5/29/18 | Happy Memorial Day!

 It has been a pretty crazy week!  First off, I just wanted to wish Grandpa Burr and happy birthday yesterday!  I hope you had a great birthday, thanks for your example to me of what a true Priesthood man looks like.  I hope you had a wonderful day with the family at the little reunion you guys had!  Love you and Grandma so much!  I’m grateful for both my Grandpa’s and their service in the military!  I was thinking a lot about them and all of our other veterans yesterday during Memorial Day, and I just wanted to say how grateful I am for those who have served and are serving our country!  We wouldn’t be here without their sacrifice!  Thank you!

       We had trainers meeting last Thursday down in Laramie, and it was another long drive!  It was a really good meeting!  One thing that we have been asked to do is carry around our missions Book Of Mormon challenge books we have been marking up since April.  We have been marking the names and titles of our Savior Jesus Christ, and it has definitely strengthened my testimony that The Book Of Mormon truly is Another Testament Of Jesus Christ!  They invited us to carry them around so that we can show and testify to people that The Book Of Mormon truly does testify of Christ, and that this is His gospel and His church!  We haven’t had any miraculous experiences yet, but a couple of weeks ago down in Wellington my last companion, Elder Gordon, and I were able to show and testify to our investigator Paul that it does indeed testify of Christ!  It was amazing!  So I know we will have more experiences up here in Casper like that one!  After all of the trainings, we had lunch then interviews with President McMurray.  Again, I must say that he is literally the greatest mission president on plant earth, I love him!  Our interview went amazing as usual, and we had some great discussion about some gospel questions I have.  He knows the gospel very very well, so it is always great to ask him questions.  At the end of our interview I asked him “How can I become a better missionary?”  We had a great talk about it. Then he told me this statement that struck me.  He said “The best missionaries are the best repenters!”  He stressed Daily Repentance and utilizing the Atonement each and every day!  This was such great advice!  I know it will help me become a better missionary.  Daily Repentance is not just for missionaries, it is for all of God’s children, each and every one of us!  I would invite you guys to think how you can utilize Daily Repentance in your lives.  I’m still learning how to apply the Atonement daily, but I know it will bless your life as you become a great repenter!  Honestly, you don’t only have to apply the Atonement when you make huge mistakes or commit serious sins, we can and should apply it for every minor mistake we make!  The Atonement encompasses all things, to where I can’t even comprehend it!  But I do know that we can be forgiven if our sins as we sincerely repent and make a change.  Just something to think about I guess!  Oh!  I was also able to have a temple recommend Interview with President McMurray as well.  My recommend was going to expire before my next interview with him, so we were able to have it then.  As soon as President started to recite each question by memory, the spirit filled the room!  It was amazing!  I love temple recommend interviews, they are so incredible!  It was so cool to have my mission president interview me for my recommend, what a cool opportunity!  I’m so grateful for Temples and Covenants that we can make in our lives!  What a blessing from our Heavenly Father!
    Last Wednesday night, right before we were about to go Tracting, Elder Trumbo turned to me and told me that he was really discouraged.  He said he was discouraged because we haven’t really been able to teach anybody yet (believe me, we’ve been scheduling appointments and doing our best to meet with investigators, but every lesson has fallen through so far.......), we haven’t found anyone super solid to teach in our area, and the other missionaries who we are living with right now have had a ton of success! (They are a training companionship too, and their second day they invited someone in their area to be baptized next month..... that didn’t help Elder Trumbo’s hopes too much.....).  FYI, if you didn’t know already, discouragement is one of satan’s biggest tools in his toolbox of lies!  These feelings are not from Heavenly Father!  Honestly, us not seeing “success” in our area yet hasn’t bothered me too much, because I’ve seen this a lot!  But it makes total sense why it would bother a new missionary.  As I thought about how to respond to this, I remembered when I was newer to my mission, and how I had these same feelings of discouragement! When I approached President McMurray about this same discouragement, he referred me to Ch. 1 of Preach My Gospel, on pg. 10-11, the section title is “A Successful Missionary.”  This helped me so much!  So of course we pulled off to the side of the road, and pulled our Preach My Gospel.  Elder Trumbo and I read this little section of Preach My Gospel together, and I was able to help him through the same concern I had early on in my mission.  That section really sets forth what true success is as a missionary. (I’d invite you guys to take a look at it, it is amazing!) I testified to him that if we put forth the effort and trusted in Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ, we would feel successful, know we are successful, and see success!  As many of your know, I’m all about a little hype and pump up all the time!  So we went forth, all pumped up, and tracted for the rest of the night until 9:00.  I was a little nervous about us seeing success, but I was comforted as I remembered who I put my trust in.  Within that hour and a half, we each handed our three copies of The Book Of Mormon each, and found seven potential investigators!  After we got back into the car, Elder Trumbo was smiling and said that he wasn’t discouraged anymore!  What a huge blessing and miracle we saw that night!  Heavenly Father provided us to see that success that night to comfort one of his missionaries, and strengthen another missionaries testimony.  I’m grateful for our Eternal Father and His son Jesus Christ, they are always watching out for us. :)

     Okay, honestly just barely, we had our sliding door open to our little deck in our apartment, and a fat ol squirrel came into our apartment!  I thought I was hallucinating at first, but it was a real squirrel!  We quickly scared him out!  Haha. I guess the last missionaries would feed him and let him in, but we didn’t want a dirty squirrel in our apartment.  

