Week #26

My week was so good and exhausting. We worked so hard this week! It was fantastic. We had two investigators show up at church yesterday. And Justin, who is 15 years old, felt the spirit very strong. We taught him about prayer and the Holy Ghost and said that it's through the Holy Ghost that we can come to know truth. The spirit works through our feelings. I then told him that for me it feels very warm in my body like I'm getting a big hug, and then Justin said, "yeah the first time I prayed I felt chills throughout my whole body." When we first taught Justin he had no idea what or who God was. He wants to keep coming back to church too! And we stopped by this former investigator and she brought up the concern right there and she set up an appointment for us to come and teach her and her family! It was neat. A lot of great things are happening in our area and I know that the Lord's hand is in it. Everything is just ahhh so good! The ward is finally warming up to us and the bishop is really starting to trust us, we are seeing great success! I have been working out a lot and bench pressing! I feel really good....and....I made a deal with Sister Basting, one of the senior missionaries in the office, to stop drinking mountain dew.... :( haha she is funny.

I have been out for almost 7 months! It is going by way too fast. I had a youth come up to me yesterday, he's 14, and he said I better not get transferred soon. It was neat because he had never really seemed interested when I would talk to him at church. I guess when you make people feel important and that they are worth something and just talk to them and make them laugh it has an effect on them. I am really starting to love the people here. I often think to myself about my experiences in Dauphin but I'm grateful for the miracles I see everyday. When we were planing on Saturday we were thinking of what people we could ask for referrals and so we prayed and listened and looked at a list of members. I had a feeling that we needed to ask a certain person for a referral. We called the Sisters to see if they were still working with this less-active lady and they said yes, but then they said that she wants missionaries to teach her sister and that her sister is in our ward. It is great how the Lord works :)

I'm lost in the work :)

I know without a doubt that this work is real and that the Book of Mormon is true 

All is well,

-Elder Clark

Week #25

This week was so crazy! On Tuesday Elder Moojalsky came in the office and because it was transfers we were in the office a lot until Friday. We had to have a meeting and give training to the new missionaries trainer, then pick up the new missionary Elder Keetch who is 18 years old! Then do an orientation. 

On Saturday we when right out to work! It snowed like crazy so our plan was to meet with a member and work with them. So we went and shoveled their drive way and walk ways. It was a good day. We had supper with Sister Demarchi and she brought her two non-member friends and they work for a company that is very involved with families. So the whole time I was sitting there I was thinking how are we going to be able to teach these people....... so we had a great conversation and had some good laughs as well and the wife was Filipino so I was speaking Tagalog! I was sitting there and I had the prompting to talk about family history work. So I asked them a question about their company and then brought it into family history work. They were so excited and now want to meet us and have us show them how to do family history work! I am so grateful for the promptings of the spirit and so glad that I was quick to listen and to act upon it!

Then Sunday we had a less active show up and we taught him later that evening. But one of our investigators showed up and she brought 4 of her friends and now we have 4 potential investigators! 

Well, that was my week!

All is well,
-Elder Clark

Week #24

This week we had supper with a less active lady and she is the best. Her boyfriend is a really good cook he makes the best Italian food. Then we did transfer planning with president and Elder McDanel is going to Warroad, Minnesota serving with the best person ever Elder Wolford!!! I love that kid so much! He is sooo weird!! But he is the best he just makes you laugh. But Elder Moojalsky will be serving with me as the new assistant!! I am so excited! He is a really great elder and we get along really good. I really know that he is supposed to be in the office with me. His name was in the back of my mind a couple days before transfer planning and when his picture was put up to mine is just felt right. I am a little nervous  though because I have to run the show now, everything is on me now. But I know it will work out. 

I had a neat experience the last couple of days were I was just praying and asking Heavenly Father for guidance just with all the stress I was going through, and I had a dream where I went teaching with these other elders and when they were teaching this lady the first thing they said was, "so you need to read the Book of Mormon and D&C and we want you to be baptized. What's holding you back?" And they were saying all of this without letting her speak..... and I was yelling at the elders saying "the first few moments with an investigator are really important, investigators must learn to trust you!!!" ( of course i would never yell though) but I said that exact same thing it says in PMG with How To Begin Teaching. I didn't think much of the dream until last night. Elder McDanel and I went to a supper appointment with some other elders and they were teaching this less active brother and his wife is not a member. They were teaching the sabbath day, and it just looked like all they wanted was a result. It didn't seem like they cared about the guy. While one elder taught, the other one zoned out. When we came out of the lesson we talked about it and were saying how they could have taught his wife and just all these other things. And I randomly said "their focus was about getting a result, rather than establishing a relationship." It just hit me that it tied into my dream. It was a testimony to me that revelation is real and that the Lord is there for me and is helping me see and learn things so that when I have to present training I will know what to do. The Lord is just so neat. I love this gospel a lot. 

This week I ate Balut! It is an undeveloped duck egg that the Filipinos eat! So I cracked open the egg and inside was a baby duck fetus... You could see its eyes, feet, body and beak! And I ate that whole thing. I smashed it. It was pretty insane when I was first eating it. I thought i was gonna throw up but I just did it! I will send pictures as soon as I get them from the other elders. 

Then this week we were able to have sports night again and it was a really good turn out. Our investigators came and they brought their family and cousins and we got 4 new investigators from it. So we were able to go and teach them, it was really neat.

For the rest of my life I am always going to live by this, (it's found in PMG pg 4):
Honor Christ name by your actions.

All is well, 

-Elder Clark

Week #23

The Filipino food is very good I'm going to be eating balut on Friday which is that undeveloped duck egg. I will video tape it and send it to you or something. 

