Elder Jansen Hall - January 6, 2014

Hey Yall!

Wow its been quite a year! I cant believe its already 2014! But what a great time of year to look back on your life and reflect. On all the good that you have done, and how you can even add more to that in the next year! Its been really cold here in Bama the past couple of days hah the wind blows hard but missionary work goes on none the less! An interestin fact about alabama is that about 90% of the people here dont celebrate the New Years haha im not sure if that percentage is right or not, but with all the people ive talked to no one said they stayed up and celebrated haha how lame! But Hey i guess i cant complain, I was only able to celebrate til 10:30 then it was bed time for me haha:) Also some important news. This wednesday is transfers. I will be stayin in North Port and gettin a new comp, and Elder Bean will be goin. So ill be here for at least 6 more weeks!

This week has been a great one though. It went by super fast! We have done a ton of service, mainly movin people, but a couple things i wanna share are the lessons we have had this week with some investigators. So the first one is Mike. He is doin great! We were able to see him on Tuesday, and also on Thursday. Both lessons were great, but somethin I want to point out is that one was with a member and the other wasnt. The one on Thursday we were able to go out with Bro Lewis and see Mike. Bro Lewis not only taught a little bit of the lesson, but he helped answer questions, He brought in personal experiences and the spirit was so strong! We could tell that Mike was feelin the spirit stongly, as his eyes were tearin up a lot durin the lesson! We have been able to answer alot of his questions. The only sad thing is that he was sick yesterday an wasnt able to come to church. He is plannin on commin next week though so we are gonna do everythin we can to get him there!

We were supposed to see Stephanie, our other investigator, when we went over to her house, she said she had to get over to her daughters house to help with her sick grand children. We are gonna do a service project for her as a ward and we are gonna go back to see and teach her. We were able to introduce the sister missionaries to her as well so that they could also go an teach her! An the last person is actually a members nephew. Now he is in his 50's but came to church the first time yesterday. We had never met him, he is movin from Baltamore. He said he really loved our chruch and wants us to teach him. So we will be goin over this week to teach him with a member!! We also have done some tractin and maybe have a couple other investigators. I dont know how strong those ones are though.

The last experince of this week I wanna share is on New Years. That mornin we had gotten up and played basketball with our ward. Then went over to a sr couples house, the Champions, and ate lunch with 2 sr couples. After that all of our apt fell through for the night. We literally had nothin for the rest of the night an didnt know what to do. Well Lee, a less active member that we have done a ton of service for, called us up and wanted us to come to his house. We went over and at the start it wasnt the best. He wanted us to get some stuff to eat then said just come up stairs when you get your food. Well we went up there and he had the TV on, his girls were downstairs watchin TV and he is a man you dont wanna offend or make mad. But ther was just a lot of noise we were tryin to talk to him and nothin was workin. He just wanted us there to hang out basically. Well that was good cuz it got us out of our apt, but not the best thing. Time was gettin late and we needed to wrap things up. Usually when we go over for service, thats all we do. We dont really leave a spiritual message or anythin. So we had talked about how to help him that way. Well I just asked him, "Lee what can we do for you spiritually? Part of our purpose as missionaries is to teach people and help people grow stronger in there testimony of Christ." He said he wanted a blessin cuz he was sick, we also got him to let us come over an  read the BOM with him. But anyway we got him to turn off the TV and I gave him a blessin. Right after he said, "Hold on one sec." Then he called his daughter up, who isnt a memeber. He said these 2 need to give you a blessin, as she was sick as well. We explained to her what would happen and she finally allowed us to do it. When I got done with the blessin, he looked at her and said, "Do you feel that?" She was cryin and he said I dont know about you but after my blessin I felt better immediatly! She said she felt the same way. Then he went on and expalined the preisthood to her and basically taught her the first lesson without knowin! It was such a great experience for him, her, and us! I know that apt didnt start out the best way but it sure did end great!

Member missionary work is so important! I know that God will keep his promises with you as you honor your covanents with him! Pray for missionary opurtunities! Open your mouth and youll be successful! I love yall so much! Have a great week! Remember to be happy!

Love Elder Hall:)

Here is me dressed yup in my cowboy stuff haha i got a gun holster, from a less active family in my last ward.

Yes, I'm sendin it home just incase anyone says anythin haha and the black cowboy hat was from them as well:)