Slower Week, Still Working Hard and Having Faith!

     A hot and humid hello to all my family, friends, and coaches back home, at college, and serving the Lord worldwide! Hope this finds you all doing well and enjoying the dead heat of the summer.  It has been a hot one in Sauk Rapids and from the weather app it looks like it's been hot in Cache Valley and Grand Junction as well! This week has been not the greatest, and definitely a down week from last week. But I will share the highlights and all the good and funny stuff. 

     Monday was transfer p-day, so for Zone Leaders that means travel plans. So we have to figure out who is riding with who down to transfers and it's insane because it destroys miles because we are so far away from Bloomington. Our Zone got wrecked with transfers. We had two white washed areas (both missionaries are replaced) and every area but ours had a transfer. So it took us about an hour to figure out how everyone was getting to Bloomington while using the least amount of miles. After that we had dinner with Sister Kennedy and Dave. It was a super weird dinner. Dave basically said he believes everyone is going to Heaven and that we (Mormons) try too hard and do too much to get there. And then he basically yelled at Darrell, Sister Kennedy's son the whole time for back talking his mom and not listening to her. Her son is slightly autistic, but he does get babied a lot by Sister Kennedy and is allowed to do whatever he wants. It was super awkward though.  We tried to talk about how we aren't doing too much to "be saved" and that God sets the rules and we just do what He asks and obey the laws of God. Dave wasn't really having it, though. We've kind of given up with Dave because he doesn't want to listen and just says his pastor is right and we are wrong. It's whatever, but it makes me sad he can't just open his eyes a little and see we have the fullness of the gospel!  Monday night we tracted for about an hour and met some cool people but no one super solid. 

     Tuesday morning we went to campus to see how busy or not busy it was.  School gets back in August 21, so we wanted to stop by some less active YSA (Young Single Adult) people and do some contacting on campus! We met this college girl named Madeline who was sitting out front of this house. We walked up to talk to her and she was like, "Are you guys the police?" I was like, "No, I wish! We are missionaries for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints." She then told us she had been curious about the Mormon church for a while, and we told her about the Book of Mormon, and of course she's like, "Wait one second!" And ran inside to grab her bible to show us the verse in Revelation about not adding to the words of this book or else you will have a plague sent upon you. So first off, we talked about how it is talking about the Book of Revelation, not the Bible. Second, we shared that it says something similar to that in Deuteronomy 4 in the Old Testament, and third, even if it did mean the Bible, we haven't had any plagues yet, so it either means the Bible is wrong (which it isn't), or we are right! So after we explained that she was much more open to reading it.  It blows my mind how people are so misinformed by either their own research or their friends or just incorrect information that's out there! After that we had a lesson with Jared and it was beyond weird. I can't even put some of the stuff he said during the lesson in the email.  He is an interesting guy for sure haha. We read Mosiah 3 with him and discussed how we can rely on Christ to help us grow and improve. Then we drove down to Clear Lake and Becker to visit less actives and do some finding. We stopped by this less active named Chris Duke, and the address we ended up having was his parents' house haha. His parents are active and his mom apparently loves the missionaries. She was just throwing food and snacks on us and referred all her less active kids to us and gave us their addresses and life stories and stuff. So that was pretty great! After that we went to his real address. He is less active and a self proclaimed atheist. Anyway, he let us in and was a super nice guy and even let us share a message, so that was great! I think he knows the church is true and all that, he just wants to do his own thing and believe his own way. And that's ok, we aren't going to force him to come to church, but it makes me sad that he's lost his testimony or desire to partake of the goodness the church offers. After that we had dinner with the Robacks.  They are seriously one of my favorite families here. Sister Roback asked us what we wanted for dinner and I said grilled chicken salad, so that's what she made us.  It was super good! After dinner we hauled back up to Sartell to give Timmy Beckrich a blessing because he had knee surgery on Wednesday. I got to give the blessing and it was great! I will seriously never ever lose my testimony of the Priesthood. I've had way too many amazing experiences with using or being the beneficiary of the Priesthood to not believe in it. 

