27 July 2009

Wow what an amazing week that i have had! we are being blessed so immensely it is increddible! So many miracles have happened this week it has been awesome! If you remember i told you about 5 weeks ago that my zone set a goal to get 12 baptisms this transfer. which is 1 baptism per companionship for the whole zone. well i decided that our district could set that same goal. and we set the goal to get 12 baptisms as a district. and well so far we have only had 3 :( But this week has been a week of miracles! and we now have 6 people committed to get baptized next week. so that would put us at 9 for the transfer. this is week 6 of the transfer, and i have 5 more investigators that could get baptized next sunday as well, because they have been to church 3 times now. They have just not accepted a baptismal date. they all have different problems that they need to work through that are keeping them from getting baptized, but it definitely could happen if they have the faith, so please pray that we will be able to help them as much as we can. and also that they will have the faith to change whatever is necessary to get baptized. These people are; Keith, Alvin, Daniel, Gloria, George.. yesterday was a great day. cynthia had to work and didnt get off until 2 o clock, but she arranged for a lady in our ward to pick up her kids and bring them to church and than cynthia came late. the kids loved church again. after church we sat down in the chapel with cynthia and her family and another family in our ward. and we taught a lsn on Temples and eternal families. it was amazing! they loved it and the spirit was really strong! We committed shauna and jaleesa to get baptized next week with their mom and they accepted! it was a really cool experience. their family is so amazing! this is the family that i have been praying that i would be able to teach. cynthia has made great progress in her faith and knowledge of the gospel. I have no doubt that i will be attending the temple with this family in about 1 year! tonight we are doing a FHE with that same family that we did the lsn with after church. and cynthias family is coming too. Karen and alvin came to church yesterday as well and loved it again! we met with them a few hours before church and they both expressed concern about the book of mormon and our belief in the bible. cause she said that when we study with her we rarely read out of the bible. well god is a god of miracles, and everything is done according to gods timetable. so we get to church and the first speaker gets up and talks about the book of mormon, what it is? where it came from? why we need it? etc... it was a great talk from a lady in the ward. and than the next speaker gets up and talks about the Bible, we believe in the bible(as far as it is translated correctly), we love the bible, Doctrines from the bible, missing links of the bible(creeds, translations, councils etc..) so basickly it was exactly what karen and alvin needed that day. it was incredible they were both crying, karen is going into a job interview today and she is worried that they are going to ask her to work sundays. i told her to stand up for what she knows is right and to tell them that she will not work during the hours of church. the only problem is they really need the money from the job and in this economy it is really hard for people to find reliable jobs, as i am sure you all know. so please pray for her, that she will have the strength and the faith to decline the job if she has to work durring church. and that she will be able to get another job or source of employment. we taught the word of wisdom yesterday and she accepted to live it, she has addictions to smoking and coffee, with just about every other single person that lives in new york does:( ha but its all good. i know that she can overcome it! alvin is doing great. he is reading alot about joseph smith because he is facinated with the whole history. he said yesterday that when he read he was visited by john the Baptist that chills went down his spine and he knew that it was true. he is doing great and i th ink it is a great possibility that we wil be able to baptize him this next sunday as well. he has smoking problems and coffee as well. wow so many other amazing things happened but i just done have to time to tell about all of them. just please pray for the people that i have talked about. they need all of the prayers that they can get. i have been in this area now for a long time. 6 months! transfers are next week so dont send anything to my address, rather send everything to the mission office addresss.. 85-69 60th dr. elmhurst, NY, 11373.
I have truly loved serving in this area and who knows maybe i will be here for a little while longer, who knows. well i guess god and my mission president do. but if i do stay here than i know that there is still much for me to accomplish here. it will be very sad leaving all of the people that i have come to love in this area. My comp elder judd is doing better, he is still having alot of fears about talking to people and he is worrying to much about what he is going to say exactly. so he gets nervous and doesnt say anything. so please pray for him as well. wow i have done some pretty fast typing today i am proud of myself.
Hurrah for Israel!!
love Elder Olsen

