Greeeenie Time!

January, 7 2013

Heyyyyy!

 So you guys are all probably wanting to know who my new trainee is, his name is Elder Preston Moore he is from New Mexico. He is a great guy, he talks a lot and he has a great desire to be out here on a mission and really loves it. It’s interesting now being on the other side as the trainer. It’s weird sometimes as we are doing our companion studies, I’ll just like flashback to when I was with elder law in our boiling springs apartment and how young I was and how smart i thought he was. I was like, man if I could ever know as much as him, or be as good as him, and then now I know that it all comes from experience, and learning from your experiences. I always thought that training a new missionary would be so hard and i never wanted to do it, but then now that I am doing it, its hard at times but its really not that hard you just have to make sure that you are the perfect example to him because he watches everything you do.  So there is a little bit of pressure but I just have to say to myself that I’m not perfect and it is okay to make mistakes as long as I’m learning from them and using them as teaching moments, as a trainer you are constantly teaching something weather you use words or just actions. So that’s that, we had the ( R) interview on Saturday and they are good to go they passed. Elder Rasmussen is our district leader now, so he interviewed them, our districts got changed up a little since they took elders out of the second ward that meets in our building (goose creek ward) and they put sisters in and Elder Rasmussen was the closest district leader to us, so I will probably get to finish my mission with him as my DL. So the( R’s) will be baptized this Saturday the 12th and I will be baptizing them and Elder Moore will be confirming them both, I’m so excited i get to be a part of them being baptized they have been investigating for over 2 years and (B) just quit smoking on the 1st and (T) quit coffee the same day and she said she has no desire for it anymore. We also met a guy this week named( M) he is agnostic and as we were walking to our car in a apartment complex he said are you Jehovah Witnesses we said no, Mormons and he said come in I’m interested in your religion and he talked to us for about 30 minutes, he is cool. He wants to read the Book of Mormon and believe in God. Oh, elder Lee went to downtown Columbia with elder Tonga who is from Tonga. 

 The only other new missionary in our apartment is Elder Brown he is Elder Hanson’s companion as a zone leader he’s from Utah.

 Yes, i got the new years package alright but it was after transfers, haha I have so much candy to eat

Way cool, to hear that grant is a licensed driver now, so he will be driving my explorer until I get back right?

 Oh and reminder for my birthday, don’t send anything like ties or clothes just keep that stuff, if you want to send junk food that’s fine but I’m trying to get rid of all the stuff I don’t need and will be sending a box home probably towards the middle or end of February.

 Grant, how’s the Book of Mormon reading going, remember i challenged you to read it all before I got home? I’m going to finish D&C before I come home.

What is madison’s mission address?

Did ASU go to a bowl game?.

Well, that’s all I have for this week, love you guys, talk to you soon.

Love Elder Harper

Pictures at Christmas

Elder Lee and Harper, sent to us from someone in their ward

 Skyping with Elder Harper on Christmas morning!

New Years

Monday, December 31, 2012

Woooow

 Man, so we had a great week. Christmas was filling and I mean literally. We had 3 meals and by the end of the night i felt like a blueberry, my stomach was so full you could have rolled me home, and then the next day we had a big Filipino dinner with a less active and his daughter they are from Hawaii, it was way good. Loved all the presents and even the junk food that I will eat even though, I’m trying not to gain anymore weight, well ill just have to be tactful. I also spoke in sacrament the Sunday before Christmas about what its like to serve a mission during Christmas, and I realized how ive come to truly learn what Christmas is all about and how Christ is the center and everything else is nice that is added to it, but not the important stuff, but that Christmas, like the temple has lots of symbolism and that is still why we do the gifts and everything else. (S) finally got baptized, she showed up a little late and we practiced how we were gonna do the baptism and to hold on to my arm and when we actually did it she freaked out and let go of my arms and she is a bigger girl so, i like had to hold her with one arm and push her down with my other and even though im strong I had to really work to get her up, hahaha and she swallowed a bunch of water, she was good though. Sooo, i bet your wondering the big news, so elder lee is getting transferred and president assigned me to train for my last 2 transfers, so pray that i get a good new greenie Its crazy to think that im in my last area, with my last companion, it felt like this time would never come. that’s way cool stuff you told me about albert choules, and that's sweet that elder oaks spoke at the funeral wish I could have been there.

