Monday, September 28, 2015

Hello Family and Friends!

It has been an incredible week! On Tuesday, I got to go to my very first Zone Conference. I love our mission President, President Loveland, so much. We were asked to be seated and studying before President came in to be reverent and such so everyone was dead quiet and being good when he came in. He walked up to the pulpit and said and I quote," I thought there was a funeral going on in here! Everyone get up and come shake my hand." Haha he is a funny guy and it was so cool to get to hear him speak to us and I made sure to take good notes.

So we have just been teaching all week this week and trying to get lessons in at any opportunity. We have been teaching this family, the Matejceks. (Mat-a-chex) for awhile now. The husband is a less active and the wife, Jamie, has been investigating for awhile now. She just has a smoking issue that she is trying to get over before she gets baptized. She said that she quit for 2 days last week but then got super stressed out and went back. She can do it and she knows she can. We prayed about a baptismal date and for some reason November 21st was really screaming at me so we checked and it is in fact on a Saturday so we told her to pray about it.

Other than that, everyone else we have been teaching have been coming along just wonderfully. I love getting to help these people grow closer to their Savior. I would encourage all of you to look for missionary opportunities in your lives and to assist your local missionaries the best you can. Love you all! Peace n' Blessing

Love, Elder Leavitt

 

Elder Horsely, myself, and Bryce, a ward member with The Cartright's "dog bird"

Zone conference with Elder Dye and Elder Chapman

 

Monday, September 21, 2015

Hello Everybody!

We had a pretty crazy and amazing week this week. Quick update on those girls I talked about last week. We went and talked to them and they said they want a little more time to talk it over and to make sure that it's right for them. I know it's right for them and I'm praying that they realize that this is exactly what they need to do.

 

Other than that just normal Missionary stuff going on! We talked to these two guys who were playing basketball in the park. They are both going to school to become Pastors so they knew their Bible pretty well. We taught them about the Restoration and they both took a Book of Mormon and said they would read it and would like to meet up with us again to talk about it.

 

So things have been pretty much the same. Oh yeah, except for the fact that I had to give a talk yesterday in Sacrament meeting! The Bishop calls me an hour before church and said that the speaker who was assigned couldn't make it so he asked me to give a 10-15 minute talk on commandments! I was studying and praying at the same time just begging for the Spirit to be with me. I was the last speaker too so I had to make up for any left over time. I gave my talk and just threw out what ever came to my mind. I remember some of it but most of it was just whatever I felt like I should say. I talked for about 15 minutes and then sat down. I guess it was a pretty good talk because people kept on telling me that they would have never guessed I was a greenie based on my talk. This is a witness to you guys that prayer does work because I know I would have never been able to give that talk if it wasn't guided by the Spirit!

 

Thank you all for your supportive emails! I know that if you open and close everyday with a prayer, that you will see the hand of God more frequently working in your lives and you will be blessed for it. Have an amazing week and as everyone here says,"God Bless!"

Love, Elder Leavitt

 

Visiting a family who had a new baby

 

Monday, September 14, 2015

Sup Squad!

It's been another amazing week in the Branson 2nd area. I'm growing to love the people here and I've had some great memories with the members and non members. We ball up with these kids at a ghetto park every once in a while and we are hoping to start teaching them soon but right now it is just us schooling them in basketball. Being a missionary has it's perks. There is a new Ci Ci's Pizza opening up on the strip today and it's the biggest Ci Ci's in the world! Remember Brother Young, The cat guy that I talked about a couple weeks ago?  His sister is married to the rich guy who owns it and a bunch of other restaurants on the strip. On Saturday, we got to go with them to lunch there as a trial run for the employees. So, basically I went to the world's biggest Ci Ci's before it was even opened! It kind of makes us hipsters.

So a crazy experience happened last week. Every Tuesday we do service at this little Thrift shop called Selfless blessings and we talk with the owners there about just random stuff. While we were talking, out of nowhere one of the ladies that owns the place said, "So can you baptize my daughters?" We both almost had a conniption right there just from the shock! We talked with her some more and she is a less active and her parents are active and her 18 and 11 year old daughters want to get baptized into the church and start coming. We are planning on starting to teach them sometime this week they just need to speak with the husband.

Heavenly Father truly has been blessing me in my life and I hope y'all are recognizing the blessings in your life because they are so plentiful! Keep on serving and always be thankful for what you have now and be willing to share the blessing with others. Love and miss all of you!

Love, Elder Leavitt

Spending time with Jamaal Charles

Monday, September 7, 2015

Hello Loved ones!

This week brings an end to my first transfer out in the mission field and I feel like I've learned so much since the MTC. We had transfer calls this Saturday and it looks like I'm staying in Branson along with Elder Chapman. I'm really happy that I get to stay here in this area with him for another great transfer.

So we had a difficult week trying to fill our schedules with appointments with investigators but we got in a lot of good active member lessons. Our ward really wants to start focusing on member responsibility for referrals. We are hoping to see some increase in our teaching pool. Even though it was hard sometimes getting appointments, we still had an amazing week full of miracles and amazing experiences. Yesterday, we had more investigators show up to church than any other week this transfer. It was exciting to see them there! I also happened to see The Seely family in the ward on Sunday. That was a crazy surprise!

A couple days ago we went to visit a less active family, The Nelsons. Their daughter, Kiana, just had surgery on her leg because she tore her ACL. When we got there, she was in a ton of pain. She took medication and nothing was working for her. We asked if she would like a blessing and she said yes. The power of the spirit that was in that room was so remarkable. Elder Chapman gave the blessing and you could tell that he was speaking through the spirit. After the blessing, Kiana just sat there, completely at peace. The authority of the Priesthood is an amazing gift that we have been given and I'm glad that I've been able to exercise that powerful authority. It makes me always want to live worthy to be able to use it in my future family.

