5-13-13

Here are some pictures of the baptism and wedding. She needed to be married before she could be baptized.

Family,

It was awesome to talk to you yesterday! Even though it may not have seemed like it on my face. It was awesome to see Billy and Caitlin again. I'll be waiting for their letter. "Doo doo doo doo, we're totally alone." - Horton. Well, let me get into my week shall we?

Last Monday we had to do service during e-mailing time. I was fine with it but just lasted longer than I thought it would take. We moved a sister in our ward who is super less-active and is one of those "do not contacts" given to us by the Bishop. She just wanted to remove all the large stuff like washer (we didn't take it because it was literally falling apart), dryer, mattress, box spring, and a couple other furniture items. For dinner that night we had it at our Bishop's house but his wife wanted us to make gifts for our Moms for Mother's day. Usually I wuoldn't agreed but since we were already there for an hour, we had to go and do missionary work (not like I don't love Mom, because I do). Dinner, in the white handbook, should be no longer then an hour and should not interfere with prime proselyting time (after 6). Our mission president has changed that to whenever the family can feed you because often members don't get home for a while off of work. The gift would have been glass flowers or something. We also had a great lesson with one of our investigators in Milan that night where the spirit was definitely present. We're waiting for him to accept the invitation to be baptized even though he has said that he doesn't want to change churches. We'll change that, hehe. On Tuesday we had our zone meeting at the new Wichita stake center. It's a really nice one year old building. While there, I got to see Elder Peterson (he was in Junction city when I was in Wamego). I also met an Elder who entered the MTC the same day as me and is from the Del Mar stake. His name is Elder Neeley and we'll be having a combined district meeting together tomorrow. Speaking of tomorrow, we also will be getting a new car tomorrow! Right now, our car is a 2010 Chevrolet Malibu. I don't know what we'll be getting now but hopefully it's better than our Malibu. It has been getting up there in it's mileage limits so yeah. On Tuesday we also went on exchanges with the zone leaders (did you know they have chik-fila here in Wichita? I LOVE it!). We didn't have too much success during exchanges although, Elder Allen needed to return something to GNC because it had green tea extract in it. So he talked to the guy at the counter about the word of wisdom. I need to do better in talking to everyone like that. I just don't have the nerve to do it. They live in this huge house with a member of the stake presidency who just had hip surgery. That night in the middle of the night, however, I heard a huge storm going on outside but then at 4:45-ish heard this beeping in this one mysterious room. I wondered where it was coming from and wouldn't stop for a long time. So I decided to get up and find it. I looked in every downstairs room and found the problem in the water pump room with the alarm on and going. It took me a while to figure out the problem but finally was able to turn off the alarm. So I went to bed but couldn't go back to sleep. Then at 6, their phone alarm went off. So I got up and turned it off. Then Elder Allen's alarms went off at 6:08 and 6:23. Then our normal alarm went off at 6:30. I was not happy one bit. I was tired and still haven't quite recovered. Their shower was cool because it had super high pressure and almost hurt if you turned it too hot. So, yeah. Later that day, after we exchanged back, we had a wedding for the person who got baptized on Saturday. It was kind of weird to be in a wedding like that but now that they're married, I think they're happy and are looking to the temple next year. After the wedding we went over to Anthony and had a lesson with one of our most progressing investigators. He didn't come to church yesterday which is a super big bummer because he said he would come again but didn't! Later we had a lesson with this unmarried couple that are super cool but have a lot to do in order to believe that this is the true church or not. But the spirit is always super strong with them and I hope they get a testimony soon because they are reading and praying. They just need to some to church once and that should bring them their answer. Thursday was my birthday and after weekly planning I opened everything and enjoyed the presents you sent me. As I said yesterday, I gave my paisley tie to Elder Dansie. Don't worry about sending me too many stripes. I like stripes as long as that's not the only thing you send me. But the ties you did send me are sweet like candy. I also loved the talks (although the signs of the times talks are pretty boring. Especially the excerpts from this one book.) I loved all that you sent me. Those little cupcake