Week 31 - Missionaries Don't Convert

Mom, I am doing GREAT :)

So the best thing that happened this week? Well first off we had a missionary training session that was broadcast from Utah. Elders Bednar and Oaks were the Presiding Apostles at it and it was a training session to all the missionaries in the world. And what a blessing.

Missionary Training Session with my District

They taught a lot about teaching repentance and letting the Holy Ghost be our guide. Because if I learned anything from this conference, it’s that missionaries DON’T CONVERT. We baptize the converted. Weird right? But think about it, why baptize them unless they have expressed true repentance? If they have applied the Atonement in their lives and felt its power, through the Holy Ghost, then they will be converted. We as missionaries must have the Holy Ghost be with us constantly in order to help convert. A missionary brought up the point that the Spirit brings the truth into the investigator’s heart. But Elder Bednar stopped, and said "Well yes the spirit can bring it UNTO, but into." People need to accept it for themselves. We merely bring it unto them, right outside the gates of their hearts, and furiously knock on the doors. But the most crucial step in conversion, is letting it in. So in order for all this to happen we need to have the companionship of the Spirit through diligence and obedience. 

Also this week we had 2 of 3 investigators on date come to church :)  Ellsworth and I were so happy!! In fact we had 4 total investigators at church and our ward set a record for the most people at church ever. So it was pretty cool. However I will not forget that the Lord had His hand in having them all there. I mean, this IS the Lord’s work!

I did not know Hevynn was working there at the temple! That’s great, and you got to spend some time with your 2 favorite grandchildren too! Hendrix is getting so big and handsome like his uncle, and Kiegan is sooooooo cute :) 

Hevynn and Bo spoke in their ward? Well, put two spiritual giants together and you are bound to feel the Spirit then! Bo's story about obeying the Lord’s will is so applicable to missionary work and everyday life. I know that in order to give that blessing Bo must have been really in tune with the Spirit, meaning that Bo had to have been obedient and diligent, ready to be that vessel for the Spirit. As members we should always strive to stay worthy of the companionship of the Holy Ghost. That way when the opportunity arises for us to go and bless others, we will know what to say at the very hour and minute we need it. 

Now follow that up with Hevynn singing a musical number!? I wish I was there!!

How’s Harry doing? How are Hema and Norma? How are Helam and Alyssa? And how are Hevynn and Bo? How is the whole family doing? If there is anything I can do, I will do. I love everyone and miss you all! I worry about dad also. He's not as young as he used to be and I know he's constantly working his butt off just to provide for us, but don't let him kill himself doing it. 

I received the packages and thank you :) haha spam and rice is the bomb!! And there’s nothing you need to send me mom. Don't worry about sending packages and stuff. Just keep me updated on the family and that will be more than enough for me :)  I’ll manage just fine!!!

Elder Ellsworth is still going! He's starting to pick up the aspect of missionary work, but one of the most noticeable part about training him is that I've realized there’s not only a lot to improve on for him, but even more so for me! My district is great! 

My District is the best!

We are leading the mission so far, we just gotta keep working and keep praying! Oh and transfers are tomorrow! Of course I’ll be staying for 6 more weeks but Elder Moli and Elder Tafuna will be moving in just 4 miles from our house and into our zone! Haha, so 2 more Polys.

Elder Cruz is transferring. I'm gonna miss him!

Love you mom and thank you for everything:)

Ofa Lahi Atu! 

Your favorite Elder Heimuli, right Hema and Helam? :)

Week 30 - We Will Be Blessed

Sorry for the late reply! So yesterday was Martin Luther King, Jr. Day, so we couldn’t email :(  I knew you would be sad, but better late than never. right?

Well I haven’t got the packages yet, but I know they will come and THANK YOU SO MUCH for all the packages and stuff you guys send me. It means a lot. In fact I bought a really warm jacket and hat for tracting. It makes it sooooo much easier when I’m not freezing to death!! So please make sure to tell dad thank you a lot from me :)

Coach Anderson wrote me this week and I was able to talk with him! I hope that this trend keeps going toward recruiting more Poly players. I know they know there’s a lot more than just BYU and Utah :)  Coach Anderson is an amazing coach and I am still very grateful for the opportunity he gave me.

