Letter #21

Hey Family,

This week has had its ups and downs, like all weeks. However, I know that we all can grow from these experiences. We just need to rely on the Lord and keep doing what he wants us to do, and he will help us through all of our trials.

 

No, I did not go to the Football game! I really wanted to, but we had Stake Conference. It was AWESOME!!!!  Saturday at the Adult Session it was very powerful! One thing that I received revelation was for one of our members. She has told us that she really wants to get her Patriarchal Blessing. She needs to ask the Stake President for it! I know that I need to help her with this because she has a chavo (bum) husband that works and comes home and does nothing. He isn't progressing to the Melchizedek Priesthood so he can bless his 4 month old daughter. He is holding her back so much! She is an awesome member and they are active, but he just never prays or reads scriptures! So I feel like part of my reason here in Kemah North is to help that family because I know that they love me :)

 

Another other cool thing about Stake Conference was as a surprise the Missionaries sang in with the choir. The choir started singing an E.F.Y. melody, then we all stood up and walked to the front of the stage and we joined with them. After the meeting was over we had lots of investigators asking "What was that feeling they got when we sang that song!?" A ton of the members also came to us and told us that they feel the spirit so strong when we sing! I love singing, but I am not good at it! :p

 

But Miracle for this week! We meet this guy from the Dominican Republic (he looks like he is from Africa with dreads and everything... haha) He only speaks Spanish! We had a very powerful first lesson with him and we are going back tonight to extend a baptism date He has only been here for a week and he told us it's not an accident that we met him! He knows that we are the real deal!!!

 

Keep up the good work and I love all you!!!

 

Love Elder Andersen

Letter #20

Hey Family,

So the picture I am sending is a family my companion and I baptized! They are the hermanas converts (Sister Missionary Converts) but they asked us to do it cause they like us more that the other Elder companionship! I baptized Giovanni and Felipe. (to make it easier they have on gray shoes) I had the opportunity to play some basketball and football with them on Saturday night. While I played Elder Bushman was interviewing them one by one. These kids are sooooo cool!!! They were fun to hang out with. The last song we sang after the baptism was Familias pueden ser Eternas (Families can be Together Forever) and during it I looked at the Mother of the children and she was crying. I know the spirit was there! I know it was able to to touch her heart and tell her that this is the path she needs to take, and her family CAN and WILL be together forever.

This week I had a wonderful opportunity to listen to Elder Golden of the seventy. He came to our mission and gave us a very powerful lesson and lecture. Some of the revelation I received was that I need to be EXACTLY  OBEDIENT to the rules and not to assume things. When I teach with clarity, obey the rules, and do the things I am supposed to do I will have better lessons; and the spirit will be with me more as I teach! Elder Golden made some promises to us that were very bold, but I KNOW that if we do what he says, and follow what God whats us to do then we can obtain these goals. 

To answer your questions: 

Dad; No I don't have much beans and rice now, I have a lot of soups!! I am getting a bunch of different variety. I am starting to love the food here!! It's really good. Also YES I finally do love beans and rice!! And Yes I got the Package and it is amazing!!! We listen to the Vocal Point CD everyday in the car!! Where did you get it from?!?! The case was broken and the CD holder inside is broken; so it doesn't hold the CD anymore. I have another one I keep it in! Did you have it before of just buy it?!?! My favorite songs are Danny Boy, He is Born, and Holy Infant. All of the songs are good, I don't have skip any songs I listen to the whole thing!!!  