     Wednesday we had a lesson set up with Danielle, a girl that Elder Myer and Cordara found during exchanges last week.  It fell through and Elder Beutler had called us and said they were going to drive up and drop off the package from Mom and Dad, so we met them at a Wendy's and got it! Elder Beutler is awesome and I'm glad I got to serve around him even though it was only a transfer. He's a good dude!  By they way, thanks for the package Mom and Dad and Grandma and Grandpa! I loved the stuff in it, and Elder Myer has eaten almost a package of the mangoes haha.  The jerky was super good, and the ties were awesome. Anyway, after that we were doing some tracting and this lady named Connie waved us down and started talking to us out front of her house. She had some way long grass and I was like, "Hey, could we mow your lawn?" She's like, "How much you gonna charge me?" I just laughed and said, "No charge!" So we got to mow her lawn! She was very particular about how she wanted it mowed and how we used her mower haha. We had to be extra careful with her mower. It was like her baby.  I got corrected like 5-6 times on how to put the bag on and how to start it. I happened to be studying humility and patience this week from chapter 6 of Preach My Gospel (Christlike attributes), so it gave me a good real life application practice to use them! So that was cool! After that we had a lesson with Flora and taught the "Big 3" commandments: tithing, law of chastity and Word of Wisdom. I loved teaching all of those because all of them are principles with a promise. As we follow each of them we are promised blessings. So one of the things that made this week tough was that Flora's parents are very against her getting baptized. She is at the point where she feels she may lose her family if she gets baptized, but feels that is what she should do. So it's a tough situation. She's really struggling with it so keep her in your prayers. Wednesday night we drove out to the farthest out less actives with Brother Christie. Most weren't home but we had a few good contacts with some of them so that was good! Our less active lessons we've been sharing lately focus on the Book of Mormon and reading it. We usually share some of President Monson's talk from this conference about reading each day. So we've been sharing those with our less actives. Nothing like the words of the prophets.

    Thursday was a long day.  We walked around and did some stop bys in the morning and no one was home.  Mornings are tough as a missionary because nobody is home, even in the summer! In the afternoon we had a zone finding hour and it was a bit of a bummer. We knocked a whole one side of a street and no one answered until the last house (haha fourth floor, last door), and then same thing happened on the other side.  Go figure haha. And neither of them were super interested. So we knocked doors for an hour and a half and talked to two people. Kind of depressing. Our lesson with Matt got cancelled because he had to work late, so we ended up having a lesson with Oko, this member in the St. Cloud Ward who wanted us and the Sisters to come meet with him. So we did! He's from Ethiopia and has a son serving a mission in California. Anyway, it was good lesson! He was a super cool guy and just wanted to get to know some people and kind of relearn the gospel. After that we went to Foley and had a dinner and lesson with the Cosgroves. We talked about temples and getting ready to go to the temple and what you need to do prepare. It was kind of scattered because Brother Roback and Brother Cosgrove kept talking about trucks the whole time.  After that we had a lesson with Bill and Tasha Gillam.  Bill seems to be doing much better since we gave him a blessing. He loves having us over.  Brother Roback and he really hit it off and they said they were going to come to church. They didn't make it this week because they were out of town, but will be there this week hopefully.  We also have a lesson with them on Thursday. Bill has a great heart, he just needs to figure it out and do the little things! After that we met Sister Zurn, a less active lady who got baptized in the Princeton ward last year. She lives in Foley now, and is super cool and was all for meeting with us and having some visiting teachers assigned to her. So that was great! Thursday ended well, which was awesome.

