TCYSA! (Twin Cities Young Single Adult ward)

Hello to all my family, friends, and neighbors back in Cache Valley and to my "Band of Brothers" at college and serving world wide. I love y'all and hope and pray all is well with each one of you! Shout out to the Bobcats for the 35-0 win vs Logan.  Way to go boys!

This week was transfers and I got moved to the TCYSA ward in Minneapolis. It is a party. My companions are Elder Johnston, who played kicker at Bingham and is playing at U of U next fall, and Elder Liaga, who played at UNLV for a year and will be at USU or BYU when he gets home. So we are a football oriented tri-panionship for sure haha. They are awesome and are a little crazy, but I'm learning how to be really good at contacting with them!

My first day here we met with Teli who has a date set here for baptism. His girlfriend is a member but he isn't. He plays rugby and is really good. He took us to Tepanyaki buffet and it was soooo good!! Teli is really quiet but has a pretty firm belief in the gospel and his baptism is coming up soon. We had some concerns with him and the word of wisdom but he didn't even go out with his buddies on the rugby team because he knew they would go drinking. So that is awesome! He is holding strong to what we taught him! We went to his rugby game to support him on Saturday and it was so fun. Rugby is a cool sport.

Another investigator we have here is named Emma. She is way cool and loves the gospel. She has only been taught for 2 weeks and already set a date and is really solid with that date. She is doing really well and came to church yesterday for the first time and loved it. I'm so excited for her baptism.

We hang out with the Spanish Elders a lot at the institute and I love them haha! Elder Porter and Elder Cardwell are the coolest guys. Elder Cardwell and myself are really good friends already because he loves CrossFit too, and we have like the same personality, so it's pretty cool. Elder Porter is hilariousl We do personal and comp studies at our apartment and then walk to the institute building and spend all day there and on campus contacting, then walk home at night. So we aren't ever home during the day!

Yesterday afternoon we went contacting out on campus and talked to like 10 people in 2 hours. It is crazy how many people will stop and talk to you. We share simple doctrines about the gospel with them and give them a pass along card with our info and the institute info on it and try to set up return appointments. It's really all we do and the Elders said they usually teach 20-30 lessons a week which is crazy haha.

The ward is really great and I'm still getting to know everyone. There are some really cool people here though. On Wednesday we took some investigators and played soccer with the ward at a park. It was way fun and a good workout to get out and run around. Me and Elder Johnston owned it cuz he played soccer in high school so we had the give and go down pat.  It was way fun. Elder Liaga got tripped by this girl who is super teeny and face planted and we died laughing.  It was so funny haha. 

Elder Johnston and Liaga are the ZLs for the St Paul zone, so I get to kind of be a zone leader with them. They wanted the zone focus to be football related, so we made this sweet plan of scoring points and TDs for lessons and stuff. The focus is basically strive to teach 15 lessons a week so your investigator pool is larger, which in turn will make all your other numbers or key indicators increase as well. We used a photo of the SV captains from last year as the background photo and it was pretty cool. I attached a pic of it in the email.

Even though this is kind of the party of the mission, I'm really trying even harder to pray more earnestly and study harder. It's helped me a lot with my confidence in talking to people on campus. I pray every day for the Lord to help put words in my mouth so I can speak with the Spirit. It's amazing how much better I am getting at talking to strangers about the gospel in like 4 days. Alma 26:12  "Yea, I know that I am nothing; as to my strength I am weak; therefore I will not boast of myself, but I will boast of my God, for in his strength I can do all things; yea, behold, many mighty miracles we have wrought in this land, for which we will praise his name forever." I love this because I know it is true with all my heart. We as individuals are not good enough to preach the gospel and be successful. We need God to help us and give us the power to teach those who are ready to listen. It's been a great week and I love my new area and companions. They are good guys and will do anything for me. Family, I love all of you and thanks for all your support, it means the world to me. I pray for you every day and hope things are well for you! My brothers at college and on missions, I also pray for y'all every day and pray you will have the Spirit with you always. I love you guys and I hope y'all know that! Thanks to everyone else supporting me on my mission. I couldn't be out here without the support of everyone, no matter how big or small. I appreciate all you have done for me!

We are going to the State Fair today and it is one of the biggest in the nation, so I will send some more photos tonight! Love you all and God be with you this week.

Much love,

Elder Beach

#10 #MavUp

Panorama of where they live in Minneapolis.

At the rugby game.