     One of the elders we live with, Elder Clark, and I got sick this past week.  It was a miserable three or four days, but I know Heavenly Father helped us get through the sickness we got!  We still have lingering effects, but now Elder Trumbo and Elder Clark’s companion, Elder Williamson, are getting the same sickness....... I guess it is going around Casper, but hopefully we all get better soon!!
     We were Tracting another night, and an older lady started to talk to us.  We told her who we were and she immediately rejected us, but she asked us if we could help her put up her flag for Memorial Day, so we did.  We had about an hour long conversation, (she was mostly talking and we were listening), but the whole time we were testifying to her about The Book Of Mormon and Jesus Christ.  She kept rejecting us, so we just patiently listened, and near the end she told us she was sorry for talking to us and ranting to us, but she hadn’t talked to anyone this much the whole winter.  That kinda shocked us.  At the end we offered her a copy of The Book Of Mormon again, and she accepted it.  It was cool to see the Spirit soften her heart over that period of time!  We showed her Christlike love, and she definitely felt it!  How amazing!
     Last Sunday we were able to finally meet the members of the ward!  We have a pretty sweet ward, so we are excited!  Our bishop is super missionary minded, and they are excited that we are serving in their ward!  Our bishop has asked us to meet every member of the ward, so yesterday we started to call the members and set up appointments to get to know them and share a message with them.  We are going to be super busy this week, so it should be a great week!  Also on Sunday, we had the most intense and incredible rain and hail storm I have ever been in happen!  We were going to give the other elders a ride since it was raining a little, then the craziness hit!  All the streets in Casper were flooding (seriously rivers on every street!), with the windshield wipers full blast you still couldn’t see, and the noise of the hail hitting the car was so loud we couldn’t hear each other talk without yelling!  It was so intense!  We saw a manhole/storm drain/sewer cover that was shooting up like a small geyser, it was absolutely nuts!  I’m grateful we had a car, because if we would have been walking in that weather, we would have been 100% soaked and bruised from all of the hail!  Haha.  I’ll send some pics of the baby geyser!

       In my studies this past week, Alma 15:18 stood out to me.  It reminded me of how we are to focus more on ministering to our fellow brothers and sisters. It states,

18 Now as I said, Alma having seen all these things, therefore he took Amulek and came over to the land of Zarahemla, and took him to his own house, and did administer unto him in his tribulations, and strengthened him in the Lord.

       Alma is a perfect example of a true minister, and how we can minister!  He saw that Amulek was going through a lot of hardships, that he had lost his family, his friends, and his possessions in his service and dedication to the Lord.  Alma nurtured him, ministered to him, and helped him get through his trials!  What an amazing example of how members and missionaries can minister more fully to all of Heavenly Fathers children!  I would invite each of you to think of how you can minister more fully to help all of Heavenly Father children feel His love and their Savior, Jesus Christ’s love for them!  I know that it will not only help them feel loved, but it will strengthen your testimony of this true Restored Gospel Of Jesus Christ!  I hope you all have a wonderful week!  Love you!

Love,

Elder Bailey



Pics:

1-2. Trainers Meeting w/ Elder Trumbo, saw Elder Judd and Elder Campbell as well!

3. Mission Tour pic from last week!

4. Squirrel that came in our apartment this morning.......

5. Baby geyser in the street.

5/22/18 | First week in Casper!

