November 24th, 2014 - Woah!

Hey Everyone!

So, last week was absolutely insane, and I didn't actually have time to email anyone, which was super sad :( We ended up having to go to a funeral for a member of the Guthrie Ward, which was alright and happened to take up most of our p-day time. So, I'm going to try and give y'all an update on the last two weeks... we'll see how well I do!

So, transfers were this last week, and I get to stay here with Elder Kenison! But, due to the holidays they're going to be pretty insane for the next little while. There is one again on December 17th, and again on January 7th, so that people can go home when they would like, and there are quite a few going home each of those days.  

On Monday the 10th we had zone p-day in Stillwater and had a blast there with an awesome specialized training meeting afterward focused on Finding. After that I got to go on an exchange up in Stillwater with Elder Burdett until Wednesday morning, so we got to have a blast working in Stilly for a little bit. We had a pretty intense day on Tuesday, with lots of random things coming up and lots of things falling through, but we got to have a couple sweet chats with people, even though we didn't get to teach any of the regular lessons that day, we still had some good things that we learned and that others learned. For one, I learned that you can only buy floor mats from the Toyota dealership in a set of 4, random, but it happened that we needed to go get a floor mat for one of the mission vehicles. I also learned that a Mexican joint called "Fuzzy's" sells deep fried ice cream, which was pretty delicious. There was also a media referral we got to go see a fellow named Allie, who told us about a god named Jamar, who also had a son named Jesus... it was a heck of an interesting visit.... To brighten our day though we had a good discussion with a family about persecution and the reasons why so many people have negative connotations to the name "Mormon". It was a pretty good day overall :)

Wednesday was also pretty exciting, aside from al the driving and bike fixing that had to be done, we got to see a couple people and had a pretty good chat with Stanlee and Brother Dickerson after having dinner with them about the doctrine of Christ and the importance of apply each principle at the correct time in our lives. The awesome thing about that Thursday (the 13th) was that we got to go to the temple! There is a sister in the ward who was taking out her Endowments, and she asked us to come and be there for support as well as a whole bunch of other awesome people from the ward and it was just a blast to be able to go to the temple again! :)

On Friday the 14th, after a sweet district meeting I got to go on an exchange up in Guthrie North with Elder Hoopes and had a pretty swell time there. For the sake of time I'm going to fast forward and just mention a couple noteworthy events. We got to have dinner at Ken's Pizza with Paul and Sister Ramsey, and it was a blast with their awesome kids and some tasty pizza. On Sunday the 16th after Sacrament meeting they cancelled church due to snow and there were already a few accidents along the interstate that we saw on the Drive back. The rest of that day became very interesting since we weren't able to bike in the snow we had to walk everywhere and ended up walking a few miles that day and visiting with a few potential investigators and active members, along with a good bit of tracting.

Last Monday the 17th, as mentioned before we had the funeral which took up a good chunk of the day with setting up, the actual service, socializing and lunch afterward and then taking stuff down, plus all the driving, it was definitely a long day. The notable thing about Tuesday we the scripture study class we got to have at the Jensens' home where the sisters taught about Gratitude. It was pretty sweet, and we watched this awesome Mormon Message: In The Spirit of Thanksgiving Elder Oaks talks in part of it, and that was probably my favorite part of the whole thing.

Also, while I was getting the link for that one, there was a new Mormon message about the refiner's fire, which was absolutely awesome. You should all check it out:

New One!

The notable things about Wednesday the 19th, was the fun time we got to have doing service at the Hope Center and then for an awesome member family as well as the sweet and super spiritual lesson we got to have that night with Brother Brasher and a girl named Carson. She's super cool and we'll have to pass her on to the UCO sisters in the YSA ward. Thursday we got to go out to lunch with a pretty cool sister in the ward, but we had a pretty good day aside from Elder Kenison's tire slowly going flat and having to call it a day a little early. It was pretty neat because he didn't have to replace to tube (as of yet), so that was a pretty cool miracle.

On Friday the 21st we had a pretty good district meeting, along with finishing weekly planning and biking around with not many people being home the main notable thing was the chat we got to have with a potential investigator and her husband who we hadn't met until that day who was super awesome as well. Then we got to have a blast at dinner with our ward mission leader and his family, so it was a pretty sweet day even though not much worked out. Saturday it rained... and rained... and rained... but we got to visit with an awesome family and had a good lesson with them, as well as helped a new family move in... in the rain... but they were super awesome so it was totally worth it.

