Hey you guys!
Sorry I couldn't get a letter out to you. I tried 3 times, but we are staying so busy, I do not have five minutes to spare during the day! This week has been the craziest week of my life. It was great!
On Monday we had p-day and went out shopping and tracted for a while that night. We felt prompted to go to one particular house, pretty late at night. She turned out to be an old Dominican lady, very interested in the gospel. Tat lesson went well.
Every day since Tuesday, we have found a family of at least 3 people and we are getting baptismal dates left and right. In the next two or three weeks, we should have five more baptisms and maybe even six! It's really getting hectic, and God is pouring out his miracles on us!
The mission set a goal of 1800 baptisms last year on June 30 and the 1 year deadline draws near. Right now we are at 1290 with two transfers left. You might say we are under the gun. However, we know that God wants that goal even more than we do, and if we are diligent, those baptisms will come fast, as they already are beginning to.
I didn't have to move on this transfer or change companions. They usually only move people around every 4 or 5 months. Bristol is a great place. It's really old. The town was founded in 1587, so you can imagine how well the roads are set up.
One of our investigators cooked us some African food she called Toborghee. She used pig foot, chicken foot, and some sort of turkey neckbone. It was pretty good, though. I'll find out how she did it if you want.
We live above a magic shop. They have some cool things. The mission is having so much success right now and we are very busy. I love you!
Elder Wallentine
Monday, April 23, 2007
Monday, April 16, 2007
Dear Family,
Thanks for all the letters! I've got some pretty cool stories and pictures for you! I'm having a really great mission.
We just finished the first transfer and everything is going pretty well. Our area is struggling a bit. It needs a little more work to find very many people. Especially with the apartments as complicated as they are. We've got a few families on our mind and things are going very well with the ward mission effort.
We had zone meeting this week and it was fantastic! I got certified out in the field in 10 days, tying the mission record! I was pretty happy about that! We are staying pretty busy here and the weather especially doesn't want to cooperate. You may have seen it on the news, but a storm came through here. They called it a "nor' easter". I don't really know much about it, bu t rained for 2 days. The Delaware River flash flooded everywhere, and it amounted to a level 1 hurricane. Nevertheless, we were still out tracting in it. I took some pictures of our car almost getting submarined. Most of our investigators were stranded at home and couldn't even get to their cars.
We live right next to the Delaware River and there are huge boats out there. Some are battleships. It's pretty cool!
Have a great week! I love you!
Elder Wallentine
Thanks for all the letters! I've got some pretty cool stories and pictures for you! I'm having a really great mission.
We just finished the first transfer and everything is going pretty well. Our area is struggling a bit. It needs a little more work to find very many people. Especially with the apartments as complicated as they are. We've got a few families on our mind and things are going very well with the ward mission effort.
We had zone meeting this week and it was fantastic! I got certified out in the field in 10 days, tying the mission record! I was pretty happy about that! We are staying pretty busy here and the weather especially doesn't want to cooperate. You may have seen it on the news, but a storm came through here. They called it a "nor' easter". I don't really know much about it, bu t rained for 2 days. The Delaware River flash flooded everywhere, and it amounted to a level 1 hurricane. Nevertheless, we were still out tracting in it. I took some pictures of our car almost getting submarined. Most of our investigators were stranded at home and couldn't even get to their cars.
We live right next to the Delaware River and there are huge boats out there. Some are battleships. It's pretty cool!
Have a great week! I love you!
Elder Wallentine
Tuesday, April 10, 2007
Dear family,
I emailed already, but wanted to write about some of the experiences we've had this week.
On Monday, I tried to cut my hair. After I figured out the razor thing, I'm sure you can imagine how well that went. We have had a rough week of tracting. We found a few good people, but we had one guy set to be baptized on Easter who fell out on Thursday. He was a great guy, but he just didn't see why he should have to pay tithing. We were pretty bummed about that. The next day was as if God were trying to comfort us, as new investigators came out of the woodwork! Until this week, I never realized what they meant by these weeks being the best and some the worst of my life. I'm starting to catch on. As always, the work moves forward in Pennsylvania!
