Happy Thanksgiving!

November 28, 2012

Dear Family & Friends,

We had a great week.  First off Thanksgiving was delightful.  We had a brunch with the office staff the Hokinson’s, Jacklin’s (I know two people they are related to), and the new office senior missionaries Sister Olsen, and Sister Martin.  The Hokinson’s leave this week back to Star Valley, Wyoming.  We sure love them and will miss them.  They invited us to come visit any time and I plan to do so.  Then later dinner was awesome  with great people, great food, good spirit.  Just a grand time we had.  Then that night we helped the Vellinga's put up the Christmas tree in the mission home.  It was such a fun day.

The zone conference did take place as a Christmas conference and it went great.  The Spirit was very strong and we all grew in our Faith in Jesus Christ and in His power to work miracles and guide us to His elect.  We all came away edified and strengthened.  The musical numbers on both days went great.  Although our time to practice together was about 20 minutes it all worked out and invited a strong spirit.  I love that Spirit that is invited through music, especially in the Kirtland Temple.  That is sure a once in a lifetime kind of event.  The missionaries were addressed by the Stake Presidents in the area, President & Sister Vellinga, Karl Andersen, Elder & Sister Edman (Kirtland Sites Director) and a few others who were invited to speak, like Elder Hokinson.  We each had the chance to bear our testimonies in the temple as well.  We then separated them by zones into the 4 choir sections in the corners of the Temple and felt a great spirit as we testified of Jesus Christ and the Restoration of His Gospel.  After that we went to the Kirtland Stake Center, had lunch, and then began the afternoon session of the Conference.  We went over different training for winter, vehicle safety, etc.  Then Elder Metcalf and I gave a presentation and practiced with the missionaries how to use the new webpage on mormon.org for the holiday season.  It is mormon.org/christmas.  This site has many, many amazing ways for missionaries and members to share our testimony of Christ and His birth and to help others feel the spirit of the season.  Check it out because it’s a great site with tons of cool features.  People love the cool feature of the 12 free downloadable Christmas songs by the Mormon Tabernacle Choir.  Following this President Vellinga addressed us.  He spoke on Faith in Jesus Christ and Faith in our efforts to find God's elect.  After this we went to view the nativity displays at the Kirtland Historic sites.  Over 700 nativities are on display there along with 80,000 Christmas lights and many other activities for all to enjoy this Christmas season.  It is beautiful there and I have enjoyed being able to view them both days.  It was great to be with all the missionaries over the last two days.  There are some amazing people here.  True Disciples of Christ I have had the opportunity to be with and witness the light that they carry.  I love this work and all of the miracles that occur each day.  Miracles from last week are several less active family's in the ward here, who have been hard to meet with in the past, are desiring to come back, to go to the temple, to unite their family for eternity.  We love these families and are excited to help them meet these righteous goals.

I love you all and am so happy that you had a great Thanksgiving and time as family and friends.  I love you.  Thank you for all your prayers, love, encouragement, and example.  I am forever grateful. 

Skype will probably be at a members home, possibly the mission office...I don't know, haven't thought that far ahead yet.  I will let you know when we figure it out.  Christmas package...I am doing pretty good on things, CD's and conference would be great.  Can't think of much else.  Oh but could you send me the Miller’s address?  I have a thank you letter ready to send to them.

Hope you all have a wonderful week.

Love,

Elder Weaver

I Am Loving My Mission!

November 19, 2012

Dear Family & Friends,

It is so good to hear from you all.  It sounds like Thanksgiving plans have all been made and are ready to go.  We are going to be with the Kirkham family and they keep inviting a bunch of people and it will be great.  They have 30+ in attendance from their family and ward members coming. Besides that, December is coming up quick.  It will be here before we know it, crazy huh?  We will be Skyping in just a few short weeks.  It will be good to see your faces.

So here's a new "small world" moment for the week...do you remember the Grays that used to be in our ward, the ones that lived down the street a couple years back?  Well, guess who is arriving here in about a month? None other than Myle's Gray.  He is a new Elder coming to the Ohio Cleveland Mission and I will get to meet him in the first 10 minutes when he gets off the plane.  Neat huh!

