Hey Everyone,
Last week was a blast!
We knocked on a lot of doors and were told some not so nice things, but it's okay because they don't understand...yet!!!
So, I don't know if I have mentioned it before, but we have a Baptist Seminary in our area. Sometimes we have a run in with some of the students. They are all studying to become pastors, so they think they are real smart. We went to see one on Tuesday because we get a referral for him. He was actually super polite and wasn't familiar with what we believed. It ended up being a good visit.
On Wednesday we had a Zone Conference in Raleigh. While we were all sitting in the conference and people were putting black boxes in all the missionary cars. Black boxes are used to monitor peoples driving... Luckily I am a good driver! :) If you speed excessively or drive aggressively or forget to log in with your card or don't buckle your seat belt, it tells you what you are doing or not doing, in a really scary sounding voice. It only talked to me once the whole week!
On Thursday we were out tracting and we found a Baptist Pastor that I am pretty sure would come to our church if we offered him a paid position!!! He is one of my favorite people we have met.
On Friday and Saturday some other missionaries had some baptisms and we were able to get Christian to one both nights and Andrew to the one on Saturday. Their Mom is against the church so it was a wonderful miracle that she let them come. Their older brother told them that the baptism would be done wrong because it wouldn't be done in the name of the Father the Son and the Holy Ghost. After the ordinance Christian turned to us with a big smile on his face and told us about what his brother said. Then on Sunday I got to Confirm Shamia and Shamona, they were the two people that got baptized on Friday. Giving blessings is always a lot of fun and the Spirit is so powerful
My ponderizing scripture this week is Romans 8:24-25:
"For we are saved by hope: but hope that is seen is not hope: for what a man seeth, why doth he yet hope for? But if we hope for that we see not, then do we with patience wait for it."
Love y'all!
Love,
Elder Harper
Monday, October 19, 2015
Monday, October 12, 2015
Wake Forest - Week 16 (Training Week 9)
Hey Everyone!
Are y'all ponderizeing? Mine for this week is In Eccl. 12:8.
Last week was fantastic and eventful! To start off, two Fridays ago our phone stopped wanting to charge, then our phone finally died on Sunday night. We have been scrambling to get everything back together in our phone. Then on Wednesday we had exchanges with our Zone Leaders. I went with Elder Owens in their area (it's a Spanish area) and Elder Bleckner stayed in our area with Elder Chandler.
Elder Owens is awesome! He is 25 and he is really good at building his relationships with people quickly, which is super helpful in missionary work. With four years of high school Spanish under my belt I got to pray twice in Spanish, it was rough, and I understood very little of what was going on, but the Spirit was there and that is what was important.
When I got back Elder Bleckner told me that 2 of our investigators, Kevin and Wendy, that we have been working with forever, want to get baptized in February, because they are going on vacation to El Salvador. Even though it is far away, at least the desire is there.
Then Thursday we got to see Harold and he said he wanted to get baptized as well. So our week was going really well. I didn't think it could get any better then Friday Happened. We had a lesson scheduled with Christian and Andrew at a members home, two brothers that want to learn about the gospel, but their mom doesn't want them to. As we prepared our lesson we felt like we needed to teach them about daily prayer and scripture study, which wasn't the "next lesson" but we went with it. Andrew was a little quieter and Christian was a lot more into it, usually it is the other way. It was a great lesson and people were sharing lots of powerful personal experiences. After we got home we got a 12 page text from Andrew telling us all about the terrible day he had had and how he had been praying all day for help and guidance and he said that our lesson was the answer he was looking for and he knew that God had answered his prayer through us.
Last week was just awesome. Hope y'all have a great week! Love y'all!
Love,
Elder Harper
Are y'all ponderizeing? Mine for this week is In Eccl. 12:8.
Last week was fantastic and eventful! To start off, two Fridays ago our phone stopped wanting to charge, then our phone finally died on Sunday night. We have been scrambling to get everything back together in our phone. Then on Wednesday we had exchanges with our Zone Leaders. I went with Elder Owens in their area (it's a Spanish area) and Elder Bleckner stayed in our area with Elder Chandler.
