Email: December 12, 2011

Hello Family!

This email is not going to be the longest, it has been a crazy day. We went to bend for a zone p day with our entire zone. One of the members up there owns an indoor sports arena and we all went there and played some football and ultimate frisby. It was a lot of fun. President and Sister Young were in town and so they came by and played with us for a while. We had interviews yesterday with both of them as well. They came out here and interviewed everyone in their own area which was pretty cool. This week has been a better one. I decided that I was going to take it by the horns and just make it a good week no matter what. We took one of the young men in one of our wards out who is preparing for a mission which was very good for him. His papers are in and he is just waiting for his call. We had some good lessons with a few of our investigators and one of them in particular was very good. She was tracted into by the other elders before us and so we took her from them so this was the first time that we had been able to sit down and visit with her. We talked for a while about what her religious beliefs were and then we taught her about the restoration of the gospel and about Joseph Smith and the Book of Mormon. We gave her a copy and challenged her to read and to pray about it. We are going to go back sometime this week and teach her more. I am very excited she seems pretty golden. Also President challenged us in our interviews to hand out 100 copies of the Book of Mormon by the end of the transfer which is going to be slightly difficult but doable. I really want to reach that especially with Christmas coming up people will hopefully soften their hearts and let us talk with them. I have to get going, I still have to email President Young. Sorry it was so short. I will write an extra long one next week to make up for it. I love you all and have a great week!

Love,

Elder Erickson

Pictures from Marsh

Email: December 5, 2011

Dearest Family,

How are thou? It sounds like everyone is doing pretty well. Getting cold there? The weather has been pretty dang nice here the past few days. The sun has been shining and it has been up in the 50's. We spent a lot of Saturday doing some service for some people and it was to warm outside to even wear a jacket it was crazy.

So this week was pretty crazy also. We had transfers and Elder Snyder was made District Leader and so now it is just us here in Prineville. 2nd ward didn't have too many investigators so we didn't have a huge amount of people to go see but we are going to be a lot more busy with both wards which I am very happy about. I hate wasting time. Elder Snyder had to go to Eugene for a Zone/District leader training on Friday so I spent the day with an Elder in Bend. His name is Elder Lechtenberg and he is actually from Lehi also and we know a lot of the same people. It was pretty funny. It was very nice to get a break from my companion and go and do some good work with him. They had a baptism coming up on Saturday so we spent the day visiting all of their investigators and inviting them to the baptism which went really well. They have so many more than we do it was a bit discouraging, but it says in Preach My Gospel not to compare yourself to other missionaries so I tried really hard not to do so.

We also had the creche this weekend which was awesome. I don't know if I told you about that but our ward and the other ward and a bunch of people from the community got together and filled our building up with nativity scenes and had an open house with musical performances from a lot of different people in the town. We had a few from other church's and then the choir from the school that a few of the youth in the ward are in and then one of the families in the ward who is extremely musically talented. It was amazing. There were a lot of people there and we were able to talk to a lot of them. One of the friends of Sister Moss who organized the whole thing came to church on Sunday and actually felt the spirit so strongly that she got up and bore her testimony. We didn't get to hear it unfortunately because we were in the other wards ward council meeting. But someone texted us and told us about it and so we went and saw them later that night and it turns out she doesn't live in town! It was kind of a let down but it was very good for her and we are going to get some other missionaries down in LaPine to go and visit them which will be good.

Other than that not really anything happened this week. It was very slow. I am going to try some new things that I set goals for and I am going to Make this week be better whether it wants to or not. I know from things that have been promised to me that I am expected to be a leader and I am going to do my best to step up and do it. I had the movie Forever Strong on my mind a lot this week and how the coach does things, and he actually has a mormon.org profile and video that I would highly recommend watching. He is the mission president in Fresno actually. I learned that from Grandma, but his name is Larry Gelwix. He says in the movie that he wants his players to be forever strong on the field so they can be forever strong off it. I think it compares greatly to being in the mission field and I have taken that to heart. I have so many things about myself that I still need to change and I am working on them now so that I will be different still when I come home and not go back to the way things were. Kia Kaha - Forever Strong. I love you all very much and hope to hear from you soon.

Love,

Elder Erickson

Email: November 29, 2011

Hello Family!

