Monday, November 28, 2011

Baptisms and Transfers


I emailed dad everything lol. but I love you and can you email my bishop in Vegas and tell him that I said thanks for the present. I would love to hear from him. I hope everything keeps looking up. I know it is for me even though it is getting way colder, which totally sucks!!!

Every week can you update me on how much money is in my account that I can use?? Because I have no idea, I probably won’t use it often, but it would be good to know.
Anyway, Have a great week!

Love, Elder Phillips

Hey,

this last month has been a crazy one. 41 people were baptized in our mission and we need to baptize 40 more in order to reach our goal. So please pray for us as we continue to try and reach that. I know it is possible; it is just going to be hard. We need all of the help we can get.

Things are going great here and it is starting to get really cold. Do you have a jacket that you can send me that isn’t super long like the one that I have? I really could use one that isn’t like a dress for most days.

I finished one transfer and I am well on my way now. Carl our investigator came to church yesterday and it was the best testimony meeting I have been to out here. I was really surprised, because all of the weird people didn’t go up lol. A lot didn’t even come to church, it is weird here, once people hear about snow they like shut down and don’t even leave their houses. Must be a Midwest thing, a guy told me that last year people got mad at the bishop for not cancelling church when it snowed hahahaha. People are crazy.

I have been teaching a lot of African American people and they are the coolest people ever. It is really awesome to see how the lord has people prepared for us.

Oh! We also got one of the brand new mission cars, that is pretty cool I think. It is a lot of fun. How are you guys doing? I miss home a lot, but this time really is flying by. Sundays just keep popping by it is really cool:) Soon I will be back!

Are you ever going to send me your conversion story? Like about how the missionaries just had all of the answers and stuff??? I could really use that. It doesn’t have to be anything elaborate, just your testimony and experience with missionaries. I won’t share it with people if you don’t want me to. I would like to read it though.


Sierra- How are you?. I heard you are in a lot of pain. Try to push through it and be strong, but listen to the doctors and do what they say so you can get better. Are you exercising? Try to stay active, I know it will help :) I miss you!

Kylie- Hey! Good job on your grades! Keep it up and get all your work in so you can get A's you have to get that new car so you don’t have to walk everywhere in Kansas. Heck you need to get your license first lol. When are you getting that? You doing ok? Let me know if I can do anything for you. I am getting you and Sierra both an awesome Christmas present!!
   
I Love you!!

Elder Phillips

Monday, November 21, 2011

Missionary Work


Mom! you are doing missionary work!! That is so cool :) I hope that she does start going to church! Can I ask you a favor? Can you type up your story of missionary experiences, like when you were converted and email that to me? I want to use it in a lesson. It doesn’t have to be fancy just talk about your testimony and what happened from the first time you met missionaries till after you were baptized.

This week has been pretty dang busy. We had so many lessons. It was a lot of fun. I also can play the Ukelele pretty well. Carl has a baptismal date now which is so awesome I just hope that it goes through. It is also getting really really cold. It kind of stinks but I am doing ok. Those Long Johns are super warm.

I have learned a lot this week about how just how much of a difference it makes when you perform service for people. We have been raking the yards and bagging leaves for tons of people. They all have been coming to church now. It is so cool to see families become reactivated. Some people don’t even realize that they aren’t active. I hope that you guys are still going to church regularly and all of that stuff.

I miss home a lot. But I am not depressed like the other people that came out with me. At least not yet I guess. The President really likes me too. The Office Elders always call us when they need help because the Mission office is in our area. So I get to see President Clark pretty often. It is a lot of fun. He is a funny guy.

How are you doing? You going to send me some awesome stuff for the holidays? Could you send me cool little toys that i can give to some kids? Just cheap stuff. There are lots of kids out here that really aren’t going to have a Christmas so I want to help out as much as I can.

I Love you guys!!

Love,

Elder Phillips

Monday, November 14, 2011

"Baby Mama" Chevy and bikes :)


Hey,

About the card, I don’t know how it got over drafted so much. I only paid for my suitcases, and a few other things. I won’t spend any more of it for a long time though sorry about that. And the letters that i send are personal for you, they just can be sent to other people too. Did you guys want me to handwrite you guys letters too? that would be really hard, but i could try.
How is my facebook doing? are you updating it lots with the stuff i say? I expect that you are really getting a kick out of that haha.

