Come unto Christ

I got to go on exchanges this Friday with the zone Leaders and it was super great! I guess I should also say that Elder Nixon who I trained in Boston has become my Zone Leader here in the Springfield Zone. He and I are super close and we were so excited when we figured it out. Naturally when exchanges came around we went together. I went to his area and it was great to almost have flipped roles. We had such a great time catching up and talking about people that we used to teach but our best moments were when we were teaching together. we'd already been companions so we knew how to work together but in 6 months the two of us have both changed a lot. It was almost like being on exchanges with someone else. We were both super happy to see the changes in ourselves and overall it was really good for both of us.

Although I should also add that meanwhile in Oxford Elder Whittle and Elder Cagle were able to commit one of our new investigators to baptism! It was the first time we taught him and I guess it went well enough that he accepted an invitation to be baptized. His name is Belmiro and he committed to be baptized on January 2. So we had a good week. 

This week my ponderizing verse is Omni 1: 26 And now, my beloved brethren, I would that ye should come unto Christ, who is the Holy One of Israel, and partake of his salvation, and the power of his redemption. Yea, come unto him, and offer your whole souls as an offering unto him, and continue in fasting and praying, and endure to the end; and as the Lord liveth ye will be saved.

So yeah that should be good

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Elder Trevon Turley

Received these pics last Sunday from a fellow mom in Trev's current Ward. My eyes immediately welled up with tears cause it's the holidays & I'm missing my boys. It also made me feel like I had a little visit from him & that brought smiles. 

Is that Christmas tree hanging from the ceiling? Why yes it is.

Well we already have our Christmas lights up! Elder Whittle was very gung ho about it and it didn't bother me so we just did it. I'll include a picture in this email. This week has been a lot of fun and we've accomplished a lot.  We set a goal to have six lessons with investigators this week and we put a name with each goal. We worked hard to achieve this and set an appointment with every single person! By the end of the week though only one of those lessons actually happened. Only One. Interestingly enough though neither I nor Elder Whittle felt bad or disheartened because we could both honestly say that we did our best to make it happen. We still had great contact with each of our investigators and did what we could to help them progress. 

President Miller been advising the mission to have more frequent and shorter meetings with those we teach. Those that we've been able to apply this with has been very beneficial. Even though we really didn't see any of them this week we still had contact. I'm trying to help out where I can and I pray God will bless me with more of those opportunities. 

This week my ponderizing scripture is Deuteronomy 6:18 which says:

18 And thou shalt do that which is right and good in the sight of the Lord: that it may be well with thee, and that thou mayest go in and possess the good land which the Lordsware unto thy fathers,

I've been working hard to be more accountable to God and this verse has really helped me to find strength in doing that. It seems to me that it's basically just saying, do what you know you need to do, stop complaining and wait to see the miracles happen. I still have my moments where I may not be as diligent as I should be but I know that God has blessings on store for me as I maintain faithfulness. So just do what's right and everything will be well.

Thank you to Sister Graff for snapping this picture of us in action setting up an appointment with a new member. 

Here's our Christmas lights. You might be asking yourself "Is that Tree hanging from the ceiling?" Why yes, yes it is. I remember hearing somewhere that it was a new fad so we decided to try it and we think it looks pretty good.

Have you been able to request any of our ancestors patriarchal blessings. It's a pretty cool thing and I challenge you all to request at least one. Just go to the church website under patriarchal blessings. 
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Elder Trevon Turley

Find when you teach and teach when you find

Well it's been another six weeks and I'm staying in Oxford. That means I'll be here for six months! It definitely has gone by super fast and I'm excited to be here another transfer. This transfer we're going to revolutionize our relationship with the Ward Leaders and it's going to be the best thing for us and missionaries in the future. We're still working out a lot of the who, what, where, when and why but we're on a good path and God will help us out and that's comforting to know. 

I've done a lot to try and improve my ability to find people to teach! I was tired of not feeling good at it and I was tried of disappointing myself with unrealistic expectations so I took a step back and set simpler goals. For example if I know we're going to an event with nonmembers I set a goal to testify of a gospel principle to at least one person there. Then I increase and improve from there. It's really helped me out with overcoming fears that I have. Heaving a deeper testimony has also been very good because I'm not afraid of what they might say in opposition because I know that the work I'm doing is true so what is there to be afraid of? There's a principle that's really helped me to feel successful in this endeavor and that's "find when you teach and teach when you find" it's all over Preach My Gospel and my new motto. 

This is Palmer from one of the families here that take good care of us. We planned last week to wear our purple ties to church together. I won mine from his mom in primary singing time. 

We had a lesson with Joe and his family again. We watched the Restoration movie and then taught them how to pray. The Spirit was present and we testified and taught with power and I know that they understood what we taught which was very rewarding. We couldn't get the DVD player to work so while Elder Whittle was fixing it I read some stories out of the Children's Book of Mormon to the kids. It panned out really well because one of the stories that I read was about Joseph Smith so when we watched the movie the kids actually knew what was going on. Booyah! I have real high hopes for this family and we plan to set a date for their oldest daughter to be baptized in December. 

Have a super week!

Elder Trevon Turley