Elder Metcalf and I love the work.  We have been working in our area, as well as preparing and giving training to missionaries around the mission. We have such a great time working with President Vellinga.  I love my time here because we have some great, great missionaries.  I have loved this opportunity to work with and serve with them.  We are preparing for a multi-zone conference in Kirtland next week.  We will have half the mission come on Monday and the other half coming on Tuesday.  We will be taking a group photo outside the Kirtland Temple and then will have a 2-hour meeting in the Temple.  We also will be able to hear from some of the Stake Presidents in the mission, learn more about how we can grow in our Faith in Jesus Christ in a place where He has appeared, and have the opportunity to bear our testimonies in the Kirkland Temple.  It is going to be powerful.  I have been able to organize music numbers for both days. On Monday we are doing an octet of "Oh Holy Night."  It's a pretty arrangement that I got out last night to the others who will be singing and playing piano.  Then on Tuesday I have been talking with some of our instrumental musicians and we get to put together a flute, violin, and piano arrangement of "What Child is This?"  It is going to be really cool to be able to perform there and I am excited!  Then after the Temple we will be going over to the Kirtland stake center for lunch and another couple hours of training and practicing.  And then off to the Kirtland Historic sites to see the Nativity Display and come to a greater understanding of how we can use this display to help others feel the true spirit of Christmas and grow in their desire to follow Christ.  This year they have about 700 nativities from around the world, with 80,000 Christmas lights around the sites, and a whole bunch of other neat things that they do to help people feel the Spirit and have an enjoyable time there.  We have handed out thousands of invitations and had some great experiences in just inviting people to come to this wonderful event.  It opens people up, and has been a really neat opportunity to just testify of Christ and help people understand we love Him and His gospel.

We were able to meet with Jordan this last week for the first official time. We shared the Restoration and he really enjoyed it.  His wife Sam had a migraine and was upstairs unfortunately.  However, in explaining how our church meetings worked he seemed particularly intrigued.  He was able to understand how his family would be able to learn about the Gospel in different classes and really enjoyed learning about Relief Society for his wife.  He just kept saying, "This will be so good for her.  She needs people like that to be around and socialize with."  They are a neat family of 4 that we are excited to invite and help come unto Christ.  Some of our other investigators are still in the pending kind of stage.  Many are actually headed out for the Holiday so we pray that we can meet with them soon after.  We are still heavy in finding mode right now and things are starting to come through.  We just found a family this past Sunday that we met with who is working on adopting a foster child they currently have. She is interested in learning and has come to church several times.  She has expressed a desire to prepare to be baptized.  We are praying that the adoption process goes smooth so we can more fully help her achieve this wonderful desire.

That is great news for SISTER ESTHER DAVIS!!!  Tell her congratulations for me. It's wonderful to see so many sisters desiring to serve the Lord through missionary service. 

I am loving my mission.  What a wonderful time of year to reflect on the time I have spent here in Ohio.  I am so very thankful for the many opportunities I have had to serve and help others.  The miracles and blessings I have been able to see on my mission are humbling.  It's amazing what can happen as we have desires to serve and love God and our brothers and sisters.

I sure love all of you, and pray you all have a safe and happy holiday week.  I am thankful to you for your examples, encouragement, and love.  

Love,

Elder Weaver

What A Fastball Of A Week That Was

November 12, 2012

Dear Family,

What a fastball of a week that was.  Tuesday we had enough time to get a hair cut, shop, and wash the Mission van and trailer before going and picking up the new arriving missionaries.  Then Tuesday we spend with the arrivals all day, doing some training and getting them excited to get out to work.  New missionaries arrive every 6 weeks.  Then the next day we take them to the Kirtland temple and sites.  After that off to the stake center for transfers, where we have a brief meeting, announce new companionships, say goodbye to the departing missionaries and then the moving of baggage and missionaries to vehicles to get them where they need to go.  After this we take all the departing missionaries to the school of the prophets to give an accounting of their mission to the Lord.  An awesome experience that I look forward to, but not before my time to do that...if that makes sense.  Then we spend the day with them taking them to the mission home, going over their departure packet, and helping them get set to depart early the next morning.  And then bam, we are already to Thursday of our week.  We spent quite a bit of Thursday planning with President Vellinga for our zone conference in the Kirtland Temple/Visitors center at the end of this month.  It is going to be awesome.  We are focusing on building faith in Jesus Christ, Finding those that God has prepared to hear the Restored Gospel, and to prepare to celebrate the birth of Christ.  I am super excited for it.  Friday we had time to proselyte.

