Letter #80 . . . temple session and time is flying!

Hey y'all!

It's only been a few days since my last email! Nothing really huge happened! Going to the temple last Wednesday was my highlight. I got to do a session and do sealings for the first time! Pretty awesome! I love the temple so much.

With Barbie!

We're going to have to push Bob's baptism date back a few weeks. He needs to come to church twice and he hasn't been able to yet. His health is getting better and better! He says he feels great!
 
I bet Brady nailed it in his homecoming! Send me a recording if you can find one, will ya? :) 

Time is flying too fast here. I'm going to enjoy every moment I have left! :)

Love,
Elder Townsend

Everyone is into doTerra! 

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Letter #79 . . . ECLIPSE and 18 months!

Familia and friends!

Things are good here in the Whitmer Ward with Elder Fallon! I really
love this Ward, and don't want to leave! Transfers are on the 7th of
September, hopefully I stay!

Eclipse, 2017

That's awesome that Luke's home! Miss all those guys. Can't wait to see em. Thanks for the update mama with everyone! 

August 21st . . . Eclipse watching party

Some highlights of the week: We went to the temple with Barbie and did baptisms for her first time! She said she liked it. There was a cool Spirit there. There always is! We were able to be witnesses and do the 
confirmations for her too. I love Barbie so much. Pray for her, she's going through some challenges with the family...
Went to the Temple later in the week and did a session with the Bridges, I hadn't done a session for months!

Brought Cheyanne and Nicolas Gunn to the Visitors Center! They are the cutest little family. Their two kids are adorable. The VC sisters took us through the "God's Plan" tour with them. They're solid! I feel she will be baptized soon.

Hit my 18 month mark... that's equivalent to having two babies FYI :)

Bob Gordon is currently on date for the 9th of September! Sheri wants to continue reading and praying before she decides to be baptized. We had an awesome lesson with Bob and Sheri! They told us about a phone call they just had with Bob's sister, who happens to be active in the LDS faith, and lives out of state. She told the Gordon's she has been praying for them to be able to have some help in their lives to get through the burden of possibly losing  Bob to cancer. As Bob's sister told the Sheri Gordon's about that prayer,  Sheri started to cry, and let her know, "You'll never believe this, but a few weeks back, some MORMON missionaries showed up and gave us a blessing of healing, andcame back a couple times with their Ward to help out on the farm...and Bob is almost cancer free!!" They both cried and cried on the phone she said, God answered her prayer through other people!! Just so happens that 'those people' were the Mormons who just so happened to have the fullness of the gospel, to bring the fullness of happiness
and truth into their life. God loves his children ladies and gents. ;)

ECLIPSE NEWS. Haha this Eclipse has brought so much madness to Missouri. It was awesome, don't get me wrong. The whole sky turning dark for two minutes and all.. super beautiful. It's just sad how overhyped it was. We went and helped out a person who was expecting thousands of people to show up to watch on their property because they were in the prime spot of Lathrop Missouri... NASA was even in Lathrop!! They bought PALETTES AND PALLETES OF soda, chips, and just about everything else. They were expecting it to be a huge success. But only like 200 people came, and they ended up 100,000 dollars in the hole. :/ Here are a few videos that Tanner sent from watching the eclipse . . . #1 "Take a little gander up there!", 
#2 Sped up version of the eclipse! 
 
President and Sister Love gave their first Zone conference! It was one of my faves of my whole mission. They focused on using our talents to make creative ways to find new investigators. A quote that they said, that I think applies to everything in life. It's been on my mind all day. "If you always do what you've always done, you'll always get what you've always got." If you're not getting the result you want in your life, CHANGE THINGS UP, do something different than you have in the past! :)

First zone conference with President and Sister Love

Love y'all.

- Elder Townsend
 
PS.  Here is one more video Tanner sent of him driving . . . probably right after a big storm.  Driving after a storm  , , , , hope he didn't ruin the car.  :)

Letter #78 . . . dodgeball with the youth and darts with the old folks!

Hey fam! 