Of note yesterday, for sake of time, we had a blast visiting a few less-active families in the ward and having dinner with one of the many awesome active families here, along with getting to talk to Elder Balch since he wasn't able to go to church since he'd been sick the last couple days. Phew. That was a long time to review and go over... I've had a ton of studies during these last couple weeks that were pretty awesome, but since my email is already super long, I'll just throw a couple quick things here for y'all to check out:

• Phoenix Arizona Temple Dedication Prayer is super awesome, and deserves a read!
• Awesome article about applying conference - Check it out!
• #SharetheGift <- check it out! It's super awesome, and I want you all to click on that link!
• This quote from Preach my Gospel hit me this week, so I wanted to share it with y'all: "God is the Father of our spirits. We are literally Hischildren, and He loves us. We lived as spirit children of our Father inHeaven before we were born on this earth. We were not, however,like our Heavenly Father, nor could we ever become like Him andenjoy all the blessings that He enjoys without the experience of livingin mortality with a physical body.
  God’s whole purpose—His work and His glory—is to enable each ofus to enjoy all His blessings. He has provided a perfect plan toaccomplish His purpose. We understood and accepted this planbefore we came to the earth." We knew God, and he knew us before this life and each one of us accepted His plan that would bring about our happiness and salvation and progression. The key here is to remember that and live according to the knowledge that we have and continually seek more from God!

Okay... I've gotta get moving, but I love y'all! I hope you have a fantastic week!

'Til Next Time,

Elder Jordan Nielson

November 10th, 2014

Hey Everyone!

It's been a pretty swell week out here in Edmond, Oklahoma, although there wasn't a whole ton of remarkable things there were a lot of cool little things that happened throughout the week. It's been super nice weather all this week, which was awesome for those days where we got to do a lot of tracting or biking, which is pretty much everyday. Since I'm currently not entirely sure what I want to put in this email today, I guess I'll just start with some of the thoughts that have recurred over the last week. Recently I read a book titled "Believing Christ" by Stephen Robinson which focused upon actually believing what Christ says and what he can do and not just believing in Him. There was also a large emphasis on the doctrines of Grace, Faith, and salvation, along with a pretty neat explanation of the atonement throughout the entire book. One cool quote that kind of emphasizes his point is: "We often think that having faith in Christ means believing in his identity as the Son of God and the Savior of the world. But believing in Jesus' identity as the Christ is only the first half of it. The other half is believing in his ability, in his power to cleanse and to save - to make unworthy sons and daughters worthy. Not only must we believe that he is who he says he is, we must also believe that he can do what he says he can do." It's been a pretty good book to read this last week, and I'd recommend it to anyone who wants to have a pretty plain talk about some oft times confusing topics.

In my studies this week I focused a lot on Preach my Gospel and studying from that, and so I wanted to share a few quotes that struck me in my studies:

• "Preach My Gospel‍ focuses on the fundamentals of missionary work.It does not answer every question or situation you will encounter. Youwill be most effective as you follow the Spirit, search the scriptures,keep the commandments, and apply what you learn" - Introduction
• "Frequent study of this manual will enable them to fulfill theirresponsibilities as member missionaries and will foster unity with thefull-time missionaries." - Introduction
• "President Ezra Taft Benson taught: “We are commanded by God totake this gospel to all the world. That is the cause that must unite ustoday. Only the gospel will save the world from the calamity of itsown self-destruction. Only the gospel will unite men of all races andnationalities in peace. Only the gospel will bring joy, happiness, andsalvation to the human family” - Chapter 1
•  “Preach the first principles of the Gospel—preach them over again:you will find that day after day new ideas and additional lightconcerning them will be revealed to you." - Hyrum Smith, Chapter 1
• "The purpose of the gospel is to cleanse people of their sins so theycan receive the Savior’s mercy at the day of judgment. Therefore, thefocus of this book and, more important, the work you do each day isto invite others to come unto Christ by helping them receive therestored gospel through faith in Jesus Christ and His Atonement,repentance, baptism, receiving the Holy Ghost, and enduring to theend." - Chapter 1
• "Repentance involves a change of heart and a desire to forsake sinand serve God. ... It requires that people increase their commitmentto live in agreement with God’s will. ... It is a positive experience thatbrings joy and peace." - Chapter 1