Miracles:

This week after the conference we had I decided to be "Exactly Obedient" and I saw many miracles! A couple of weeks ago we had a member call us and tell us she wants us to teach her niece Sharon. We set up that we would meet them at the English class that we hold every week. So we went there and the hermanas (sister missionaries) told us that she lives in there area so we told them about our plan. Then last Sunday Elder Bushman and I were going through the Potential Investigators and found a lot of names in there. We wrote a couple down in our planners to go visit. (we planned to bring the paper with us but we ended up forgetting about it) Luckily we had written down a few and this one address just stood out to us! So we put it in the G.P.S. and we went there. We were looking for a mujer (woman, wife) named Stella and guess who came to the door? . . . Sharon!!  We were like "Hey!" and introduced ourselves and asked if we could come back later; however we had actually set up to see her at the English class! Then we found out that class was cancelled so we called the member that wanted us to meet her and asked if she can bring her to church so she did. Then The member told us to come to her house after the baptism and we could teach her a lesson in there house. So we went to the Baptism and went the the members house and we had the BEST lesson ever! I felt the spirit so strong and I know that it testified that what we teach is the truth. It wasn't us who brought in the spirit ~ it was defiantly the members! We taught them but then the Aunt testified and was telling her how the much the church meant to her and why she is a member. She told Sharon that it was us that brings the spirit but Elder Bushman and I were like no it was defiantly the family! The Aunt and niece were balling and we extended a date for baptism and she accepted with ease! I know that she had been prepared by the Lord and then we were put in her path. 

Another short miracle is we were walking in Scarsdale Park and we saw this Hispanic walking and we said "Hi!" my companion just stopped and stared at him. The guy stopped and looked back and my companion and said "I don't know why, but I need to share our message with you." We ended up talking to him for a little and at the end he said "I felt some kind of attraction to y'all!" He wants us to come back and teach him too. 

We just need to follow the spirit, and he will guide us wherever we need to go!

Love y'all and I pray for y'all all day :)

Love Elder Andersen   

Letter #19

Hey Family,

Well to start this off, YES General Conference was amazing!!!! All the talks were amazing, but my favorite quote was from Edward Dube. His story about when he was in the cotton field struck me; he said "Never look back, always look ahead of what we have to do". When I heard that my eyes opened big. I have always reflected on how I was last week, and what I did. Always thinking of things that happened in the past, but after hearing that talk I was like; Man It's all about NOW!!! It feels the same that I can't look back and think of stuff, I have to act on things now. One of my new goals is to forget the past and focus on what I need to be doing now. One goal our mission set was to baptize 1000 people this year. It really hit me that I need to be focusing on hitting that goal and other goals too. Of course there are small goals I need to work on to eventually hit that goal, but we need to always be setting and trying to maintain our goals so we can achieve them.

 

This is something I can use for my investigators and the members. I have told you about Josh Amezquita before. He is 20 and he wants to serve a mission, but he is kinda "in the world" right now. He is trying to save up money for his mission, but all his money is going into the house and fixing his rice rocket car. Elder Bushman and I are trying to get him to set short term goals to obtain it. He is always bringing up things from the past, and saying he can't do anything. Some of his problems are that his family doesn't have money, and won't be able to afford for him to go. I am going to tell him that the Prophet just asked us to donate more so that we can have more missionaries serve. Hopefully that will help him, but he has some work to do. I just need to promise him blessings, and he will go; but it will take some work though :) I am excited to work with him and help him out! :)

 

I know that God puts people in our way, this week we randomly parked next to this guy and we started talked to him. He was saying that he wants to change. We told him that we didn't park there on accident; that God lead us to him. We ended up trading his beer for a picture of Jesus Christ and we poured out his beer and threw it away. He seems like he really wants to change and be a better person. I am really excited to go see these people that the Lord has blessed and prepared for us to teach them the gospel.

 

I love y'all and keep up the good work :)

 

Love Elder Andersen

Photo Fun!!

For my birthday (THIS IS MELISSA WRITING) I asked my siblings (the ones on missions) to write me ON my birthday and send me pictures from the mission... Elder Andersen knows of my LOVE for Duck Dynasty and so he took it to a WHOLE NEW LEVEL!!~~ LOL!

I guess the other missionary in the top picture (Elder Mastergeorge) asked his mom to send something FUN for them and she sent them these... Duck Dynasty Beards!!
haha! I LOVE IT!~ 
Elder Andersen and Elder Mastergeroge enjoying the mission life!!

Letter #18

Hey Family :)

So all y'all knew that I was going to receive a new companion, I was like What the heck!? This is my 3rd transfer and my 4th companion. Hopefully my new companion and I will stay here for awhile! His name is Elder Bushman and he is from Wala Wala Washington. He is very sweet, we work hard and have fun. He is also diabetic and mom he told me some cool things to help your blood sugar. He learned from his doctor the the more carbs you get the faster your blood sugar goes up and down. And the more protein you eat the less of an incline, he tells me the more he eats protein like peanut butter or anything like that than it lasts a lot longer cause it stores and uses it when its needed, so that will  help you have a more consistent blood sugar! But the Crazy thing about elder Bushman is that he served in the exact area we are in now 2 transfers ago, so when i came in the mission he moved from Kemah to Port Lavaca and then after 2 more transfers he moved back here with me!!! When the people in this area saw him, they were very happy so see him and they love him! It is probably a good thing he is here because he knows a lot of old investigators and he knows what to do.

This week has been really good, when Elder Bushman came in he said "Ok, we are going to change this whole area, and we are going to be awesome, and we will baptize weekly!" (our Mission President has a goal for us to baptize weekly, and it is very possible if we do certain things. It is a process and it takes some time to set up, but it is possible) So i am very excited to see some miracles happen!!! :)

Miracle this week: Story below

I had a feeling we needed to go see Manuel one day. We went over to his house and knocked on the door for about 3 min!  I was like man why would I get a feeling to come here if he isn't even here?!?! So I knocked one more time and then I heard "Hola como estan amigos." (Hello, how are you my friends)  I look around and there he is walking out of the laundry mat, so we walked over to him and we begin talking to him. Elder Bushman asked if we can share a quick message with him, he said yes but only 5 min. So we walked into his apartment and I brought up a story in 2 Kings about Naaman and how he had leprosy. I read it to him (see below) and asked him what the story meant to him. He hit it right on the dot with his response. I then told him the part about what I thought was cool, how I look at this story is this; Naaman is a normal guy who wants to be healed or find the truth. The prophet Elisha is God, and when he sends his messenger  to go tell him what to do, that is a prophet or missionary or a member of the church. So God sends his messengers to tell what people need to do to be healed or find the truth. So Elisha tells the messenger to tell Naaman to go to the River Jordan and wash 7 times. When Naaman heard this he was angry. First, there were other rivers closer than the river Jordan and Second, why did the prophet send a servant to tell him... why didn't he just go out and tell him?! Naaman came to his senses and then did it and was clean from his disease.

When I look at this story I can totally see the people I teach (Naaman) and Myself (the Messenger of the prophet or GOD). I know that they really want to find out if there is a God, if The Book of Mormon is true, and which church to join. We teach them what God wants them to do. That they need to pray, read the scriptures, and go to church. They always have excuses like they don't have time, or why go to the church its farther then this local church, or I don't believe this or that. The moral of the story is that the messenger sent from God is there to tell him what they need to do and then they need to act. Naaman wasn't cleansed of his leprosy until after she showed his faith, and did what the messenger had said. So my job is to show people this, that they can find what to do with their life by reading the scriptures, praying, asking questions to God, and by being baptized. It is hard to get them to do that stuff because all the worldly things make it so difficult. Oh man, do I try to get all this people to come unto Christ!

 

I love all y'all so much. Keep up your studies and prayers, Heavenly Father Loves You!

 

Love Elder Andersen

 9 So Naaman came with his horses and with his chariot, and stood at the door of the house of Elisha.

 10 And Elisha sent a messenger unto him, saying, Go and ^awash in Jordan seven times, and thy flesh shall come again to thee, and thou shalt be ^bclean.

 11 But Naaman was wroth, and went away, and said, Behold, I thought, He will surely come out to me, and stand, and call on the name of the Lord his God, and strike his hand over the place, and recover the leper.

