A little bit of Citrus Heights

Howdy y'all!

So, working with Elder Peek has been pretty awesome. We get along well, and the missionary work is a bunch of fun.

We met a Ukrainian family too, and that was pretty interesting. The father was kind of trying to disprove our Church, but he wasn't bringing up anything anti. He was mostly just saying that we don't know everything now, and we will all learn more about everything after we die. He and his family are Pentecostal, so they believe in the Trinity and stuff. We are going back tomorrow, so hopefully they are open to reading the Book of Mormon and finding out for themselves that what we say is true!

We tracted into a guy named Eugene Gentry last Thursday. He is a black guy in his late 50s or so, and he is awesome. We told him that we share our message about Jesus Christ, and he told us that he has faith in Jesus Christ and he knows that Christ died for him and for everyone. He actually started crying after he said that, and it was a really cool experience to see how much of a testimony that he already had. He told us that we could come back the next day, so we set up a time and told him goodbye. The next day we came back, and he invited us in and offered to make us sandwiches and stuff. Super nice guy. After that, he basically said that he did not want to waste any of our time since he already knew Christ is his Savior. We started sharing our message about the Restoration of the Gospel, and most of the time he just sat quietly listening. We told him that we have modern-day prophets today, and he said that he wants to hear the Prophet so that he can find out for himself by listening and seeing what the Prophet does to know of he was called of God. We told him that we have General Conference this next weekend, so he said that he would listen to it. He asked us how he had not heard of this before, and we told him that is why we were talking to him. As we testified of the Book of Mormon and how the fulness of the Gospel of Jesus Christ was restored through the Prophet Joseph Smith, I felt the Spirit so strongly. He said that he would read the Book of Mormon and pray about it, and we set up an appointment to come back this next Thursday. There are few times in my life when I have felt the Spirit that strongly, and it was amazing.

General Conference this weekend is going to be so awesome! It is the start of suit-coat season, so we are going to start wearing suits every day instead of just on Sundays. Should be pretty fun while we are riding around on our bikes! 

Love you all!

Elder Nielsen

Citrus Heights, CA

Dear all,

How is everything going for you guys! 

So, like I said before, Elder Peek is my new companion. He has been out for about 10 months. He is from south Weber, UT. We get along pretty well! He is 6' 4", and we work well together.

From left to right, Elder Sampson, waitress :), Elder Gillies, Elder Nielsen, Elder Peek (new companion), Elder Gull

We have been able to get a lot of good work done. One of the really cool experiences we had was when we met with someone that has been investigating the Church for about 15 years. We asked him what concern held him back when he was meeting with the missionaries before, and he told us that he has a hard time believing that Joseph Smith could have translated the Book of Mormon and the fact that we have modern-day prophets. We asked if he had ever read the Book of Mormon before, and he told us that he had only read sections of it. We bore our testimonies, and then we committed him to read the Book of Mormon. We are meeting with him this Wednesday to read from the Book of Mormon. I love being able to teach about the Lord's promise that if we read the Book of Mormon with real intent and we are praying to know if it is true, then we WILL receive an answer. Our Heavenly Father will never fall through on His promises, so we can know that we can receive everything that he has promised us as long as we are doing our part.

I love missionary work more with every passing week. Being on a mission has really shown me how much the Gospel means to me. Without the Gospel, life would be meaningless!

I love you all, and I hope this week goes amazing for you guys!

Love,

Elder Ethan Nielsen

Transfers be happenin' in the Golden State

Hey there everybody!

Everything is going pretty awesome here in Citrus Heights! We are still teaching Bob, and he is doing awesome! He can't read small print very well, so his wife is reading the Book of Mormon to him every day. She isn't a member of the Church either, so it is really exciting stuff! We taught them the plan of salvation this past week, and it went really well! 

We also met with Chris this week as well. He is the guy that got out of prison a bit ago and is wanting to change his life around. He told us that he is on parole, so he is going to have to wait until he isn't anymore so that he can be baptized. He told us that he was kind of bummed about that, but he is just going to be patient and look forward to the day when he can be baptized! We showed him a bible video this past week about the good Samaritan, and Chris talked about how he has gone around finding ways to help people as well. We told him that he is already preparing to take upon him the name of Jesus Christ by looking for those opportunities to serve the people around him.

Elder Nielsen got to go to the Sacramento Temple last week.

We got transfer calls yesterday, and I am staying here in Citrus Heights in the Tempo Park ward! Elder Tomblin is getting transferred way up North to Andersen, so I will be getting a new companion. His name is Elder Peek, and I have heard that he is a pretty cool guy! I am looking forward to working with him. He is coming in tomorrow morning at 10:30, so hopefully everything goes well with that!

I hope you all have an awesome week! Love you all!

Love,

Elder Ethan Nielsen

Citrus Heights is my homeboy.

Hey there everyone!

We have still been teaching a guy that just got out of the hospital a couple of weeks ago. His name is Bob, and he came to Church with his wife, Lois, this past week. Apparently when Lois was younger, she asked for her name to be removed from the records of the Church. They both seem pretty interested though, and Bob said that he is looking forward to being baptized. Unfortunately, because of his 4-way bypass surgery he isn't able to get baptized because of the scars that still need to heal a bit more. He said that his doctor would clear him in a couple months, so I am looking forward to that! Their hearts are so open and have been so prepared to receive the Gospel, it is crazy! They will ask questions and then say, "Oh, ok!" It is kind of a relief to have people like this that we are teaching, because almost no one else is like Bob and Lois!

