July 4, 2016 in Statesville, North Carolina

Howdy ya'll,

I had my departing interview yesterday, and it was a blast! Really good and really spiritual. It was a great review and I am so grateful for all I have learned. It's weird that I start hitting my "last's" this week. I had my last zone conference last week, and bore my departing testimony. I am very excited for this last week, this is such a great area and I love the people here. Elder B. is great, he can do anything it seems!! I am just so grateful for everything this week!

N. had her interview and is getting baptized on Saturday! There were some wonderful testimonies on Sunday from the Bishop and his wife about being able to teach her, and it was so touching! There were many testimonies of Christ. The spirit was very real, it was one of the best fast and testimony meetings on my mission! We are teaching her a couple more times this week, and I can't wait for Sunday!

The other really exciting thing this week was exchanges! On Thursday, Elder J. (Spanish Elder) and I went to our area and spent the day doing service and teaching a couple families. Several said we could come back this week, so we should hopefully have some great new investigators once I leave! Then on Friday we had a Zone Conference and it was super good! We had a big training on the Atonement, it was such a great discussion to have for a last zone conference. Elder H., Elder W. and I got the chance to share our testimonies and none of us cried! We all felt like it, but our testimonies came out more powerful than reflective, and it was a good moment. We sang the mission song one last time with the missionaries, and then Elder H. and I spent the day on exchange. That was a super fun exchange, and we taught like 6 lessons with members present and had the best sushi in the world!

Church was fun in general, and I am way excited for this last week! More good stuff! :) Thanks for all the stories! Sure love you folks!

Love,
Elder Branch

We chopped down these huge trees at Sister F.'s with some dull ax's, and got loads and loads of blisters. It was in the middle of a rainstorm and the chainsaw was broken. All in all, we felt like real men. Twas good.

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

May 2, 2016 in Statesville, North Carolina

Hello! It's a great day, cause I hear from you guys! :)

(Shorter letter this week because he wrote lots to Hunter about preparing for his mission.)

Elder H. (not the Elder H. my companion) got sick for like 3 days so we did some splits with Elder P. so that he could still get out and see their investigators. All in all, our main people we are working with are still solid and on date, and the other people are not. Only interesting new development is that D. called us crying today saying that she has been wanting the gift of the Holy Ghost super badly, and wants her baptism to come even sooner than the 28th! We are seeing her tonight, so pray that she will be able to keep all her commitments without any hiccups! Thanks again for your prayers, we sure appreciate it.

Our other friends are doing well too, a few are hoping to come back to church this coming week. We got to go see some of them this week with Brother M. He is a Pit Man for Nascar!  It was pretty fun.

Thanks again for the email! 

Love ya!
Elder Branch :)

This was at rescue ranch. 

I don't know why my face looks concerned, 

cause I actually love snakes, but oh well!

April 18, 2016 in Statesville, NC

Hello All,

This week we had a mission tour with Elder Zwick. He and his wife are super super amazing speakers!!!! They had some wild crazy stories from the missions they have been on. There was lots of good council too.

A.'s baptism went really well! His family is having very hard times right now though so please pray for them heavily!

We took Elder E. to East Coast Wings for his birthday (which is delicious!) We got transfer calls and Elder E. will be going up to Burlington. I will be staying here with an Elder H.

We had some good teaching appointments this week too. We didn't get to see the P.'s, but we did see the other D. who has been attending church, and she came to stake conference this week! Also, the B.'s came!!!! :D We spent 2 days there this week helping clean her house because the government was threatening to take C. away if it wasn't cleaned. We found tons of mold in the fridge, which explained why they were sick all the time. But since it is clean, everything is good and they were able to come. We are always working on finding more people here, and we expect some mighty miracles this coming week!

Other fun parts of the week included going to a Rescue Ranch volunteer appreciation dinner. Rescue Ranch is the place we volunteer that has tons of 'exotic' animals they take care of (tortoises, lizards, snakes, etc.) The had a dinner this week and we got to go. At it they were doing a casino based thing, but instead of real money we played for tickets to put into a raffle. Elder E. and I had no clue what we were doing, and the other Elders (who knew how to play) hadn't showed up yet, but the lady that runs the place showed us some of how to play roulette, so we did that for a little bit. It was fun, but probably the weirdest dinner for missionaries ever... haha.

