Another 6 weeks done!!

Wow I can’t believe I have been out for three months already! Time flies.

Anyways here is how my week went...

2 Mondays ago: Not a whole lot happened except for when a guy tried to bible bash in Wal-mart. By the end of the conversation he almost said himself that the Book of Mormon makes sense but he caught himself in the middle of the sentence and then left with out evening buying anything. Well at least we gave him something to think about and it helped me to continue to see how powerful the Book of Mormon is. 

Last Tuesday: We met with Tim today and had a really good lesson! We ended up teaching him the plan of salvation and he has already listened to three chapters in Nephi on his phone... The only thing that we forgot to do was to be baptized which is kind of a big one but we live and we learn right? We also had a really awesome lesson with a Less active who we are helping return back to church. He shared with us how he wants to be sealed in the temple to his fiancé and how he is so thankful for us helping him in the path to obtain this. This helped me to realize that its not just about "baptisms and knocking doors” but helping all people come closer to Christ whether they are fully active members or someone who we talk to on the street for 2 minutes. Also while we were teaching him he has a question about something and I wasn’t sure how to answer it then I just had a random scripture pop into my head and I went to it and it was exactly what he needed. It is cool how the spirit does that.

Wednesday: Missions aren’t just a walk in the park... You may be having success but that doesn’t mean that it is easy or that we are always going to be happy. Satan works harder during those times when you are working the hardest to be a good missionary. This with the stress of adjusting to missionary life all just came at me at once and it was pretty hard going through out the day probably the hardest day yet but we had interviews with the mission president that day and he gave me some great advice and helped me a lot. It was still hard but this is probably something every missionary goes through at some point. Later that night we had a cool experience with another less active who finally let us in for the first time in years and then opened up with us during the lesson and started to cry part way through because he felt the spirit so strongly and realized how much he needed church back in his life. It definitely helped me to forget about all my other stresses for a while so it was really cool.

Thursday: Still another hard day but we met with another less active who shared with us her baptism story and how she wants to take the Sacrament again. This week has just been full of crazy cool experiences with less actives and there desires to change. I really hope that I will be able to help all of them do what is needed to get back on the path again. Then that night we had another great lesson with Doug and Jessica!!! The only weird thing is that we were teaching two people about marriage and why it is important and why it is something that would need to happen before they are baptized when we have never been married and if you asked me 5 months ago if I was going to be talking to two people about being married I would have thought you were weird ha-ha. But I hope we helped them to understand why being married before you live together is important and that they can be guided in knowing what they need to do in order to progress. 

Friday: The Temple trip fell through so We ended up not being able to do much but I did accidently get habanera pepper in my eye during dinner... Yeah my eye was on fire for the rest of the night but it was pretty funny. Then I ended up standing in a dumpster for 30 minutes when we were doing service that night stacking boards that ended up making my body itch for the next day ha-ha. But we took another investigator on a tour of historic Kirtland. I am grateful to be so close to Kirtland because it has become such a great missionary tool and it helps to gauge how interested the investigators are. 

Saturday: Well apparently we are for sure getting another set of Elders and they just bought the studio connection to our apartment but we have no clue if they are splitting our area or if they are making us Spanish only... Hopefully we find out before transfers but if not then there isn’t much we can do about it. Tim wasn’t able to meet and had to go out of town until Sunday night so he wasn’t able to come to church either but when we met with him Sunday night we had a great lesson and this time invited him to be baptized and he said yes he wants to take that step forward but he wants to pray about it first which is awesome!

Sunday: We had two less actives we have been working with come to church and same with Doug and Jessica and then half way through the meeting as we were sitting by them this crazy homeless guy came in asking for money so Elder Ogle and I had to go out and talk with him in the hall way and he just kept asking for money and saying some other weird things but finally after sacrament the bishop came out and handles the situation and it worked out and everyone was happy but it was still not something you expect to have happen when you are at church. But yeah nothing to much else happened that was exciting because all of the Spanish investigators who we usually meet on Sunday weren’t home :(( 

Well that is how my week went!

Here are a couple things I learned this week....

I am so grateful for the atonement and the hope that it gives us. Repentance for sins is an on going process, which is hard, but in the end we are so much better because of it. If we went to church every Sunday prepared to take the sacrament the way it is intended then we would be so much better because of it. The gospel is simple and we need to always remember that. 

I am so grateful for the opportunity to be serving a mission and learn more about and come closer to Christ each day. 

I love you all! 

Elder Frandsen

Hello everyone!

