Captain I'm an Elder not a plumber

Dear Family,

  The reason we are emailing on tuesday is that we went to the temple today, it was really good.  

  We had a kindof slow week this, just with being able to teach people.  Julie and Donna were baptised on Sunday. It was a great service. I was able to baptise them. It was a little interesting.  Donna is 79 years old. And she didn't quite get the concept of bending her legs and using her hand to plug her nose.  But she was immersed and came out alive.  It was pretty funny. After they were baptised, I was trying to let the font drain.  Usually you just push it to one side and the other side would pop up and it would start to drain. But that wasn't happening. So I was just tried pulling it and it would come up a little and I could feel air. I had to get changed, so I decided to see if that would let it drain.  After the service was over, we went to check if it had drained any, and it hadn't.  We told Sis Robins about it and she decided she would try so I wouldn't have to get wet a second time.  She tried, got all wet, and still couldn't get it. So I had to go and try and figure it out. I ended up just having to unscrew the whole drain.

  But that was about it this week. Nothing real exciting happened. This week is the last week of the transfer.  This transfer was the quickest one so far. I have no idea what is going to happen at transfer. But I am pretty sure either elder yamashita or I will be transferred.  I don't really have a preference at all. 

 I keep on forgetting to answer moms questions.  As to the dentist, there's no time and the mission really doesn't want us doing that kind of stuff.  My teeth will survive.  About school. I will go back to BYUI for at least a semester or two. I need to get my GPA up before I think  about transfering.  Wait on housing. I am trying to correllate with my friend who visited before I left.  He is in Samoa, which makes it hard. It takes like a month for a letter to get there, but I should hear back from him soon.  And the Romney thing. We just say we don't talk about politics.  We are not to engage in those type of conversations so we are either silent and try to tie in our message when they talk about it...or leave as soon as we can.  But not too many have brought it. I imagine that will change come november. 

  I can't believe Wesley has a twitter. That is funny.  When is tanner's first game?Probably coming up in the next couple of weeks or so.  Have an awesome week.  Next email will be on tuesday again. 

 

Love, Elder Clark

Milk before meat or visa versa

Dear Family,

  This week was really good.  We had 5 invs at church.  It was awesome.  Julie and Donna came and they are getting baptised this sunday.  They are really excited.  They came for Sunday school for the first time and guess what the lesson was on? Exaltation. Becoming like God.  Not exactly the best 1st lesson. But what can ya do..they seemed to like it and roll with it. So thats good.  Also Linda and Fred came, which was awesome.  Linda has like every health issue you can have. They really liked it, and said they will be back.  They had to leave after sacrament meeting because linda didn't bring a mask and her immune system is really down due to kemo pills.  But it was a really great Sunday.  We had a high coucilor speak and he brought someone as well and she was a little long and left him 5 minutes. But it was still good. 

  We had interviews with President last week. It went really good.  We didnt really talk about too much.  He just asked how my mission was going? I told him I loved it and its going by too fast.  And he just said "you got plenty of time and stop thinking about that...but I feel the same way." So it was good. But before the interview I thought I would stay in May Valley for a LONG TIME, but now because of some of the things he asked him about elder Yamashita i think I might get transferred soon. But I dont know.. 

  One of our investigators gave us a referral for Marshawn Lynch the Seahawks Rb who lives in our area.  I guess he is having a little trouble with his decisions right now. We haven't contacted him yet but hopefully this week. 

  HAPPY BIRTHDAY GRANDMA!

  I hope school goes well for everyone. And goodluck wes and tanner in football. What positions will the both of you be playing?

  Have a great week!

Love, Elder Clark

Summer yeah!

Dear Family,

  Well the summer heat is finally starting to hit Seattle.  We have been over 85 for a week or so now. Which feels really good. All the old people on the other hand don't really like it.  In Seattle most of the houses do not have AC, even the new houses they don't put AC in. So it can a little hot in side at times.

  We had a pretty good week.  Julie and Donna came to church again, so they are progressing nicely for the end of August.  A lot of the people we found either dropped us or we dropped the, so we will have to revamp our finding effort.  We found a bosnian guy about a week ago. He is 43 and lives with his parents, which is a huge obastacle.  He really wants to learn more and comt to church and be baptised, but his mom told us if we ever came back again she would call the police. Not sure what to do there. When she came to the door, I don't think its possible for a bosnian woman to look any more furious. 

  We had zone meeting this week. It was really good. President Larkin actually attended it and gave the training.  His training was awesome. He talked about two things that contribute to faith. One of things is action (obedience) and the next one is power (sacrifice to charity). And that the action is just doing the missionary things, but to tap in to God's power we have to totally forget our will.  So we have to sacrifice because we love the people, not just so that others will think were great missionaries.  It was really good. He talked about the latter day work. How the priesthood was a promised blessing to Abraham and his posterity but then they were wandering in the wilderness for 40 years and all the priesthood holders died. But that the latter day work is too fulfill those promises and blessings that were promised to Israel.  

  So its kinda funny.  Sis Robins daughter Hannah is visiting from school. Sis Robins told us that she is planning to go on a mission. Sis Robins tells us everything, she's a big chatter.  But we had to promise not to say anything, because Hannah doesnt want anyone to know for some reason.  She has been asking us all these questions about missions and stuff and we have to pretend like we don't know anything about her wanting to go on a mission.  

  Well it seems like no one is excited to go back to school. I'm glad the olympics are over so everyone will stop talking about it.  I'm doing good on supplies.  My pants are fine. I pair of pants got torn from the gears on the bike but Sis Robins can fix basically anything. 

Love, Elder Clark 

Olympic Torture

Dear Family,

  It was a pretty good week.  Yesterday wasn’t the best.  I am not a very good faster and the three investigators that said they were coming and one of them had a ride with a member didn’t make it too church so that wasn’t too good.  Also the ward missionary who organizes the meals is gone for two weeks and no one signed up for dinner yesterday or today. 

  We survived on bike for a few days, but just barely.  I hurt my shin pretty bad. We were riding down this hill and then someone was calling us. So I was trying to take the phone out of my pocket, as I was doing that, a member was driving by and honked at us and so unconsciously i tried to wave.  Just as I was doing all that the hill leveled and there was an incline for this 5 foot sidewalk. I somehow survived the incline, but was still going a pretty good speed and didn’t have very good balance. I didn’t exactly make the incline going down that ended the side walk. The pedal did a pretty good number to my shin. But we only had to ride bikes for three days..it wasn’t too bad.

  Investigator wise, we should have another baptism on the 18, just need them to come to church this Sunday.  We need to solidify a lot of our investigators and keep finding.  Were hoping that this nine year old gets baptized this month.  She is in an active family, but I guess she is deathly scared of the water, so she hasn’t been baptized yet. But it’s a really sensitive situation and we don’t want to offend anyone. 

But that is about it. There hasn’t been too much going on.  The Olympics are kindof hard to miss. The Robins have been watching, and we can hear the tv from our bedroom. It’s been a little tortuous.  The ward is getting really excited about missionary work. There have already been more baptism this year than any other year. 

The work is going good.  Its finally getting hot. It was in the 90’s the last two days.  It was sort of nice to have the hot weather. Elder Yamashita didn’t like it too much though.  Hope everyone has a good week!

Love Elder Clark