   It has been a pretty crazy week this past week!  I got a call from President McMurray yesterday informing me of the passing of my beloved Grandpa Bailey.  I was not too shocked because he has been sick for some time and slowly getting worse and worse, but it still hit me pretty hard.  When I heard, I thought of my sweet Grandma Rose, who so lovingly has taken care of Grandpa for a long time.  Grandma, I LOVE YOU!  You are such an incredible woman, thanks for loving and taking care of Grandpa so well.  You are a huge example of Christlike love and service to everyone who knows you, especially me.  Thank you, you have no idea how much you are appreciated!  I actually found out the morning of our mission tour, so I had a lot of very good friends there to support me during this tough day.  What a miracle it is to have loving friends to help us out when we are down!  My heart is saddened, but the knowledge of The Plan of Salvation has brought me great joy to know the Grandpa Bailey is in the Spirit World, resting from all the pains and trouble he experienced here on earth.  What a joy that brings me!! I love this Gospel with all of my heart, and it brings joy even through the rough times!  I am praying for you guys, especially Grandma Rose, Dad, Aunt Natalie, and Uncle Stu.  Love you guys so much :)
      Last Tuesday night I was able to meet my new companion, who is fresh out of the MTC!  His name is Elder Trumbo, and he is so awesome!  He is from Placencia, California, and he has a great desire to be a good missionary.  We’ve gotten along great so far, and we are looking forward to our transfer together!  It was sad to leave Elder Gordon and Wellington with all the work we had going on there, but that’s okay!  That is just how missions work!  Elder Trumbo and I got here to Casper on Wednesday, after a long drive from Colorado up to here.  On the way I was able to see a bunch of my best friends from my mission!  Elder Tippetts, Elder Judd, Elder Hatch, Elder Kimball, Elder Halladay, Elder Bennett, etc.  all such great friends, I love them!  Anyways, we made it to Casper, and turns out we didn’t have a place to live...... we were trying to figure things out and finally found some elders, Elder Williamson and Elder Clark, who would let us live with them, that was a huge headache but it was a great miracle that we have a place to sleep!  We are now in the process of finding a new apartment to stay in, so that should be good!  We will find one soon hopefully that is closer to our area!
    The second day we got here we went to Walmart to get some essentials.  As we were at the checkout, a man approached us.  He said, “are ya’ll Mormons?”  We replied to him yes, then he asked “okay, well I just got one question for you.  If Joseph Smith lost the gold plates, why wasn’t anyone mad at him?”  This sparked up an amazing conversation!  We explained to this man that Joseph Smith did not lose the plates, but he returned them to Angel Moroni, the same angel that guided him to where they were deposited, after he was done translating them.  After we said this the man said, “oh, well that makes more sense.”  We testified to him that through reading and praying to know The Book Of Mormon is true is how we find out if the gold plates were real and if Joseph Smith is a Prophet Of God.  He then looked deep in thought, and then pulled out his business card and said “here’s my card, give us a call and we’d love to have you over for dinner sometime!”  We told them we would, and they left.  Wow!  They told us that they had met missionaries in Fort Morgan, Colorado.  I have had a lot of these “random encounters” on my mission, but they are not random at all!  Heavenly Father placed them in our path to help them feel the Spirit, and we know through us testifying that him and his wife felt something, and wanted us to come over to their house, how amazing!!  Later that same day, we saw a man out in his driveway, so we immediately went and spoke with him.  Turns out half of his family is Mormon!  We asked if we could come by and share a message sometime, and he said we could!  We got his information and tried to visit him a few days ago, but they weren’t home.  We will try both of these people this week!  How amazing!
     I had the opportunity and privilege to conduct a Baptismal Interview with a lady who was scheduled to be baptized this Saturday.  Her name was Rana.  It was the most Spiritual Baptismal Interview I’ve ever performed!  As we had our interview, she told me her conversion story, and it was amazing!  As she testified to me and shared her testimony, I couldn’t help but feel the Spirit!  It was so so strong!  We talked about eternal families, and I was able to testify to her how I’ve seen the gospel bless my families life!  I welled up with tears many times because of the powerful spirit that was within the room.  At the end of the interview, we both were in tears, so I went to grab the box of tissues that were in the high council room.  I gave her one, then I grabbed one and they were the only two tissues left in the box!  Miracle!  I told her how that is definitely a tender mercy from Heavenly Father, and we both laughed because of how randomly amazing that was!  We were able to attend her baptism the next day, and it was a really sweet.  She is one of the most solid converts I’ve ever met!  I can’t wait to find more Rana’s within our area!  We know they are out there!!  It gave us hope to find people like her!
    On the way home from the Adult Session Of Stake Conference last Saturday night, we felt impressed to go and visit an investigator who we haven’t met yet.  It was 8:45 p.m. and she has a couple of little kids, but we followed what the Spirit prompted us to do and went to visit her.  Her husband answered and was very nice to us!  We asked if we could come back and they said we could!  We got their last name and phone number so we can contact them!  It was amazing to be able to follow the subtle prompting of the Spirit, and know that it was what Heavenly Father wanted us to do!  I’m grateful that we have the Spirit with us to guide us each and every single day!  Amazing miracle!
    We had Elder Rawson Of the 6th Quorum of the Seventy attend our Stake Conference.  He is such an inspired man!  One thing he testified to us during Stake Conference that we need to turn to Christ!  He said that we can find joy and we turn to Him, and that Jesus Christ and His Atonement are the biggest miracles of all!  Man it was so inspiring to hear from him.
     We had our Mission Tour with Elder Wilford W. Anderson of the Seventy just yesterday, and it was absolutely amazing!  We drove down to Cheyenne Sunday night where it was being held, and stayed with Elder Hatch.  It was fun to catch up with Elder Hatch!  We came down for a choir practice Sunday night, and Elder Judd and I sang in the choir together!  It reminded me of in the MTC.  Elder Judd and I would sing in the MTC choir together, so it was awesome to sing with him again!  We practiced one more time Mondaymorning (singing our mission song) and then had an amazing meeting with instruction from President and Sister McMurray, and Elder Wilford W. Anderson and his wife Cathleen.  What an inspiring meeting!  I wish I could explain what was taught, but there was too much it would probably double what my long emails are already like!  Haha.  I personally learned so much!  Elder Anderson invited us to focus on convert Baptisms more!  He said to find, find, find, teach with confidence, and find the elect!!  During the second portion of the meeting, we had both Cheyenne Stake presidents, President Bailey and President Brown, for a Q/A with both them, President McMurray, and Elder Anderson.  It was so amazing!  We discussed how we can work with members more effectively!  Man it was amazing!  So much information I wish I could share..... one quote I would like to share is this.  Elder Anderson stated, “We don’t serve because of our callings, we serve because of our Covenants!  We are never released from our Covenants.” Amazing!  Remember that each of us, calling or no calling, has a duty and a promise that we’ve made at baptism, and in the temple.  We need to live up to those promises we’ve made with our Heavenly Father, so amazing!
      We had a great lunch between the instruction and Q/A, and I was able to see a few old members of the wards that I served in here in Cheyenne!  And the lunch was amazing as always!  After the meetings, we said our byes to friends, and we had scheduled dinner with Jan, a recent convert member I got to know really well in Cheyenne.  Between then and dinner, we were able to go and say hi to the Weber’s, honestly one of my favorite member families I’ve met on my mission!  It was so fun to see them again!  They are incredible, and make me feel like their own child.  I love them!  We had a wonderful dinner with Jan and her non member son Lucas.  She is struggling a little bit, and we were able to talk with her.  She is amazing!  It was fun to catch up with Lucas as well.  After dinner we headed back up to Casper.  A lot of driving in the past couple of days, sheesh!!
       One thing I studied this past week was in Alma 9:26-28 which states,

26 And not many days hence the Son of God shall come in his glory; and his glory shall be the glory of the Only Begotten of the Father, full of grace, equity, and truth, full of patience, mercy, and long-suffering, quick to hear the cries of his people and to answer their prayers.
27 And behold, he cometh to redeem those who will be baptized unto repentance, through faith on his name.
28 Therefore, prepare ye the way of the Lord, for the time is at hand that all men shall reap a reward of their works, according to that which they have been--if they have been righteous they shall reap the salvation of their souls, according to the power and deliverance of Jesus Christ; and if they have been evil they shall reap the damnation of their souls, according to the power and captivation of the devil.