 So I do not have a whole lot of time because we are going to the temple on Friday so that will be my p day but they said we could take a little time today and email before going out and working... So I would like to talk about three cool things that happened :) and sorry I have not sent any pictures... for some reason these computers here do not want me to send pictures.

 Anyways,

1st: Sooo the assistants called us on Tuesday to tell us that the mission president has heard our cries for help because we have so many English investigators and less actives we are working with that we cannot do much with the Spanish people. They said since they have seen the work progress in this area recently that they would like to split it and add 2 English only elders to help out so we can help the ward to grow! Last night we ran into the mission president at a fireside and he told us to talk to the apartment manager Trena(whom we are teaching) about getting another apartment or expanding ours. Hard work pays off.

Pretty much every street in my area

2nd: Doug and Jessica... We had another amazing lesson with them on Thursday night and our ward mission leader came with us and it is amazing how much more effective lessons are when you have a strong member of the gospel there to help teach and testify. We ended up having a 2-hour lesson because Doug has been reading the book of Mormon, gospel principles manual, doctorine and covenants and the pamphlets and he writes down all the questions that he has and it is awesome. Jessica does the same thing and this week we had challenged her to read the word of wisdom pamphlet and pray about it and ask for help in quitting smoking. So she did just that and she has done great she has cut down her number of cigarettes significantly and she sees why the word of wisdom is so important. We talked to them about the law of chastity and they are deciding about marriage right now and what they should do. So pray that God will guide them in that decision. Then they came to church yesterday and it was the coolest thing. The ward welcomed and accepted them really well and it just felt natural that Doug and Jessica were there with us. Again, Doug shared with us just how much he loved church and how amazing and kind and accepting everyone was! We invited them to a fireside that night and they said they would love to come so they ended up giving us a ride and we ended up teaching them another lesson in the car that we had not been planning on but that is how the spirit works. Doug and Jessica both felt the spirit very strongly at the fireside and Doug actually started to cry during one of the testimonies. I Love seeing how much the gospel changes people and the joy that it brings into their life. Afterwards Doug and Jessica shared how out of the 10 churches they have attended combined that this is the only church that has been able to answer there questions and really live by what they teach. I don’t know how we got so lucky as to find them... they are amazing and so ready for the gospel.

3rd: Tim. So Tim is a special man... We met him last week and I felt like we should invite him to come to church before we had even taught him anything and he agreed to on Saturday I had another feeling that we needed to go and talk to him and ask about church again and again he said yes but then again so do a lot of people and they don’t end up coming but we found a ride for him and 5 minutes before church started, there walks in Tim!  We were so happy we didn’t know what to do because we had three investigators at church but our ward mission leader ended up sitting next to Doug and Jessica so I sat next to Tim and explained everything that was going on as it happened. Remember that we have not taught Tim a lesson before we had only invited him to come to church so he quite literally knows nothing about what is going on. He stayed for all three hours and it was awesome how everyone came up to him and introduced themselves. After church we asked him how he liked it and he said it was so great and he loved it and he felt so accepted! So we invited him to come to the fireside that night in Kirtland and he said yes! And when we arrived Tim was sitting in the front row with Brother Hay and the sister missionaries talking to the mission president. Afterwards he told us of how when he told his aunt and his mom about church and what happened that they both expressed to him how they were interested and would like to come next week and will hopefully both be there tomorrow when we go to teach him! I wish that all investigators were like that. Then life would be easy, but life is not supposed to be easy, I have learned. 

I love this gospel and the happiness it brings. I love being able to help others find the happiness that it brings as well. Yes I love this area even though it snowed two nights ago and has been freezing and I don’t have a coat yet. After a week where we had 3 solid potentials drop us and no one answered, to have the miracles on Sunday and see our hard work pays off, made it all worth it.

Love you all!! 

Elder Frandsen

Yup, my favorite job of backing of the car.

Hola!

So this was an eventful week so ill just cover a couple days again,

  Tuesday: So we took our apartment manager to Kirtland and it was really spiritual and who knew that our apartment manager was going to be a golden investigator! All of the senior missionaries kept asking how we had found her and all it is that we invited her one-day to come to Kirtland. But we are now teaching her and again it shows how God is preparing people everywhere. So we are now teaching our apartment manager :) Also we taught four real investigator lessons! Which is crazy because in my first week and a half we only taught 1!

