What Blessings Have You Received From Living the Commandments?

Dear mom,

The highlight of the week- Elder Stanley had some converts from Irmo, his first area; go through the temple on Friday for endowments and sealing. We got to go! It was so awesome! The Columbia temple is beautiful, and tiny, and sealings are awesome, too!

The sealing was in the evening, and during the day we had a Zone Conference in Newberry with Elder William R. Walker of the Seventy. He is in charge of all the temples. He was AMAZING! So much good advice! One in particular is "Loan people a Book of Mormon, don't give them. It gives you a reason to come back, it gives them urgency to read it before we take it back, and if they don't read it we can give it to someone else who will." Awesome, powerful man. Amazing.

T. had a family feud right before his baptism, and he subsequently put it off ‘til later. We'll keep on him. He is really broken up about his family. It's sad. He said, in his lingo texting "At times I feel I'm fighting for my life it's times I lay awake Night crying I wat gods help to live an do right I needs god’s blessing I a sad man." Sad sad sad. We'll keep on him though.

So I talked with Elder Hahn (he's been in Anderson for the last 7 ½  months) about my converts up there. C. and M. are struggling financially still, but M. got a job that is helping a bit. The kids are doing great, and they are still about 50% attendance, which means "active" although not as active as we'd like. M. W. is still SOLID and preparing for the temple in November! M. A. is cooking crack and on the lamb. So yeah? My first convert is.... less-active. Elder Cramer reported that D. and Z. are still 100% active and awesome! :D

So I have a new appreciation for the game Frogger now. I always wondered, "What's the big deal?  How hard can it be for a frog to cross the street?”  But now that it's summer we see about 10 frogs a day, and 8 of them are flattened on the asphalt. We have also been the Game Over for about 12 to 100 frogs or so..

So y’know the term "you fight like an old married couple?" I have now witnessed why they say that. Old married people bicker a lot. Haha...

I have a question for y'all. What blessings have you received from living commandments? Specifically:  the Law of Tithing, the Word of Wisdom, and the Law of Chastity. 

I am sure James would love anyone who reads this letter to write him about their experience of living the commandments- not just his family.  Notice his address on the right side.

This past week I bought an ocarina. It is horrible and plastic and sounds awful, but it sure is fun!!!!!!!!!! J

As a final note, I'd like to say 2 things. I know the Book of Mormon is true, and Sean Lee is awesome.

That's about it this week.

Love y'all muchly!

Hurrah for Israel!

Elder Seaver

Lots Going On, Not Enough Time to do it all. . . .

Dear Mom!

Wow that sounds like so much fun! I wanna go on youth conference and act out the Book of Mormon! Y’know, it's funny how many Almas and Nephies and Lehies and even Anti-Nephi-Lehies there are in the Book of Mormon. It's tough to keep it all-straight. The thing that took me the longest to figure out is why everyone was quoting "Mormon, in the book of Moroni" and "Moroni, from the book of Mormon" and how that all worked out. I'm super excited to see pictures from y'all's trip!

So mom, I have a challenge for you. new.familysearch.org - ¿Comprende? :)

So this week a guy named S. A. H. called the mission office in Irmo. He was then referred to us since he lives in Leesville (the west edge of our area). He was being taught in Lilburn, GA (yes that's where the Wolferts live, and I will send them a letter next Monday after he gets baptized) and missed his baptism 'cause he moved up here. He came to church yesterday, he's coming to stake conference on the 24th, and we're baptizing and water's edge confirming him that evening! We're pumped!

So anyway, that's about the week. Lots going on, not enough time to do it all....

Love y'all!

Hurrah for Israel!

Elder Seaver

P.S. Happy Father's Day!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Polly Wolly Doodle All the Day

Dear mom,

I wanted to start by illustrating a small story: I heard it said that Elder Jeffrey R. Holland had glued together Song of Solomon (Old Testament) together. I wondered why. Never read it before. So, naturally, I decided to read it. But my little bit of OCD (now conquered- I'm free!) caused me to have to read the entire Old Testament up to that point first, so I could fully understand it and such. By the time I got to SS, I had heard enough rumors to be dissuaded from pursuing the present course. I read the footnote found on the first page of it stating that "the songs of Solomon are not inspired writings" and so I just skipped on ahead. I had, for the past few weeks, still been slightly tempted to read it. I know that the best way to avoid temptation is to, well, avoid it. So this morning as part of my personal study I decided to destroy the temptation once and for all. I took pictures of Christ from the pamphlets we use and cut them to fit the pages, then glued them over the poisonous text! :D I'll show you one day (pictures, Skype, or when I get home. Depends on how lazy I feel. Which, when it comes to pictures, is pretty lazy.). It's awesome. 