Probably the funnest random thing we did this last week was on Saturday, we got invited to go with D. to a city celebration for Arbor day. We went on a 2 mile run, and then we got the chance to play bubble soccer for a couple minutes! It was pretty great! Ill send you some videos.

Well, that about covers it for this week. Thanks for the fun emails! Thanks so much for all your help! You're great! I love you :)

Elder Branch

ps...Hunter!! You got your mission call!!! Wow, I was so excited! Actually, Elder E. had just barely added mom and dad on facebook when you opened your call and they made the post about it, so I saw it and was freaking out for like an hour and a half. Haha, I am super excited for you, you will love it. It's fun that we are both on the east coast, too bad you're a durn Yankee ;P Haha, congrats Brother. Hey, when you have questions about what to buy, keep me involved, I have 60 bazillion pointers or things I learned since serving that I think will help when shopping and preparing and stuff. I'm glad we have a month and a half, we can do a mini 12 week program, except in 6 if you want :) Congrats again, I sure love ya!

A.'s baptism day!

Bubble Soccer Video

Elder E. 

 This gentleman goes home this transfer! I'll miss him

EJ runs the Rescue Ranch 

April 11, 2016 in Statesville, NC

Howdy!!Our area is going well but we figured out our apartment had mold. 

Adding to the apartment horror stories that are the last 6 months of my mission, on Tuesday, Elder H. and I were on exchange. As we were going to bed (Aka: talking for like 3 hours, and then sleeping), Elder H. asked what was up with our windows. Previous missionaries had put up these foam boards with tarps covering them to cover the windows so that no light came in.

Anyways, he took a look behind the tarps, and lo and behold, black mold everywhere. The worst window was the one that is right next to my head when I was sleeping, which was a big cause of allergies and sickness that has plagued us this whole transfer. So that being said, we actually felt pretty accomplished that we were able to still teach quite a few people while also cleansing our apartment. Hooray! Miracles!

This area has so much potential, I can feel it. We had a great lesson with a new couple this last week named the P.'s and it was a good faith builder. Their first names are D. and D. We had received a Book of Mormon referral for her back at the beginning of this transfer (over a month ago), and had tried calling the phone number a couple times and never got in touch. We had their street they lived on, but not the actual address. One day we went to the street, prayed that we could find them, and then went out to knock. We didn't have very long, but we were given a huge tender mercy, because the very first door we knocked on, he opened. We talked a bit, and he took our number so he could add it to his phone contacts, and then informed us that her nephew in Mooresville was a recent convert. The next week, we got in contact with him, and had been trying to discuss when/how we could see them, as we still hadn't had an answer from the phone. Yesterday we went by and knocked on the door. They were both home this time, and they invited us in! We got along with them super well, and had a great Restoration lesson. At the end, we were able to invite them to be baptized and they accepted once they come to know it is true :) So we are going back this Wednesday, and are pretty excited. Please focus prayers on them! They are miracles for this area.

Every appointment we had with D. and J. fell through this week, so we will be meeting with them next week. She still wants to get baptized, so we will work on it. They are pretty hilarious and nicknamed Elder H. "grinny" this week, because I was already nicknamed "smiley". Elder E. is named "Poindexter," and D. doesn't recognize who we are if we go by any other name... It's interesting but fun.

Sister B. came to church Sunday but her daughter didn't. Bishop has good feelings that they will eventually come around. Please pray for them too. Thanks

Oh, One other fun story. On Saturday, our entire Zone got together to help with a Just Serve project in Morganton. It was actually a project sponsored by a group called KaBoom, and they go around and make playgrounds for kids. They use a hashtag, #playmatters. Anyways, 300 people put together an entire playground in 1 day! Starting at the dirt, and building the park, wood chipping it, and doing other projects like a stage with benches and an outdoor exercise cement pad thingy. It was intense, and lots of fun :D I will send some pictures of that too.

Love you all,
Elder Branch

At the beginning they had us all dance to warm up. 

I'm just left of the man in red pants. 

There were 4-6 inches of wood chips covering the whole ground. 

This is nearing completion. 

Elder G. is smack in the center 

with his back turned, right by the cement wheelbarrow. 

There are 8-10 missionaries in this picture.

The total project was 5.5 hours long. It was great! :D

April 4, 2016 in Statesville, NC

Hello y'all!

