Brad's email 3-30

Hey Everybody!! 

Another excellent week! We have been doing TONS of service this week, but we were doing it for members for the first part of the week... I mean we love to do it but we would be more successful if we did it with non members. So when I was at home one of the evenings for dinner I decided to pray for new ways to find investigators. After I had prayed I just laid on the floor and just closed my eyes and I cleared my mind and all of a sudden I got this AWESOME thought. My thoughts... " I love doing service but I would rather do it for a non member but we have tracted this area every other week and no success... so if our version of tracting doesn't work then we need a new plan.  We have a truck... how can we use it."  Then the super clear thought jumps into my MIND!! " Service tracting!! We can put lawn mowers in the back of our truck and a weed eater and we can go door to door and ask if we can mow and trim their lawn and we will take the trimmings!" So we decided to try it!  Elder Patterson and I are both stoked to try it. So on Saturday we got 2 push mowers and a weed eater and we went to 10 different houses and 4 of them let us do it and the rest didn't, but out of the 4 that let us do it we got 3 new investigators out of it and we are actually starting the discussions with one of them and their family tomorrow! So inspiration comes to those who seek for it.  Know that trusting in the Lord and knowing with fervent prayer and faith He will give it to whoever needs it and seeks for it. If I hadn't prayed for a new idea and way to help people we would not have had those 3 new investigators!  It works!! 

Elder Patterson and I had an appointment with a PMF (Part Member Family) and the wife isn't a member and we had committed her to baptism for Feb 28th, but it didn't happen. The husband got his name removed form the church and then re-baptized, so right now he doesn't have the priesthood and to regain that it would be about a year and a half process. He wanted to do the baptism and he couldn't so he said he doesn't want to proceed with it. But he still wanted is to go over the discussions with them. Yesterday we had a discussion with them and we have been praying that his heart would be softened and she would be able to be baptized. So yesterday he said to us... "I want her to be baptized as soon as she can cause if now is when she wants it then now is when we should do it".   We set a date for the weekend after gen. conference. SO that was a HUGE miracle! We have been praying for her to have an influence on her husband and she has! God knows how to change somebody's heart as quickly as he has too! 

So yah! its been a good week! Oh and there is a new video that the church has made! It's another Easter Video! So I invite and challenge everyone to watch and share it on facebook!  http://www.mormon.org/easter it is such a good video on Christ and that he still lives!!

Well that is about it! Have a great Easter!!

Love Elder Riley

Brad's Latest Email 3-16-15

Hi All!!

Okay! Well this week was a good week! We have been doing so much service!! I am actually getting TAN!!! Every day this past week has been in the high 60s and low 70s. We have been in our service clothes more than we have been in our proselyting clothes! haha It has been a busy week. A mission is an amazing thing. I now have such a wide variety of things that I can put on my resume. I have done so many different kinds of service!! It has been so nice and I have learned so many different techniques. Oh, but one thing happened last week that was the worst! So on Tuesday after District meeting we always go out to eat. So we decided to go to IPC (Idaho pizza company) and on Wednesday I woke up around 3 in the morning being extremely dizzy and having nausea. I threw up. So all day Wednesday I was puking and I literally didn't have any strength at all! I puked a total of 12 times!!! It was a rough day. I don't ever want to have food poisoning again and my entire district had it! It was bad! But thank goodness that was the only bad thing that really happened. 

Yesterday as we were in ward council, someone had to give a spiritual thought and in this video that he showed us there was a saying that stuck out at me. "You never know how strong you are... until being strong is all you have left." That really stuck out to me. This brothers spiritual thought was on courage. It was a great thought. It talked about how standing up for what we believe in, to have courage.  As a missionary I have the opportunity to lovingly correct them on something false that they have learned about our beliefs. 