       Jesus Christ, our Lord and Savior, has prepared the way for each of us to gain Faith, Repent, be Baptized, receive the Gift of the Holy Ghost, Endure to the End, and live forever with Him and our Heavenly Father again!  I love Him tremendously for this!  He is absolutely the greatest miracle in my life, and in all of our lives!  It reminds me of the hymn, “I Stand All Amazed.”  I truly am amazed at what He has done for me.  I’d just invite each of you to think of how the Savior has impacted you in your life, and always remember what He has done for you.  And to truly thank Heavenly Father for the gift he has given to us of eternal life!  I know that I will see my sweet Grandpa Bailey again!  The Plan of Salvation is absolutely true!  It brings closure to the wounded heart, comfort to the weak, and reassures us that we WILL see our loved ones once again!  Grandpa Bailey will be missed, he has been such a blessing in my life and in the lives of all who he has met.  I love you Grandpa, and I know I will see you again!  I hope you all have a great week!  Love you!

Love,
Elder Bailey

Pics:

1: Meeting Elder Trumbo for the first time!  He’s such a stud!

2-4: Saying bye to Elder Gordon, Elder Bennett, and Elder Halladay & Elder Kimball! (Three generations :)

5/15/18 | Bye Wellington!

  Wow, this week has been amazing!  We’ve seen a lot of miracles!  Congratulations to my sister Alyssa and my new bro in law on getting sealed in the Provo City Center Temple!  So happy for you two!  Still can’t wait to meet you Jake! Mother’s Day made it that much more incredible!  It was so fun to talk with you guys! :). I’m so eternally grateful for the mother I have in my life!  Mom, you are absolutely incredible!  I LOVE YOU! it was so fun to talk to you and the fam.  I’m so grateful for you guys!  Like I said, we heard last Saturday night about transfers, and I’m leaving Wellington!  I was kinda sad because of all the success we’ve been starting to see recently, but I know it is what the Lord wants!  I don’t know who my companions going to be, because he is coming straight from the MTC! We should have a fun transfer together.  I’m excited to meet him tonight!  I’m really sad to be leaving still because Elder Gordon and I get along extremely well, and he is an absolute stud!  But I can’t wait to meet my new companion tonight, it will be so sweet!!
    Elder Gordon and I were out visiting Potentials we had found previously while Tracting, and we had the thought to go visit a less active family who we hadn’t been able to get in contact with yet.  Let me tell you, it wasn’t a “random” thought, it was definitely a prompting!  The wife answered the door, and we had a good few minute conversation, then she offered us water, and we accepted.  She told us to sit down in the patio furniture and we talked with her for about an hour getting to know her and her two little girls.  They are so amazing!  After our conversation, she invited us over for dinner in a couple of weeks, and said we could come back and share a message then!  We are hoping to help them find their way back onto the covenant path!  It was such a miracle to be able to talk with them!  
     We had a member, Richard Hopkins the second, give us 15 dollars a piece to get lunch, we were so grateful!  He is the best, I’m glad I was able to meet him!  We decided to go to Subway to get some specialty five dollar subs!  We went in and there was an old man sitting at a table.  As soon as we walked in, we looked at each other and immediately I knew this old man from somewhere!  I started thinking back through old areas, and couldn’t think of his name!  Right before we paid with the money we got from Richard Hopkins, he slapped a 20 dollar bill down and told the cashier that the next two sandwich’s were on him.  We got our sandwich’s, and approached him.  I told him I knew him from somewhere, and asked what his name was.  He said “Dwayne Stevenson!”  Haha I knew I knew this guy! Turns out he was a less active guy from the Prairie View Ward in Cheyenne that I had worked with almost a year ago!  We had a good conversation, and we asked him if he had gone to church in awhile.  He said he hadn’t, so we invited him to do so!  He said he will!  Amazing!  I definitely know Heavenly Father had us cross paths so that we could invite him to go to church!  And he is from Preston, Idaho, and guess who is also from Preston?  Elder Gordon!!  They graduated from the same high school (only like 64 years apart but still!). It was not a coincidence we ran into him, it was incredible!
    Miracle on Main Street! Back at it again.  Elder Gordon and I made it a goal to walk up and down Main Street in Wellington each night from 8:30-9:00, and we’ve been able to talk with so many people!  We were on an offshoot street, and we saw a guy getting out of his car.  So we went over, introduced ourselves and started talking to him.  He said he and his wife were about to go eat dinner, but that we could come back on a weekend in the morning.  It was so cool to see how receptive he was!!  We tried going back on the weekend, but he didn’t answer.  Elder Gordon will go try him next week!  It is cool to see how the Lord puts people into our paths as we put forth the effort!  We then taught him the Plan of Salvation, and went over the first half then went really in depth in the second part.  We were able to share Bible verses about the plan of Salvation with him (Spirit World 1 Peter 3-4, Kingdoms Of Glory 1 Corinthians 15, etc.).  Paul loved how pretty much the whole Plan of Salvation is outlined in the Bible!  He loves the idea of perfected bodies and thinks it is crazy to imagine how BIG the Atonement actually is.  After we taught the lesson, and throughout the whole lesson, the Spirit was very strong!  We asked him if he felt the Spirit, and he said he did feel it right then and throughout the whole lesson!  We testified to him that the Holy Ghost was testifying of truth, and that what we taught him was absolutely true!  We told him why we extend commitments, because those are the ways you can feel this same Spirit when we come whenever you do what we invite him to do!  We invited him to continue to read and pray, and attend church when he can. He said he would.  We testified to him how much the gospel will bless his family!  We were able to testify of how we personally have seen the gospel of Jesus Christ bless our families and our parents.  We testified to him how much his marriage would be blessed if it was based in the gospel!  At that moment the Spirit was so strong, and Paul got really teary eyed.  He offered to say the closing prayer, and was choking up while saying it.  How amazing!  We helped him recognize and understand the Spirit, so incredible!  :). After the prayer he told us that it might take awhile but he wants him and his wife on the same page with the gospel in his family!  What a miracle of a lesson!  I know they will be baptized someday, and I hope I can attend it!
      Mother’s Day was incredible, for two reasons!  We found two new investigators, and we set up three return appointments with Potentials from Tracting!  It was fantastic!  Then to wrap it all up, we got to call home!  Again, it was amazing to be able to speak face to face with my family, guys I love you so much!!  I’m glad that everything worked to where we could FaceTime.  Took a little to find that good WiFi because of the storm here in Fort Collins, but I’m glad we got connected!  I’m again so grateful for not only my mom in my life, but for my Grandma Burr and Grandma Bailey, you are all such amazing examples to me!  Thanks for the incredible amount of love you have shown me throughout my life, it has helped me become who I am today!  I hope you guys had a great one!  :)
      We had a lesson with Mike yesterday, and we quickly started with a prayer as soon as we got there.  We then followed up about his reading, and he was honest that he didn’t get much in because of his back pain and having to get a shot in his back.  We then read Mosiah 17-18 with him, and talked about the chapters afterwards.  We asked Mike again if he knew The Book Of Mormon was the word of God, if Joseph Smith was a prophet of God, and if he had a desire to be baptized.  He answered Yes for all of the questions!  We then invited him to be baptized on July 14th, (he still needs some time, slowly but surely, but he is progressing very well!  He is also out of town for some weeks, so we needed to push it until then :)), and he accepted!  It was amazing!  We expressed our love for him, and that we were going to be there for him every step of the way to help him to get to that Baptismal date!  It was an amazing lesson!  We loved it, and Mike seemed so happy at the end!  He was sad to hear I was leaving, but I told him I would love to come back to his baptism!  Another Miracle!  :)
      Yesterday I got the chance to say bye to Paul, the Rhodes, and the Whittiers.  These are some amazing individuals I’ve met here in Wellington.  We had a great time talking with Paul, and we got to take pics with him. (In the pic we are wearing some nice ties he gave us!). Later that day we said bye to the Rhodes, and they gave us cookies!  We had a great talk with them, they said I can visit anytime!  :).  Then the last people we said bye to were the Whittiers.  Wow, Sister Whittier even made Elder Gordon and I some legit Wellington T-Shirts!  They are so amazing!  We taught them a lesson and helped them start to set up their family mission plan, so it was awesome talking with them.  They are so amazing too!  I’ve been so blessed to be here in Wellington, I’m gonna miss this place, but Casper will be amazing too!
      In my studies this past week Alma 5:7 stood out to me, it states,

