Greetings from the Great OCM!
This has
turned out to be a terrific week full of hard work and success. When I
first got to the area our teaching pool was very small. This area
(Danville) was opened about 7 weeks ago so it is just now getting
rolling. But this last week we increased our teaching pool by finding 6
new investigators (2 of which came to church on Sunday) and we have many
awesome people we are now teaching.
We spent a lot of time finding in the first few days
of the week. We met our goal for finding 6 on Wednesday and this
allowed us to focus on other indicators such as teaching with members
present and getting all of them to church. It turned out to be a very
successful week. Now we just need to do it again this week, or even
exceed it.
Sadie is coming to OHIO. That is awesome. I doubt
that she will be coming through Columbus, mainly because the church
history sites are in the more northern part of the state, but actually
my area is probably closer to Kirtland than any other in the mission
since I am in one of the most northern areas. So she won't be too far
away! I am so jealous because we don't get the opportunity to go to the
church sites even though they are just a couple hundred miles away!
By the way Big-D says hey (he is the member who's
home we are emailing from since we don't have a library in
Danville). Brother Miller is his real name but we call him Big D. He
is in a wheelchair and is overall a champion. His wife (Sister Miller)
is kind of like our "mom" in this area. She helps us with everything we
need
We had an amazing Sunday. it was snowing all morning
and usually when that happens almost no one comes to church. We had 5
people lined up to come and about an hour before church things started
to get hectic. We were in Ward Council down in Mount Vernon when we
found out the member who was picking up 2 of our investigators cancelled
on us because he felt uncomfortable driving in the snow (there was
about an inch of fresh snow on the road). We grabbed one of the ward
council members and drove out and picked them up. Then we were dropped
off, we grabbed our car, went over to the other 2 investigators homes
and they followed us to church. So amazingly we were blessed and got all
5 of them to church in the slippery snowy weather. It was a crazy
morning and normally some of them would have gone to the Mt. Vernon
ward, but because of the weather they all came to the Amish group (where
Elder Dubose and I usually attend). The spirit was very strong in the
meeting. And since the "group" is so small essentially everyone had to
bear their testimonies to pass the time, but there were rarely any
brakes in between testimonies in this small group of around 40 people.
There has been a big controversy in the ward whether
or not English investigators should be attending the Amish group,
because the Amish group was created with the intention of creating a
comfortable environment for other Amish investigators. There were lots
of opinions on the issue. Many felt that the Amish group should be only
Amish, however President Nilsen and The Stake president told us to just
get them to church wherever is convenient. However the Bishop and other
ward leaders felt otherwise. luckily we were wise how we approached the
issue and everyone agreed that we would take it on a case to case basis
and the missionaries would decide where the investigators will be most
comfortable. There were some heated opinions though at first and I was
worried for the sake of member trust, but the stake president made a
decision, a compromise was made, (the Henry Clay way) and now everyone
is happy with the decision.
So that is about it for this week. It was a great
week, the kind of week that makes you want to stay on your mission for
more than 2 years. I know that this is the Lord's work, and I know that
true happiness is found in this gospel. I love it! I just love being a
missionary! To all my younger siblings I encourage you to learn for
yourself if a mission would be right for you. There is no doubt in my
mind that this is what the Lord wants me to do and it is truly the
greatest thing I have ever done, or probably ever will do in my
lifetime.
Love,
Elder Beutler
– Henry D. Moyle
Address to California Mission
Address to California Mission
