Out With the Old - Final E-mail of 2014

It was great to Skype with Sam on Christmas day. He's doing really well. I'll admit I teared up a couple of times, but overall the feeling was very positive and happy. The allotted 40 minutes was enough time to say what needed to be said without feeling rushed. It was my favorite part of Christmas! :) 

Here are his answers to a few of my questions in this week's letter:

How was the rest of your Christmas? What are your plans for New Year's Eve?

It was great! We ate food, and got more presents from members, and had fun. Then for New Year's Eve, we're going out and teaching still. Then on New Year's Day we have a mission party.

How was singing/playing at the visitor's center?

It was super cool and fun! All 250 of us singing at the same time. It was just really fun to sing with everyone. Then the violin playing went pretty well. Everyone said it was good.

What was your best experience this past week?

Probably this morning's personal study. I read my patriarchal blessing and it was really good to get a boost again. I felt like myself again! :D Hopefully I can keep it up! And also met with a less-active man again who said that the personality combination of Elder Moschetti, myself and Elder Osthed drew him out of his shell. He laid out the next steps he needs to take, and his ultimate goal is to return to the temple and marry a righteous woman there. Sweet! It's nice to see the influence you have on others sometimes.

Your worst?

Being so darn depressed with my weaknesses and mistakes! But I'm working on it. We created a plan to help. 1. Smile. 2. Faith: belief, action, power = confidence. 3. Think HAPPY thoughts! 4. Pray always.

What great lessons have you learned?

Cookies bring miracles. And you feel better about yourself when you work hard.

Love you!

Love,

Elder Stowell

Merry Christmas

I just wanted to share my testimony of Jesus Christ with you as my Christmas Gift. I've shared this with my friends, so I figured I should send it to my own mother too. :) I know that Jesus Christ is our Savior and Redeemer. He is the Son of God, and you are a beloved Daughter of God. I know that our Father in Heaven loves you so, so much, and knows you personally, and because He loves you so much He allowed his Son to suffer and die in the Atonement so that you could be cleansed from your sins and mistakes IF you follow Jesus Christ's teachings. I know that God has given us a modern-day prophet as He did in times of old. That is President Thomas S. Monson, who holds the sacred authority to guide the restored Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints as God's mouthpiece on the earth today. I also testify that the Book of Mormon is, in conjunction to the Bible, God's word to us in these days to help guide us and give us knowledge of His plan for each of us in this life, and that if we read and pray about its message we can know for ourselves the truth of God's restored gospel. Finally, I testify that if we do His will in this life and follow His teachings, we will have eternal life with our Father in Heaven. My invitation to you is to read from the Book of Mormon, pray to God in Jesus Christ's name to ask Him if the message it contains is true, and ask if He loves you. I promise you He always answers prayers, even though it may not be on our timeline or in the way we expect.

Merry Christmas to you! :D

Love,

Elder Stowell

December in Mesa

Here are highlights from Sam's letter this week. :) Sorry it took me a few days to post it!

The [baptism and confirmation] were good! President and Sister Jenkins showed up for the baptism too. The whole thing went pretty well. Then for the confirmation, I did it, and it was nice. It's nice being a part of those sacred experiences. I did get to play violin for the baptism as well. And Elder Osthed and I shared "He Is The Gift" while A. got changed, and it was probably the most unified lesson we've ever taught. Yay!

[The Mesa Temple Christmas lights] were incredible! I went for the first time on Wednesday night, and even though there were over a thousand people there bustling about, there was just... peace. Such peace. I wanted to stay forever. And the lights were just amazing!!! Soooo many!!!! Really, it was an amazing experience. We get to go a couple more times with other people, too! Yay!!! :D

A cool member missionary experience...

One of our members absolutely loves us. As such, he goes out with us essentially every night. One day his neighbor asked to borrow his lawnmower, and he said she could use it in exchange for a lesson with us. She agreed to it, and eventually we got our lesson. Then another one. And we've been doing service for her every week. And now she has a baptismal date for January 31! The member was scared to talk with her, but he did and look at the result. He's our best member missionary! :D

We just have one or two places to go right now for Christmas. I'm sure that things will line up as it gets closer. I'm playing violin in our Christmas sacrament meeting next week, and again for a Christmas Village walk, and again for Christmas Day with the Mesa Missionary Choir. It's fun to play!

I love you all!

Love,

Elder Stowell

Share the Gift

President Jenkins has created a vision for the mission, which is AWESOME. It's super powerful, and we are enacting it immediately. The end goal is a mega-baptism month in March of 100 baptisms. We're starting with plans to fix faults with ourselves, then next month is a mega finding month, then February is mega teaching month. 

*Is A's baptism still on for this weekend?

YES! Which is AWESOME because he isn't smoking anymore and Elder Dickerson and I found him on splits 4 months ago and I have worked with him ever since! He's so excited!!!! 

