November 26,2018 Sean's Baptism

This week was great! We had Sean's Baptism and Conformation and the spirit was so strong! We can see the change in Sean as he has lived the gospel and progressed to where he is at today even in this short time. Some other awesome and interesting things happened this week. Sunday, we were asked to speak in Sacrament Meeting. We weren't given a topic and so we spoke on whatever we wanted. I decided to speak on member examples. There is a great scripture in 2 

Nephi Chapter 26 which reads:

       

       23 For behold, my beloved brethren, I say unto you that the Lord God worketh not in darkness.

24 He doeth not anything save it be for the benefit of the world; for he loveth the world, even that he layeth down his own life that he may draw all men unto him. Wherefore, he commandeth none that they shall not partake of his salvation.

25 Behold, doth he cry unto any, saying: Depart from me? Behold, I say unto you, Nay; but he saith: Come unto me all ye ends of the earth, buy milk and honey, without money and without price.

26 Behold, hath he commanded any that they should depart out of the synagogues, or out of the houses of worship? Behold, I say unto you, Nay.

27 Hath he commanded any that they should not partake of his salvation? Behold I say unto you, Nay; but he hath given it free for all men; and he hath commanded his people that they should persuade all men to repentance.

28 Behold, hath the Lord commanded any that they should not partake of his goodness? Behold I say unto you, Nay; but all men are privileged the one like unto the other, and none are forbidden.

33 For none of these iniquities come of the Lord; for he doeth that which is good among the children of men; and he doeth nothing save it be plain unto the children of men; and he inviteth them all to come unto him and partake of his goodness; and he denieth none that come unto him, black and white, bond and free, male and female; and he remembereth the heathen; and all are alike unto God, both Jew and Gentile.

I shared how the gospel is for everyone. Christ invites all to come unto him and as Members we need to be an example of Christ like love to members and especially nonmembers. Our example is what invites the sprit into the meetings we have and helps people feel welcome. Christ set the perfect example and we can better follow that example by reaching out to new faces or people who are in need. By sharing our time and talents to bless others and become their friends. 

On Friday, we had a good few hours to find some new people and we found a guy named Jonathan. We invited him to church and he said he might try it out and then he showed up! It was awesome. After Sacrament, a lot of the members actually reached out to him and introduced themselves. It was great. We had a lesson later that evening with him and he accepted the invitation to be baptized on the 15th of December. He is super awesome! 

We had a good Thanksgiving and ate a lot of food. We spent time with members and some less active people. It was a great time to be grateful for all that each of us have. I am grateful for all the blessings I have and the learning and growth that happens each day as I focus more on the Savior and his example. I challenge each of you to try a little harder to be a little better and follow Christ's example in all that you do. Have a wonderful week! 

Elder Gardner Sleeping

Elder Gardner, Sean, Elder Jensen, Elder Elgaaen

Wake up Elder Gardner

November 19,2018 Weekly

This week has been really good. We had a really horrible interview with Tanisha for her baptism and it was super sad. The person interviewing her took over 90 minutes and was making up his own interview! Then he said that we should wait a week for the baptism which was super pointless so we called the mission president and he said the baptism was still good for this Saturday and the person interviewing was still learning. Haha 

Transfers went okay. We had a super long drive up to Jesup and the area is pretty small. There is a lot of inactive members and not lots of people who are super willing to be involved but we are working on improving that. We have a person on date for this Saturday named Sean. He is super elect and we are excited to Baptize him. He will be a super awesome member. 

Something that is unique about this area is we have a member who owns a Gym and he let's us work out there in the mornings for free and we really enjoy it! When your at a gym, you have a greater determination to actually work out so that is a huge plus. 

Our first full day in the area, we went finding and found 3 super awesome people within 1 hr. It was cool to see how making the effort to talk with everyone really brings blessings. We were able to accomplish a lot and find some good people to work with. 

On Saturday Tanisha did get baptized and from what I heard, the service was good and there was a lot that was accomplished. I am excited to keep up with her and see her continue to progress in the gospel and experience more blessings. This week was all in all great and full of lots of learning and fun. I love my companions and my new area. I hope you all can have an awesome week and have lots of great experiences and continue to apply the gospel every day and see so many blessings come into your life. Have a great week!

Cool car of a member's son

Elder Jensen

Ever Sleeping Elder Gardner

Lifting Iron at a member's gym!