This was a really weird week. It went by really slow and fast at the same time. It didn't feel like it was very productive because we had two days off and everyone was out of town for the holiday and it was very hard to meet with anyone. We had Thanksgiving dinner with the Thompson family. They have a lot of family here in town so there was a lot of people there. It was super fun. We played Apples to Apples after dinner and I totally lost because I didn't know anyone and they all pick really weird cards for everything. We got to watch 17 Miracles also. I had not seen it yet and it is an extremely good movie. I only cried three times though. To see the faith that they had throughout all of those trials is incredible. It makes me feel like I'm a whiner. They went through more hardships in that period of time than almost anyone does their entire life. They stayed strong and came to know their Savior. I want faith like that. I have been studying about faith a lot lately. Reading through the New Testament has so many different instances that happened because people had or didn't have faith. And we are told over and over again that if we had faith as even the size of a mustard seed then we could command mountains to move and they would. I am making it a goal to have that kind of faith.

This week we went and saw some potential investigators that we had tracted out a while back and had some good experiences. Both are families which is sweet. One of them had talked with Missionaries down in Medford a few years back and likes the church and the emphasis we put on families. He told us that he's not sure that we will convert him but he would love to have us come over and teach them. So our plan is to just go in and try to get him to have a spiritual experience. We are not the ones that convert people its the Spirit. We had left him with a copy of the Book of Mormon and he hadn't got a chance to read any of it yet but his wife who we met for the first time this week said that she would read it to him while they were in the car. (They were heading to Idaho for Thanksgiving). So we were very excited about that.

The other guy we tracted into also and he doesn't have really any religious back ground but he was really interested to hear more. We were only able to talk to him for a minute this week because he was heading out of town also but he told us to come back because he was still really interested. I am really excited for both of them.

So transfers are tomorrow and we all got the calls on Friday to tell us what was happening. Elder Snyder and I are staying here in Prineville and they are taking it back to only one set of Missionaries here. So we are now covering the whole town. Elder Cooper and Elder Berg the 2nd ward missionaries that were here are leaving. Elder Cooper is going down to Roseburg to be a Zone Leader and Elder Berg is going to Grants Pass. Elder Snyder was made District leader also. So far everyone of my companions has been district leader while I have been with them. Pretty weird.

Sounds like Thanksgiving was good for everyone. Black Friday sounds like it is getting crazier every year. We have heard a lot of stories already it's just insane! Love you all and remember to be missionaries in your everyday life. It's what Christ would be doing if he were on the earth and we are striving to be like him.

Love,

Elder Erickson

Email: November 21, 2011

Hello Family!

Well another week has gone by extremely quickly. It seems as though time has sped up and there is nothing I can do about it. Even the days are going by very fast, usually they go slow and weeks go fast but both are. We had zone conference this week in Redmond which is like 20 minutes from here. It was extremely spiritual and I loved it. The biggest thing that was talked about was the Holy Ghost. We talked about the Holy Ghost and how he will teach you the truth of all things. We focus on being worthy to have that spirit with you all the time. President Young talked a lot about pride and how the pride of our hearts keep us from having him in our companionships. He said that there were a lot of missionaries who were saying that it was them who was having the success and were slow to remember who it really came from. It was amazingly spiritual. So after that we made goals with our companionships to give thanks more often each day and week.

I made it a goal to say my nightly prayer and only thank him for things. After the first few minutes of prayer you run out of things and you have to really think about what you're thankful for. Not just the superficial things. It has been awesome so far. Also this week we had a really good experience while tracting. We said a prayer and asked for guidance about where to go and we both felt good about a street. We went out and tracted the street no one was really interested and we were getting kind of discouraged, but we went to the very last house and it looked kind of like a bed and breakfast or a little store and so we were kind of unsure whether to knock on it or not. Well we did and the ladies name was Angie Peebles. She is awesome! She knows like 10 people who are in our ward and works with them all the time. We got talking to her and she loves our church and really the only reason she hasn't been baptized yet is that she was never really invited to come or to listen to the missionaries. Some of the members had jokingly told her that she couldn't go inside the building because she wasn't a member and she took it as being serious. But it seems like it is definitely her time to receive the gospel. She asked us if we would help her mother put up some Christmas decorations and told us that she would feed us in return so that is awesome and we are going to try and get her to church this week. So it was a pretty good week.