*Best experience this week?

Best experience this week was with Brother R, a less active. We were sitting in the car outside of his house and decided that he was probably still at work, so we drove off. I felt that we needed to go back and knock, so we did and he answered and let us in. We shared "He Is The Gift" and it brought tears to his eyes, and as we talked he wanted to read the signs of Christ's birth in the Book of Mormon, which he hasn't read from the Book of Mormon in a loooong time. He loves the story of Samuel the Lamanite. So he decided to read the entire book of Helaman. Wow. Then he told us how much he loves having us in his home, and hugged us and still had tears in his eyes. I love that man.

*Worst experience?

Just being tired and getting a little frustrated with my companion and myself. But things are getting better. Oh, and I taught the Law of Chastity lesson in Gospel Principles. :P

*Have you had any good experiences with "Share the Gift"?

Absolutely! We use it for essentially every lesson. The above was probably the most visible good experience, but it's always a great message to share. We are allotted about 275 cards to pass out with it, and our challenge to those we teach is to "Share The Gift" :) We also pass out a lot of cards for the Mesa Temple Christmas Lights, which we get to go to on Wednesday! Yay!!!

*Do you know how much I love you? :)

Yeah. I see it more every week. :)

Along with that, I made a note to thank you for sending me out on a mission. I recognize more and more how much other people have to work and save to come out, but you paid for mine with the rental money*. Thank you, Mom and Dad. And thank you for getting me all prepped and helping me out so much. I love you both! :D

In other notes, the First Presidency Christmas Devotional was really good. It was nice to watch it in a recent convert's home. I was surprised that President Monson didn't speak though.

Well, we turn on the AC in the car... in December. It's super nice. Some days we get hot, especially when doing service. We also open the window and turn on the fans at night to keep cool. :)

I saw a sun dog (that cool circle around the sun and one of the bright spots on the side) and saw a giant circle around the moon.

 

We did a cool service project this week. We tore out bush stumps with our hands, and we got about half of them done in the 2 hours we were there. Some were stubborn and required a shovel, but we got a good workout from it!

There are some odd things here. For example, a bunch of (possibly illegal) Mexicans who stand in groups of about 20 on the corners or at gas stations. The people here, if they need manual labor, go to them and pick one up, bring them to their yard and the Mexican works, usually doing yard work. Then the person pays them whatever the person wants to and then takes the Mexican back. It's kinda sad, actually.

Here's a spiritual thought for the week. Read "The Lord's Wind" from the October 1993 General Conference. It makes me think about how Faith is the foundational principle of the gospel, and that without it nothing will ever move forward. The other principles of the Gospel are extensions on Faith. We must be willing to ACT on that faith. God is all-knowing and all-powerful. How could we not have Faith in Him? He loves us and knows exactly what is best for us. Therefore we must trust Him. Each of us must be the Lord's Wind.

Hope you have a great week! Love you! :D

Love,

Elder Stowell

*When the mission age was changed to 18, we realized it would be difficult for our boys to save enough money for a mission if they wanted to leave right away. We have some rental properties so we started a "Stowell Family Mission Fund" and our kids contribute 20% of their income to it and the rest is funded by rental income. The kids also help with the rentals.

Thanksgiving Week

I had a wonderful Thanksgiving. We had 4 dinners, 3 at members' houses and one with an investigator. Turkey bowl is INTENSE here. We get there, and some of the men are putting on their cleats. This ward is pretty athletic. It was flag football, and enough people showed up for 4 teams with about 8-10 people on each. People went hard. But it was super fun, and I got the most physical exercise I have gotten on my mission so far. I was sore the next couple of days though.

*Are you or your companion getting transferred? If so, where?

Nope! We're both staying! That means I'll hit my 6 month mark here! :)

*How are things going? Any promising investigators? Are you and your companion still teaching up a storm?

The work is good. We usually have a lesson or two every night, and we're still leading the zone in lessons (which isn't hard or good. Our zone is struggling right now. We have the lowest numbers zone in the mission.) A. is getting baptized on the 13th! I'm so glad that I get to be here for that. We don't have many others that we're consistently teaching right now that are progressing, but there are a couple here and there that we get a lesson with and they've gone well.

*What was your best experience this week?

Being a part of a particular blessing [where I really realized] the power of the priesthood. Never before have I seen a blessing of healing work so immediately. It was incredible, and I have new respect for the power which I hold. 

*Your worst?

Being in a particular lesson [where the man only wanted to argue] and the Spirit was simply gone. It was the worst feeling I've had in a long time. At the end of the lesson, I just felt empty and hopeless. ...It's hard to imagine what life must be like for those who do not have the gift of the Holy Ghost. Live your life worthy of its presence, because the alternative is what hell feels like.

I love you all! 

Love, 

Elder Stowell