Fun in the SUn

July 22, 2013

hey family!!!!! first off i love you!!!! whoooo!!!!!! hahah :D

this week was very good and very busy!!!! we had a lot of stuff to do! one of the things we had to do was 'apartment shopping' for all the new missionaries that are coming out!!! it was really tiring and took a lot of time! we had to do a lot of driving too. but we finally finished. we are expecting over 30 new missionaries in the next transfer, that's like a whole new zone coming in hahaha! lots of work to do!!

I went on exchanges with elder creager! he's a cool cat. then for lunch we had my favorite restaurant (well one of my favs!!) la jarochitas! that's the place where i ate 30 tacos hahaah. and there is only one in the whole mission and it was in that zone! so i talked him in to letting us eat there!!!! haha.

We have this new investigator who is really interested, its almost too good to be true!!! haha. she is just  super interested and wants to learn everything!  we should be having a church tour on tuesday with her!!!

Then on saturday we had a baptism!!! it was really good! his name is hector and he is great and he wanted me to confirm him on sunday so that was really nice! it was such an honor to do that for him and use the priesthood to do it! he's shorter than me but as you see in the pic really big and elder ochoa baptized him and elder ochoa is a pretty small guy!

then at church on sunday there was a younger couple who waved us over and the husband isn't a member and they want us to start coming over!!! it was such a miracle! it came out of no where haha.

but everything else here is really good. This week will be busy as well, I have 3 exchanges to go on! it should be fun! I enjoy them.

thanks for all you do for me! I appreciate it all soo much.

con mucho amor,

Elder Lifferth

 

 

Transferred

July 15, 2013

Hey family! pretty hectic week here. I found out last monday night that i was getting transferred. so i packed wednesday and got transferred thursday.

I was able to say a couple good byes, it was good. me and elder olivo formed a good relationship and it was sad to leave. i was really worried/concerned for who his new comp would be. just some parental feelings for my son haha! on wednesday evening we have FHE with wendy, her family and investigators and they slammed my face into whipped cream haha. it was nice.

But now I am in the mt vernon zone, i live in alexandria and the spanish ward here is called old town. I'm serving with elder boucher, from peru. his second language is english and he just learned it out here so lots of spanish ahaha. he's a good guy. he's 25 already done with college there which is cool.

We have a couple investigators who live in a trailor park, very poor circumstances. that's the first time i've really been in one. it just kinda feels like a super long camp out is going on ha...

we have some really solid investigators, one will be getting baptized this saturday. his name is hector and i actually met him last time i came over here for exchanges with elder ochoa. so that was cool, he still remembered me!

That's sad about the change of bishops but i'm sure bishop stoner will do great as well. bishop raff and i really got a long i felt like. when God calls people to certain positions He calls them to succeed not to fail, that's something i've seen also that nothing can stop the work of God, nothing.

everything is going really good here. that's news to me that amanda will be having another girl. in all the pics everyone looks really good. haha. i miss you all!

oh yeah my new apartment has a gym so i'm content! yeah! haha. we are going to be very busy these next couple transfers but it should be fun!

i sure love you all!!!

con amor,

Elder Lifferth

 

 

 

 

Great Falls Photos

July 8, 2013

4th of July

July 8, 2013

Hey family!!!

i sure love you all. sorry i'm emailing late, we went to great falls today. it was nice. but like elder moodie said with the heat and the humidity it feels like 200 degrees!! lots of sweating hahah!

mom your hair looks nice, stephen you look like you have a zombie eye!!! hahah hope it gets better!!!

this week was a little low on numbers again but we had some pretty cool miracles!!!