So I had my first bike wreck this week also. We were flying down this hill and I went to turn onto this street and for some reason my back tire just came off and I slid and got some good road rash on my hands so that was fun.

For Thanksgiving we are going over to the Thompson's. Sister Thompson is awesome. They just recently got back from serving a mission in Canada and they feed us all the time its pretty sweet. I'm pretty excited. Well I have to get going I love you all and hope everyone is doing well.

Love,

Elder Erickson

Email: November 14, 2011

Hello Familia!

Yeah I speak Spanish now, (I wish!). I decided today that I want to learn how to speak Spanish. So I might start doing that soon. Maybe. Anyway I am eating this delicious burrito right now whilst I am writing this email. We found this awesome little Mexican place here in town today. It's amazing.

Well this week has been kind of a hard one. We had soo many appointments fall through and I feel like there was so much wasted time. I hate it. I just wish everyone would listen and realize that this message will do nothing but help them. Because of all of the failed appointments we did a lot of work trying to find and reactivate less active members. Its going okay but it still is not the greatest either. I just don't know what I am doing wrong. I want so bad to share the message with someone. We only have one investigator right now and we weren't able to meet with him this week either. We have an appointment with him on Tuesday so pray for that to work out. I really need your prayers right now more than ever. I know I am still new and don't know the best way to do things but I want the area to be successful and I feel like its my fault that it's not.

But other than that, the weather was pretty nice this week. It is supposed to snow this week and we are hoping it doesn't until we have the car again. We get the bikes again til Friday. It is getting really windy which makes it seem so much colder than it really is. Also we have zone conference this week and the four of us Prineville elders are singing in it. I don't know why they asked us but we are so I will let you know how that goes. We are also getting a new car for some reason. Ours only has twenty two thousand miles on it and they usually don't sell them until like fifty of sixty. But that will be kinda cool. They have been buying Subuaru's lately so we might get one of those.

The ward thanksgiving party is this weekend also. On Saturday night and they are also doing a pie and cake auction for the young mens/womens budget. It should be fun and we are going to try and get a lot of less actives and nonmembers there.

So how's life back in good old Utah? Snow yet? I realized this week how long it takes to go through the mission office when you send a letter so just send them to the house now if you want. The address is 491 NE Brookstone Dr, Prineville Or, 97754. They will get here much quicker. Well I still have to write president sorry its not the longest email. Hopefully I will have more to write about this next week. Love you all.

Love,

Elder Erickson

Email: November 7, 2011

Hello Everyone!

Well I did get a few letters this week so that is awesome. You are all undisowned except for Mckay. Just kidding. I got all of Maggie's 6 letters so that was awesome!! Well this has been a very long week. We had a lot of appointments that we had set up fall through and it was very discouraging. It is a good learning experience though because we are now finding out what we need to do better to get people to stick to their appointments. We have been getting phone numbers and giving them a reminder text the day of the appointment which has seemed to work a lot better. Yeah I don't know if I told you but our mission is one of the testing area's for texting on the phones. It has actually been awesome. So many people are on their phones all the time and they use technology more and more so it is easier to do it that way. Have any of you been on mormon.org? Not lds.org but it is its own site. If not I would highly recommend it. It is actually very cool. It is used for members to make profiles about how they found the church and how they live their faith and it has a ton of videos from people around the world who are or have been in the public eye that talk about how they are Mormon. It also has all of our basic beliefs for people to read and a way that you can talk to missionaries right there in a chat room kind of a thing. It's very cool. It's good to see that technology is being used for good rather that all of its other downfalls. They have a campaign going in new york city and Chicago and Boston and a few of the cities where they have advertising all over the city its very cool. So we are supposed to get on there an hour a week and share the gospel that way.

Well sounds like everyone had a good Halloween. I saw the pictures of the babies and they looked so cute! I tell everyone I can that I have the cutest nieces on the planet. We had to be in the house on Halloween by 7 so we just played some games and just hung around. The weather is rapidly deteriorating. It is very cold here now. We actually had it snowing a little on Sunday morning. We do a car share so we have the car Friday through Sunday and the other Elders get it Tuesday through Thursday and we are on bikes the other half. It is very cold on the bikes lately. It seems as though it gets colder the days we are on the bikes. We are still trying to find the other Elders a place to live but nothing yet. Well is was good to hear from a few of you and hope to hear from you soon. I would love some family pictures if anyone wanted to send some.
Love you all very much!

