October 28, 2013

Dear family,

 

It's been an amazing week!  On Saturday I got to go to the baptism of two people I taught in the Brighton ward.  Since I'm still in the stake and Elder Whitecar is just in the next stake over we both got to be the witnesses at the baptism.  The mother was a less active and the two daughter (ages 11 and 14) were not members.  It was amazing to see them welcomed into the ward.  It was also fun to see members in the Brighton ward again.  

I had another great experience this week.  We went to a members house for dinner and they invited their aunt, who has been an inactive member for years, to dinner.  At the end of dinner we shared a short lesson with them and shared the scripture Alma 38:5.  At the end of the lesson I noticed that the aunt was almost in tears.  We found out later that the aunt said she wanted to come back to church.  It's neat to see the miracles that can happen when you are doing the Lord's work.

 

I'm excited for this week!  Tomorrow we have one of those expanded zone conference.  I found out that an expanded zone conference means that they are inviting stake and ward leaders to the conference.  On Halloween we are having a mission conference from 10-4 then we have to be back to our apartment by 5 and stay in for the rest of the night.  It's really nice to have a small mission because then it's really easy to have mission conferences.

 

Sorry I don't have as much time to write today.  Thanks for all your prayers! I love you all so much!

 

Love,

 

Elder Joshua Gandy 

October 21, 2013 - Temple Announcement

Dear Family,

 

If you have not already heard the Gilbert Temple will be dedicated on March 2!  The open house will be from January 18 - February 15, and the cultural celebration will be on March 1.  They just announced it last Saturday so we are still waiting for more announcement on what this will mean for the missionary work.  In our letter from President Nattress this week he said they will be training us on how to prepare everyone for the temple.  The letter also said that we will have three expanded zone conferences in the next month.  We have interviews this week so I'm sure he will tell us more about it then. It's exciting times here in the Arizona Gilbert Mission! 

 

Our past week has been great! Last P-day we had a zone activity and we went to Elder and Sister Thompson's (the senior couple in my district) apartment and had lunch and played games.  Three missionaries in our zone had a birthday this month so this activity was kind of like a big birthday party.  We were also able to teach one of our investigators three times this week.  We don't think she has a job so it's really easy to find a time to meet with her.  We were also able to have a lesson with another investigator last night.  The lesson went great and it's amazing to see how she has been prepared to hear the gospel and to accept it.  She is going to be baptized on November 16. 

 

One thing I've learned this week is that the Lord's hand is in everything that we do, especially as missionaries.  It's amazing to see how the Lord times things perfectly so that we are able to talk to people.  While we were riding our bikes we stopped to talk to this lady getting her mail.  We came to find out that she was a former investigator.  We don't know why the last missionaries stopped meeting with her, but she told us that we could come by next weekend.  I know our Heavenly Father helps us through everything that we do no matter what we going through.  Something that I've noticed a lot in my scripture reading is how many times it says to trust God and we can get through anything that is put before us.

 

Thanks for all your prayers and your support! I love you all so much!

 

Love,

Elder Joshua Gandy

October 14, 2013

Dear Family,

 

The work is going great!  The weather is also starting to feel really nice, and I hear it will just get better from here.  The beginning of the week started off a little slow.  We weren't able to teach a lesson until Friday, but we were able to teach three lessons this last weekend.  We have one investigator who we haven't been able to contact for the past couple weeks, but we were able to talk to them and invited them to come to church.  Yesterday he came to church!  Coming to church can be a big step for people, but it's a very important step to take.  We were really excited to see him there.  

We are working with several investigators right now, so were are really excited to continue teaching them.  We also found a couple of potentials investigators this past week that we hope to start teaching soon.  This week we are going to focus on teaching a lesson every day.  That is something that President Nattress has asked us to start doing.  We should teach a lesson every day, and if you can't teach an investigator or a less active member than we should teach active families. 

 

This last week I got to do family history training again since Elder Gardner needed to do it.  After the training we got to work on the computers for a little bit.  One of the things I tried to do was sourcing and finding records.  I did not realize that there is still a lot of things to do on familysearch even for the ancestors that you already now about.

 

My companion, Elder Gardner, is great!  I think I already told you that he also graduated high school this year.  He did theater in high school and was in his schools glee club, so we did a lot of similar things in high school.  We are getting along great! 

 

Thank you so much for all your prayers and support!  I love you all!

 

Love,

Elder Joshua Gandy

October 7, 2013

Dear Family,

 

Thank you so much for the birthday present!  I had a pretty good birthday with general conference and a member made me some cupcakes.  I'm so excited to get the Ensign so I can read all of the talks again.  

So if you haven't found out yet, I am training a brand new missionary straight from the MTC.  His name is Elder Gardner and he is from Sunnyside Washington.  He just graduated from high school just like me, so for a couple of days we were both 18 year olds that just graduated.  I'm staying in the same area and my area did not change. 

 

We invited someone to be baptized yesterday and they accepted! So if everything goes well then we should have a baptism at the beginning of November.  We also got two new investigators this past week.  It's a mother and her daughter, and the mother wants her daughter involved in young womens.  We found them just by talking to them on the street.  The mother told us that she usually doesn't come outside, but she knew that she was suppose to meet us.  We've taught her once already and we have another lesson set up this week.  We hope to get a member to the lesson and to get the daughter involved in young womens. 

 

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

 

Love,

Elder Gandy

 

P.S. The weather is starting to cool down!

 

Here is a picture of my zone last transfer: