Harvest Blessings

Dear friends and family:

It's been a great week for both of us! We've been able to improve in almost every key indicator this week from last week, with the exception of recent convert/less active lessons and new investigators. This week we're going to be focusing on improving our harvest blessings, so that they lead to more new investigators.

Our Sunday was one of the busiest Sundays of my mission, and my life. We had six investigators in Sacrament, two of which were baptized!

First of all, Shelly and Claricia, who we found on Wednesday of last week, were finally baptized. They are very excited to continue to come to church, and to learn and grow in the gospel. They will be receiving the Gift of the Holy Ghost next Sunday. They only speak Haitian Creole, so I have been teaching them pretty much on my own, other than asking Elder Baily questions in English and then translating his responses.

Dylan is another one of our investigators, who's preparing to be baptized next week. The Delray South sisters met him last Saturday as they were doing a chapel tour. He had been watching BYUTV and the Sunday devotionals, and he really likes Thomas S. Monson, and so he showed up to the church looking for someone to talk to, and one of the first things he asked was "when can I get baptized?" The answer was the 15th, and that's what he's working for. We can't wait for him to get dunked this next Sunday!

Marie G. is a lady that was harvested by the Zone Leaders, and she lived in our area. She accepted baptism on the 15th, and she came to church yesterday. She only speaks Haitian Creole, but we'll help her get more support from the ward and she's also preparing to be baptized on the 15th.

Jarmel and Tamika are two people that we found on accident. It was a miracle that we found them, because we were trying to find someone else but we knocked on the wrong door. They accepted baptism, and they came to church for the first time yesterday. They are on date for next week, but they have to get married first, and so we'll be praying that we have a marriage on the 14th.

I had the opportunity to translate for an interview for the first time this week. It was an eye-opening experience to see how the interviews are conducted, and to see more clearly the repentance that goes into getting baptized. I was very glad to have that opportunity.

I'm also very excited to go to the temple for the first time since the MTC on the 20th!

Also, I can't wait for Nathan's baptism on the 16th! It will be a P-Day, so I'll certainly wear the adoption shirt. It's sad that Liv is going. :( I hope I'll get to meet her after my mission.

Thanks,

Elder Slade

Adoption shirt

 Shelly & Claricia

Update from Sis Slade

Dear family,

I think that this week sharing the email that I sent to my mission president will suffice.

President Bonham,

As I was thinking this morning about I wanted you to know for this week, I decided that your week is probably pretty busy and mission presidents probably have a lot on their minds, so this week I just want to share with you how happy I am to have so many blessings in my life! Here are 5 things that I am so grateful for this week:

1. Sister Bartsch. She is so amazing! She stretches me to reach a fuller potential than I have ever reached up to this point in my mission. She is like a ray of sunshine. She builds me up and makes me feel so loved. I would say that she needs to be transferred every 2 weeks so that every missionary gets to have "Sister Bartsch time," but I would never tell the mission president that because that would mean that I wouldn't have her anymore... :)

2. The adoption hearing for my little brother, Nathan, is this coming week! T-Minus 10 days until Nathan is officially a Slade! After that my family is going to the Denver temple to be sealed, just like we got to do a few years ago when my sister Eliza was adopted. I love my family!!!! I get to be with them for forever and ever and ever.

3. So much member missionary work in our ward this week! The highlight for me was when our member-present for our church tour showed up with her nonmember friend without telling us and we ended up giving the church tour to two not-yet-members.

4. I was thinking at the cottage meeting last night how grateful I am for a mission president who shows his testimony by example. I've heard you share your testimony of the Savior over and over again, but I realized it's not through your shared testimonies that I know that you know He is your Savior. I know that you know that He is your Savior because you are here in Washington serving as our mission president.

