Aug 31, 2015

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As you can tell, I didn't know what to put as my subject. I bought these sweet shorts last Monday and got some ugly ties from goodwill. They were like 3 dollars each. Oh my I love them so much. 

Then we had specialized training on Tuesday, three zones were there, that was awesome. We had really good training on the doctrine of Christ, we focus on that a lot in this mission. Every meeting is about that and better teaching techniques. It was a slower week. The weather has been amazing. Most of the days it never got higher than 75°. Yeah AZ is still probably an oven. (only 105° with 80% humidity)  

Unfortunately we've had a lot of things fall through this week and some investigators fell off date and one moved away. But we are still moving forward, and speaking of moving, we finally moved! Oh this apartment is much nicer. It has A/C and a washer and dryer inside!!(sorry Michael) (brother in Ghana who hand washes everything) oh so so good. We are trying to move our work more up north so this is good. Plus it's right next to the church which is good since we are on bikes .Yesterday this drunk guy who looked like a goat tried comparing God to Santa claus. Drunk people are so annoying. and there's so many. 

It's pretty cool, I can see myself changing. I am different than who I was before. I understand a lot more and I actually love studying the scriptures. My faith in Jesus Christ has increased so much, and I've come to know Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ a lot more and what I mean to them. I am so grateful to be on a mission. I know this is the Restored church of Jesus Christ. I love it here. PEACE

Elder Verdoni

Letter to Mom

and yes i moved the apartment is sooooo nice, much better.  It's a little smaller but so much better. and really close to the church . The weather this week was beautiful. never got above 85°, a little humid this weekend though. Oh they put these tracker things in all the cars to monitor driving. The President taught about the doctrine of Christ. He is awesome. He loves drawing diagrams, he had four huge chalkboards full of stuff. He's so funny I love him. 

I don't know if I ever told you about them, but we have senior service missionaries here, the Bassetts. I love them so much, they treat us like their grandkids. Elder Bassett does so much for us. Every Sunday night we go over to there apartment and have ice cream and have a spiritual thought. On Saturday it was the last hour of the day and we had this assignment from Bishop to see a less active, so we decided we should do that. Elder Bassett took us to this guy's house. Turns out he hasn't been to church in a while because he's going through a hard time. He has four girls and they don't know. He wants to fix it but doesn't know how. He was crying at the end of the prayer and really needed a visit. It was a really cool experience. We had dinner at our bishops house last night, it was really nice getting to know him and his family. That's been my week so far! love ya!

Aug 24, 2015

This Week Was...Electrifying

So we've been teaching this sweet family, the 'F's, and they are just awesome. They are progressing and they have a baptismal date for the 12th. They own two beautiful chows and they can get a little rowdy. So 'J' has this taser that he uses on them. I saw the taser and so naturally I tasered myself. That was very fun! Then right before we left, Elder Heiner didn't want to be shown up so 'J' tasered him. 

The next day we found out our entire neighborhood could hear us when our windows are open. Elder Heiner then immediately sang all the versus to 'If you could hie to Kolob.' Our neighbor asked us about it later haha. Oh man I am loving Fort Wayne. This is my home, I'm having so much fun. The other day we were walking and we were bout 10 min from home and it started pouring. My shirt was see-through, we were so soaked. Yesterday we went and saw this investigator 'D.' He's always drunk, it's so funny. He started spraying surface cleaner in the air because his apartment stunk. Also he's a barber and I'm having him cut my hair next week. I've always wanted to let a drunk black barber cut my hair. I can't wait to see what he'll do. 

One of the new sister training leaders in my zone, Sister Mclaws, literally lives or lived right down the road from me back home. Small world. Yesterday we watched the dedication for the Indianapolis temple and the spirit was so strong. I'm so grateful to be on a mission. I've learned so much and I am excited to learn more. Missions aren't easy but they're worth it. Anyway love you all! 

OH AND I'M MOVING SO MY ADDRESS IS CHANGING DON'T SEND ANYTHING 

Elder Verdoni

Letter to Mom

We have been teaching this family,  they are progressing very well. We went there almost every night. They took us out to lunch on Saturday to the mall (Babylon). It's every missionary worst nightmare. It plays lots of worldly music and there's lots of pretty girls everywhere. So then they pulled up our Instagram and my twitter. That was awkward at first, haha cause there's pictures of me in a speedo. (dive team) Yesterday we got to watch the dedication for the temple, it was so cool. President Eyring gave the prayer. Overall I learned how important the temple is and how I need to make it a priority in my life when I get home. I plan to go every week when I'm back. We get to go to the temple as a mission at the end of next month. I'm so excited. Yeah that was my week. love you!

 

  I love this sweater so much 

America day is everyday

church parking lot

(Because he knows his mother can't look at it)

Aug 17, 2015

Transfers and Other Stuff

Hey guys! Haha nice some of you are in school right now. That's fun. (Mesa Arizona school started last week, only 117F outside)This week was good. I feel like I say that every week and probably will say that every week, because all weeks are good.

We had zone meeting on Wednesday and that was awesome. I learned a lot about faith and how I need to have more. We played a really fun game as a zone. It was the Disney name game. It was really fun, and we came really close as a zone. But unfortunately transfers are tomorrow and a lot of the zone is leaving. I'm not and neither is Elder Heiner, so that is good, however I'm sad to see my friends go.

Friday we went on exchanges with the zone leaders (trade a companion for a day) and I had to stay and lead the area. It was my first time. I was really nervous at first but it went really well.  

I almost got eaten by a dog. All I was trying to do was hand this guy a picture of Jesus and his dog tried to eat me. It was a boxer with crazy eyes haha. For some reason I've been saying the word sick a lot. I have no idea why but it's become a bad habit. I used to say dope so I guess this is better. A guy named mark told me that men don't use the word marvelous or lovely and then proceeded to tell us this story about how his transvestite friend bobby asked him on a date. All we said was hi, we are doing great. 

