Email June 29, 2015

Hello! It's hot! Supposed to be a nice warm 111 on Wednesday! It has been hot all week! 100+ every day if I remember correctly. Warm. :) We spent a lot of time trying to contact former investigators and updating their information and haven't seen much success with them yet. But we will keep on trying because I have faith that former investigators are a great resource for finding new investigators! Plus, a good number of them have had testimonies at one point so all we would need to do is help them find it again. Harder than it sounds, but it provides great opportunities! We were able to have some good lessons! We were finally able to meet an investigator's son who is less active and he's super cool! It's really sad that he and his older brother had a bad experience at church and aren't willing to give another ward a shot. We invited him out to church and he said it is a 50/50 shot. Didn't come. Neither did our investigator. They need your prayers!!! She has started to read sporadically from the Book of Mormon, which is good, but it's not quite enough. Keep them in your prayers. We had an AWESOME lesson with one of our investigators! We were able to get some things out of him that are concerning him. It's all based around his family too which is super cool because it shows he loves his family. We had the lesson at his girlfriend's home like usual and her mom sat in and shared her conversion story. She shared how it was important to her that she converted for the right reasons, not just for her husband (boyfriend at the time). I think that was really good for our investigator to hear. He and his girlfriend are starting to read more and have committed to being more committed to their studies and they committed together at the end of the lesson to study more deeply and to pray more to know if these things are true. I know that if he does, he will find the answer that it is! And that will bless his life so much. We were able to talk to him about sealings and how his family, if they aren't able to accept the gospel in this life, will have the opportunity to accept it in the next and he felt really good about that. It was a great lesson, definitely very guided by the Spirit. Please keep him in your prayers that he will read and pray and receive the answer that will come to him! There was a lesson we had with a less active YSA who moved in not too long ago. The lesson was about prayer and how it is essential to gaining our testimonies. We shared the story of Enos and he really liked it. We talked a lot about how Enos describes his prayers and how he receives his testimony and it was a great lesson! The Spirit was strong there as he shared his desire to be fully active in the church again and gain his testimony again. He works with another YSA member who has gone less active recently and he said that he is going to try to get him to come back to church as well! How awesome is that! Alex is super cool! At our lesson with an investigator and her daughter we found out that they watched the Book of Mormon movie, the one that covers 1 Nephi through part of 2 Nephi, and they loved it! The coolest part is that it was shortly after we invited her husband into the lessons and HE was the one who looked it up! It got them excited to keep reading! They really wished there was another movie, but there isn't. :( However! We had a good lesson! She had some concerns about Joseph Smith because she heard that some of his prophecies haven't come true yet. So we are a little worried about potential anti stuff, but we had a really good talk about reading the Book of Mormon and praying about it yields an answer that man cannot give nor take away. It is a God-given answer and what is given by God overpowers what humankind says. Basically saying that no matter what you read or hear, if you read the Book of Mormon and pray about it and get the answer that it is true, anything anyone else says about it doesn't matter because you know, from God, that it is true. They really liked that too! So they committed themselves to reading and praying about it every night as a family!!! Please, please, please keep them in your prayers that they will keep their commitment! And also please pray that their daughter will be able to make it to Girls Camp! We did see a few other choice people with good lessons, but I'm running out of time so I'm going to tell why this week was so crazy: like I said earlier, most of the first few days of the week were spent knocking on formers' doors and either getting no answer, finding out they had moved, or hearing they aren't interested. It yielded no fruit. :( So over the next few days it got a little better, but it was still pretty unfruitful when it comes to finding new people to teach. Friday right after our prayer for weekly planning we get a phone call from a guy who needs help moving. So! We went. And then when we got back we got stuck in a conversation with our missionaries about some stuff going on in the zone. And we had very little time to plan so we got almost nothing done before we needed to leave. Then that night after a lesson we got a phone call from a companionship saying they're stranded and needed help getting home because their bike tires popped and were on the opposite side of their area and it was 9:30. So we went and rescued them and didn't get in until around 10, 10:15. Then the next day we had to take them to the bike shop and then take them home and we decided to help them fix their bikes. But it took forever. Then we had to have a talk with them because they have been struggling within the companionship lately and it's getting really visible and so we wanted to help it get better ASAP. Then we find out that our quarterly interviews with President are taking place on Wednesday, district meeting on Tuesday, and we have our weekly MLC meeting on Thursday. We have to talk with the whole zone about goals and a number of other things. It has just been thing after thing! Nonstop this week was crazy! But I loved it. I love the gospel. I love how the gospel gives us hope and help. I know there was an Atonement performed for all of us. I'm glad to know that the Atonement can strengthen me and can cleanse me. I'm glad to know that the Atonement gives us both the enabling power, or the strength and ability to overcome struggles and challenges in our lives, and the cleansing power, or the ability to be forgiven and purified. I'm glad to know that repentance was and is the first plan, and that it was never the backup plan. Repentance and change are real and they are made possible because of the love of our Heavenly Father and our Savior. How amazing is it that even though we make mistakes, there are two perfect People out there saying "Look, you made a mistake. But that's all it was. It's not the end of the world, it's not the end of your life, it's not the end of your test. You've still got plenty of time to make it right. And with Our help, we know you can overcome this. We know that you don't have to always feel the guilt and shame and embarrassment of past choices. We know you don't want to feel those things. We know you're not perfect and We are willing to work with that because We love you and We want you to be with Us, forever!" The Atonement is real! Change is real! Repentance, change, and perfection in Christ are real! I know this is all true. I love you all! I hope you have an incredible week! God loves you! Never give up! Love, Elder Cevering