20 July 2009

Hello Family!!
well i had an amazing week! alot of great things happened. yesterday we had 6 investigators at church, karen and alvin came and they are doing amazing! Karen is scheduled to get baptized on august 2nd now, and alvin is not committed yet, but yesterday at church when he was introducing himself in prissthood he told everyone that he is thinking about joining, and than after church we had a lesson with our correlator and alvin told us that he knows that the book of mormon is true. so i think that he will be ready to be baptized on the 2nd as well. he just needs to overcome smoking. they both loved church! karen was taking notes the entire time! cynthia came and brought her 2 kids. jaleesa is 9 and she loved primary! shaun is 16 and loved young mens, he got a list of all of the activities that they are doing in the next few months and after church there was a fireside for the young men and shaun wanted to stay for that as well. so he got a ride home from one of the members. cynthia is scheduled to get baptized this next sunday. and than we will get her kids baptized either one or two weeks after that. i am hoping that they will be able to get baptized in two weeks cause we have transfers on the 4th of august, so it would be amazing to get them all baptized before i left. please pray for all of them. well keith did not get baptized on saturday. he is just not ready. he hasnt had that change of heart yet. but i think it is coming for him soon. I dont think that i am going to stay here for another transfer, it is going to be sad leaving this area :( but at the same time i have been here for a long time and am ready for some change. Elder judd is doing okay. the last few weeks he has been kind of had an attitude problem. but i think he is just home sick and stuff. he is still really nervous when teaching and finding, but he is getting better. it has been interesting training him because i was the exact opposite when i was a greeny, i wasnt nervous at all. but he is doing well and i think that we will be able to finish off the transfer strong. well i love all of you and hope that all is well thanks for everything that you do for me.
Hurrah for Israel
Elder micheal Olsen

12 July 2009

well i had a great week! it was full of miracles.. Well i guess i will start with last night. so all of you should remember cynthia, i have been teaching her for almost 6 months now. she is amazing! she has 2 kids shaun who is 16 and jalessa who is 8 yrs old. she was divorced a few years ago. well we have tried to committ her for baptism before but she has always felt like she is not ready and that she doesnt know enough. but she has been coming to church every week lately and reading and praying about the book of mormon every day. yesterday i made a bunch of cookies to deliver to some of our investigators, and we went over to the marichal home(a family in our ward) yesterday and got them to go with us to deliver the cookies. sister marichal is a single mom as well and her son joe goes to the same high school as shaun and they are on the track team together and everything. so we went over to cynthias and she let us in and we asked if we could just share a 5 minute lsn. I love being a missionary! there is no other feeling that is better than being a tool for the lord to use. we had prepared a little lsn but during the opening prayer something came to me, 2 nephi 25:26- basickly we do everything in christ so that our children may know where they can turn for forgiveness of sins. so after the prayer i read that scripture and than bore my testimony about how i was raised in the gospel and that i will be forever gratefull for my parents and the values that they taught me when i was young. and than i asked everyone that was there 1 by 1 to share their testimony with cynthia, the spirit was really strong! and we commmitted her to be baptized in two weeks! she gladly accepted and is excited to be baptized. it is so cool when the the spirit takes over and tells you exactly what you need to say to people. she explained that one of the fears that she has been having is bringing her kids to church because she has been dissappointed in churchs in the past and didnt want to get her kids involved unless it was something that she was sure that she wanted to do. but she told us that she has not been dissappointed in our church. and said that she is going to bring her kids next week! so i have no doubt that they will have a baptismal date soon. when we first started teaching them shaun accepted a baptismal date so we allready know that he wants to be baptized. it was an amazing lesson! it was really strong in the spirit. she is getting baptized the 26th of this month. and i hope that her kids will be able to the same day or the next week. she is a solid convert and her and the kids will be a great addition to the ward, i think it will really get some of the members excited about doing missionary work. I have been here for almost 6 months now, at the end of this transfer it will be six month. it is possible that i could stay or leave, its kind of a toss up right now. but i wouldnt mind either way. when i read tylers e mail last week aboout his story of standing up on the bus and started teaching everyone on the bus and than asked everyone to write down their info, haha well that made me kinda trunky to go back to the city! i love it out here on the island but there are tons of people in the city and you just talk to alot more people. but i will be happy if i stay here for one more transfer. Keith is supposed to get baptized this next saturday. but i dont think that he is going to be ready, he seems to be a little off lately. he has been talking to this man that lives in our apt complex that is no good. sadly i have bible bashed with him a little. but i know that he is putting doubts into keiths head. Everyone please pray for him he needs to open up his heart and let the spirit in. well everything is going great! tell sammy that i love him and happy birthday for me!! when are you guys going to be home from your road trip?? well i love all of you and thank you again for the package it was so nice! i hope that you all drive safe. i love you!
Hurrah For Israel!!
Elder Michael Olsen