My Apartment Building

  Wednesday: The day started off with two cops busting into our apartment at 3 AM. I was so confused at first as to why two cops were in out room and how they got there and what we could have possibly done wrong. But it all ended up being confusion because our back door to the apartment building was open and the cops didn’t know it was an apartment building for some reason and they went in to make sure that no homeless people were in the building. They didn’t find any homeless people in the building but they some how found a back way with a door unlocked into our specific apartment so they were really confused when they opened the door and two teenage kids were asleep. So that was a great start to the day. Then after that in the morning I gave my first blessing ever to my companion! I was super nervous at first because I hadn’t done this before but once I calmed down and finally gave him the blessing it was actually a really cool experience. We went to Kirtland next because we had to practice for a program they are having in a month. We then taught Judy who wants to come to church this week. We then had a lesson with Doug and Jessica and they have a baptismal date! And when we invited him to be baptized he said yeah let me go mark it on my calendar ha-ha. I wish all investigators were like that and that excited to hear the gospel.


  Friday: another cool little experience... We went to an apartment complex and stayed there for about two hours and in that two hours we taught 3 lessons, taught another lesson in Spanish and have gained another Spanish investigator. Then we ran into a less active that wants to go back to the church and gave us her info to pass along to the missionaries that live in her area. And that was only one apartment complex out of the 5 others that were there! It has been really cool to watch our pool of investigators go from 3 to the 10 that we have now :)


  Saturday: We met with Estaban the less active we ran into in the street last week and he told us of how he had been praying for the past month to find the missionaries and how we just ran into him that one day. Another testimony builder of the power of prayer! We then went to go to a return appointment with a Spanish guy and taught him the restoration and have another lesson so now we have 3 Spanish investigators!

  Sunday: This was a very spiritual day and I kind of had my first baptism... kind of. Doug and Jessica were the only investigators who made it to church this week but it was an amazing experience for them and after church Doug couldn’t thank us enough for allowing them to come and worship with us and to experience the special feelings of our church. That was a really neat experience because I have watched him these last three weeks since we met him grow so much and become so much happier it with Jessica! After church there was a baptism for a lady who has been investigating the church for 20 years now and her husband who was baptized 2 years ago who had investigated it for 17 years was going to baptize her but the only problem is that he cannot move very well. So they asked me to be his spotter just incase if he needed help. Well first off he choked up when he was saying the prayer and I have only felt the spirit that strongly a couple times as I did when he started. But when she went under I had to jump in the water and pull her up because he couldn’t but he had to do it again because he said a word wrong so the second time I had to jump in again to help him pull her up so that is why I count it as a half baptism because I assisted ha-ha. It was still a super neat experience and I am very grateful I was able to help.

 Well it was another good week even though at times it can be really hard and discouraging when investigators drop or you aren’t sure what to do. But I can always look at the miracles that have happened and the people that god has lead us to and it makes it all worth it. Another quick little funny story: A lot of the homeless people in the area come up to us and tell us that they are Jesus Christ before we even talk to them. It still takes me by surprise every time it happens but apparently that is a usual thing that happens here. But we always just give them a restoration pamphlet and tell them that god loves them and we love them as well and then they get a smile on their face and say thanks and walk away.

 Love you all!

 Elder Frandsen

Hola!

Well here is how my week went! 

Kirtland Temple

Last Monday Night: We had a lesson with a 10 year old kid named Cyrus and he has an autistic brother named Aiden and while one of us is teaching the other sits on the couch across and hangs out with Aiden and show him pictures of people in the scriptures or stuff like that. I had the opportunity to be with Aiden this time and it was super cool! He has a really sweet spirit and loves to hear when we talk about scripture stories so I told him scripture stories while my companion taught Cyrus. After the lesson His mom said that Cyrus is to young to be baptized which is really sad because Cyrus tells us every time how much he wants to be baptized. So pray that his mom’s heart will be softened. Anyways, after that we had an appointment with the Bahia people and while walking to there house we had a guy named Derek stop us and ask who we are and we told him and ended up teaching the restoration and then he said he has been looking for a new church for his family and would love to come to church on Sunday! Really cool experience. Anyways we had to drop the Bahia people because of other reasons, which are sad, but they just aren’t ready to hear the gospel yet.

Tuesday: So we picked up 4 new investigators today and 2 of them were Spanish and we set up other return appointments with potentials. We have a college in our area and we went and walked around and got a good feel for the place and had a soccer kid who invited us back to share our message with him. hahaha so here is a funny story from the day... Later that night we had just talked with a less active and were walking down the street when a couple of guys stopped us and asked if we were cops or with the FBI and of course we explained who we are and then they started asking us more questions but after about 2 minutes I could tell a couple of them were drunk and one of the others ended up telling me he was actually on acid and asked why he couldn’t stick his hand through the metal of his car if there was so much space in atoms. lol. Well we ended up teaching them about the word of wisdom and law of chastity and they we dumb struck and asked if we knew what happiness was and one of them that wasn’t drunk was actually really interested and took a pass a long card but right before it got sketchy one of the dudes straight up offered his wife to my companion because he said he felt so bad for him hahaha his wife wasn’t to happy but we left right after that and my companion was scarred for life but we had a good laugh about it. After wards I was able to teach the restoration in a street contact in Spanish for the first time and it was awesome!

