December 29, 2015

Hey Family!

 It was awesome to be able to talk to you guys on Christmas! It seems like everyone is doing great, and everyone had a sweet Christmas! I love you guys so much and I miss all of you! The Star Wars marathon sounds like a good time! 

 This week was pretty sweet! Our Christmas was awesome and yes we did end up eating 4 dinners that night! I’m definitely going to miss Christmas on the mission. It’s so awesome! So remember how I said it doesn’t snow here? Well the night after Christmas it just started pummeling snow! We were driving and it was like driving in Utah when it snows, like fishtailing and stuff! People in New Mexico have no idea what to do when it snows haha, like people are going 10 mph in a 40 and we saw one guy make a left turn on a light that had been red for like 15 seconds! Like the rules just don’t apply on the road when it snows haha, but it was fun! So then the next day, which was Sunday, we woke up and there was like 8 inches on the ground, I know that’s like nothing for UT but for NM that’s like almost record breaking, and so we got a text from one of the ward members that said church was cancelled because of the weather! So we were like what do we do? So we called President Miller and asked him what we should do, and he said if we feel safe enough to drive we can go out and work or shovel people’s driveways but if not just stay in and study and weekly plan for the next week. So we went out and shoveled peoples driveways in the morning for a couple hours, and then after that we came back and weekly planned and studied for a little bit! But it was super weird because that hardly ever happens, and especially not for just 8 inches of snow. It was good to get some snow though, I was hoping it would snow on Christmas but the day after works too! It kinda stinks that church was cancelled though because we had a lot of investigators that were going to come to church that day, oh well. 

 We did find a sweet new investigator this week though! So we were knocking doors the day after Christmas, and we knocked on this one door and a YSA girl answered and she was like “Come on in guys!” So we did and when we walked in there was another lady that we assumed was her mom, and we saw a painting of Jesus with all the little children, and it was a mormon one that you see all over in the Church. So they invited us to sit down and we were talking with them and we asked this girl (Morgan) if she was a member and she said no but her mom is. Then her mom spoke up from the kitchen and said “I’ll be in ther in a sec.” So we kept talking with Morgan and asking about like her religious background and kinda her life, and she said that she teaches childrens Sunday school at a baptist school down in Texas and she is visiting for a little bit. She said that she doesn’t like some of the things about her church and she is looking for another one haha! So we kept talking to her and told her about the BOM and a little bit about what we believe, and then at the end we asked if we could come back and teach her more about the BOM and our church before she goes back to Texas, and she said that she would love that! So we are going to start teaching her and her mom said that she wants her to be baptized as well so that’s awesome and will help a ton! We’re pumped!

 That was pretty much my week though! We taught a couple lessons with our other investigators. But I hope all is well with you guys! I love you all a ton! The church is true! Talk to you guys later!

 Love Elder Summerhays

December 22, 2015

Dear Family,

That's sweet that the Utes won! We were getting updates of the game from one of the members and I was getting worried when they started choking at the end, but hey they pulled through for the victory! I am pumped to FaceTime you guys on Friday! It sounds like the white elephant and the nativity went well!

Anyways, this week was pretty good! We had a ton of appointments cancel on us but it happens. We were able to meet with Robert and Rosemary, and we read out of the Book of Mormon with them. They said they would absolutely be at church this week and they never ended up showing haha, but we are going to meet with them this week and throw down on them for not being there haha! We also had an investigator that moved away so we won’t be teaching him anymore, but we have a lot of potentials that we are hoping to turn into new investigators soon.

 We also are helping a lady with a mouse infestation that she has in her garage. Mom is going to love this one, her garage is filled with boxes and bags and just things all over the place, and she has bags of bird seed that she uses to feed the birds in her yard, but some of the bags have split open and spilled everywhere so there is bird seed all over the floor. So basically it’s like paradise for mice because they have a ton of places to hide and they have a ton of food. We have been going over there to set traps for her and we have caught like five mice already, but every time we open the garage we see one or two more scurry in, so it’s basically a lost cause… but tomorrow we are going in there to clean the bird seed up and move some of the boxes and take some mice to the woodshed. It’ll be a good time. 

