Elder Krebs, Elder Rushton

Quilting Guild, Winslow, Arizona

Lots, and lots of rain!

Wood Hauling with Dilkon Elders and Elder Ghnem.  Cole's buddy Elder Kay and his companion.

Hello Everyone,

 

So this past week was really good we didnt have too many meetings and there was not much that went on!  We did end up going on exchanges with the holbrook elders!  Elder Chipman came to Winslow with Elder Gnehm and i had the chance to go to Holbrook with Elder Krebs!  It was great i love Elder Krebs to death this is his second transfer being out so he came out in July!  He is a great missionary i cant believe he has only been out for only 3 months! We had a very productive day in Holbrook and he taught me a lot!  It was nice to be able to get to know him a lot more!  He is from Logan, Utah!  The rest of the week we really just tried to stay working hard!  Something that me and Elder Gnehm have been working on is just talking to everybody!  It is amazing when you are able to talk to everyone outside they get more and more comfortable with you!  There is a guy we met on the west end of town that we went back and talked to 4 times before we even introduced the gospel to him!  Thats one thing that i have seen work really well is sometimes that first time is not the time to talk about the gospel so there is no need to force it just simply come back later another day!  It has been really cool we have been seeing miracles come from that from talking to everyone!  This next week we have a very busy week in front of us we have MLC on tuesday so were leaving for farmington today and then we are going on exchanges with the wide ruins and sanders elders on wednesday andthursday so we wont be back into town until friday!  It should be great and a lot of fun!  Im am very excited and looking forward! I was glad to hear about bishop watt being the new bishop back home he will do a great job i know he will!  I know his councilor will be great also!  Thanks for everything have a great week!

 

Love Elder Rushton

Hello everyone,

 

So this past week was pretty good it was definitely a different kind of week!  I started out by waking upon Tuesday with a bit of a sore throat I didn't think much of it so I just went through the day and then went to bed!  Well on Wednesday when I woke up I had a fever of 100 a really bad sore throat and some sinus pressure! So that morning I called Sister Batt and she told me just to take it easy that day and it would go away!  Well that day we had dilkon coming down to winslow for exchanges so while Elder Gnehm and Elder Kay went out and worked I sat in bed while Elder Hunter watched me haha It was the worst feeling the entire time when your sick on your mission you hate sitting there in bed you feel so terrible about it and you feel like you should be out working but you cant so the whole time your just fighting yourself and your frustrated! haha Its just no fun!  Anyway me and Elder  Hunter took off for Dilkon that night around 4 and we finished the day teaching out there!  So the rest of the week I lost my voice and I cant hardly talk!  That always is no good when your a missionary because that is all you do is talk! So it has just been a frustrating week but I am feeling better so that is good!  This week we spent a lot of a time tracting a part of town called south side!  Its on the other side of the railroad tracts and lets just say no one really goes out there!  Well we really felt like we would find success out there!  So we went!  We talked to lot of interesting people and didn't find much success!  But if there is one thing I have learned on my mission it is that when you show the lord that you are putting forth your effort  he will reward you!  It might night always be in the way your expecting but he will reward you!  So on sunday we talked to this kid that we met playing ping pong with at the seminary building the kid is a member anyway he said his dad is ready to take the missionary lessons!  So we went out and met his dad wow his dad is so prepared!  His wife just left him because he wasn't living the best like he wants to change and knows he can through the atonement he wants to become a better husband and father and that is exactly what this gospel will do!  Anyway Im doing great im loving my mission!  I hope everyone has a great week!  Take care love ya!

 

Elder Rushton

Hello everyone,

 

So this past week was busy man we had a lot to do!  We had to set up and take down for the fair!  We had to make sure each district in the zone new when to get to the fair, who they were staying with that night and how long they were gonna be there!  All in all I believe the fair turned out to be a great thing!  we had a lot of supplies there pictures of the savior, book of Mormons (English, Spanish, and Navajo) We had pamphlets and a referral paper!  It worked out really well toward the end of the fair we had the process down!  The way I found the most success is taking around the pass along card that shows Jesus appearing in the Americas to the nephites and I would just ask people if they wanted a picture of Jesus!  Of course they do everyone loves Jesus!  Then when they took the card I would start introducing the book of Mormon to them and telling them how Jesus Christ visited the Americas as well as jeruselum then we would say we would love to come visit you sometime and tell you a little bit more about it!  It went great we got a lot of people to sign up and it looks like we will have a lot of success from it!  There was one day at the fair that this lady come up to us and immediately she didn't look too happy!  She slammed this paper down on the table and told us she was a Baptist preachers wife who was here to prove us wrong! haha It kind of just cracked us up!  She started into this anti Mormon stuff that she found on the internet!  I was very impressed with our missionaries that were there none of them raised there voice none of them argued back we just testified to the lady that if she would read the book of Mormon she would know it to be true as well!  She didn't like it too much and she stormed off!  It just goes to show when your out there trying to do something good someone or something always has to try to come ruin it!  Im glad we didn't argue with her I have noticed on my mission one thing if your going to bible bash with someone it does absolutely no good both people are just going to walk away mad thinking they won and that the other is wrong and that doesn't do any good!  We ended the fair and had a great time doing it!  We had a couple tender mercies of the lord there (fair food,  cool booths everyone, and country music playing in the background!  haha which we didn't listen too)  :) It turned out to be great!  Me and Elder Gnehm had to meet with both stake presidents in our zone and tell them how the work is going in there stakes this week as well too!  That is always a big process we have to fill out a lot of paperwork for the stake presidents!  So its just nice to be able to sit back now and know that those things are done!  Im greatfull for the opportunity to be out here Things have been great and they are only going up from here!  Love you all take care!