Elder Owens is awesome! He is 25 and he is really good at building his relationships with people quickly, which is super helpful in missionary work. With four years of high school Spanish under my belt I got to pray twice in Spanish, it was rough, and I understood very little of what was going on, but the Spirit was there and that is what was important.
When I got back Elder Bleckner told me that 2 of our investigators, Kevin and Wendy, that we have been working with forever, want to get baptized in February, because they are going on vacation to El Salvador. Even though it is far away, at least the desire is there.
Then Thursday we got to see Harold and he said he wanted to get baptized as well. So our week was going really well. I didn't think it could get any better then Friday Happened. We had a lesson scheduled with Christian and Andrew at a members home, two brothers that want to learn about the gospel, but their mom doesn't want them to. As we prepared our lesson we felt like we needed to teach them about daily prayer and scripture study, which wasn't the "next lesson" but we went with it. Andrew was a little quieter and Christian was a lot more into it, usually it is the other way. It was a great lesson and people were sharing lots of powerful personal experiences. After we got home we got a 12 page text from Andrew telling us all about the terrible day he had had and how he had been praying all day for help and guidance and he said that our lesson was the answer he was looking for and he knew that God had answered his prayer through us.
Last week was just awesome. Hope y'all have a great week! Love y'all!
Love,
Elder Harper
Monday, October 5, 2015
Wake Forest - Week 15 (Training Week 8)
Hey y'all!
I can't believe it is already October! The more time I am out, the more my motivation builds, because I know how short time is.
I absolutely loved conference this past weekend! For some reason it is just better on your mission. One central theme stood out to me, "Have Faith." Simple as that. Faith is like a muscle, the more we use it, the stronger it gets, while if we neglect it, it becomes weaker.
I hope y'all will take the invitation to Ponderize a verse or two of scripture each week. I am excited to start. This week I chose 2 Tim. 1:7-9. It starts by saying, "For God hath not given us the Spirit of fear; but of power, and of love, and of a sound mind..." I think it's ponder worthy! :) I would love to hear about y'all's experiences and what ponderings you have!
Last week was a fun week. We caught the edge of a hurricane, and I was not impressed. Hurricanes are supposed to be crazy, but this one wasn't bad at all, just really wet. I also got my cast off on Friday. Life wasn't fun with one hand, but it's all better now.
Love y'all! Have a great week!
Love,
Elder Harper
I can't believe it is already October! The more time I am out, the more my motivation builds, because I know how short time is.
I absolutely loved conference this past weekend! For some reason it is just better on your mission. One central theme stood out to me, "Have Faith." Simple as that. Faith is like a muscle, the more we use it, the stronger it gets, while if we neglect it, it becomes weaker.
I hope y'all will take the invitation to Ponderize a verse or two of scripture each week. I am excited to start. This week I chose 2 Tim. 1:7-9. It starts by saying, "For God hath not given us the Spirit of fear; but of power, and of love, and of a sound mind..." I think it's ponder worthy! :) I would love to hear about y'all's experiences and what ponderings you have!
Last week was a fun week. We caught the edge of a hurricane, and I was not impressed. Hurricanes are supposed to be crazy, but this one wasn't bad at all, just really wet. I also got my cast off on Friday. Life wasn't fun with one hand, but it's all better now.
Love y'all! Have a great week!
Love,
Elder Harper
Monday, September 28, 2015
Wake Forest - Week 14 (Training Week 7)
Happy Fall y'all!
Fall time here is the best! The leaves are just about to start changing and all the colors will be beautiful!
Last week was pretty rough for the majority of the week. We saw very little success, and it seemed like everything we tried to do failed, and no one wanted to listen to what we had to say. We were on bike and it was raining for most of the week, so it was a good character building week!
