Chelsie and Natalie's Baptism

 (Elder Slade)

To the best friends and family a person could hope for!

This was a wonderful week! Our friend Natalie got baptized on Saturday and then Chelsie got baptized Sunday! Chelsie was going to get baptized next week, but a surgery came up and she had to move it earlier. So she got baptized last night! It was a wonderful experience! The spirit was super strong during both! It was confirmed that what they were both doing was a major step in coming closer to Christ. I am so happy for both of them!

It's been amazing to go to different areas in the mission, with different companions, yet still meet people that I come to love so much! Heavenly Father truly has given me love for these people that I couldn't have felt by myself. I am so grateful to have met Chelsie and Natalie!

I am now with Elder Snow and Elder Haskett, but it was great to be with Elder Gunderson and Elder Jesclard. They are all such stellar missionaries!

Love yall!

1. Saying goodbye to Elder Clove

2-6. Pictures of Chelsie's baptism. I'll get Natalie's pictures next week

S6 E4: Gumbo, T-bone, and Aaron's Baptism!

 (Elder Cummings)

Good morning y'all!

This week was an awesome one, I'll just run down just some of the miracles:

1) Our good friend John decided to treat us again and fixed some T-bone steak! See the picture below, that was just the first one I had...

2)Except for our church services on Sunday, I don't gotta wear a mask because I've been vaccinated!

3)On an exchange down in Gonzales, LA me and Elder Bartholemew held up a sign that simply said in all black letters, "Free Jesus Book!", in about an hour we had talked to about 15+ people and given away pamphlets and scriptures and gotten numbers to do some good ol studies with them. Welcome to the South. *clicking noise and whistle*

4)Zone Conference! We had an awesome zone conference, I am just in awe about how unified our zone is. That's a miracle itself. So much love for those good people

5) We had a lesson outside right after church yesterday so we were in our suits, and Elder Richards spilled this rusty, muddy, liquid all on himself as soon as we got there as he was moving a lawn chair...literally the disgusting liquid done wicked right off his suit pants like nothing, and then it went and stained the concrete without problem

Now for my more favorite miracles:

6)We've been doing some Bible Studies with a sweet lady named Shontell. She is the definition of Matthew 5:6 "Blessed are they which do hunger and thirst after righteousness: for they shall be filled". We're having the studies over zoom,  and she is just sitting there with her notebook out taking notes and writing down all the scriptures we say, and then asks awesome thought provoking questions. She is the most humble learner ever! So we are teaching the Plan of Salvation from the Bible with her and she is eating it all up and loves it. She talks about how it makes so much sense and helps her understand this life more. We text her the link to the Plan of Salvation pamphlet and invite her to read, ponder and pray over it. About 15 minutes after the lesson she texts us a picture of an old beat up physical copy of the Plan of Salvation pamphlet and is like "I've had this for years! I've been carrying it around everywhere for so long now, now I know where it comes from!" Turns out she had somehow gotten a hold of a pamphlet and had kept it all these many years. If that is not a miracle I don't know what is!

7)So we're in Elders Quorum and our friend(I'll call him Jerry) speaks up and begins to start crying, he is talking about the support and love he feels from the church and the experiences he has had here. Jerry has been attending church every week since October but has not gotten baptized for various reasons. He suffers from anxiety and other things and so setting a date for baptism has always been really really hard for him. After Elders Quorum we walk up to talk with him and he is with two awesome brothers in the ward and Jerry looks at us and says, "Can I be baptized tomorrow?" It was SOOOOOOO Awesome! This morning Elder Richards and I woke up, got showered, and went to get things ready for the baptism. It was beautiful, all the stress and burdens he had felt seemed to be taken off. You could see it in him. What adds to this miracle is that just last week I asked my family to keep Jerry in their prayers and BOOM he receives the strength and confidence he needed to take the next step! Miracles! And now Jerry has made the most important decision in his life and will receive greater blessings and happiness than he ever has!

Because of that, I would like all of y'all to pray for Jesus and Carolina, they are two kids we are teaching that are being baptized on Saturday. Please also pray for Dallas, Carolyn and Shontell! Miracles are real, they just require the faith! I love y'all and hope y'all are fixin to have a great week

Elder Cummings

Pics!