 12 Are not Abana and Pharpar, rivers of Damascus, better than all the waters of Israel? may I not wash in them, and be clean? So he turned and went away in a rage.

 13 And his servants came near, and spake unto him, and said, My father, if the prophet had bid thee do some ^agreat thing, wouldest thou not have done it? how much rather then, when he saith to thee, Wash, and be clean?

 14 Then went he down, and dipped himself seven times in Jordan,^aaccording to the saying of the man of God: and his ^bflesh came again like unto the ^cflesh of a little child, and he was ^dclean.

Pictures

Elder Andersen sent pictures to my Parents... enjoy ~

Letter #17

Hey Family,
No, I did not know that it was the anniversary of Joseph Smith getting the plates. Man, it is crazy to think about this stuff! Whenever I think about it, I get so happy and I feel the spirit because I know it's true!

Crazy story: Last night Elder Preece, Huntsman, Neilsen,  Mcory and I stayed up talking about random things. They told me a story about how they went to this house where people had been seeing spirits and feeling very weird whenever they were there. So they called the missionary's over there. Elder Huntsman just felt horrible the whole time he was there, he said the spirit was definitely not there. So he cast out the evil and then dedicated the house. He said it's feels better to be there now. So I learned how to cast out devils and evil spirits. That might come in handy some day.
This week was a crazy and fun week. On Thursday Elder Neilsen and I went and played volleyball with our Rama. (= Branch; I feel weird calling it Wards and Branches so I will just say it in Spanish) It was really fun. We also set up rides for our investigators to come to church, however those ended up falling though. It is very sad when we have 3 investigators that WANT to come to church but all of them don't have a car and they live 15 miles away. We can't give them rides or else we would! And unfortunately all the families out in the area have full cars and have no room. It is very frustrating that the president of the rama sets it up then they don't follow through. Now I can understand why the Lord wants us to work with members,  because we need to strengthen them so they can have courage to take investigators to church. I know that if we have faith that it can happen, and it will.
One example of faith:
Yesterday Elder Neilsen and I went around to all our appointments and no one was home. We parked the car and just sat there thinking It's going to be a horrible day!!!! Then I remembered what my president said "If we have faith, the Lord will make up for the rest." So I looked at Elder Nielsen and told him that we needed to go visit them all again. We did and one by one they were all home!! We ended up with 6 lessons that day, we were also able to set up for this guy that wants to go on a mission to do a "mini mission" with us next week! I am very excited for him to come, because he wants to go on a mission. It is sad because family situation is very hard, they barely making enough money to survive. He has to work to help around the house! When he comes out with us we are going to go have fun teaching lessons and all, and at the end discuss how a mission can HIGHLY benefit him and his family. I know that since Sharon and I left on our missions that y'all are blessed! I feel the need to tell him about my family and how they are happy and love that I am on a mission. I just want to show him that a mission is all pros and no cons.
I am thankful for all you do! Keep up being awesome and do what is right.
One last thing I want to tell y'all is on the Worldwide Missionary Broadcast they had a video of s family and the song is "I will go where you want me to go" was playing. I would like y'all to watch that and think about what it means. When I watched it the other day, I think it meant that we need to pray for service opportunity's or for people to help in daily life. Maybe even pray for someone that you can refer to the missionaries. I wish that more people would refer us to their friends. I have found that when members refer their friends, then those people are always willing to listen. I think it is because they can see the change and why we are so different from the members. This week y'all should pray for people to serve or people that you should send the missionaries to go visit!

love y'all and pray for y'all often!
Para siempre Dios este con vos  (Forever God be with you)
Love Elder Andersen

Elder Andersen sent me a picture. I sent him a t-shirt that I thought would be perfect for P-Day. I made Sharon a special shirt, and I was going to make one for him too (I still will) but I saw this and HAD to get it for him! We both LOVE Duck Dynasty, and this one had a great saying on it... 

"Family First... Business Second" I thought he could remember all the family that loves him and then GET to Business of serving the Lord! :) ~ Melissa