Week 41 - A hard week, but the work must go on

This week was pretty hectic and difficult, but I grew a lot and learned a ton!!  We were on foot this week.

On Monday we had dinner at Bishop Clove's house! We invited a family over that we are teaching and we had such a great time! We had dinner together and then Sister Clove shared a great lesson. The Clove Family is soooo awesome!

On Tuesday we helped out at the local homeless shelter for a couple hours. After that we tried to visit people that we had planned to see. But all of those fell through and walking takes a lot more time than driving. At about 5 we headed to soccer practice to coach our team.

On Wednesday we went on exchanges with our Zone Leaders. Elder Kilpatrick and I had a great time serving together for the day! We taught Angel about the Gospel of Jesus Christ and he loved it. We asked him if he would prepare to be baptized on June 7th he said yes!! The rest of the day was spent walking in the rain and trying to find more people to teach.

On Thursday we had our district meeting, it was very good.  After that we had a great lesson with a man named J.R.. Then due to the rain, soccer practice was canceled and we spent four hours in the pouring rain knocking doors with no success.  We kept going and realized tomorrow is a new day.

On Friday everything fell through once again, but at least it wasn't raining. At this point my feet were destroyed from walking so much, but we just kept going.   They were pretty much bleeding, but I put mole skin on the areas that killed and it helped a little.  I am going to buy some Dr. Scholls inserts today so that should help.

On Saturday pretty much the same thing, my feet just hurt more.

On Sunday we had a great church service. But during the Priesthood we got a text from a man we are teaching that he wants us to stop coming by. After church we went to West Liberty where we were caught in a storm! We had no car so we had no shelter. I had never seen so much rain before in my life.  Within 5 minutes the streets where flooded and we were soaked!! 

Last week was definitely a week where God wanted us to grow! Through the rain and the rejection I truly wanted to just say "I give up" but I realize that not everyone is called to have great days every day on their mission everyday. This week I really don't know why everything fell through and didn't go how we wanted it to. But I guess that is up to God.

This week we are very excited to go out and work hard once again. The work must go on.  Elder Steele and I are going to the Nauvoo temple on Saturday, a member is driving us.  From my new area it's about an hour and a half a way.

Love,

Elder Roberts 

Week 40 - Pizza, Mexican Food & Easter Sunday

This week was so amazing!

On Monday we had a great P-day, and wrapped up the night by eating dinner with the Macaphee Family.

Tuesday, we went to MCSA and they put on a pizza party for us for the work we do there! Then we had a lesson with Robert, a member who was just baptized a couple weeks ago. After that we tried to contact a couple people but with no luck we headed in to a tienda (store) here in town where we met a awesome man whose name is Andreas! After talking with him about what we do as missionaries and getting to know him we had soccer practice. Then we wrapped up the night by having dinner with the Garridos. Brother Garrido makes amazing Mexican food!

Wednesday we worked all day in West Liberty. We loooooove West Liberty! Its population is 60% Hispanic. Their elementary school is one of the first in the nation to be bilingual. We had great lessons with people while we were there!

Thursday, we had district meeting, and it was so amazing because the assistants to the president were there! I gave a training too. After district meeting we went on exchanges with the assistants, Elder Anderson and Elder Weiss. They are amazing missionaries, and I learned so much from them!

Friday, we started off our day by having an a amazing lesson with a man we are teaching, and were able to explain to him that it is never to late to get on the right path! Then we did weekly planning. After weekly planning we taught a part-member family, and had such a great time! The husband is not a member but we are working with him and have to take a little bit different of an approach, because he has been taught the missionary lessons 3 times already. But he said he would come to the baptism on Saturday and Church in Sunday.

Saturday we headed back to West Liberty and worked there till 5:30 and the headed back to Muscatine for a baptism. We were expected 10 investigators to be there. But none of them showed up... So that was a little disappointing, but everyone has their choice.

Sunday we celebrated Christ's Resurrection!!! Sacrament meeting was so great!! Elder Steele, Elder Coalwell, Elder Ganoe and I sang in the choir! It was a lot of fun! We sang "This Is the Christ". After church we studied for a little bit, which was a very powerful experience to study Christ's last days on the day of Easter. Then for dinner we went over to Bishop Clove's house, all six missionaries that are serving in the Muscatine ward!

