5/29/17.. I know that He lives and that He loves us.

Oh my goodness we had such a great week full of some miracles! Elder Kimball and I have had some amazing things happen that we are super excited about. We did a fast last week that we could find families to teach and baptize. This week we fasted that we can see our sacrament attendance rise. Well let me just say my testimony of fasting and prayer have been strengthened a lot.  The Lord blesses us for sacrifices. 

So we already had been teaching the Bennet family and she has been recovering from her c  section so it was tough to have her be committed to coming regularly to church activities. We have been trying to figure out how we can get the ward involved more and we did, the relief society brought meals over there this week and it was so great, she was so appreciative of it and it was a great way for her to get more involved with the ward more. Well we had been praying she could have a quick recovery and she has already been recovering crazy fast. She said she got some new drugs that don't make her drowsy and stuff so she wants to get really active starting now. 

We have an investigator class at the church every Wednesday and she had broken down and had to called triple A got a rental car and still made it to the class. Then Friday we had another lesson with the whole family, so Aaron the dad, Chrystal, Tae, Junior both 9, Serenity 8, and Aliah 3. We had an amazing lesson, Sister Messisco came with us and we taught the Plan of Salvation. They all were really involved and the spirit was strong. At the end of the lesson we invited them all to be baptized and immediately the mom said yes were all gettin baptized! We focused on the dad towards the end because he is a little less committed right now, but I think he will jump on board soon. Chrystal was saying some really nice things too.  She said that Aaron had been telling her to get new friends and that she feels really at home with the ward. She also said she is looking for a new job so that she can be really active in the ward when she gets back to work. It was amazing, she came to church yesterday but the kids weren't able to make it. 

We also had an investigator named Bill there and he is the chain smoker haha he is an interesting guy but seems to have desires to repent which is amazing. 

We had district meeting in High Point this last week and we talked about finding and finding families specifically. Sister Hodges gave a discipleship training and she asked some questions and it was something that I had been thinking of recently. She told us to think about who we were before our mission and then to think of who we are now. It really made me think how much I've changed or that i hope I've changed to be more of a disciple of Christ. I am the same person, but I can now say that I truly love my Savior and that is what drives me to do what I do out here.  I know that He lives and that He loves us.  I know that He is our Redeemer and that it is only through his blood that we can be cleansed of our sins.  I know that the Book of Mormon is word of God and that this is His church on the earth today.  I am so grateful to be on a mission and to serve the Lord everyday.  I am grateful for everything that I've learned here on my mission.

This morning we got out and had a home run derby with some members of the ward. We are going over to the Messiscos to play some volleyball and barbecue a bit which should be super fun. 

I got those suits mom. I'll definitely need to get them tailored, the jackets are a little big around the gut and stuff. The pants are good, I'll probably have them just slim them down by the ankles. 

After district meeting last week we had lunch with the Craddocks who drove us down there. We went to a burger place and we were just talking and Shaq comes up, flashback a month earlier Elder Kimball and I were talking about basketball and I got him to believe that Shaq came out of retirement and is playing for the Celtics this year--super funny and I totally forgot about it. Fast forward, we are talking about Shaq having a custom car and Elder Kimball goes "oh did y'all know Shaq came out of retirement and is playing for the Celtics?" it was quiet for a bit and he looks over and I'm laughing so hard.  It was so funny. 

Love yall 

love you mom!

Elder Morgan 

5/22/17...The doorbell rings...and IT WAS UNCLE DAVE AND MATTHEW!!

I had such a fun week! We were able to find 5 new people to teach and 1 part member family to work with so we are excited about it. 

I guess I'll tell the crazy story about last night first haha. So we had a super fun dinner with The Smyres and The Thomas', some young couples in our ward that are so funny. Brother Thomas actually served his mission here and came back and lived here. We visited a couple more people and then went back to our apartment. We get in and sit down I was about to call one of the companionships in the district and the doorbell rings. We had no idea who would be over at 9. I go look through the peep hole and don't really recognize anyone just see 2 people. I open the door and it took me about 5 seconds to realize what was going on.... IT WAS UNCLE DAVE AND MATTHEW!! so crazy! They were driving back from Duke across the country so they decided to pay me a visit. It was really fun actually they are so nice and they brought some Thai food and a gift card .  It was so nice and i hadn't seen Mathew since he got married!  

