November 12, 2014

Hi Family,

That wasn't the best news about the Ute game. That sounds brutile! It's awesome to hear that you guys are studying Preach My Gospel for FHE! The teach with the Spirit is one of the most important sections in Preach My Gospel and I didn't even know about it until I got into the MTC. Teaching with the Spirit is absolutely essential in missionary work. The Spirit is what converts people not us. We can give the Restoration lesson a billion times and we can say it word for word but if the Spirit isn't there then it will have zero effect on the investigator. Another thing I learned in the MTC is that if we are living the Gospel, like mom said in one of her emails, the Spirit will give us what we need to say in the very moment that we need it. Before the mission in mission prep class and in the MTC, I would think about what to say before I said it and I would be frantically thinking about what comes next in the lesson and I wouldn't even be able to focus on the investigator. If you do that while teaching a lesson, there is no way that the spirit can touch the heart of the person that you're teaching. In order to be an effective missionary you have to teach people not lessons. If you have faith that the Spirit will provide and if you're living the Gospel the Spirit will tell you what to say in the very moment that you need it, and you will be able to tailor the lesson to the investigator's or whoever you're teaching's needs. Anyways, this week was awesome!! We gained 5 new investigators and set another baptismal date! The one that we set a date with is named Randy. We met him on Halloween night while we were OYMing and he said he would be interested in a message! So we taught him the Restoration and he loved every little bit of it! We invited him to be baptized and he said yes so we set a date of November 29th with him! He also said that he knows without a doubt that Joseph Smith was a true prophet of the Lord and that no one can change his mind about it! He studied about Joseph Smith on LDS.org last night for 4 hours!!! I'm pretty sure he knows more about him than me and Elder Harral do now haha! But anyways our other investigators are Maria, Sheron, Alfreida, and Shauna. Maria is Spanish and she's like 60 something years old. Sheron is like 70's and we always carry her groceries in for her. Alfreida and Shauna live in the same house! We taught them a couple days ago and before we taught the Restoration we were asking a little bit about them and Elder Harral asked "So are you guys sisters, or mother and daughter, or what?" and Alfreida says "Oh no she's my girlfriend!" ...Hahaha we were not expecting that at all! So that might be a little barrier on the road to baptism but hey we are going to keep trying! I know that if we put our faith in the Lord and be obedient to him then he will perform miracles for us! I loved what Dad said in his email, that everything happens for a reason and that the Lord always has something in store for us and when something goes wrong and we wonder why, just look around for the miracle because He's always pouring blessings out on us. I love you guys and I hope everything is well. Stay safe and keep doing the right things!

Love Elder Summerhays