Doing the Work

Had some great lessons this week with Camille and Al! They are progressing great and their baptism has been moved to March 7th to allow more time for marriage and stuff! The Webb's are progressing too and we had a very spiritual lesson on the Atonement. He said he learned so much more and it all made sense. I think it really helped Colten apply the Atonement to himself more personally.

Burnt a tie this week for my 6 month mark!!! haha. The other day we went on exchanges and I went with Elder Vanleeuwen and we went to Jackpot, Nevada (yes it’s in the mission) and that was a fun experience. We got lost in the Nevada desert at one point ;). 

Elder Kevin Brown from Lofton's mission came to Buhl with his family and took us out to lunch! They are fun and he gave me stuff from Lofton!! He said I am just like my brother hahah that's the best compliment ever!!

We had some other great lessons and had fun with some awesome families this week. There is a new Chinese restaurant in town 'Kim Long' and it is super good! Kinda like Panda Express but better!! :)

Talk to y'all next week! Love and miss y'all

-Elder Bean II

Good night Idaho

With Brian Bradley at the Hutchinson's.  He just returned from serving a
mission in Lubbock Texas. His twin brother is serving in this mission.

Hutchinson's farm

Burning a tie to signify 6 months on a mission!

With Elder Vanleeuwen

Transfers - Staying in Buhl with Elder Bunker!

So glad to be staying in Buhl with Elder Bunker! Things are going way awesome here. Just some awesome experiences with our investigators, less-actives, and even some great members! Feel like we have been inspired to do a lot of things and great rewards have come of those things!

We have been teaching Camille/Almon(Al) a lot and they both have baptismal dates for February 28th! I am excited and Saturday they agreed to drop all addictions and things against the W.o.W and are planning on getting married soon! We see Al just about everyday cause he is home a lot (finding a job right now) and he needs the support and loves us coming over! We read 2 Nephi 4 with him and he loved that one and after we left he texted us all day about he is receiving his answer and that chapter really helped him and hit him hard. He is so receptive it is awesome! They also came to a baptism Saturday for other Elder's in our District and they liked that! Then they both came to church Sunday and thought it was great and we all went over to the Schofield's for lunch and it was great! The Webb's came to church too and to the Schofield's afterwards. Found out Colten Webb doesn't actually have records so he technically is not a member, so we would have to teach him like an investigator! Which is probably good because now he can have a fresh start. 

    So we went to go contact this family (Cook's) and they used to have missionaries in the past until one of them ruined it.. but we are trying to get back in the house, so we parked down the street and this guy down the street comes out to talk to us and find out he is "All-Denominations" but is a less-active member. He invited us over for dinner and he said he appreciates what we do and that he believes in the LDS beliefs, just doesn't believe in having a set religion. Then we talked to the Cook's and he said he would give us a call or text when we has work off next! So that was two good things in like under 20 minutes ahha. 

  The Stake President (Pres. Ackerman) and the High Councilman over missionary work (Bro. Bowman) took us out to lunch Tuesday to show their appreciation and to apologize for some things that happened last week with the stake. I loved it though and they are two awesome men!! Then we got a call from Sis. Nelson and she gave us a referral to go help this lady out. She also said she wants us to start coming and teaching her husband who is a non-member. So we go see the lady that night with Bro. Lloyd and find out her name is Johanna, and she is recently divorced, her son (21) died a couple months ago and she is going through a rough time. She has two daughters Sally (20) and Bailey (16). Johanna said that they would all like to meet and have us over. Just being over there with her I could almost see how desirous she was to know there was hope. I could just see the miracles that the gospel could work in her life and I felt our Savior's love for her. I am excited to start teaching her this week and I already have an awesome conference talk prepared to give her that I think will help her a ton. 

   Also we taught this other family Saturday, The Wilders. Sis Wilder and her son Nephi Ellison are members (less-active due to work) and Bro. Wilder is a Seventh Day Adventist. Also Nephi's girlfriend Megan is not religious at all and she is having a rough life. So we taught them and the Spirit hit so strong the whole lesson. I could definitely tell they felt it and recognize that their Heavenly Father does love them.

  Met this guy, Tom Bush, while tracting and he walked us around his house and inside his house showing us all his cool stuff and pictures (I think he isn't all there, but it could of been the meds he is taking, cause he seems very chill and open guy) he invited us back too ahah. (Inspired Tracting works!!!....sometimes lol).