Miss ya. Thinks are good out here! Shout out to Parker for
killin it with Full time filmmaker. Word around town is that things
are growing like crazy! He's at over 100k YouTube subscribers, and is
shooting to have 250k by the time I'm home!! Shoutout to Lex for being
the mama to the cutest little baby Kirt. (Kira) :) Also, I heard
Parker Thompson and Jaydra got engaged!! That's so awesome. I love
both of them!

Some highlights of the week: we had a lesson with Cheyenne and Nic! Nic is a less active member, Cheyenne is not a member, and we've been teaching her! Normally it's super chaotic with the kids in their house, but this time, the kids were just calm enough to have the parents focus on us the whole time. We taught the simplest restoration lesson I've ever taught. The spirit was very strong. We're going to the Visitor Center with them tomorrow.

We've been reading the Book of Mormon with Barbie a few times a week with her at her work. Her family is super against her joining the church. It's been hard for her, but her faith is amazing, she's pushing through all the persecution she's facing. We're going to go to the temple Wednesday with Barbie! That'll be super cool. Ryan, the other guy who was just baptized is ready to go to the temple as well.

We are working with this girl named Jessica, her husband is a member, they both have a smoking problem. Jessica has just recently quit smoking, and has been cigarette free for a month!! She's been coming to church, and asked if we could teach her the lessons so she could be baptized in the next month or two!! happy happy happy!

We threw darts with the residents at Barbies work! :) Haha flippen
awesome huh? We also had our Missionary youth activity, which was
awesome this week. We had like 30 people show up to play dodgeball. We
had a few non members there as well. Good times!

Arthur Embry is living in Orem now!! I told him to go visit you guys. I think he'd like to come to the MTC!! I'll tell him! You should call him.
 
Love you all,
- Elder Townsend

Letter #77 . . . Rain, Arthur, Barbie, interviews and BOM!

Hey fam bam! 

Love and miss y'all. Thanks for the letter mom, loved it. We had one of the few rainstorms of the summer this past couple days! It's been awesome. It's felt nice, and I love the rain. Totally beats the hot weather. 

In Jail at the Ray County Museum

Cool stuff from the week, Arthur the country singing dude who's my best pal is moving to Provo tomorrow! Had another Bingo Meet and Greet with all the new missionaries in our zone and all the cute ol' residents at Barbie's work. Had a Bible study, Arthur and I jammed out afterward for everyone! 

We had Interviews with President and Sister Love this week! Love them lots. 

Eclipse glasses!

So it's pretty sweet. I don't know if you all have heard about the eclipse that's happening on the 21st of this month, but it's like a once in a lifetime thing, the moon is going to go in front of the sun and the sky is going to turn dark... IN THE MIDDLE OF THE DAY... for like 3 minutes! It's gonna be sweet. We have some special glasses to see it and everything. :) 

This week we went to the visitors center with Barbie in Independence. We had taken her there for a tour on the top floor, but we took her on a tour of the bottom floor, which is basically just learning about the history of the saints being kicked out of Missouri. It was awesome. We've started reading the Book of Mormon with her a few times a week at member's houses because her husband does not like her reading it at home.

I'm in Helaman 15 of the Book of Mormon by the way. Love it. These last couple chapters have been amazing. I'll send some more pics as soon as I can! Love ya!

 

Tan

Letter #76 . . . "It's Worth It!"

Familia and Everybody! 

Tanner's friends are starting to come home!

Miss you guys. It's crazy seeing all the bros get home off their missions! They're all looking good! Tell em' I love them all so much. Claire's getting huge, Spence is getting huge! Craziness. It's blowing my mind seeing these dudes come out this week that just barely graduated last month. Britt, your time is creeping up! Keep on reading the Book of Mormon, and praying to know if it's true. I promise that is the best preparation you could do. Just know the mission is the greatest thing ever!
Last week was Elder Staheli and Katoa's last P-Day! We went down and walked around the Kansas City Royals and KC Chiefs Stadiums. They are right next to each other! They both left this week. I'm gonna miss those dudes. Staheli's parents came and picked him up. I got to meet and talk to both of them for a while!