6 July 2009

wow well i gotta say that is a little weird seeing a picture of you guys on the brooklyn bridge. downtown brooklyn was my last area. so the bridge was in my area, we would go there all the time to do finding. and the york stop on the F train! i used that stop at least once or twice every day. so weird. . you guys could have taken the C train to High Street and that would have saved you a few blocks of walking. The Blocks surrounding the York stop is where the Watchtower buildings are, the jehovas witness' headquarters. there are probably 8 or 9 large buildings that they have right there. And Ebony lives right around the corner from the york stop in the project buildings. Ebony was the golden lady that was going to get baptized and than a whole bunch of drama happened. Ah that was a sad day. did you guys go to church yesterday? what ward did you attend? so you guys are camping at jones beach tonight huh? that is only about 30 to 45 minutes from where i live. pretty weird huh. haha its all good. long beach is a really cool town that you will probably drive through to get to jones beach. well i dont know what all there is too see on long island. but montauk point is really pretty and there is that big duck that is a convenience store inside, that is in riverhead, which is pretty much at the end of the island. I dont know if you guys are planning on going back to the city but if you do coney island is pretty cool. Well i had a great week! keith is going to be getting baptized on the 18th of this month, karen is going to be getting baptized on the 26th of this month, and a new lady that we found this week is getting baptized the 26th as well. her name is samantha torres. she saw a tv commercial and ordered a book of mormon. we went over there and taught her a lesson the day after she ordered it. she has a 1 year old little girl. and is looking for a firm foundation in her faith and beliefs, she is catholic but doesnt really like it. and the missionary who talked to her on the phone at the MTC told her about the restoration and the book of mormon, so we re taught that and she was really receptive, the spirit was there and she accepted a baptismal date on the 26th. we are going over there tonight with a member in our ward i am really excited. Cynthia is doing great. she came to church again yesterday and really loved it. she has been several times now and still doesnt have a baptismal date!! we have talked about it multiple times but she just doesnt feel ready,. we are going over there today to help her do some yard work and things and i am hoping that we will be able to set a date. she told us that she is just scared that she doesnt know everything that we believe and doesnt want to join and than find out something that we believe that she doesnt agree with. we read over the 13 articles of faith with her. please pray for her! she needs all the prayers possible. she is so close! she would be an amazing addittion to the ward, and her kids are awesome! Elder judd is doing well, he is still having trouble figuring out what he wants to say, i am trying to teach him not to think about what you are going to say, but just to study hard and live worthy and pray for the spirit and than study the people that we are teaching or talking to and he will know what to say. he is getting better. it has kinda hit me recently that i have been in this area for a long time, 5 months now! My comp is really worried that i am going to get transfered this transfer and than the missionary work is just going to go downhill., because all of the members and investigators know me so well. i could stay here for 1 more transfer alot of times they keep trainers with there kids for 2 transfers, but who knows with this new president. Oh yeah we have a new mission President now. Last tuesday we drove into queens for a mission meeting to meet him and his wife. He is awesome! and really pumped up. he is really focusing on obedience and baptizing!! whoo!! i am excited, it was sad to see president bennion go but i am excited for president Nelson as well. Sounds like tyler is doing great! i hope that you all have fun while you are staying here! drive safe. i love you all thank you for your support! Hurrah For Israel!!
Elder MIchael Olsen