Ocean View

This week we went on a hike at Montana de Oro.  To my right was the ocean.  The water was blue and the waves were a beautiful, frothy white.  We stood at a cliff that overlooked the Big Blue.  I could sit there for hours just watching the waves, reading a book, and writing my thoughts.  Don't worry, I love our mountains, but there is something of beauty and awe that the ocean holds.

This week has been busy, stressful, exciting, miraculous and relieving.  The most stressful part was transfers.  We got a call from the Assistants to President Felix on Saturday with all the transfer information.  We then called everyone in the Zone with their new assignments.  We had a lot of changes.  We had to combine a ward, close an apartment, move around a companionship, and figure out rides down to transfers for everyone.  Up here in SLO the missionaries drive themselves down to transfer meetings.  So we as Zone Leaders, have to figure out luggage and carpooling.  It's a lot to think about.  We made sticky notes to represent cars and luggage and people.  (He is my son)

The best part was teaching Jose.  We taught him about the Plan of Salvation.  We felt really good about it.  At the end Jose prayed to know if the Book of Mormon is true!  He also told us that during the week at work (a fast food place), he pretty much bore his testimony to some of his co-workers that God is real and loves them.  Jose has a baptism date for Aug 2, but that will have to be pushed back because he hasn't been able to attend church yet.

I was so happy to attend the Fresno temple on Tuesday.  We get to go to the temple in the month of our birthday.  Elder King's birthday is in July.  Our Relief Society President and another guy drove us there.  The temple was really small, even smaller than the Billings, MT temple. We were there for a couple hours and felt that sweet peace that can only be found in a the temple of God.

That same day we had interviews with our Mission President, President Felix.  He and Sister Felix are AWESOME! They love the missionaries SO much and they love the Lord even more.  Sister Felix looked through our Area Book and talked with one of us while the other was in an interview with President Felix.  

All week the SLO wards were feeding the Special Olympians from Dubai who will be competing this

week in LA. They were awesome.  If only I knew Arabic.

I am really enjoying my mission.  I like to work hard.  I like responsibility.  I love to serve.  I want to work harder, love more, and fear less.

Elder King and Elder Ruby (Zone Leaders) with Elder Dorius (Elder Ruby's MTC companion) in the background.

New Investigator

Elder Ruby's letter from last week:

On Tuesday we met with Mark.  Mark is a really interesting kid.  He just graduated from high school.  He's gone to church before in Paso Robles with his member friend, Richard, who brought him to church two Sunday's ago.  Mark lives in Los Osos (close by) and Richard drove 35 minutes to the lesson from Paso!  Mark is 6'5" (I know because Elder Willis asked him), blonde, very professional looking, wears rad socks, plays tennis, loves math and is super smart.  Mark had already read the Book of Mormon (it took him 6 weeks) and he wanted to take the discussions!  He was there to learn.  We started with teaching about the Restoration.  We went into depth.  We drew diagrams on the chalkboard at the church, we asked him a lot of questions, we testified often and we really hit the apostasy hard.  Mark was just a sponge.  He would soak up what we said, and then answer our questions better than we could!  We asked him if he would be baptized if he found the Book of Mormon to be true.  He said yes!  Boy, I felt so good during and after the lesson!  I couldn't stop smiling (hard to believe, I know).  I was so grateful that God gave us the words to say in that lesson.  Thoughts just flowed, and my memory was good.

Wednesday, we had an exchange.  I, again, went into a Spanish Elder's area, so I got to learn some more Spanish.  Here is goes:  Yo se que El Libro de Mormon es verdadero.  Este conocimiento me ayuda a vivir feliz.  Yo se que Jesu Christo es el Salvador y el redemtor.  Este creencia me ayuda a tener esperanza.

I am so blessed to be a missionary now, here in California.  I know the Gospel of Jesus Christ has been restored to the earth and to the people.  Joseph Smith was a prophet.  The Book of Mormon is evidence that God loves us.  Jesus Christ is our Savior and Redeemer, and God knows and speaks to all people.  I know we came to earth to become like our Heavenly Father.  We do this by making choices.

When people ask me how I am doing, tell them I am loving the experience, the weather and the people, but what I love most of all is watching how seeking and learning truth and then acting on it changes hearts and minds for the better (and ultimately perfection) including, and especially, my own.

No Post This Week:(

I'm sorry.  I won't be posting a letter from Elder Ruby this week:(  He did send us one and he is doing really good.  I have spent the last few days getting ready for Girls Camp and didn't have time to retype his letter.  I apologize.  Please don't give up on me!  I will be at camp Wednesday through Saturday.  I will be sure to get a post done for next week.  Summer has been super busy.  I'm sure you all know what that is like.  Keep him in your prayers.  He really appreciates them and notices a difference.  Thank you for your support and love.  Look for a letter and an Elder Ruby "selfie" next week.  Adri

New Investigators!