Thank you all so much for your emails this week. I love hearing from everyone of you guys. No matter what you are going through, keep your head up, keep on going, and trust Heavenly Father. He can't help you if you just sit in one place. Love you all!

Love, Elder Leavitt

 

It was crazy running into this guy at church!

 

 

Monday, August 31, 2015

Hey Everyone!

It has been another week full of service and trying our best to get new investigators. The baptism for Alex last week was amazing but since he is 18, he was baptized into the Singles ward. The Branson 2nd area hasn't had a baptism in about 2 years so we are hoping to break that streak soon. It's been really hard trying to get new people to teach. Everyone is so set in their ways and their beliefs. It makes it nearly impossible to teach them by the spirit when they won't open up their hearts. Elder Chapman said that this is the hardest area that he has served in so far. I guess that's just perfect for a new elder like me!

We have been seeing a little bit more success in one of our investigators. Her name is Marsha Young. Her husband is a less active member and she is a baptized Baptist. We love going over there because we get to sit outside and just talk about the Book of Mormon and read about it. When we first started going over there, Marsha would go inside and not participate but now she will sit outside with us and read with us. She asks a bunch of questions and seems to be getting a little bit more interested! Brother Young said that he has even noticed her studying at home and getting more into it! Oh and did I forget to mention that they have 22 cats!!! Yeah, exactly! They don't have any children but they sure do have cats. Whenever we teach outside, they are all running around and jumping on us and they are everywhere! They know every single one of them by name so I am determined to be able to name them all before I leave.

I've been loving this area so much. I love the members of our ward. Since all of them perform in shows here and they all have beautiful voices, they do this thing in sacrament meeting called an instant choir. They just announce what choir song is going to be sung and invite anyone to come up and sing. Honestly, this ward is comparable to the Mormon Tabernacle Choir... It's insane and the organist is like a professional musician. He is composing a musical right now that is going to be submitted to Hollywood. He is truly amazing!

Thank you all for the supportive emails and such! I love you all and I hope all of you are constantly setting a good example to those around you. Continue to serve and always serve with a smile! Love ya all!

Love, Elder Leavitt

 

Taking a cruise after the baptism

Thank you for the Dairy Queen gift card!

 

Monday, August 25, 2015

Hello Everybody!

This week has been very eventful in so many different ways. I have had such spiritual and just plain crazy experiences this week.

So first off, we had our first baptism on Saturday! His name is Alex Yiannios and he is such an amazing guy. He was meeting with the missionaries before I got here and we set a date with him not too long ago. Wow, what a spiritual experience. He asked Elder Chapman to baptize him and asked me to give the opening prayer. A small role but still, it mattered! haha. You could really feel the spirit there as they entered the water and as Alex made those sacred covenants with our Father in Heaven. Alex is 18 and is really tall! We had to triple dunk him to make sure he got all the way down! It just makes me happy for Alex and the new life before him.

Now with the Crazy. So we live in a pretty nice neighborhood, but there was quite a ruckus going on the other night. While Elder Chapman was showering I heard shouting outside and I went out to see our neighbor standing on the balcony. When I went to see what was going on, we could see that across the street a huge guy was yelling at a women. Through their open door, we heard him say that he was going to kill her. He kept saying it over and over! It got way bad and we were scared for the lady so I called the police on him! Like, four cop cars came hauling up the street and they talked to us and they went to talk to the guy and he was mouthing off to the cops so they cuffed him and took him in right there! Right in front of our apartment! I honestly felt really good about helping that lady and it was just a crazy random moment!

Anyways, Thanks for the great emails this week and I appreciate the support that I receive from all of you. I challenge you all to be mindful of the opportunities to serve that are all around us. Sometimes we get too caught up in the craziness of our own lives and miss a vital chance to help serve someone else. Love you all and hope you all have a safe week!

Love Elder Leavitt

 

Please enjoy this picture of us with Alex

 

Monday, August 17, 2015

Hey guys!

I've already been out for a month! What the heck!?!? It doesn't seem real! So things have been pretty crazy here the past week. We have been volunteering a lot of time at local Thrift Shops and Rec centers. We have been hoping that by serving we will receive more investigators but we haven't had much luck yet but we will keep trying!

Update on our wonderful Investigator Dominique: He dumped his girlfriend that was keeping him from the gospel then moved to Springfield to become a UFC fighter soooo... yeah we are praying that the missionaries up there find him because he was ready for the gospel and we wanted to help him so badly!

A fun experience happened yesterday! We were tracting in a neighborhood and it was just our luck that we tracted right into the home of a Baptist Preacher! And I would love to tell you all that the preacher accepted our message and the spirit was so strong and everyone was so happy, but the complete opposite happened. The second he saw us he started bashing on the church. He insisted on telling us what he KNEW was true about our church and according to him, he knows more about the LDS church than we do! He was not hesitant to tell us that we were going to Hell and stuff like that. He told us all these stories about how he had to set a Book of Mormon on fire to cast the demons out of his house and said that he would pray for us to find the light and see the errors of our ways. He refused to call us Elder and just called us by our last names. And I just smiled the whole time and I almost laughed out loud when he told us his name was Lamen! Hahah what are the odds of that? This honestly just strengthened my testimony. It gave me a look at what strong grip the adversary has on some people. Real Christians wouldn't be going around telling people they are going to Hell and I hope none of the members from our church has ever been as disrespectful to someone else's religion as that man was to us. The gospel is true and this great cause will go forward!

I love you all and hope to hear from you all. Remember, there is always going to be someone who is looking up to you so lead by example and always reflect the love that our Heavenly Father has for all of his children.

Love, Elder Leavitt

 

 

Our investigator, Michael. He's usually much happier!