Dec. 21, 2015 R___'s Baptism :)

Hey there and Merry Christmas!

Wow, what a wonderful wonderful weekend!  R___ was baptized! It was the best and there's no feeling as fun as the spirit!

R___'s husband G___ was able to come. He was really nice and everyone was happy to get to meet him. R___ was telling him all about the church building and the members. I think he really enjoyed it.

After the interview last weekend, we spent most of our time putting together programs, asking people to help with the different parts of the program, printing programs, getting R___ her baptismal clothing, and stuff like that. Between that, the meetings we had, and life in general, we only ended up with like 6 other lessons. Not that we didn't try to teach others, we were just so busy that we didn't get lots of time and no one was home during the times we were able to go out. But R___ was able to get baptized and confirmed so it worked out well :)

The actual baptism was at 4 on Sunday and lasted about 45 minutes. We had a talk on Baptism by Chief G___ B___, who was chief for like 34 years, and a talk on the Holy Ghost by Brother C___. The baptism happened in between the 2 talks. Elder P___ got to be a witness.  

Wow! What an amazing feeling, being able to baptize someone!! Definitely one of the happiest and most spiritual moments on my mission, right along with J___'s baptism day and seeing P___ come back to church. So yeah, for the baptism R___ wanted to sing Christmas songs, and it was just a party :)

On Sunday, Brother C___ confirmed R___, and we were in the circle. The blessing was powerful, and once again as we took our hands off her head, she smiled and it was that happy feeling all over again. Man the spirit is fun to feel! :) 

After that, we had the sacrament, which is just the best! Following the sacrament, we had the ward Christmas program and Elder P___ and I were in the choir. We have practiced lots of fun songs in the choir, and I sure liked how it sounded. I was also part of a double quartet that sang a super neat version of "With Wondering Awe." The version almost sounds like a Gregorian chant, and it's done completely acapella. The last song the choir sang was a version of "For Unto Us a Child Is Born", based off of the Messiah piece but with a totally different arrangement. It is tons of fun to sing too, and to cap off the whole program we had a choir and congregation version of "Oh Come All Ye Faithful", with a sweet organ and piano fanfare accompaniment. R___ said the whole thing was "Awesome!!" So yeah, it was pretty much the best weekend of my mission, followed by what I hope will be the best week yet!

Thanks for all you do. Love you!
Happy P-daay! From Elder Branch

R___'s baptism day!  

Caroling with the district was a blast@ We caroled to a whole bunch of

places, and people actually liked us! :) This was at the Stake

President's house, and it was lots of fun :)

This is R___'s dog Hoss (like in Bonanza). He was legit sitting like a

human on this footrest. He seems to be a similar breed to Rascal. :)

I was eating a brownie, and this crumb that was left on the plate

looked so much like a llama that I had to take a picture!

Elder P___'s burrito  :)

Aug. 10, 2015 in Greensboro, NC

Howdy! 

Hey Hunter and Em, a neat thought came up during church this Sunday. Our lesson was on families and someone mentioned that your siblings are your longest relationship on this earth, because you won't usually meet your spouse until you are 20 or so, and we usually don't outlive our parents. I can't think of 2 people that would be better to know for 70 years on this earth :) sure love ya! 

So this week was actually pretty amazing! We are having more and more success  and I feel that we are really genuinely helping people. I'm loving the ward even more each week, I love being in an area for more than 2 transfers :)

So a couple highlights, we had a super spiritual lesson about eternal families with the Q. family at a dinner. The wife and we were definitely feeling the spirit hard core. She came up on Sunday again, thanked us for it, and started to cry again. They are super nice!! So pray for them please!

We also had a lesson with the S's that resulted in tears. We were reading from where they were at in the Book of Mormon and it happened to be 1st Nephi 18 where it talks about building the boat after the manner of God, and we had a great discussion. We were able to bring one of the absolutely fantastic young men in this ward named M. with us.  :)

Finally we went and visited Sister P., and had a really good visit. She asked "why do people always say God loves you when he gives you trials?" We showed the Mormon Message "Refiners fire" where it talks about trials allow us greater future happiness and it was good. Then we gave her a blessing and it was amazing. I was the voice, and she made it clear she didn't just want a "God loves you" blessing, but a truly inspired one. I don't remember all that was said, but it was very powerful and she said it had answered some specific questions she hadn't even told us about, it was amazing! The spirit #waytooreal :)

Refiners Fire Video

We taught R. and he is super great! Pray for him please! :)

Elder Branch :)

Elder TooBlessedToBeStressed Branch

 

We found a mountain bike trail behind our apartment complex! 

And it has a teeter totter that we are both to afraid to try on our bikes, but I sat on it! :D

Tour de France homage