1 March 2010

Hello
Well what a week of miracles! seriously probably one of the coolest weeks of my mission. So tuesday we had a huge snow storm and my comp and I were doing some planning in the church. We were looking at our transfer baptismal goal (it was 5 baptisms) and well we had only had 1 so far. I really wanted to hit this goal. so we made a plan for each one of our investigators that could be baptized that next sunday(yesterday)... so you guys remember the frazier family right..? Troy the father joined the church when he was 17 years old in the bronx. he has never been active, didnt recieve the priesthood or anything. Well last transfer after the hardest day of the transfer when elder goodman and i had to drop 6 baptismal commits cause they just were not progressing, we were both just having a bad day. it was sunday night gettting close to 9 o clock. all of our appointments juked us and our back up plan was to look up less actives on the ward list that no one knows who they are. well we had been doing this all night and the very last name that we looked up was troy frazier, when he answered the door the first thing that he said was how did you find me? haha we talked to him on the porch for only 2 minutes left him with a book of mormon and a chapter to read, when we left he said man this feels good! we went back a few days later and met his family, he has a wife (Nakisa) 3 sons and 1 daughter.. L.J, Troy Jr, Javon, and Aquila..
we taught the whole family for like 2 weeks and they were progressing great but than we hit a major road block. Troy called me crying saying that Nakisa's father is a preacher and that he doesnt want us coming over any more(they live in the basement of his house) so we tried to meet at other locations but it never worked out. Troy lost interest and hope for a while. well i kept on calling him frequently and would never get an answer, we would stop by whenever we were in the neighborhood but would never get an answer to the door. My new companion was always wondering why we kept stopping by someone who never even opened the door. but I just always felt like there was something special about this family, and that i sould not give up on them. and than one day they answered and it was like the light switch was turned back on. they were full board on everything. we met with them that day and than later that night Nakisa told her father that the Book of Mormon testifies and teaches about christ and that it makes her feel good, and that she is a grown woman and should be able to make her own decision. so from that day forth we started teaching them again. a little more than 2 weeks ago i guess. Well they all came to church last week for the first time, and loved it. and than came tuesday when we were doing our planning. that night we went to their house and watched the Testaments movie, it was awesome! the spirit was there so strong. after the movie i asked them all what they would have done if they had been there when jesus christ appeared to the people, i asked them if they would have been Baptized right than, they all answered yes.. the spirit was truly guiding me in the words that i was saying and than i commited them all to be baptized that sunday. they all gladly accepted. we met with them every day. we had not yet taught any of the commmandments, the next day we taught the word of wisdom and Nakisa drinks 5 cups of coffee and also alot of iced tea and she smokes occasionally. she commited right than to live the word of wisdom. they progressed so fast it was such a miracle. and yesterday they got baptized! God truly answers prayers. This was such a cool experience, Its awesome to see how the lord can use us in his hands. the frazier family is amazing! they are so excited to be in the church. the rest of the family is actually getting interested now too, so that is awesome! I am sad that i am leaving this area... but it has been amazing serving here. this transfer we broke records for the mission. we had 18 baptisms, this zone usually averages 6 to 7 a transfer. so we completely blew that out of the water. I have a really busy day ahead of me. i still have to pack all of my things and drive them over to the mission office and than i have to be to the airport with president by 2 to pick up the new missionaires. we are doing a street sweep with all of the greenies its gonna be sweet! I am going to go crazy, and were bringing a box to stand on haha. well i love you all. i know this gospel changes lives and that nothing is impossible with the lord! I love you!
Hurrah For Israel!!
Elder Olsen(michael)