A fire, some cops and a fat guy in a kiddy pool...

Hey Fam,

Got a new one for you this week..,

You Might be a Mormon if...

you have ever used the phrase "bless those that are not here that they can make it next time.." while offering a prayer at a state prison, youth detention center, or other place of incarceration. 

Well to start off I will explain the title of the letter...

So we again, as we were driving home with a member, kept the tradition alive of shooting the flare gun when a new missionary comes to the area. So we pulled off to some of his property and shot the flare gun, except when I shot it this time I must have pointed it wrong or the shot was a dudd. It went like 40 yards not straight up but side ways and it landed in the ditch and all I saw was a tiny flame erupt and let's just say I have never ran so fast in my life... like probably ran a 4 flat 40 to stomp that fire out! Hahaha we got it all on video too and it is one of the funniest videos  watching me run to put it out. The Spirit of God like a fire is burning I guess?

Next story, The two times that Elder Alder and I tried to go tracting this week we got the cops called on us!! Two days in a row and it was the same cop who came to check it out. That is why missionaries are scared of the big rich neighborhoods because the people don’t have to worry about getting food on their table so instead they worry about the person parked outside in their neighborhood for 2 minutes and calls the cops. But it is alright we are planting seeds with the cop that came both times So our plan is to get the cops called again this week and this time place a Book of Mormon!! Good idea?

Last part, We had Mission Leadership Council with all The Zone leaders and Sister Training Leaders Yesterday and it is a pretty long meeting.  Elder Alder and I decided to make things a little bit more interesting by giving each other a sentence we had to use in an answer we gave and make it seem totally normal. I gave him "save 15% or more on car insurance" And he gave me "a fat guy in a kiddy pool" and Elder Alder pulled his off perfectly and it was getting near the end of the meeting and so I had to just go for it. They were talking about better ways to approach people on the street and I said" Sometimes we make it really awkward, Like a fat guy in a kiddy pool..." and I never got the chance to finish my thought because President was laughing too loud, lol. I will miss the weird little things about being a missionary when I am finished. 

Other than that this week went really well. The investigators we have are progressing more and more and we have added some more solid people to our teaching pool. We keep relatively busy and as we know, a busy missionary is a happy missionary. We have made a plan to help Frank Festdogg plan to help him the priesthood by the end of April and baptize his daughter who just turned 9. He is already off to a great start and has come to church for 4 weeks in a row and brought her along with him. Lindsey has been reading the Book of Mormon and is almost ready to make the commitment of a date to be baptized. Chet we set a date with him this month for near the end of next month and he feels that he will be able to make it on this date this time. Alan has gotten over his sickness so we finally got to meet with him again and he is still doing great and progressing towards baptism. Fred in the first 2 weeks has become a lot more excited about coming to church and being able to join the church. The Sterchaks were sick last week so we couldn’t meet with them but we will be seeing them again tomorrow and they are still doing great. I am really excited for everything that we have going on plus we are working with the youth each week on getting there friends to come to things, and so we are getting the ward more involved in that way. We wanted to try a different approach to getting members involved by getting the youth involved and it has worked great! 

Well that is it for the week! My time out here is slowly winding down... :( Missions are great and I am so grateful for everything that I have learned and have been able to experience over the last year and a half. I have learned a lot about the importance of self discipline/mastery, as we improve those then we have more power in our life to accomplish whatever we put our mind too. The more self mastery we have the easier it is for us to fully keep the commandments. But it is a lot easier said then done... A scripture That I Have really thought about recently is D&C 58:26-29

The church is true!! 

Read the scriptures!!

Dont forget to pray!! 

I love you all :)

Until next week,

Elder Frandsen

Another week, another dollar......

Hey y'all,

Wait for it.....

Q: What do you get when you grow marijuana on the Stake farm?

A: High Priests

They get better every week huh?

Well here is a quick run down of what happened this week....,

Elder Alder (my new companion) and I met up on Wednesday and went back down to Lima and that was about all that happened this week.

 Talk to you next week!

Just Kidding. This is really what happened. 

Elder Alder goes home in two transfers ( I will probably only have one more companion after him... scary) and he is staying pretty strong for being so close to going home and is actually a really funny guy. It always makes the work so much better when you have a companion with a good sense of humor, but we are complete opposites. He likes video games and I like sports but for some reason it works out. We found 2 new investigators this week in the form of 2 different part member families and are now teaching them!! We also set a baptismal date with Chet, our 82 year old investigator and Fred, our 18 year old investigator. Alan Stant has been sick the past week but is still on date for next month and still progressing well.   It seems like everyone out here is getting the flu and I think I am getting it now as well, or the chicken that I cooked last night wasn’t quite cooked right, I guess we will see! Other than that I really cant think of anything else of interest that has happened in the past week,  soooo yeah! 