     Friday we had a lesson with Jennifer and it was super sad. Her husband had read up on all these BS "Joseph Smith prophecies that never came true", so she was asking us about all those. Some were so crazy. Like one was that he prophesied there would be people with big hats on the dark side of the moon. I mean maybe that meant astronauts!  But I've never heard that before and we were like, "Look, you can't believe everything your husband or pastor tells you about our church because they don't know haha." She was like, "Well, they're good honest men!" I didn't want to get off into that, so we just said, "Look, everything that is true that Joseph Smith prophesied has come true. So you can believe that!" She won't pray about the Book of Mormon either, and we answered all her questions about biblical doctrine and a bunch of stuff. She said she is going to be done with looking into the Mormon church for now. I told her to read, "What is the Blueprint of Christ's Church?" and I'm hoping that will help her see that this church is true! After that we weekly planned and that took forever haha. After that we had dinner with the Bridenstines. We had some dang good grilled chicken that George made. After we had a lesson about the Book of Mormon and we each bore our testimonies of it. The Spirit was really strong and I'm 100% sure George felt it. He's such a good guy, I wish he could just have a desire to join. After that we had a bomb lesson with Mark at the church. We shared the Elder Holland Mormon Message about the Book of Mormon and Mark asked us how we came to know the Book of Mormon was true and if it was hard to decide to serve a mission. I shared my story about how colleges were backing out on recruiting me because I was serving a mission and that was super hard. I definitely questioned if it was worth serving at one point during 2015-16 after the season got done. I knew I just needed to do it regardless, and it ended up working out perfectly for me to go to CMU.  God knew that's where I needed to end up, so it's amazing how it all worked out. When you put the Lord first, things always work out! You just can't always see it immediately. We also had a lesson with the Charters on Friday night and shared a Mormon Message about the Atonement of Jesus Christ and how it can help us through trials. Brother Charter said it was much needed, and we were in tune to know that's what they needed. It was really cool. 

     Saturday morning we made the monthly zone focus, which will be focused on the Book of Mormon, and we have a goal to give out 400 Books of Mormon as a Zone this month! I'm really excited to do it, and I'm excited to "fill the earth with the Book of Mormon!" Saturday afternoon we went out with Ryan Beard, a priest from our ward and tracted this way out there street north of Sartell. It was a little community called Watab. Very small town and super rural. We had minimal success at first but ended up having some great gospel conversations with some people and gave away 3 Books of Mormon. So it was cool! He came out with us to get some experience, so I think he had a good time! After that we went to the ward Pioneer Day party and it was awesome! Matt and Mark came, and lots of less actives, so it was great. We did some stick pull and a hug tug of war, too.  It was super fun! Saturday was a great day!

     Sunday we had 3 investigators at church!  Before church we tracted for 2 hours and everyone we talked to was Lutheran or Catholic and wasn't super interested haha.  But it was fun and we had some good discussions about the Trinity vs the Godhead with people. It's amazing that when people read the Bible they still believe in the Trinity. It's super obvious to me that God and Jesus Christ are separate beings after reading the New Testament. I find it odd that so many people still believe that.  That is one of the cool things we know because of the first vision! Matt, Flora, and Dan Smith came to church. Dan Smith is the husband of a member and he's a super cool guy. He loves lifting and was in the military.  He's a big dude. I talked with him at church for a while and he's a super nice guy! After church we basically tracted for 2 hours and had a member lesson with the Mays. Elder Myer had the plague and wasn't feeling super great, so I got to talk to everyone, which was cool! He was a good sport and just went with me because he felt like crap. He's doing better now though, so that's good.We had a lesson with the Beckrich family Sunday night. We decided to talk about faith and repentance and focus on the basic principles of the gospel. We had a great discussion with them about having "faith unto repentance." I hope they understand that they need to come to church and exercise faith and take the sacrament to have the spirit with them continually and help them "always retain a remission of their sins," as Elder Bednar says. So Sunday was a pretty solid day, too!