November 12,2018 Jesup Georgia

NEW ADDRESS: 285 S. 6th St Jesup GA 31545 Apt 4

This week was an eventful week! To start, we had transfer calls and I will be getting transferred to Jesup Georgia. I will be in a trio with 2 district leaders as my companions who are both going home after this next transfer. The next transfer will also only be 5 weeks so the elders don't go home on Christmas Eve. Elder Adair will be training a new missionary and so I have to go to the transfer building and be there by 8:30 and it is a 2 hour drive. Then Jesup is the furthest area from that in the mission. So next week will be a crazy week!

We met some super interesting people as well this past week. One guy was named Dr. Steven Bivins. We walked up to him on the street and he is a local pastor of a church. He talked with us for a good while and asked us if we would be on a talk show over the radio on some Sunday. We told him we would look into it. He gave us some other people who we could see which is always good. So after we went down the street and talked with a lady named Jackie. She was super awesome and after everything we said, she would say umhum and draw it out really long. It was super funny. She told us that we should invest in stocks and only share the gospel online and not to people who have grown up in other faiths because they can't be helped. She then referred us to a house around the corner to a bishop. We knocked on this guy's door and he said his name was Bishop T. Wilson. He invited us in and showed us how he has a online ministry over Facebook and how he shares spiritual messages on there. It was fun talking with him and it really motivated us to use Facebook more.

Over Facebook, we got to teach a few lessons. It was super powerful teaching over Facebook Messenger because it really allows us to say exactly what needs to be said and review and ask inspired questions. Also it helps the people we are understanding clearly receive the message and we have seen it be a super effective way to teach the gospel. Another cool thing is we add members into the chat and then they can see the progress of our people and comment and share testimony of how they have seen the gospel bless their lives. Technology is amazing! 

One sad thing but super awesome thing this week that is happening is we have a baptism for this Saturday for Tanisha! She is so awesome and is super ready to get baptized! The sad part is that I will be gone for the Baptism. It has been a great blessing being a part of her conversion process and seeing the blessings the gospel have brought her so far in her life and I look forward to her seeing more blessings later on! 

One scripture that stuck out to me this week in my study was in 2 Nephi 7. Jacob is talking to the people about some prophecies from Isaiah and in verses 10 and 11 he says, 

10: Who is among you that feareth the Lord, that obeyeth the voice of his servant, that walketh in darkness and hath no light? 

11: Behold all ye that kindle fire, that compass yourselves about with sparks, walk in the light of your fire and in the sparks which ye have kindled. 

This scripture asks the question if you obey the commandments, will you walk in darkness? The next scripture made me notice that as we are obedient, we will be a source of light which we can follow. We will have the spirit within us and it will be a guide through our midst of darkness in our life. We just need to follow the small impressions and spiritual promptings we feel and focus on the light and good in our life as we follow the gospel. I love you all and hope your weeks are great! 

Banana Tree

Elder Elgaaen and Adair

Food from Wendy's 

Hang glider

Red Ant hill kicked by Elder Adair

November 5, 2018 The Sink

This week was a crazy one! From the very begining it was crazy and it stayed like that through the whole week. So on Monday, we went over to one of the people we are teaachings house. Their house is pretty dirty and so we took a broom to sweep it and clean it up. Elder Adair was sweeping and I decited to go around and clean up some of his trash so we could take it with us when we left. We were doing this after dark and they only had one working light in their house. We were walking around with the flashlight on our phone and there was cockroaches everywhere. After we cleaned for 30ish minutes, we asked if we could wash our hands and proceeded to use the kitchen sink. In the sink, there was over 2" of buildup and both the sinks were clogged. I was going to leave it but saw a spatula on the side of the sink and recited to dig in. The smell was so bad, Elder Adair and I were both gagging! It was the grosest thing I have ever done! HAHA

We had a pretty chill week otherwise. We got to go in early for Halloween because of the dangers that are out and if we knock on peoples door and don't expect candy, they would probably be upset. On Saturday, we taught Tanisha about the sacrament and she committed to come to church and she did! After we finished teaching her, we went outside and there was a taco van selling mexican food and we bought some Tamalies. They were super good! It was a good way to end our night. We also had a super awesome lesson with Anita and Patricia. They are super awesome. They do have some big things to overcome but they are willing to work on them. We taught them about the healing power of the atonement and they really liked that lesson and were willing to make changes and have earnest prayer. 

That pretty much concludes my week! It was super fun and I enjoyed every day. Happiness is a choice! It is something we chose to be each day when we wake up first thing in the morning. I hope we will all choose to be happy and choose to make the best of every day! Love ya and hope you all have an amazing week! 