Not much else to say other than the Lord is directing his work and we are doing our best to be his instruments! I am witnessing some amazing things happen and this area has improved so much in the short 3 months I have been here. I have come to know my relationship with my Heavenly Father is one of the most important things. Knowing him and feeling his love make everyday a blessing and easier to bear my burdens. I love my Lord and Savior Jesus the Christ and I know he lives and he loves us. He wants to come to us, but we must exercise our agency and come to him! I love y'all and wish y'all a good week!!

Much Love, and Happy Late Valentines Day-

Elder Bean II

Heading out to do service

Sacrifice for The Lord Will Definitely Bring More Divine Aid and Blessings

Week was awesome. Every week gets better and better!

So we played a ton of volleyball last pday which was awesome. Then we ate with the Garbett's for dinner before heading back to Buhl! Remember them from my last area? They are awesome and we are going over there again tonight! :) Went to the Webb's and the Hutchinsons that night and they are super awesome. So Colten and Diara Webb just make my whole mission worthwhile. When we were there Monday night he said that ever since we have been coming around he notices the Spirit more and more and his whole life is better and it is changing. He has a lot of respect for us and they definitely show it. It really makes me feel so good when I see people like this. I love them. I have pure love for them. 

The whole week was overall fun and great. A lot of great moments with some awesome people. Friday, Elder Risley came and did exchanges. We had like the best day ever. We taught some awesome lessons, Papa Kelsey took us to see alligators haha, we tracted and found some people, took pictures on a random couch, went out to Castleford and visited people. hah the whole time we had a ton of fun. Then at night we had an awesome talk. We talked about some of the struggles I am having and it helped so much. He has 3 months left so he definitely had some great advice for me. And then he challenged me to do some things to help and over the past three days I have noticed a drastic improvement. It has been such a blessing and a miracle. Sacrifice for the Lord will definitely bring more divine aid and blessings. 

Colby's baptism was Saturday! So great. Us 8 missionaries (sisters didn't make it) sang two musical numbers while they changed and it invited the Spirit in so much! Everyone loved it ahah. Then we stayed for the Stake Youth Baptism's and saw Kinzie get baptized! She is a Morgan and we have been teaching her a couple times and they are a fun family! Then we saw Cameron Gorrell be baptized and during the confirmation Bro. Gorrell called out like 8 people to come stand in and then told us to come stand in too cause we looked left out haha. It was funny. They are a fun family too! Then we went to the Morgan's "Afterparty" and had some great food and then played football with Kolton, Keegan, and Kolby... everyone in their family's have "K" names. Ken Morgan is the dad and his kids are Kolton, Kylie, and Kinzie. Then their cousins have K names too. It is kinda cool. Then we went to the Webb's again and helped them with this puzzle of Jesus walking on the shore! It is an awesome picture and so much fun to do that with them. Then it was Georgia Hutchinson's birthday yesterday so we went over and had Chinese food! It was fun cause Tyler, Tonie, and Korby came up from Utah.

Sunday was great! Camille came to church with her son Gabe and the Webb's came too! Colton said he liked it a lot, which was awesome to hear. Then we went to Mark's and gave Andrea a blessing (they went to the emergency room at like 2 in the morning cause she is in pain, they don't know what is wrong yet). We went to the Webb's again and they fed us pork chops and mashed potatoes!! It was soo good. They are amazing. They said they wanted to feed us to thank us for all that we do. We have such a good relationship with them. They want us to come over everyday but they know we have other obligations too. They just love the Spirit that we bring into the home. He definitely has struggles right now and we are helping him overcome some stuff but he is coming so far. His heart is in the right place. I have some pictures with them too! 

It was an awesome week. Love it here and love the people. I miss and love y'all!!! Take care fam.

-Elder Bean II

Mission conference with Elder Ballard. He's in the center of  the pic, third row.

Made a scripture case out of cardboard and pictures.

Friday with Elder Risley

Alligators in Idaho

With Papa Kelsey

When you see a random couch in a field, you have to take pics

It's been springlike weather in Idaho this week!

Diara and Colten Webb

The Hope of God's Light

So week was awesomely fun! Played football last P day and it was awesome until Elder Meyers (one of the AP's) dove after me and broke/sprained his hand... I feel terrible but he says it wasn't my fault... oops. It was his basketball shooting hand too and his writing hand. 

