the 49ers game. As I'm sure many of you know, it was a very tight game and people weren't very interested in talking to the best looking, hardest working and humblest missionaries around. As we're going though I was getting really sick of people telling us to buzz off in no uncertain terms, so this door we knocked, I saw the game was on, and in stead of the usual pitch I spit out "We just want to know what the score is". So the guy let us in! We watched the last minute's worth of game, told him who we were and what we were doing, he said come back, and so we will! Pretty great right?

Good to know that even when I'm more interested in the score than salvation, the Lord can still use me to bring salvation. Mostly I like to think I'm a pretty adaptable tool in His hands.

Anyway, that's all for this week. I love you all, you're great, I validate you, etc. Take care!

---Elder King

3rd Nephi 5:13

Text Message - January 15, 2012

I received this message a few minutes ago! Super cool to get these kinds of surprises.

"Proof that they are fighting for the light side of the force. We enjoyed having your son over for dinner tonight."

Email Letter - January 9, 2012

Comin' at ya from Roseville! Things here area going really well, I've had a good first week here and expect to enjoy the rest of them as well. The first week in each area is particularly tough though, so I'm looking forward to this week even more than last. It's just tough to get around not knowing the area and the little things like that. One of the things I like in Roseville though is the high amount of bike trails and that almost every road has a bike lane, unlike Yuba which had hardly any. It's nice being here. I can't wait until things turn green though, Roseville has a city ordinance or law or something that ensures that a certain percentage of land stays undeveloped. So there are a lot of fields and parks and wildlife which is a lot of fun, I hope I get to stay until summertime to see all of that even more so.

My new comp Elder Vergara and I get along really well too which is great. He is a hard worker which makes me happy; we've both enjoyed working together, at least for this week. It seems that the other elders in our apartment really sabotaged the relationship with his last companion and that's not cool. We're going to keep that from happening though, because that kills the work. There hasn't been work in this area for a long time sadly. I think President has put me here to revive the area like I did in Yuba, which is tough but possible. We're going to be working hard so the Lord will bless us in our efforts. I'm not worried.

Something fun that happened this week to Elder Vergara and myself was when we were tracting, we ran into a catholic priest, father Martin. He first let us in because he thought we were the bishop of his parish St. Lucif... Clares. He's a fun guy; we talked a lot about the similarities and differences of our churches. Of course he disputed our authority saying that it didn't come from Peter, which was funny because our authority comes from Christ, which is something they don't claim. He also disputed our mode of baptism, which is funny because we baptize how Christ was baptized, which is something they don't do. There was a lot talked about, he accepted a copy of the Book of Mormon, and we're going back this week when we finish tracting his street.

The thing I'm most excited for is the temple. I get to go as soon as I find someone to take me and another missionary that can go, Elder Vergara isn't eligible time wise because he went a few weeks ago. I can't wait, I've missed the temple a lot and since it was closed while I was in the MTC I haven't been for a little over 7 months. It'll be so great to go, since there are other missionaries from my group that just came from areas that they weren't able to go I'm sure one of them will be able to go with me, that'll be a lot of fun. To get to reconnect as we visit the Lord's house. It'll make me very happy.

Well that's all for this week, I love you all, take care and have a wonderful week!

---Elder King

3rd Nephi 5:13

Email Letter - January 2, 2012

Well it's been an eventful couple of days, I wish I could say the same about the rest of the week but again due to the holidays it was unnaturally slow. I do have some big news though; as you can guess with the subject of this email I am indeed being transferred! I am leaving the Hillcrest ward and heading south to the Roseville 5th ward, which if I remember correctly is the ward that Randy and Chele used to live in. Maybe I'm wrong. Either way I'm very excited, it'll be a new challenge to help me grow even more. I've heard a little bit about my new companion as well, he's from Colombia, and doesn't speak English very well as of yet. He's been out a little bit longer than me, I think just one transfer, and his favorite band is the Red Hot Chili Peppers.

Lately, I've been practicing on the piano; I've felt the need to. So I've been playing various hymns on p-days the last couple of weeks and I'm getting pretty good, I can sight read the top hand most hymns that only have one sharp or flat, and I'm improving each week. Maybe I was meant to play the piano after all mom!

Pertaining to the work, again, a slow week. People are still out of town or were busy, that happens but its okay. Elder Thueson and Elder Richie his new companion should get along really well and do some good work here, besides, if they don't, Brother Tafua will hurt them.

Anyway, that's all for this week, sorry I wrote late and that it's short again. I love you all, take care!

---Elder King

3rd Nephi 5:13

Email Letter - January 1, 2012

Hey everyone! happy new years to you! I love you all, you're great! Just saying.

---Elder King

3rd Nephi 5:13

Email Letter - December 26, 2011

Hi everyone! This is more for the people I didn't get to talk to yesterday. This week has been good, the highlight of course was Christmas when I got to talk to family and do nothing all day. The Tafua family is amazing. We spent the day at their house, they got both Elder Thueson and me a Nike sweater and some chocolate covered macadamia nuts imported from Samoa, which are delicious, and they offered up their home to us to talk to our families. It's great to have amazing people like them that we associate with on a daily basis to take care of us and love us as their own children.