Rugby!

More rugby!

When three college-bound football players are companions, this is the focus of the zone goals!

Elder Beach, Elder Liaga, and Elder Johnston at the State Fair.

Missionaries at the Minnesota State Fair.

Another one at the State Fair.

"Mazda Speed Cam" at the Minnesota State Fair.

Elder Liaga, Elder Johnston and Elder Beach with the Minneapolis skyline behind them.

2 months out + Transfers!!!

Hello to my family, friends, neighbors back in Cache Valley and to my "Band of Brothers" at college and serving world wide! I love y'all and sure miss you, but the work here is so much fun and I love it! Today is my 2 month mark woo woo!

I am getting transferred!! I will be in the St. Paul zone with two other Elders in a tri-panionship. They are the zone-leaders and they both play football so I am hyped!  This area is the TCYSA (Twin Cities Young Single Adult) area and I have heard it is a super fun area!

This week has been a blast!  We had a good lesson with Ann on Tuesday. We had a lesson planned but she had some concerns about her family. We talked about those with her and set up a meeting with the Bishop for her. We are really trying to have her son meet with us and her as well, but he is a super busy guy with school starting and he is in the marching band and they practice for like 6 hours a day. She told us she wants to get baptized and she knows this church is true but she doesn't want to tear apart her family, and she doesn't know if her husband will give her permission. We pray for her a lot and she gave a very sincere, heartfelt pray at the end of our lesson. It will be hard to leave Ann.

On Monday we had a lesson with Peter. He has been on vacation for a few weeks so this has been our first lesson with him since my first week here. He had a lot of doubts about prophets before he left, so we told him to read the Book of Mormon and pray about it. He told us on Monday he had a stroke or something so he doesn't remember anything we taught him, which I'm 99% sure he didn't have a stroke. He said he had a problem with the Articles of Faith as well, so we went over them with him to see if we could clarify them. We read all the longer, confusing ones and he said he was good with them. So we read the one about honoring and obeying the law, and he said he thought that laws were stupid and were meant to help some people but not others. So we talked about following the law of God and he said he could do that. So then we read the one about prophets, pastors, teachers, etc etc... And he's like yeah I'm good with that one. So we were like ok good! Then we keep teaching and he says I don't think there is a prophet today and we are like, "Peter, you just said you agreed with the article of faith." Then he started talking about all this weird stuff and I kept trying to bring it back to prophets and the gospel, but it wasn't happening. Then he started telling us that in the Book of Mormon it talks about Ruth, who is Adam's first wife who was rebellious, and then Eve came after her. My companion was like, "We actually need to get going," and I was ok with that. I was dying in the car after haha. We moved Peter from having a baptismal date set, to visiting once or twice a month because he is starting to have some crazy ideas about stuff! It's sad but it happens I guess. 

We had a really good lesson with Grace on Friday. Her kids are getting their visas so they can come here from Liberia. It's been a miracle how it has all worked out for her. It's really cool! She probably has the greatest faith of anyone I've ever met. Anyways, her cousins live with her and one is usually like way out of it when we go over. He perked right up when we came over and told us he was an endowed member of the church, and we were like, "No way, that's sweet!" So we talked to him and he said he had a falling out with the bishop of his ward but really liked our bishop so he wanted to come back to church. But he didn't come on Sunday so that was a bummer. But he is a really cool guy! We had a lesson with his brother on Saturday. He has had a date set for like 3 months and I had never even met him yet. He said he still wants to be baptized and we went over the interview questions to see what we still needed to teach him. Prophets, chastity and word of wisdom were ones he still hadn't been taught or had questions about. So we are meeting with him on Thursday! Just kidding I won't be there.

On Thursday we did exchanges with the ZLs. I went to Medicine Lake with Elder Anderson and Elder Long came here with my companion. Elder Anderson is from Spanish Fork and he is basically what I want to become as a missionary. He loves what he does and it is easy to tell that. He says hi to everyone and loves those he works with so much. He introduced me to this country album called Nashville Tribute to missionary work or something like that haha. It's really good! There is one song called "Today is the Day" and if you want to get pumped to do missionary work then that is your song! It was good! We had a missionary country jam session in the car haha.