Elder Elgaaen & Adair with Alvin

Elder Elgaaen & Alvin

October 29,2018 The Mug Shot

This week was full of excitement! We had a slower week on finding new people but were able to teach 16 lessons and help a lot of the people we have progress further in the Gospel of Jesus Christ. One lesson we had this week which really stuck out to me was our lesson with Anita and Patricia. Every time we meet with them we can see their nature change and they become better and better each time. We met with them on Saturday and we got a call from them the night before and we were thinking that they were going to cancel. Turns out Anita wanted to cook for us which was super exciting. We had the best meal yet! We also were able to teach the plan of Salvation and answer a lot of their concerns about life after this life and assure them that if they were to live the gospel they would be good enough to enter into the Celestial Kingdom. We also talked about baptism and feel that after a lesson or two they will be ready to accept a batismal date! 

On P-day this past week, we "Grilled with the Boys" and brought our grill with some hot dogs. We made bacon wrapped dogs and grilled them up. It was super fun and we had a good day. The zone leader asked us to grill for a P-day in a few weeks when the whole zone will be there so that is exciting. 

A crazy thing that happened to us this week was when we were knocking at a trailer park. There were probalby 10 trailers in a row and we had never knocked there so we knocked every house. When we pulled up, we parked accross the street in a field. We finished up a phone call and put in a lesson before we started knocking. There was a trailer right accross from us and a lady came out and was staring at us. Also a guy inside that trailer stuck his head out the window and was staring too. After a few minutes, the lady went back inside. We finished up and were getting out of the car and the lady came back out and asked if we were looking for someone. We told her we were the missionaries. She went back into her house. We went down to the end of all the trailers and started knocking. When we got the the trailer with the lady who had asked us the question eariler, she answered and we introduced ourselves again and asked if we could show her a video. A guy from inside part way through the video told her to get back inside or he would beat her. She ignored him(she was in her 40's) and we though nothing of it. We started showing the video and after a few seconds in, the guy threw a mug super hard at the door and it sounded like a bomb went of. He started yelling at her and so we took our tablet and said have a nice day and left. We did have a good lesson later which made the day a whole lot better! Haha 

This week I thought a lot about the power of the Holy Ghost in our lives. When we have it with us, we feel really good. When we don't, we can feel the difference and change in our lives. The Gift of The Holy Ghost is probably the greatest gift that god has given man. It is essential to always have that with us to guide us and keep us away from the path of sin. 

This is the grand privilege of every Latter-day Saint … that it is our right to have the manifestations of the Spirit every day of our lives.

- Lorenzo Snow

Let us do everything in our power to have the spirit with us in our every day lives. It will bless us and inprove every aspect of our days! I love the spirit and the power and compfort and strength it brings into my life each day. I cherish it! 

Big Wood Burger with Onion Rings

Catching Fish

Fishing Again

Cool Street Sign

Fishing with Elder Adair

Fishing with Jace

Transporting the grill

Lighting the Grill

Playing Frisbee Golf

Playing Frisbee Golf

Playing Frisbee Golf

Playing Frisbee Golf

Bacon Wrapped Hot Dogs

Really old Truck

October 22, 2018 More and More People

This week was super awesome! There was so many great things that happened I will just go through my week day by day!

On Tuesday, we decided to send out a scripture text to a number of people we are teaching. After we sent it out, our phone exploded with people commenting and saying what they liked. It went super well. We then had a great lesson with Virginia who is super awesome! She has in the past not liked some of the Missionaires who had met with her. She has been reading in the Book of Mormon however and has felt the spirit and said she is starting to like the people in our church. Later, I went to Lake City with Elder Alder and Elder Adair was in our area with Elder Sanders. Elder Alder and I had a good night and taught some good lessons. 

Wednesday, we did some service for a old couple; the Youngs. They were super nice and fed us breakfast after. When I was eating my eggs, I felt something crunchy when I was sticking my fork through a chunk and thought nothing of it. I put it in my mouth and chewed it up and came to realize it was a huge chunk of shell. I chewed it up and swallowed it. Haha! We found a lost sheep who has been inactive for many years as well as her husband who was interested who is an ex Jehovahs witness. 

Thursday we had to wake up early and head off to Zone Conference. It was a good one and the main focus was on being representatives of Christ in all we do, using technology to involve members, and the purpose of the number goals we set. After we had some trainings on how to use some new cooking tools our whole mission will be getting. After, I went on a tradeoff with Elder Sanders in our area. We had dinner and correlation and that concluded our night. 