As far as the missionary work went this week it was really slow due to the holiday. We knocked hundreds of houses because everyone cancelled appointments because they were going to be gone, or busy, or whatever. We did, however, have a really good lesson with a less active in the ward that's been coming back with her recently baptized husband, and we think she finally gets it. Before now we know she wasn't doing the things that she was supposed to be doing, that all of us are supposed to be doing like prayer, scripture reading and so on, because she didn't see the need. But now we think that she sees that it is only going to bring happiness to her and her family if she does. We think she finally gets it.

Sorry again for the short letter but that's all for today. I hope you all had a very merry Christmas, I know I did!

---Elder King

3rd Nephi 5:13

Email Letter - December 25, 2011

Hey family, merry Christmas! I'll talk to you on the phone soon. To everyone else, merry Christmas as well, take care and have a good day!

---Elder King

3rd Nephi 5:13

Email Letter - December 19, 2011

Hey everyone, things were good this week, it was really long because there weren't a lot of people that wanted to meet. A lot of people are out of town for the holidays and that sort of thing. As far as the work goes it's been slow because of that. But that's okay, it happens and we keep working.

I don't have a lot to say though this week. We're excited to have a lot of open time to meet with our younger investigators due to school break and that sort of thing. It's all going to be good this week, we have a lot planned and a lot going on, so it'll be a good week. Then, at the end of it, I get to call you guys, super excited for that! That'll be very good. Brother Tafua will be taking care of us all Sunday long next week so we'll be with him for the calling. I love that guy, he's like another dad to me.

Anyway, that's all for this week, sorry it's a shorter email but there isn't much to say, last week was boring. Take care all of you and for those not of my family, Have a very merry Christmas!

---Elder King

3rd Nephi 5:13

New Mission Blog Address

http://californiarosevillemission2011-20.blogspot.com/

Email Letter - December 12, 2011

Hi everybody! It's been a good week in the CRM. We finally were able to get some service, we really need the blessings from it, so it was good to have it. We were able to help one of the members hang drywall and during the cutting and measuring period we raked up his leaves. I like to think we helped a lot.

We also picked up a new investigator, named Bill. He came looking for us and seems pretty promising, he is a client of a local chiropractor and through talking with him became interested. We started teaching him last Friday and when he had a kneeling prayer at the end we asked how he felt and he said that he felt he was on the right path to truth, but didn't want to jump in with everything until he knows more. We're very excited to see him, as well as our other investigators, grow. It's very good.

We had Stake conference yesterday which was really good also. We got to get together with all of the other missionaries in our stake, as well as with President and Sister Weston and their family. It was great to see them all and enjoy a good time with them. All of the talks were really good but one in particular stuck out. The young woman's president spoke about how our attitude makes a big difference in our spiritual growth. She shared a lot of the story of Nephi's positive attitude in contrast to Laman and Lemuel's negative one. One of the major points was that when we have a positive attitude as to what the Prophet, in this case Lehi, asks us to do we grow and learn from it, and instead of just doing as Laman and Lemuel did that we become what the Lord has asked us to become. It was pretty cool. One of the other talks from a member of the stake presidency completely denounced anyone that doesn't call us Christian because we don't believe in the Trinity, but in three separate Beings that make up our Godhead. That one was pretty cool too.

Sorry I don't have much to say this week but know that I love you guys and everything is going great. Take care!

---Elder King

3rd Nephi 5:13

Email Letter - December 5, 2011

Hello everyone! I have another fun story for you this week, about my adventure with Elder Tigges. Before I begin though, let me tell you about Tigges, this guy is a character! He grew up in North Carolina, and was homeschooled so he is a little on the non-social side, but this kid is a crack-up, his favorite jokes he got from his grandpa who was a member of the Klan, so you know what those are all like, he is a ginger so we give him a hard time for that. Plus, he's really creepy.

When I get my camera adapter back from another elder, whether today or next week I'll send video from my adventure with him. Until then let me tell you about it. The fog was awful, during the day we could see about 15 feet, at night we could see about 3 (maybe). Well, we were heading to dinner, it was dark, around 5:30 at this time, and dinner is about a 15 minute ride away. BUT dinner is also on the other side of this dirt path that has a 20 foot drop off of that path if you don't ride extremely carefully, that we could not see due to "the mists of darkness that were upon the face of all the land". So we had to take a detour through a field that had recently been plowed. So we were sinking into the middle of our shins as we walked through the field, the ground was too soft to ride the bike. Then, we end up on this ridiculously sketchy street that we did not feel good about. So we booked it out of there, good thing too because the member we were eating at told us that as he drove down that street shortly after we got to his house there was a car that was squished and an ambulance and all of that good stuff.

At dinner, a cat jumped onto my lap, so I punted it as I stood up and it dropped. It deserved it, the little devil. Kindly the member gave us a ride home and it was much better than walking across a "dark and dreary waste". Also, dogs chased us that day. Twice.

What a great adventure! The work has also been an adventure, we have a gator getting heart surgery in a week, that's interesting to prepare for. We have on that we're extending a date to this week, and we just found a family to teach! I'm super excited to start teaching them, we're working hard here and reaping the benefits of the Lord's trust. Everything has been lining up really well for us. That's just how it goes sometimes!

Anyway, that's all for this week. Take care everyone, I love you all!

---Elder King

3rd Nephi 5:13