Our lesson with Dan this week was soooooo good!!  We took a brother from our ward who loves golfing and he and Dan hit it off really well. They chatted about golf for like 10 minutes haha. We kept talking about the Spirit World and were able to clear up some questions he had about that with Alma 40. The spirit was really strong and we challenged him to be baptized. He said he didn't want to commit to a date but he did want to be baptized into a church, he just hadn't found the right one yet. We hope he will come to realize that this is the church he has been searching for. If you met him for the first time and talked to him about what he believed, you would think he was LDS. It's insane how close his beliefs are with ours and he has never met with missionaries before! I'm really sad that I have to leave Dan because he is progressing really well. 

We had another lesson with Gary and taught some more about the Book of Mormon. He had a lot of questions about like how it relates to the bible and the time frame of it. So we talked about that and I got to bear my testimony of it. Gary is a great guy. He even invited us to help at his church's breakfasts they put on haha. I don't know if Elder Cordara and his trainee will do that, but I was all for it!

Yesterday was the President's fireside. We took Ann with us and basically what they do is have a few converts come and share their stories and testimonies. There was one lady that shared her story and it was a lot like how Ann's story would be. Her family was really against it and she only had support from those in the church. Ann was crying the whole time and it was great! Not that she was crying, just that the spirit was there! It was a great meeting. This one elder sang "I Stand All Amazed" and I cried through the whole song. It really hit me just how much the Savior loves us and how much he truly did for us. I know he will always be there for us no matter what. In D&C 122:7-9 it talks about how the "...son of man hath descended below them all. Art thou greater than he?" It really hit me that no matter how low we feel, He has been just as low or lower and knows what we are going through. It is truly amazing to have that in mind. 

I am really going to miss the Maple Grove area, the ward, my companion, and especially the people I've come to know and love here. It's been a blessing to serve in this area but I am looking forward to serving in the YSA area next!  My dad sent me an email with a scripture from Exodus 14:13..."Fear ye not, stand still, and see the salvation of the Lord." That has been my scripture of the week! Even though the mission is hard and there are things I am scared to do every day, I know this is the work of salvation and that the Lord has his hand in every part of what we do. I love all of you back home and thank you for the prayers and emails each week. They mean more than you know, and help me feel like even though I'm a thousand miles away, I'm still home. 

One more big shoutout to my Bobcats back home taking it to Riverton! Y'all keep it up and kill Logan this week haha to my Brothers at college and on missions, fighting the good fight, I have a quick scripture I found in my studies this week:  Moroni 8:3 "I am mindful of you always in my prayers, continually praying unto God the Father in the name of his Holy Child, Jesus, that he, through his infinite goodness and grace, will keep you through the endurance of faith on his name to the end." I keep you all in my thoughts and prayers and pray the good Lord will keep you safe until we meet again. Family, I love you all! To my brother, I am proud of the hard work you have put in for football this season. You deserve everything you get, my man. To my sisters, keep working hard at school and sports and love every day! Mom and Dad, thanks for everything. I love you more than you know!  Grandma and Grandpa, thanks for the support and I miss you a lot but I know I'm supposed to be here!

I love you all back home and thanks again for the support!

Much love,

Elder Beach

#10 #MavUp

Elders Long, Anderson, Cordara and Beach

Lots of Lessons to Learn!

Hello to my friends and family back in Cache Valley and to my brothers at college and serving worldwide! I love all of you very much and I hope you know that!

This week has been a really good week! Last Monday (P-Day) we had a zone p-day and played volleyball, basketball and football at our church building. I was soooooo hyped that I got to throw the football around for a while. It felt great to do that because I haven't thrown a football since I left! It was a fun day and we had a great time with our zone. 

On Wednesday, there was a crazy rainstorm here. It rained like 2-3 inches in an hour and a half haha. It was nuts. Luckily we were with Brother Parkinson because he was joint teaching with us, so he drove us around! That night we had a lesson with Sister Saylee who is a less active member in our ward. We taught about tithing so she can start getting ready to go to the temple. She said if she paid her tithing, she wouldn't have enough to pay her rent. We promised her that if she had faith, and did what the Lord asked her to do, it would all work out. We shared 3 Nephi 24:10 where it quotes Malachi 3:10 talking about if you pay tithing the Lord will "open the windows of heaven and pour you out blessings... And there won't be room enough to receive them." That is a powerful promise that the Lord has made to us! Sister Saylee seemed to like that so we are hoping she can pay her tithing this week.