7 Behold, he changed their hearts; yea, he awakened them out of a deep sleep, and they awoke unto God. Behold, they were in the midst of darkness; nevertheless, their souls were illuminated by the light of the everlasting word; yea, they were encircled about by the bands of death, and the chains of hell, and an everlasting destruction did await them.

       So first off, I gained a greater love for Alma 5!  Wow!  It is absolutely amazing!  I would invite each of you to read it.  But this verse stood out to me when it talks about the “light of the everlasting word;”. Immediately, I thought of what this could mean, and I thought of how this is the Savior!  Our Savior, Jesus Christ, is the light that shines in the darkness!  He is the light!  And it was amazing how it stated how their souls were illuminated by Him.  We can each be illuminated by our Savior!  But we can’t just expect this to come, we have to do what’s necessary, and we can be truly illuminated by Him!  I would invited each of you to think how you can be illuminated by Jesus Christ more in your life, and to do what is necessary to become such!  He wants to illuminate each of us, but we just have to have that desire and act!  I hope each of you have a great week!  I love you!  Thanks for the support! :) 

Love,

Elder Bailey 

Pics:

1: Mother’s Day Call!

2. Bye to Paul the man!

3: bye to the Rhodes

4: bye to the Whittiers

5. Cake and Candy supply business still going strong! Haha

5/8/18 | So many Miracles!!