Saturday was easily our best day. We went to contact a potential investigator, Valerie. We met her on Friday and she said we could come back. We had a nice visit and she said she would read from the Book of Mormon and pray about it.
Then we went to see another potential investigator, but that fell through. We were back to tracting. We knocked down one street and started to head to the next, but we felt like we needed to be somewhere else. We decided to go to another area. We got to the front of a neighborhood, and we felt that it was where we needed to be but not yet, for some odd reason, so we didn't enter the neighborhood yet. After we had knocked on a few more houses around the area, we went into the neighborhood.
We hit a few more houses and ended up in someone's driveway. We could see someone in the garage, so we waved, and they met us at the garage entrance. We introduced ourselves and they were so amazed that we had showed up when we did. They went on to explain to us that their father was having a rough day and his wife suggested that he read John 3:16. They went on to say that the Father hadn't opened a bible in years and the moment they finished reading the verse, we showed up in their driveway. They want us to come back this week. 1 NEP 4:6 and Hebrews 10:31, has been in my head a lot and Ether 12:6 fits with it perfectly because to me it sums up the path we are all on, and if we can learn to walk by faith, everything will work out in the end.
Love y'all!
Love,
Elder Harper
Fall time here is the best! The leaves are just about to start changing and all the colors will be beautiful!
Last week was pretty rough for the majority of the week. We saw very little success, and it seemed like everything we tried to do failed, and no one wanted to listen to what we had to say. We were on bike and it was raining for most of the week, so it was a good character building week!
Saturday was easily our best day. We went to contact a potential investigator, Valerie. We met her on Friday and she said we could come back. We had a nice visit and she said she would read from the Book of Mormon and pray about it.
Then we went to see another potential investigator, but that fell through. We were back to tracting. We knocked down one street and started to head to the next, but we felt like we needed to be somewhere else. We decided to go to another area. We got to the front of a neighborhood, and we felt that it was where we needed to be but not yet, for some odd reason, so we didn't enter the neighborhood yet. After we had knocked on a few more houses around the area, we went into the neighborhood.
We hit a few more houses and ended up in someone's driveway. We could see someone in the garage, so we waved, and they met us at the garage entrance. We introduced ourselves and they were so amazed that we had showed up when we did. They went on to explain to us that their father was having a rough day and his wife suggested that he read John 3:16. They went on to say that the Father hadn't opened a bible in years and the moment they finished reading the verse, we showed up in their driveway. They want us to come back this week. 1 NEP 4:6 and Hebrews 10:31, has been in my head a lot and Ether 12:6 fits with it perfectly because to me it sums up the path we are all on, and if we can learn to walk by faith, everything will work out in the end.
Love y'all!
Love,
Elder Harper
Monday, September 21, 2015
Wake Forest - Week 13 (Training Week 6)
Good morning everyone!
Last week was a lot of fun. I had a great birthday last Monday! The Howell family took us to a trampoline park and we had a great time jumping on stuff.
We worked super hard this last week. We did a whole lot of knocking on doors and met a lot of fun people, a few not so nice people, but mostly nice people. I found out that Elder Bleckner (my companion) is fearful of large dogs, which makes knocking on doors that much more fun!
My favorite experience of last week was when we went to see a family we had been trying to start teaching. On Friday we decided to just stop by. We had made several return appointments that had fallen through, we figured they were just trying to be polite, but we tried this one last time. They let us in! They are a great family! They have two little kids and they are curious if the LDS church would be the best fit for their family.
I have a strong testimony that the Lord prepares people to find the gospel and often times it takes the faithful act of someone else to bring them into it. Love y'all!
Love,
Elder Harper
Last week was a lot of fun. I had a great birthday last Monday! The Howell family took us to a trampoline park and we had a great time jumping on stuff.
We worked super hard this last week. We did a whole lot of knocking on doors and met a lot of fun people, a few not so nice people, but mostly nice people. I found out that Elder Bleckner (my companion) is fearful of large dogs, which makes knocking on doors that much more fun!