5. I know that Jesus Christ is my Savior too. I make so many mistakes and sometimes overwhelm myself worrying about everything that I do wrong and feeling like I'm still only a half-completed project. But it's in those quiet moments when I can feel the Saviors love for me so powerfully that I know that He is the one who will make me whole. I really know that he loves me! I feel His love for me and everyone around me every day, and it's because of Him that we have a purpose in going out every day and sharing his role and His work in the lives of each and every one of us.

love, Sister Slade

I am doing well. We continue to see miracles every day. If you get the chance this week, please take a moment to write me a letter about the things that you are most grateful for in your lives!

Happy Father's Day!

https://www.lds.org/media-library/video/2013-01-002-earthly-father-heavenly-father?lang=eng

Love ya!

Sister Slade

Elder Bailey

Dear Friends and Family:

As you know, I stayed in Boynton Beach North. But you may not have known that Elder Van Wagenen was transfered to the Coconut Creek ward, and that my new companion is Elder Bailey. He's an english missionary, and he's really awesome from the few days we've had together so far.

Boynton Beach North is an all-bike area. However, Elder Bailey has been instructed by a doctor to stay off of a bike for the next two months. Is there a contradiction? No. Because, for at least the next two months, this area has a car! (With unlimited medical miles!) Hooray!

Elder Bailey is very tall. He is 6'7". He likes to play basketball, and he likes to read, and to exercise, and to be outside. He's not quite as happy as I am that he can't use a bike for a while. I'm just counting my many blessings. He's also a very hard worker, and a great teacher. We have seen so many miracles in these days that we have been together.

We are currently teaching some very awesome investigators. They are some of the most elect I have ever taught.

The two baptisms that are scheduled for this next Sunday are Shelly S. and Claricia D. They are two Haitian ladies who we found while we were harvesting on our first day together, after we got home from Wednesday's transfer meeting. They don't speak English, so as we went back to teach them I was the only one who could really participate in the lesson. They have been keeping every commitment that we have given them. Shelly, in particular, is always apologetic that she only read the assigned chapters once, and she has not yet reread them, so she says she still doesn't have a full understanding. But, she's the only investigator I've met so far who's had any idea what it is that she read, and who naturally applies it to herself. Claricia is less verbose, but she is just as excited about being baptized this Sunday.

We also found out that they know Boynton Beach Central's investigators who were just baptized yesterday. We're going to try to get them to come out teaching Shelly and Claricia with us.

There were so many other transfer day/transfer week miracles that we have seen. We've accidentally found the elect while we are going to teach a different investigator, we've taken out members to teach who, as it turns out, already knew and were friends with the investigators, we've seen our numbers for the week jump from almost 0 at the end of Wednesday to almost standards by the end... And now we have a car, so we can be even more effective with our time.

Last week, I forgot to mention: we found a less-active member by accident. It was a miracle that we did, he had moved without telling anyone where he was going. We were biking home for the night, and we stopped to give a guy a card. He told us that he used to go to our church, and over the next few minutes we found out that he was Michael LaForge, who was baptized over a year ago, and who had stopped going to church because he didn't have a ride.

Hurricane season started yesterday. I believe it'll last for about four months, until September.

Pray for Shelly and Claricia, so they will be able to be baptized this week; and pray for Jarmel, Tameka, and Myrlande, so that they will be able to be baptized the week after.

I love you all!

Thanks,

Elder Slade

Baptism

Dear family,

Osharrhea's baptism was absolutely amazing! I have developed a huge love for Osh and her family, just as has happened with all of the other investigators that I have had the chance to teach. Her brother Nick who was baptized with the rest of the family in February was the one to baptize her. The spirit was so strong, it was like a warm pressure literally filled the room from the very start of the baptismal service!

