August 26, 2013

Dear Family,

 

So this last Tuesday I kind of got transfered.  I'm still with Elder Whitecar and I'm still living in the same place, but we got three more wards to work with.  So right now we have four wards, but in the next week or so we might lose the Brighton ward which is the ward we had before.  I'm going to missing only having one ward because we got to know everyone.  We went to a ward party the Brighton ward had this past Saturday, and it was a lot of fun because everyone knew us.  It might take a little while to get use to having four wards.  

 

We had a couple of lessons this week and we have someone on date to be baptized in September.  Now that we have more wards we have some more people to teach.  

We also found out this past week that Elder Anderson is coming to speak to our mission in September.  They are also trying to come up with a musical number for that meeting and it looks like I will get to participate in that.  It will probably be some kind of small group number.  I'm glad I am getting the chance to sing every once in a while. 

 

So this week we had a meeting for the new missionaries, and President Nattress taught us about a promise that was made in this last general conference by Elder Anderson. If you want to look up the talk it is called "It's a Miracle", but here is the promise that was given by an apostle of the Lord.

 

 "I promise you, as you pray to know with whom to speak,
1. Names and faces will come into your mind.
2. Words to speak will be given in the very moment you need them.
3. Opportunities will be opened to you.
4. Faith will overcome doubt.
5. The Lord will bless you with your very own miracles."

Thanks for all your prayers and I love you all!

 

Love you all,

Elder Joshua Gandy

August 19, 2013

Dear Family,

I just finished my first transfer! I am staying in the same area with Elder Whitecar.  They might be changing the area and giving us another ward.  Transfer meeting is tomorrow so we should find out by then.
   

I'm so excited to hear that Jocelyn is going to Mexico.  I would have never guessed Mexico.  It probably would have been the last place I would have guessed.  I'm so excited for her!
  

On a normal day we usually study from 8-10 then go out until 12.  We then have lunch for an hour and then we do training hour.  Then we are out from 2-9 with dinner at 5 which is usually at a members home.  But on Tuesdays we have district meeting every week and Friday we do planning from 1-4 in the afternoon.  Other than that it is usually the same schedule.  Since we don't do a lot of tracting, we usually do a lot of member visits.  We set up appointments to teach the members and leave them commitments.  So we work a lot with the members.

We are working with two families right now so we are doing pretty well for having such a small area.  One of the families came to church on Sunday and it sounds like they will start coming every week.

Thank you for the letter and I'm glad my friends are letting you know where they are going.  Thanks for all the prayers and I love you all very much!  I love this gospel and I am so glad I have this chance to share it with the people in Gilbert Arizona.

Love,

Elder Joshua Gandy

P.S.  This last Saturday was probably the hottest day since I've been here.  I heard it was around 110-115 degrees.  It was pretty hot.

August 12, 2013

Dear Family,

 

Thank you so much for your letter.  I'm so happy I got a 5 on the AP Calculus test because because I thought I didn't do very well on the test.  It's exciting to hear where people are going on their missions.

 

So this is the last week of the transfer so I will know by next Monday if anything is changing.  This last week has been pretty eventful.  On Wednesday morning we got to go to the Mesa Temple.  I guess we get to go once a transfer.  It was a really neat experience and I'm really glad we get to go often in this mission.  No one knows when the Gilbert Temple is going to open.  They said they would announce the open house 6 months before, but there has not been any announcement yet.  They also won't do the open house in the summer because it's so hot.  So it will probably open in the spring or fall of 2014.  

This Monday we also got a new investigator to work with.  We got to do some service projects this last Saturday.  We helped someone with some yard work and another person put in baseboards.  We haven't had a lot of opportunities to do service projects so it was fun to do something a little different.

 

Everything here is going great.  Everyone is back in school here so now people are back to their normal schedules. 

 

Thank you for all your prayers. I love you all so much!

 

Love,

 

Elder Joshua Gandy

August 5, 2013

Dear Family,

It's been another great week!  I remember when I first got to Arizona I was dying in the heat and I did not want to be outside.  Now the heat really isn't that bad.  I'm getting use to it now and 106 degrees really isn't too bad.  This morning was really nice because it was cloudy and about 90 degrees.

It's been interesting working in a small ward.  We have met most of the members and have taught a good portion of them the restoration lesson.  Right now we are trying to figure out more ideas to find people to teach.  Most of the people we talk to on the street have already talked to missionaries before and have friends that are members.  It's really important that we have the ward members help us find people to teach because they are more likely to be successful at it.  We are planning on working a lot with the youth and get them excited about missionary work.  Most of them are going back to school this week so now they will have more opportunities to talk to their friends about the gospel.

I'm not sure what the missionary work is going to be like here when all the kids are in school and all the fathers are at work.  I believe we will be getting iPads and using facebook and other online tools sometime soon.  I'm guessing sometime by the end of the year, but no one has told us anything official yet so I'm not sure.

I can't believe Ziggy is almost 16.  He is almost old enough to drive!  I hope he is still there to see Joseph again.  Sister Miller's niece, Sister Bennett, was in my zone in the MTC.  My zone only had two or three districts, so it wasn't very big.

Thank you for all the prayers.  I love you all so much!

Love,

Elder Gandy