On Thursday we did a lot of finding because we had like one lesson. So we biked up to North Champlin and caught Emmanuel at home! He has a baptismal date set and I hadn't even met him until Thursday haha. He works pretty much all day every day. Anyway, he is a really cool guy and we set up an appointment with him for Saturday and he called us Saturday and told us he couldn't make it because of work. So we are trying really hard to see him soon!

We found these two guys that rent a house together and they were fixing their motorcycles out in their drive way. We walked up and the one guy says "Hey Elders!" And we were like uhhh... Hey!! The guy's name was Maui and he said he was "ex-Mormon" haha. His roommate was a big guy, looked like a linebacker and he was super funny. He kept swearing and I was just trying not to die. We shared a message about the Book of Mormon and how it can change your life for the better. The big linebacker guy seemed to be touched by it, because he thought he wasn't a good person. I felt bad because you could just tell his heart was gigantic. I told him that no matter what we have done or if we feel like we've messed up too much, we can always improve and change through the Atonement and that the Book of Mormon shows us how to do that. It was really cool! He said we could come by whenever we were around and get a soda. They were heading out on a bike trip to Wyoming this week!

We actually had a gospel discussion with Luann on Saturday!! It was cool! We talked about temple work and baptisms for the dead. The topic of priesthood authority came up and I just started explaining to her straight up about how we have priesthood authority straight from Jesus Christ and she didn't really want to hear it. Elder Cordara then told this huge loop of a story of how God just wants us to show our commitment to him by being baptized and that the authority we have is like God's stamp of approval. She liked that way of explaining it a lot better haha.  It was a good learning experience for me!

Yesterday, Sunday, I got to teach the lesson in Gospel Essentials class. I taught it on priesthood because when we got home on Saturday, I was really mad that I couldn't find a scripture anywhere in the Bible that talks about Jesus giving his disciples the priesthood authority by the laying on of hands. It has ones about giving them power to heal the sick and cast out Devils but not where it says he gave them the priesthood. So I did a lot of digging and research on the priesthood and basically ended up having a whole lesson of research so I just taught about the priesthood. It was a really good lesson! We had one investigator there named Gloria. She gave some really good comments on the lesson and it was cool. 

We taught Ann Pearson again on Wednesday and also had a zone training in St. Cloud. The training was really good, but it was basically just new missionary training for everyone who isn't training or being trained. They had all the missionaries leaving this transfer bear their testimonies and it was really cool to listen to those. I started thinking about when I will go home and I'm excited to come home haha. But then I thought, if I was at the end of my mission right now, I would not be satisfied at all with what I have done so far, so I was like, "G, you better get to work!" It was a cool moment of inspiration for me. 

The lesson with Ann was great! We taught about the Book of Mormon and how it will help us overcome fears and doubts we have in our lives.  The spirit was really strong and I was even tearing up a little. We left her with a challenge to take a concern she has to the Book of Mormon and she could find peace in it!  It was a way cool lesson. 

.

Yesterday night we were visiting potential investigators and we stopped by this one guy named Gary Deering. He opened the door and was like "Come on in!" We were a little taken aback by it, but we went in and taught him about the Book of Mormon and how it testifies of Christ just like the Bible. He is a really cool guy and had actually met with missionaries before and they kind of lost contact. He says he really appreciates our efforts to spread the good word. We challenged him to read the Book of Mormon along with his bible and that he would come closer to Christ if he does. He said he would! It was way cool to find him like that.

It's been fun, I've had some ups and downs but I know this is where I am supposed to be. God loves all of us so much and that is the thing I have learned most since I've been here. He is there to help us and wants to help us, we just need to turn to him and ask! I read Ether chapters 1-4 and it's awesome to see how blessed the people are when they pray sincerely for help vs when they don't. Keep that in mind this week; if you need anything, ask God! That is one of the most comforting thoughts knowing that he is always there for us. I have a picture of the Savior on my workout white board and it says "The way may be difficult at times, but I will always be there." If that isn't God's truth then I don't know what is. I love the gospel and I love sharing it with the people of Minnesota and the Maple Grove ward (there ya go dad). Thank you all for the prayers and emails. They mean so much and I love hearing about how all of you are doing! Makes me feel like I am still home! Much love to all my fellow Bobcats serving worldwide. Last I heard we are at 112! My Brothers from football - I love y'all so much and pray for you daily. Keep fighting the good fight whether that be at college or in the mission field. Family, I love you all as well and pray every day for you. Thanks for all the support and just know I am so grateful for you and for all you do for me

Much love, 

Elder Beach

#10 #MavUp

Sorry not a lot of photos this week! We've been hard at work with lessons and stuff. This is Ziggy who I had to take a picture with during a lesson so he would shut up and pay attention.