 We also met with our new Stake President this week. His name is President Allman and he is sweet! We talked about our vision for the stake and what his vision is, and he talked about how he gets super frustrated when missionaries don’t go out and work. There have been a couple missionaries in our zone that haven’t been working as hard as they should and they kinda ruined one of the areas, but they got transferred this transfer so there are some new ones there now. But we talked about all the potential that Rio Rancho has and how we can help the missionaries see it. Something I have realized on my mission is that you can’t just be an object, you have to be an agent. I was taught that multiple times before my mission but I didn’t fully grasp it until my mission. Nothing in life is going to happen if you are just waiting for it to happen, if you want something to happen you just gotta do it! There are a lot of missionaries and people that want things to change in their area or in their life, but they are not willing to do the things necessary to change it so they just wait and nothing happens and then they just get discouraged and things get worse. Just do it!! Yeah it may take a little while for things to work out but when you are working diligently and you don’t give up, it will always work out. Agency is so sweet! 

 Anyways, I love and miss all of you and hope all is well! I’m excited to see you guys on Christmas! Keep doing what’s right. I’ll talk to you later!

Love, Elder Summerhays

                                

December 14, 2015

Dear Family,

 Transfer news came in and Elder Worley and I are staying together in Rio Zion! We are super pumped! There is a ton of work going on and a ton of work for us to do so this transfer should be a super good one! Thanks a ton by the way for the package! I love the alpha smart and not only does it let me have better journal entries, but I can type my weekly email up in the mornings so that they can be longer! We have also decided to do a twelve days of Christmas thing with our zone. Each day we are going to leave a note and some treat or something on each companionships doorstep leading up to Christmas, and we are going to use the wal-mart gift card to buy all of the stuff for it. I am going to buy a santa suit as a disguise so we don’t get caught, it’s going to be sweet! But thanks for all of the things that you sent me, I love you guys so much!

 This week was pretty sweet! We were able to baptize Kristina and Desiree! The baptism was awesome and a ton of people showed up to support them! They are so solid, and once again are going to be kingdom builders! We also had three confirmations yesterday because last Sunday was that conference so Emily got to get confirmed with them yesterday which was awesome! I got to do Emily’s confirmation and our ward mission leader, and a seminary teacher did the other two girls! It was so sweet to have three confirmations in a sacrament meeting! And they are all friends too so they will be able to fellowship each other throughtout their lives!

 We had a sweet Zone Conference/MLC/Zone Training this week. Elder Randall K. Bennett of the Seventy was able to come and teach us! All of the zone leaders got to have a pre meeting with him before the zone conference, and he told us that he had prepared by studying for weeks what he wanted to train us on, and he said that he didn’t have anything written down and that he was going completely by the Spirit for the conference, and throughout the conference you could definitely tell that he was going by the Spirit! He taught us so many things that the mission needed and that I needed personally! Then after the conference we had a special MLC where all of the zone leaders got together with Elder and Sister Bennett and President and Sister Miller, and Elder Bennett said that we were going to go around the room and say one thing from zone conference that we feel like the mission needs most. So we did that and the AP’s wrote them up on the board. After we did that President Miller got up and talked for a little bit, and we all counseled together on how we can narrow it down to one thing that we can focus on. Then President Miller just stared at the board for like a solid 1-2 minutes, the Spirit was super strong, and then he said “There is one thing that encompasses all of these things, and that’s conversion.” So then we all counseled together about conversion and Elder Bennett talked about it and gave some last comments and MLC was over. It was one of the most Spiritual experiences of my life!! He is my new favorite seventy haha! 

 Then later in the week on Friday we had our zone training where we were supposed to review zone conference and train on what we learned in MLC. So Elder Worley and I took Elder Bennett’s advice and studied the whole week about conversion and reviewed our notes from zone conference and when we prepared our training we wrote down a few things as kinda topics for discussion but the whole rest of the training was going to be by the Spirit. It went SOOO well!! While we were up there training thoughts feelings impressions and scriptures kept just coming to my mind and heart like things I had studied and experiences I had, and I would say it and it would be straight from the Spirit! We asked a couple of the missionaries what they thought about zone training afterwards and they said that it was the most spiritual zone training that they had ever been to! I know that it is because the Spirit knew what the zone needed to hear and Elder Worley and I were just the instruments that were used in relaying that to the zone! It was so incredible though! 

 We have applied the things we learned in the meetings with some of our investigators and we have seen sweet results. Robert accepted a baptismal invite so we hope to set a date with him soon! More of our other investigators are also keeping their commitments that they weren’t before. Things are going great in the area right now and we are pumped for the new transfer! Anyways, that was my week, and now I’m gonna go take some people to the woodshed in ultimate Frisbee! I love and miss you all! Talk to you later.