Wednesday: Well we decided to fast for the ability of our Spanish to grow and for us to be able to find more real investigators in Spanish. It was really great but it wasn’t made easier by the fact that we walked about 15 miles in total before dinner but I survived. We picked up another investigator and talked to lots of people and people are starting to ask us who we are because they see us walking around so much. 

Thursday: I forgot to write in my journal and so much happened this week that I am not quite sure what happened this day except for the fact that we invited our apartment manager to take the lessons and come on a tour of the historic sites in Kirtland with us and she said yes! And also we talked to one Spanish guy and my Companion heard him speaking English and I heard him speaking Spanish and it was the weirdest thing ever ha-ha I think I am just thinking about learning Spanish to much that my brain isn’t working right loll.

Friday: We gave away 4 Book of Mormons and ran into a less active who has been searching for the missionaries and gained 6 new investigators all from just walking around right by our apartment! But first we started off the day by driving through Cleveland to get to the mission home for a training meeting and that was super cool to go through the city! But now we are out of miles so it was walking by our apartment for the rest of the week, which ended up being a blessing. After that we contacted a referral and it happened that he had gotten in a car crash the day before and has been praying all day in thanks to god for not hurting anyone else and for the opportunity to still be alive so when we came he was so happy and accepting of our message and we are going back next Tuesday. After that we went and taught an investigator we had picked up last Friday and he is an 18 year old black man who loves people and we got to know him better and teach about the book of Mormon and he is coming with us to Kirtland on Tuesday and bringing some of his friends!! After that there was a car show in the park with a bunch of retro 50's-70's cars and it was so cool! We gave away quite a few passes along cards because we had already given out the other book of Mormons but it was still a great experience. After that we went back to the apartment and grabbed a few more BOMs and headed down to a different area on the other side of our apartment and some kids stopped us and we played catch with them while telling them who we are and what we believe in and gave two of them BOMs and they asked there parents if we could come back and both families said yes! So that was cool but then the guy who lives next door came out and started bashing on us saying that we a liars and a bunch of stuff like that and I had to control my tongue or else I probably would have said something I regretted loll it still made me mad cause we haven’t done anything to him but free agency. After that was when we ran into the less active named Estaban and we had walked down a super long road and i had a feeling that we should turn around and walk back the way we came so I told my comp and he agreed and the next thing we know these four college aged dudes come out of no where in a dark alley and so we didn’t think anything good was going to come out of it but then estaban stopped us and told us his story of how he lost contact with the church after being baptized in New York and how he wants to come back to church so we got his info and have contacted him and he is coming to general conference this week with us. Super cool experience. 

Saturday: Not a whole lot of people answer their doors on Saturday so not a whole lot happened but when we went back to the two families houses the old guy was waiting for us and started to bad mouth us again and we didn’t want to cause a scene so we rescheduled with the families because they also had something come up but it’s sad to see how much that one guys doesn’t like us for no reason. That night the ward mission leader invited us over for coordination to have a fire and talk about how to help build up the ward so that was actually really fun and a productive meeting. 

Sunday: Derek didn’t come to church but he found us later in the night and told us about his phone and how it broke and he has a new number and made sure to get ours and call us to make sure it is all good. We explained how next week is general conference and he said he thought that sounded really great and he is going to come this week and he had his family with him so we got to meet them. I know God has a plan for him and there is a reason why we have run into him 4 separate times this week. Anyways, at church I met another person who knows the fam! Their names are Anna lee and Rusty Albrecht. Or formerly known as Anna lee Lund from Gunnison who grew up with dad! It was super cool to get to know them and all. After church we had another couple appointments fall through and this was the first time I have felt discouraged because of how hard we have been working but so much stuff with the Spanish families has fallen through but right when I started to feel like that the next house which we have vested a lot and hasn’t been home let us in and we finally taught our full first Spanish lesson! My MTC Spanish came in clutch and I actually ended up teaching most of the lesson but Elder Ogle would tell me what they would say sometimes because I couldn’t understand it all but they loved what we taught and they both said they felt like the Book of Mormon is the word of God and they took everything else really well. Which was crazy because I realized that I had actually just taught real people in the real world in a different language and they had actually understood everything I was saying in their language! I was able to understand about 50-60% of what they said also which was also really cool! It was a testimony builder of how much the MTC really does prepare us and how the gist of tongues is a real thing. This experience also built up my desire to learn Spanish by 100x more than how it was before. We have our next lesson with them next Sunday in between conference sessions so it worked out perfectly! 

