Brian passed his baptismal interview and is all set to be Baptized on Wednesday!!

Hey mom!

This week was awesome. Brian passed his baptismal interview and is all set to be Baptized on Wednesday!!!! He is such great guy. The Bishop and other ward leaders keep mentioning how it isn't that often that you see an obvious future leader be Baptized. It has been such a great experience being able to teach him and see the sacrifices he has made to be Baptized. He is even doing missionary work already. He is influencing a couple of people just by his example. There are 2 people who want to learn more just because they have seen him accept it and have seen the change in his life. Man it is just such a great situation!!!

One cool miracle that happened this week was an investigator that doesn't want to consider himself and investigator just accepted the lessons. His wife (who he just married last month) called and told us that he has accepted the invitation to listen to the lessons. This is a big deal because he has been coming to church for like 2 months. He just started to practice Christianity only 3 years ago. But he loves to read the manuals and ask a ton of questions. We only had one official lesson with him and he did not want to commit. But the Bishop developed a great relationship with them and he ended up being the one who married them. A lot of people have been putting in effort to help us out with "bringing him into the fold". We were only meeting every 3 weeks and having dinner and just discussing what his questions were. He is in Mosiah chapter 15 and he is also reading the Doctrine and Covenants. Needless to say he is prepared and the fact that he is now ready to have the lessons is huge!!!!!

Funny Story. Because it has been so cold we have started to park in the Garage at night to avoid the ice storms and the snow and just the general miserable freezing car in the morning feeling. So our car was making a ton of noise when we were turning on the Heater. So we take it in and they check out the car and walk back in and the guy has a huge wadding of what looks like cotton in his hand. It turns out a mouse has been building a nest in our air vent hahaha. So members are bringing us mouse traps today and we will hopefully put an end to this problem. 

Other than that Christmas was great. The Friends had us over and it did feel like we were at home! It was awesome. We opened up presents had breakfast and then watched Mulan. After that we did some service for a family. They live way out in the woods of our area. Their son is moving in with them after a really bad situation (thats the best I can describe it) and so he has all this stuff that he brought with him. Well it was all just stored in their garage so we moved it all down to his room or we put it on a trailer for him. He saw us at church and explained that he was dreading having to come home and move all that, that night, but when he saw that it was done already he was so grateful. We had set a goal as a Zone to give 2 hours of service on Christmas and ours really helped someone which was really rewarding to see. 

We had a lady speak at church on Sunday in behalf of her Grandma. Her grandma has Parkinson disorder but our Bishop felt really inspired that she needed to talk. So she wrote up a talk and her grandaughter read it. Then at the end they gave a microphone to her and she bore her testimony. It was seriously one of the most spiritual Sacrament meetings I have been in. 

This week was truly great!!!!

Love 

Elder Powell 

The true meaning of Christmas

Hey Mom!

 

This week was pretty good. We had a great lesson with Tracy Hayens and his wife Wanni. She really wants to be baptized and is working on reading a little bit in Elglish from the Pamphlets that we teach with. We also just found a copy of the Book of Mormon in Cambodian. It has a personal testimony from someone in it so we are going to give it to her next week.

 

We went to the Temple Visitors Center with Brian and Brandelyne on Tuesday. That was tons of fun. We saw Paul Cardall perform. He was awesome! We got there early so we could watcht the video Joseph Smith: The Prophet of the Restoration and he loved it. We took some pictures on his camera and we will have him email it to us.

 

We also had a great service project that we did on Saturday. It was the ward Christmas party and they made it service oriented. Basically they chose 7 families consisting of members and non members and they made a list of things they needed doanted and put them as ornaments on the tree in the foyer. The ward members then grabbed the different things they wanted to donate and then they all brought them Saturday morning. We had a great turn out and there the packages that were made for them were huge. It was awesome to see how to change the typical ward party into a service oriented party that showed the true meaning of Christmas. We went with one of the members of the Bishopric to drop one families gifts off and it was really touching. It was a great way remember what Christmas was all about.