     Today we got to go down to Crystal for P day cuz tomorrow is MLC. The Gretz family came up to visit us and took us to dinner and bowling.  They're one of my favorite families from Apple Valley.  I love them haha, always a party with them.  So that was awesome!

     This week has been a tough one, but I wanted you to hear about all the positive things that have happened this week! It's like opposition in all things. We had a great week full of miracles last week and this week was more of a tough one. I know the adversary is working hard to thwart the work here, but I know it will go forth regardless.  One cool thing I've learned this week is how much my testimony of the Book of Mormon has grown in the last year and a little bit. I remember my sophomore year of high school seeing the Mormon Message "Testimony of the Book of Mormon" by Elder Holland, and it really hit me that Joseph and Hyrum wouldn't go to their death finding solace in the Book of Mormon if it wasn't true. That always stuck with me throughout high school, even though I never did much to strengthen my own testimony of the Book of Mormon.  As I entered the MTC a year or so ago, I realized I needed to have a testimony of the keystone of our religion in order to effectively teach those about our unique message of the restoration. As I've studied and pondered and prayed about it, I've received a witness that it is true. I will never ever doubt or deny the truthfulness and power that the Book of Mormon brings into my life. It has changed me so much and made me a better disciple of Christ. I love reading it and feeling the spiritual strength it gives me each time. As Elder Holland says: "Brothers and Sisters, God always provides safety for the soul, and with the Book of Mormon, He has again done that in our time. Remember this declaration by Jesus Himself: “Whoso treasureth up my word, shall not be deceived”—and in the last days neither your heart nor your faith will fail you.” I'm grateful to have the Book of Mormon in my life to bring happiness and hope to me in the travail of the last days. I testify that it is true, and I exhort you all to diligently study and ponder its amazing message of Christ. Anyway, enough preaching from me.  I love you all, and appreciate all the prayers and support. They are much needed! Have a great week! 

Much love,

Elder Beach

#MavUp #10

Meeting the Gretz family before they took us bowling.

The YSA Ward stick pull!

Mowing the lawn.

A little MNT chalking while teaching a less active family. :)

2 Dates Set!

     A big hello to all my family, friends and coaches back home in Cache Valley, at college, and serving the Lord around the world!  Hope this email finds you all well and happy with life! I sure am happy with life right now! It's been an amazing, miracle filled week in Sauk Rapids!

     Monday was a normal p-day for us. Laundry, shopping and throwing the football around for a few hours haha.  There isn't much to do up here because the missionaries are so far apart, but throwing the ball is always fun. I love that.  After P-day we had dinner with the Broads. They are an older couple that live in a super nice trailer park. Dinner was a little interesting to say the least haha. Basically Brother Broad told us all these super weird like "urban legends of Mormonism".  There were some weird stories! And he complained about the Presidential election the whole time, too.  He has a giant rock on his dining room table and named it "Heart of Trump". I about died when he said that but he was dead serious so I had to hold in my laughter.  After dinner we tracted for about an hour and we felt we should go to this little street we had never been to. As we started knocking, we realized the neighborhood was inhabited by elderly Catholics, Lutherans, and various other religions who weren't super happy to see us! But we kept knocking and at the end of the street this lady was out on her driveway talking to another guy. She called us over and told us she had known the Elders down in Red Wing and absolutely loved them! They had helped her son with home repairs and yard work while he was going through chemotherapy for cancer. So we got to talk to her for like 30 minutes! She had some ducks in her yard and let us feed them and stuff. The crazy thing was she was only visiting her daughter for the day and actually lived in Brainerd. It was amazing that we felt we should tract that street and ran into her.  Super cool! We then had a huge rain and thunderstorm with lighting, so we ended up having to be inside the last like 45 minutes of the night which sucked, but it is what it is,