Sorry for such a long letter this week hopefully I will get better at summarizing stuff better! 

Here are some things I learned and saw blessings from: We are pretty much out of miles for the month so we have probably walked about 50 miles or so this week which made the days long but the blessings that have come form that are crazy! We picked up 10 new investigators this week, which are 8 more than the average and 6 more than have been picked up in the last 6 months. People are recognizing us and because of that they will come up to us and ask who we are and what we believe in and do. This is all because we ran out of miles and have had to walk. Also lots of people think we are Jehovah’s witness which is funny and we get asked what number of the 144,000 that we think we are but then it actually leads into a conversation about the church and who we actually are. 

       Everyone in Ohio smokes! Imp not sure if it is just the area I am in or all of Ohio but we were told around 80% of the people smoke in this area. Fall hasn’t started yet but there are so many trees it is ridiculous so hopefully fall isn’t skipped this year and it just goes straight to winter. My trainer is awesome and he has already taught me so much. We work really well together and have been able to do lots of good in this area. All things are possible through the lord with faith. I love it out here.

Love you all!

Elder Frandsen

The houses of Ohio

October 5, 2015

Conference Time (Christmas Time for missionaries)

The freezing church building during conference.

Well I don’t have as much time this week so I thought I would just write about some cool experiences that happened.  So on last Tuesday it was raining really hard all day and we are still out of miles at this point so we had to walk with umbrellas but about 2 miles from the apartment my umbrella broke and so did my companions so we got soaked and had been rejected every time we tried to talk with someone so it was kind of crappy. We said a prayer and the next thing that happened was that we both felt we should go to the apartment complex across the street... so we did. We knocked on all 20 of the apartments and 13 out of the 20 let us in and we set up return appointments with all of them!! The other great part is that half of them were Spanish :) Also the first person we met said that her family is a part member family who just moved in and her daughters had been wanting to meet with the missionaries for the last couple weeks but they didn’t know where to find them and we just happened to show up randomly so that was a really cool experience! So far we have met with 5 out of the 13 and have 5 more appointments set up for tonight and tomorrow so we will see how that goes. Later that night we had a lesson with Doug and Jessica and he shared with us this super cool experience he had with the Book of Mormon and right after that I felt like I should ask him to be baptized and so I did and he accepted!! Right now he is set to be baptized in the middle of November so pray that he can stay strong :) On Thursday we had Zone Training meeting so afterwards we went on splits with the zone leaders. I went with Elder Bowcut, which is cool because I have known him since I was 5 if not younger! So it was really fun to be able to talk about what’s new at home and everything. We did serve  for most of the night but we had an hour at the end to go contacting and we made the mistake of sitting by a KFC and every time we would try to talk to one of the people they would pretty much just say, "No thanks I need to get my chicken". Hahaha so we finally gave up on that area and ran into a pizza delivery boy who gave us his address and told us he wants to hear the message so I guess it wasn’t a complete waste of a night trying to contact. Conference: I loved listening to all of the talks and maybe it was that I am just a missionary now or what but I got so much from this conference and it was really cool :) The biggest things I got from it were: The gospel is simple and we don’t need to get caught up by the fact of its simpleness and how important true faith is. God promises us so much if we just keep the commandments. How much I love my family and how grateful I am for the gospel and the blessings that it brings to families. Keep the Sabbath day holy. Also by striving to do the simple things we can always have the Holy Ghost. Also on Sunday we had our second lesson with the Lopez family and it went super great! The father really opened up to us and told us of how he wants to change but he doesn’t know how to and how grateful he was that we are trying to help him. We have a third lesson with him this week and our teaching pool of solid investigators grew by three this week, which was super, awesome! I love serving out here and I love the people! My companion and I get along great and everyday we see miracles and see how the lord has prepared so many people to receive the gospel and when we are working hard and have faith he puts them in our path. I love you all! Until next week,

How many people watched conference with us.

Ohio Week 1

Hola Familia y Amigos!

First Day, this is me at the Kirtland Temple.

Well here is how my week went...

Saturday-Monday: Last couple days at the MTC! It was sad to say bye to my district and zone but I am excited to see where we all end up and what happens. Said bye to friends and teachers and I smelled "The Tree" for the last time I also finally had my last MTC meal which I am not too sad about. Overall I really did love my experience at the MTC and the friendships I made and the lessons I learned.