So, Guess what? President and Sister Holm are friends with President and Sister Wolfert! Who knew? I'm going to write them a letter today.

President and Sister Holm spoke yesterday in the Lake Murray ward (same building as us in Gilbert, as well as Lexington) and afterward President took a moment to talk to both Elder Stanley and myself. He is so inspired! And Sister Holm really is amazing at being mom-away-from-mom. They are so in tune with the Spirit- I'll tell you more about it one day. It's not really something to be public knowledge and I'm getting kinda tired of typing right now.

So yesterday we got drenched again. I only have 5 ties that aren't silk. The rain is ruining all the silk ones.... We don't even have a single store in our area that sells polyester ties either! :/ It's going to be a repetitive and boring summer of ties. :p Ans speaking of monotony, I'm kinda sick of black pants. I thought from my call packet that black was really the only approved color. Turns out it really don't matta. People have light grey suits, brown suits, brown slacks, blue suits, you name it. Sheesh..

So there was a conference call (they happen often- at least once a month) with the whole mission. One of the things said was that "the music we are listening to is 'off the plan' as a mission" and that we are going back to the basics. It doesn't have to be Mormon Tabernacle Choir, but it DOES have to be about the Savior, and fit some other qualifications. Most missionaries listened to Tenth Avenue North (I don't like em much though, but other companions I've had do), which is Christian rock, and many were guilty of listening to just slower-tempo music and instrumentals. That I am also guilty of. So I purged my music library. Thankfully I still have some BYU and MoTab cds and a good 20ish songs by Celtic Woman that fit the budget.

Man, teaching here is going so slow. We are about where we were last week, and the week before, and the week before, working with the P. family (part-member) and D. and A. They're all just kinda at a standstill- the P. need to come to church to progress and D. needs to repent and trust in the Savior and PRAY. Polly Wolly Doodle All the Day.

By the way, those back scratchers are being thoroughly used. :D Good thinkin!

Aight. That's about it. Love y'all!

Hurrah for Israel!

Elder Seaver

Gone an Entire Pregnancy

Mom,

 

I want you to know that I was going to use the pregnant joke, but you beat me to it! I laughed so hard reading that! :p

 

Wow, time is really flying! It's been a transfer already... This will be my first transfer since Elder Greear that I'll have the same companion again. Elder Stanley and I will be spending another six weeks together here in Gilbert. I love it here!

 

We're working with a family of 5 (the mom is a less-active member) and it's going really well! We're also working with a lady named D. (Don't remember if I've told y'all bout them) and her 9-year-old son A. She works on Sundays, so she couldn't come to church. But she came at six PM and we gave her a tour of the building with some members to get her and A. comfortable with it all. They really liked it! She did comment on how we were "missing" the altar, candles, stained glass windows, and crosses. I got a kick outta that one. Growing up with different churches and switching to one so simple as ours must really be a big change- something I'm glad I haven't ever had to deal with.

 

So I was pondering dear old Chumlee the other day, and I happened across a scripture explaining what will happen to him now that he has passed on:

D & C 29:24-25

 24 For all old things shall pass away, and all things shall become new, even the heaven and the earth, and all the fulness thereof, both men and beasts, the fowls of the air, and the fishes of the sea;

 25 And not one hair, neither mote, shall be lost, for it is the workmanship of mine hand.

So there it is.

We had a bunch of bananas that went bad this past week, so I attempted banana bread. Yes, it was fantastic!

I got some new socks to try and counteract the blisters- Eureka! It works! Nice thick-bottomed socks with a meshy top to vent the heat. It's great :D

I saw this cool electronic dictionary the other day at Wal-mart, just a little thing that I thought was so clever. Like a Pokedex for words! Who woulda thought.

Hey, can you send me one of those origional copies of the Book of Mormon? Yknow, the original print replicas they have now. And can you find the military sized B of M, too? I think they have the blue ones for like $4 on lds.org, but I wanna see if you can get the red ones anywhere. I was just thinking I'd like one to have in my pocket all the time. I hate being without my "sword" when I give the one I'm carrying away to someone else.. :/

That's about it for this week!

Hurrah for Israel!

Elder Seaver