Sister Bartsch and I have found many new investigators recently, but we're struggling to find investigators that progress and that will keep future appointments. Help us pray for that! Nevertheless, we have seen so many small miracles- little tender mercies where things just seem to work out too perfectly throughout each day. Heavenly Father is the best secretary. Here are a few of those miracles:

Eric- A few days ago we had gone to talk to a former and we stopped on the way back to talk to a man who was working on his car. The man made it very clear that he was not interested, and in an effort to get rid of us he said, "Go talk to my neighbor, he's a 24 year old rich bachelor, go bother him." Thanks for the referral, Dennis! We were running late so we went back the next time we were in the area to talk to Eric. He just happened to be out on his porch enjoying the sunshine and drinking a glass of wine. At the start of our conversation with Eric he told us right off the bat all of the disagreements he had with our doctrine and why he wouldn't read the Book of Mormon, but for whatever reason both Sister Bartsch and I felt like we shouldn't quite leave yet so we continued talking to him even though he had said no. Partway through the conversation we found out that he's German and part Norwegian, which made Sister Bartsch's day! Sister Bartsch shared a really powerful testimony of the Book of Mormon, and by the end of the conversation he said he would take a Book of Mormon and just see what it was about. it was a complete turn around! We're going to go back in a few days and see what he thinks of the Book of Mormon so far :)

Ruben- Ruben took the missionary discussions a few months back, and we've been feeling like we should go see him this week. Ruben has been having a really hard time as he is dealing with repercussions of past mistakes he has made, and it is causing a lot of grief for his family. The first thing that his mom said to us in her broken English when she saw who was at the door was, "Last week I prayed for you to come again. Take Ruben to church." We're excited to start teaching Ruben again.

Rolando- We were walking back to our car after street contacting one afternoon, and we've been making more of an effort to make the gospel the constant focus of all of our conversations and thoughts. We were in the middle of a deep conversation about prayer when Rolando poked his head out from behind his car and stopped us. Rolando is 21 and moved here from Mexico a few years back, and he has so many questions about God and our purpose that he wants answered. Problem is, he feels frustrated and doesn't know if he even believes in God or not because he feels like he has tried praying over and over again and he feels that he has never received answers. Rolando began asking us all kinds of questions about prayer, and when I told him my testimony of how much prayer has changed my life his eyes got really big and he said, "You really believe that, huh?" He said we can come back to teach him more! :)

These are the little miracles that we see all the time!!! I feel so blessed to be at the right place, at the right time, doing the right thing! Missionary work is the greatest! Challenge for the week: look for all of the little tender mercies that the Lord orchestrates in your daily lives, and be amazed as you see that the more you look for them, the more there are.

Love, Sister Slade

The Lovely Osharrhea's baptism

Transfer Week

Dear Friends and Family:

So, this week is transfers. The news: I'm staying in Boynyon Beach North, but Elder Van Wagenen is leaving. So tomorrow, we'll go to transfer meeting and we'll find out who my new companion is, and where Elder Van Wagenen is going.

One of the things that I've learned from Elder Van Wagenen is how possible it really is to have miracles, and to find and baptize weekly, sometimes many people a week. My time with him has really helped me to increase my vision and my desire to work, so I can see those miracles and those results.

This will be my fourth transfer in this area. I'm grateful that I've had all of this time to get used to using bikes. It's not too hard to get from one place to another anymore, but it's starting to get so hot that we have to plan in times and places that we can refill our water bottles throughout the day.

I'm nearing the end of Alma in my personal study. A few things I learned this week: by small and simple things are great things brought to pass. Not just good things, but bad things as well. For example: the kingmen "desired that a few particular points of the law should be altered". It seems innocent and small, but what they really wanted was "that the law should be altered in a manner to overthrow the free government and to establish a king over the land".

Similarly, as applied in missionary work, things that seem small and innocent can lead to large problems. Many investigators fail to progress because of a single "wind of doctrine"; or, they can gain a testimony of Jesus Christ and the restoration as they read in the Book of Mormon a little bit every day.

I can't wait for Nathan's adoption! And Liv's too, if it ends up happening.

Thanks,

Elder Slade

A Million Miracles

Dear family,

So little time to talk about so many miracles! Consider this email a "teaser" for all of the other miracles that I'll have to tell you about 6 months from now when I see you in person! I wish I could write about all of the new people that we have been teaching but sometimes it seems that words just don't quite do it justice. The people truly are the best part of a mission! The best part of life, actually!

