Monday, April 27, 2009

Elder Olsen Letter 27 April 2009

Hey Everyone.

well i had a great week! everything is going great for me here in newyork! alot of really cool things happened this week but i dont have time to talk about all of them. So there is this girl named Krystal in our ward she is like 23 and a recent convert of a little over a year. She is awesome so anyways last week she brought a friend (craig) to church he reall liked it. so we set up a meeting with him. we met atthe ostler home, they are an awesome family. they remind me alot of our family, they have 5 kids all boys and the youngest is in 5th grade. the dad is a general contractor but trades stocks as well. and the mom is just super nice to everyone. so yeah alot like our family.So anyways this was like a legit Prach My Gospel lesson. we met at the ------ home with krystal there as well. we had dinner and talked about random things and than we taught a lesson around the dinner table. The ------- family testified as well. and krystal talked about how she found out that the BOM was true. it was amazing! the spirit was really strong and craig was really soaking it all up. he just had this look on his face like wow i cant believe what i am feeling right now. it was really cool. My comp elder ------- is a good kid. but he gets nervous alot, he was sweating in the lesson with craig when he was teaching. but he is getting alot better at teaching. So craig came to church again yesterday and really liked it, it was ward conference so we got to hear from a member of the stake presidency. We are going to FHE with craig tonight for the singles in the ward. and we are going to have a little lesson either before or after and we will probably commit him to be baptized soon! so please pray for him, that he will accept. Cynthia came to church yesterday! it was unexpected,we commited her to come last week but ever since than we havent been able to get a hold of her but she just showed up yesterday at church. That was really cool! The ward here is doing well, we got a bunch of new people here last week that are here for summer sales, one of themi went to high school with. weird huh. but the ward is reallly starting to pick up and i think that we will be having alot of sucess soon. We set a companionship goal this week that we are going to extend a baptismal commit every day. So that should be fun. I want and think that i can get 5 more baptisms in this area so i have set a personal goal to do so. I think that I will be here for a few more transfers. welll i love you all so much! mom and dad you are the greatest! thank you for everything that you do for me! i will be praying for you all.


Hurrah For Israel!!!Elder Michael Olsen.

Tuesday, April 21, 2009

Monday, April 20, 2009

Elder Olsen Letter 20 March 2009

Hello Family!!
well I had a really cool week. We had an appointment with Pastor
------------- this morning and it went really well. We got him a Book Of
Mormon in URDU his native language. He told me that he would have the
Whole thing read by next week! ha he is so awesome. He told us today
about all of the small miracles that led up to us finding and
teaching him. So first of all back when he was in Pakistan he met a
Mormon and got a very bad idea of the church, he thought that we were
Preaching anti-Christ things. Two days before we knocked on his door
he was outside of the court house on main street here in patchogue
preaching and passing out cards and pamphlets and stuff. He said
that someone asked him if he was part of Joseph Smiths church! He had
never heard the name Joseph smith. Than two days later we knock
on his door, it is pouring rain and we probably looked miserable. He
didn’t know that we were Mormons, he wasn’t sure what we were. He has
Lived here since 2000 and never once has allowed anyone into his home.
Than that first night that we were over there his brother in law
just happens to stop by unexpected who happens to be a member of our
church. His daughter is going to Columbia University in manhattan and
she is vary interested in the church as well. she was showing Pastor
-------------- allot of things on MOrmon.org. we didn’t even tell them about the
web site. His wife seems very interested as well. He told us again
today that he wants to join us, and he is getting serious; he is
already thinking of all the things that will have to change in his
life to become a member. There are allot of huge things that will
change in his life. He works for the Methodist church, he lives in a
house owned by the church and that is where he gets his income. But he
told us today that after he finishes the book of mormon he is going to
fast and pray about what he should do. He says that he knows that
if god wants him to join than he knows that god will provide a way for
him to do it. It was such an amazing experience! he is going to be an
amazing missionary. back in pakistan he has his own church that he
started. He said that he is going to go back and get them all to
Convert to our church! I am so humbled that the lord has trusted me
With such a great opportunity to help this man find the truth. please
pray that he will have the courage and the faith to do what he must do
when he finds out that the book of Mormon is true. please pray for
my companion and I that we will be able to teach him with the spirit,
and recognize his needs. Gloria and george are still on track to get
Baptized, and we got allot of other exciting people too, but you will
have to wait till next week to hear more. Jesus Christ is at the head
Of the church! I know it! I love you all! Thank you for your prayers
and support!
Hurrah For Israel!!
Elder Olsen