This one day we were tracting and we saw two kids playing some soccer, so we asked if we could play with them and they said yes. we asked how they wanted to do teams they said them for versus us! we thought "hmmm easy win" hahaha! so we decided to make a deal. if we win we get to teach their family, and if we lose we get there "address" so we can bring them some ice cream! .....they won..... hahah! but at least we got their address so we can teach them either way! haha. we were really embarrassed that we lost... :(

on tuesday we had another spanish forum to go over rules and just talk. i had to give a 10 min presentation/teach on good studies. i really enjoyed it and tried to make it fun. i called up 4 volunteers and then made it like a game show! i quizzed them on if they remember certain things like "what they studied that morning", "a talk from sacrament mtg", "and from last friday" stuff like that. then i emphasized the importance of using a study journal and review your notes. tried to make it fun.

then on the 4th our ward had a nice bbq! so good, haha!!! one of the members from argentina cooked the meat so you know it was great! ahah then later in the night one of our members invited a lot of the missionaries to watch the fireworks from her apartment. they have a great view of the show across the river! it was really nice...but not as big/long as you would think coming from the nations capital...i've seen better! but they did have some cool fireworks that spelled u-s-a!

one of our miracles we met a man tracting who's wife recently died of cancer....he really opened up to us! and we were just able to testify and teach simply about the plan of salvation, he was very emotional but by the end he was feeling so comforted and peaceful! it was such a great experience to be a part of! so we'll see how it goes with him! we went back and taught his little brother who was really nice too!

we had a referral from the english elders that we checked up on and her name is yasmin. her husband recently left her and her son (alexa 19 and played on the usa -18 mens team!) yasmin is such a great person and really opened up to us as well!! she cried and also felt the spirit really strong! she really loves us! she calls us her little angels! haha, it is awesome!

mom, i went on friday to get my thyroid checked. so hopefully its all taken care of!

this thrusday is transfers..i hope i stay one more with elder olivo, but i might get transferred. i'll find out tomorrow evening though. God's will be done!

everything else has been going good. just working hard even with a lot of rejections. we're not sure what's going on haha, we have had a rough patch number wise these past 3 weeks, but we are working hard and being obedient so it'll pass!

i hope you enjoy the pics! love you all!

Con amor,

Elder Lifferth

 

 

Arnoldo :D

July 1, 2013

Hey family!!! Love ya'll

This week was good and also one of the lowest number weeks i have had...hahah but we also had a baptism!!! Arnoldo got baptized yesterday!!! it was so great how it all came together perfectly. On wednesday we had a baptismal interview set up with president burton (it had to be one of the presidents because of the legal stand point) and he ending up not being able to with about 30 mins before the interview...we were pretty scared haha then we called president riggs and told him what was happening and he was able to come at 8 at night. it was such a miracle that he could come because he only had free time at that moment! God helped so much. then yesterday at his baptism he changed into his white baptismal clothes and walks out and his mom laughs at him haha it was really funny but he got embarrassed then said he didn't want to get baptized ha, but we talked to him and calmed him down. a lot of people came and before it all started he asked us to see if there would be much people who came because he didn't want it too big but a lot came anyway hah! i'm so proud of him and his desire to change. now all we gotta do is strengthen and help him stay on the right path. it was great!!!

pretty cool miracle happened yesterday as well. before the baptism we were knocking and trying to find more people. we were walking and we weren't sure where to go, so we prayed and we felt we should go all the way to the end of the complex. so we go and knock the whole building...nothing ha! so we start walking back and on the way back we look over and see 2 little girls whose family we are teaching and they told us they moved there!!! then later thinking about that we thought what a miracle! because we could have lost contact with that great family! because they didn't tell us they moved. and we never would have found them by ourselves! it was a cool experience!

then on this past wednesday we had our whole mission conference a couple people talked then they had cafe rio cater and we were all able to say our goodbyes to the missionaries that are now part of the richmond mission. it was really good that they decided to hold that conference so we could all see our friends one last time on our missions! it was great!

but this week we had very few lessons and lots of people saying no...our numbers were very low ha...it was pretty disappointing but we tried our best and never gave up and that's what matters!

well i sure love ya'll!

con mucho amor,

Elder Lifferth

ps. padre, yo estaba pensando en que tu tienes escrituras en espanol...y tal vez quieras darmelas?? solo estoy pensando tener algo de ti. pero si no, esta bien, no te preocupes. te amo mucho pops!

pss...well great the computer won't let me upload the pics...till next week!! love ya'll

 

It's all good

June 23, 2013

HEy family!!!