Time is flying by. transfers are here already. I'm halfway done with training. That's insane. I've grown so much out here. I've learned so much, I love this gospel, I would be lost without it. I know that the church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints is the true church. I know the Book of Mormon is the word of God. I know Jesus Christ is my savior and redeemer of the world. I love all of you. Write me, send pics. peace out. Also if there's anything specific you want to hear in here, let me know.

Elder Verdoni

President and Sister Porter with Elder Verdoni

Aug 9, 2015

Oh Hey

Time is so weird as missionary, like its not even a thing. Do you know how much of a struggle it is to constantly never know if something happened last night or this morning,. or like yesterday or two weeks ago? Time is an invention of man and we are doing the lords work as set apart servants of him. So it's like not even a thing. 

This was a good week. We went bowling with half our zone last Monday. Guys I'm so good, I think I'm going to join a league! I scored a solid 60! #blessed. 

I had a really great new missionary training by our mission president and his assistants. I learned so much, had some good days, got super pumped about our goals and got a greenie package from my mom full of junk food. I finally got my bike back from the bike shop. (I put it into the bike shop 5 weeks ago and have been borrowing a members bike ever since. It was a piece of junk lol but it got me around.) It's beautiful. It makes me so happy, you don't even know. We ride a good 10-20 miles everyday (my legs are huge) totally worth the almost $300 worth of repairs. She's beautiful. I named her She-luh. 

We had a really cool experience on Saturday. We went over to teach this family the Book of Mormon lesson and they're awesome, but they invited over their pastor friend because they wanted him to listen to us. But anyway, from the start, this guy just starts bashing and pulling scriptures out left and right and saying what we are teaching is lies and if they follow us they're going to hell. Yeah, he said that. Elder Heiner and I were so mad. The spirit was not there, and if it's not there, we can't teach. He didn't even let us talk, he would interrupt us literally every time we would start talking. He was very contentious. At first I was super nervous because I had no idea what to say. I kept thinking, where's the promise that I shall not be confounded before men? What can I say to make him stop in his tracks?  But I realized that for me to not be confounded before him was to not talk, and honestly not to listen to him. He was straight crazy and blinded from the truth. You know someone has no idea what they're talking about when they try to argue Revelations 22:18 where it says you cant add to these words, because that was also in Deuteronomy which is the 5th book in the bible, and that means the rest of the bible is false, also Revelations was written before most of the epistles. Satan blinds people and hardens their hearts and it's so sad. The only thing I could think of doing was to remind the family about the spirit. We teach before every lesson about his role as the teacher and testifier of all truth and how we can recognize him (John 14&15:26 Gal 5:22). 

Then we got up in the middle of his sermon, apologized to the family and left. Elder Heiners eyes were red, he was so angry. We biked over to some trees and prayed, after that we decided to read some of the Book of Mormon to calm us down, and I randomly opened to Moroni 8:26-30 and it perfectly described our situation. We felt much better and very calm and decided to go back to leave the family with a prayer so they can feel the spirit. We got there and the whole family except for Jxxx (he was inside still talking) was outside ranting about this guy, so we had some good laughs but then we were able to teach a very powerful lesson. Agian, we helped them recognize how they felt when we last taught and how they felt in there. Using scriptures and testimony we helped them realize that we taught with the spirit who teaches all truth and that guy didn't. They recognized our truth. We committed them all to come to church Sunday, and all 6 of them were at church. 

TOUCHDOWN JESUS! It was awesome, definitely a miracle and a big testimony builder for both of us. We saw first hand that God places us in situations where at first we might seem lost and that it's horrible but everything we go for is for our experience and for our good (D&C 122:7) We also saw and know that if we exercise our faith, even though it might seem hard, God will deliver us and make something good out of something terrible. (1 Nephi 1:20)

It was so cool I love miracles. and being here. I also love my God and my Savior. I also love you. deuces

Elder Verdoni

Aug 3, 2015

Emails and Stuff

Hey guys! I don't have a lot of time today, but this week was good!

I had another baptism! His name is E?. He's sweet, he's awesome. he was so excited and now he is a full fledged member.

Lots of miracles have been happening, like this one time it started pouring literally out of no where so me and my comp stood under this tree and this guy invited us inside and we started talking to him. He's a solid guy, both spiritually and physically. He's ripped, like me. lolol jk But yes, this week was good. 

Hey send me pictures please, I like pictures. Oh and another miracle, Elder Heiner and I went to Dunkin Donuts after E?'s baptism to celebrate (duh) and we went in with the intention of buying two each, but we walked out with a dozen and two chocolate milks and we only paid for six donuts. #blessed. We only ate two and gave the rest away to our neighbor kids. haha. They love us, anyway 

OK, so something that we focus on a lot in our mission is the doctrine of Christ. If you don't know it, it's faith in Jesus Christ, repentance, baptism, receiving the gift of the holy ghost and enduring to the end. We've been promised that if we follow this, we will receive eternal life and peace in this life. It's found in 2 Nephi 31:17-31. and pretty much throughout all of the book of Mormon. But that chapter is amazing. This doctrine or gospel can guide us through a life of constant change and improvement, based on faith and repentance. Sometimes we think of repentance as bad or something we do after we sin but in reality it's change. It's when we change our lives to be more in harmony with Christs teachings. And I can testify that when I follow this, when I exercise my faith and repent and change, I see miracles. Miracles happen when you exercise this faith in Christ,and numerous amount of blessings will come into our lives.

Miss you all and hope life is good!

Elder Verdoni

 Literally stuck in the road?