For example: (and I am not bashing on ANYBODY), but we were sitting down in a 5 star restaurant.... ( Dennys ;) ) and this man came up to us and told us everything that we do wrong in our church.  Luckily he wasn't making a scene and before he had the chance, I Interrupted him and invited him to sit with us. He did. He was an older man and I asked him where he had learned what he knew about the LDS church. He didn't tell us what church he was a member of, but he said that they have a class at the church that preaches and teaches how to deal with "MORMONS".  So he told us some of the things that they teach the congregation. I began to ask this old man where it says to love they neighbor as thyself? and he told me it was in Mark. So we looked it up and we read it and I asked him who were his neighbors? He said anyone around him. So then I asked him what it meant to be a christian? He said to be Christlike and to lead by example. I told him I don't understand why Christian churches,  not all, but some preach against another. I asked him if it means to love they neighbor as thyself shouldn't we be united? So we continued to talk and it turns out that he wants to know more. He apologized for the way he presented himself and we took down his number and are going to call him and see when we can come and see him.

I could have just let him tell us what he believed, but instead I let him know in a loving way that the things he found out or learned were not completely true. So have courage to stand and be proud of what you believe. If we are all Christians we need to be united. We NEED to be Christlike! We need to be example of the believers! 

Well that is about it! 

Thanks all! 

Love Elder Riley  

Elder Allison

1. Hello Family.
2. This week was super awesome!! We are making a lot of progression with a lot of different investigatores. And we are focusing on still a lot with the young men. It is so much fun. Today we went to the meeting then hurried back to go and play basketball and soccer with the young men. We brought 8 young men investigatores to the activity!!!! ( It is a tiny bit easier to convince a young man to play soccer than to go to church on sunday :) But it all starts somewhere. jana. 
3. The good news is that Fernando is super excited for his baptism this saturday, and the ward is helping him out a whole bunch. We went and visited him with the bishop on thursday and it was so awesome!! The bishop is changing his excitement! :)  Also Sebastian is very excited for his baptism on the 28th. He has his white shirt and white pants all ready. And his family is all in, supporting him. We know that soon his mom will also make the choice. She is reading the Book of Mormon. And is in 2nd Nephi 12 right now!! She is enjoying it. Its just a matter of time. Also we have been working a lot with Brayan, Brandon, and Bruno a lot. Their mom and grandma arent giving the support that they should be. I dont know why, but the ward is also helping with them a lot also. It is funny because we usually walk the kids home after church, and there are like 10 young men, or kids walking home with us. 
4. Another cool thing this week was that we found a place that they call the "lost city" i dont remember if i told you about this the last week, but it is a little "neighborhood?" Its like 30 yards by 50 yards, more or less, with just one entrance that is hidden in the corner of our area. I didnt know about it until a few weeks ago. But it is a little place with about 40 or 50 houses, made of tin walls, They are by far the most humbling houses i have seen here in mexico. I have seen a lot of houses that were pretty difficult, but this one takes the cake. Well we went in there and contacted some people. We didnt really know how to, but i started playing soccer with some teenagers, and kids, and we kind of won their confidence, and we were able to enter into one of the houses and teach about 5 people. Everyone there knows each other. So we are pretty confident that if we can get a few people to start going to church we will be able to find a ton of people. One of the dads that we taught went to the english class, then the next day went to church. It was funny because i started to juggle the soccer ball, but then it fell into a little ditch like thing. I reached down to get it. And BAM, my pants ripped SUPER bad, everyone started laughing SO much. One of the kids was on the ground laughing so hard, It was one of the funnier experiences that has ever happened!! jaja :)
5. The young men won a thriller this week 13 to 9 jaja. They made me and my companion jerseys. They are pretty sweet. 
6. Today we are going over in like 2 hours to eat lunch with Fernando, his mom, his sister and two ward members for the birthday of Luz ( fernandos mom) We are pretty certain that in just a few weeks her, and her daughter will get baptized, they go every week and love church.
7. All in all everything is going great! I love these people more than you could EVER imagine! They are so special to me. I love being a missionary. Have a great week!!! 

1. Love Elder Allison