Tuesday: I woke up at 2:30 am to head out to the bus to take all of us to the airport. We finally arrived around 5:30 or so to the airport and got all checked in and then I got to call home and stuff, which was awesome! Sadly on both airplanes I sat by all missionaries so I didn’t have much of a chance there to talk to anyone but in the Georgia airport I gave away a pass along card to this older couple who asked me why there was so many of us with name tags on and what it meant. Sadly this was right when we had to board the plane so I only had a couple minutes to talk to her but I gave her the card and she said she would go look up the website for ourchurch, so that was cool. Well we arrived in Cleveland and got everything picked up and met the mission president and his wife (they are both super super awesome) And then I found out the craziest thing yet... So all along I heard there was about 20 Spanish missionaries in this mission out of the 210 but there are actually only 7 and I make 8. Yeah. that took me by surprise and also only one of them has been out for 1 year all the rest are younger than that. Well after that we went to the mission home and got acquainted and everything. We had our interviews with the president and his wife which was really cool and he shared how excited he was to be able to work with us because he just arrived in July so we are going to be pretty much his first missionaries that he will have welcomed by himself and will see us all the way through the mission. After that, since we had such a big group, three of us were picked to go and spend the night at the AP's house down the road. So I stayed there for the night and it was all a blur how fast everything had come and gone throughout that whole day and I had no clue what to think of it all.  

Wednesday: We woke up at 4:30 because we had to travel to Kirtland and a bunch of other stuff so that set up for another long but good day. We went up to Kirtland and toured the Kirtland temple and the Newel K Whitney store and were able to start our missions off by saying a prayer in the school of prophets. This whole experience here was just super awesome and made all of us, especially me excited for the next 2 years. Next we went up to the Kirtland stake center to find out who our trainers were going to be. First before I found out I saw Deesh, Mckay Bowcut, Kenzie Saunders and Sister Taylor who are all from Spanish Fork and Salem area. I had no clue that they were all serving in Cleveland, so that was cool. Then I met my trainer whose name is Elder Ogle he is from Chicago and is super awesome! I am serving in Perry West, which is in the Kirtland zone so we take our investigators to Kirtland a couple times a week, which is great. Elder Ogle was with an English Elder the previous transfer so his Spanish is rusty and I also found out that we had 0 Spanish investigators at the time which has been hard because I don’t know how my Spanish is going to progress... any advice? We went back to the apartment and had to get ready for our first meeting, which was with a less active member named Stephen. Stephen is a very interesting man and is probably one of if not the most intelligent person I have ever met but he reminds me more of an evil genius ha-ha. He goes on random tangents and he talked about anti-matter for a while and evolution and about what he is inventing right now and showed it to us it was pretty cool. After that we ate at a member’s house and the crazy thing is that this member actually served his mission with Uncle Kelly! I couldn’t believe it because I am in the middle of nowhere and I meet someone who knows my family. It was a long but awesome day.

This is me with Deesh

Thursday: We did our planning for the week and had to helped with some ward stuff so we weren’t able to go contacting until around 4 but we met with an investigator to make sure he was still good to come to the tour of Kirtland the next day and we read a chapter of the Book of Mormon and he asked a question about baptism and it was crazy because the day before I had studied a chapter in Doctrine and covenants which was the exact answer for that question, so I shared it with him and he loved it! I thought it was pretty cool.

Friday: Super awesome day! We gave away 6  Books of Mormon in two hours and picked up a new investigator and it happened all right by our apartment! In the afternoon we went to Kirtland with  Doug who is 66 and his girlfriend Jessica who is 33 and they went through the tour of the historic sites and they both loved it and both felt the spirit super strong when they were able to pray by them selves in the school of prophets! Doug is an awesome guy who has had some rough times recently and when he found the missionaries he was super interested because he has been looking for something like this in his life. They are awesome people and I am super excited to keep teaching them. Well anyways after that we decided it was time to finally find some Spanish investigators for this area so we can actually use our Spanish. Our apartment is right by "the Hood" and we have a Spanish store right by our apartment so we decided to go try out that area and see how it went. Well we knocked on some doors and the first one to answer was a Hispanic man and we were able to talk with him for fifteen minutes and he read out of the Book of Mormon and accepted it and then I felt like we should go to this random blue house and right when we were walking up to the door a man named José walked out and we talked to him for 15 minutes and he also read out of and accepted a Book of Mormon. Then we walked around the block and met this kid named Manlike who is 18 and we explained who we were and he said he really would like to here more and we have a return appointment set up for this week. Next we went to an ice cream shop and the two girls that were working asked us about our name tags and who we were and then we ended up giving both of them Book of Mormon and have return appointments for this week also. In this one night we doubled the amount of investigators, which was awesome.