This week was just crazy, not a lot happened. We have been in Regina from Monday-Thursday. We got home around 9:00 pm on Thursday, then the following morning we went to the walk in clinic because Elder McDanel wasn't feeling good. That was the worst thing ever we had to wait for like 4 hours. Canadian health care = horrible. So he goes to see the doctor and I'm in the waiting place making phone calls to set up appointments with investigators and this guy over hears me on the phone and says, "So how long you been out?" I said 6 months and he said "you have 2 years right?" and I said yep sure do. I then asked him what he knew about missionaries and he said well my whole family is Mormon but I'm baptist, and I was like oh right on. So then we start having a friendly conversation and he starts pulling out his scriptures and starts bashing with me I was so mad. We talked about Joseph Smith a lot and he said the The Book of Mormon is made up because there is no physical evidence of the plates that it was written on and that the Bible had evidence because we still have all the scrolls. So I then asked him what the definition of faith was....and he stumbled over his words and was saying well uhh in Hebrews 11 uhhh it says uhhh that faith is the evidence for things which are hoped for and not seen, it was neat because he had nothing to say after that, but soon after that he just kept going to scriptures. I bore my testimony that I knew The Book of Mormon was true. As I was sitting there listening to him I realized to myself that this guy has no idea what I have gone through. I have seen people change and witnessed them receive a witness that The Book of Mormon is true. I know that The Book of Mormon is true and that it truly is another witness of Jesus Christ. The bible says that "out of the mouth of two or three witnesses shall every word be established." The old testament and new testament being the 2 witnesses and the Book or Mormon being the third witness of Jesus Christ and his gospel. So that made me mad but whatever I know who I am and I can never deny what I know to be true.

Later that day we traveled to Minnesota with President to assist him in some interviews and look at some areas to put missionaries in. While we were down there I realized how cheap things are in America. We didn't get back until 11:30 that night.

Saturday we were dead....I'm so tired it's ridiculous. We have just been going non-stop traveling without taking a break. We barley have P-Days just time to email and then we are out and about. later that night we had a fireside and Tamara who is less-active showed up! It was so great to see her! We are going over to her place for supper and her boyfriend is going to cook us supper he's a really good guy. Oh so here is something crazy. We stopped by Raul and Aiylnn our Filipino investigators and they just fed us again, only they fed us this crazy weird meal. It was pig with a bunch of stuff in it and then rice and you eat it together. It was super good. Very strange, but really good. Also, I have been drinking poison....(Pepsi)

Sunday we had church and it was good. Church starts at 12:30 now so it feels like our day is wasted but it was a really good day, saw a miracle. I had the thought to stop by Sister Demarchi's. It was a good thing that we did, because her fire place was going crazy and we were able to fix it, if we wouldn't have gone over there she would have had a house full of smoke and would have been breathing all that in. I didn't think of it as a prompting until after so I'm glad that I was just going about doing good.

Well that was my week. I got to go to the temple again in Regina and that was really good. This week will be pretty busy though. We have transfer planning starting Tuesday-Thursday and it's a pretty big transfer so we will see what happens. If Elders McDanel does get transferred then I would be the senior comp but with leadership assistants or zone leaders there is no junior or senior comp everyone is equal.

I sure know that this work is true :)

All is well,
-Elder Clark

Week #22

Well this week had been a crazy one. After I got done talking to the family we went over to a Filipino family's home and had a Christmas lunch there, wow it was really good. After that we had supper at Belatu's and she made her spicy chicken and it was even hotter this time. Wednesday was boxing day, which is basically like black Friday and it was crazy everyone was gone shopping so we didn't do to much that day. Thursday we went on exchanges with the zone leaders and I went with Elder Moojalsky. We stopped by this guy named Kelly and he is a really interesting character. After that we went and visited another person, but he ended up not being home, and so we tracted around his house and we ended up tracting into a family from the Congo and we taught them. The spirit was really strong and amazing, miracles took place. They wanted us to come back and the mother speaks french and cannot speak English, but can understand it really good and at the end of the lesson she turned to her kids and talked to them and they said, "my mom said thank you for coming because we have all been spiritually fed, and that you have planted a seed in good soil." It was super neat! After that we went to a supper appointment with the Liston family (a Filipino family) the food was still really good like always. The Filipinos are funny people and they treat you like family I love them a lot. They wanted to take a picture after so we did and it was a good thing I brought my camera. On Friday we planned for a bit and then had a meeting with president. All I can say is that this transfer is going to be a wild one.



Saturday we taught those kids we met from our sports night activity and it went really good. It was the second time we taught them and they want us to keep coming over and teaching them. The oldest one is 15 and he is friends with one of the young men in the ward. After that we went and met with some elders to see how they were doing and we took them out to Dairy Queen. We then stopped by a less active who we were trying to get a hold of forever and she was finally home, what a blessing it was! 



Sunday was crazy though! We had one of our less-active members who we have been teaching show up to church!! and she hasn't been coming to church for a very long time so it was good to see her. After church we had an appointment with Belatu and she made this super good food it was like a thick pancake that looked like a sponge and tasted like sourdough bread and spicy meat and salad and you just ate it with your hands. It was really good. Oh also on Saturday we went and visited a Filipino former investigator and they ended up feeding us Filipino spaghetti! Wow it sure was good and now we are going to be seeing them again soon. 



I'll be in Regina today until Thursday for exchanges with the Zone leaders and then we will be having Zone leader Council up here as well, Tomorrow we are going to America with President!! We are going to help him look for some new areas to put missionaries in. Transfer planning is next week.... should be an interesting one. My face is getting fat! I have been eating out so much because we are always on the road! 


All is well,

-Elder Clark