October 24, 2016

Family and Friends,

Thanks for everyone's desire to do good in the world! Sometimes people are just not thanked enough and I want each of you to know how thankful those around you are for the good you do for them. This week was good for us. Not the most effective, but still good. I'll be going to Batavia tomorrow which is in the Rochester stake. It'll be a good next transfer!

I have a parable to share. There was a king named Leroy who was loved by all the people in the land. They adored all of his many attributes and he made everyone feel loved and welcomed. He could talk to anyone about anything because they all respected him so much. One day he needed help building a new wall around the kingdom and he asked everyone for help. The wall, which would've taken 3 years to complete, was done in 6 months because of everyone's willingness to put in their "extra mile." The wall looked 20 times better and bigger than the previous wall.

King Jethro was ruled over a neighboring kingdom and was despised and loathed by his people. Anytime he tried to strike up a conversation, the people rolled their eyes and responded sharply. He would typically respond the same way and there wasn't much joy felt throughout the kingdom. There was a sense of social-famine in the land because of this dissonance. The day came for wall repairs in Jethro's kingdom and after trying desperately to get help, it was finished after 10 years.

The final project could hardly be distinguished from the old shambles; hardly a soul put in any effort.

Now my challenge comes in the form of a few questions: What does it take to be King Leroy? Why did things go so poorly in Jethro's kingdom? How can Jethro become more like King Leroy and how can Jethro's people become more like Leroy's people?

Have a great week and I look forward to your responses!

-Elder Moon

October 17, 2016

Friends and Family,

This last week was slow. We didn't have very many lessons because everyone had dropped us the previous week, but we're working to find more people. Anne is someone we met and offered to help clean out her garage. She has MS and broke her foot and couldn't figure out how she was going to do it, but we offered to help and she was just shocked.

She offered to pay us but we said we can't take money. We gave her a restoration pamphlet and she read it by the time we came back the next day to actually help with the garage. Then last Wednesday we had a great lesson with her and a member who lived a few streets over.

That's the highlight of the new hope this week!

Challenges are good, but are they actually helping people? I think at least one person does one of them on any given week, so I'd say it's worth continuing. For this week the challenge will be self-claimed, if that's in anyone's glossary. Choose something you're struggling with or a commandment you don't keep very well or an attribute you want to work on or something you want to do this week. Select something and set it as a goal. Then do it! This challenge will be something you can make as hard or easy as you want, so push yourself but don't burn yourself out!

Have a great week!

-Elder Moon

October 10, 2016

Friends and Family,

This week was just rough in terms of the work! Like half of the people we've been teaching dropped us. People have their agency to accept or reject the message, but it's still rough. However, the people we DO still have are good! The Shin's are back from their vacation so we'll see them again this week. And Linda came to church so that was good!

Personally, I'm doing well, but how are all of you? I hear from some of you every now and then, but for those of you I haven't heard from in a while, how's life? Tell me the new things going on in your life!

The challenge this week is to share with someone your favorite scripture and why you love it. It can be someone you've been meaning to share it with, or a total stranger, but whoever it is, try to make it stretch you. Don't share it with your spouse or sibling just to get it over with, unless you really and truly feel that spouse or sibling needs it. Share with someone you feel prompted to share it with. Then write in your journal about it! As we record spiritual moments we show God we want more promptings and will act on them!

Have a wonderful week everyone!

-Elder Moon

Zone P-day!!

October 3, 2016

Family and Friends!

This last week had pros and cons. Conference was great! And our friend we've been teaching that I sent a picture of last week, well he had a hard weekend. He's stressed and needs more time to figure things out, so we're kind of on pause with him. Sad day! But the Shins are doing great and a few people came to see conference so things are going well! We also want to find more people this week, so if you need something to pray for, that'd would be great! Or prayers for James and the Shin's are always good :)

I hope you were all able to watch conference, or some parts of it at least. It was very good and several talks were awesome! I loved Elder Oaks giving great ideas for missionary work and there were also some quotes from various people about justifying and rationalizing sins. That's not good to do! Someone said to not "minimize our sins" meaning don't think "it's not THAT bad" or it'll cause you to not repent. Repentance is such a wonderful blessing we've been privileged to take part in! But enough of what I thought. Tell me what you liked! 

This week's challenge comes from one of the songs they sang at conference. It's "Let us all press on" and it comes from verse 2. It says: We will not retreat,  though our numbers may be few when compared with the opposite host in view. But an unseen power will aid me and you in the glorious cause of truth! We MUST decide now that we will not retreat! We must never, no never, no never forsake! We may be few but an unseen power really will aid us as we strive to be obedient even when, no, especially when things get hard! 

I challenge each of us to find something to do this week to show we will not retreat even if we have to stand alone! 

Have a great week!

-Elder Moon

September 26, 2016

Friends and Family!

Pride is bad. No fine print, no loopholes, no confusion about it, it's just bad. But simply observing that my dad did his mile and a half for his Air Force PT test in 10:28 and I did the same distance this morning in 10:23 is not a prideful observation :)

Haha, the work is going well here! James is stalwart and consistent, we're meeting with him and our mission president tomorrow to talk about baptism and see how close we are. The attached picture is James and I. He has since been wearing a shirt, tie, and pants to church and keeping all the commitments we leave with him!

The Shin's are also doing well. Slower progress, but progress nonetheless. We also have found several good people who live in the other zone, inner city Rochester, but the work is the same regardless of what area the people live in. We'll have to hand them off to the other missionaries, but oh well!

We have general conference this weekend and my challenge is to watch it! If you've never watched general conference, there are several sessions that are about 2 hours long each. But they're divided into several different talks (sermons/speeches/whatever you want to call

them) and several modern prophets and apostles speak. The talks are an average of about 10 minutes long, so I invite everyone on this list to listen to at least one of them. Those who consistently watch conference every 6 months, I invite you to choose something you can do to get more out of this one than you usually get out of them.

Have a fantastic week everyone!