Week 4!

Hello to y'all back in Cache Valley and to my bros at college and serving worldwide! I hope things are going great for y'all and I keep all of you in my daily prayers. Thanks for all the emails, especially my family and Christy! I love getting them and any news y'all can send me about what's going on at home is great because I love hearing about it and sharing it with Elder Cordara and the ward members! 

The work here is going very well! We have a pretty good size investigator pool and the ward is throwing us people left and right to teach. It's amazing!

On a different note, I had a rough start to the week. We had a lesson on Tuesday and that was probably the worst lesson I have had on my whole mission. We brought a joint teacher, who is a convert so we thought it would be good for our investigator to meet him. However, it sucked. The lesson didn't go very well, and then our guest started Bible bashing with our investigator, and I was like "What the heck is going on?" It just sucked from top to bottom. The spirit wasn't there at all and our investigator didn't grow at all from the lesson.  Afterwards I just felt like a crappy teacher and I was kinda down in the dumps. 

Wednesday was great! We had new missionary training at the mission home in Bloomington and President Forbes and Sister Forbes gave us some great training on finding and teaching methods. I learned a lot! The best part was I got to see all the buddies from the MTC and hang out with them all day. Elder Peterson wasn't there because he is in Thunder Bay, but I wish he could've come down! I miss Elder Peterson.

Wednesday night we headed over to Weaver Lake for a "blitz" which means 4 Elders will work the area for one whole day. Their area is struggling right now so we did this to help them out and try and find new investigators for them. Thursday morning I got to work with Elder Judd. He is from Mesa, AZ and is going home in about 3 months. He is a really funny guy.  During companion study with him I basically just told him I was struggling with feeling like I kinda sucked at teaching. He gave me some great insights and told me to bear testimony more and let the spirit teach through me. He also said the key to being a great missionary is just loving everyone. He said if you do that you will have a successful mission. I really worked on that at the start of my mission, trying to have the pure love of Christ for everyone and I would pray for it every day. I realized I hadn't been praying for it as much that week and that was probably my problem. It was really good for me to talk to Elder Judd about stuff and get it figured out. That was my favorite part of the blitz! Pretty much all we did the whole day was knock doors because they have zero investigators right now. We didn't find anyone, but I got to work on my door approaches and actually had a pretty fun time!

That night we had dinner with the Fjeldsted family. Brother Fjeldsted is in the bishopric and he invited a friend from work over named Andrew. Andrew is a super nice guy. We taught him about missions and what they are (he had a ton of questions about them!) and we also taught about the Holy Ghost and how it can bless our lives. Andrew actually knew a lot about the Holy Ghost already, which was super cool! We had a really great discussion about it and shared some great scriptures with him. We are meeting with him again this Thursday!

On Friday we taught Ann again. She is having a lot of concerns with what will happen to her family if she gets baptized. She knows it is true and that's what she should be doing, but she doesn't want it to ruin any of her family relationships, which is understandable.  We taught how God loves us and gave us the atonement to overcome trials, which was perfect for her. Sister Fjeldsted came with us because she and Ann are good friends, and she said a lot of helpful things as well. After we left, Sister Fjeldsted told me that she took a trip with the YW group to the temple or something and she said some of the Beehives and Mia Maids were like, "Elder Beach is so cute!" and I thought, "Oh no!" When we got in the car Elder Cordara was like, "Elder Beach! Getting it done!" And I was like, "Shut up, bud" It was pretty funny!

On Saturday, Brother Ableman who is our ward mission leader, took us and Weaver Lake to the temple! It was the best session I've been to. I really felt the spirit and it was great. I sat in the Celestial room for a while and prayed and it was a great experience for me. I received lots of comfort and peace afterwards he took us to Wendy's so that was good!  Oh, my pants at the temple were so small!! Haha! I was surprised I didn't split the butt open or something. It was bad.

On Sunday, Ann came to church again! It was fast Sunday and I actually fasted and survived! It was a really good experience for me and I actually enjoyed it. We had a ton of less actives plus investigators come just randomly which was super cool! It was a good Sunday!

