Transfers!

Hello everyone!  So I don't have too much time so I am just going to hit the major points of what has happened lately.

-We finished up transfers and I am getting released and going to a new area.  We are about 99% sure that I will be going up to Kaysville to serve as a zone leader.  I will be serving in one of my old areas!! I served there for 5 weeks right before I came here.  It is going to be awesome.  I am so excited to have the opportunity to focus on the work and on a zone to try to lift and bless and motivate and just help them see success and be happy.  It is going to be a great opportunity.  So I will leave on Tuesday for the new area.

-My companion's birthday was on Wednesday and we had a very good day.  We taught 5 lessons and worked on transfers and he got some presents from some of the office staff and the people we teach.  It was fun. 

-We finally found one of the people we have been teaching after losing her for a week and a half.  Her purse was stolen (with her phone inside) and so she couldn't contact us and she went to park city with her family for a while so we could never find her.  But she got a new phone and then we got in contact and have been teaching her again.  She is preparing for the 1st to be baptized.  

-We had another couple lessons with Josh who I told you about last time.  He is awesome.  He is almost done with the doctrine and covenants and when we met last time we talked about the doctrine of Christ. At the end we asked him how he felt, and he said "well my plan is to finish reading the doctrine and covenants and finish the lessons that you teach me and then I want to be baptized."  It was sooo cool!!!!  We were about to invite him, but he already had the plan and has been praying about a time in march for baptism!  I have never taught someone as prepared as he is in my life!  He will be such a strong member of the church.  Usually most converts are converted by the way they feel when they meet with missionaries, when they read the Book of Mormon, or when they come to church.  It is interesting with Josh though.  I believe that he was converted solely because of the doctrine.  He knows the doctrine of the Church to be true, which is very good for someone who just started reading 2 months ago or less.  Granted he did read the whole triple.  Anyways, he is praying about the 8th.  It was such an awesome miracle and great experience to get to teach him.  

-We have a baptism today at 2:00pm for a girl named Danielle.  She is also very prepared.  It should be a great day!  

-We hit all of the Standards of Excellence this past week!  It was kind of hard to have that many lessons and be able to do everything else, but it was definitely a successful week. :)

-Lastly, we met with President to work on transfers and he invited two future mission president to come watch.  It was interesting!  One is going to Dallas Texas and the other to the Philippines!  We just talked about how a transfer works and what we do to find out where each missionary should go and who should do what.  It was fun to talk to them about it and see how excited they were to go to their own missions and work with the missionaries there.  

Well this was longer than I thought, but I have to go. We are going to go fill up the font.  I will try to write again on Monday.  Love you all!!!  Miss you a ton. Hope all is well there and that everyone is getting better!

Love,

-Elder Hansen

Peak the Strategy

Happy Valentine's Day!

Dear Family,

I have to say, valentine's day in a YSA ward as a missionary is not the best day to get things done.  Ha ha not many people want to meet with you.  And all the members are out on dates so they can’t come to lessons with you.  So tonight will be an interesting night!  Ha ha anyways, it is good to have a couple minutes to write you.  I am sorry that it has been so long.  I have been getting all of your emails and letters and I truly appreciate the updates on everyone!  It gives me comfort to know what is going on even when it is not the best news.  I hope and pray that everyone continues to recover well and that there will be fewer problems in the future. 

Life has been pretty great out here!  I am finally better from being sick!  I wasn’t even that sick compared to what is going on back there!  I hope the pneumonia goes away quickly since you caught it early.  The work has really picked up though.  We have been teaching a lot more and they are bringing their friends to appointments too!  Also we got the coolest referral I think I have ever received on my mission!  His name is Josh.  He grew up in a home with Catholic and Christian non-denominational backgrounds.  He didn’t know what was right, so he has been searching.  He moved out here for work and his family came for military.  He works as a pharmacist at the LDS hospital. He was curious about the LDS faith so he got a copy of the Book of Mormon and just started reading.  He read at a very quick pace and wanted to get a feel for it before meeting with missionaries.  He finished the whole Book of Mormon in 6 weeks! He said that at the beginning he had a lot of questions but as he read the Book of Mormon all of his questions were answered and he believes that it is true!! So epic.  His friend from Ogden got him a nice set of scriptures (a quad) and he just wanted to keep reading! So he read all of Moses and all of Joseph Smith History.  He started reading the Doctrine and Covenants and is already at section 44.  At this rate he will be done with all of the standard works by May!  He sent himself as a referral on LDS.org.  And then we got the referral from some sisters in the mission when they received it!  How cool is that???  He is one of the most prepared people that I have ever taught.  I love being able to work with people who actually want to learn and grow and are sincere about finding the truth. I am so grateful for the miracle it is to be able to teach him and help him come closer to the Savior. 