I know I have shared this scripture before but I will share it again. Ether 12:6 has truly come to be one of the most meaningful scriptures to me in the past year.   I have a testimony that God teaches us through our trials and that we grow so much through the trials of our faith and afterwards we see the fruits of it all and realize just how much God helps us through those trials and our faith is strengthened. You see it so much throughout the scriptures and you see it every day in life. The story of the brother of Jared crossing the sea is a good example of this in Ether 6:1-12. Think of the fierce winds from the Lord as the trials that we have and how they push us towards the promised land or to better and brighter things. 

I know God is real And I know that he loves each and everyone of us unconditionally. I know that Jesus Christ is our Savior and that he is walking through all of the experiences we have in our lives, good or bad, by our side ready to pick us up when we fall. I am so grateful for this knowledge and for all the opportunities that God has given me and most specifically the opportunity to be a missionary. 

I love you all! 

Dont forget to read your scriptures and pray :)

Until Next week, 

Elder Frandsen

Changes... :(

Elder Bennett, me, Doug and Jessica
"The Crew"

Hey Fam,

Ready? 

Q: What did king Lamoni say to Ammon?

A: Could you give me a hand?

(Alma 17 and 18)

Don't think about it too hard. 

Anyways, Here is the run down for the week:

     First, Elder Bennett is getting transferred :( this was a big surprise to the both of us and I am actually really sad about it.... I  Hate getting really good companions for only one transfer. We have become really good friends over the last month and a half and have seen lots of good things happen in that time as well. I really hope that my new companion is willing to work hard and work smart and not just be one that is going to bide his time until he goes home.

     Here are some of the highlights from the week: We went to Kirtland on Thursday and we saw Doug and Jessica and got to go on another tour with them, but this time the Sister missionaries had Elder Bennett and I give the tour hahaha. Doug and Jessica are doing so good! Doug has a calling in the Sunday school presidency of the ward a home teacher and he is preparing to receive the Mel. Priesthood and Jessica is a visiting teacher and is set to get a calling here pretty soon and they both go out teaching with the Missionaries, like once a week! They both are still so excited about the gospel and love learning more. It was so good to see them again. 

     Chet, a former investigator that we picked up a couple weeks ago came to church this week! Chet is a friend of a member and he is 82. He almost got baptized a year or so ago and had a miscommunication with someone or something and ended up calling off his baptism and stopped investigating. When we stopped by he let us in and he feels like trying it over again and see what happens this time. He had a good time at church and said he felt great about it. 

      Fred, an 18 year old investigator of ours, who is from a part member family, has been doing great. This week he said that as he was reading about baptism in the pamphlet we gave him that he felt that he needs to be baptized... so we set a date with him for the end of March! It was a pretty awesome lesson.

     Alan is still doing great and is still set for next month. He wasn’t able to come to church due to transportation issues but the lesson we had this week he had both of his daughters at and they both participated and hopefully they will start to investigate more with their dad. 

     The Sterchecks are doing well. The bishop came with us to visit them and it was just what they needed. Sam is only 10 but he is extremely smart... he repeated to us from memory the whole Joseph Smith story in the grove and how the Book of Mormon came to be, from reading about it in the Children's Book Of Mormon! He has been praying daily and reading daily and every time we come over he and his sister are always so excited and have drawn a bunch of pictures for us. I will miss that part of being a missionary one day.... 

      And last but not least, Sharon our other investigator got out of the rehab center and surprised us by reading 30 chapters of the Book of mormon. When We had our lesson with her she shared how she didn’t remember a whole lot but she remembered how she felt and said she knows it is true. We shared Mosiah 18 with her and she has decided that she wants to be baptized once she has finished the rehab she is in. Another miracle.

Those are just some of the cool experiences that we had this week. Hard works pays off, These people are all starting progress now and I am pretty excited to see what comes of it all. the other thing we did this week was have a coordination meeting with the stake president about missionary work... a lot of talking and time but it was a good meeting. Hopefully it was more than just a bunch of words and something gets done because of it. 

Well that is all for this week! I have been studying personal revelation a lot recently and have learned some pretty cool things but it all goes back down to what it says in Moroni 10:3-5 To ponder study and pray with a sincere heart, real intent and a faith in Christ. The Holy ghost will tell us the truth of all things and it is different for everyone but a couple other scriptures that stuck out to me were 2 Nephi 28:30, 2 Nephi 31:3, John 7:17, Ether 12:6 and Doctrine and Covenants 9:7-9 (this is a scripture chase that helped me learn more about Personal Revelation, for any of you who care to try it). I love this gospel. I know that The Teachings of Jesus Christ are real and will help us if we are willing to study them, and live by them. I am so grateful for the scriptures and all that they teach us. 

Love you all! 

Until next week,

Elder Frandsen

Sister Green, from Spanish Fork, and Jones who gave us the tour.

Heavenly Mother Madonna

Elder Bennett, William, and I

Hey Fam,

Here are a couple of new ones for you:

Q: Where is Engagement Ohio? 

A: Between Dayton & Marion

Did you know that if you are not LDS that you belong to a Non-Prophet organization? 