1. John and the steaks!!

2. Us and the Gumbo!!

3. Ivan and Lisa! The two funniest people in the world

4-5: Zone Conference pics

6: Us and "Jerry"!!

Transfers!!

 (Sister Putnam)

First of all, so sorry for missing last weeks weekly email, I don’t want that to be a consistent thing haha we were busy spending our last pday with our district and packing because sister Madsen and zinn got transferred. And that means I got a new companion. My new companion is Sister Israelsen, she and I were actually comps in the MTC so that's awesome! She's wonderful and so good at teaching!!

We've had a couple lessons with Reba and Shae, and we are actually preparing to pass them off to the missionaries near them which is sad that we won't be teaching them as much but still really exciting!

Okay, love you all!!

Sister Alyssa Putnam

Six months already???

 (Sister Putnam)

Okay, so we did a lot of service this week, plenty of yard work and stuff. We had one service that apparently the Elders had done service for and she was apparently really rude to them, so we were really nervous about it, but she was actually really nice. We did another service for this other lady who was pretty rude and I'm pretty sure used us as a cleaning service so that she wouldn't have to break her nails, she kind sat around while we cleaned. The house was also really sketchy so needless to say we won't be back.

We got our second dose of the vaccine on Wednesday, so that was awesome!! We also have a friend, Ruby, who is youth age, so we went to the mutual activity that was sports so that she would have someone she knew there, and we played rugby. It's odd, I've heard of rugby but I'd never played it until Wednesday and it's just football but weird.

On Friday the elders threw hot dogs all over our car for no reason so that's fun. Prank wars are so funny cause they make no sense lol.

On Sunday they asked Sister Madsen and I to speak in church on the subject of mothers and I had the opportunity to reflect on how much my mom and my grandmothers have influenced me, and I'm really grateful to have so many righteous women in my life.

Okay love you all!!

Sister Alyssa Putnam

S6 E3: Good Ol' Southern Classic

 (Elder Cummings)

Hey y'all! This week was filled with fishing, the biggest Bass Pro Shop ever, crawfish boils, and more miracles!

We were invited to a youth activity to share a spiritual message afterwards and we went fishing in the members pond in his backyard(not as uncommon as you would think out in the boonies) I caught some kind of fish haha, I think it was called a perch? Don't blame me, I've barely ever gone fishing.

We had to drive 2.5 hours down to Denham Springs because our car needed to be re-registered so that was a lot of fun...we stopped by Bass Pro Shop: Outdoor World to make it a little more enjoyable, one of the coolest buildings ever. Look it up. I got to talk with a guy about being missionary because he came up to me and thought I was the manager or something. So planted some seeds it was good.

Then for the best part...we had a Ward Crawfish boil!! It was sooooooooo goooooooood. We straight up had about 300 lbs of crawfish. Man that stuff is amazing. I ate so much and it was so spicy that my hands started throbbed and hurting after a while. My lips felt like I had bit both of them by accident. But it was worth it.

My favorite part of the week is when we had our good friend Jared Stacy(a former missionary serving here now moved back to Alexandria) drive us around in the boonies. We went to a lesson, which ended up falling through. As we're driving back in the middle of nowhere Jared rolls down his window and screams "I love your dogs!" To a lady outside. The dogs just start sprinting at the car so we just parked it and waited for the owner to calm them down. After chatting for a second and seeing our missionary tags she was like "y'all are a far way from home". Turns out she lived in Tooele for a couple years and loves Utah and is obsessed with temples! She isn't a member but her late husband is and she wants to do anything she can to go inside the Salt Laky City temple. We just talked with her for an hour outside and she wanted us to come back next week! I'm not kidding, we were in the boonies. There was never gonna be a reason we would drive all the way out there and knock on her door if we didn't know who she was. But the Lord provided a way for us to get in contact with her, I love miracles!