 Love Elder Summerhays

                                   

                                                

                                                  

      

December 7, 2015

Dear Family,

 Sorry I totally forgot to tell you all that this week is deep clean P-day, which is where we deep clean our apartment:P so P-day is on Monday... I hope everyone is doing good! Also next week is transfer week so P-day will be on Monday again!

This week was sweet!! We were able to baptize Emily and it went super well! Once again the High range ward came through in the clutch and we had 50-60 people there to support her! The grandmother Gina loved it and she was crying for most of the baptism! The Spirit was there so strong and it was a great day! 

Yesterday instead of Sacrament meeting we had a Tri-stake conference at a huge building called the Santa Ana Star Center. We had the meeting because they added a new stake in the Albuquerque area called the Albuquerque North stake, so Elder Randall K. Bennett of the seventy was there. So the three stakes that were there were us (Rio Rancho) Albuquerque, and Albuquerque West. What’s sweet is that Cherry Hills is in the Albuquerque stake and Volcano Cliffs is in the ABQ-West stake, so I got to see people from both of my last wards! I saw Randy, Avram, and Sarah Loy and I got to catch up with them, and I also saw Elder Burton and Elder Gardner which was sweet! Randy is a church service missionary right now, Avram said he has a golden referral to hand off to the missionaries that is even more golden than he was haha, and Sarah has been going tracting with the missionaries in Cherry Hills! It is so sweet to see that they are all doing missionary work and are staying strong in the Gospel! 

The best part of the week though, besides the baptism of course, happened yesterday after the conference. We had an appointment with Sister Hodshire’s granddaughters, so we went over to teach them and we had planned to invite them to baptism because Sister Hodshire had talked to the people who have legal custody over them and they had said that they are ok with it. So we went in and taught briefly the first points of the Gospel of Jesus Christ lesson and when we got done talking about baptism I said “So would you guys want to always have God’s Spirit with you?” they said “Yes of course!” and I said “You can, and that happens when we are baptized and receive the Holy Ghost and keep our covenants!” They had gone to Emily’s baptism just the day before and they had loved it so they kinda had baptism on the brain! So after that I said “So we wanted to invite you guys, when you come to know these things are true, which you probably already know they are, do you guys believe that everything we are teaching is true?” they said “Yes!” so I said “Will you follow the example of Jesus Christ and be baptized by someone holding the priesthood authority of God?” And while I was inviting them they were both smiling and nodding at me! So they both said yes to the invite and I said “Sweet! Now all that we have to decide is when. We are holding a baptismal service this Saturday, do you think you guys could be prepared by that day?” and they both exclaimed “Yes!” It was SO awesome! Then Sister Hodshire said “We need to find out if this Saturday works for the other Grandparents, who have custody. So she called them right then and there and asked them if it would work for them, and they said it would work! I just stood up and celebrated right in front of them and they celebrated too! So we will be having another baptism this week and Elder Worley will baptize one of the granddaughters and I will baptize the other one! Everything worked out perfectly and I know it’s because God has prepared them and the family for them to be baptized! It is so cool to see how Heavenly Father is truly in charge, and this is His work!

I am grateful to be serving a mission and to be seeing the joy that comes into others lives because of the Gospel! I love and miss you all and hope all is well! Talk to you next week!

Love Elder Summerhays

                                          

                                         

December 1, 2015

Hey Family,

Congrats to the kids on the W in the turkey bowl and to Ann for the W in the dessert contest! It sounds like Thanksgiving was awesome! That's cool that Great Grandma Markle and Tyler were there at Grandma Deb's! That's awesome too that Ty is getting married soon! Elder Worley and I always pull out the Chewy impression haha! 

This week was really good! We were able to meet with Robert Jones and his family. We dropped by on Friday and they were just getting ready to leave to Colorado to go see some evangelical conference where some guy gives a big sermon. We think it’s a dumb idea first of all because they have no money, neither of them work and the tickets are $200 and they don’t have money for gas to get back or a place to stay when they get there, and second of all because the guy giving the sermon is probably a moron who just wants money and fans. They were like “We’re just going to take a leap of faith and go for it!:D” when or if they get back we are going to have to explain faith to them again… Anyways we shared a short message with them and said a prayer with them before they left. We got to meet with Emily and her family this week as well. We have been reviewing the lessons with her just to refresh and get her ready for her baptism! She is excited and nervous for the baptism which is natural. The High Range ward does a sweet job at fellowshipping so there should be a pretty big turnout at the baptism! It’s pretty cool to teach her because her parents are returning less active members and her grandma is not a member but she is super religious, so every time we teach all of them bring up good questions sometimes deep ones about the gospel and it is good for the whole family not just Emily!