Anyway, this week we got to see a few people and with one family we got to watch a video the church recently put out about temple garments and such, and since I can't remember if I've given y'all a link to it before I'm going to put on here: LINK! Another topic we talked about a lot this week was daily scripture study and prayer and the importance that has in our lives. We watched the Daily Bread Mormon messages (Links: 1 2 3) and had some fantastic discussions about those topics. On Wednesday it seemed to be a family history kind of day as that was discussed, at least in some form, with most of the people we got to see that day. On Friday I got to go on exchanges up in Guthrie again, and it was a pretty swell day. We talked with a few people and got to have some good discussions about baptism and the Holy Ghost with a couple people where we got to emphasize the importance they have in our daily lives as we strive to come closer to Christ. The only really exciting thing that happened was on Saturday when I got a flat tire and some nice couple gave us a ride back to our apartment. Apparently the wife grew up with Sherri Dew, which was pretty neat especially since I found out today that she'll be doing some sort of lecture thing (check it out here) this week that I'll hopefully remember and get to listen to next week. That night we got to talk about obedience with Sandy - who got baptized a little while back and her daughter Michelle - who is getting baptized on the 21st of the month, and watched President Monson's talk "Obedience Brings Blessings", which is super awesome. Of note for Sunday was the awesome day at church, and then also a quote that I wrote down during dinner. It's a joke, so you have to read it aloud in a Jersey accent: "Why should you never play cards in the Jungle? Cause there might be a Cheetah!" Considering it was a little kid who told it to us, it was pretty funny.

Though there wasn't much that happened exciting wise this week, it was still an awesome week to be a missionary, since every week is an awesome week to be a missionary! We had some fun times, and some not so fun times (like the flat tire that I later found out was actually 2 flat tires... evil burrs), but the work moves forward. I hope y'all have a fantastic week! Love y'all!

'Til Next Time,

Elder Jordan Nielson

November 3rd, 2014 - Winter is coming?!?

Hey Everyone!

Well it looks like winter is coming since this week we've had many days of suit-coat-weather. This week has been pretty interesting, and since I chose to listen to the CES devotional during email time today you guys are going to have a shortened email... so to make up for it you should watch the devotional - it's pretty neat! Check it out here: https://www.lds.org/broadcasts/watch/ces-devotionals/2014/11?cid=HPSU110214549&lang=eng

Anyway, this week had a couple notable things - first off that we got to go to the Oklahoma City zoo last week for Sister Curtis' birthday where I took tons of pictures and we had a blast! They had the Halloween decorations up, so it was particularly exciting and full of things to take pictures of. But, I don't have time today to go through the pictures, so you'll have to wait in suspense until I get around to it. That night we had a blast with the visits that we had with people and the wonderful dinner appointment we were able to have. On Tuesday we got to help a couple in the ward in the morning and had lunch with them, before heading out to try and see people and didn't have much luck. We had a sweet dinner appointment before our scripture study class that night where we got to talk about building a sure foundation - the same thing Elder Hallstrom talks of in the CES devotional and it was pretty sweet. We watched this video:Video! In addition we discussed some of the following scriptures:

• Helaman 5:9-12
• Psalm 71:3
• Jacob 4:14-16
• Matthew 7:24-27
• Mosiah 4:9-10
• Alma 48:7-10
• Jacob 4:6
• Alma 33:22-23

On Wednesday we got to help a couple in the ward move down the street, which was pretty fun and then saw a few people before the ward Halloween party, which was super intense! There was a ton of people there, and we had a fantastic chili cook-off (of which we were the judges along with the sisters), with a ton of other activities and such. There were games/challenges in the rooms along the hallway and in the foyer and there was a photo booth and then at the end there was an awesome trunk-or-treat! There were quite a few less active members and friends from other faiths there, and it was an awesome chance to meet more of the members of this giant ward.

On Thursday there was much less of note that happened, though we did have to say goodbye to Sister Champlin, a recent convert who is moving back down to Pensacola and is probably there by now. I was pretty out of it most the day with an intense headache, but we did get to have dinner with an awesome family in the ward. Friday was Halloween, which was exciting in and of itself since we had to be inside by 6pm instead of the typical 9. There were a couple other exciting things that happened, but I don't have time to talk about those, or really much of anything else since I still have other emails to write today :( I hope you have a fantastic week! Love ya!

'Til Next Time,

Elder Jordan Nielson