Hope is the Anchor to the Souls of Men

Dear Parents, Mom and Dad/Dad and Mom, (You may wonder why Elder Todd always addresses his parents this way. The answer: we don't know, he's always been apologetic so he can't put Mom first without thinking he's offending Dad or conversely. So we referred to ourselves as his parental advisers in our last letter to him.)

I plan on getting a haircut this week, just in case you were wondering. I have not been able to, but do not fret, I will get it done. (His hair grows fast and instead of laying down, it sticks straight out. So once a month we would have him cut his hair.) I did mention this idea to my companion, to which he says that my hair is short and that I had a haircut last month. For which I replied, "Hair does grow."

Yes, we did have a baptism yesterday, which was amazing. It was my first baptism in the mission field and the first baptism I ever performed. The person I baptized was the mormon.org referral and he is a bit taller than I and also a bit heavier (he is very muscular). Plus, the water was not as deep as it could have been. So, needless to say, he was thoroughly washed of his sins for I had to dunk him four times to make sure he was entirely immersed. (Seth is fairly short so I can imagine the trouble he had trying to get the man's whole body under the water without dropping him. See his FB page https://www.facebook.com/ElderSethTodd to learn more about baptisms in The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints)

My week was good for the most part. I went on exchanges with one of the missionaries in my district and we found many potential investigators. We have a two return appointments, though one did not turn out and my companion and I will have to try to talk to him again. The other we have yet to see. Though, I also did go out with the zone leaders and that is where it gets interesting. So, before I first got here, my current companion had this mormon.org referral that he went to see and he saw her and had a return appointment on Monday. That return appointment was during a week that I was here. She cancelled and said she was not interested. I always wanted to meet with this lady, because, well, no reason really other than everyone needs to hear the gospel. My companion did show me her house, but I, honestly, forgot which house other than the street. This street was where the mormon.org referral lived. My companion and I tracted (LDS vocabulary for knocking on doors) the last half of it. Now, with the zone leader, I decided to tract the first half. First, three doors, nobody home or not interested. Fourth door, it was that lady. She rejected us, but then we offered to share a message about Christ. As we shared a message from the Book of Mormon and Bible, it slowly turned into questions about the Book of Mormon which lead to the first discussion, the Restoration of the Gospel of Jesus Christ. She did question us with the statement, "Where is it in the King James Version?" We would show her and explain. We got to the point where she said she would pray to know if God wants her to read the Book of Mormon. So, my companion and I have a return appointment. What is funny is that she asked us, "Did anyone send you?" The zone leader spoke up (he did not know the whole story), so his answer was, "No." That is true, nobody did send us (well, except, God), but I know it might be interesting when she sees my companion again. When the zone leader and I left, I explained the story, which he started to laugh. (We hope he explains why the one missionary said "No.")

We have another baptism this upcoming week. My companion gets to baptize him. The man is the charitable man, who has so many stories of how he has helped people plus other stories. I do enjoy his stories. He told us about where he lives and that there is a homeowners association. The homeowners association has brought him to court several times. He told us about a time where he repainted his door. The paint he used was the same color, type that was originally on the door. The association brought him to court, because it was against the rules to paint your house without a petition from the neighbors, with them saying it would not offend them. The judge was on the man's side, because it was the original color (so, the association lost). That is one of his many different stories that he has. He also quit chewing tobacco recently, which was excellent. He is definitely prepared.

I am taking pictures. I have been trying to upload them, but the frustration part is that they will not upload. The upload keeps on being interrupted. So, I will keep at. (His camera has a very large megapixel resolution.)

I will stick with the U (University of Utah) at this current time, but it was good to talk to the sheriff member to get advice (This happened the week before). I definitely feel as though the mission will prepare me for my future. I have been feeling that a lot.

Sean went through his surgery? Wow, I did not know it was that soon. I am glad that it sounds like it went well. I am sorry Mom is going stir crazy as she is taking care of the children while Sean recovers.

I heard about Veronica, but not the others. Denice (former LMCHS student, now at West Hills Community College) emailed me for some advice for her mission papers. And I heard that her mother is on date for baptism. That is really neat and awesome!

I am glad to hear that Dad has a good class this year and I hope that keeps up. I am excited to hear about you two each and every week. I am also glad to hear that my dog is being taken care of. She usually keeps warm at night. Which reminds me, what material do I need to obtain to survive winter? Also, do you know of any simple recipes that have little materials that do not require a crockpot (for we do not have one yet and I do think about it) and do not require an oven (we do not have an oven, but we do have a toaster oven)? If you do, thanks. If not, it is all right. I will find some on my spare computer time.

All is well.

Love,

Elder S. Todd

Truth, like gold, is to be obtained not by its growth, but from washing away from it all that is not gold. 

- Leo Tolstoy

What We Love . . . Determines What We Become

Dear Parents, Mom and Dad/Dad and Mom,

Do not worry. I am alive and well. I did not have the chance to email yesterday, because I had to mow somebody's lawn before today. Time set aside for emailing had to unfortunately be used for service. We had actually pushed emailing back some time, but yesterday, while fun, turned out to be hectic. This week has been okay and also hectic at times. I did not want you to worry, though I knew you would and the call from Elder Burton confirmed it. I tried to send at least one line, but time was not our side. But, according to my companion, this is okay, because we had to do service yesterday.