Sure love ya'll. Mom i'm sorry you had a dream and had to worry about me a little bit! But no worries nothing bad happened to me yesterday! haha i had to think really hard about that, i was wondering hmmm did something bad happen to me?? but it was all good!

This week i was really busy because i had to go on 2 exchanges. 1 on tuesday with an elder from my district and for lunch that day we had cafe rio and we met up there with other elders and we got there after them and they said that we just missed seeing bryce harper! i was like oh cool who's that?! haha they were all shocked, it reminded me of the sandlot haha "the great bambino" it was really cool. if you don' t know who he is, he's a pro baseball player, really young, really good and lds. he got rookie of the year his first year. I don't know how active he is but he was the one who walked up to them and gave them $60 haha and then drove away in his nice mercedes haha! so that was cool! except he said that he would hook them up with tickets...i kinda hope not so because they were saying if they did get tickets they would go! i just hope they get President's permission first haha!!!

my other exchange was with elder ochoa! he's a spanish ap. he finishes his mission in 2 months! its really crazy. but he's doing good! it was fun.

on friday we had our zone conference and it was really good! i love them. i love hearing from president and his wisdom ha. at lunch during it a newish sister missionary sat by me and we were talking and found out she's really good friends with cousin jay! i guess they went to high school and college together. Her name is shawna richardson. if you can tell jay to write her that would be great. Its under the normal mission address on burke. so if you can pass the info along!!! it was pretty cool.

but yes!!! it was a requirement for all missionaries to watch the leadership training! haha you should have heard the chapel when they showed the dc north mission. haha! it was really excited at first (as they read the dc part) then sighs of "oh man" haha so close!!!! i was looking in there to see if i recognized anyone...just their mission president who i met at the temple. he's nice. then i was trying to see if i recognized any of the missionaries in the choir...but i didn't! haha. but like dad i got emotional too watching it. it was really good. we were all talking and hoping that that wasn't President Packer's "goodbye" he is such a great man and you just know of a surety that he has literally given his whole life in serving God and others. That's something i want to accomplish in my life time, for people to say that of me!

i think i mentioned this last week that arnoldo's uncle died..and they have been super busy with that so we have to push off his date til the 30! so if ya'll could keep praying that it all works out! satan is getting in the way...but we can overcome satan with God's help!!!

This past saturday was elder moodie's b-day!!! happy bday big guy hahah!

i'm glad summer mike enjoyed camp helaman. i really enjoyed that as well. i enjoyed working with Justin. it was fun!

well i think thats about it for now!!! pretty happy for rsl, even though i don't really care too much. i do still love soccer though!!! haha

love elder lifferth!!!

ps that last picture is of our apartment...we got pranked haha. the other missionaries in our complex are bike elders and wrote on our car "just married" with hearts and smiles haha...and we were biking out and all of a sudden everyone seemed to come outside and saw it and saw us and were like oh you 2 just got married?! congrats! we were like nooooooooooo!!!! haha really embarrassing. so we got into their apartment and got them back..then we came home and they got us back again hahaha it was really funny and there wasn't any bad feelings!!!

 

 

 

Barf

June 17, 2013

Hey family! you know what's funny? i was going to ask you to send my some gluten free revel bars because i've been craving them! haha yummy!

elder moodie's b-day is june 22!!!! happy birthday you old geezer! haha

this week was really good even though not a lot of stuff worked out hah. not yesterday but the sunday before we went to a lot of the men of the elders quorum to sign them up to come on exchanges with us and they all cancelled the day of....except 1.... so we didn't get a lot of member present lessons haha!

one great thing that happened is that a. got out of jail the other day! we were teaching him before and while he was in jail his mom and sister got baptized! well he is now on date to get baptized this upcoming sunday if he passes his interview! there is a huge change in him now since before he was in jail. so i really think he is ready to get baptized. he's a really good guy and satan truly is attacking him from all angles...its sad to see. we will go over and talk with him and he tells us how a lot of his friends (clearly not true friends) ask him to do drugs and drink, but he tells them no. and then he said he was walking to go get his bike from a friends and the friend he was walking with out of nowhere threw a rock at a car that was driving and the police stopped him...we have really been stressing the importance of good friends ha. satan is trying so hard to prevent his baptism! but we go over every day to keep him going!  I wish that every one had a great friend and example of families like i have. i have a great family and a great friend in elder moodie! we are very blessed!

