Arizona Week 81 - Caroling for Christmas

Hello Everyone,

I hope you all had a great Christmas. Ours went well. The Relief Society in our ward lived up to their name and gave us some toiletries and cleaning supplies for our apartment. I hate to say it, but it was timely. It all went to good use.

It's been another unusual week (which makes it hard to remember what happened). We've been very busy but have been finding good success. We went to teach a man that we had ran into a few weeks ago. I was a little surprised at how receptive he was. We had a really good lesson about the restoration of the Gospel and he is interesting and sincere.

On Christmas Eve, we went caroling with other missionaries in our zone. It was pretty fun and it really seemed to touch the hearts of the people we visited. It’s sad now that people are getting back to being cold and rude, but I suppose that I'm used to that by now.

I can't remember if in a previous email I mentioned that I ran into the first man that I taught and baptized on my mission. He and his wife will be going through the temple this coming month and getting sealed. The sealing will happen in the Gilbert Temple, and I got permission from President Sweeney to go out of the mission for that. I am very excited. 

The rest of the week was crazy and busy. Everyone seemed to be moving this week so we helped out with a lot of that. I'm hoping everything calms down pretty soon.

Happy New Year everyone!

Elder Kirk

Arizona Week 80 - Busy, Busy Week

Hey Everyone,

This week has been crazy.

On Tuesday, we helped out at Project Connect. It's a program that helps get homeless people different types of services that they need such as haircuts, ID cards, etc. There was a ton of people there. There were many things that would be able to help these people out. It was a neat program.

On Wednesday, we went to the Temple Lights with an investigator and his wife who is less active. It was really great until we went into one of the visitor center theaters. We were going to watch the He Is The Gift video. The sister missionary announced that we would watch it in Spanish. The people we were with understood enough Spanish to be OK, so we stayed to watch it. Well about half way through, an old, angry, bearded man stood and roared, "In the United States of America we speak English!" and stormed out. It put a damper on the night so we left after the video was over. It was still a good visit though.

On Friday, we had a temple trip. We were able to go early to do baptisms and other ordinances before the main session. We each took a name through for the entire process from baptism to completion of the session. It was an awesome experience. 

On Saturday and Sunday, we performed in the stake choir. It turned out very well. We got a lot of compliments on the choir. We are very glad that we decided to be part of the choir. 

It was a really crazy week. Hopefully this week is a little less hectic, but it probably won't be haha.

Hope you all have a great Christmas!

Elder Kirk

Arizona Week 79 - He is the Gift

Hey Everyone,

We had a pretty good week. We were able to go to the temple lights again and listen to a choir sing. It was a lot of fun. I love being on a mission during this time of year.

We got a Christmas tree today. As for decorations...well, we'll think of something.

Well, the highlight of our week was one of the dinners. We ate with a member family. Remember the "He is the Gift" video? Well, we showed the video to an older couple at dinner that had recently returned from a mission. They loved it. The sister was in tears by the end. We testified of the Savior's birth and his mission. I don’t think that we had even asked if they knew anyone that we could teach yet, and they starting giving us names and addresses of people that they wanted us to go see. We left with 3 or 4 names; the other elders left with 3 or 4 also. Then they told us that they had more names but that they'd have to check on where they live now and get current contact info for them. They promised a list of probably 8 more names in a week's time. It was amazing to see the way that they immediately wanted to share this with those they love. 

Well, Elder Jacobson and I went back the next day to help them set up their Christmas lights. Then, we helped them get a tree. We also helped them decorate the tree. Then, they took us out for ice cream. =) It was a lot of fun, and they know who we are now. They also know that they can count on us to help.

We get to go to the temple this week. We are looking forward to that.

Also, the stake choir is performing this coming weekend. I hope it will all come together by then. It should be a really neat event. There will be a lot of different performances. There will be some soloists, a children's choir, some string groups, and us, of course.

I hope you all have a good week too.

Elder Kirk

Arizona Week 78 - Mountain Pine

Hey Everyone,

This week was transfer week. Elder Jacobson and I are very excited to get to stay working together for another transfer! We are especially excited because we have a lot of good things happening in the area.

We taught the Krawczyk family this week. We should be getting a date picked for their son's baptism pretty soon. They are pretty neat.

We'll be taking Thomas to the Mesa Temple Christmas Lights tonight. We've taught him just about everything, so we'll be having a baptism set for him in the near future. 

We will also getting a new investigator tonight. She came to church a couple weeks ago with her neighbor. Her neighbor was baptized at the beginning of the year. Our investigator loved church but it was a little confusing to her, so she wants to know more. Fortunately for her, we can teach her more. J

This morning we got the workout of a life time. We got up at 5 AM and rode our bikes about 7.5 miles to Camelback Mountain, hiked the mountain, then rode back to our apartment. Our legs are very tired, but we had a lot of fun. It was just Elder Jacobson and me, so we really enjoyed ourselves.

This week will be good also, we have a lot planned and should be able to meet with a lot of people. We're getting a Christmas tree for our apartment today. We're full of all sorts of holiday cheer.

Here are some pictures from our hike:






The Sunrise.











Elder Jacobson and me with a Christmas tree that we found growing at the summit.

 A sign that describes the trail very well.

A note from Elder Kirk's Mom from a website discussing Camelback Mountain: 

There are two well-marked trails that lead to the summit – Echo Canyon Summit Trail and Cholla Trail, which are open from sunrise to sunset.  On a cautionary note, both of these trails are marked double black diamond and therefore are not recommended for young children or those who are uncomfortable climbing exposed rock faces with potential drop.  On the hike you will gain 1200 feet in elevation, to arrive at the summit height of 2704 feet.

Have a great week!

Elder Kirk

Arizona Week 77 - Thanksgiving

Hello Everyone,

Happy Thanksgiving!

Hope it went good for all of you. Ours was pretty good. We (fortunately) only had one family ask us over for dinner. It was really good, and I wasn't in as much pain as I was from the 3 dinners of last year. Well I suppose that we did also have a thanksgiving breakfast. That was really good too.

We had a really neat experience after the breakfast. We were walking back to the apartment when a woman walking the other direction asked us if we knew where the church was located. She explained that she had just moved here from Mississippi and after being baptized there, she hadn't been very active. We told her where the church was and gave her a pass along card with our phone number on it. As we got closer to home we realized that we had no information for her: no address, no phone number, we didn't even know her name. Well, Saturday came, and she called us. She said that the message on the card was really what she needed. She explained that she had come to Arizona to try and get her daughter and granddaughter off of drugs. We gave her the information she needed to set an appointment with the bishop so that he could help her with those things; and we got her name and phone number and address. We didn't make the same mistake twice. The neat part was that I was only carrying one of the pass along cards; I usually don't carry any.

We were also able to visit with the Krawczyk family on Monday. The mother is less active, the father and children are not members but they are now taking the lessons from us. They are a really fun family. Sister Krawczyk actually requested to have missionaries visit so that she could get active again and so her children could be part of the church as well as her husband.

A lot of good things are happening and this is a great time of year for missionary work. There is a new video that the church has launched called: He is the Gift. You can find it on cristmas.mormon.org It is a really well made video. I hope you will have the opportunity to check it out and show your friends. Good stuff.

Well Merry Christmas to you all (I can start saying that now). Hope you have a great week.

Elder Kirk