Sunday, May 31, 2015

Zone Conference, Lots of Rain and a Funeral

May 31, 2015

Hey y'all!
     This week has been awesome! Tuesday there was this super huge thunder storm that we rode in for a majority of the day. Had to wear those blue ponchos Elder Sunderland lent me. I looked like something out of ET. It was pretty intense but awesome at the same time. Fun times. Wednesday we had a super intense, long zone conference. A lot of training and inspirational stuff. Thursday, we had service at the bishops and cleaned out horse stalls for him. It's pretty backbreaking work. Super fun though. We also had dinner that night at their house. We are teaching these two ladies downtown that live right across the street from each other so that's pretty awesome. Yesterday was a highlight too. We had a "funeral" district meeting for Sister DeSpain yesterday. It was pretty awesome, the spirit was felt but we all had a good laugh.

(I found these pictures on the Mission Blog)



Elder Toolson, Elder Plewe, Elder Moose

Kingsland Zone
L to R: Elder Sunderland, Elder Toolson, Elder Curtis, Elder Davis, Elder Lewis





Monday, May 18, 2015

Prayers Work People!!!


May 18, 2015
Hey y'all,
     This week was pretty awesome! We've been keeping really busy teaching and finding people. We've had some super intense spirit filled lessons/days this week and then those days that were super frustrating too. A lot of rollercoasteree days. Wednesday in particular was a weird day. For the first half of the day until about four, nothing happened, no lessons no one answered, it was awful, but then we went home and poured our souls out to God. Like we each had 20-30 min. Prayers. It was intense. Prayer works people!!! We taught lessons nonstop for the rest of the evening and ended up getting five lessons that day! We've been doing insane amounts of finding but we do our own dumb little things to maintain our sanity. We went pawn shopping today and I picked up a wolf knife and a baptist hymnal from the seventies. The things you find...


Elder Sunderland, Elder Davis, Elder Curtis holding Elder Toolson



Thursday, May 14, 2015

A Two for One Post

May 4, 2015

Hey y'all!
This week was pretty awesome. I've had a ton of fun this week. Tuesday I had my tradeoff with Elder Mellor. We had volleyball that night and made fun of his hugeness. Also discovered that Burger King has something I actually like. Reese's peanut butter cup pie. Hit that up. I also had a tradeoff with Elder Bell Thursday too and we had an awesome day that day. Taught like 6 lessons! Pretty crazy week this week trying to track down investigators and less actives and working our butts off. Super excited to talk to y'all next week though! Can't believe that's already coming around again... Where does the time go? We are very tired all the time but I guess that's a good thing right Evidence below. Also last interesting tidbit for the week. We bought 15 roast beef sandwiches from Arby's today because we had an awesome coupon. Got 50 bucks of Sammies for 25. Pretty cool. We had a lesson yesterday about not being offended based on Elder Bednar's talk from 2006. I have no idea what it's like in AZ but less actives are a huge problem here. Like there're a lot. Basically he said choose not to be offended. No one can offend you. It is always your choice. Don't forfeit the blessings of the sacrament, priesthood and temple attendance and full fellowship in the church all because someone intentionally or unintentionally offended you. It was awesome!











May 11, 2015



Hey y'all!
     I literally have zero idea what to say in this e-mail since I talked to y'all ( or at least some of you) yesterday. Awesome to see y'alls faces yesterday, I'm starting to forget faces, so send me pictures every once in a while! I love them! So recap on this week, a lot of it has basically consisted of us hunting people down and teaching them, or dropping them. We've been doing a lot of clean-up just tracking people down and seeing if they are interested or not, so that's been fun. We had a couple members come out with us this week, but Thursday was probably the best. Brother Michael Musgrove came out with me and Elder Curtis, we were on a tradeoff that day and we tried going to see a bunch of Less Actives that night. We ended up seeing two, but the best was this guy named TC. He's a one-armed black man that used to mow lawns for a living, now that's skill. He talked about some past issues he had but was generally a super cool guy, hope he comes back. we also saw brother Murray that night too. I forget if I've told you about him but he always fattens us up with snickers and all that good stuff.  He is  the best and lives right behind us. Favorite thing I read this week: Mark 5, where Jesus casts devils out of a man and they enter a herd of swine. It's always been super random to me and never made any sense but thank the Lord for institute manuals. Now its like one of my favorites.“This particular instance of ejecting spirit beings from a stolen tenement is set forth in detail by the gospel writers to show:“(1) That evil spirits, actual beings from Lucifer’s realm, gain literal entrance into mortal bodies;“(2) That they then have such power over those bodies as to control the physical acts performed … ;“(3) That persons possessed by evil spirits are subjected to the severest mental and physical sufferings and to the basest sort of degradation--all symbolical of the eternal torment to be imposed upon those who fall under Satan’s control in the world to come; “(4) That devils remember Jesus from pre-existence … ;“(5) That the desire to gain bodies is so great among Lucifer’s minions as to cause them, not only to steal the mortal tabernacles of men, but to enter the bodies of animals;“(6) That the devils know their eventual destiny is to be cast out into an eternal hell from whence there is no return;“(7) That rebellious and worldly people are not converted to the truth by observing miracles; and “(8) That those cleansed from evil spirits can then be used on the Lord’s errand to testify of his grace and goodness so that receptive persons may be led to believe in him” (Doctrinal New Testament Commentary, 3 vols. [1965–73], 1:311). Woo! I'm always tired but I guess that means we've been working hard so that's good. Love y'all Write you next week and see you again in six months or so. I have a ton of pictures for y'all too.

Elder Toolson (y'alls favorite missionary)

 1) My favorite stop sign in town, in the hood.


 2) The corner of Arizona and Virginia! I flipped out when I found this.



 3) My picture for the cardboard thing y'all want to make


4) Our Ghetto style BBQ today. super good.