Being Out Here My Testimony of Prayer is Constantly Being Strengthened

Dear family and friends,

I am doing very well! The last week has been a very busy one and I love every moment of it! We get one hour a week to look at our emails and to write back. So far it has been enough time. We usually only check for mail on monday as well. Either way I am happy to get your letters and am excited to see how you are doing.

 Like I said before this week has been really busy. I will send a picture of our whiteboard that has all of the names of people we are working with. Currently we have about 15 investigators that we are working with. Unfortunatley in the next few days we might be dropping a few of them. We also work with a lot of less active members and recent converts which I really enjoy! It is just important to re-activate someone as it is to baptize someone and we make a lot of progress with the less active members we teach. The place we live is very nice! and we are fairly close to the beach. Yesterday was the first time I even saw the ocean. I guess that is not why I am here, but we were visiting some people on the island and I saw a little of the ocean as we drove by. There are some very interesting people we are teaching and I will tell you about some of them! Tea and Nikki we have been teaching about 2 or 3 times a week. They have one or two kids and are "planning" on getting married. Sometimes they have a hard understanding what we teach them but they are very teachable and want to learn. They also have some bad smoking problems that Tea says he wants to overcome, we are keeping our fingers crossed! One of the less actives we are teaching is a man named Brother Kyle Kinder. He is recently comming back to church and we teach him about once a week. He has a great spirit and is reading the Book of Mormon almost every night now! He texts us every night letting us know what he read. We are working with an investigator named Erica, who we have taught a few lessons to and she is really nice. It is difficult with her because she says she is both Bi-polar and schizophrenic.. We are working and praying very hard for her. These are just a few of the people we are teaching, we are really trying to get them progressing and comming closer to Christ so they can be baptized.

Out here we dont do a lot of knocking doors. So far we just havent had time to do that. We make a real emphasis on getting referrals through members because they are very much more likely to accept the gospel. The member support is great and we ate with members 4 times this week! Two of those times were at Golden Corral. My hopes of staying fit and skinny on my mission are probbably gone if the rest of my mission is like this. I guess i cant complain too much though. I have a question, there is a guy in our ward that looks very famaliar. Kind of like someone we knew in Virginia. Did we know a Vic Allen? The ward leadership is great here and the ward members are very supportive.

Being out here my testimony of prayer is constantly being strenghtened. I have had many opportunities thus far where I recieve very specific answers to prayers. It is something I wish I would have learned to do better. As far as teaching the lessons, I am getting better. We try to teach 50% of the time between me and Elder Peck. I am almost to the point where I know where scripture references are that i can just have a blank Book of Mormon for all of the lessons, it is a work in progress still but I have made a lot of improvemtnt.

It sounds like everything is good at home. Josh, happy birthday!! I hope you had a good time at your camp. You better not be bigger than me when I get home:) It sounds like the rest of the sports world over there is going well!! it is neat that everybody is sucessfull at everything they do! If you could in your next letter send me when everybody's birthday is just for a reference for me so I dont forget. It sounds like mom had a good experience at the Harley store. Being PTA secretary sounds like a lot of work and I hope you are sucessfull.

It sounds like such a neat experience to go to Trevor and Kelsey's wedding. Tell them congratulations for me and I wish I could have been there. The same goes for Trenton and Jessica!! It is crazy to think that they are both getting married. I did know T.J. and that is very exciting to hear he and Amanda are getting married. Maybe I should leave more often!! It seems to be good for everyone else!!

Im not really sure what else to tell you!! There is just so much work that we do here that there is simply too much to tell! Just know that there has yet to be a dull moment on my mission. Everything is centered on the work, and there is a lot of work to be done! I know that this is the most important work I will ever do for others and am very greatfull for my great family who loves me and supports me. I am also very greatfull for my great friends that support me as well. Keep sending leters and keep being awesome! Ill talk to you next week.

Love,

Elder Brayden Mortensen


P.S. I apolagize for not getting you the pictures.. My camera died, maybe I will send my memory card in a letter. I havent taken that many pictures, but I will try to get those to you.

 

Wipeboard of People the Missionaries are Working With

Map of Mission Area