Love

Elder Roberts

Muscatine Elders/Sisters:

A random cow:

Week 39 - Lots of biking in tornado country

Here's a recap of my week in Muscatine, Iowa!!!  I want to start off with the weather:

Monday through Friday it was nice

Saturday it rained off and on 

Sunday it poured and a tornado touched down 20 minutes away in West Liberty.

Monday it is snowing :(

We all thought Spring had officially started. We thought wrong haha

      

So Monday we had a great P-day! We played sports at the church for most of our P-day with the missionaries who are serving in the Muscatine ward.

Tuesday we had a Zone training Meeting in Washington.  While traveling there the splash guard underneath our car started to hang down, and it made a pretty crazy sound going 75mph... So we pulled over and tried to fix it. With no success because we had no tool we looked for things in our cars. We ended up finding a bread clip and clipped the guard back up in the car. And to this day that is still what is holding it up hahaha Zone training Meeting was great!

Wednesday we biked everywhere! We had great lessons with some of the people we are teaching. But most the day was us trying people and them not being there. Our legs were so tired by the end of the night.

Thursday I woke up super sore, and it was back to the bikes for us! We had an unplanned lesson that was amazing with our investigator Angel, and we also got in contact with a woman named Julieta who has talked with missionaries before, and wants us to teach her again!!

Friday we had a great weekly planning session, and planned out next week. We are going to be going on exchanges on Thursday this week with the Assistants, which I am super excited for!!

Saturday we went on exchanges with the other set of elders here in Muscatine, and had a great time doing the Lord's work. We also started to build a baptismal font in a member's backyard (he has a river going through his yard)!!

Sunday we had an amazing fast and testimony meeting!!! The spirit was so strong and I was so grateful for the testimonies shared. Then after church we had some terrific lessons! While at a member's home the tornado siren went off. And it wasn't a test, so we ate dinner and just kept our eyes out the outside while eating!

This week we saw many small and simple miracles, and I am truly grateful for those.

My tip for everyone this week.....If you want to ruin a pair of suit pants, just ride a bike with no chain guard :)

Love,

Elder Roberts

Birthday pics

Service project:

Week 38 - Busy week, fun birthday

This week has been the craziest/busiest week on my mission so far! It has been so much fun!

On Monday we had a sweet P-day and then had a great night visiting people! We had no more miles on our car for the month so we were riding bikes. It started to thunder and Elder Steele said "it would be hilarious if it started to rain". A minute later it was pouring rain and we just laughed the whole night while riding in the rain.

Then on Tuesday it was my birthday!!  We started off the day by doing service at a homeless shelter where five old women sang happy birthday to me because the Sisters had let them know that it was my birthday! It was so funny I was laughing so hard! Then we had an awesome day of doing missionary work and came home to our apartment completely destroyed with birthday decorations! It had one of the best birthdays I have ever had.

On Wednesday we had interviews with President Jensen, which are always great! I love President Jensen sooo much.

On Thursday and Friday our days were packed with appointments.  Saturday and Sunday we had the privilege to watch general conference and listen to the prophet and apostles speak! I learned SO much and have a lot of things to change!

Thank you for all of the prayers! I feel them every day.

Love 

Elder Roberts 

The birthday boy

Week 37 - A new area and a birthday

My new area is Muscatine, it is a pretty big city (pop. 23,000)! My companion's name is Elder S. He is such a stud. This week was weird at the beginning, saying goodbye to everyone I love back in Osceola, but when I got to Muscatine, it was time to work! We are so excited as a companionship and a district to teach people about the gospel, and help them come unto Christ! 

I am in a huge town and we are in a car share, so a lot of walking and really nice blisters!  I love it.  It is just starting to warm up a bit.

It is so weird to think I will almost be out for 9 months and I am just turning 19 tomorrow.  For my birthday we aren't doing anything special, I just want to work all day and have great lessons, there isn't anything better than that.

This week we have a ton of things to do. There isn't much pause time which is so awesome. I forgot my journal this week and so much has happened so it is really hard to remember what we did.  But the pictures make up for it, right?