This week I was thinking a lot about how I could be a better missionary. I was frustrated with myself because while being in a leadership position, I feel like I'm far from doing my best and am just struggling to be the leader and example I want to be. On top of that, that makes me feel more responsible for the influence I have on others, and I need it to be a good one. While I was praying I had the thought "If I only I was perfect at being a zone leader" and immediately I had another thought, that was not my own. It said "Then there would be no point for you to be a zone leader" it struck me more than it has in the past that this life is about becoming. We are not expected to be perfect. Just like a child learning a piano song is not expected to play it perfectly at first. They're learning and practicing. We don't learn a new song planning to play it perfectly the first time. And so it is with life. Try not to get frustrated like I do when you fall short because we all "come short of the glory of God". And that's why we need our Savior. We has, does, and will lift all of us from our weaknesses and shortcomings to become "new creatures in Christ Jesus" as we come unto Him following his teachings.

Elder Cummings

Photos!

1.Outdoor World!!!!

2. Brother Taylor made us some Harry Potter wands!

3-4. Some southern boys fishing

5. Fat ties. This is my new fattest tie. I call him: the Giraffe🦒

 

A few cool highlights!

 (Elder Slade)

To the best friends and family a person could hope for!

This week was great! Some highlights:

-A 9 year old we are teaching named Natalie, who is getting baptized on Saturday (I am SO excited!!), went teaching with us! She wanted to join a lesson we had with Isaac, another person we are teaching, who is 16. She helped us teach the law of Chastity! Pretty epic! She is an incredibly smart girl! Afterwards, she went and knocked a few doors with us! I think she made us one of the finest missionary trios there ever was in Southeast Idaho!

-Chelsie who is getting baptized on the 29th, went to Deseret Book and splurged by buying a TON of church reading material! You know you are teaching someone who elect when they buy a journal edition of the Doctrine and Covenants and Pearl of great price.

-Got transfer news last night, and I learned that I'll be zone leader companions with Elder Snow in Iona! We were companions for two transfers in Ammon, and he is a BEAST!! I'm so excited! I'll be in a trio with him and Elder Haskett. But before that, I'll stay in this area for a week in a trio because Elder Clove is being transferred to a Service mission and they didnt want to whitewash the area.

I've learned a lot in this area. I've learned how truly the Lord can magnify our efforts when we turn it all to him. Elder Clove is one of the most dedicated and diligent missionaries I know, and despite having health issues that would be really debilitating, he has pushed through, giving it his all. He is a model for Christlike service and diligence to the end.

Love you all!!

1. Natalie doing missionary work with us.

2. Elder Clove and I

3. Elder Crawley and I on exchanges

4. Elder Clove almost faceplanting while riding a scooter

5-7. Using a crescent, Eldder Clove performed some ritual to lure Chonkers, the squirrel, into coming closer.

S6 E2: Another week in Alex

 (Elder Cummings)

Time flies when it feels like you got none that's for sure.

I'll be keeping this one short but we've been jumping around trying to make it from lesson to lesson trying to be on time to everything, we've done pretty good so far but there's always improvement.

There was one lady that we've been doing Bible Studies with over the phone for a couple weeks. We finally met in person at the church building and we were able to talk about the Gift of the Holy Ghost because that's what she wants. We talked about the blessings that come from that and the Restoration that puts it all in context. Afterwards we did a church tour! I love church tours! We were able to walk through the church and talk about all the different aspects of it, from family history to Sunday school to eternal families and sacrament. She LOVED it. She was ranting about how she wants her grandbabies in primary and that she wants to go to the temple soon and that she'll bring her whole family to church! The Spirit was palpable as we discussed our worship of Jesus Christ, and we were able to help her identify that and help her have an even GREATER desire to have the companionship of the Holy Ghost.

I've been thinking a lot about why I'm out here on a mission, and there are a lot of reasons but 1 Timothy 4:10-16 gives an epic description that I agree with a lot. I invite y'all to go read and study it yourself, here's verse 10 though "For therefore we both labour and suffer reproach, because we trust in the living God, who is the Saviour of all men, specially of those that believe"

1. A cool pic on a cool car

2. Faith

3. Selfie with Ivan, absolute beast

4. Us and the New Orleans Elders(peep my guy Elder Roderick, I miss him)

5. The Alexandria Ward missionaries