Kansas City Royals and Kansas City Chiefs Stadium on p-day!

Goodness gracious, I didn't know it was possible to sweat so much. I've been soaking wet all week. We've been doing service outside almost every day this week. It's fun! I love it. But I'm not going to miss the humidity much haha. Barbie is doing awesome. She is so happy these days. Besides the fact that her husband is dragging her down not supporting her coming to church or anything related to it, she is still pushing through and relying on her testimony. Barbie gave us a present this week! She wrote us the nicest letter, and gave us a nice money clip with a watch on it. On the back it says, "It's worth it. - B" Which is what we would tell her when she'd ask how we got the courage to come out here and drop everything for two years.

New comp, Elder Fallon!

I got a new companion this week! His name is Elder Fallon. He's from Lathrop California and he's a cool guy! We're getting along just dandy and I've loved serving with him. I borrowed an awesome book from some members. It's called, "Personal Writings of Joseph Smith". It's so cool. It's literally just a book compiled with all of his journal entries and letters that have been preserved. Reading his journals gives you a better understanding and perspective of who he was and what he was like. Reading it makes the Book of Mormon seem that much more incredible, seeing that he truly could "barely write a well worded letter." He's just a normal dude chosen to carry out an amazing mission. His grammar and spelling in his personal journal are really not great.

My testimony and peace I feel has been very much strengthened these past few days. My BOM reading and prayers have been a lot more sincere. With that effort, I've seen an increase in peace, in power to resist temptation, etc. Church this week was especially awesome. I've found on my mission, that you really get out of it what you put into it. A lot of times at church my mind wanders to other things and I don't feel much peace throughout the day. But this last week I focused the whole time on listening to the Spirit. I was pondering my questions throughout the day, and felt such a peaceful assurance knowing that God loves me, and knows me. I'm so grateful for the gospel.

Love Tan

Tanner's friends coming home!

P-day adventures in Kansas City

Last p-day with Elder Staheli

Cool quote!

Letter #75 . . . 2 Baptisms and 2 Priesthood Blessings!

Hey fam and friends, 
 

Tanner, Barbie and Elder Staheli at Barbie's baptism!

This week was awesome! Barbie and Ryan were baptized on Saturday!! It was an amazing day. Barbie has such amazing faith. Her family is not supporting her joining the church, (her husband and children) yet she is moving forward in her decision because she knows that she's felt so many confirmations that this is where she needs to be, and that this truly is the true church on earth. She's your age mom and dad. I played and sang "Be Still My Soul" at Barbie's and played "Come Thou Fount" at Ryan's. I confirmed her the following day during Sacrament. It was a pretty special day. Ya' ll gotta meet her one day when she comes to visit Utah!

We were able to see some pretty amazing manifestations of the power of the priesthood this week. The first had to do with Brother Kelley, the less active member who we gave a blessing to a few weeks ago. He asked for a blessing because he was afraid he was going to lose his fingers. His middle and ring finger had been turning black and basically decaying on his hand over the previous six weeks, he was in a lot of pain, and it just kept hurting worse and worse. He'd been doing tons of tests with the doctors and they had no idea what was going on. In the blessing a few weeks ago, I promised him that his fingers would be restored to full health if he had faith, and that he would not lose his fingers. He showed up to our Bible study class we teach, by surprise and told us, "You know how you said in the blessing that I could be healed if I had faith, well I want you to know that I did
have faith in that." He showed us his hand and it was back to normal.
It was pretty amazing to see. He said the pain stopped the day after
the blessing and it went back to normal in a few days. I had never
seen anything like that. The priesthood is REAL!!

It was also Ryan's baptism day . . July 22, 2017

The other cool priesthood moment we saw was when we visited Bob Gordon and his family this week. They were excited to share that the doctors had just recently been giving him nothing but good news about his cancer in his past few checkups. He said the tumor that he had in his esophagus had shrunk by 50%, and that it has stopped spreading. They said they believe it was because of the blessing we gave him about a month ago. Just like with Brother Kelley, in the blessing I again felt prompted to tell him he will be restored to full health if it be the Lord's will, if he has faith.

