May 9, 2016 in Statesville, North Carolina

Hello everybody! 

Happy Mothers day to all, it was a blast to talk to you, family! What a fun fun time. I don't have much time today, and we talked yesterday, so I will keep it short.

Wow, what a week! I had so many tender mercy moments, from seeing Dw. be baptized to talking to our families, to having lots of friends come to church. Our area is definitely improving, and we are mostly aiming on finding more people to teach even though we have lots of other things going on. 

C. is doing well, both her and her mom came to church so she will be getting baptized this Saturday! That means we have 1 big huge awesome week ahead of us, trying to plan that and finish up the lessons, so please pray for that!!

D. is also doing well and hoping to be baptized on the 21st or 28th, but if it is later that will be ok. We cut down some trees for her this week and got poison Ivy, but we were able to shower right after and use soap and never got the rash. Hooray!!

Service has also been fun at Rescue Ranch and Yokefellows, we haven't been to 5th street in a while though.

Some of the biggest news took place Friday and Saturday. Dw., the other Elders investigator, got baptized!!!!! His family has struggled with it but he knew it was true and got baptized! Please pray for his family. At the baptism, while Elder H. and L. were doing a musical number, the piano player lost all of his sheet music in the middle of the song! Luckily I had stayed on the stand and was able to grab it. He did an amazing job keeping the song going even while I was grabbing the sheets, the Elders didn't even know he lost the music! 

After Dw.'s baptism, we were having a luncheon and a random guy was walking past the church and said he felt lead to it by the spirit! Turns out he has been less active for years, but all of his family are not members. As a result, the other Elders now have 3 new investigators! How about that!

On Sunday Dw. was able to be confirmed and receive the Holy Ghost, and should get the Priesthood this Wednesday. The Alexanders (mission president and wife) came to see that happen at Sacrament, and as a result they also saw my Mothers Day talk. That in and of itself was miraculous, considering I didn't finish writing it until Sunday morning, and our church was at 9:00am. I had literally only read through it once, and I ended up praying my way through. I prayed probably 60 times that morning that it would be personal and spiritual, and Heavenly Father did not disappoint! I cried a couple times through the talk, especially when talking about the Savior, and mom. It turned out great I was just grateful that Heavenly Father helped so much! He's great!

Anyways, that is about it for the week, but it sure was good! I love ya!

Elder Branch

Feb. 8, 2015 in Huntersville, NC

Howdy Howdy Howdy,

J. was able to come to church and is being baptized this Saturday!!! :D   He is the best!! We talk about how it seemed like we've known him for a long time.

  

We got to work on Bro. S's yard project more this week. It was pretty fun, and a bit wild.

Another story is that our mission is going on a 40 day fast the next 40 days! Everyone picks certain things in their life they want to sacrifice. It's going to be hard and awesome.

Love ya lots!!
Elder Branch

Jan. 5, 2015 in Huntersville, NC

Our investigators have been harder to contact this week, a couple of them got sick or had family in town. Luckily, they are all still interested. We were able to have a couple member present lessons this last week, and our investigators have all committed to reading the Book of Mormon. We're working hard each day and striving for miracles.

I'm grateful to be companions with Elder S. He's such a solid missionary and has taught me a lot. One of the things that drives him crazy is when missionaries are robotic, and I really appreciate the help he's given me to help me remain careful, while still managing to have fun and be who I am. He helps people to "open up" to us, which is a great strength of his, and one that I am still trying to improve. It's been a great chance for me to learn from him. I'm still not quite sure what I'm teaching him, he seems to know most of it already! Being together has been good for the both of us I think, and we're excited for miracles these next 6 weeks!

The members here are all onboard with missionary work. Whenever we have a scheduled appointment, we are almost always able to find a member to go out with us, even among their busy schedules. We've even have had a couple brothers volunteer to go to lessons with us on their lunch breaks. We will keep working with them and do our best to gain their trust and help them with missionary work. 

Well, I love Yall so much!!! Thanks for the emails! I'll write more next week :) (Good news, I got to reply to a whole bunch of emails that have been waiting! Yay!) :) I sure love Ya!

Elder Branch :)

The pictures at the bottom are from a sandwich shop here that's fantastic. It's called Which Wich and you can write notes and hang them on the wall.

Dec. 22, 2014 in Huntersville, NC (A picture of a Zone Activity from Sister S.)