Anyway, I miss you guys a lot! This week has been a crazy one. It is hard to keep motivated when everyone that you try to get appointments with, drop their appointments. It is way ridiculous. We have a couple of new potential investigators though.

One is a younger African American kid named Chevy, Chevy has a "Baby Mama" and works in "sales". Kind of sketchy i know but he is really interested in the Book of Mormon and we have gone over and prayed with him a couple times. Also, Carl is about ready to set a date for baptism, i will probably set it tomorrow then, I will have my first baptism! Assuming that he doesn’t chicken out. He is an amazing guy and I love being out here sharing the gospel and seeing how it changes people’s lives.

I finally went and got my bike! Thank You!! It is really nice and i promise to take good care of it. But if i have learned anything about bike areas, they involve lots of crashing hahaha. I will be careful though but thanks!

Since my companion is the District Leader, i get to go on exchanges all over our district. This is way fun, because i get so see all of the rich areas and I even got to see Albert Pujols House. He is like a star player for the St. Louis Cardinals. Also, the guy who owns Willy Wonka, he lives in our District and is actually a member. Crazy right?

Well, not to much exciting stuff happened this week im sorry. I did meet lots of people in other areas, that were truly prepared by the lord but in my area, things are kind of rough. I hope that they start to look up soon though! :) Pray for me!

I love you Lots!! I miss you too!!

Love,

Elder Phillips

Monday, November 7, 2011

No shooting please!

Hola Family!

This week was my first really rough week. People kept dropping appointments, and just not a lot happened. It is really crazy. Don’t worry though, we had a decent day yesterday and have been fasting every week. Things will get better.

There are some really crazy people out here.. I kind of miss the niceness of the west. We met a lady who was almost scared of us because of "who we are associated with" I asked her why she would be scared of someone associated with Jesus and she didn’t really have an answer . My favorite people are the Born-Again Christians though. They always have really really crazy stories! They are always interesting and somewhat superfluous but they love to share them and we love to listen.

Have i told you guys about Carl? Carl is an older African American man who the lord really has prepared. Only one problem, he is very scared to be baptized because everyone in is family is Southern Baptist and he doesn’t want to cause a problem. He has a really strong testimony of the church though and loves us missionaries. He calls us the "Men in Black!" lol We always have to wear our black pants when we go over there or he gets disappointed with us. He is such a cool guy and we are hoping he comes to the conclusion that he really needs to be baptized by someone holding the authority from god.

Also, we have a new investigator named Terri Berry, She is a character!!!  This lady loves the gospel and is reading the Book of Mormon, she knows Joseph Smith was a prophet and the Book "has to be the word of god" but she also thinks she is an exorcist and kind of like one of those people that deal with paranormal stuff. It is crazy some of the stories she tells about when she met demons and stuff. She is great though we are just worried that she will preach false doctrine a lot. She is wonderful though and loves to talk.

The ward here is great!! Our ward mission leader is the man, and this guy Brother Wolfley seriously rocks when we take him to lessons. We always call him because he is the most help. The ward here is good though and they are starting to warm up to us and invite us over, at first they didn’t want to feed us because of bad experiences with missionaries before. Things are changing in this area though. For the better.

So part of missionary work is also visiting Part-Member or Less-Active Families. In doing this, we met Mike Eberhart. He is clinically insane and part deaf. We didn’t know this at the time though. Mike thinks we are detectives from the church and has a strong dislike of the bishop because her thinks the bishop, along with older missionaries, tried to drug him and steal his truck. It is always an adventure when we go over to see him. However, we aren’t allowed to go over there anymore, it isn’t necessarily safe.

Well, I haven’t been shot at, yet and we work hard every day. I love it out here. Dad mentioned that there are probably good places to eat, but truth is i just don’t have money to eat there haha. We are very very cheap when we eat out :)

I love you all and I miss you tons! That was my week though. It has been raining a lot but it isn’t to cold, yet..... I hope everything is getting better!

Elder Kirk David Phillips