humidity's coming, dripsy in ypsi

May 21, 2012

Hey there. Hey happy birthday dad and makenzie! it sounds like you guys had fun celebrating. even though i wasn't there, i was thinking of you guys on your b-days. hope everything was great and that you got a bunch of cool gifts!

Here's the picture from Cyaira's baptism last week. That's her and her family. Elder Davis got permission to come up for the baptism, so you'll prob recognize him because he's so tall. It was a neat experience. I don't remember if I talked about it last week, but at the baptism Cyaira's friend came up to us and said she wants to be baptized. she's been coming to church every once in a while for years. her and her family is really tight with cyaira's family, and she told us she's been wanting to be baptized for a while and feels like now's the time. so we've been working with her all week and she's just cruising along. she's loving the book of mormon and it all means a lot to her. her mom isn't interested in having formal lessons right now, but we've had a couple good discussions with her and her mom, and the mom is very supportive. she's willing to give rides when for lessons and church and mutual. very exciting, she's awesome and will be baptized in the next couple weeks.

another miracle that happened this week was with a guy named dan. last monday we got a call from him saying he used to meet with missionaries a few months back and wants to get back on track. we saw him the next day for an appointment and before we really even introduced ourselves he said, "i know the church is true, i know joseph smith is a prophet, and i want to be baptized, and i think i can be ready in 3 weeks." whoa. i felt like i was in a dream. he's incredible. a few months back he was working towards baptism and was coming out to church regularly, but some things came up that knocked him off track. but last week he got the feeling he needed to call up the missionaries and get back on track. it's cool because he knows a lot of the members already so it's really just a matter of picking back up the momentum. so we've been working with him all last week too and he's planning on a baptism a few weeks out.

the lord has been pouring down some incredible blessings recently, and it's been fun, but it's also humbling. i feel like i have to live up to the responsibilities that He's given us that come with the blessings. i don't remember the reference, but there's a part in the book of mormon where king benjamin is talking about how we'll always be in debt to God. we try to please him to return the love he's shown us already, but when we please him he pours down even more blessings. but i think he's less concerned with that debt we owe him and more concerned with us just being happy. god is good, and the gospel life is the good life.

but michigan life isn't always the good life, it's starting to get humid.

well gotta go. love you guys lots. have a great week.

elder lamb

Cyaira's baptism!

May 14, 2012

Hey! Long time no talk! It was great talking to you guys yesterday, it just wasn't long enough. But November will be here quicker than we know it. Crazy. I forgot my usb chord for my camera, so i'll make sure i send you a pic from the baptism next Monday. But the baptism yesterday went great. The dad ended up coming out and it seemed like he was touched by the experience and the Spirit that was present. You could tell that Cyaira's whole family was feeling the Spirit and that the baptism meant a lot for them. There was a lot of people there from the ward too, Cyaira's been part of the ward for a while so even on Mother's Day it ended up being a packed house. She had some of her non-member friends there, and after the baptism one of them came up to us with Cyaira and said she wants to be baptized. Talk about a blessing falling from heaven. The girl's mom was there and we talked to her and she's really supportive about it too. So we're teaching her on Wednesday.

I still feel sick, but it is what it is. What's ridiculous is I was just telling Elder Pedersen a few days ago that I've never been sick on my mission. Then out of nowhere - boom - i get hit with something. What I should have said was I've never baptized 500 people on my mission and let that happen instead. I'll try it today and keep you posted. Today we'll probably run a few errands and just take it easy. We might play some basketball with the Belleville Elders but I might end up taking a nap as they all play. I've been against naps so far out here though so we'll see.

Yesterday at church a lady we found in Plymouth who was baptized with her son the week after I left was visiting some friends in the Ypsilanti Ward. So that was neat to see the two of them doing good still going strong. And I already told you that Jacob Foster was in our ward yesterday too with his sister. Small world. I've seen Morgan and the Scotts, who knows who I'll run into next.

Oh so last week we started teaching the boyfriend of a recent convert in the ward. We had a good lesson with them last Sunday and put him on date to be baptized. He was already thinking about getting baptized into another church at the end of the summer, but we put him on date for a day halfway through June to be baptized as a Latter-day Saint instead. I think something we said really inspired him because he actually ended up getting baptized yesterday in his church. Not quite what we were hoping for, but still exciting in a way.... Ha but we're still going to be working with him, that might have just been the warm-up round.