Well we were bummed we didn’t get to bowl last week but we are going today and we are gonna do it for like 4 hours, its gonna be sweet and then im taking everyone in our apartment out to texas road house for dinner and then we have to be in the apartment by 8.

I don't know what else to say.

It would be way cool to have grandma speak on the same day as me and have the whole family there

love you guys

Elder Harper:)

December 24, 2012

Hey there so i'm just sending a quick response, not going to be a long letter but yes we are gonna skype at 12 my time and yes we have been invited to have dinner with a family for Christmas eve.  We also are going bowling today, haha gonna be so fun and then we have 3 meals on Christmas. That's all I have for you now but i'm excited to talk to you guys, i wish it could have been when the rest of the family was there but i'll see everyone soon so no worries.

 

 Love Elder Harper :)

Monday, December 17, 2012

Monday, December 17,  2012

Hey everyone

This week was exciting, we have (S) on date now again, we talked to her and she was saying that she has really been thinking and she doesn’t want to wait any longer to get baptized that she will do it even if her mom can’t be there and so we put her on for dec 29 because she got stitches and she can’t get into water until she gets them out. So we had to wait till the 29^th, but she is really excited for it and so are we because this has been going on longer than we had expected it to. We also have (K) on date for the same day (he’s the kid that came to church on his own) and tonight we are gonna teach him the word of wisdom and law of chastity. Something else, that is cool that happened this week is on Saturday night we had tried to see someone and it was 8:58 and I decided to knock on one more door and we picked one in a random building in this apartment complex. We  knocked on the only door with lights on and a kid answered and said your Mormons right? We said yes and he said we could talk to him and his sister.  We found out that his sister who is 15 is a member and also their dad is, but they haven’t been to church in a long time and they just moved back to north Charleston a couple weeks ago.  We went back and saw them yesterday and met the dad and they are just a way cool family that has been needing the church lately.  We were led to them because, I was inspired to knock on one more door, the daughter will be going to young womens on Wednesday and the dad will come to church when he can when he isn’t working, he works for (  ), so he has a crazy schedule, but we are gonna go over and eat with them next Wednesday. He’s gonna make some Hawaiian food cause he is from there. I love the guidance of the spirit and I can feel his guidance so strong, all I have to do is be worthy of his presence and I will be able to see miracles happen.

Man, Martha Lou’s Kitchen sounds way good, minus the sweet tea, I want to see if I can go there cause we are planning on going to down town Charleston sometime.

Yes, I got grandma Siiro’s package of stuff about a month ago it was great, and I thought I wrote her back but I guess I didn’t, I also got a call about a package that was sent to me but I don’t know who sent it but it was sent ups which doesn’t work cause the mission office can’t forward it to my apartment they have to hand deliver it so I will get that one on Wednesday this week. So just make sure that you let everyone know who sends me packages that they use USPS, not UPS, and I got grandma harpers package and your guys's. 

The skype situation, I think we will do it on Tuesday at 12 my time here, which would be about 9 your time, I was gonna try and do it when the family is all there, but it wouldn’t have worked like that cause we have some plans later on during the day.

 Oh mom where in Minnesota did you grow up we met a family who used to live there.

Well, hope you have a good week

Love,

Elder Harper

Monday, Dec 10, 2012

WOOOOHH

This week was exciting, so last Sunday we had this girl named (R). She is 24 and has been investigating for a while and comes to church when she can,  we also went over to her house on tuesday night with our ward mission leader bro Collins to have dinner with her, and we talked about baptism and why she hasn’t been baptized yet and the only thing that has been keeping her was living the word of wisdom cause she drinks sweet tea, but she said she likes orange juice and mountain dew more than tea and the tea would be easy to give up now, so we committed her and she accepted to live it and set her on baptism date for January 5 cause she only could come to church this weekend until then and you have to be living the word of wisdom for a week before your baptism, but the next day at our interviews we talked to president Holm and asked since she believes in everything that we could baptize her this weekend if she hasn’t drank tea by Friday and he said yes, so long story short we told her we called some people and she got baptized and confirmed this last weekend haha.