We had our last lesson with Robert this week, as we found out that he lives in Marysville so we had to do a pass-off lesson with the Armar YSA sisters. The good news about this is that the Armar sisters are none other than Sister Anderson and Sister Glancy! So fun to see both of them again and to teach a lesson with them! The Plan of Salvation lesson we taught was one of the most memorable of my mission thus far. The spirit was so strong, and I know that it's because Robert is so amazingly prepared! We invited him to begin reading the Book of Mormon last week and he read all the way through Mosiah in 4 days. Every time we met he soaked it all up like a sponge, it's like he hardly knows what to do with himself because it's all so real and so familiar to him. In our lesson I invited him to be baptized and he got so excited, but when we invited him to prepare for June 21 his face fell and he explained to us that he's going back to Nevada after school gets out. It was such an incredible moment to be able to explain to him how he can be baptized in Nevada because this is THE Church of Jesus Christ, and not only is His gospel and His priesthood the same wherever you go, but it will one day cover every corner of the Earth.

We have been meeting with Osharrhea daily and we and she are so excited for her baptism this coming weekend! She told us that one day last week she stayed up until 3 in the morning talking to her mom about the gospel. Everything about teaching Osh has gone so flawlessly because she has already been so well-prepared by her family, and she has them as a strong support system no matter what. Member missionary work truly is the way to go!

I'm out of time, but sending bucket loads of love your way! Love ya!

Sister Slade

Our favorite "Mission" snack for weekly planning each week.

 District P-Day at the beach! The little sand structure in the middle is the Everett Temple.

 Robert!

 Have a great day!

"Miracles are the natural result of the correct application of eternal principles"

Hello family!

I have about half the time to email here in the Everett library than I used to have, so my weekly emails may be much shorter and a lot less coherent from here on out, but here goes!

This has been a week of miracles! The week before I came here pretty much all of the investigators that Sister Bartsch and Sister Sinclair were teaching jumped ship, but this week Sister Bartsch and I were very blessed to find a few new investigators that seem very promising!

We have started teaching a 19 year old African American girl named Osharrhea. Her entire family was recently baptized, but she has been away at school in Alabama. Well she recently returned, and she is seeing how happy her family is and she wants to be baptized too! She is so sweet. She came to church and to a baptism and to our ward carnival this weekend and she loved them all!

Last week Sister Bartsch contacted a guy named Robert on campus, and he is so prepared! During our first lesson when we were talking about the apostasy I felt like I should ask him if he had ever felt a "personal apostasy" or a time of confusion and darkness in his life where he felt like there was something missing. When I said this his eyes got really big and he said "I feel that way all the time. Every time I'm not with people, I go back to constantly wondering what is missing and how I can fill this hole. But it's weird- it's like I don't even know what I'm searching for!" We testified that our message is what he has been searching for, and the spirit was strong for the rest of the lesson. After he said the closing prayer he said, "I feel really good! I think I really want to give this a try." The whole lesson was so golden and surreal that after the lesson Sister Bartsch and I had to immediately say a prayer of gratitude before we continued with our day. We can't decide if Robert is real of not. We think he might be one of the three nephites coming to test our missionary teaching skills. :)

I'm just about out of time, but really quick, i wanted to invite you all to do two things:

1. Will you all take the time every day to have personal scripture study with me? Even if it's just for five minutes, take some time to start study with a prayer, study your scriptures, and end with a prayer too. Don't even think of going one day without it! We wouldn't go a day without feeding ourselves physically, no matter how busy or stressful or crazy that day was, so why would we think of going a day without feeding ourselves spiritually? Every day counts! I promise that if you make "daily devotional time" a priority, the Lord will give you greater direction and peace throughout every day. Take some time today to pray to Him and promise Him that you will do this, then follow through on your promise and watch Him work miracles in your life.

2. If you haven't already, go buy the book "The Power of Everyday Missionaries" by Clayton Christensen, then apply the principles that he talks about in your own life! It's only $5 and that money goes to the general missionary fund, so no excuses! It is an amazing book, go buy it and tell me what you think of it!

Love you all!

Sister Slade

We stopped to talk to a woman who was holding her pet snake and she said that we could hold it :)