 

Other than that we had a slow weeK! Lame but we are working hard at finding new people to teach. One thing President Riggs wants us to focus on is asking EVERYBODY for referrals and to focus on teaching families!

 

Talk to you soon!

 

ELder Powell!!!

Miracles are happening and its such an amazing time to be a Missionary!!!!

Hey Mom!!!!

This week was awesome!!!! First we had a Family Home Evening with the High Priest group leader in our ward and that was awesome. His wife made this type of cider that uses orange juice and pineapple juice and it was delicious. So we asked and got the recipe hahaha. 

On Tuesday we helped a family move. That took a while. For the first couple of days this week there was ice all over the ground (we had an ice storm which froze all the water and snow) so we could drive anywhere. Well after the move we had a lesson with Brian and went out to give a Baptismal interview out in Sterling. Long story short it was an adventure! Everything worked out well and we had  a great time. Brian is doing amazing. He is coming to church and they are reading the Book of Mormon and keeping all their commitments! When we asked him if he had received an answer to his Prayers if Joseph Smith was a Prophet he said that he felt like he did because every time he reads the Book of Mormon he knows he is feeling the Spirit and that it all makes sense. Man he is so awesome. The ward leaders are really excited for him to be Baptized because they feel that he is such a special soul and everyone is just really excited for him. 

On Wednesday we had this really long meeting during the day. But after I renewed my temple recommend with President. That was awesome. He told me how he really wants me to stay in this area for my last transfer (which was really exciting to hear). After we had a Stake Meeting where we meet with the Stake High Counsel Representative over the Ward Mission Leaders and all the Ward Mission Leaders in the Stake. Basically they set a goal of achieving 50 convert Baptisms. Last year the Ashburn Stake only got 25 and the year before that they got 23. Well as of today we are at........49!!!!!! It is so awesome. Everyone is so excited. There are still 2 people being baptized this month and possibly a 3rd. But all the ward mission leaders really want to attend the 50th and are really focused and pumped about missionary work. It is awesome to see how people are catching the Lords Vision of the hastening of the work. Miracles are happening and its such an amazing time to be a Missionary!!!!

We had the Christmas conference on Friday and that was really awesome. I got to see friends and past companions. We had a lot of fun but also focused on the True meaning of Christmas. President as usual delivered a great talk.

Then yesterday we had a great day at church, and had a lesson with Tracey Haynes and his wife Wanni. It was a great lesson! She understands and speaks a lot more English that we thought. She totally has the intent, but stated she wants to know 100% that this is true. It was a humbling teaching experience because we really had to teach very basic but still be able to teach the correct principles. A couple of times we had to stop and think "ok how am I going to explain this" but it turned out so well. 

Things are going great. We get transfer calls tomorrow so most likely I am staying here with Elder Fink. We are excited about that and for all the work we have to do!

Love 

Elder Powell 

Great....more snow

Hi Mom,

This week was awesome! The 2 biggest things is that Brian is still doing amazing, and.........I got to submit Keagans mission papers!!!!(I will explain)

We had zone conference and that was really good. It was only a short 3 hour one because we are on a short transfer this time and so they have to squeeze in 10 zone conferences. Pres and Sister Riggs gave 2 really great lessons. Sister Riggs was all about Faith. She was talking about how when the Apostles said "Lord increase our faith" and she talked a lot about how there are things that we need to do to increase our own faith and that is what the Lord expects. Then President talked about Repentance. He was at a mission Presidents seminar and they trained them on how to effectively teach repentance. He taught us the true doctrine of it and we discussed how when we teach it, it needs to be about how amazing it is that we have the chance to repent. Teach it more positively and that it is a happy thing, because it truly is! 

The lesson was great with Brian Tuesday. In it he asked me to Baptize him. I was really shocked because there is a member that we have been taking and it is like his best friend and he asked for me to Baptize him and for the friend to confirm him. I dont know why but I really did feel the spirit extremely strong when he asked me. It was really humbling and after he even commented and was like "I could tell you were feeling the spirit when I asked you that". He keeps doing so much to be prepared for Baptism. It is going to be such a great day to see them be married and to see him make that next covenant in his life and prepare him to go through the temple in a year!