She was so excited to be able to get baptized now instead of having to wait all the way till January 5, she just is eating up church and the members are just loving her up, of course her best friend is a member in our ward also, but she has made so many friendships already, she will be an awesome member of the church. (S) isn’t really progressing how we thought, her mom got home from the hospital and I guess can’t go outside because she is going to start chemo soon, so we are not sure how long it will be until she could go outside long enough to watch the baptism so we are waiting on that.  (S) is telling us now that she doesn’t want to do it because she thinks we are pushing her and that we don’t care that her mom is sick, but we told her that’s not what we are doing, that we care about you and your mom. We are just giving her time and we have talked to the Relief Society about bringing her and her mom a dinner and just fellowshipping with them until her mom gets better and we can schedule a baptism, good thing though is that she came to church. This week, we found this kid named (K).  He is 16 and he came to church last week randomly and he said he wanted to start coming back to church and decided to come to ours. We taught him the restoration already and we are gonna teach him again this week.

The only southern tradition I can think of right now is that they deep fry everything, like the turkey or the ham haha I don’t know how ham would taste deep fried but turkey might be good, that’s all I can think of at the moment

that’s so exciting to hear Madison is going to DC, haha and also that she leaves so soon, wow that’s crazy, and I’m bummed I wont get to see her, you will need to send me her mission address when you find out, tell her congrats from me

I got my christmas box both from you guys and grandma harper

I don’t have any info yet on the skyping but I will try to find out who can do it and let you know

The senior couple in our area is the Benedicts and I don’t know if they do a blog

Well that’s all I got this week, love you guys

Love Elder Harper :)

Monday, December 03, 2012

Wow, so we had a crazy week so many cool things that happened and also lots of disappointments, so I’ll just start with those first we had so many appointments set up this week including some church tours which I haven’t really gotten to do much in my mission, but we had 3 set up this week and all of them fell through such a bummer cause I was so excited, and (S) baptism did not happen! so here is the story she wanted her mom to be there or else she wouldn’t do it and her mom went in for surgery on Wednesday and was hoping to be out before Saturday but she wasn’t and we found out that she gets out today so that’s good and also we had called her on friday just to see how she was doing and she said that she didn’t feel ready, that she had to wait till she was 18 cause she didn’t want to be affected by peer pressure after her baptism to break the commandments and she felt like you have to be perfect after baptism, so she just didn’t understand the concept that baptism is the key that unlocks the door to the atonement and that she can’t be forgiven or repent without being baptized and also, that when she receives the gift of the holy ghost after her baptism, that he can guide her with decision making especially when she is peer pressured to drink or smoke or get a tattoo or break any commandment. So we had the young women’s leader sister (R) who is awesome, give her a call and talk to her. (S) has been going to young women’s every week and is doing personal progress, haha she is so awesome and is basically already a member, she will probably be baptized this week and probably earlier than saturday. So to the good news, we had some way cool lessons this week the first one is we taught (D) (mom) and (K) (18 year old daughter). They are native american so that was pretty sweet, and they have really been searching for the right church cause they have been to others and they have never made them feel good and they love the restoration and were pretty excited to read the book of mormon especially (K), when they found out its about the American Indians. We also had a cool lesson with a girl named (M) who actually has kind of dropped us but we are trying to work with her and understand her concerns. She feels like she can’t be a Mormon, but when we taught her the spirit was sooooo strong and she was just paying close attention to the whole lesson and when I asked her how she felt, after the first vision she said "I feel good its weird but good and like someone is touching me"  and we invited her to be baptized and she accepted but she is having those second thoughts like everyone does cause satan is making her think that, I will update you when we find out more.

 

 So yes i got your package you sent and i got the Christmas card and my debit card and drivers license

 We are in a car and we bike also but we use the car a lot and elder lee has a gps but I will still need the one you sent, because he will take his when he leaves

 

Man, I’m excited to hear where Madison goes!

 Oh, also cool story at church the singles branch also meets at our building and there is this couple that are getting married in the mesa temple and I was talking to them cause they are from Arizona and the girls name is cecille taylor and she said she is from Gilbert and I asked do you know a jackson law and she said "yea! He’s my second cousin!" haha I was like no way so yea that was way cool.

 

The other elders in our apartment are elder Herrera, he’s originally from Mexico and elder Hanson from Layton, Utah

 

Well, that’s all I have this week, hope teagen gets better

Love Elder Harper