We went on exchanges with Elder Pace and Elder Peterson this Saturday and it was awesome. We gave out 7 copies of the Book of Mormon and we found 3 super prepared people!  During planning the night before, we were looking through our potential investigator sheets.  We saw a name that I didn't recognize and a street I have never heard of before, so we decided to put him (Scott) in our plans.  Like usual, our day didn't go as planned. The afternoon was a bunch of doors that didn't open to us.  We got to a point where we took a step back and thought about where to go next.  We chose to go by Scott's because we hadn't gone by when we had planned to earlier.  We took the long way to get there.  We were using E. Willis' GPS (really handy), but I felt like turning the wheel a different direction. Eventually we arrived, and as we pulled up, I recognized the place.  Elder Willis and I had been there before and the whole house had been empty.  I wondered why we hadn't updated our records.

However, we looked twice and saw a couple of girls moving into the house.  We offered to help and then helped anyway.  When we finished, they started asking questions.  Their names are Caroline, Katie, and Lindsay.  They were super interested.  We taught about the Book of Mormon.  Luckily, we had three copies handy and we gave them all their own copy.  We shared Helaman 5:12.  As I helped Caroline turn to it, Katie opened right up to the page!  Then we had them read Moroni 10:3-5. We asked them about how they thought/felt about it.  We mentioned "real intent" and they said that just the other day they had been talking about that!  They said that if they found the book to be true, they would do what it said.  I read to them Mosiah 18:8-11, and spoke to them about baptism.  Caroline had just gotten baptized last week into the Catholic church.  She said that she didn't want to be confirmed but she had to to be baptized.  Obviously, she has been searching for God in her life.  They all want to learn more.  Caroline and Lindsay live at another place.  We got their contact info and we should have already met with them again by the time that you read this!

This week has been another whirlwind, if you haven't noticed.  Mark (a non-member) came to church last week with a member friend.  They told us last week that Mark wanted to take the missionary discussions.  We had lessons with him on Tuesday and Friday.  I was the happiest I've been for a while after teaching Mark the Restoration of the Gospel of Jesus Christ.  He said he would be baptized if he found the Book of Mormon to be true!  Mark is an incredibly intelligent young man.  He can listen and the spit out gospel concepts and principles better than we explained them.  We asked why it was important to have a prophet on the earth and what would happen if there was no prophet.  He told us that it would be like the game of "Telephone!"  He has a lot of friends in the church in Paso 2nd Ward too.  He has already read the Book of Mormon.  He read our reading assignment, read the additional study suggestions, and brought another friend to the next lesson!  He has a soft date for his baptism of July 25th.  People who God has prepared are "coming out of the woodwork."

We had the opportunity to give a member a blessing for anxiety and depression.  She had been suffering for years and after much prayer and fasting, she felt like she needed to receive a blessing.  She asked me to give the blessing.  The first words that the Spirit would let me say were "be healed."  The blessing following was relatively short and unexciting.  Just yesterday, this member followed-up in a text stating the miracle that happened to her.  I don't have time for the details, but because of the incredible faith she had, she was healed and no longer suffers from those ills!  I felt a witness that the priesthood power we hold is real and God works according to our faith.

Here are some pictures of Elder Ruby's apartment in SLO.  Unfortunately, they aren't "selfies", so we don't get to see Him, just his neat and tidy apartment.  He seems to be doing so well.  He has been out just over 10 mo.

9 Months!

Long time, no see, (9 months) and no write...that's my fault.  So here's the update for the week.  We started out with MLC (Mission Leader Conference) on Tuesday.  That meeting is conducted by the assistants under the direction of President Felix.  I'm not sure if you remember the 5 areas of Focus for the mission.  We recite them every morning or so...they are :
1) We begin with the end in mind
2) We are consecrated servants of Jesus Christ
3) We strive to serve the Lord through our obedience
4) We are led by the spirit as we find and teach
5) We desire the salvation of souls. 

Last month, President Felix had the mission focus on #4.  This transfer we are focusing on being consecrated servants of Jesus Christ.  During this MLC, President had a training on this area of focus. He had us give him synonyms for "consecrated" and "servant."  He shared some really good quotes about these two words.  They fed us chicken and waffles for lunch.  That was a new combo for me.