Last Monday we went to Pizza Ranch! It is hands down the best pizza buffet I have been to. They have some killer pizza flavors. The best one I got was steak pizza. It has steak and onions with cheese and this really good seasoning stuff on it

It's been a good week, and I've really grown in my testimony of the Atonement and of sincere prayer. I know God loves us and wants us to succeed. In "Batman Begins", Bruce Wayne's father has a great line: "Why do we fall Bruce? So we can learn to pick ourselves back up." I kinda started learning how to pick myself up with the help of the Savior this week. It's been a truly great week. Things are clicking on all cylinders now for Elder Cordara and me! In Ether 12:27 it says ..."I give unto men weakness that they may be humble;....for if they humble themselves before me, and have faith in me, then will I make weak things become strong unto them." I love that and I have read that a lot this week. 

I love all y'all back home! I miss each of you but I know I am supposed to be here doing this work at this time. Please send me updates from football and any other noteworthy news from home! I love getting it. Thanks for all your prayers and support and I would greatly appreciate it if y'all continued to pray for our investigators as well! Thanks and God bless!

Much love, 

Elder Beach

#10 #MavUp

PS... Photos from top to bottom: MTC buddies at missionary training

Golf crew last P-Day #Wregulators

Temple trip with Weaver Lake Missionaries

Brother Jones, myself and Elder Cordara at the Durant's daughter's wedding reception!

This really good dinner Brother Jones bought us. That cost $6.99

Selfie with Elder Lowell on the left and Elder Roberts who is "asleep"

Week 3 in the Field!

Happy August 1st to all y'all back in good old Cache Valley and my fellow Band of Brothers serving worldwide. I love all of you and hope y'all are doing well! I hope the Sky View football team is having a good time with Bobcat makers and are working hard to carry on the tradition of success. I'm excited to hear about all the success y'all will have this season!!

This week has gone by so fast, it seems like just yesterday I was writing about last week haha. 

My favorite thing this week was our lesson with Janna's brother Dan. Dan is investigating the church and is the definition of "perfect investigator." We weren't really sure what to expect going in. Dan is a really nice guy and that's about all we knew. We taught the Restoration because that is the first lesson and he believed every single thing we taught! As we taught, he would tell us about things he believes and it was pretty much exactly what we believe! Dan used to be a party animal and had some drug and alcohol problems, but has come full circle and has been sober for just over two years. He has built a strong relationship with God and Jesus and loves the bible. We talked to him about reading the Book of Mormon and he says, "Well, I haven't read that much..." And we ask him how much he has read and he says, "About 15-20 pages." And we were like Dan! That is awesome!! So we are really excited for him. He said he has a lot of questions about foreordination and life after death so we will be teaching him about the Plan of Salvation tomorrow and I am hyped.

Another amazing miracle we had this week was yesterday! Ann Pearson and her daughter, Laurel, came to church!! It was great. Ann knows like everyone in the ward because she has been investigating for a few years and she had a great experience coming to Sacrament Meeting. Laurel really enjoyed it as well but is really hung up on the whole Atonement. It is such a huge part of what we teach and believe and she feels like it is more of a primitive sacrifice, but we are teaching her again on Tuesday, and we can hopefully address all her concerns! I'm excited. Laurel is great and is really trying to figure things out for herself. She is going to Humboldt State in Northern California to become a marine biologist. She is almost done with school and is heading back on Wednesday, but will be back at the end of September! Anyway, the miracle of them coming to church was that EVERY single talk and song was about what we have been teaching them and you could just see them thinking about it and it was touching them. It was great! It's so easy to see God's hand in everything we do out here. Sister Forbes, who is the Mission President's wife, has a great relationship with Ann, so that is awesome because Sister Forbes is a convert from Catholicism. Things are really falling into place I feel like!

We had dinner with the Trainor family on Wednesday and it was really great! They had a burrito bar and Sister Trainor had fried tortillas for it and they were so good. Their family is really trying to be more involved in member missionary work so we were able to help them with the ward mission plan. I would recommend our ward mission plan to everyone back home. It has the acronym PIPA and I will discuss it in detail right now: 

P- Prepare your home in a way that invites the spirit.  Keep it clean and have church pictures around your home that will lead to questions from non-members. 

I- Invite a nonmember into your home AT LEAST once a month. It doesn't have to involve a lesson or anything - just have a nonmember in your home and have your home prepared as a place they can feel the Spirit, and questions for you to answer about the church will follow!

P- Pray for the people you have in your home and also pray that you can be ready to answer questions they have. 