Ok let me tell the other crazy story of the week! We were super stoked about this Cheerwine Festival....its not wine lol. Cheerwine is a soda here that started in Salisbury and is huge in the south.  It was their 100th yr anniversary so we decided we'd go where the people are and talk to some people! We went at 12 until 3 and then we decided we'd go back after dinner. We found quite a bit of potential investigators too! It was exciting! We saw the officer that was checking out our car a couple months ago and I had to ask her if I could go to the bathroom in the bushes and guess what? We are going over to teach her this week! I was super stoked about it! When we went back after dinner and were walking through the crowd and I hear someone call out "brad" at first i was like, someone else is probably named brad right by me. Then I turn and Its one of the girls from the singles branch in Kennewick! It was so wild to see her there!  It was crazy!

Ok so now onto things here in NC haha. Chrystal Bennet went into the hospital Monday and they had her go into emergency c section. She was going to have twins but the little girl didn't make it. It was really sad she was only 2 lbs. We're really trying to get the ward involved right now.

At the Cheerwine festival we saw the officer that was called when someone called the cops because our car was parked suspiciously on the side of the road in a neighborhood. We got talking with her at the festival and she was so nice and we were able to exchange information so we can teach her the gospel I'm so excited she has a lot of potential I think. 

Wednesday was really fun, we had district meeting which was great then we went on exchanges with the zone leaders, Elder Shultz came here with me and Elder Leavitt was with Elder Kimball in Lexington. It was so fun, Elder Shultz and I get along so good.  We had so much fun. 

Just got done bowling with the Elder Shultz and Leavitt and Sister Peterson and Yoneseck.  It was a ton of fun actually, our zone it so fun to be in.  Sadly I'll probably be leaving after this transfer ends in a month, but you never know I could stay another transfer with Elder Kimball. 

Love you so much!

Elder Morgan 

5/15/17... This week was great... we had district meeting and interviews with President!

Hey yall! 

Just wanted to give a shout out to my mom first off. You are such an awesome person, I hope that one day I can have as much charity as you do.  You're such a loving person and really care and want to help others.  It has been such a good example in my life to watch you do this! I love you mom and loved seeing you yesterday! 

This week was great we had district meeting and interviews with president! 

Transfers were this week but they didn't effect us. We had to drop some people this week which was a bummer, Annie we dropped her, she has been going through some rough times and also Donna. Donna was the one who quit drinking when she read the Book of Mormon. That made me pretty sad, she has so many reasons to know it's true but she didn't recognize them even when we pointed them out for her. 

Friday we were able to find a couple new people to teach and potentially a family!  We met this lady named Faith Friday night. We knocked on her door and she was telling us how she has been to many churches and that she just doesn't feel right in them and notices the flaws in them. She loved the message of the restoration and it was such a miracle that we found her we meet with her again early this week so we are excited to meet the rest of her family. 

The Bennets are doing solid.  We went over there Sunday night to ask why they didn't make it to church and the spirit definitely did the rebuking and we really didn't even have to ask why she didn't come. She said the whole family sits down and reads the Book of Mormon so they're really solid right now, she is having a C-section this Thursday!  Also they were all playing on this slip n slide when we rolled up and it was so funny they started throwing all these water balloons at us lol we ended up getting hit a couple times it was so funny. Their kids are the best.

 

Friday we had to drive down to High Point so I could interview someone for baptism and right when we are about to get there we get a text that they cancelled, so we drove an hour down there with a member and told him to just turn around. It was lame. 

The rest of the week was good though.  Saturday ended up being good, found some people we can start teaching this week hopefully. 

Love yall! I'll send some pics today! 

Hey Coach Waddoups wanted me to fill out an information thing so they could have me on record and I don't have all the information. 

It asked for my social security # it was required. Is that weird? 

I don't have that and it asked for Tims phone #

Love you

5/8/17... Elder Kimball and I will be staying and Elder Leavitt will be one of my new zone leaders here!

Quick shout out to Parker for being such a beast at track.  And Lisa for finally turning 40😆. Happy Bday! 

Had a great week! We got transfer calls as well, and Elder Kimball and I will be staying here in Salisbury at least another transfer. And guess what? My trainer Elder Leavitt will be my new zone leaders here! I'm so excited to serve around him again!  I can't wait to go on exchange with him here it'll be so fun! 

Monday was so fun last week we went and played beach volleyball again at the Messiscos and it started pouring on us again. It's super fun because Elder Kimball is super competitive and so we have a good time playing. It was so fun this week.  We tracted 2 of the colleges here Livingstone and Catawba. Livingstone is an all black school...we stuck out so bad walking through it. haha  It was so fun talking to the college students too. Then we talked to a member here that tracted it with missionaries and they got cursed out for being there so we had a pretty good welcome I guess haha. Catawba was pretty sweet, not a lot of people were out there as we thought would be on a Saturday night-- too many parties going on, I guess :,(  but it was pretty nice.....checked out the baseball field of course...well kept.  Not as good as Southridge field obviously. 