Wow, we sure had a busy week! We had some really good service opportunities for a neighbor of some members. One of the members contacted us and told us that this lady had just found out she had cancer, and needed help digging tons and tons of small weed-like onions out of her garden of rose bushes and flowers. So we spent most of our week with the other elders working in her yard. She was so amazed that we would come and do that for free (well, she did buy us Cook Out and Chick-fil-A). We got to know her and the best part was we ended up watching a session of Conference with her at her house! We asked if we could come back and share a message about our church, and she accepted! It will probably be the other Elders teaching her, but it was great none-the-less! The best was at the end, when she started to tear up from the help, even though it wasn't a big deal to us. I love service, and moments like that as a missionary are the best!

Along with that, we had a couple other miracles happen too! There was a child's baptism on Sunday before conference, and afterwards a member of the Bishopric told us there were some visitors who had attended. These same visitors witnessed the baptism, it touched the heart of one named D. and she asked the Bishop how she could be baptized! We set up a time to visit them, and they were even able to stay for Sunday Morning Conference when President Monson spoke. We will be going over to teach them this week! :) It was just another testimony to me that God will lead people to us, as long as we are ready and worthy. 

We taught A. and set a baptism date for the 16th! We watched a session of Conference with his family on Sunday afternoon, and it was super fun. D., who the other Elders are teaching, came too and stayed for dinner afterwards. He is super fun! We have met him lots, and he hangs out with the other Elders. He met the Church because he was hired by the BSA and was helping our Ward's scouts get some fundraisers done, and Sister B. invited him to meet with the missionaries. He sang with the Elders when he came to church, and this weekend he sang at that child's baptism (I played the piano, it was fun). He just needs the consent of his wife to be baptized, so you could pray for him!

That's about it for this week, besides the fact that General Conference was AMAZING! I loved all the talks, but some of the particular ones were Elder Bednar, President Uchtdorf in priesthood, both of President Monson's, and of course Elder Holland wrapping it up. All of us Elders were cheering once we heard he was the last talk. D. just looked at us like we were crazy until he heard the talk. His favorite though was President Uchtdorf's from Priesthood as well. Elder H. and I were freaking out, because this was our last General Conference on our missions. Man how time flies!

Thanks for everything! Love ya! :D
Elder Branch

Pineapple

Some pipes burst as we were trying to fill the font, 

which created quite an adventure!

This is the awful pollen 

that has been causing major allergies! 

It literally looks like yellow frost over everything!

Pollen, close-up

Mar. 21, 2016 in Statesville, NC

Hello again!

Wow, so this last week has literally been like the longest week ever. It seems like 2 months since last week! So along with that, we actually had a pretty rough week. We joked all week between the companionships that it was the worst week ever, which it wasn't, but lots of annoying things happened. All of our set appointments cancelled, we spent all our money, we ran out of miles, we locked ourselves out of the house, and we had some wild food. I will expand on a couple of these stories, and then I will tell some actual good ones.

The other elders have a mom and daughter who are getting ready for baptism, and they couldn't find anyone available to come to the lessons. Since we had no lessons, they recruited us to join and my role was to play baby sitter to 2 of the younger kids, a girl and a boy. It was wild, but their lesson went pretty well and I got made hero status in the kids eyes, so all was good.

We also taught a less active man-woman who is Trans right now. He had his name changed last week. It was very very interesting, and honestly really sad. His wife was there too and we brought a member who used to be his scout master. We shared the Hallelujah video, but in all I just felt empathy for him. There are lots of youth and even adults here who are struggling with LGBTQ temptations right now, and I feel for them. That would be so ridiculously tough.

Anyways, off of those subjects, and on to the miracles!! That whole thing about sacrifice brings forth the blessings of heaven is totally true! At church we had 2 friends who have been attending for a while, named D. and J., ask us to come visit and possibly review the discussions!  Also, we have these members named the B.'s, and they have been trying to adopt an 8 almost 9 year old named A. for a while now, and this last week they got it finalized! :D They are one of the homie families in the area, and we were pretty excited for them. Our main goals are to find a new family this week! One that will actually let us show the Hallelujah video, and then teach them the gospel! :) So yup, good things are a comin.

Thanks for all the fun stories. 

I sure love ya!

Elder Branch

Forsythia!

So in Carolina, there are all these fantastic trees 

that turn super white 

in the spring! 