Now for Kegan. We had to drive somewhere in the mission for some car maintenance, on the way I thought hey lets stop by the Richardsons and say Hi. When we did we found out that all he needed to do was take his picture to submit his papers and he was being difficult hahaha. He for what ever reason was not wanting to but when we showed up he did and then they had me hit "submit"on mission papers to the Bishop. It seems like something so small but it was a big thing for all of us. Im just amazed at all that has happened with Kegan. He is almost on a mission and that is such a big deal for him!

On Sudnay it snowed. Now in Virginia, the snow is NOT enjoyable. First it snowed, then rained then it froze. We weren't aloud to drive anywhere or go out and work. So we had dinner set up with the Friend family. Brother Friend picked us up, we had a great dinner and then talked and played some games and then watched the Christmas devotional. They want to do so much for us because their son is serving in the Irvine mission and they really miss him. They want to have us all over for dinner on Christmas. They are an awesome family! 

That was pretty much the highlights of the week. Also I gave a Baptismal interview and the lady was really prepared. We have a stake goal of 50 baptism for the year and we are at 45! We are trying so hard to get there!

Love Elder Powell 

Miracles CAN and WILL happen!

Hey Mom!!!!

Its that time of the year again so that means I'm breaking out the Christmas tie and wearing it from December 1st until Christmas hahaha. This week was pretty good. We had a SUPER long thanksgiving.....we had 5 meals. It was insane. So this is how it broke down. We went to this families house and had pie for breakfast. It is a tradition that they have and they invited people from the ward so a lot were there. That was a good start. Then we went out to eat lunch with another family. The took us to a restaurant named Bob Evans and we had a turkey dinner for lunch. The family is a less active lady and her non member Husband that we do service for. They are a great couple and the Husband is hysterical. But that was tons of fun. Then like 3 hours after that we went to Victoria's and had a Turducken dinner. Holy cow let me just say that was delicious! Its a Chicken, stuffed in a Duck, stuffed in a Turkey. It was so dang good. That was a huge meal. Then after we went and had dinner at Hanna's. Her mom was having another house party for her family and we had some more Thai food. It was the order I would of picked to have the Thai food as the 4th meal but I am thankful for it! That was a lot of fun. We always meet new people when we are there and they are all really nice. After that we went over to Alexis' house. The 9 year old that was baptized. That was really fun. Her family is so awesome and they all love the missionaries. They are all from Guatemala so we had some spicy stuffing hahaha. But after it was all said and done Elder Fink and I went home and crashed. We didnt move for like 30 minutes and once we were done with planning we went straight to bed hahaha. But it was a great day.

On Tuesday I had my last appointment with my GI. That was a good visit. But the problem was the traffic on the way back. Traffic is terrible in Northern Virginia hahaha. It took us 2 1/2 hours to travel 28 miles. But anyways, that night we had a lesson with Brian and Brandelyne. We didn't have much time but it was a great lesson. We went over the Law of Chastity and the Word of Wisdom. He accepted them and went on to explain how they had already been living these things and are talking about what will need to happen before they are married on the 1st. Brandelyne is a member and she has been making the necessary changes and so has Brian and they are so prepared for him to be baptized and for them to be married! Its going to be great!

On Friday we met the Richardsons at Cafe Rio. It was so great to see them. Kegan is doing so well. He was officially ordained an elder and he is almost done with his mission papers!! He has done all the interviews and he is just finishing his medical stuff. They are trying to get it all done so he can go through the temple in January. That would be like the coolest thing if I was here for that. 

Really other than that not that much happened because a lot of people were either out of town or were sick this week. But we are working really hard right now. Our Bishop set a goal of 6 more baptism for the end of the year and we have had 2 from September to January. So we are really trying to work hard and we have the faith the miracles can and will happen!    

Love Elder Powell!!!

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