I figured if I started off with a bad joke or two then the rest of the letter wont seem so bad! Anyways, here is how my week went:

We got to go to the Indianapolis temple with William to do baptisms. It was such a cool experience to be able to again go with a recent convert to the temple for the first time and watch as they feel the spirit and how they react when they go in the temple. He was able to be baptized for 5 family file names and then be confirmed for the same 5, what a good kid. The other crazy thing that happened was that I saw Taylor Rowley at the temple as well!  We went to high school together, the odds of that happening are crazy because I am in the only area in the mission that is closest to Indianapolis than any of the other surrounding temples. She just happened to be going to that temple with her recent convert on the same day. it's a small world when you are Mormon. 

Oh and something else crazy is that I hit my 6 month left mark last week... where has the time gone?? 

Here are some of the crazy quotes that I have heard this week either over the phone with an investigator or in a lesson:

"Heavenly Mother is Madonna,”  "I am going to be re-incarnated as a mermaid and then marry a dragon,” "God sent me here to buy some guns and protect the world in the apocalypse,” " I can telepathically communicate with my husband,” “well he is my boyfriend right now but he doesn’t know that he is gonna be my husband and he comes from canada to pick me up everynight in the dream world" 

These are just a few of the awe inspiring quotes that I have heard this week and the others probably shouldn’t be shared over email. But My personal favorite is that Heavenly Mother is Madonna, needless to say it was an eventful week. 

Yesterday another crazy thing happened... we got a call from a former investigator’s mom who is currently out of the country on a trip. While she has been out there her daughter has had some mental health issues and the only number she could think of or find that knew her daughter in this area was some how our number. So she called and told us that her daughter wouldn’t answer her calls after their first conversation, where she had said some crazy things and threatened to kill herself, so she was worried sick and asked if we could get someone out there to help her. So we called the police and luckily we still had her address in the area book and gave them the address and explained the situation and they called us this morning to let us know that she is now at the hospital safe and sound. I am glad that her mom called us though because I don’t know how she could have gotten the help she needs otherwise. 

The other changes from this week are that the Brethren came out and have made some changes to missionary work!! They have changed our daily schedule up so that we have more freedom and agency to choose how and when to study in the mornings and changed the nightly schedule so that we can get more sleep if it is needed. They have also made it so that preparation day will now start at 8 am instead of 10 am. They got rid of a bunch of the key indicators that we used to keep track of and now only have 4 main indicators. There were some big changes there for us old timers that are so used to a regimented schedule but I am actually really excited about these new changes and I think that they will be really good for us as missionaries. They also gave some awesome training on becoming better teachers and working with the wards, which goes along with what we have been doing in this ward. We presented a plan to the ward mission leader that involves helping the ward council to get on track/ board with the ward mission process and having a member of the mission presidency to come down and do some training because none of them have received it yet. So he is meeting with the bishop to talk about it and to set up a time where we, him, and the bishop can meet together and discuss it and how he would like us to be involved with it and to help the ward. I am really excited about it because the bishop is a really good guy who is new to the calling but has a strong desire to magnify his calling. I think and feel that it will be a big help to the ward and the missionary work here. 

We had a really great lesson with the Sterchek family last week and this week. We are bringing bishop with us to teach them. I am really excited to be able to work with them, they are an awesome family and have a real desire to come back to the fold and to stick with it. We weren’t able to meet with Allen due to him being ill but he said that he has been reading while he has been sick and is excited to meet next. We dropped out investigator David because he wasn’t progressing but he did share with us that we were able to help him get out of a suicidal stage in life that he had been in previous to us meeting with him. He now sees more of a purpose to life and is going to take some time to figure out the things going on in his life. Cody and Fred the young men we have been teaching are also doing really well and will hopefully be able to come to church this week.  Fred is getting his license and doesn’t have to rely on someone to get him to church that isn’t reliable. It has been pretty cool to watch Fred progress in the last month from only slightly interested, to keeping all of the commitments that we leave him and excited about meeting. So the work is moving forward down here in Lima Ohio, even if it is a little bit at a time. 

Something exciting for next week... I get to see Doug and Jessica tomorrow when I head up to Kirtland for a meeting. I am stoked to see them again :)

Well my mind is blank right now and I am drawing a blank on what else happened so I guess that is all that needs to be said! I know that this church is true, I know that the Apostles and Prophets were called of God and that God sees the bigger picture and guides the leaders to give us the direction needed to get through life and our perspectives of the little picture that we see here on earth. The scriptures are guides for helping us to better follow God and develop Christlike attributes that will in the long run truly bless us in this life and help us to have the spirit with us and to be happy. I know that as we seek the will of God through the small and simple things that we will have those little confirmations that help us to continue to know that this is the right thing for us... Building up that foundation one brick at a time. I am grateful to be a missionary and to be serving where I am serving at this time. I love you all! I hope you have a great week and tune in again next week for more updates and quotes from Lima Ohio! 

With love, 

Elder Frandsen