A- Answer any and all questions they have about the church. If you do this, they will feel the Spirit and have a desire to learn more. If nothing else you have strengthened your relationship with them and "planted seeds" in them (Alma 32:36).

The Trainors are awesome and they bought Elder Cordara peach yogurt because he loves it haha. They have a chocolate lab named Brownie and he is a cool dog! A lot of people here have cool dogs but none as cool as my dog! 

We had Zone interviews on Wednesday and they were great! President Forbes is so funny and such an amazing guy. During my interview with him I sat in a chair and he paced up and down the room and ate cashews. It was a great interview and time to get to know him better!

Wednesday night I had quite the funny experience while I was sleeping!  We had taught the Restoration like 5 times that week and so I had a dream that we were teaching someone the Restoration. However, I was sort of half asleep, half awake, and I was sitting up in my bed teaching to no one! As I finished my part of the lesson and it was Elder Cordara's turn to teach, he didn't say anything (he was asleep, obviously). So I was stressing out really bad and I was like Elder! Elder it's your turn! But he didn't say anything. So I sat there for a minute trying to figure out what the heck was going on and finally realized I was having a dream haha. So I sheepishly fell back asleep and the next morning Elder Cordara was like, "So apparently you can teach the gospel in your sleep!" And I was like yeah...

We got to teach Jephthah Gatei again and his brother-in-law, Prince, who joined the church about 4 months ago! Jephthah is a great man. And Prince is so cool! Haha Prince is 37 and we both thought he was 24-25.  He is very energetic! Jephthah's wife, Mercy, isn't a member but she has been taught all the lessons and believes everything. She has a calling in another church she goes to so we wanted to talk to her about that. She wasn't there, so we talked to Prince and Jephthah for about an hour about her. Prince came to the conclusion that one day, she will just call the missionaries and say she is ready to be baptized, and that that day is in the near future! Jephthah agreed and it is so incredible to see how much faith is in their home!

We had a west African BBQ and had the ward council and invited all the Africans in our ward to come because a lot of them are less active. We only had Jephthah's family and Sister Saylee come to it, which is a lot less than expected but it was a good event. Sister Saylee even came to church the next day!

The elderly lady, Luann, that we help out with yard work has been a little more open about talking religion. We talked to her about her church and our church and about missionaries. We also mowed her lawn yesterday and she gave us $40 to go to this place called Pizza Ranch, which is a really good pizza buffet but expensive so she told us to go there for helping her! She is so great! Keep her and her husband in your prayers!

Last thing, the Parkinson's next door neighbor isn't a member but is a very nice guy. His name is Jacque and he is the coolest guy ever! He used to do MotoX and BMX racing and now is an avid biker. He has been helping us out with bike stuff and teaching us how to tune up our bikes and keep them running well! He is such a nice guy! My bike has been having a problem making 2 clicks every time I pedal and I can't figure out what it is and Jacque didn't know either.  So if anyone has any advice, I would love it!

I'm having a blast out here! It's hot and humid, but lots of fun and hard work. I'm learning so much about the gospel and also about myself. It's amazing how many things I need to work on haha. But I'm glad that I have the opportunity to improve in those areas of my life! I keep y'all in my prayers every day and know that I love each of you back home so much, and I love my brothers out there fighting the good fight with me, whether that is at college or in the mission field. I read a talk this week by Elder Maxwell called "O Divine Redeemer." It is an amazing talk about the Savior, and I would suggest it to everyone! Anyway, I love you all, and best of luck to the Sky View Bobcats this year! Represent well at Maverick Stadium in the opener!

Much love, 

Elder Beach 

#10 #MavUp

My workout board

A beautiful nature shot

Me with a football in my shirt because that is the only way I could carry it. #ballislife

A goofy pic of me

50 Shades of Elder Gray (I borrowed Elder Gray's name tag for the photo)

A typical lunch for me: Turkey, cheese, and lettuce wraps, Gatorade, fruit, and chips

MMM mission (Many Mighty Miracles!)

Hello to y'all back home! Hope things are going great and I was excited to hear that the Bobcats 2016-17 season starts today! Work hard and have a great season y'all. I'm excited to hear how it goes! 

We have had a week of many miracles! The Lord is truly present in this great work we are doing. Whether it be service, knocking doors, working with members, anything... We have had miracles this week!