My favorite experience of last week was when we went to see a family we had been trying to start teaching. On Friday we decided to just stop by. We had made several return appointments that had fallen through, we figured they were just trying to be polite, but we tried this one last time. They let us in! They are a great family! They have two little kids and they are curious if the LDS church would be the best fit for their family.
I have a strong testimony that the Lord prepares people to find the gospel and often times it takes the faithful act of someone else to bring them into it. Love y'all!
Love,
Elder Harper
Monday, September 14, 2015
Wake Forest - Week 12 (Training Week 5)
Happy Birthday Elder Harper!!! #20!!!
Hey Everyone! Last week was a tough one, but a really fun one too. We biked a whole lot and met some really interesting people.
We met one man who is 81, but still loves to play basketball like he is a teenager. He told us story after story and he had some funny opinions.
One of the highlights of the week, was last Monday. There is a man in our ward that owns a big laser tag place and he lets the missionaries play for free so we got the whole zone together and played football, and laser tag, and had a great time.
We also met Caleb. He is 20, and he is awesome. He told us the gospel is "rad." We explained the Plan of Salvation to him last night and after we explained baptisms for the dead to him he asked, "why don't other churches have some thing like this?" haha He is a lot of fun and really likes the gospel because it makes sense.
We caught a possum!
Laser tag!
Love y'all! have a great week!
Love,
Elder Harper
Hey Everyone! Last week was a tough one, but a really fun one too. We biked a whole lot and met some really interesting people.
We met one man who is 81, but still loves to play basketball like he is a teenager. He told us story after story and he had some funny opinions.
One of the highlights of the week, was last Monday. There is a man in our ward that owns a big laser tag place and he lets the missionaries play for free so we got the whole zone together and played football, and laser tag, and had a great time.
We also met Caleb. He is 20, and he is awesome. He told us the gospel is "rad." We explained the Plan of Salvation to him last night and after we explained baptisms for the dead to him he asked, "why don't other churches have some thing like this?" haha He is a lot of fun and really likes the gospel because it makes sense.
We caught a possum!
Laser tag!
Love y'all! have a great week!
Love,
Elder Harper
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| Mr. Possum |
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| Laser Tag with the Elders! |
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| Elder Harper's Birthday Celebration with the Howells and his Companion "Got Air?" |
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| Happy 20th Birthday Elder Harper!!! |
Monday, September 7, 2015
Wake Forest - Week 11 (Training Week 4)
Hey everyone! So last week I fractured my wrist so this will be kinda short because typing isn't my strong point at the moment. Most of last week was messed up because I was in a splint, that restricted the use of my elbow. We were limited in what we were able to do but we still got things done. One thing that has really helped me lately is my scripture study. I put a few scriptures together and they have given me a little extra motivation despite my struggles:
"...wherefore, dispute not because ye see not, for ye receive no witness until after the trial of your faith." (Ether 12:6)
"...receive with meekness the engrafted word, which is able to save your souls. But be ye doers of the word, and not hearers only..." (James 1:21-22)
"And let us not be weary in well doing: for in due season we shall reap, if we faint not. As we have therefore opportunity, let us do good unto all men..." (Galatians 6:9-10)
Biking in a cast isn't fun but I know that understanding comes after we trust Him to lead us in the right direction and just because I have a limitation doesn't mean I am limited in what I can do in this work. Love y'all!
Love,
Elder Harper
"...wherefore, dispute not because ye see not, for ye receive no witness until after the trial of your faith." (Ether 12:6)
"...receive with meekness the engrafted word, which is able to save your souls. But be ye doers of the word, and not hearers only..." (James 1:21-22)
"And let us not be weary in well doing: for in due season we shall reap, if we faint not. As we have therefore opportunity, let us do good unto all men..." (Galatians 6:9-10)
Biking in a cast isn't fun but I know that understanding comes after we trust Him to lead us in the right direction and just because I have a limitation doesn't mean I am limited in what I can do in this work. Love y'all!
Love,
Elder Harper
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