I truly believe that often God takes situations and trials like these,
and uses it as a way to truly show his power to them and bless them
with the blessings he so badly wants to give us. All we have to do is
turn to him and trust him. In these two cases, I feel like he's using
it as a way to get them on the path to accept his gospel. So sweet. :)

Baptism day for Barbie and Ryan

Well Elder Staheli leaves this week! I'm sure I'm staying here for at least another transfer or two. All is well here in Mizzeruh!

Much love,

- Tan

PS. Tanner sent a video of him and Elder Staheli burning one of Elder S's shirts since he is going home this week.  "Boys will be boys!" :)  Click on the following link to watch the 2.5 minute video . . .
Watch the pyromaniacs here! 

Their "unwimpy" magnifying glass and groovy glasses!

Raging fire!

More from the special baptism day!

Old comp of Tanner's came back to visit, Torrico! 

 

Email to us missionary Moms from Barbie!

Letter #74 . . . most special moment of my whole mission!

Hey my fam and friends. This week was great. The mission is pretty
dang cool. The GOSPEL is pretty dang cool. Two of our investigators,
Barbie and Ryan are both on date for the 22nd!! :) Before I talk about
them tho, HAPPY BIRTHDAY BRITT!! YOU'RE A STUD I LOVE YOU LOTS. Josh
did baptisms?! Woot Woot jarshie poo!

Liberty Jail, July 2017 with Barbie and the Bridges

Went to the Liberty Jail this week with Barbie. Tom and Sheila Bridges, some amazing members came too. It truly was up there for the most special moment of my whole mission. Earlier on in the week Barbie expressed how cloudy her mind was about making a decision to be baptized. We told her to clear her mind for the next few days before we went to the jail. We told her to just think of the question, was Joseph Smith truly a Prophet? We went to the jail, she came in, seeking to find her answer about Joseph Smith being a true prophet. She is the most truly prepared person I have ever seen... It continues to blow me away... We went in a room, and watched the hour long Restoration movie. You could tell she was soaking it all in. All 67 minutes of it!! We went and walked around the Jail. Brother Sharp gave us a tour, was guided by the Spirit, and said everything that Barbie needed to hear.

"Don't worry Mom!  I tucked my shirt in right after the pic!" :)

After the tour we went into a room, Barbie marveled about the faith of these men in the Jail, standing true to their testimony regardless, even in trials. She was especially impacted by the fact that all the men in the jail had a chance to escape and be made free if they would just simply say that Joseph Smith was not a Prophet of God, and ALL of
them chose to stay in the miserable Jail, than be made free, and denounce Joseph as a true messenger of God. She said, "Not even Peter did that!! Even he denied Christ." POWERFUL. There's an amazing spirit felt there. I have felt an overwhelming peace and so much emotion throughout the week, especially the night we visited the Jail with her. As we sat and listened to Barbie testify in tears, that she felt so much peace, as she was there at the Liberty Jail. She told us she knew without a doubt that Joseph Smith was truly a prophet. I couldn't
help but cry with her. Hearing such sincerity and testimony in somebody's voice overwhelmed me completely. In the midst of our tears, and with a smile I asked, "Wanna set a date?" She immediately responded with relief, "Yes!" She wiped her tears and smiled the biggest smile you ever did see. I love her, and feel so grateful I was able to witness her conversion, and have my faith and testimony strengthened immensely because of it!

 One of Tanner's journal entries

Staheli is hanging in there, he's got about a week left. I'll probably most definitely stay here next transfer, which I'm fine with. I love this ward. I'd be fine to train or do whatever! I'm at Alma 62 in the
Book of Mormon. Loving it more than ever, it is my greatest source of peace.  

 Love you all. :)
- Tan

PS.  Note from Mom . . . Tanner has written in his journal everyday of his mission and here is his entry from last week when they went to Liberty Jail with Barbie and the Bridges.  

Here is an email Barbie sent home to Tanner's Mom this past week!