My companion is a great guy. He has his quirks, but he's pretty cool. He got a box of Easter candy from his dad, but didn't want to eat it all, so he gave it to the kids of some of our investigators. We had a pretty good time doing that. We had two confirmations on Easter, both of which I was told I would perform just as we walked into the chapel. It went very well, though.
I got a bunch of letters from the ISU student ward this week, so that was fun! Thanks for everything!
Love,
Elder Wallentine
I emailed already, but wanted to write about some of the experiences we've had this week.
On Monday, I tried to cut my hair. After I figured out the razor thing, I'm sure you can imagine how well that went. We have had a rough week of tracting. We found a few good people, but we had one guy set to be baptized on Easter who fell out on Thursday. He was a great guy, but he just didn't see why he should have to pay tithing. We were pretty bummed about that. The next day was as if God were trying to comfort us, as new investigators came out of the woodwork! Until this week, I never realized what they meant by these weeks being the best and some the worst of my life. I'm starting to catch on. As always, the work moves forward in Pennsylvania!
My companion is a great guy. He has his quirks, but he's pretty cool. He got a box of Easter candy from his dad, but didn't want to eat it all, so he gave it to the kids of some of our investigators. We had a pretty good time doing that. We had two confirmations on Easter, both of which I was told I would perform just as we walked into the chapel. It went very well, though.
I got a bunch of letters from the ISU student ward this week, so that was fun! Thanks for everything!
Love,
Elder Wallentine
Monday, April 9, 2007
Dear Family,
I loved being able to read all your letters last week! Thanks for all the recipes!
This week has been interesting. It was a little rough for tracting. It turns out that we've been kicked out of five apartment complexes and one residential city block, just because people don't like solicitors. They made up a phony rule and tell us we need to have a city permit to go tracting and threaten to call the cops on us. It's not anything big, but it sure gums up the works. We have to leave for an hour and tract elsewhere until we're sure they didn't call the cops on us, then we go back to work. Don't worry. Even if they do call the cops, the cops have bigger things to worry about. They just look at the person funny, and go back to their business. There are some really great things happening and we have seen miracles almost daily in finding people and new opportunities that pop up everywhere. It gets more exciting, too, when we have to occasionally hide from the apartment workers to avoid getting booted out of the place. We had two confirmations this Sunday and have set a few more baptism dates. It is exciting!
I love being out here on a mission. Thanks for everything you've done to help me get out here into the field. I found out that "The Testaments" is on DVD now. And, instant oatmeal is fantastic!
Love,
Elder Wallentine
I loved being able to read all your letters last week! Thanks for all the recipes!
This week has been interesting. It was a little rough for tracting. It turns out that we've been kicked out of five apartment complexes and one residential city block, just because people don't like solicitors. They made up a phony rule and tell us we need to have a city permit to go tracting and threaten to call the cops on us. It's not anything big, but it sure gums up the works. We have to leave for an hour and tract elsewhere until we're sure they didn't call the cops on us, then we go back to work. Don't worry. Even if they do call the cops, the cops have bigger things to worry about. They just look at the person funny, and go back to their business. There are some really great things happening and we have seen miracles almost daily in finding people and new opportunities that pop up everywhere. It gets more exciting, too, when we have to occasionally hide from the apartment workers to avoid getting booted out of the place. We had two confirmations this Sunday and have set a few more baptism dates. It is exciting!
I love being out here on a mission. Thanks for everything you've done to help me get out here into the field. I found out that "The Testaments" is on DVD now. And, instant oatmeal is fantastic!
Love,
Elder Wallentine
Monday, April 2, 2007
Hey all,
It was great to read your letters and emails! Sorry if you haven't been receiving letters from me. The email was down for a while and I don't have a whole lot of time to write plain old letters.
Things have been crazy here. Last week I tried giving my companion a haircut, and well, I don't think I need to elaborate on how well that went! I have been eating some pretty interesting African food. I can't count how many times I've wondered what they were feeding me at some of these houses. I seems like they use any kind of random meat--turkey neck, pork shoulder, anything with fins--mix it with hot peppers, vegetables, and spices, and boil it all together, bones and all, and serve it over rice. It's pretty good, though. I love being out here on a mission.