 

Elder Rushton

Hello Everyone,

 

So this week was great we had the opportunity to go to one of our new district leaders district meetings!  Elder Young who is in Wide Ruins!  It was great he is an awesome leader and he will do a great job!  He is also from Idaho Falls, ID!  He trained about how to build companionship unity!  it was great!  I think it was awesome because almost everyone in our zone got a new companion this last transfer so it helped us out a lot!  I don't think Elder Young knows it but he might be doing that same training at the next zone training haha but all in all it was great!  Then the highlight of the week was definitely getting to go to Farmington and listen to Elder Jeffrey R. Holland on Saturday!  As me and Elder Gnehm went in and sat down I started looking around and all of the sudden I saw my Lukachukai friends there!  The Daines were there that was so cool to see them I have missed them so much and also paige norcross was there and what was so cool to see was Alison was there as well!  Alison is the girl who got baptized in march when I was in Lukachukai!  It was so special to see someone you taught the gospel to sitting in a meeting with you with Elder Holland!  We were able to have Elder Robins there of the presidency of the 70 and Elder Catcher who is in the chorum of the 70!  Elder Holland was so amazing to listen too!  It was cool to see when he walked into the room we all stood up and just watched him walk up to the stand!  That feeling was awesome! Elder Holland spoke and man he is a powerful speaker!  I took lots of notes that I will never forget as long as I live!  One thing he talked about that stuck in my mind was he said the phrase that "we are our own first convert" if we are not willing to convert ourselves fully to the gospel how do we expect to convert others!  He also mentioned that that is the number one priority of why we go on missions is to convert ourselves and by so doing it will convert our future families, wife, kids, etc.! The most powerful thing that he said to me was when he was closing he bore such a strong testimony he talked about how the church cant afford to lose one single one of us and how we shouldn't ever question going home from our mission early he stressed over and over again how important we are to this work!  Then he said this and this is what I will never forget for as long as I live he said "we cannot afford to lose one of you."  Then he pounded the pulpit not even kidding and in the most loving loud voice he said "salvation is at stake not only in your life but the lives of those you are sent to find" then with a finger pointing right at us he said "if at any time your testimony weakens I want you to fall on mine" then he testified of the savior and the church so powerfully and the words that I have had stuck in my mind ever since then is when he said "I DID NOT GIVE MY LIFE FOR A FAIRYTALE" he said "this work is real and I would not be here if it wasn't"  That phrase I did not give my life for a fairytale struck me Elder Holland has been an apostle for a long time now he has given a large part of his life to the church! He wouldn't just do it for a fairytale so that was cool!  I love Elder Holland!  It was awesome!  Anyway I heard there was some change back home to the stake presidency and all I can say is it sounds like a great stake presidency I am excited to be able to meet them here in a couple months! I would like to thank President Anderson, Hillman, and Thompson for all that they have done They have done a lot for the stake and they will be missed!  I would also like to thank Bishop day for what he has done for the Thomas 6th ward he and bishop Mathews are part of the reason im out here on a mission today so thank you for that you will be missed!  Hope all is well take care and have a great week!

 

Love Elder Rushton

Elder Rushton and Elder Phillips

Dirty after wood hauling

Dilkon District

Hello Everyone,

 

So this past week went by fast!  Seems like that is always how the week before transfers go!  So The big transfer news is that Elder Carpenter will be leaving!  He is going to Kirtland, NM he will be leaving today!  I sure will miss the kid it sure has be an awesome fast 12 weeks with the kid!  I am getting Elder Gnehm as my new companion he is a cool guy I don't know much about him but things should be great!  This past week we stopped by a guys house that we met him at his garage sale!  Immediately there he began talking religion with us and it led to us asking if we could come over well finally we caught him home!  We taught him about the restoration and the book of Mormon and it all just clicked for him!  I have never seen someone so interested as he was!  It was such a great lesson and its going to be great continuing to teach him!  He has a lot of things to overcome in his life but he can do it!  Garage/Yard sales have been amazing!  We have found so many people just by going to yard sales each Saturday its been cool!  We had the chance to go wood hauling yesterday for a good part of our pday!  I know a lot of elders that would have complained and said they didn't want to do service but as for us we love wood hauling we would do that any pday!  It was fun it was for the dilkon branch and they really needed some help so it was good to be able to help them out the best that we could!  We are all pretty excited here in the winslow zone we have the Navajo county fair coming up next week it will be held in Holbrook and were going to be having a booth there so we should get an opportunity to talk to a lot of people should be fun!  So this is really going to blow your mind but we are having a mission wide fireside on Saturdayeveryone will be heading into Farmington for a meeting!  There will be one of the twelve Apostles at that meeting!  We found out who that Apostle is going to be this week Elder Jeffrey R. Holland Is coming to our mission to speak to us!  We are super excited and it should be great!  Anyway love you all take care and have a great week! 

 

Love Elder Rushton