Saturday: We did service for some of the day by bailing hay with some of the members, which was really fun. We went to Kirtland again with a less active and watched a program that was going on there and he has been coming to church for the last couple weeks which is awesome. Then we tracted by our apartment again and met some really interesting people of the Bahia faith but they were really nice and we have another appointment with them tonight! It was another really great day.

Sunday: I met my long somewhat distant cousins who are in the ward I am serving in! Aunt Rita is their Aunt as well just on the other side so we aren’t blood related but they are really close with the Gardner family! That is just crazy to me again how I met someone out here that knows my family! He has actually stayed at grandpa and grampus house in Gunnison before! Anyways later that night we went contacting and tracing by our apartment again for a couple of hours and it was awesome! We gave away 8 Books of Mormon and picked up 5 new Spanish investigators for this week and another two English investigators! We also reached the goal of 20 lessons for the week, which hasn’t been reached in this area for like 5 months, so that was cool :) 

Overall this week has been super amazing and I have had so many cool experiences. The only thing that I am struggling with is the language because I don’t have a lot of opportunities to speak it so it isn’t really progressing and my companion is still a bit rusty so it is hard to speak it in the apartment when he has to train me so we are working together to make it better but as long as we have faith I know we will be able to do it. 

I can’t believe how many trees and how green it is here it is crazy! The whether has been great and the leaves are just about to change colors! Also I am right by the lake and right in-between Cleveland and Kirtland. This area is awesome and the people are awesome although a slight bit on the crazy side at times. I have also learned that the people here all have super nice cars but live in tiny not so nice houses. Sometimes the car is more expensive then the house ha-ha. But I love them all and I am so grateful for the opportunity to be here! MY companion is an awesome guy and I am glad for his example. Love you all hope you have a great week! 

My mailing address is 

6720-creek side drive

Unit C Madison Ohio 44057 

Pray for me that I can learn the language and be able to understand it as well :) 

Elder Frandsen

“Two awesome missionaries!!! They just shared a wonderful message with us!!   They are great teachers!”

This was texted to me by an investigator.  :)

In Lafe's letter he mentioned this,         "I met my long somewhat 
distant cousins who are in the 
ward I am serving in!"

This is one of the cousins he mentioned.
We received this post on Facebook.

Hola Familia y Amigos!

Last Week at the MTC

 So this week there are only a few days that I want to talk about, because not a whole lot happened those other days.

Sunday: First Fast Sunday!! In the morning we had 4 talks from the presidency of the MTC and one talk stuck out to me about the importance of tithing and the blessings that come from such a simple thing! I met an Elder who is over 7 feet tall and don’t worry I got a picture that I will send. During the devotional that night the speaker talked about opening your mouth and being prepared and worthy to receive inspiration about who to talk to. I received a prompting that I should go and buy a couple paperback books of Mormons to have for when I am traveling to Ohio this next week. Hopefully I am prepared or in the right place to be able to use those with the right people! Anyways it just made me super excited to get out to Ohio again and finally start teaching people!

Tuesday: Definitely my favorite Day at the MTC. One of the branch presidencies came in and interviewed us all and he answered a question that I didn’t even know that I had! He taught me what I need to do to go from being a good missionary to being a true servant of the lord and being a tool in the lord’s hands. He helped me to be able to love my companion more and finally get past some things that had been bugging me. About 2 hours after That I had probably one of the coolest experiences in my life and all that I want to share about it is that I know that god answers prayers in so many different ways and he will even prepare that answer even before you have prayed about it. It just strengthened my testimony about the power of prayer and how god knows all of us individually so yeah that was super cool :) Then After all that we had a devotional Which was Really great and again I had the feeling that I should go and buy 4 book of Mormons so I made sure to write it down this time so I wouldn’t forget! I am still not sure why I bought four of them but I hope to find out! This day has taught me a lot about my self, and what I want to become.

Thursday: We had in field orientation today! I learned so much about the importance of member missionary work and how I need to learn to work with the leaders and members in the wards that I will be apart of. I was able to work with a native Spanish speaker during our role-plays and I was surprised at how much faster he spoke then the teachers! I was still able to pick out enough that I could respond and I am super grateful for this experience because it humbled and let me know that I still have so much work to do to be able to be really effective with teaching in my mission language.

I received my travels plans last Friday and I am leaving the MTC next Tuesday at 3 in the morning! My flight leaves at around 7:30 and I have a layover in Georgia and will arrive in Cleveland by about 3:30 and I am super excited!! There are 23 in my travel group and I am the only Spanish speaking elder going to Cleveland this transfer.