We had a rough week, but everything is going pretty well. We got another baptism on Sunday and we should have one for next week as well. I've almost read the Book of Mormon through again, and I'm loving the lessons and the people we get to teach. Things have been hard sometimes, and the inner city is pretty run down and dirty. We saw a lot of drugs and burned out buildings. I wouldn't want to be there without being a missionary, but it's not so scary when you have the little black name tag on.
We had a couple of investigators watch General Conference. It was great! One had two little kids who like throwing things, so I spent a lot of the Sunday session catching toys hurling towards my head. It was great though. I loved Elder Scott's talk on Sunday. The mom of those two little boys got baptized between Sunday sessions of conference and it all went pretty smoothly. Thanks for sending me my line of authority. I love this place, the atmosphere, the people, everything is pretty fantastic. Our apartment was built the same year as the Constitution. I haven't seen much of inner Philadelphia, but there are some pretty cool parts of the suburbs that are really old. I'm in Bristol, PA if you want to look at it on Google earth.
I have learned the power of fasting and prayer. One boy who we had to prove to that we were missionaries. . . well his dad got really mad when he found out he was talking to us. He refused to cook him dinner that night. We were pretty terrified that we were going to lose them. That night, I fasted and prayed like crazy that his heart would be softened and that he would no longer stand in the way of his son's conversion. At our next appointment, everything was settled with his dad, and we can visit him whenever now, not just when his dad is at work.
Pennsylvania is really nice right now. When I got here in March, it was freezing and there was about 3 inches of solid ice over everything. The wind was blowing and it was pretty cold. After that storm, we spent a couple hours of service helping people get their cars unstuck from the roads. They were actually frozen to the ground. Now it's about 60 degrees and sunny, sort of. Kind of rainy, really humid, a lot like Florida, only colder.
Have a great week! I love you guys!
Elder Wallentine
It was great to read your letters and emails! Sorry if you haven't been receiving letters from me. The email was down for a while and I don't have a whole lot of time to write plain old letters.
Things have been crazy here. Last week I tried giving my companion a haircut, and well, I don't think I need to elaborate on how well that went! I have been eating some pretty interesting African food. I can't count how many times I've wondered what they were feeding me at some of these houses. I seems like they use any kind of random meat--turkey neck, pork shoulder, anything with fins--mix it with hot peppers, vegetables, and spices, and boil it all together, bones and all, and serve it over rice. It's pretty good, though. I love being out here on a mission.
We had a rough week, but everything is going pretty well. We got another baptism on Sunday and we should have one for next week as well. I've almost read the Book of Mormon through again, and I'm loving the lessons and the people we get to teach. Things have been hard sometimes, and the inner city is pretty run down and dirty. We saw a lot of drugs and burned out buildings. I wouldn't want to be there without being a missionary, but it's not so scary when you have the little black name tag on.
We had a couple of investigators watch General Conference. It was great! One had two little kids who like throwing things, so I spent a lot of the Sunday session catching toys hurling towards my head. It was great though. I loved Elder Scott's talk on Sunday. The mom of those two little boys got baptized between Sunday sessions of conference and it all went pretty smoothly. Thanks for sending me my line of authority. I love this place, the atmosphere, the people, everything is pretty fantastic. Our apartment was built the same year as the Constitution. I haven't seen much of inner Philadelphia, but there are some pretty cool parts of the suburbs that are really old. I'm in Bristol, PA if you want to look at it on Google earth.
I have learned the power of fasting and prayer. One boy who we had to prove to that we were missionaries. . . well his dad got really mad when he found out he was talking to us. He refused to cook him dinner that night. We were pretty terrified that we were going to lose them. That night, I fasted and prayed like crazy that his heart would be softened and that he would no longer stand in the way of his son's conversion. At our next appointment, everything was settled with his dad, and we can visit him whenever now, not just when his dad is at work.
Pennsylvania is really nice right now. When I got here in March, it was freezing and there was about 3 inches of solid ice over everything. The wind was blowing and it was pretty cold. After that storm, we spent a couple hours of service helping people get their cars unstuck from the roads. They were actually frozen to the ground. Now it's about 60 degrees and sunny, sort of. Kind of rainy, really humid, a lot like Florida, only colder.
Have a great week! I love you guys!
Elder Wallentine
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