this week we have been focusing on finding new investigators! because not much of ours are progressing like we want...but at church yesterday we had 3 investigators come! it was great. we have been praying like it all depends on God and working as if it all depends on us! its been fun.

on saturday i got sick....in the morning i drank some chocolate milk...bad idea. just had a bad stomach ache the whole day and for dinner our neighbor elders made some taiwanese food and later i found out that he put soy sauce and almost all soy sauce has wheat... and i get even worse! after that i couldn't work..so we went home around 6 and i slept and woke up and threw up like never before it was so nasty haha!!! tmi?? i don't remember getting so sick like that before...wowzers it was bad! 

for my year mark our elder neighbors made me some gluten free spaghetti! it was really nice of them and also for dinner elder olivo took me to red robin because they have gluten free buns! i got a nice burger. it  was a nice day. i'm very blessed. 

and on sunday all men 18 and older got candy and cheesecake for father's day! haha it was really nice of the ward. i hope you had a good day dad!

that chess table looks awesome! who made that? its nice! 

well that's about all that i can think of! i sure love you all! thanks for your examples and kindness.

con mucho amor,

Elder Lifferth 

ps sorry computer isn't letting me upload some pics.... oh well!!! love ya'll

 

 

Fun in the Sun

June 10, 2013

Hey family!! its so good to hear from ya'll!!!!

This week was good, yet very interesting to say the least haha!!!

First off....my lactose intolerance has returned to seek revenge haha... oh man.... its ok though...its not as bad as before like no throwing-up just upset stomach...kind of sad but its ok!

Last Tuesday I went on exchange with Elder Frazier (i think he's the one  dad knows his dad?) it was really good. since he doesn't speak spanish i had the fun job of doing everything! i really enjoy it. we met this one lady who at first was just like...oh i'm already cristian, i was like that is great. then she loooked really happy and excited so i started talking a little bit of Christ and then brought in the book of mormon and her demeanor completly changed! she literally had a nice little freak out on me! haha! she ran up to my face and started asking me if i knew what the word mormon means. i was like si el era un profeta en este libro. y ella me dijo que no, la palabra mromon significa demonion del infierno. then she started slapping the book of mormon and got in my face and pointed her finger in my face and said how i'm also i demon from hell. then i said, pues hermana solo me gustaria compatir lo que creemos...y explicar quien era mormon y porque tenemos el libro de mormon. but she honestly woouldn't let me say one word! haha it was crazy. and of course eldre frazier has no idea whats going on only that this lady is all in my face haha. i told him she wants to get baptized! haha jk! so that was a good experience :)

one cool thing is that a member died a couple months ago and her husband isnt a member and he has still been coming to church and i thought one of the missionaries in this ward was teaching him but no one was so we went straight to his house and set up an appointment for tonight! its really hard because they have a 5 year old daughter and the mom passed away 2 months ago and he got into a bad accident at work and broke his leg really bad and he is still accepting and trying to do the right thing! it was really hard to see all that stuff. in his home is just the sweetest humble spirit there!

the other day we knocked on a door of a "mclean bible church"  member....bad idea hahaha. at their church they study Preach My Gospel so they know how to combat us. its really crazy haha. she was luckily nice her husband wasn't..she was just like you should come tomorrow so i can show you how the book of mormon is wrong and how the bible proves it. she was saying "not to change your mind, but just so you know" i was like you gotta be kidding me... haha.

then we had a great encounter with 2 jehova witness...at first they were just super excited to let us come in... i was like hmm ok why not.. then we realized why they were so happy to have us in...to battle... haha!!! man.. but we didn;t battle, just simply bore our testimony.. and we really struck them dumb..they had no clue what to say. thats the power of the spirit!!! (crazy encounters this week right?)

then yesterday we had a little breakfst before church and 2 of our investigators went. the purpose was to get them to come to church! and it worked! haha it was so great!

i think thats about all!!! i sure love you all. let me know if there is anything i can do!?

Con amor,

Elder Lifferth