Well… we suppose it's because of our upcoming Skype conversation this week, but for whatever reason we didn't get a letter from Elder Branch yesterday. Actually, Hunter did get a short email response to a few of his personal questions about seminary and we got a message about some expenses but that was it.

Fortunately, Elder Branch's companion, Elder S., sent some pictures of a Zone Activity to his mom and she posted them. Thank you Sister S.! We think we can see Elder Branch on the left in the back in a white shirt. We also think that's his companion in the front on the left bustin' the break dancin' moves. How does he do that?!   ;)

Merry Christmas!

Oct. 20, 2014 New area, Huntersville, NC

A little more about Concord...yeah, Elder Z was a great example to me. He showed me how to serve, how to contact (which I'm still working on, but more about that later), how to work with the ward, and how to be exactly obedient. Elder B also taught me lots, especially about love and enduring trials. They were some pretty fine chaps :)

So for transferring our bikes, what ended up happening was Sister H from Concord drove the Sisters and she has a bike rack, so she picked up my bike from the W's the night before. Then the day of transfers we took the wheels off of Elder B's bike and it was able to fit in the trunk of her minivan along with our suitcases. The W's also wrote Elder B and I goodbye cards and they were way nice! Concord was a good ward with great families.

So yes, my new area is Huntersville and I am with Elder S who lives in Layton Utah!!! So that was super funny and is probably the top question we get after where I'm from: "did you know each other before coming out?!" The answer is no, and we don't even have any mutual friends, but we did play against each other's soccer teams when I was with Coach Cloward :) He goes home after this transfer (5 weeks from now!) and I will likely be taking over the area so I'm trying to learn it quick!

Also in the area is Elder L (who was Elder Z's companion for 2 transfers up in Boone), and Elder K from Kannapolis!!! Haha it was pretty funny, because we used to be in the same district but different areas, now we're in different districts but the same area!

Our district includes the Mooresville Elders and Sisters (one of the Mooresville sisters came in this transfer and is getting trained), while Elder K's (who's their district leader) includes the Lake Norman Elders and Sisters. The lake Norman Elders include Elder G, who came out with me and was in my MTC district :) We do live together though and that is fun :)

This ward is fantastic! We have met lots of the members and they are all super nice!!! Elder S says it's very similar to a Utah ward as the members are young families with kids and moved here from out west. Our ward mission leader is Brother K and he is so funny! He reminds me of Andrea ;)  He gives all the missionaries nick names. Elder K's is "Elder K-nibb" (pronounces the K). Elder L's is Prince Williams. Elder S's is Elder Simon (like the lion kings Simon and Pumba). Mine is Mini-muff because he said I look like I'm 10, but I'm a stud muffin :) 

So as far as Huntersville itself, it's been a very hard week! Huntersville is the smallest (or close to the smallest) area in the mission, and it's also quite well to do. Also, Huntersville has been very slow recently and the teaching pool is very small.

Elder S is great and because he has one transfer left, we resolved to do like another companionship did, where the Senior companion taught the other companion all about the area and then "handed off the reins" to the younger. So we're going to try that out. 

All of this means I'm going to have to really start getting comfortable being uncomfortable. I'm going to take the lead in contacting, planning, goal setting, and pretty much everything else. We also want to work on obedience because there were some times this last week where we could have done better and been more purpose driven. I've been feeling pretty down because of that. I really have room to improve. Like Elder Klebingat said in conference "Selective obedience brings selective blessings." This experience has taught me the power of prayer and forgiveness though and I think it will help me throughout the rest of my mission, starting today. I talked with the Zone leaders yesterday on the phone and they encouraged me to work through these trials and to work to get Huntersville back on its feet. So it's rough, but like the scriptures and the prophets promise, "We fear no man, for God is with us."

I'm so sorry to hear about Dad! Food poisoning sounds rough! Speaking of food poisoning, I have a great story! Last night us 4 elders visited a super nice couple from Napoli who love the church and the missionaries. Elder K and I hadn't met them yet so we visited. One of the things we did there was eat what's called a "black egg." It's a delicacy in their culture! The pictures tell it best:

(There was a short video that shows the actually eating of the delicacy but no one wants to watch it, 
believe me.     -Zac's mom)
 

Thanks so much for all your support! Life is good here in North Carolina, and it should be getting much better with faith and work ;) Love you lots!

Love,

Elder Zac Branch :)