So things are good out here in Ypsi. Still having fun and working hard. Today I should be sending two boxes of winter clothes to you guys. You can unpack them if you'd like but it's not anything important so you can also just leave them all in the boxes and I can figure out what to do with it all when I get home. The weather's nice today. It feels like a California summer right now. A little breezy but still warm. The humidity hasn't kicked in yet but it'll be here soon. Oh boy.

Have a great week. Love you guys.

Elder Lamb

so cal fiesta

New transfer. My new comp is Elder Pedersen from Yucaipa, that's near Riverside down in sweet southern California. but you guys know that because you all were there for youth conference. so it's nice to be serving with someone who appreciates an In-N-Out burger and hanging out at the beach. don't worry it's not so nice that it makes us homesick or makes us lose our focus. he actually only has two transfers left so he'll probably stay here until he heads home, which means i'll probably take off after this transfer or be here for a few more months because they usually don't white wash an area like that. it's weird to think in short chunks of time like this.

we've had a great first week of the transfer. some awesome miracles have happened with people we're working with. we're having a baptism this sunday actually, so i'll tell you more about that when we talk on the phone. i'm excited to talk to you guys too! makenzie and delaney look grown up too so who knows if they're even the same people anymore. i'll find out on sunday when i ask them. i don't have a ton to say today, but life is good. i love the gospel and i love the Lord. i'm still figuring things out myself and will be forever, but without a doubt i have learned some valuable things out here. the Lord pours blessings down when we serve Him and others. But my favorite part about all this is that so many of God's children get to find more happiness and peace in their lives. it's not my doing, it's the Lord's, but it is a humbling experience to be able to go out and represent Him. i love the gospel, the Church is true! have a great week.

much love,
elder lamb 

April 30, 2012

all straightened out

Baptisms! Here's a pic of Kristena's baptism a few weeks back, I never sent that to you. The other pic is from Saturday night. A lot of people dressed in white. I don't know if I've said much about the family we've been working with, but the whole experience with them so far has been incredible. My first day in the area, 6 weeks ago tomorrow, a member pointed out a kid walking by as we were driving back from transfer meetings. She said the kid is a member but his family hasn't been active, so we decided we'd start working with them as soon as we figured out more about them. Then later that same night, our ward mission leader called us and said he just stopped by a family he had just been assigned to do home teaching for and that the mom wanted a couple of her children baptized. So we've been working with this family the whole time, meeting with everyone, not just the two girls working towards baptism. There's 8 children total and the mom is single and under a lot of pressure working to provide for the family. A great lady. The mom is working on Sundays but some of the members of the ward have just been incredible in getting the children to church and mutual and other activities. And the baptism ended up happening this weekend. Something else that's pretty neat in the whole orchestration of things is that another set of missionaries in the zone felt inspired to stop by a less active man and they were able to start working with him, and as it turned out he had two sons he wanted to be baptized. And then somewhere in the teaching process of these two families, we found out this man and this lady were divorced a while back, and one of the girls we had been preparing for baptism goes to his house on the weekends. The dynamics are pretty complicated. But we team-taught this girl with the other set of elders. And yesterday her, her younger sister, and the two sons of the dad were all baptized! So the girl standing in front of me in the picture is the older sister, the one who switched between the two other elders and us, Elder Davis baptized her. The younger girl standing in the very front is her sister and I baptized her. The two little boys are obviously the brothers. And then the guy in front with the facial hair is another cool guy who was baptized by another set of Elders in that ward, a cool guy. But it was a great baptism. Just an awesome family who has come a long way in the past 6 weeks. More good things to come for them too.

So other big news, the transfer's over. Elder Davis is peacing out. He's going back to the Spanish branch down in Detroit, he's a Spanish Elder so he's pretty pumped to go back "home". It was a power transfer, a pretty dynamic duo we had going. But good things are in store for the next 6 weeks for sure. We're working with a lot of great people right now.

I think that's about it for the week. Today we're running a few errands and Elder Davis is packing up. We got haircuts from a lady in the ward this morning and helped some other members pack up a trailer to move out. It's raining today. Oh this week we stopped by a member family for a dinner appointment and we found out that the wife is a chiropractor. She offered to do a quick adjustment afterwards for either of us and I couldn't resist. My hip had actually been bothering me for a few days after tweaking it in basketball one morning. I ended up getting an adjustment on my back from the wife, apparently my lower back was pretty tight and I had a rib that was out of place. One of my legs was longer than the other too? I didn't even know that could happen, she showed her husband and Elder Davis and they said it was a good inch or two of a difference. She's done chiropracting for Cameron Diaz, Jennifer Anniston, and a couple other stars when she worked in Hollywood. Now I feel like a star.

That's about it around here. Have a great week.

Much love, Elder Lamb