We also picked up a couple new investigators this past week. The first one’s name is Florence. She was referred to us by some Spanish sister missionaries who knocked on her door and OYMed her and she said that we could come back. So we went and contacted her with a member and were able to go in and teach her the Restoration. She is a little bit crazy but the lesson went really well and she cried at the first vision and told us that she wants to feel God’s love in her life! So we promised her that she could. Her only concern is church, she said that she doesn’t like going to church because the pastor or whoever speaks always gets up there and preaches about how we should live our lives and then he goes out the next day and drinks and parties and is a total hypocrite haha. So we explained that The Church of Jesus Christ is different than other churches and that she won’t see that in our church! So we hope to eventually get her to come, and she also said that she wants us to teach her daughter next time too so that will be sweet! The other new investigator that we found is Arsenio. He was referred to us by the same sister missionaries. He is a single guy probably in his late 20’s or early 30’s who has met with missionaries before and who is looking for the truth in his life. He had been taught the Restoration before but he didn’t remember most of it so we went over it again, and the Spirit was super strong during the lesson! At the end we focused on prayer and reading the BOM and we asked him what he thought about the lesson and he said “I think that I need to spend more time reading the Book of Mormon and really pray about it.” And we were pumped and testified like crazy! It was sweet and we have another meeting with him on Sunday so we are excited to follow up with him on his BOM reading!

Geronimo ended up moving back out to the reservation to live with his mom so that kinda stinks… other than that our week was pretty sweet! It’s so cool to see how when you work hard, the Lord blesses you in so many different ways. Like we have been tracting and contacting a TON in the last couple weeks which I actually love to do, but we haven’t seen too much success from it, besides a couple potential investigators, but because we are working God is rewarding us in different ways, like we’ve gotten a ton of solid referrals and we have a lot of investigators come to church and just a ton of different ways. It’s just cool to see that when we not only have faith but show our faith Heavenly Father will help us and strengthen us! Anyways, I love you all and thanks for everything you do for me! Talk to you later.

Love Elder Summerhays

November 24, 2015

Dear Family,

Happy Thanksgiving!! You bet our zone is playing a zone turkey bowl today!! We are so pumped! I'll let you know how it goes next week. I'm definitely going to miss Thanksgiving with the family, But I'll be stuffing my face over here in Rio Zion. We have 5 dinners lined up for thanksgiving so we are going to have to pace ourselves so we don't explode! It'll be a fun day! Know that I'm rooting for the kids in the turkey bowl this year! Hopefully they can pull through for another W!

This week was sweet for us! We were able to meet with Robert Jones and his family a couple times! Rosemary is his wife and she is a little skeptical about the church. She brings up a lot of unrelated doctrinal issues that she has, for example we were reading 2 Nephi 31 with them and when Nephi says "And the voice of the Son came unto me" she said that it couldn't have been the voice of the Son because Jesus hadn't taken the seat on the right hand of the father until after his life and resurrection. We explained to her about the premortal life and how Christ was with God and how he created the world and she agreed with everything that we said but she still didn't agree that he was talking to Nephi... So I don't think she even made sense to herself in her own mind but she agrees with the Gospel that is taught in the Book of Mormon so if we can soften her heart then she can start progressing! Robert came to church this week and he said he loved it so he is definitely in, but we just need to get Rosemary in as well!  We had a good lesson with them yesterday where we brought a member who explained our church meeting to Rosemary and she asked a lot of questions and we were able to answer them and when we left she thanked us for coming and said that she enjoyed it! 

We weren't able to meet with Kyle this week so we were kind of bummed, but the sweet thing is that on Sunday right when church started he texted us and told us that he had a feeling that he needed to come to church and asked us if he was too late, and we told him no and that he is totally welcome to come, so he did! He came just in time for the last speaker who gave a sweet talk about the trials that we go through and how we need to be grateful through them and he said that the talk hit him really hard and he was grateful that he came! We will probably meet with him a couple times this week and we are hoping to set a baptism date with him soon so we are pumped about that! 

We also set another baptism date this week with a girl named Emily! She is 14 years old and she lives with her parents who are both members who used to be less active but are returning. She asked us the other day after a lesson who she can talk to if she wants to be baptized, and we were like US! Haha so her date if for December 12th but it may have to be moved due to some of the member's schedules because they want to be there! 

Anyways that was our week! Love you all and have a good week! Bye

Love Elder Summerhays