Some little things I have learned: The sinks in the residence have two temperatures. Frost bite or 3rd Degree burns and the showers have this thing that whenever someone in the stalls closest to the shower are flushed they get hotter by about 30 degrees so if you aren’t paying attention you get a nice surprise when your body gets burned ha-ha.

If you have time: You should all watch the video Safety For The Soul by Elder Holland Because it is a very powerful testimony of the book of Mormon and it is my favorite :)

Yo Amo Ustedes.  yo Estoy muy feliz por este opurtunidad estar serviendo el senor. Yo se que el libro de Mormon es verdadero. 

I love you all! 

Elder Frandsen 

Another Week Down!

Hola, Familia y Amigos,

     Here is how my week went,

Saturday: I have never been so excited for Saturday to be over so it can be Sunday! It is a weird feeling for sure because it was always I was sad when Saturday was over because it meant school was coming and it was the end of the weekend. I guess missions do that to you. A funny thing that happened was one of our district’s teacher pulled my companion aside and talked to him about obeying page 33 better. He is in love with one of the sister missionaries and it is really funny yet annoying at the same time but I think when the teacher said something he finally realized how distracted he was getting by it all. Oh well u guess we will see!

Sunday: I love Sundays here at the MTC! This Sunday was a little different because I had to go to district ad zone meeting because I am district leader so that took up half the morning but I still got an hour for personal study so that was good! Getting the leadership lessons is also a good experience. We had a great rest of the day and the devotional from brother dahlquist was really cool and he taught about his experiences from being a mission president and how we need to be spiritual anchors and vessels for others to build off of.

Monday: Just another day that started off the week full of long days with classes. I have notices that the dyas are starting to blur together here! We have a weekend hangover from speaking English on Sunday and we can always tell when on Monday our Spanish struggles more than usual. By the end of the day it has pretty much caught up though.

Tuesday: I knew that I would have at least one apostle come before I left this place and I was so excited when I found out Elder Oaks was coming!! It was awesome and such an amazing talk! He was asked to talk about teaching out of preach my gospel by the prophet and so that’s what he did. His wife first talked and talked about the story of Paul and how at first he was the vilest of sinners and was changed to the greatest of teachers and apostles of the lord. Brother oaks really explained what parts of preach my gospel meant and how we can have the spirit with us to teach. It was so awesome and I can already tell that by using what he talked about I can feel the spirit more in lessons!

Wednesday: 1 Month down!! It is crazy how fast the last 4 weeks have gone by!! The days seem long but the weeks seem short it is crazy but I am loving my time here. My district was picked to host this day and I was able to help pick up Jacob Ence and hosted Jonathan Hill! I also hosted another kid who is going to Cleveland as well! I am grateful for the experience to host it was awesome.

Thursday: I saw garret parry today! There are so many kids from school here now it is crazy but so awesome! I am glad to see how many of us want to serve the lord. Today was also the last lesson with our investigator Alan :( He is getting baptized in two weeks but then again he is just an actor so yeah but I am still grateful for the opportunity to teach him and all the lessons that we learned from it. I also had the most spiritual experience so far in our lesson with Hermano Croft Who is acting like one of the investigators from his mission. Ill just leave it at that. 

Friday: Today!! We receive our travel plans today!! Crazy huh?? I only have 10 more days left in this joint before I am in Cleveland! I am so excited to get out in the field and to start teaching people! P-Days are much needed and I am Grateful for the one day where we can rest and think about what we have learned during the week.

You should all check out Dearelder.com :)

Funny Story: During one of the lessons I meant to ask someone to pray but I accidently said Will you read before we start this lesson to invite the spirit. And then I just bowed my head and when there was no prayer being said 10 seconds later I looked up to see the investigator with the most confused look on her face and my companion just laughing to himself. We had a good laugh out of it. I also asked her to read the wrong scripture that lesson and she read about translating the books instead of how to feel the spirit so she was a bit confused again. It was a great lesson still and we could all feel the love even if my Spanish isn’t perfect.

I love it here and I love learning a language. Thanks everyone for being such great examples to me! 

You se a la iglesia es verdad. yo se el libro de mormon es verdad tambien. estoy aggradecido for la opurtunidad ser aqui ahora aprendiendo la cosas estoy aprendiendo sobre la iglesia y mi mismo. yo esperanza ustedes tienen un bueno semana :) 

Adios! Te Amo.

Elder Frandsen

Garret's mom sent me a couple more pictures of Garret and Lafe at the MTC.

Devin and Lafe at the MTC