Tuesday we got a Book of Mormon referral! So someone that ordered a Book of Mormon online and wants us to come give it to him. We went and saw him, he was super excited to see us.  We taught him the restoration put him on date and then he wanted to come to church! We were stoked! He didn't make it to church but hopefully he will progress! 

We're going to play some v ball today and already went and played basketball this morning with Patrick and Mikey....we beat them and they had to buy us lunch. haha It was sweet. Then went and hit some baseball at the park! They want me to pitch to them next week I'm excited haha Elder Kimball is scared I'm going to hit him with the ball! 

I've been studying in Mark lately and also reading the Book of Mormon on my free time and diving deeper than I usually have in it. There's so much more that I'm learning this time through. I'm in 2 Nephi because I've been reading really slow to really understand everything.  It's amazing how much gospel knowledge Nephi and Jacob have that they teach at the beginning of 2 Nephi. I love in 2 Nephi 9 when I says to be carnally minded is death and spiritual minded is life eternal. I've been pondering that and the difference between being carnally minded and spiritually minded in all that we do. 

So often are we carnally minded and don't even realize it. I'm trying to be more spiritually minded lately! 

Qs

WHAT TIME SHOULD WE SKYPE???

Not sure what y'alls schedule is like-- I sent you an email. 

I cannot remember what accounts we used last time

Tyler's account:  wake2surf and pass:  gosuns!

Let me know if you got the amazon pantry... and if you gave any requests...

I didn't get one yet. 

Qs from Tyler...

What do you say when you street contact people?

Just start a conversation with them and maybe ask them a question to spark a gospel conversation then try and tie the conversation into the restoration and end with a invitation to investigate or read or be baptized or come to church anything really! 

What is the funniest thing that has happened in a lesson?

Ooh that's hard I'm not sure. So many people will prayer whisper here where they talk in your prayer and so sometimes Elder Kimball will just start laughing during it. That happens quit a bit though. I'll think of a better one. 

We had a lesson last week with a crazy guy and we're teaching the restoration and in the middle he just stops us and says "hey what's your girlfriends name?" I was dying! Then he says later ok pretend you and your girlfriend go to New York....I could hear y'all talking to me from New York. He was hearing voices is what he was saying! He was pretty Loco en la cabeza. 

Love yall!

Love you mom!

Elder Morgan 

Ok let's skype at 1:30 my time! I'll try and get a good computer or something to Skype from a member!

5/1/17... This week was kind of crazy!

This week was kind of crazy! And again It seems like I have forgotten everything that happened haha! 

Well we were able to find a couple solid new investigators this week. We were in some nicer neighborhood's this week looking for some people that might be a little more committable but those people are harder to find. We were driving through and we saw this super sweet jacket up jeep. So I told Elder Kimball we gotta go knock it. We knock and this girl comes out who was just super nice, knew some members growing up a little bit and seemed super interested in the restored gospel! We have a return appointment with her tonight. 

Tuesday we went and did some service for some members and it was a couple days after it had rained a TON....Their driveway was flooded and we couldn't drive in. We drove all the way out there and so we were like well we don't just want to turn back. So they canoed out and got us and we canoed back....yes it might have been a little rule bending on that but they needed some service so we went. I have some pictures it was crazy!! The water got so high haha but it wouldn't have been over our heads if we fell out so it wasn't too bad. 

We are working with the Bennet family and they are super awesome! They have some awesome kids! --Like 5 kids that are super fun and then the mom is really some lid right now but guess what she found out this week lol. She is pregnant and is going to have a baby in a few weeks and they told her that they found another baby in there and she's having twins! How crazy it that haha. But they are all excited about church they're probably our most solid people we're working with right now. 

Nothing too new though-- just the same old Salisbury this week. 

Love yall

Love you mom!

Elder Morgan 

off the record...

I'm doing pretty good my companion and I have had some rough patches a little bit and you know I'm not one to argue or fight really. He is just the most competitive person I've ever met, so everything we do he has to try and make it a competition, not even including sports so it just rises unnecessary conflict sometimes. But we are working hard and we get along most of the time. We'll probably be together another transfer I'm guessing. 

I am terrible at dealing with it.  I just don't react to some things he does and it seems to just build up anger inside me instead of resolving anything. 

He literally told me that he doesn't talk in lessons sometimes just to make me mad. Like that is so frustrating that he is affecting others... not just me. And then the spirit is gone when we have contention.

I need to change and have more love though, I realized that it's like me getting annoyed at something a younger brother would do, like copy me or something, say things to try and sound cool and I am going to be a horrible person if I can't learn to love more and not let these things affect me. I'm kind of scared that that would happen, I don't want to be that person. 

I don't think I'll send a super long email for the group, just kind of a shorter one probably sorry! I do have pictures though!