 I have yet to move to my new address. Why? Well, as we were packing up, putting our stuff away, my companion noticed a bedbug on his bed. We were quite curious to see if my mattress had bedbugs and we turned it. They were there. Now, you may be wondering how I could not tell they were there. I had bites mainly on my right arm and a few on my left, but I had honestly thought they were from mosquitoes. I had heard from the mission office that the bites would be along my vein. So, I had my reasoning and did not think much about it. So, moving is on hold until today when Elder Medsker is coming to check out the place to see if there are anymore. We covered the mattress in plastic mattress covers and I had to sleep on it until we threw it away. We threw it away yesterday, so I slept on the couch last night. I washed all my clothes and we believe we got rid of many of the bedbugs. Elder Medsker will come to test it out. We have new furniture at the new place and it will be fun moving in (sort of).

This week has been okay. Our mormon.org referral is still in Texas, but he wants to turn his life over to Christ. In fact, we called him, then a few days later he called and said that he wanted to be baptized. He is on date, though we will have to push the date we set a week back since he has yet gone to church, meaning that he did not go to church in Texas. Investigators need to go to church at least three times in order to be baptized. 

The Baptist lady was not the one that wanted the gas money, but with her, she just wants to talk and does not want to convert. The lady that wanted the gas money is doing well and she came to church this past Sunday. She reunited with an old friend that recently was baptized (before I got here) and it went well. The one that was recently baptized brought her husband to church.

The man from Trinidad still loves to talk about his previous life in Trinidad and he showed us the many guns that he had. On one visit some family dropped by to shoot guns, which ended our lesson pretty quickly. And one family member preached what he had believed. It seems as though people love preaching to us; I believe that this was the third or fourth time somebody preached to us. 

Our charitable man who helps out the homeless is doing well. He has been struggling a bit, but he believes that the Book of Mormon is true. He has read it all the way through and is reading it again for a second time to understand it better. He has been attending church the past two Sundays and recently came to Sunday School. This man wants us to teach the homeless and wants to bring us to them. He also plans on giving them rides to church in a couple of weeks. It will be interesting to see these people as well any atheist friends that he has come to church. 

Sunday was pretty good. We had five investigators come to church, which was amazing. My talk (sermon) was wonderful. I wrote my introduction and I created an outline for the rest. Pretty much, I prepared and then I relied on the Spirit the entire time. I spoke, paused a couple of times to gather my thoughts, nervous as all get out, because I did not write anything. When I sat down after my talk, I was like, "Ah, man, I blew it, it was awful." No. Not at all. I got so many compliments on my talk. In fact, one person asked me to send the talk to him. I said, "I did not write anything. I have an outline. I do not know exactly what I said." He still persisted and eventually, I will send my talk to him and send Mom a return letter and a letter to my TRC from the Missionary Training Center. 

Service has been great. With the Mormon.org referral gone (to Texas), we decided to mow his lawn. We borrowed a member's lawn mower and it kept on clogging. The grass would not spit out, so we had to give up. And then it rained for a few days. (We had some awesome storms with lightning shooting across the sky and to the ground.) Yesterday, we had to finish it before Marcus L. returned, so we had to do what we had to do. (I got to use a riding lawnmower. What ingenious laziness!) I helped build a wall out of drywall and I did pretty well. It was quite interesting to go and do something new. Also, drywall is very fragile.

My exercise is basically what exercises I feel like doing that day. I made a list of exercises before I left and took it with me, but now I cannot find such list. So, it pretty much is whatever I feel like doing. There is a room for exercise here in my current apartment (the bedbug apartment), but there is not much to do and my companion hates to go there. My new place does not have anything, so I will continue to do whatever I do.

I have gotten a haircut. I know my hair was and is getting long, but everybody said it was short. Do not worry, I knew it was long. My companion suggested that I get a free one from an elder, but I turned it down. I rather be safe and get a haircut from a licensed person. So, we went to the family history center to these nice ladies to get referrals and they referred a hairdresser at my complaint of having long hair. (They also thought my hair was short, so I had to mention my hair as long). One of the ladies decided to give me unnecessary money to go get a haircut, so pretty much I went to the referral and talked to her a bit. I will return there soon.

I believe you mentioned record keeping in the last email. Record keeping is really important. We have the area book, which helps us to keep track of the lessons and progression. We have the numbers in the planner, which help track our progress as missionaries. Nobody is a number; it is just a way for us to track how we are doing as missionaries, what we can improve on, and how we can help others.

Interesting on the sister missionary getting sick where you live. Recently one of the sister missionaries here got sick and she had to lie in bed all day.

As for my dog, I am glad that she is doing fine and I do miss her a bit. Take good care of her. I do not see many Boxers here. I have seen only two. Why do people like little dogs so much?

Love,

Elder S. Todd