Love,

Elder Erickson

Email: October 31, 2011

Hello family,

Well it has been about two weeks and I have recently decided to disown everyone except for Mom, Maggie and Grandma, as they are the only ones that I have heard from since I got here. Maggie is now my new favorite. On another note, the work has been picking up here in Prineville which is awesome! Bernice Powell was baptized on Saturday and it was amazing! It is amazing to see the work of the gospel in someones life. She has completely changed, she had a problem with smoking before and with drinking coffee and she overcame both and was baptized. It has also helped her less active husband to see the error of his ways and come back to church also. So all around it was awesome.

We did a lot of finding stuff this week because the teaching pool was running low. We found a good ten new investigators that we have return appointments with this week. We did have a few fall through this past week so we have decided to not really count them as new investigators until we actually meet with them that second time. It was funny when I got here we had two full boxes of copies of the Book of Mormon and the first one is almost gone. We figured it out and we have given at least six if not more away almost everyday this week.

I don't know if I told you but we have two sets of Elders living in the same place right now, which can get kind of crazy but its fun. They have been looking for a new place but are having a hard time. This town is just kind of dying off. It's sad to see so many people without work. A lot of the ward members have been moving elsewhere to find work. I also took a look at the ward list this week and realized how many less active people there are around here. If we had all of them coming to church we would need to create another ward to accommodate them. We made a goal to try and visit one of them a day and see where that takes us.

Well I really would love at least one letter. I have not received any as of now and it's kind of a bummer and that's why you are all disowned for the moment. I guess Melinda you're off the hook too because I just barely sent your birthday card off and I'm sorry that it took me so long.

So a random fact about Prineville, It is where Les Schwab started. So a lot of the people in the town work there and apparently Facebook just put one of their big data places out here also. That doesn't really help with jobs though because it doesn't really need many people to run it. Anyway, Love you all and hope to hear from you.

Love,

Elder Erickson

Email: October 24, 2011

Hello family,

Well I am back in Oregon. Sounds like you have already heard but I am serving in Prineville. It is almost the dead center of Oregon. There is a town not too far from here that is called Post that really is the official center of the state. We are almost the farthest out but there are missionaries in Burns that is about another three hours from here. It is a pretty small city, not quite as small as Coquille was but there are two sets of missionaries here, so our area is almost as small. It is crazy how many people are related here. It has been a long and short week at the same time. There hasn't been a huge amount of success here in the recent past and I hope that we can change that pretty quick. My new companions name is Elder Snyder. He is from Provo. He has been out only 4 and a half months. He is a little different of a guy but he loves the gospel and that's all that matters. Right now we only have two investigators, Bernice Powell who has a baptism date for this weekend and Aaron Mapes. They taught Aaron a while back and then had a hard time getting in contact with him for about three months but we got in contact with him and went over and talked to him on Thursday. He is a religious guy he goes the calvary church here in town and loves the bible. He had a problem with having to receive the gift of the Holy Ghost by the laying on of hands when we talked with him. He thinks that anyone can have him with you all the time once you have decided to believe. We have a few good scriptures that we are going to talk with him about next time. We assigned him to read Acts 8:14-17 and Moroni chapter 3. They really haven't had a real lesson with him yet. He loves to talk so they just ended up talking about gospel topics with him. This next time I am hoping to go over that concern and then have a real lesson. We did find a good few investigators this past week that I feel good about. We are meeting with one on Wednesday that I feel very strongly about. My goal is to have her baptized by the end of November. She knows a lot of the members around and teaches music to a few of the youth. Her father passed away about a year ago and she is now taking care of her mother full time. She seemed very interested and we gave her a copy of the Book of Mormon and gave her a section to read and pray about and we are going to discuss that with her Wednesday. But other than that its been pretty slow. They didn't really do any tracting here before, I don't know why but I have made it so we do that at least two hours a day. We are heading out to a corn maze today and might play some basketball. Oh something funny happened I wanted to tell you about. So you remember Justin from last season of biggest loser? He was Rulon's partner. Anyway he is our bishop's brother and he came to visit this week and so I got to meet him. Pretty random but I thought you guys would like that. Well got to go. Love you all and look forward to hearing from ANYONE.

Love,

Elder Erickson