Tuesday, April 14, 2009

well we had a pretty good week. we still dont have our car back! it has been about 3 weeks now. it is getting kind of annoying, cause there is alot of things that we could be doing to help the work out here but we cant cause it is too far away. but is has been good nothaving a car at the same time too. we have been doing alot of finding. Here is a cool story. so friday night when we were planning we didnt have any appointments all morning. and we couldnt thi nk of anything to do. so we decided that we were going to knock doors all morning till 3. well we woke up the next morning and it was just pouring rain! seriously it was raining hard. so we got ready prepared our message for the day and went out to tract. my comp had an umbrella but i dont like umbrellas. i actually like walking out in the rain. so we were soaking wet in a matter of minutes! we probably looked so rediculous. but we had alot of success tracting that day. alot of people were letting us in their homes to teach lessons and we got alot of new investigators! it was amazing. .i think that we had so much success that day because of our attitude. it was terrible weather and people thought we were crazy for even being outside. but elder alder and i decided that we were going to have fun working! so we did, we were having a good time and people could see that . it was really neat. church was realy good yesterday. lazaro got the calling to be the new gospel principles teacher! he is amazing. dad steve you would love this man! he had an amazing lesson prepared. it was on faith in jesus christ. He still needs to learn to tone it down sometimes, but that is just cause he is not used to our culture yet and he is a very loud and emotional person. he told everyone is gospel principles yesterday that he was a navy seal for a long time and lead a team and everything. served in Iraq and alot of other places too. he still works for the goverment. he is just a great guy but i think that he scares alot of people. haha He got ordained a priest yesterday and kind of spoke in tounges. it was interesting. i really dont think i could explain it via e mail so you can ask me about it on mothers day, which is approaching very soon! he gave george one of our investigators at church who is commited for the 24th his QUAD(Book of mormon, Bible, Pearl of great price and D C) he is a very good man. we had 8 Investigators at church yesterday. it was a pretty good day. this morning we went over to the zone leaders pad cause that is where we do laundry and they made me breakfast and cinnamon rolls with the candles and everything. it was really nice. well i love you all so much you are amazing! thanks so much for the packages! i will be praying that the deer crest house will go through! and just be praying for all of you!


Hurrah For Israel!!


Elder MIkey Olsen

Wednesday, April 8, 2009

Elder Olsen Letter 7 March 2009

Hello Family!!

This week has been pretty good. Conference was amazing! I loved it so much, I think that my favorite talk was Jeffrey Holland’s yesterday on the atonement that talk was amazing. I think it was exactly what allot of people needed right now. There is a man in our ward brother --------- he was baptized like a year ago and his wife and kids just left him and took off to Texas. He has been going through a pretty rough time. He was sitting at home debating whether or not he should come to the church to watch conference. He then prayed and decided that he should come; well he got there right before elder Holland’s talk Afterwards he told me the story it was just amazing! The talk really touched him and gave him hope to keep moving forward and put his trust and faith in Jesus Christ.


I was sitting next to --------------- during that talk; he is the man that got baptized like 3 weeks ago. He loved it and was crying and everything. He is actually going to Utah in May to see temple square and everything. He has a few friends that really want him to come. He is going through a really rough time right now. He and his wife are getting separated. I hope that the kids are not too harmed from the situation. The other talks that I really liked were Uckdorfs in priesthood well actually the last 3 in priesthood were all pretty amazing! It was really motivating! We had 2 investigators who came to the morning session yesterday. Gloria and George who are both committed to get baptized on the 24th of May. They really enjoyed it and felt the spirit. They really liked president Monson’s talk at the end of the first session. . Oh yeah I forgot to tell you transfers were last Tuesday right. I got a call from president Bennion Monday night at 1030 pm, he called to tell me that he had just found out that the Elder that I was supposed to train is staying in the MTC longer because he doesn’t know English good enough yet. They moved elder Merrill to a different ward about 10 minutes from south shore and called elder Alder (who was in the M.T.C with me also) that night and told him that he was getting transferred when before he was staying. Now I am with Elder alder.. I don’t know if I am going to still be training the kid. It will probably depend on allot of things. We will see I did find out that the kid is from brazil, Tyler told me about some kid that he knew or something that was coming to my mission. Im not sure if it is the same person. His name is elder gaspar(not sure if the spelling is right) So yeah I hope that was not confusing.

Things are going good the work is coming along good we still don’t have a car so that is really hindering the work. We have allot of people that we need to be seeing but cant cause it is too far. It has been hard to find rides but we have been doing allot of walking and knocking doors. Tyler sounds like he is doing really well. ! He is out of the MTC tomorrow right? I love you all thanks so much for everything that you do for me! I have the best family in the world! Hurrah For Israel!!!!!
Elder Olsen (mikey)