Letter Home from Elder North

Date:  April 27, 2015

Area:  North Little Rock, Arkansas

Companion:  Elder Reed

Dear Salamancas,

We had a pretty interesting week, here are some highlights-

We had dinner with a lovely Hawaiian woman, Sister Kircowski, who runs the Primary. Living with her is Sister Jackson, a four foot two German woman about eighty years old. She told us about how when she was a little girl she was baptized, but her parents told her nothing of the gospel so that she wouldn't accidentally blab about it to the SS. She remembered hearing a man shouting on the radio and tried to ask Mother why that man was shouting, and she was shushed, having to wait till they were home for her question to be answered. "That is our Fuhrer, don't say anything." Mother explained. She remembered Jewish people being rounded up onto traincars and going away. Later when she came to America people would ask her what she knew about what happened. She didn't know anything and when it was explained and shown to her she realized that's where they were taking her neighbors.

We went to meet someone one day and ended up running into Joe, a guy Elder Reed met with Elder Johnston during an exchange. I had not met him and he was pretty out of it, but was telling us to come back another day. We said a prayer with him and during it he draped his arm around Elder Reed as he gave the prayer.

I found some powerful salsa in a missionary apartment we closed down. It was delicious.

We are making excellent progress with one of our investigators, Dwayne. Last night we taught him the first half of The Plan of Salvation with a senior missionary couple, the Cheney's. Pray for Dwayne, that he continues to make excellent progress and receives powerful answers to his prayers.

-Elder North

Letter home from Elder North

Date:  April 20, 2015

Area:  North Little Rock, Arkansas

Companion:  Elder Reed

Dear Otters,

First full week here serving with Elder Reed in the office. Most exciting news is that one of our new investigators came to church! Dwayne and two of his young kids, he seems very excited and we will be speaking with him and his fiance more in the coming week. We've got a few other investigators between our chores.

One of the major things we did last week was update the contact list of the Mission and update all the Missionary phones. We wrote up the list and put it on one phone, then placed it on a blank phone. From there we double checked it and were able to have two phones with all the contacts. We had the missionaries delete their contacts so we could give them the right list. We ended up having to drive to Memphis at the last second to go handle that last meeting because the phones quit on the Assistants, who we had tried to instruct on how to do it themselves. 

For P-Day last week we did a little touring of Little Rock, riding a trolley and visiting the Heifer center. Many cow puns were uddered.

-Elder North

Letter Home from Elder North

Date:  April 13, 2015

Area:  North Little Rock, Arkansas

Companion:  Elder Reed

Dear Frankenstiens,

I am now serving in North Little Rock with Elder Reed! He is from Murray Utah. He's been out one transfer less than me and it is fantastic!

Our calling and are is unique, we are what is called "The Office Elders", or "The Moving Elders". We close apartments, get people furniture, help run the Mission Office and do whatever else the Mission President needs done offhand that he doesn't give to the Assistants. It is a time consuming job as we still do all we can to proselyte and teach the gospel at any opportunity.

This may be my final area and I look forward to it very much! I have a unique calling and an excellent companion.

-Elder North

Letter Home from Elder North

Sara Gates and kids with Elder North

Date:  April 6, 2015
Area:  Morrilton, Arkansas
Companion:  Elder Barker

Dear Maple Leaves,

This was an excellent Conference, for sure! We got a lot of fantastic talks. I particularly enjoyed Wilford W. Anderson's analogy of the gospel and joy in the gospel being compared to dance and music.

Conference is always an enormous reminder to me of the obvious and necessary role of the priesthood and apostles in Christ's Church. At no point did he rescind his mandates on how the Church is to be organized. Recognizing this and following the counsel to know them by their fruits makes 

They gave me the official call Sunday morning that I was being transferred! We knew pretty well ahead of time though since Elder Barker got a call informing him that he would be training. I will be moving what will be even more likely to be my last area. It is possible it won't be, but unlikely. I did not have a whole ton of time in Morrilton but it was good and I met a lot of good people. There is a pretty solid Ward here and I hope they can continue to grow.

Elder Barker got his Easter Package from home so I mooched some of those candy-coated cadbury eggs to celebrate the occasion. We spent Sunday conference at the Peterson home, they fed us Chicken Spaghetti and I preformed some Magic Tricks.

I've pretty much already said goodbye to people here, Anna, Austin and Sister Gates in particular. On to the next area!

-Elder North

Letter Home from Elder North

Date:  March 30, 2015
Area:  Morrilton, Arkansas
Companion:  Elder Barker

Dear Buggy's,

We are taking on what will hopefully be our final week without the car. Hopefully it is done in time before one of us needs to be taken out of the area. 

Transfers are now approaching and this should determine my final area hopefully. If it is here in Morrilton, or elsewhere. So long as I don't get moved at the last second that is. We are excited and looking forward to Easter and Conference! Always an excellent combo so we have been handing out these cards with the Church's Easter Video linked on it! I encourage everybody to go check it out. HeLives.Mormon.org

I managed to avoid any sickness this past period of cold weather. Elder Eatchel had a couple little bouts of sickness. 

This week really was exhausting. Thank you all for your prayers!

-Elder North

Letter Home from Elder North

Date:  March 23, 2015
Area:  Morrilton, Arkasnsas
Companion:  Elder Barker

Dear Flippers,

Our car is smashed! We were driving down the road from a dinner appointment and hit a small deer. Elder Barker and I sustained no damage, the vehicle took it all. We're on foot for the foreseeable future now, likely to the end of the transfer. It's not so bad though since Morrilton is relatively small, we're very close to the Church building and people are willing to give us rides here and there. I'll send the pictures that Elder Barker took.

We have met a large number of people because of not being in a car and I'm certainly getting a good degree of exercise daily! Tonight we will be doing family home evening with the Gates again tonight. It was pretty great last week so I'm looking forward to it. This week we will have a District Meeting in Danville.

Two cool things this week was a less active and long time investigator who both had concerns seemed to suddenly have overcome them on their own and came to Church. We can't really pin down what was said or done that did it but simply our contact provided the means for the spirit to work.

The coming week will be another walk week, the car is estimated to be repaired by the end of this week if they got the parts today. Wish us Joy!

-Elder North

Letter Home from Elder North

Date:  March 17, 2015
Area:  Morrilton, Arkansas
Companion:  Elder Barker



Dear Paps,

Elder Barker says Hello.

Things have been interesting here on the Arkansas side. Things are much more, the same than I thought they'd be? My real expectations were not too wild but I suppose it's that missionary work has a lot of same factors wherever you're placed. I believe you are now in touch with Sister Gates. She's great and gave a talk this Sunday about following the first great commandment.

This week was our week without the car and it's been rather fruitful. A decent number of people have let us in to speak with them and share what we know. We're hoping they will let us return and come to church as well. Raking up a large amount of potential investigators.

Yesterday we had a great experience with Sister Gates, sharing Family Home Evening with them and Brother Stover. Brother Stover is an older gentleman who helps us missionaries a great deal. He converted to the church about 9 years ago and is a strong member. He also made us a great cabbage and sausage stew to eat. The day before I shared some of my Siracha with Logan at the after-chuch potluck, since he said he likes hot sauces.

We will be getting a vehicle tomorrow, so that's nice. My respect goes to those missionaries who walk or ride bikes anywhere they go. They're areas are often smaller but they would still be doing a lot of moving that I'm not quite accustomed to.

Everybody keep up your prayers and best of luck to Caice!

-Elder North