They create the impression that there are 

70 billion tree's of life in every direction. 

This is Elder H.'s and my friend. 

She doesn't like Elder P. and Elder E. never tries to touch her

 because he is too busy playing with a tortoise. 

This is at the Rescue Ranch, 

a place we like to volunteer. 

The people are super nice there, and the animals are super neat! 

Mar. 7, 2016 in Statesville, NC Transferred from Catawba

Hey Everyone!

So I am now in Statesville, NC. My first week was pretty good, except that on Monday night I got sick and stayed sick until around Friday morning. So our week was kinda dead as far as proselyting due to that, but we were able to get out the last 3 days and make some visits. From what my companion has been telling me, the work in our companionship has been really slow recently, especially compared to the other companionship in our ward. Our main goal/vision as a result is to fix that.

We put forth some good efforts this week, and may have a couple promising people. The best part though was that after a long hard day, we came home and found that we had received a referral for a family who apparently have been talking to their nephew, who is a recent convert, about the church. It just showed me again that sometimes success doesn't come from what we do, but that when we put forth effort success will come in some other way.

As far as our companionship, Elder E. is super funny and is excited about the work. He has been out for 6-7 months because he served in the Boise, Idaho mission before coming to ours. He is from Pocatello, and his family has 11 kids (or step kids and half kids). He trained tortoises back home, and he is really really really good at puns. (For instance, he nicknamed our companionship "the Termites" because we are Eaton Branch).

The other Elders are Elder P. (blonde) who is the District leader and hits his hump day this week, and Elder H. who came out the transfer before me, and is real funny. Sister B. fed us twice this week and sent the picture of the four of us. 

We got to do lots of service this week, and it sounds like it is pretty regular, so that will be fun.

Love,
Elder Branch

Nov. 23, 2015 in Catawba, South Carolina

Hello!

Things in Catawba are just peachy. Peachy as in R___ accepted a baptismal date for the 19th of December! Woohoo! And she came to church again this last Sunday and loved it. We had a lesson Wednesday with Brother B___ (Ward Mission Leader) about the word of wisdom and it was super good! So yeah, R___ is pretty much the best. At the end of that lesson, Brother B___ told her the story of the Catawba Tribe (he is an Indian, though kinda distantly) and she was super amazed. She really likes Native Americans. Keep praying for her! Thanks for all the prayers already! 

Church on Sunday was wild, cause we had something going on all the time, plus ward council, plus choir at the end. We got to share a training in ward council on Vision, Goals, Plans, and Accountability. It was pretty fun. Then in church we helped pass the sacrament, as well as give the opening and closing prayers. Elder B___ taught the Gospel Principles class the second hour, and the 3rd hour we stayed for part of Relief Society so that Elder B___ could play the piano to accompany Sister R___ while she sang a song. It was good!  After church we went to choir. The Sister who conducts is super nice, and makes good apple crisp.  ;)  The piano player is the actual choir director, but he is usually playing the piano. Elder B___ helped people get some things worked out  and it all turned out good.  That was our crazy Sunday to cap a crazy week. But that is how I like it!

On exchanges this week I went to Monroe where we were feeding the homeless. Some other highlights this week include seeing the C___'s.  During our lesson with them this week we were teaching their 10 year old son and 8 year old daughter, and the son totally wants to get baptized soon and at the end of the lesson the son volunteered to pray and prayed that he could be baptized! So please pray for them too.

We saw Brother S___who we are going to start teaching. We also saw Brother P___  and the C___ Family. Brother C___ makes Catawban pottery, and he had some sweet pieces he showed us! We had a good lesson with them, gave them blessings, and at the end they invited us back when we didn't have a dinner sometime, so nice of them.   :)

On Saturday we went to Sister C___'s (yes, they are related somehow) and raked her leaves from her huge backyard into one gigantic pile. Here in the fall, everyone out in the country rakes their leaves into piles, lights them on fire, and let them smolder for the next 3 days. We made a huge pile and then jumped into it. It was a blast! (Elder B___ had only jumped in leaves a couple times before, so he really enjoyed it). Afterwards she fed us homemade soup and banana pudding! (Banana pudding is my favorite! :D) It was well worth it. I'll include some pictures.  :)

We are always praying and fasting to find more friends to teach. We found a couple good leads this week, so we are looking forward to this next week, especially with it being Thanksgiving. I've realized even more than before how thankful I am for my mission, and the longer I am out the more I feel this sense of urgency and excitement for the work.