We met with many members this week to identify a family they would like to take to the nativity displays in Kirtland this year.  We have been giving them invitations that were created for the event to give as they invite a family or friend to go with them.  We have also been using the pass-along card version of the invitation for our door/contacting approaches.  It's been cool to see as we have used this approach the difference in how people react.  Even if they aren't interested in meeting and learning more, they have a greater trust and stay long enough to feel the spirit about us.  Also, it has opened up several doors for us to teach and testify of the Restored Gospel.  We met Nancy this week and she has had several experiences in the last couple of years that have helped her truly gain a testimony of the reality of Jesus Christ.  We were able to learn about her family that lived around and how she hoped that they would be willing to learn more about Jesus Christ and see all that He can be in their lives.  We had an appointment for Saturday, but something come up in her family and couldn't meet that day.  We are now looking to meet with her this week. With Sam and Jordan we are scheduling with them for an appointment this week.  We are going by tomorrow to schedule and hopefully meet their family.  With their crazy schedules it will be difficult, but completely possible.  I have gained a testimony of 1 Nephi 3:7, God will always prepare a way.

For Thanksgiving we are going to the Kirkham’s.  They are a neat young family in the ward, and are having tons of people over, including President and his family.  

I am glad to hear you are all doing well with school, work, church, and just everything.  I love you all so much, and am very grateful for your wonderful examples, love, and encouragement.  I pray you all have a wonderful week.  Break a leg in the show Sis.  I wish I could see it live!  You will do great.  

Love,

Elder Weaver

Well, That Was An Interesting Week!

November 6, 2012

Dear Family & Friends,

Well, that was an interesting week.  We spent a lot of time shifting plans around and helping take care of all the things around the mission for safety and the security of missionaries.  We are all well.  The storm did cause us to lose power for 2 days, along with several other sets of missionaries around the Cleveland and Kirtland area.  We stayed in the mission home 1 night with a couple of missionaries.  The longest set of missionaries with out power was about 4 days.  Some members just got power back on Sunday.  However, we were very blessed to have not been hit harder. Many flooded basements, and downed trees.  Most people deny help due to trees being on power lines and are calling professionals to pump out there basements.  We have offered many a time.  It sounds like great service is being rendered in the harder hit states though.  We have seen several articles about the help missionaries and stakes in New York and New Jersey are giving to the communities they are in.  Hearts are softened by these acts of charity and kindness.  People must just wonder where all of these smiling, hard working people come from.  

We had a great study time in the mission home while we stayed there during the storms. President Vellinga had all of us look up a scripture on storms and then teach each other about the doctrine it taught.  It was an awesome meeting.  A great edifying spirit attended and we each came to a greater knowledge of the power of the atonement and grew in our faith and trust in Jesus Christ and His enabling and strengthening power.  

After all the storms and things passed we held Mission Council with all the Zone Leaders, as well as the trainers meeting for all the new trainers for this next transfer.  Today is Arrival Day of all the new Elders and Sisters, so we will be taking them around today and doing some training with them tonight.  Then tomorrow is Transfers and Departures.  Everyone will find out who their new companion is and where they will be serving, and then we put our "trunky boots" on while we assist President in getting all the departing missionaries to the mission home for their final night and then off to the airport early tomorrow morning.  It amazes me how much faster time can fly when you are busy.  This last 6 weeks doesn't even feel like a week. 

We may have found a family.  We have made contact with both the wife and the husband and they are both interested.  Incredibly busy alternating schedules, but they have a desire to meet and come to church.  We are praying hard for them and the other investigators we have found recently. We have a goal to help 6 of our brothers and sisters enter into the covenant of baptism by the end of the year in our area and it’s completely possible.  We are striving to exercise our faith and to work diligently to find, teach, and baptize those who the Lord has prepared here in North Olmsted.

I hope you have been having a great week.  It sounds like the haunted garage was a success and that Christmas is already getting into full swing. Elder Metcalf loves Christmas ALOT. We have already listened to Christmas CD's several times. :)  Good thing I don't mind.  

I did receive a package from you, thank you so much.  I love the ginger snaps; they are the best.  I shared a few with President and Elder Metcalf and they loved them as well.  I thoroughly enjoyed the article and letter in there as well.  Small, small world we have.  All the time I am finding connections to people I know back home are here in the mission.  Tell the Kimball’s thank you for the Halloween package and letters.  Also, thank the Miller’s for sending a package a received when I was in Lima.  Tell both families I appreciate their love and encouragement, as well as the tasty treats.

Well I sure love you all and pray that you have a fantastic week.

Love,

Elder Weaver