You stayed up sooo late working on that talk!!! Man, I bet it was a great talk though no doubt about it. I’m glad you told me about meeting all those people in that ward. I bet you’re a proud mom. It’s also so great that people remember Hema and respect him. Same with Helam and Hevynn! I can say that I am truly blessed to have had such great examples in my life. In my older brothers and sister it’s almost like I had a map showing me exactly what to do and even sometimes what not to do. When you have such strong, respectable, lovable, and just all around great family members it makes it easy to live right. I hope I can be just like them for Harrison and the babies.

Wow Sunday was as crazy for you as it is for us!!! Running around at all those different meetings and still finding time to see the family at the family meeting! You’re amazing mom, and I know you always do it all out of love. Love for our family, love for your young women, and mostly love of God. :) It’s also good to hear of all the upcoming babies!!!! Tell Tini boy and Ben them all congrats from me. I will be waiting for pics of all the babies I’m missing out on, haha. I hope the video I sent cheered people up, because it was a blast for me haha. It’s kind of hard to dance out here when you don’t have the time but I still got it, lol!

This week has again been miracle-filled. Ellsworth and I were dropped by one of our baptismal dates. She said she wasn’t ready and that she will come back on her own time. We were sad. We tried so hard. We really believed that obedience and diligence would bring something, it just was not what we were expecting.

So we were just dropped, and we were just starting our studies, when we got a phone call. It was from our bishop. He said, "Elders, I have someone for you to teach."

It was a part-member family. In a crazy twist of events, she was never baptized and confirmed. so we went right over there and taught her. She is now on baptismal date for Feb 6th. It truly was a miracle.

Unfortunately, it’s really cold here and people don’t like to open their doors or stand around and talk. Some are struggling with commitments so if you could pray for them, that they may keep the commitments, that would be great! 

But if we are diligent and obedient we KNOW we will be blessed. We can always apply that exactly to our lives as well. If we are obedient to God’s commandments, we will be blessed. From loving one another, to going to church, to praying and crying unto the Lord, or even having our thoughts directed towards Christ WE WILL BE BLESSED. There’s really nothing more that I want for the people we find and serve, and the missionaries I support, and especially my family. I think most times those blessings are simply that we keep our thoughts pure, which keeps our actions in line with God’s will, and make our families (parents, wives, children, etc.) more like heaven on earth. I’ve seen it, and I know you will see it when you follow the commandments of God and the counsel of His servants. 

I love you mom. I love and miss everyone at home.

God Bless You All   

Ofa Lahi Atu:)

Sincerely, Elder Heimuli

Week 29 - Move On

Hello Dearest Mother:)

Indy has some beautiful sights

This Sunday was crazy because it snowed. Since it snowed the roads are iced over. The mission cars got grounded when we were actually at church, and when cars get grounded we can’t use them because of weather. But we needed to take the car back home. So I decided to take the car back and drive very carefully. Well when we were literally just down the street, I slid into the curb and broke the tire.... Haha so that happened.

It's so cold over here

But other than that, this week was great. There were a few BEST things that I’ll share with you. So we helped move a couple who felt they were "wronged" by the church. They seemed kind of standoffish but by the time we were done they were happy and talking to us and I could see how the service we rendered softened their hearts. The next day we had interviews with President Cleveland, and it was fantastic! He helped me understand much better the principles of Patience, Faith, and the Atonement of Jesus Christ. But one thing I really grasped was Forgiveness. We all try to repent of the sins that we have made in the past, realizing that we ALL make different mistakes. But when we linger on those mistakes they become a burden. Repentance is an important step in feeling clean, however, we need to understand that afterwards we need to move on. By being able to look forward and try our best, only then are we truly sanctified. So if we said somehing we shouldn’t have, we must repent and try to make it right. And then MOVE ON!! This reminds me of Lot and Sodom and Gomorrah. Remember how Lot’s wife looked back and turned to salt? She was about to go forward, but then she halted…and she looked back. So learning from that I came out of the interview ready and willing to put forth more Faith. The next day Elder Ellsworth and I put 3 people on baptismal dates! All are progressing right now and we just picked up 2 new solid progressing investigators this week. It’s been a miraculous week and it’s all because we put forth A LOT of faith. He will always come through when we are willing to show our faith through our actions (aka hard work!).

We also had Zone Conference in which I had to do a musical number on the uke... 