My area is awesome and I am doing good! We had one new investigator this week. That was Camille's fiancé (Almon) and he is interested in turning his life around.. he is in some addictions right now.. He is a rough guy, been to prison and stuff. But he is really cool and listens to us. So Josh Pehrson is like my homie. We called him Tuesday cause we didn't have a dinner Wednesday and he said to call him whenever we need a place to go hah. So we went over on Wednesday to his house. He is 26, his wife Ellen is 29 and they have a little girl named Paige that turns one on Valentines Day! They are awesome. He came with us to a lesson that night and he was talking about his mission and telling us stories and giving us tips to make the mission way better. He is such a bro. Then we went back to their house after the lesson and I told Ellen before we left that we would do the dishes so we did and she made us cookies! She loved that we did the dishes and they were so thankful and I felt so great. Like I love that family so much and to be able to serve them and do that was fun. They are probably my favorite. Also on Wednesday, in the morning we had to go to Twin Falls for 3 week training for Elder Bunker. So the trainers and the trainees separated and us trainers talked about the successes and struggles to improve and it was awesome. Everyone is having the same general issues and it was great to get together and discuss how to overcome them. It helped so much and things are improving so much now. 

Thursday we went to Castleford to visit some people and we went to this less active family, but they weren't home, so as we walked back to the car I saw their neighbors outside so we went over and talked with them. It was a young mom, Alejandra, with 2 girls and she said she had missionaries before in Jerome and would be interested in having them again! Way cool. Then at night it was like 8:20 and we park at home and we are about to go inside cause we have nothing to do for the night and then I turn to Elder Bunker and I am like "Dude we have like 40 minutes left... Let's just go walk around and see what happens" so we do haha. It is so dark and we are walking the streets and I just feel prompted to knock this door. So we do and the guy is really nice (Greg) and we shared a little message and then he said we could come back! (we went back on Saturday and found out he is a Mennonite (sorta like amish.. but they have a ton of similar beliefs as us and they are super stubborn in their lifestyle and their "community" so they are crazy hard to convert). Then we knocked on another door and found this ladie named Tamie that I could tell could really use the gospel and she was nice and said we could come back!

Friday was Zone Training! It was great and learned a ton. Then we were back in Buhl walking around and saw all these ambulances, fire trucks, police, and then a life flight chopper in the sky so we were pretty interested. We walked towards it all and saw where the helicopter landed. There was like a crowd of people watching but turns out it was just a training exercise haha. But we talked to a lot of people in the crowd and found some less-actives and some potential investigators! So it was a neat opportunity.

Saturday we had a follow up with Camille and Almon. That turned out to be really great opportunity to read with them and answer questions. Then the craziest thing happened. I started to explain this mormon message "Hope of God's Light" (btw it is my favorite and the best mormon message I have yet to see) and the Spirit hit me so strong. I can't even explain it. It was like an answer to my prayers and my eyes filled with tears as I testified for the first time in my whole mission. I have never had that happen while testifying or teaching yet. It was surreal.  If you watch the video you will understand why! 

Yeah Fast Sunday was a little weird yesterday in one of my sacrament meetings (joy of covering two wards mean double church! ahha) This guy took like 20 minutes talking about random stuff that he likes in his life.... Like come on. We went to Mark's after church, one of our investigators, and he said he felt so awkward and that he got nothing out of church yesterday because of all the people talking about their lives for long amounts of time and I think only one or two actually said a testimony lol. But the other sacrament was awesome! Josh Pehrson got up and bore an awesome testimony and then he said something that has really brought the spirit into his home and helped them so much is having us over and he started to testify of us and how much we do. He is such a great guy. Like I cannot explain how awesome he is. I am probably gonna kick it with him after my mission aha. I bore my testimony too, and I loved it. I love getting to share how I feel. Last night we went over to the Well's (less active family and he is head football coach and they are very fun to be with) and he filled us in on the whole Super Bowl and how frustrated he was since his Seahawks lost. Crazy game from what I have heard lol.

Anyways I love and miss y'all. I love this Gospel. It brings so much happiness and peace to me. I can't explain it but there is nothing that can bring me to be sad or down because no matter what it is, through the Gospel and following Jesus Christ and relying on him we can overcome anything. He can comfort us in our sorrows, pains, sins, anything. We are so blessed to have all of the knowledge and leadership of the Gospel here on earth with our loving Heavenly Father and his son Jesus Christ at the head of the church! I love being a missionary and getting to go out everyday to help someone and to serve my Lord and Savior. 

Elder Bean II

With Brother Hutchinson

Morning basketball workout