Week 64 - We Killed Chickens

Hi Mom!

I really don't know where this came from

Sorry for the late reply. Things have been pretty hectic here, almost as hectic as what's going on at home! So the Ogden house is slowly but surely being built and getting ready for the newbies to move in huh? Well, good thing Hevynn and Bo have awesome families and Helam and Alyssa to help haha! And I know I'm late but tell Bo happy bday from me. I know he misses me (probs not) but I miss him and love all the fam at home! Hope his bday party was awesome! 

Hema is also very thoughtful. That was so nice of him to bring you poke (and Hendrix!) to your work. I'm sure it did make you feel better. Weird how kids stress you out, but grand kids make your day better haha!!! But for reals Hema and Norma are awesome and always super thoughtful of other people.

CONGRATS TO AKA!!!!! HECK YEAH!!! Haha so I can visit her when I'm in California :) well only if her president allows it....hopefully. She will be a great missionary, I'm so excited for her. She's going to be the funny, cool, energetic sister missionary!

Speaking of missionaries, Dallin's letter was awesome. What a stud. I know he is just killing it out there and he is a strong servant of the Lord. 

So those investigators you asked about didn't come to church, BUT another one did!!!!! It was actually a friend of one of the members that we invited, and she came!!! It was awesome! After 6 months we finally have someone at church. She likes the church, but she is part of another religion. However, she says she likes to explore theology and is willing to listen and learn. I'm hoping that the spirit will touch her. We are meeting with her this Wednesday, so pray for us that things go well on this one. And thank you for all the prayers! We can feel the difference and we definitely need all the prayers we can get. But that was very exciting. Easily "the best thing that happened" to me this week.

This week was an interesting one! So Monday we had meetings with President for a while. But after we were done we went over to an awesome member's house in Beech Grove named Grandma Banks. What a sweet woman. We had a BBQ at her house for Labor Day. Yes, I over ate!

On Tuesday we did a ton of office work and then had dinner with a less active member and his son. The father has another son who is on a mission and that son asked us to visit his dad and his brother. We tried knocking on his door the week before. No luck. So Elder Wimmer left a card with his number on it which said, "Your son Noah told us to come by." A little back story: Noah and Elder Wimmer were good friends before Noah left on a mission. Wimmer wanted to visit Noah's father really bad because he had asked him to. The next day we got a call from Noah's dad who questioned why we left the card there. He acted like we were bothering him. But then when Wimmer told the man that his son had sent him, the guy was suddenly so happy. So happy that he invited us to dinner! When we came to dinner on Tuesday, he just let us right in and we all had a good time that night. We shared a message about drawing closer to Christ, accepting God's will and increasing our faith. It was a spiritual lesson and now we are going back to see them every Tuesday! Did I mention that he makes some AMAZING food? Well he does!!

On Wednesday was specialized training. During this time all the new missionaries come together and we train them on various subjects. Elder Wimmer and I did training on talking to people and FINDING. The core to missionary work is finding. In fact that's pretty much what missionary work consists of. There's no one to teach unless you go out and find, right? We shared some good examples and role plays, and the training went really well. After that Elder Wimmer and I had dinner with a YSA member at the Fishers chapel. It was nice that we didn't have to travel far for that one.

This returned sister missionary fed all of us at the Fishers chapel

After which we ran and dropped off various things to different areas and visited some members.

We had to drive this huge van and trailer which sucked to drive

Thursday we went on exchanges down in Bloomington on the IU campus. Elder Wimmer went with some elders in the area next to us, and I went on exchanges with the Bloomington zone leaders. We pretty much just personal contacted the whole day. While we were contacting I ran into a girl and starting asking her if she knew what I was. She said, "Of course I know. You're a missionary! I'm actually Mormon too." I found out she just moved to IU from Pennsylvania and has been pretty less active her whole life. So we got her info and the zone leaders are now working with her.

Later that day we also had a volleyball game. I remembered that Elder Wimmer and I knew a non member who lived in Bloomington and asked if she wanted to come play. She did, and she brought her friend!!! So before the game started Elder Wimmer and I actually took them to the chapel and had a lesson with them. It was a spiritual lesson, and by the end of it we committed them to read the Book of Mormon and meet with the missionaries down in Bloomington. They said they would and actually one of the girls said, "I've always wanted my own Book of Mormon." I was pretty happy when she said that. Not going to lie.

On Friday we drove back from Bloomington and PC'd (Personal Contacted) IUPUI. We actually enlisted the help of the Indy North Zone Leaders and we all blitzed our campus. We found a lot of potentials and hopefully we get to see 2 of them this week!!! I'm praying that they hold!!

Wimmer took this pic of me and another elder contacting on campus

After PCing all day we went back to the office and finished some more work. Then we went to dinner at the Christensens home. They are the family that texted you the picture of Elder Wimmer and I with 3 of their boys. They are a great family and we shared a lesson on sacrifice. 

What are we willing to sacrifice in order to be closer to God? How about 30 min of scripture reading vs time spent playing video games? How about a day of sleeping in vs a day to go out and serve someone? Or going to church vs hanging out with friends? What are going to give up to become better disciples of Christ? It was a good lesson and we had loads of fun as well.

On Saturday we were really busy. We had the mission temple day, a day set aside every month to have all the recent converts and returning less actives come to the temple to do baptisms for the dead. Elder Wimmer and I coordinate those and it is a very busy task. But the best thing about temple days are the faces of the people when they know they are doing such an important work for their loved ones. You really see how much it means to some people and how precious they view this ordinance. People who have not even been in the church longer than a month value the temple so much. It's truly an amazing experience.

After the temple day Elder Wimmer and I went down to Bloomington to do a service project on a farm owned by Grandma Banks. We killed chickens :)

It's over for this chicken

And these chickens too

Never did that before, so it was a fun experience. In fact we cooked the chickens later and it was delicious. 

So we cooked them...and ate them

But after the service project and cooking the chickens we ran back to Fishers to finish preparations for various meetings the next day, for Church, and for a "Why I Believe" fireside. "Why I Believe" is an amazing experience in which the recent converts come together and we have a little fireside to hear their testimonies and learn how they came to know the church was true. 

Wow, whenever you hear the testimony of a recent convert it just makes you shiver sometimes. It's so pure. They truly have changed their lives and they can feel that change. We can feel that change whenever they express it through their testimonies. It's always such an uplifting experience.

So the week was great. I've had a lot of experiences and I've done a lot of work. But it's so great and I am loving the mission I am on. 

I hope everything at home is going well mom! Give my love to all the family!

Ofa Lahi Atu!

Elder Heimuli