With Elder Pau'u before we performed our Christmas dance

Haha that was fun, but one of the greatest things that happened at the conference was that I got 2 letters! One was from Brother Smith and the other was from President Gordon. It was so great. They are so kind to think of me. It was their Christmas cards and it made me feel sooo happy! So next time you see them tell them I love and miss them and that I am so grateful for what they did for me!

Elder Ellsworth is doing very well! I made him teach some door lessons without me helping at all haha!! I just looked at him whever he tried to pass the conversation on to me. But he did very well and things are looking better! In fact Cruz, Huntington and Ellsworth and I were all on our way to a dinner appointment. 

The 4 of us

Ellsworth and I were supposed to go teach a referral but Cruz and I decided to send the two greenies to go do it :) 

Elder Cruz

Haha they were freaking out but I called up a good ward member to come to the lesson and we pretty much left those two to do it! The member reported to me after the lesson that they did very well. So Cruz and I were like proud and happy dad because our sons were able to teach that lesson. If you think about it, if this gospel wasn’t true, then putting the bulk of its fulltime preaching in the hands of 90,000 18- and 19-year olds would probably not be the best decision. But the Church IS true, and God loves His children, and the Holy Ghost testifies of truth, so thank goodness we can’t mess it up! As long as we are worthy of the call and the companionship of the Spirit nothing will stop this work from progressing. 

Whoa Hendrix is already 6 months and Kiegan is 2 months today? Time really is going fast. Thank you for the family's prayers. They make such a difference and they help my companion and me sooo much. Again I love and miss you guys so much!! As for things to send me you know you don’t have to :) I’ll be fine! I pray for you all! 

Ofa Lahi Atu

Elder Heimuli

Week 28 - So Many New and Really Weird People

HELLO AGAIN!!!

My New Years was great. We had New Years off because everybody in Indy are still drunk from the night before haha!! We got to have a new years football bowl so I was pretty happy about that!! But I’ve been super sore because I haven’t played football like that in a while! Afterwards we went to the chapel and played even more sports!!! We played bball for like 3 hrs and you all know how good I am at bball :)

With Elder Howard (he's a crack up) and Ellsworth playing bball

Then we all went out as a zone and got some good pizza at a cool restaurant. Then we returned home and did the next best thing... we slept :) so it was very laid back. But the next day me and Ellsworth hit the streets hard haha. No success but we just gotta keep going after it.

It seems like New Years was pretty eventful for you guys :) It must be crazy now because everyone of course has not only our family, but their other side, and their own family. I also miss that Japanese New Years meal tradition!!! Haha maybe you should send that left over Poke my way ;) jk everyone probably ate it all!! But you are right, time goes by so fast out here I shouldn’t let a moment slip by and I am still trying to grasp that. I’m not as experienced as you all in Life but I will do my best to not let it just go by without me noticing. 

So this last week we've still been struggling. I’m still having a hard time finding accountable investigators. However I just have to grin and bear and like you said, I can’t let anything slip by me. But I’m getting used to the city. In fact it’s a lot of fun!!! You meet so many new, and really weird, people!! Haha what a joy it is!! My boy is doing good. So of course his name is Elder Ellsworth and he's from San Bernardino, California. He's doing really well now and he's grasping the way to work quickly. Yet we are both learning as we go, both growing more and more daily.

My boy Ellsworth and I on our bikes. He's freezing. I don't think they have this kind of weather in California. I don't think we even have this kind of weather in Utah! It's cold.

Yeah I was also excited to hear Stanford beat Iowa!! They deserve it, and I shot Coach Anderson an email about a month back to see how he was doing! He didn’t reply but I knew it’s because he's very busy!!!! 

Oh and yes mom, I am doing my best to lead the District. It’s stressful but it’s okay because there’s only room to grow right? The ward provides great support and the bishop is awesome!! He expects a lot from the missionaries so it makes me step up my game just a bit more. 

And again New Years is one of my favorite memories because I always know that Grandma and Grandpa are there :) I miss them alot and I love them ALOT!!!!!! Please tell them that when you hear from them. I hope and pray for their health and all the families!!!

This upcoming week we have a goal to put 1 person on baptismal date and 2 progressing investigators. So please pray for us in reaching this goal :) 

Love you mom!!

Ofa Lahi Atu!! 

Elder Heimuli

PS. I got my camera back. Here are some Christmas pics!

Reading my Christmas letter from the Fam

LOVE the Robinson Family!

Thanks Dad for the belts!

Huntington and I were so happy to open our Christmas packages!