Hmmm what else has been going on… We had a lot of meetings lately.  We had an MLC and Leadership Training.  Both were great.  They might have been some of my last meetings that I will get to attend.  We have been working on transfers and I will most likely leave this transfer.  I might be a Zone Leader, or maybe a District Leader.  It is all up in the air, but we worked on it a lot yesterday and I think I have a couple ideas of what will happen.  Either way I am excited.  By this time in my mission I have learned that the Lord will put me wherever I can be the most effective and wherever both myself and those around me can be lifted and grow to become what He needs us to become.  It is a good feeling to know that because now the changes I go through are not as hard.  And that also translates to life in general.  Life is full of changes.  And even though I do not prefer to go through so many, I can always be confident that the Lord has a purpose in it for me and that I will become what he needs of me. 

Well that is about it.  We had some other sweet miracles.  A girl in the Capitol Hill ward who thought she was a member turns out not to have records.  So she already knows everything and she can’t really remember being baptized so we have started teaching her and she will be baptized in the next week or two.  She is awesome. Also we have started meeting with a girl in the Westminster ward that has come a couple times.  We went to temple square with her and had a great time talking about the gospel of Jesus Christ and sitting in front of the Christus.  It was an awesome experience.  She is prepared as well.  She also is full of desire to know the truth.  What a blessing it is for us to be able to work with these people.  I am so grateful for the success that the Lord shows us as we put forth our faith and act as true Disciples of Christ. 

I have to go, but I hope you all know how much I miss and love you!!!!!  Keep healing and keep me posted.  You are all in my prayers.  I love you so very much.

Have a terrific week with school and work and all that!

Love,

-Elder Hansen

Peak The Strategy

Hello everyone!  How are you doing? I am happy to hear that the surgery for Becca went pretty well! She has been in our prayers out here a lot. I am also happy that Grandma's went well too!  I hope they both continue healing well this week and that they know how much we love them.  Please keep me informed about how Karen is doing. I miss her and I wish I was there to be able to see her.  I was happy to talk to her for a couple minutes on Christmas.  She is so wonderful.  Let me know how she is recovering. They are all in my prayers regularly!

Well this week was good.  We had some wonderful lessons and started teaching a couple new people.  Monique is one of them.  She really wants to learn and understand what she should do in her life.  It is cool to find people with that complete sincerity.  We are excited to teach her at temple square this week.  We also taught Hannah at temple square.  It was fun!  We saw the movie "God's Plan." Then we went to the temple model and talked a little bit about what goes on in the temple.  

I am going to keep this pretty short, we have some things to get done for our meetings tomorrow and the next day.  Oh!  But first I have to tell you about a couple things!  One of our missionaries named Elder Webb had to go home this week for medical reasons.  He is such an amazing man.  I'll tell you his whole story another time.  Basically Elder Clarke (the one who did our mission tour and that we went teaching with) wanted to personally thank Elder Webb for serving.  So President Hansen had us set up the timing and we got to accompany him to go see Elder Clarke!   (Once again Elder Clarke is from the first quorum of the seventy)  Anyways, we went and he let us come in while he talked to Elder Webb.  It was a very special experience.  He thanked Elder Webb on behalf of the prophet and on behalf of the Lord.  He also gave Elder Webb a couple of assignments.  I can't find the words to describe the spirit that was there.  It was amazing.  Then he asked Elder Webb what his favorite food was and Elder Webb said "Steak."  So he gave us a couple of assignments as well.  First to go get some steak for Elder Webb for lunch! ha ha :)  Then to make sure that Elder Webb's travel arrangements were complete and that he had transportation from one terminal to another for his layover in Dallas.  He said that if we had any problems we should call him. It was cool to see how a man as busy as him would be so willing to help.  Elder Clarke called Elder Webb's parents and stake president the night before as well.  It was just a sweet experience.  I will tell you more about it another time.  We got a picture with them while we were there so I will attach it.  Also Elder Martino from the second quorum of the seventy stopped in to meet him.  And the man in the picture is Steve Peterson from the missionary department.  On the way out Brother McConkie (Elder McConkie's son) came to meet him.  It was so cool.  I will always remember the smile on Elder Webb's face as we walked to our car. 

There were some other things that happened this week, but I can't remember them at the moment....  Oh well.  

I love you all soooo very much and I hope you can feel my prayers for you.  

God lives and He loves us.

Jesus Christ is our Savior and Redeemer.

The church is true.

Godspeed.

-Elder Hansen

Peak the Strategy