thingies are super delicious too. Later, we had a lesson with an investigator who we saw the day before. He is super solid but just needs to come to church for Pete's sake. If he could do that, he would be solid. Other than that, we had a pretty slow day. We'll see this one family one more time before they move back to Michigan this Thursday. They said they'd come back to Harper next year. But that's next year and not next month or something. Friday we had a super super super long day. Good thing we had those CD's to keep us company. At 5 we had a baptismal interview for Rose so she was ready to go and passed. While we were getting ready to leave, a former missionary serving in this area walked in. He served there in 2006 so it was fun to talk to him for a bit with his wife. After dinner, however, we did some service with one of our eternigators. He was grateful for the help pulling out some trees in his backyard and stuff. Sorry, we didn't pull them out. We cut them out first then pulled them out. Does that make sense? haha. After the service, we shopped real quick before going home right before 9:30 and right on time. Saturday we first had the baptism. I wasn't the one originally supposed to do it. But the person that we called over and over never responded so we just brought our whites to do the baptism in case he didn't show up. He didn't so I just got dressed and did the baptism myself. The water was up to the middle of my knees and it wasn't all that warm but I said the words correctly and dunked her on the first try. My picture looks a little ugly, I know, and I know both you and Dad's first response will be for me to stop faking my smile, but whatever. Later, we came home and were off to Caldwell. I forgot to tell you that all the oil companies here (Shell, KSI, and BHI) are all pulling out so some of our investigators and our members (including our ward mission leader) will be moving. So that is quite a bummer. In Caldwell we had little success but did teach some lessons. This one guy kept talking about his trip to Egypt in the 70's for 30 minutes. I don't care about your trip to Egypt, bro, I just want to baptize you. He unfortunately wasn't interested anyways and has some strange beliefs about religion in general. After dinner at home, we went back to Milan to teach this one guy who was referred to us by another one of our investigators in Milan. He thought we were just there to talk to him about God, which we were. But that was a good lesson where I asked him to pray about being baptized and joining the church. He works every day so hopefully we can help him realize the importance of keeping the Sabbath day holy. Yesterday was an okay day. None of our investigators came to church and we taught gospel principles as usual. We got a ride home from the Leavitt's though. They infromed me that Alex is engaged. So that's exciting for that family having their last wedding. Once we got home, we skyped and then went over to Harper and tried contacting a few people. It being Mothers' day, not many of our investigators were actually there at home so hopefully we can contact them later this week. At night we had a nice dinner with this nice family with 6 small little kids. I don't know how that family does it  but they are awesome. The father was reminiscing on his little league days playing baseball. I didn't want to be a boaster so I didn't talk about my glory days too much. That leads us to today! I just found out also that Elder Dansie and I will be having lunch with President Keyes tomorrow. So yeah! That's my week. Not too eventful but having a baptism always makes it a good one.

I have come to know the Savior a lot on my mission because I have come to know how to trust in him. Through the darkest times on my mission, I have realized that I have taken small steps towards Gethsemane then retreated again while the Savior went the whole way and died for us. I also look at Joseph Smith and what he went through at Liberty jail and throughout his whole life while the saints were persecuted. So the Savior knows each and every one of us and what we have each gone through. That has helped me get through the trials on my mission because even though they seemed insurmountable at the time, the Savior helped me through. 

Is that what you were looking for? Any aha moments, huh? Yeah, I'd say so while reading Jesus the Christ and the Book of Mormon and how sometimes the scriptures just come to life. I can't really point out any particular instance in which that has happened but know that it has happened. Well again, it was great to talk to you all yesterday and be able to e-mail you today. I hope you have a great week and don't get too much trunkiness with the end of school just around the corner. I'll let you go. Love,

Elder Sutherland

PS: "Duck Dodgers to the rescue!" BOOM!

"Duck Dodgers...!" BOOM!

"Duck...Dodgers" BOOM!

"Duck" BOOM!

...

"HAHA! IT'S YOU KNOW WHO TO THE RESCUE! It helps if you don't say the name."