Another part of that meeting is reporting on zone goals.  We report on how last transfer's goals were accepted and met, then we explain our goals for this transfer.  Elder Willis and I came up with our zone goal this month as inspired from Elder Tad R. Callister's talk "Becoming a Consecrated Missionary" (I encourage you all to read it.  The talk may be harder to find because it is a talk T. R. Callister gave when he was a mission president in Toronto, Canada.)  One of the last sections talks about going the "extra mile" meaning, the consecrated missionary gives every ounce of energy to the work.  He/she is exhausted at the end of the day because everything was left outside.  Our zone goal is that every day, each companionship will go the extra mile (do something out of the ordinary, something that makes them stretch or a random act of kindness) and they will send that extra mile in a text.  It's been working out all right so far.  We have some really good missionaries in our zone!

The assistants go on exchanges with all the zone leaders each transfer.  Since we live furthest away, we got to do exchanges the night of MLC and Wednesday.  I went with Elder Yager.  He and I have a lot in common.  We are both the oldest of four, we grew up in small towns, our grandparents own a farm, our dads are in the medical field, and we have very similar "conversion stories."  We both worked hard.  I went with E. Yager to Ventura for the day. We spent the whole day going to appointments with return missionaries.  It was awesome hearing their mission stories.  E. Yager set a really good example for me.

So, I'm working on becoming consecrated.  Being lead by the spirit (last transfer's focus) will help me do that, but if you have any suggestions feel free to send them to me :) Here's a story:  So, a pig and a chicken were debating about which made the greater contribution to the breakfast industry.  The chicken said, "Boy, I give eggs every day to that poor farmer.  I'd have to say that's a pretty big contribution/sacrifice." Then the pig said, "Sure, but I give it my all." Here's another one: A man walks up to a worker in a rock quarry and asks "What are you doing?" The worker said, "I'm cutting out this stone from the mountain." The man asks a second worker the same question and the worker replies, "I'm working to provide for my family." The man asks a third worker and this worker says ," I'm helping to build a temple of God." The third man was consecrated because he knew the divine purpose to his work.

"The church is true, the book is blue, and Moroni's always on the ball"
-Elder DuPlessis

I hope everyone has a great week!

I may have to skip a week with the blog.  We are going on vacation and I'm not sure we will have internet.  But, never fear, I will be back online as soon as we get back!  Thank you for all your support and interest in Hyrum's mission.  He is doing really good!

Zone Leader Lifestyle

Life has been crazy here in SLO (San Louis Obispo).  So, I'll explain mission leadership as far as I know.  (it's only been 6 days since I've been a zone leader).  The mission is divided into 8 zones and each zone is divided into 2 or 3 districts.  Each district has 6-12 missionaries (3-6 companionships).   District Leaders are responsible for the missionaries in their district.  They plan and conduct district meetings on Thursdays and they help solve conflicts (if there are any) in their district.  District Leaders collect "key indicator" numbers every week and report them to the Zone Leaders.  Zone Leaders authorize travel within the zone (outside of the missionaries' districts); we collect numbers from the district leaders every Saturday; we hold District Leader Councils; we solve bigger conflicts (there haven't been any); we go on exchanges (24-hour companion changes for training purposes) with the District Leaders and companions, we come up with zone goals; we got to MLC (Missionary Leadership Council) once a month; and we go on exchanges with the Assistants to the President!  Wow!  That was a handful of responsibilities in addition to being a good leader, example and missionary.  It's been exciting.  My follow-up trainer, Elder Walker, is a District Leader in "my" zone.

My first time in a YSA (Young Single Adult) ward was a new experience.  It's a bit odd being a missionary to people my age and return missionaries, but they really like us.  The ward isn't very big - probably 20 people there this week.  Lots of them are moving for the summer too, so our member resources are going to be low.

We did one hour of service this week.  There were lots of people moving because college is out, but not many people let us help.  That's okay.  We have some planned service next week.

FYI: the weather is beautiful.

College is Out!

Elder Ruby didn't write much in his email this week.  He told me to expect a letter with more detail about what it is like to be a Zone Leader later in the week.  When I get the letter, I will share it with you:)

Here's what he wrote in his email:

There are a lot of prepared college kids out here.  The members are really good at sharing the gospel too.  Sadly, these past few weeks have been tough because of finals.  Also, probably 90% of the students here will be heading home or vacation for the summer.  We're not worried about finding people though.  Surely God has prepared/is preparing people who will stay.  He will lead us to htem or them to us.  We expect one of our investigators, who is leaving, to get baptized while he is back in Utah with his Mormon girlfriend. :)

 Elder Willis is a good missionary.  He is from Arizona.  I am going to kill him!  Haha.  In mission lingo, that means that I am his last companion before he finishes his mission (dies).  In some ways we are a lot alike: how we take a long time to make decisions (I swear I am getting better), and how we usually do what we are told, and we are polite to everyone.

I did 3 hours of service this week.