July 21, 2008

Hey Everyone-
Well I can’t believe how fast the weeks are going! I feel like I just emailed everyone and once again I have to try and remember all the events that took place this week. On Monday we said goodbye to Katie and you got to say Hello to her! She is so thoughtful, she bought us both ties as we left and gave us some pictures along with a note. These are things I will always cherish! Later that night we had dinner with the Gaag family, he is from Germany and very nice. I love member meals, because we didn’t know anything about Brother Gaag. During dinner we found out he is hilarious and has a great family and very missionary minded!
Tuesday was transfers; I can’t tell you how much I enjoyed that. I got to just sit back and enjoy the whole experience without being nervous about a new companion or area! We got a great group of missionaries in the zone. I have been thinking so much on how to improve this zone! Bellevue South has been known to be a dead zone and so we are doing all we can to try and change that reputation! I just want to have our zone to be united, have faith, and a desire to work hard! I see a lot of potential this transfer!
Wednesday was our Zone meeting, my companion and I spent a lot of time on what we could say to our Zone to get them excited and spiritually motivated! I lead a discussion about heroes in the Book of Mormon and the challenges that they faced! I then asked them to think of things they struggle with either in life or on their mission. I then bore my testimony that we can all overcome them the exact same way our heroes in the Book of Mormon did and that is through the Saviors atonement! If we but come unto him he will make our burdens light and make our weaknesses strong! I have such a testimony of that, I see him sustain me every day!
Thursday we did service for the Torgusons family. She is a member and her husband is not. I had a good conversation with her about that and she told me her husband is a Lutheran by tradition and if it weren’t for that he would join our church! I thought of the talk from conference, Faith of our Fathers and told her about it! We loved doing service, especially driving his tractor lawn mower! We are going back tomorrow to finish it! We hope to be able to sit down and talk to him and hopefully ask him how we can help him to be baptized!
Friday was my 21st Birthday; I received a lot of letters and packages in which I was thrilled about! So thank you all for caring about me and wishing me a Happy Birthday. It was a unique birthday for me, I thought about what every other young man would do on his 21st birthday and I am so grateful I am out serving the Lord! There is nothing that I would rather do! We had Zone Leader Council at the mission home and Sister Moffat made it special for me. We were unable to go to cheesecake factory; my companion wasn’t feeling the best. So the rest of the night I studied while my companion got better! (I am planning on going to cheesecake factory Wednesday!)
Saturday my companion was still sick so he slept half of the day, I didn’t like it too much. I was grateful to go out that night and get back to work!
Sunday was as busy as ever, we are doing things non-stop the entire day, after 8 hours of church and meetings we ran to a dinner with the Adams, and then ran to a lesson with Ingalisa! Now Ingalisa is 12 yrs old, her parents are members but not active. The Sister missionaries tried teaching her a couple months ago but she didn’t like it. So we have been trying to build a relationship with her family, they are very nice. Ingalisa is very shy! Well Sunday night we had a lesson planned with her and we decided to put her on date! We weren’t sure how we were going to do it but trusted the Lord would fill our mouths! We both felt the Lord’s help and we had a wonderful lesson and she accepted to be baptized in August!! We are so excited!! Well that’s about it for this week, I finished the Book of Mormon again, how I love that book and its truthfulness, I can’t deny it. I encourage all to read it daily!!! Well I love you all thanks for your support. I hope all is well with each of you
!!!
Elder Russell