Friday, we had a few good lessons and found someone before we traded back. After, we had weekly planning and that lasted until dinner. After, we saw Brian who's aunt passed away and he was going through a lot. We shared how we can all live again and did our best to comfort him. Then we went to a lesson with Tanisha and she is so elect. We set a baptismal date with her. She is so ready we may move it up a week or two. Haha. 

Saturday we did a lot of phone work and got members together to help the people we teach and support them. Every member we got in contact with said yes so that is a highlight! The Live Oak branch is so awesome! We found another person who's husband is a member and taught her. She is awesome but can talk your ear off so we have to work really hard to stay on topic and teach. We had a lesson with a potential we found last week and she became a new person too. 

Sunday, we had a full sacrament meeting. Brian came and we were expecting Tanisha but she didn't show. We found out she was in the hospital and had just gotten released later that day. We went out with a member and saw a referral and taught her and her roommate. We had a great lesson after with Brian reading in the Book of Mormon and helping him understand the context and apply it to himself. Also later, someone knocked on our door and we went outside and nobody was there. We looked around and found Elder Burg hiding! Haha it was great to see him again. 

 

Our week was super filled the spirit and miracles. I know as we do our best to serve the Lord, and use the tools he has given us, we will be so blessed! Fill your week with scripture study and prayer and everything will be better. I can promise you that! I love and appreciate all y'all do and love serving the Lord! It's the best, I love it! Haha have a great week! 

Pictures

1. Family history

2. PMG on someone's truck (preach my gospel) haha 

3. How we grill with the boys! 

The way we grill with the guys.

PMG Preach My Gospel Truck

Elder Elgaaen

 

October 15,2018 Hurricane Michael

This week was full of miracles! On Saturday night, we felt inspired to knock on a door while we were Inetting. It was getting late and was already dark out. We knocked on this door and a lady answered and we invited her to watch the 1 min sacrament video. She agreed to watch it and she was super interested in coming to church. She didn't have a ride so we started building a member team. Our branch mission leader picked up her and her 2 kids and brought them to church. We had a member sit by her in sacrament. She came with us and met some of the branch Missionaries in gospel principles. The primary music person invited her 3 year old go with her into primary and the primary welcomed her by singing the welcome song and she left super happy. Also in relief society, a member sat by her who has a young kid as well and became really good friends with her. The member invited her into her home with us for dinner on Wednesday! She is probably a 3-5 week baptism! It was a super awesome week! 

Another Sunday Miracle is Brian came to church! He said he wanted to come and wasn't too sure about coming because of his medical issues. He said if he did come, it would only be for 30 minutes. When we were pulling into the church parking lot, we saw his truck and were super pumped about it! He met quite a few members and said he enjoyed church! After church before he left, we asked him if anything stuck out to him or if he felt inspired. He said he was going to come next week and felt good... but later that night, we got a call from Brian and he said he was thinking about church and some of the things he learned and felt super good and inspired. He also told us that he had started to pray every night and morning and has noticed a huge difference in his life! It was an amazing Sabbath! 

Some sad news and crazy news that happened is we went to see Jennifer. When we got there, she said that her boyfriend had beaten her with a bad and had gone to prison! That was a shocker! She showed us some bruises and explained what happened. She is probably going to move to lake city soon so that was sad news. 

Another thing that happened this week was Hurricane Michael. I was not effected by it besides 30 minutes of rain and a little wind. We went to Lake City with the other elders and spent the day there doing missionary work. It was a good time! After, we have heard some about the condition of the Hurricanes path and it isn't good! They need a ton of help and resources. They have lost all cell service, have no gas, hardly any structures within miles of the beach are even standing.... We were told that for about 80 miles, there isn't a single standing pine tree. People don't have any transportation or resources. Every store is closed! It may take months to get power back because the whole power grid has to be rebuilt. It is a time to definitely be grateful for everything we have as well as a time to pray for those who don't and to do everything we can to serve. I hope that they will let us Missionaries go down and do some service but who knows! 

Last of all, we got to do some service on Saturday. We "mowed" Brian's lawn with a motor less lawnmower. In about an hour, we had finished a 15'-50' section! Haha it was super fun though and we enjoyed it. This week was amazing! Miracles have not ceased! I also would challenge everyone to pray for the people affected by Hurricane Michael. They need the prayers! I love you all and hope you have an amazing week! 

1. Broken Bridge

2. Me dunking pinecone

3. Bass

4. Dunk Gif

5. Catfish

6. Food!