On Tuesday, we took Luann to the family history library and she LOVED it!  She stayed for almost 3 hours! She found a lot of info about her dad and his side of the family. It is so cool to see how family history work brings families closer together. We have been helping her a lot with yard work, which I love! Service is a great way to share the gospel. Our relationship with her is really building but she is still resistant to hearing any gospel messages. So for now, we just love her and serve her! However, she said she would watch Meet the Mormons because she is really interested in the candy bomber! So it's a start. She said we should go to this pizza place called Broadway Bar Pizza so we are gonna check it out tonight! Please keep Luann and her husband in your prayers! Her husbands health isn't doing super well right now. 

Ok, biggest miracle of the week: Sister Parkinson has a friend named Ann who has been investigating the church for a few years. Her mom recently passed away and it has been hard on her faith. Her husband isn't a huge supporter of the church either. But we've had two lessons with Ann and one with her daughter Laurel this last week! Yesterday we taught Ann the Gospel of Jesus Christ and it was an amazing lesson. Brother and Sister Parkinson came with us and it was great. I had the opportunity to challenge Ann to be baptized and she said yes! She feels like she needs to be an example for her family so she really wants to! It's so cool she has had a lot of physical and emotional struggles the past little while and we shared Ether 12:27 with her and told her how the Lord will make our "weaknesses become strong."  It was an amazing spiritual experience. We are meeting with her again on Wednesday and with Laurel sometime this week as well!

We have dinner with the members almost every night and we decided to follow up on a promise made by Elder Rasband (I think, not sure) at a stake conference out here. He said if you have the missionaries in your homes and have them teach you the first two lessons in PMG, by no later than the end of the second lesson you will have a name in your mind of someone ready to receive the Gospel. So we have been doing that each night at dinner. We have return appointments with like 4-5 families for this week! So hopefully our list of potential investigators and referrals grows this week!

Another miracle that happened was we got to teach Janna! She is the lady that Elder Cordara and Elder Last found and helped with her lawn mower. So we set up a first lesson with her, taught the restoration, and set a a baptismal date with her as well! It's incredible! We are having another lesson with her next week and we have a lesson with her brother Dantomorrow!

There is a single mom named Kristi who just got baptized on the 2nd of July and so did her daughter Laney. So we have been teaching them as well and helping Kristi get ready for the temple and baptisms for the dead. They are so nice and I love them! Anyways, Kristi's best friend Nastasia wants to have a lesson with us so we are meeting with them on Thursday! I'm so excited for it!

This week we are mowing 4 lawns in 2 days! Just like the good ol' days back home haha. It's fun though and myself and Elder Cordara are getting really good at it!

The most spiritual experience I had this week was when we taught a lady named Glory. She is from Liberia and has some kinda crazy ideas about doctrines and stuff but she is great! So her two sons, Josh and Ziggy were there too. They are like 11 and 4 I think. We taught about the sacrament and showed a quick video. Josh was really paying attention and thinking. It was cool. After the video, we talked to Josh about what the sacrament means to him. I don't remember what he said, but it was really profound for an 11 year old with little knowledge of the gospel. As we were sitting there, I felt Gods love for him so strongly. It was such a powerful, amazing yet simple feeling: God loves you and has good things in store for you.  It was incredible. And as we said the closing prayer I prayed that Josh and Ziggy would be able to feel of the love God has for them and know that he really does love them. It was so cool! Right after that lesson, we had a lesson with a new convert named Grace who is also from Liberia. Grace has such a strong testimony!  When we got there, she said her friend named Terri was there and she was going to join us! So we ended up teaching restoration, and set a baptismal date with Terri! But as we were sitting there teaching, I had that same overwhelming feeling of Gods love, this time for Grace. It truly made me realize that God loves us so so much! Like more powerfully and deeply than we can know. It's awesome!

Well, we are back at it again tomorrow! I miss y'all back home and think about each of you daily. God has good things in store for all of us! I can't wait to hear how Sky View football does this year! I know y'all can do well if you work hard and come together as a team. Trust each other and have each other's backs. I love getting emails about stuff going on at home so if anyone wants to send me one, even just a quick one, that would be awesome!  I love all of you back home and I know God loves you too. My dad sent me a piece of advice from President Gordon B. Hinckley: "Get on your knees and pray, then get on your feet and go to work." Simple yet so very true! I can't stress enough how amazing prayer is. Rely on the Lord during your trials and he will carry you! I love you all! Thanks for your thoughts and prayers!

Much love,

Elder Beach

#10 #MavUp