I am ponderizing 2 Nephi 2: 25-28 this week.

Adam fell that men might be; and men are, that they might have joy. And the Messiah cometh in the fulness of time, that he may redeem the children of men from the fall. And because that they are redeemed from the fall they have become free forever, knowing good from evil; to act for themselves and not to be acted upon, save it be by the punishment of the law at the great and last day, according to the commandments which God hath given. Wherefore, men are free according to the flesh; and all things are given them which are expedient unto man. And they are free to choose liberty and eternal life, through the great Mediator of all men, or to choose captivity and death, according to the captivity and power of the devil; for he seeketh that all men might be miserable like unto himself. And now, my sons, I would that ye should look to the great Mediator, and hearken unto his great commandments; and be faithful unto his words, and choose eternal life, according to the will of his Holy Spirit;

Thanks for the emails and fun stories! I sure love ya!

Happy P-day! 

From Elder Branch

So I have always heard about the infamous doughnut hamburger, two Krispie Creme doughnuts for the bun, burger in the middle. This week, thanks to the anonymous kind gift of a whole box of doughnuts and buying hamburger meat, I decided to give it a whirl. It honestly tastes a whole lot better than it sounds, but it is definitely the messiest and probably highest calorie hamburger I've ever had.

 

Oct. 12, 2015 in Greensboro, NC

Hello!

On Monday, after p-day, we tried to see T___. He didn't answer but then we went down the street and saw our classy 85 year-old Pentecostal friend D___, and he is doing well. He surprised me because his tool shed that we helped clean up was magically off of the sketchy trailer it had been on and actually looked pretty good! Mom, you need to forward this picture to Elder G___. His socks will be blown clean off!!!!:) Anyways, D___ was happy to see us, and his wife was too. We talked about his brother S___, who is having health issues and isn't "saved," so D___ wants us to help him. We offered service or teaching him, but when they asked S___ he turned it down, which was a bummer. Anyways, at the end of the lesson, D___ randomly started getting off his chair and onto his knees, and it looked like he was falling or something, only in slow motion. Turns out he just wanted to hold our hands, bless us with power, and pray, which was pretty nice of him!

After that adventure, we 'felt inspired' to go get smoothies from Smoothie King. It turned out it was real inspiration, because we talked to the guy who worked there and he was pretty neat. We gave him a Book of Mormon.

On Tuesday we taught the S___'s and E___ all about general conference, and reviewed our favorite parts. We committed E___ to go back and read/watch the talks once they were posted online.

Probably the 2 best parts of the week though were these. First we got to visit with Brother R___ on Friday morning, and we invited him to a ward cook off that night. Turns out, he came!! That was a pretty big step for him, because so far he has only really come to things if he was going to do service for someone, but this time he came just to have fun and get to know people! It was great!! As for the actual chili and international dishes Cook off, they had a whole competition and everything. People made lots of chili, and there were also a couple international dishes. Best part was... Elder J___ and I were two of the 3 judges! I have a whole new respect for the judges on Chopped and such, judging is really hard!! There were some mighty tasty things there. In the end, we decided that the egg roles were the best, and the Sister who made them was super touched and even cried a little bit :) It felt good.

With transfers coming up, I guess my main focus has been on working as if I am staying forever, while trying to leave things better than I found it. So for my letter this week, I would love to share a story about one of my favorite people I have been able to teach here. When Elder G___ and I were together, we met P___. She answered her door and asked us to pray that she would have confidence to meet with us. We prayed for her, and in 2 weeks, followed up. This time, she said she had to tell us something, and broke the news that she was actually a member but she hadn't been to church in 30+ years. We got to start teaching her, and it was a slow process. At first she didn't want her records transferred in. Slowly but surely, she started opening up. Just this last week, we were able to go over with a great couple and we invited her to church, and yesterday she was right there beside them, taking the sacrament for the first time in 30 years. It was a wonderful blessing to be able to see that, and I am so happy for her! This truly is a work of love.

Elder TooBlessedToBeStressed Branch

(Elder Branch has a friend serving a mission in Russia who sends pictures of Russian cats in his emails most every week. We can only suppose that this is Zac's response to his friend's Russian cat pictures, two North Carolina cats.)