I have really noticed the blessings of obedience as I have been out on my mission. The Lord gives us commandments in order to give us blessings in our lives. It is like he shows us a safe full of blessings, and then holds out the key to us just waiting for us to take it. The key is His commandments and the things he asks us to do so that we can stay close to Christ and to the Spirit as we go throughout our lives. If we obey the Lord, then we take the key and we are able to open the safe that is full of blessings just waiting to be claimed! I know that it is kind of a cheesy analogy, but that is really how it is!

I went on exchanges this past week with Elder Gull. He is from Spanish Fork, so not that far from the hometown in Orem, UT! He is a really cool guy, and we were able to work well this past week. We were able to see a lady that we gave a Book of Mormon to, and she told us that she found out that one of her coworkers is LDS. She told him that she was going to start reading the Book of Mormon! It is pretty exciting when we meet people that are open to hearing the Gospel!

Transfers are coming up this next week, so I will have some news on what happens in the next email! Maybe I will get transferred somewhere else! Probably not though, cause my companion has been here for 5 transfers.

Love you all! I hope you all enjoy this week!

Love,

Elder Nielsen

Rain in Citrus Heights

Hello everyone! Happy Labor Day!

So, as you can tell by the subject line, it rained here in Citrus Heights! It started this morning, so I decided I would go enjoy it a little bit! I was in all of my missionary clothes, but I just stood there in the rain for a little bit...and it was awesome. 

So, we just had Zone Conference this past Wednesday. President Weston came and talked to us a bit and made a couple exciting announcements. He told us that we had been chosen as one of 12 test missions that will be able to use Facebook! I'm not sure if it is actually just that many missions, because I have heard of a couple other missions that use Facebook too. It seems like it would be less common to hear about missions like that!

We had a pretty crazy experience this week. Chris Oerding, the investigator that has been preparing for baptism, just got married. We actually had the chance to help him out with it! We were rushing back from Zone Conference, since the wedding was on the same day as the conference. We were about 15 minutes late, and we still had to go pick up rings for them! We just bought some pretty cheap rings that were only around 10-20 dollars, and I actually picked her ring out! That means that I will be ready to pick my wife's ring out! It is really cool though, because Chris is now living the law of chastity so he can be baptized! He is really wanting to get baptized soon, so hopefully it can take place within the next 2 weeks or so!

Over the past couple weeks, I have really come to love learning from the scriptures more than I ever have in my life. Lehi said that he "delighteth in the scriptures," and I have come to feel the same way more than I had before my mission. The scriptures are such a powerful tool to learn and teach, and they provide such wonderful examples of the Lord and His prophets so that we may learn the principles of the Gospel.

I love you guys so much! Hope you all enjoy this next week!

Love,
Elder Ethan Nielsen

Working hard & seeing prayers answered

Hello everyone!

This week, President Weston called us letting us know that he wants us to split up the area between the 2 sets of elders. We met and cut the area down one of the major roads, and now we have a much smaller area! Our original area was made up of about 4 subsections, and we got 1 area while the other elders got the other 3. The area we got is really busy with work though, and there are a lot of apartment complexes there too.

We are teaching a guy named Chris, and he is super solid. He got out of prison a couple months ago, and he was in there for about 8 years. He is engaged to a member of the Church who is somewhat less-active. They have been living together for a little bit, so we taught them the Law of Chastity last night, and Chris committed to live it! They said they are planning on getting married ASAP, and they are hoping they can get married this week! Our ward mission leader told us that as ministers of the Gospel, we are technically authorized to perform a marriage. It would be super sweet to be able to say I performed a marriage while on my mission! The Bishop will probably end up performing it though, so it will be super cool. We had taught him on Saturday as well, and he told us that he wanted to be baptized. It kind of caught us off guard, because we weren't even talking about baptism right then. Since he just recently got out of prison he will probably have to wait until he is off parole, but he has a really strong desire to be baptized! It is going to be super cool, because I might be able to go to the Temple when they get sealed together. Going to the temple to see a family that I taught get sealed together is one of my goals on my mission, and hopefully this is it!

I went on exchanges on Tuesday with Elder Larsen. We made sure to do a good job at planning, and making sure we were specific in our prayers. We have had a tough time setting up lessons recently, but since we were praying more specifically in order to set up lessons we were able to set 3 up! It was a really neat experience showing me how much Heavenly Father recognizes even our little efforts. It kind of relates to what someone had said to our district a couple of weeks ago. They said, "It is the Lord's work, so let Him do some of it." It definitely helps to include our Father in Heaven as we are trying to serve Him and His children.

Love you guys so much!

Elder Nielsen

Playing basketball with the neighbors (Ethan on the hoop)

A photo taken by a ward member. He loves the ward he is serving in (so does his mom!).

Missionary work in California

Hello everyone!

We started teaching an investigator named Chris this week. He is about 27 years old, and he just got out of prison pretty recently. I think he was in prison for about 8 years or so. He is a super cool guy who wants to do what is best for his fiance, her daughter, and himself. His fiance is a somewhat less-active member, so they are going to get married coming up here pretty soon. He has been reading the Book of Mormon, and he says he really wants to know what is the right path for him. He committed to pray about the Book of Mormon, so we are looking forward to him getting his answer! If he gets baptized, he and his fiance say they are going to get sealed in the temple! It is super exciting because the temple is what we are trying to get these people to aim for, and that is what it is looking like for him and his fiance!

Transfers are coming up in about 3 weeks or so, and I am pretty excited for them! Transfers are always pretty exciting, so that is definitely something to look forward to.

It has been pretty nice weather the past week or so, and I am loving it! It has been around 90, and it is tons better than the 100s that it has been at. Humidity in some places around the country like Oklahoma would be killer, though...

Sorry, there wasn't a whole lot in this letter. I love you all! Keep living the life!

Elder Nielsen