What a great week this past week!  Thanks for the package mom and dad!  I got all of the groomsmen stuff for Alyssa’s wedding, I’m so excited for you and Jake to get married this Saturday Alyssa!  Congratulations!  Can’t wait!  Wish I could be there, but that’s okay, I’m where I’m supposed to be!  I hope that it isn’t too stressful for you guys the next week!  I’ll be praying for you!  Hope everything goes according to plan!  Well, let me tell you guys about how amazing our week was this week!
    After P-day last week, we felt prompted to go tract out some low income town houses, and it was so incredible! We were able to meet a college girl named Naomi.  We talked with her and she seemed really interested!  She accepted a copy of The Book Of Mormon, and we invited her to read from it.  She said she was busy with studying for finals, but she would find some time to do so!  We are following up with her tonight, and hopefully teach her The Restoration!  We are so excited for that!  We also met a man named Steve.  He was headed out his door to a baseball game, but we asked him if we could come back and share a message about Jesus Christ.  He said he’d love to hear it!  We weren’t able to stop by later last week, but we will this week!  It was so cool to receive that prompting, act upon that, and see the blessings that came for doing so.  I know that we can all receive revelation!  I am so grateful that we have the Holy Ghost in our lives!
    District Meeting last week was awesome!  President Goodell came, he is the first counselor in our Mission Presidency.  It was so good to have him there!  He has so many insights that no one else would even think of!  He is an inspiring man!  One of our main focus’s was working with members.  We had a lot of amazing insight, and President Goodell commented that it was exactly what we needed to be talking about!  We were able to come up with some great ideas, and we are all going to implement a strictly missionary minded dinner lesson that focus’s on simple invitations everyone can invite others to do so it isn’t as daunting.  We hope and pray that it will pay off!  It is a lot easier to do missionary work when there are 250 missionaries (members) within a ward, rather than just two full-time missionaries!  Members need to be the finders, and we as full-time missionaries are called to be teachers!  We are going to help all of our wards be more missionary minded!  Can’t wait to see this amazing change!  We will see so much more success!  
   We had our “No Drive Day” or Car Fast this past Saturday.  We were on foot all day, and it was so awesome!  We literally talked to everyone we could, and it felt absolutely incredible to speak to all of God’s children we could!  We had some pretty cool experiences.  We saw a Uhaul truck in front of someone’s house, so we went up and asked the people outside if they needed any help.  They said they had just barely finished for the day.  The guy came up to us and told us how he is moving to Cedar City, Utah and how much more stuff he had to pack up and take down there.  We told him that we could definitely help him pack up his stuff.  He was so appreciative that we offered to do that!  He said we could come back this upcoming Thursday and help him out.  He then told us how ironic it was for us to offer to help him pack up.  He said that a few days prior, in Cedar City, two missionaries came up and offered to help them move in!  He thought that was the coolest thing ever, that in two separate places, the missionaries had “run into him” and offered to help out.  What a cool miracle we were a part of!  This wasn’t “ironic” at all, but a divine coincidence where Heavenly Father sent four of His servants to one of His precious children and their family to provide service.  How incredible!  We don’t know if something will come out of this, but Christlike service changes people’s hearts!  Amazing stuff.  It felt good to be “On the Lord’s Errand!”
   That same Saturday, we had a lesson with Jeremiah.  He has been put through the ringer!  He got laid off from work and is now dealing with that.  The adversary is truly working at him, but we had a good lesson about Alma 32.  We read the whole chapter, and talked about how Faith can get us through these tough times!  We also testified to him that through reading the Book Of Mormon, he can feel love and comfort through the power of the Holy Ghost!  He said he would make a greater effort to read this week. He also came to church with his little baby son, it was amazing!  He really enjoyed it there, and we know he felt the Spirit!  He is progressing well!  We stopped by quickly before service last Thursday to see how Mike was doing.  He told us he has had some bad back pains recently.  That’s been tough for him, but he said he still wants to continue to read and pray!  He narrowed his Baptismal date down to July, so we are working with him to pray about a specific date to be baptized in that month.  We are so excited for him!  Can’t wait for him to set that goal and make that leap of Faith!  We weren’t able to meet with Paul, he had some more family stuff going on.  But we will this next week!!
    We were visiting a Potential Investigator who told us we could come back and talk with her husband, who would love to talk with us.  So we stopped by, and right as we were about to knock, they pulled into their driveway.  The husband got out and we told him who we were and that his wife said we could come talk with him.  He was so happy we had come, and invited us into his home to talk.  What an amazing discussion/lesson it was!  He is a Fundamental Independent Baptist, and he first asked us “what are you guys out here sharing?”  We told him a message about Jesus Christ.  He then asked, “what sets you apart from other Christian faiths and what I believe?”  We testified to him that we have a prophet on the earth today, and proper priesthood authority from God!  He then had us sit down, and we had a very peaceful spiritual lesson with him.  He asked us many questions, and we answered them all boldly.  We pretty much taught him the whole Plan of Salvation, and it was amazing!  We could feel the Spirit testifying what we were telling him to be true.  He told us he wished he understood more about life before earth, about God’s plan for us, and what Jesus Christ was doing for three days after his death and before his resurrection.  We answered all of these with boldness, and he would say “oh yeah, that makes total sense.”  He read us some scriptures that he said Baptists use against Mormons, but it was not even what the scripture meant, haha.  But one of his main concerns was that The Book Of Mormon would be adding onto the Bible, and he didn’t understand why we need prophets and priesthood authority now because he thinks Jesus was enough.  We offered him a copy of The Book Of Mormon, and he gladly accepted it.  We invited him to read it and pray about it. He said he would, but he then said this, “what if while I read from The Book Of Mormon, and I find a teaching that contradicts the Bible?”  We told him we didn’t know of any, but if he found any we’d love to hear it!  After we said this, he kinda took it as a personal challenge to read all of it and see if it contradicted the Bible.  That is a dangerous wish of his, because we know that as he reads, he will be filled with the Spirit of the Lord!  He will not find anything that contradicts, but will find Jesus Christ’s gospel explained clearly and simply!  It was awesome to be able to put all of our trust and faith in The Book Of Mormon!  We can’t wait to hear how his reading goes!!  Amazing!  While we spoke, he told us that his kind of baptist church, Fundamental Independent Baptist, knows the Bible super well!  He invited us to come to his church sometime, because we knew the Bible really well too.  I was a little shocked about this.  I don’t think I know the Bible too well, but what I do know is that Heavenly Father inspires us and helps us with Heavenly knowledge.  I know he helped us with bible knowledge as we taught this man.  I am truly grateful for Heavenly help!!!
    After dinner yesterday, we went and contacted some potentially interested people from Tracting.  The first one told us he was busy through his window while cooking dinner when we first knocked on his door, and he told us to come back.  We finally made it back to his house, and he came out and spoke with us.  He said he had just sat down to feed his son, and asked if we only do this in the evenings.  We told him we do this all day!  He asked if we could come back earlier at around 11:00 ish.  We said we definitely will.  He told us he works with a couple of Mormons in his office, and he asked about our missions.  We had a good conversation, then Elder Gordon came in clutch and offered him a copy of The Book Of Mormon, invited him to read it, and said that this is what we will be going over when we come back.  The guy, Shane, asked us where he should start reading.  We told him from the very beginning would be awesome!  We can’t wait to go visit Shane and his family!!  We also talked with another guy, Chris, who we had tracted into the same night we met Shane.  He told us he was swamped with the national guard, and was actually headed to Camp Williams in Utah for most of June.  We were able to get his phone number, then Elder Gordon came in for round 2!  He offered him a copy of The Book Of Mormon and Christ accepted it.  We invited him to read and pray about it!  It was so amazing!  We are starting to truly see the fruits from our labors, and finding more and more people who are interested!  We love it!!!
     In my studies this past week, I read Mosiah 3:19, (most of you probably know this one, but I love it!) it says,

19 For the natural man is an enemy to God, and has been from the fall of Adam, and will be, forever and ever, unless he yields to the enticings of the Holy Spirit, and putteth off the natural man and becometh a saint through the atonement of Christ the Lord, and becometh as a child, submissive, meek, humble, patient, full of love, willing to submit to all things which the Lord seeth fit to inflict upon him, even as a child doth submit to his father.

     I love this scripture!  What I’ve come to realize is that putting off the “Natural Man” is an absolutely daily constant fight and battle that can get easier over time, but that we must Never Let Our Guard Down!!  As we fight daily, we need to remember that we are on the winning team!  Satan wants us to lose and be miserable like he is, but as we learn to always put on the full Armor of God, and never let our guard down, we will be blessed tremendously with extra strength against the adversary!  Always remember to NEVER LET YOUR GUARD DOWN!  I hope you all have a great week.  Thanks for all the support, love you guys! :)


Love,
Elder Bailey



Pics:

1-2: Brother Woolerys truck!  We brought him to our lesson with Jeremiah! He’s awesome! 

3. Found this while walking around all day, rabid animals! 

4. All the groomsman stuff I got in the mail for Alyssa’s wedding!  Haha pretty nice stuff, thanks to the fam! :) love you guys! 

5/1/18 | Miracles on Main Street!

   Another great week serving in the Colorado Fort Collins Mission!  We had Zone Conference this past week in Greeley, and it was amazing!  In preparation for Zone Conference, President and Sister McMurray asked us to read “A Consecrated Missionary” Talk by Elder Callister.  Man what an amazing talk!  After I read that talk, I was inspired and found out I need to improve on many different levels to truly become a consecrated missionary!  I have a lot to improve on, but I’m not getting discouraged!  The Zone Conference was focused on Faith in Jesus Christ. Here are a couple of thoughts that President McMurray shared.  He told us that Faith requires Action!  He shared with us a BYU Devotional by President Kevin J. Worthen.  It was titled something like “Fear Not, A Great Commandment”.  It was given last year at the beginning of the school year.  Wow what a talk!  In this talk he states that the kind of fear he is talking about means this, False Evidence Appearing Real.  He said there are four steps to help us Fear Not.  1. Recognize and Remember that this comes from satan.  2. Serve Others more to increase Faith, and decrease Fear.  3. Faith is a decision and a choice! And 4. Do not Doubt! Choose to have Faith!  As missionaries, satan tries to make us have this fear.  The be afraid to talk with everyone is one of the biggest!  President McMurray told us this later in the conference, “If you want to Baptize more people, know more people, talk with more people, seek referrals from everyone! (There always has to be someone they know!) and Ask for introductions.”  Elder Gordon and I are taking this to heart!  We have committed to talk with everyone we can, so we can Baptize more here in Wellington!  Our hard work is paying off thus far, but it is only going to get better from here!  Wellington was considered a “dead area” when Elder Burke and I first were whitewashed into the area.  It has been amazing to see how hard work can transform an area!  And I know that as Elder Gordon and I work tirelessly each and every day, and go out of our way to speak with everyone, that we will see more and more miracles and find more and more people to teach!  What I’ve learned on my mission is that Hard Work and Obedience are the keys to success!  Heavenly Father will magnify you and help you as you do your best and give it your all!  After Zone Conference, we had interviews with President McMurray, and man how amazing they were!  I don’t know what it is, but every interview I have with President, I always come out so invigorated to do missionary work!  He is like the ultimate “Hype!”  And man do I love me some Hype!!! He is honestly the greatest Mission President I could have asked for, and I’m still convinced he is #1 worldwide!  On our drive home from Zone Conference, Elder Gordon and I set many goals to help us become what Heavenly Father needs us to become, and it has been so awesome!  I will continue to let you guys know how that goes, because it has been amazing so far!  

       From Zone Conference, Elder Gordon and I applied what we learned, and we decided to do something that Elder Tippetts, one of my former companions, had done which brought a bunch of success.  We told Heavenly Father that we would be on Main Street in Wellington, walking around, every night, at 8:30-9:00.  We know that as we let Him know that we would be there, and as we talked with everyone, He would send someone to us who is ready to learn more!  8:30-9:00 is honestly super unproductive, especially in Wellington.  People get mad at us to trying to knock on their doors so late, everyone is sleeping, etc.  So we knew that this would help out so much!  That first night we were able to put our plan in action, we were able to talk with five people!  That was awesome!  The next night we talked to more people.  Then on the 3rd night of doing this, last Friday, we were able to talk to three teenagers playing basketball.  The leader of the trio talked with us, and he said he wasn’t too religious.  We told him what we do as missionaries, and how we invite everyone to read from The Book Of Mormon, and pray to ask God to know if it is true.  He gladly accepted a copy, and told us he would read it.  We got his number to follow up this week with him!  What a cool miracle! We call this little finding activity, Miracle on Main Street!  And boi have we seen so many miracles so far!  We can’t wait to see more in the coming days and weeks we do this!!  Heavenly Father wants to bless us, but we have to put forth the effort and ask for His help and guidance.  It will come, if we exercise our Faith!

