Dec. 1, 2014 in Huntersville, NC, New Companion Elder S

Elder S is my new companion and he is super great!! He has 3 months left and is also our district leader. He's from Provo and is 21 but looks young like me still, so Brother K is fondly referring to us as the "Deacon Elders." Haha, it's great :). 

We are working hard. Thanksgiving was great and life is good in Huntersville. We are visiting lots of members and getting to know them better. We sent them all a "Happy Thanksgiving" text and have been visiting and serving them. One neat experience was at dinner yesterday. We finished dinner and shared a message, and just before we left we realized we hadn't cleared the dishes. We went to the table and I cleared while Elder S washed the dishes. Sister D said "Wow, we've never had missionaries do that before." It was great!!

So as far as transfers, they work this way. On Saturday we get a phone call telling us if we're going and what time the transfer meeting is. Then we pack our stuff if we are leaving kinda throughout Saturday to Monday. Then on Tuesday, we all go to the transfer meeting and they have the departing missionaries bear testimony and usually there is a special musical number (this time it was Savior, Redeemer of My Soul and it was sooo good!!!!!!).

Then President C calls groups of missionaries to the front, and from all those gathered in front, he calls the companionships. Then once all the transfers are taken care of, President and Sister C share testimony and we close with the NCCM mission song, which always makes the departing missionaries cry. 

"We sure love Ya North Carolina, and we pray you'll receive His word. No place else we go could be finer, for this is where we've come to serve the Lord." 

Then we close, everyone grabs baggage, bikes, media orders, and everything else missionaries need. We also get a couple minutes while this is going on to say "Hi" to any past companions or MTC friends or anyone else you know. (I saw Elder J, my MTC zone leader, at this last one. He is now companions with Elder B!!) After that, we all head to our areas and start a'workin and the departing missionaries head to the mission home for a last night devotional from President and Sister C. Then the departing missionaries fly home the next day. Pretty snazzy, huh!?

Our 5th Sunday Lesson at church was all about consecrating our time, talents, and energy to the Lord and in the 3rd hour, the W's asked the group how they make church service a blessing to their families. I shared how when I was little, whenever you had home teaching and your partner couldn't go, you would bring me along as your "companion." I heard one brother a couple rows back say to himself, "that's a great idea."  I think so too  ;) 

Have you seen "He is the Gift"?  It's the best!!
 He is the Gift 

Well, I love you soooo much!!!! Thanks for the emails!!

Love you Elder Branch

Nov. 24, 2014 in Huntersville, NC

So we got transfer calls on Saturday, and 3 out of the 4 of us will be leaving! But guess who's staying? I am! I'm going to miss these guys but I will get a new companion who will also be the district leader for Huntersville Elders, Lake Norman Elders and Sisters, and Mountain Island Elders and Sisters. There will only be one companionship in Huntersville now.

Probably one of the greatest miracle contacts on my mission so far was this last Saturday. Elder S and I were riding through a neighborhood and we saw a dad and his 9 year old daughter out bagging leaves. Elder S called out and asked if we could help and the man just looked up at us and then looked back down. This is a common rejection we get so we were about to ride off, but I had ridden past our turn over by them and so I called again to ask if we could help them. This time he looked up and said, "Sure, if you aren't worried about your clothes." I told him we were dressed casually today, we didn't even have suits on! We believe he just hadn't heard Elder S before. Anyways, we hopped off our bikes and started helping them bag the leaves. As we worked, the man told us his name was T and his daughter was H. He asked us about our missions and he seemed to know a bit about the church, but not tons. We talked with him all about missionary service and then he started "quizzing" his daughter on us in a kind of educational way. He asked her "H, do you know what is different about their beliefs and ours?" She didn't know so he asked us to tell them about the Book of Mormon. Then he asked how they could get a copy of one!! T told us he and H read lots of books together and that they would like to read it and see what it's like. We were able to give them a Book of Mormon and a Restoration pamphlet and we will be visiting them to follow up and teach them more about the Restoration. 

We are super excited to teach them and we are praying that they will be open and accepting. Miracles do come as we get out and do our best to love and serve people. As 1 Corinthians 13:13 says: "And now abideth faith, hope, charity, these three; but the greatest of these is charity." Or, in other words, "People don't care how much you know until they know how much you care"

G hasn't come to church yet so we will keep working with him. He did give us a super nice calendar made of pictures from the horse rescue though! We did some service for him at the rescue.

A good General Conference talk I studied this week is "Which Way do You Face?" By Lynn G Robbins. He says:

"When people try to save face with men, they can unwittingly lose face with God. Thinking one can please God and at the same time condone the disobedience of men isn’t neutrality but duplicity, or being two-faced or trying to “serve two masters” (Matthew 6:24; 3 Nephi 13:24).

While it certainly takes courage to face perils, the true badge of courage is overcoming the fear of men."

He also shares 4th Nephi 1:27. The world today tries to change Gods standards but his standards never change. So yeah, it's just a fantastic talk, so take a look!   ;)

Hanks for all yuns do! (yuns is like yall I found out. There is also yins, younguns, Dear, honey, baby, and "Normans"  haha, all good nicknames) :)

Loves!

Elder Branch