Love

Elder Roberts

Waiting in the chapel before transfer meeting:

Walking in the chapel door looking confused:

With my second family:

Saying goodbye to Elder J and Elder M:

Captain America is the cutest:

This sister is one of Jackie Waldron's best friends, they went to SVU together.  Now we are serving in the same ward:

Week 36 - Showing love to the preacher man

So this week was pretty awesome! On Monday we had a district P-day which was sooo sweet! We went down to Graceland College in Lamoni and played sports in their arena since it was spring break for them! It was so fun just being able to hangout with the whole district and just have a good time! 

On Tuesday we tracted all day which was so awesome! We walked a lot and we were really sore from Monday. We had a very crazy showdown with preacher guy on the town square! Whenever we walk past him on the other side of the street he will follow us yelling stuff at us. So this week we decided to walk on the side that he mostly parades on. We pressed the button to cross onto his side and started to walk. Our hearts were pounding super hard. He saw us and started yelling and walking towards us with a cross in his hands. We met him in the middle of the sidewalk and he started telling us all this stuff to try and discourage us. We just smiled and after he was done ranting and raving we told him that if he ever needed anything to just let us know, and that it was nice to meet him and to have a fantastic night. His face was priceless and we just went on our way. We have a plan to teach him and to one day have him enter into the water of baptism!! Everyone needs the Gospel of Jesus Christ! 

On Wednesday we had a pretty normal day and taught some amazing lessons. On Thursday we went on exchanges and we had a great dinner with a family in our ward! We were teaching them how to be amazing member missionaries and after the lesson the husband said "Well do you guys want to go meet some people?" and then he took us to his neighbors and introduced us! Now that is missionary work! 

Friday we had our last weekly planning session together as a companionship, possibly. It was pretty crazy to look back and see what the Lord had done in Osceola within these 2 transfers. 

On Saturday we went out to lunch with Enrique, one of the people we are teaching, and got to know him better.  Other than that we just tried to find more people to teach. On Sunday we had a great church service, and taught a couple of people. 

I have been serving in Osceola for 7 months now and I love it so much. Today we will find out if I am staying or heading to a new area. 

This week I have been studying the Savior a ton, He is the perfect example, and the more I study His life the more I realize how amazing He truly is!!! He is always there.

Love,

Elder Roberts

District p-day

Week 35 - No matter what, He has a plan

This week has been pretty good! The weather was pretty nice this week until Sunday, and today. Right now we don't have anybody really solid we are teaching. 

Tuesday we went up to Truro and visited some members up there and helped one of them take her Christmas decorations to her storage sheds. We also had a lesson with one of the people we are teaching, Pedro, we taught him about tithing and he thought it made a lot of sense. After that we helped with the English class, which is always really awesome. I got sick at night though so after the English class we stayed in for the night

Wednesday I was sick the whole day so I stayed with Danny while Elder M n J went out and visited some people. Wednesday was pretty miserable, I think I drank a whole bottle of Pepto by the end of the night.

 

Thursday we did a lot of finding and a lot of street contacting which is always a blast! We also planned for the upcoming week.

Friday we had a Zone Training Meeting in Osceola, there were 18 missionaries here! After ZTM I went on an exchange with Elder Croxall, which was a super great exchange. We stayed the night in Chariton, while Elder M n J and Olsen stayed in Osceola. 

Saturday almost all of our appointments fell through, but we contacted a sweet family! We got the address of this family from a high school girl, she told us that her friend could really use a visit from us. So once we got the address we typed it in the GPS and headed to her house. It was in the middle of nowhere. Not like some people think the middle of nowhere is. I mean they didn't have neighbors for 5 miles on both sides and all you could see was field. So we parked outside this abandoned looking house and walked to it. We noticed that there was a house that was actually standing about 100 yards behind it. I kept thinking the people who live out here probably live out here for a reason, they don't want to get bothered. But we just kept walking, to the door. I knocked on the door and a twenty year old guy answers the door and strikes up a conversation, and he was just super nice. He said his sister wasn't home but that he would tell her we stopped by. We then walked to the car while chicken and geese were running by us and we got in our car. It was a pretty crazy experience.

Sunday, Bishop Bair got released, and Bro Graves was called to be the new Bishop! Bishop Bair's son, Jacob, got his mission call to the Arcadia, California mission, we are so excited for him!!

This week some pretty crazy thing happened here in Iowa and back home, but I know the Lord watches out for everyone. I know this gospel is true! I know Christ lives! I know no matter what happens, the Lord has a plan.

Love 

Elder Roberts

Picture from the ZTM: