Email: April 23, 2012

Dear Family,

 

This is your dear john letter.  I just don't feel its going to work out anymore and I think we should stop writing.... ha ha Just kidding!  How are things?!  I hear someone had a birthday yesterday!  The big 39 again I think?  Happy Birthday Mom!  Maybe next year you might get to be 40, they have held you back from that in for a while but just keep working hard and I know you'll get there!! 

So things here are going great!  The weather this past week was awesome!  It got up into the mid 80's almost everyday.  I did a lot of sweating the first part of the week but now my body is getting used to the heat again.  It is a lot more humid than I thought it would be.  There was one day that we walked outside and it reminded me of when we were down in Texas picking up Mckay.  Now I am beginning to understand what you went through down there!  But I love it.  People are outside more and we get to talk to more of them it's awesome.  My bike is working great for the most part.  I kind of regret not buying a new one just because of how much of a hassle Betsy has been but it's okay.  I have made a goal that I am going to keep this bike with me for the rest of my life!  I will do whatever it takes to keep her running.  I am so good at fixing it up and tuning it and all that good stuff now.  I got my first flat this week which kind of sucked.  It was on a day that we were super stressed on time and we needed to be at dinner right on time because the baptism was right afterwards and we came out of an appointment and I had a flat.  So we had to call our dinner to give us a ride.  I consider myself pretty lucky that that is the first time that I have had one so far. 

We had a great baptism this week for Vicki Graham.  It went really well.  It was really hectic to put together the program and get it all printed out and then set everything up but I am getting better at it so its okay.  We didn't have a chance to confirm her yet because yesterday was Stake Conference for us so we are waiting until this upcoming Sunday to do it.  We are hopefully going to have Zack's baptism this weekend but I am not 100% sure yet, It might have to be pushed by to next weekend but that's okay because he is for sure going to get baptized and Elder Mildenhall is going to be the one to do it.  We went and met his mom for the first time this past week and she is a super awesome lady.  She is recovering from a blood disease and is on bed rest and is going through physical therapy but she is doing better.  We are going to start teaching her as well but it will be a while before she can come to church and get baptized. 

We had a good week with finding also and found a bunch of awesome new investigators.  We met with this kid named Jonathan whose mom is a member down in Myrtle Creek and so he knew about the church but wasn't really interested until now.  We went and taught the Restoration to him and he said that it all made perfect sense and he had always wondered why there were so many churches out there.  We set up another appointment with him for Tuesday so things are going well with that.  He was willing to come to church but decided that he didn't want to come for Stake Conference for his first time but he will be at church next week. 

We had a lesson with this girl that we thought was going to be a golden investigator but she ended up just wanting to try and tell us how wrong we are for believing what we believe.  We gave her some scriptures that support what we teach and eventually turned the lesson around and invited her to find out for herself through prayer and study and we are going to go back one more time and see if she was actually willing to do that but if not we aren't going back.  It's not worth our time.  It's hard to see the influence Satan has on people and how subtle it really is.   All he has to do is just change the doctrine around a bit and then they get so far off.  Its sad. 

Well how is everyone?  Thanks for the pictures Meg, those little girls are growing up so fast!  It looks like the birthday party was pretty fun.  You can tell them that I will be there for their 3rd birthday!  ha ha, have you taught them to say my name yet?!  Well love you all very much.  Remember to be an example of the believers in word and in deed everywhere you go.  People are watching, even if you think they aren't. 

 

Love,

Elder Erickson

Email: April 16, 2012

Dear Family!  

 

We had another great week this week.  It only rained one day and the rest we had dry and sunny weather!  I love it!  It's crazy though, it could be sunny all day and then it will just randomly start raining so I still have to carry around all of my rain gear just in case. 

I did hear that Sister Littlejohn gave you a call ha ha.  We have been working with her and her daughter since I got here.  They have been inactive for a long time and started coming back to church after I got here.  They are awesome.  Sina, her daughter still has trouble smoking but we are trying to help her get over that.  They are one of my favorite families.  She just loves to feed us and have us over and she just recently had an interview with the Bishop and she is getting a temple recommend so she can go back to the temple!!  It is so crazy to see how much they have changed just since I got here.  The spirit and the gospel can change people so fast. 

We set another baptism date this past week with Zack.  He was the one who just walked in off the street.  He is so excited about the gospel.  He wanted to be baptized this coming Saturday but we have Stake Conference and there are meetings all day that day so we are going to do it next weekend.  We taught him 3 of the lessons last week and he has just soaked it all up.  He came into our gospel essentials class yesterday and was so involved and was asking questions and making comments, I love it!  It doesn't look like Elder Mildenhall will be able to baptize Vicki this week because the member that has been bringing her has his heart set on it so we will just have him baptize Zack next week.  So either way we are going to have him in the water before he leaves! 

It's crazy how much my faith is growing and how often my prayers are answered.  If we are doing what the Lord wants us to, he is so willing to do what he can for us.  We found some good new investigators this week and had some good lessons with some of our other investigators.  We have been striving to get them to church because you can feel the spirit there so strong.  When they come, they usually end up wanting to continue because of the fellowship and spirit.  I read through the experience of Alma the younger this past week with someone we were having a lesson with and it really hit me how important faith is.  He was visited by an angel because of the faith that his father had that he would be changed.  There are so many examples of faith in the Scriptures.  Ether chapter 12 is now my new favorite chapter, I love it.

Zions was pretty fun huh?  I can't believe that I have lived all my life in Utah and I have never been there!  I would definitely like to go sometime in the future.  I am excited for you all to come out here when I'm done.  It is so pretty here when it's not raining.  It's so green.  Yesterday morning when we were riding down our hill to go to church the sun was shining and everything was just so beautiful!   It makes everything seem to go better when the sun is out.  Well anyway, it was good to hear from some of you this week.  I hope all is well and everyone is happy and healthy.  You are all in my prayers all the time.   I am grateful to have been born into our family.  Love you all!

 

Love,

Elder Erickson

Email: April 9, 2012

Hello Family! 

 

Sounds like Easter went well for you all and you had some good talks to listen to in Stake Conference.  We had an AWESOME week!  We actually got asked Tuesday if we would speak in church yesterday which was kind of nerve wracking but it went really well I felt.  We had a youth speaker who talked about what the Resurrection is and what it means and she did a really good job.  Elder Mildenhall then spoke on the prophesies of the Resurrection in the old testament.  The choir sung a few songs, one in between each of the speakers.  I was the concluding speaker and I ended up having about 20 minutes to fill.  I was pretty nervous because I have never had to do that before but the spirit helped me along and I feel that it went really well.  I spoke on what Christ did after his Resurrection and what he taught about and what it means to us that he conquered death.  I had anticipated having a good amount of time so I prepared a lot this week so I had things to talk about. 

 

Other than that we also ended up setting two baptism dates so now we have 3 with a date right now which is awesome!  I haven't been good at that part of missionary work yet and so I made a goal to be better and I am striving to be bold with people and help them change how they live by making commitments. It also helps that I have been given that challenge by President Young and I really want to show that I am dedicated to this work and that I will do it to the best of my ability.  We are going to have a baptism about a week from Thursday with a girl that has been coming to church with our one of our members who wants to be baptized and is very anxious about it.  We taught her the first two lessons after church yesterday and it went really well.  The other was with Marcus that we have been teaching for a while.  I have talked about him a few times I think.  He has been reading the Book of Mormon and wants to see the evidence that it is true.  He believes that faith is very evidence based and says because it claims to be actual history that he wants to see the proof.  We have given him lots of references that he can look at and he has been.  We set a goal baptism date this week so he has something to work toward and he's not just doing nothing to reach that goal every week.  He knows that if it is true that all of it is and he really understands the importance of the Priesthood and it being restored and wants to be a part of it when he comes to know that it is true. 

 

We also had a cool experience Saturday and Sunday.  The ward put on a musical performance commemorating the Resurrection.  In the middle of the program a young guy walked in that we had never seen before and just sat down and listened to the rest of it.  We talked to him afterward and he had been walking by and heard some "good music" and wanted to hear more so he came in and sat down.  He started talking to some of the members and made some friends and we all invited him to come back to church the next day and he was super excited and he came!!  He is like 17 I think and he loved it and plans on continuing to come and worship with us.  His name is Zack.  The member who went and picked him up actually ended up talking with his mother as well and she has a brother that is a member and she wants to hear more about the church as well.  We might actually be teaching him tonight at a member's home which will be awesome!  The work is going so well right now I love it.  I am trying to follow the example of one of my zone leaders that I have had since I got back out, his name is Elder Bird.  He is one of the most successful missionaries I have seen and its because he just goes out and works hard and has fun!  Those are the two biggest keys to success is doing the work but having fun while you are doing it.  People can see when you love what you are doing and want to know why.  Anyway I feel that that is why we are having success right now. 

 

How is everyone else doing?  Mom and Grandma have done the mormon.org challenge and created a profile, what about everyone else?  Matthew and Melinda you both spend enough time on the computer just go onto mormon.org instead of Facebook one time and make a profile.  Matthew there is a video of a professional snowboarder named Jeremy Jones that I really think you would like.  Just try it out, it is awesome!!   Time is flying by, it is already April of 2012, we're a third of the way through the year already!  Crazy!  Well love you all very much and remember life was not just to be endured but enjoyed! 

 

Love

Elder Erickson

Email: April 2, 2012

Hello family!

I realized that last week I put the wrong week on there so week 24 is
the real one.  It is the 4 transfer mark and I burned a tie today!  It
was pretty funny and it smelled really bad ha ha.  So Elder Ludlow
leaves today to go to Eugene and serve there.  My new companion's name
is Elder Mildenhall.  He only has six weeks left in his mission.  He
was in the other district that came out with us when I came out the
first time.  I also got a call from the assistants with a challenge
for the both of us this transfer.  Elder Mildenhall has not been in
the water to baptize someone his whole mission so I was challenged to
make that happen this next six weeks.  It is going to be a tough one
and I would really appreciate the prayers.  I know that it will not be
because of anything that we do but it will be the Spirit that will be
the one changing them.  I am a little nervous that it won't happen but
someone told me the other day that fear is the absence of faith so I
am trying really hard to have the faith that we will be able to make
this happen.
We set a baptism date with one investigator his name is Richard Chan.
He is a referral we got and have been teaching.  He watched conference
but we have not talked to him since then so we are going to do that
this week and see how he felt while doing so.
Conference was awesome!  I loved it.  Elder Bednar's talk in the
Priesthood session was my favorite by far.  I also like Elder
Uchtdorf's talk as well it was really good.  Just stop it!!  Elder
Anderson's talk on Sunday afternoon was also really amazing, ah I loved
them all!  I really didn't want it to end when it did on Sunday.  I
love hearing from our leaders the inspiration that they have received
from the Lord.   I am going to focus more on writing down the
promptings that I receive on a daily basis.  I am still not very good
at writing in my journal but I am striving to be better at that.
Sorry this isn't the longest email, and I won't be able to write back
to everyone individually.  Today we didn't have a lot of time.  Elder
Mildenhall got here at 12:30 and Elder Ludlow leaves in about 2 hours
so we are trying to get everything done in time!  He kind of
procrastinated his packing and now is paying for it.
How is everyone doing on making their mormon.org profiles?
We got some Easter baskets from a family in the ward this week that
were awesome!  They are such a cool family.  The wicks family, I will
definitely keep in touch with them after I leave.  They have 3 girls
that are 11, 9 and 5.  They are hilarious!  We went and had a nerf
fight once when we went over for dinner.  They are awesome at helping
us with lessons and are always willing to open their home if we need
to teach someone there.  I love them.  We are actually going to their
house for dinner again tonight!  Anyway, thank you for all the prayers
and love and support that you give me!  Hope your Easter goes well!
Love you guys!!
 

Love,
Elder Erickson

Email: March 26, 2012

Hello Family!

So only Grandma has gotten back to me on the challenge I left with
everyone last week.  It is really not that hard and it only takes 5 to
10 minutes to create a profile and tell about yourself.  It is the
easiest way to share the gospel right now.  I will keep bugging
everyone about it until you do it!  I have a few more challenges that
I would like to extend but I can't until you complete this one!
This past week has been a pretty good one.  We did our twelve hours of
tracting and ended up finding 6 new investigators.  I would say that 5
of them are money but the other one already flaked on an appointment
with him so kinda stunk.  We are focusing more on putting the effort
into those who are showing any kind of effort to working towards being
baptized.  Since we have been doing that we have been finding more
people it seems.  We actually found a family on Saturday while we were
out tracting and they were only visiting someone, they didn't even
live there.  Fortunately they live in our area so we set up a time to
come back and see them this week.  They are recently married and have
a four month old little boy named Braxton.  He is a cutie!
We also had interviews with President Young this week.  It went pretty
well.  I have realized how much politics are involved with being in
leadership and I hope that I never get called into it!  I like being a
plain missionary and just sharing the gospel.  IT's awesome!  We also
found out that Elder Ludlow is leaving in about a week at the end of
this transfer.  So I will be getting a new companion which will be
interesting.  It sucks when you finally get comfortable teaching with
someone and figuring out the best way to do things, you get a new one!
Sister Young talked to us at interviews and she shared a lot about how
you need to laugh everyday and how much laughter helps you work
better.  It is so true!  We have had several people just attack us
when we were out knocking doors this past week and if we couldn't
laugh about it then it could just ruin us and make us not be able to
work.
I finished the Book of Mormon this past week again and started it
over.  I love reading through Moroni's words at the end when he is
talking to anyone who reads the book and exhorts, or strongly urges,
them to read the words and find out for themselves.  We had a
discussion with a man yesterday who had taken everything that he had
heard from anyone about the Book of Mormon and based his knowledge of
it on that.  We asked if he had ever read it and he said he didn't
need to because he knows from other people what it is.  We explained
what it was and he didn't believe us because of what others said to
him.  If everyone would take that promise and exercise a particle of
faith and experiment on the word, they would receive an answer.  It's
that simple.  People have been so easily blinded by Satan.  Read Alma
48:17-19 and even vs 20.  But if we could all be like those men, Satan
would have no power over our hearts.  They were so firm in their faith
and testimony that the adversary's influence wasn't even a temptation
for them anymore.
Anyway, I would exhort you to strive to be like these men.  They were
an incredible example to us of how we should live our lives.  This
gospel is true.  Our savior Jesus Christ lives and guides the church
through his modern day prophet, Thomas S. Monson.  I know that this is
true.  I love you all.

Love,
Elder Erickson

Email: March 19, 2012

Hello Family!

All is well in Roseburg.  We had a good week this past week.  I do
feel that we could do better and so that is going to be my focus this
upcoming week.  It was supposed to rain all week long but it didn't
which was a blessing.  There were a few days that it rained but then
it stopped and was sunny the rest of the day.  The weather here is so
crazy!!  Not a whole lot happened this week actually, we did find a
new investigator that is pretty awesome.  He has a good friend who is
serving a mission in Germany and so he knows a little about the
church.  He said that he has been wanting religion in his life so he
wants to read the Book of Mormon and try church out and see how it
goes.
We also had a member in one of the other wards who gave us a call a
few weeks ago and has a client/friend that he talked to about the
gospel and he was super interested.  He set up a time for us to talk
with him yesterday and it went very well.  He loves the bible, doesn't
have a church that he goes to but "wants what the Mormons have"  He
has several member friends and he feels like they are always so much
happier than everyone else and he wants that for him and his family.
He had a lot of questions about how to gain that and so we talked
about the Book of Mormon and the church and what he could do to obtain
the same thing.  He wants to come to church this upcoming Sunday and
see what it is like.  He is a very humble man and is going through a
rough time in his life.  He used to be an FBI agent and now is retired
and wants to find forgiveness for the things that he did.  We are very
excited for him because he sincerely wants to change his life.  His
name is Victor Hansen and he owns a little used car dealership.
Another member in our ward gave us a call last week and has someone
that they want us to teach in their home tonight.  We have not met her
but we are going to do that tonight which will be awesome.  That is
about all the news that I have from this side, but I do have a
challenge for everyone.  I want you to all go onto mormon.org and make
yourselves a profile.  It is very easy and it will only take a few
minutes.  It is one of the easiest ways to share the gospel and bear
your testimony of what you know is true.  There is a lot of cool stuff
on the website that you will all like.  Love you all very much, have a
fun week with Amy and Rodney!
 

Love,
Elder Erickson

Email: March 12, 2012

Dear Family!

How is everyone?  This past week was pretty awesome!  The weather at
the first of the week was pretty rainy and cold but it warmed up
really quickly and there were a few days where it got up into the 60's
and 70's.  Spring is already coming around.  We have been told that
this is a way weird winter and that the rain may end up coming way late
and we'll have a super long rainy season.  I would rather not have that
happen.  I have a feeling that I am going to be in this area for a
good amount of time.  I am pretty sure Elder Ludlow is leaving after
this transfer and I should be here with another comp for at least
another 3 months after that.  I am really excited for the summer
months though.  I have heard that it is so pretty here.  It already is
but the clouds and overcast make it kinda dreary.
Anyway, we had Abby's baptism on Saturday!  It was awesome.  I was
thinking back on it and it took a while to get her here but it went so
smoothly when the day finally came.  I have such a strong testimony of
going out and working hard and when we do that the Lord just puts
people in our path.  I can't remember if I told you but we actually
found her the first day that I was here in the Newton Creek area.  We
had a lot of the lesson's with her in member's homes and so there was
a good amount of those people who were at her baptism.  She asked me
if I would be the one to baptize her.  It was a very cool experience.
I have never had that opportunity.  She asked one of the members that
we had had a lesson with if he would do the confirmation which went
really well on Sunday.  The first Sunday that she came to church she
actually found a few people that she already knew from before and so
she already had friends there.  I really feel that the Spirit guided
us to her that day and because we acted on the prompting, we were able
to help someone come unto Christ.  I Love this work!!
We had Richard take us out to dinner this week and we got to talk to
him about the gospel for a good hour and a half.  He was the referral
we got from his friend up in Washington.  He knows a good amount about
the church already and is interested in coming to church and learning
more.  We were given some referrals by one of the member's last Sunday
night that we tried to contact this week.  Most of them didn't work
out but one was a less active family that has two kids that are 19 and
21.  We went by to see them and they are awesome!  They were super

welcoming and they set up a time for us to come by and have dinner
with them.  The mother is going to start coming back to church, not in
our ward but in one of the other wards because her mom goes there and
needs some help getting around.  The father on the other hand is going
to be a hard one.  He said that the reason he doesn't go is that
members don't really live what they believe.  We tried to explain that
people have agency and that no one is perfect but he is pretty
stubborn.  It's pretty frustrating that people let their own pride get
in the way of their salvation.  They need to just get over it!  There
is another part member family that we are working with where the wife
who is the member, doesn't come because she thinks people are too
fake.  It's so ridiculous!  But we can only encourage and try to help.
But other than that things are going well.
We got Marcus to come and play basketball Wednesday night with us and
he had a lot of fun.  There was a good amount of people there but not
too many.  It was sweet.  Well I hope all is well back in good old Lehi,
hope you are taking advantage of having Buffalo Wild Wings in your
city!  Someone told me that they have one up in Corvalis so I am
hoping that someday I get to serve up there so I can eat there!!  I
love you all and have a good week.

Love,
Elder Erickson

Email: March 5, 2012

Whats up family?
This week wasn't the greatest.  I got a cold from who knows where and
it wasn't just a little one.  I was hacking up stuff all week, it was
not fun at all!  I am finally getting over it.  It's hard to not get
sick when you are on a bike all day and you don't have a ton of time
to rest.  I feel like my immune system doesn't have time to
recooperate ever.  We had one morning that I felt so gross that I just
slept and then we went out in the afternoon but other than that we
just kept working and I feel that we saw some awesome things because
of it.
We got a call on Friday afternoon from the mission office giving us an
awesome referral.  It was from a guy up in Washington who had been
working with a guy and had been bringing him to church and talking
about it with him.  He was moving to Roseburg on Saturday into our
area and he wanted us to be there to help him move in.  We also got a
call from the guy in Washington and he just gave us a little
background on the guy and what we should expect and try to do with
him.  So we went and helped him move on Saturday and it went really
well.  His name is Richard Chan.  He is super friendly and is taking
us to dinner on Friday to talk more about the church and all that good
stuff.  We invited him to church but he had to take the U-haul truck
back up to where he was living and get his car so he wasn't able to
make it.  We are having a ward party this weekend and we also invited
him to that and church next Sunday as well.  He said that he would be
there.
We also met with a guy named Charlie who is dating one of the members
in the other wards.  We talked for a while and then asked him if he
would be interested in learning more about the church and in trying it
out and he said he would so we have an appointment with him tomorrow
in the afternoon I believe that should be pretty awesome.  We had to
change Abby's baptism to this Saturday instead of Tuesday because none
of the ward was going to be able to make it that night and we want a
good amount of people to be there so she will feel more welcomed.  She
was at church yesterday which was awesome and the bishop introduced
himself and talked with her a bit, it was very good for her.  We
already had the interview so everything is good to go with that.  We
also were able to get back into contact with a part member family I
think I told you about.  It's a single mom with a 9 year old who told
us that he wanted to be baptized.  We haven't been able to get a hold
of them for a while but we did the other night as we were riding home
and set up an appointment for tonight and we are hopefully going to
set a specific date for that.  All in all things are going pretty
well.  I feel like I am finally starting to focus on my purpose as a
missionary and not worry about other things or myself so much.  It
feels good.
How's life going for everyone?  I hear it finally snowed pretty good,
it is very weird to have a winter without snow.  It is already march
and I have seen snow once and it didn't stick so it doesn't count.  It
feels like it is spring here already.  This past week it was sunny and
got up into the 60's it was crazy.  It is very pretty here though.  It
is very hilly and has sooo many trees.  I love it.  Well love you all
very much.  Thank you for all that you do for me.
 

Love,
Elder Erickson