       We had a correlation meeting with our Ward Mission Leader, and he told us how the dinner with Paul’s family went, one of our Investigators.  He told us that Paul’s family had a blast, and that they were able to meet Paul’s wife and befriend her!  This was a crucial step in Paul’s progression, because we know that once his wife see’s the blessings of the gospel and meets amazing families within the ward, she will have a desire to learn more!  Another huge miracle for this week!  

       We had a good lesson with Mike last Saturday, and he narrowed down a Baptismal date in the month of July.  He doesn’t know which Saturday yet, but he wants to set that date and that goal to work towards!  We read The Book Of Mormon with him, and invited him to again prayerfully set a date that he thinks would be good.  You may be thinking that July is kinda far out, which we did too!  But he has been meeting with missionaries since 2016, and hasn’t ever come to church.  He told us he knows The Book Of Mormon is true, and it is the word of God.  We invited him to come to church, and he almost came!  He said his puppy is almost old enough to stay by himself.  We invited him to start with just coming to Sacrament Meeting, then to work towards going for all three hours.  He said that sounds really good!  I am confident that Heavenly Father will help us get Mike to church!  I know that miracles happen, so we will continue to have Faith and High Expectations.  Mike will come, I just know it!  We weren’t able to meet with Jeremiah, because his son was sick.  And Paul was busy doing a service for a family member, so we couldn’t meet with them either.  We will this week though!  It should be good!

       Paul and his daughter Danika came to church this past Sunday!  Danika loved primary once again, and Paul loved church as well.  Everyone is so loving toward them, and Paul feels so welcome and loved by the ward!  Slowly but surely him and his family are progressing towards the gospel.  It will happen!  I know it will!  Our investigator Scott came to church too!  He made it late and attended the City Park Ward, but he still came!  How amazing!  It was so awesome to have three investigators at church, what a huge blessing.  

       This past Sunday night we had two people to visit, two less active families.  We were able to bring Brother Gann with us!  He is a big burly guy, about my height, but was a big football player at CSU.  He has a super clean and mean lookin beard as well.  He is an awesome guy, and we were glad we could have him with us!  The first family didn’t answer, even when we saw them pull up...... awkward.  But on the second visit, no one was home either.  That was a bummer, so we walked back out to our cars on the street and talked to a little bit about missionary work and the elders Quorum.  About five minutes, we saw a car coming up the street, and sure enough it was the people we were going to visit!  They stopped and said we could come in, so we had a great contact with them.  It was actually a member and his non-member wife.  His wife didn’t participate in the conversation, but she was really nice to us.  We got to know this member, his name was Chris, and it went very well!  He told us about his life, and a main reason why he stopped going to church.  We then talked about his mission.  He served in the Dominican Republic, and love his experience there!  We shared a lesson about Helaman 5:12, and after we taught him a little, he shared with us a really cool miracle he saw on his mission that lead to the person, and her husband, they found to get baptized!  As he shared that experience, a sweet Spirit filled the room.  After he finished, we testified to him that he could feel that same happiness, joy, and love that he felt on his mission, if he built his foundation upon our Rock, Jesus Christ, and did the small things, like read the Book Of Mormon, pray, and attend church.  We invited him to do so, and then closed.  The Spirit was so strong, and we could see that he felt it!  It was so amazing!  Whenever someone talks about their mission, I feel the Spirit.  What a strong experience we had.  It is amazing how many of these experiences I have seen on my mission, what a blessing that is!  We know that Chris will come closer to Jesus Christ, and come back to church!  We are hoping to teach his wife too!  Amazing!

       Elder Gordon and I were able to help clean the Fort Collins Temple yesterday!  What an experience!  We were in all white scrubs, vacuuming and cleaning each room in the temple.  One crazy thing is about the carpets in the temple.  We were instructed to vacuum right to left, then we were to use carpet rakes to make sure there were absolutely zero lines left in the carpet.  This task was rough, but once we did it, it looks immaculate!  We cleaned from 8:00 yesterday morning to noon.  It was so cool to be some of the only people in the temple with vacuums, cleaning the Lord’s house!  After we finished, the assistant custodial guy gave us an exclusive tour of the temple, it was amazing!  What an amazing experience.  The peace, love, comfort, hope, and joy that comes from being in the temple is absolutely incredible!  I love being in the temple and feeling these feelings.  I know that Heavenly Father loves us so much!  He want the best for each of us!  We should all have that goal of getting to the temple!  The temple is truly the House Of The Lord!  

       This letter is getting a bit long, but I need to share this good scripture with you I read this week!  It is very simple and short, but just think about its counsel.  It is in Jacob 6:12,

12 O be wise; what can I say more?

       If we truly follow Heavenly Fathers council and as we follow The Gospel Of Jesus Christ, we can find that pure joy and see miracles happen in our lives!  We need to be wise, and follow these teachings!  If we are foolish and don’t follow these teachings, then we won’t see the blessings that come.  Let us all be wise, and remember the promises to the faithful from the Lord!  I love you guys so much, and hope you have a fantastic week!  

Love,

Elder Bailey 

Pics:

1. I actually got 3rd place in the “Safeguards for Using Technology” quiz!  Let’s go!

2. Zone Conference pic

3. After our temple cleaning assignment!  

4. Biggest Campbell’s soup in the WORLD!