     Tuesday morning I was not feeling it. I was just having one of those days where I wasn't in the mood to go talk to people and was just not myself. I really am not a very outgoing person, but that has changed so much. I really love sharing the gospel with people now. It's crazy how much easier it is for me to approach random people and share a message with them that they may think is totally insane.  It's cool how the mission changes you for the better! So anyway, we did some walk around stop bys and I was just hating life for some reason. I was just like, "I hate knocking doors when no one is home because it's 11 AM and no one wants to talk to us." I was having the adversary get into my head a little.  Our last stop by we did to a potential named Shaun was awesome. He was out working on a car and as we walked up I literally had like an epiphany moment of, "This man needs the gospel and he is a child of God." As I felt that I just immediately started talking to him and those negative thoughts went away and I felt so much better. I find it so interesting that whenever I get down on myself or the work or whatever, the best remedy is to work and talk to people. It always brightens my day.  Super cool! There's a quote in Preach My Gospel about how the best remedy or medicine for worry or stress of homesickness is work. Because if you work, you will have the Spirit with you, and if you have the Spirit then others will feel it and the work will be successful. I agree with that 100%. We had a lesson with Greg Ward right after lunch. He's an interesting fellow haha. He's been taught on and off for about 5 years and doesn't progress at all. I really tried to listen to him and figure out where he is coming from and all that, and he just kept contradicting himself and saying he doesn't want to be more happy in life or burden God. I finally just bore my testimony of the fact that God loves him, Joseph Smith is the prophet of the restoration, and the Book of Mormon was true and would bless his life and bring him more happiness. He didn't really have anything to argue with after that haha.  I don't know how much more we will be teaching him, but I hope he felt the Spirit and God's love for him! We drove down to Becker after that to visit some less actives and potentials and literally no one was home. It was insane. The two people we talked to were Alex, who was the Ukrainian guy we found a few weeks back, and this less active guy who lives next to the Bishop. He didn't even know the Bishop lived next door to him haha.  We talked to him for about 30 minutes about football and DJing. He DJs for a living and is kind of a party animal, but he's a nice dude and loved talking to us. We invited him to church and gave him a Book of Mormon and invited him to read it. After that we headed back up to St. Cloud to go to YSA institute. President Baker asked us to start going to just add some more numbers to it and be a support there so that was super cool and really fun. 

     Wednesday was kind of weird day. We had district meetings in the morning so we Skyped into those, and then had a service opportunity with this lady set up at noon. So we show up and she's like, "I told you I have a doctors appointment right now and can't do today." She never told us that which was a bummer, and then she talked to us for literally 30 minutes about tornados and how there was going to be one in Sauk Rapids that day. She said she was a weather spotter and knew what to look for and there was going to be one that day. Well, there wasn't. It was rainy for half the day and super hot and humid and sunny the later part of the day.  We did a zone finding hour after that and we knocked this street in Sartell and literally no one was home. We talked to like 2 people in 40 doors, so that was kind of a bummer. However, one of the 2 people was super nice and talked to us for about 20 minutes. He was from Las Vegas and his best friends were Mormon so we talked about that for a while. He said his wife was a staunch Catholic and I asked him if he was too, and he said, "No... I'm a half-A Catholic!" I thought that was pretty funny.  And so did he haha. Anyway, we had a nice chat with him! We did some less active stop bys after that and met Rustin Bird, who is Reegan Bird's little brother. He is pretty cool and a lot different than his sister haha. He used to be in the military and now lives off of veterans assistance and just drinks whiskey and plays X-Box all day.  He doesn't work or anything so I don't know how he affords a house and liquor and all that, but he does haha. Anyway, he was pretty nice and we talked to him and read a little of the Book of Mormon with him. He asked for a Book of Mormon and a Bible so we gave him those to read. Hopefully he does read them! We had dinner with the Otis's and Sister Otis made Kamut pancakes. They are so good, and we need to make them when I get home, Mom! It's this Middle Eastern grain that is super healthy and super dense so like 2 pancakes made me stuffed haha. They were really good! We did some NAC list stop bys after dinner and met some of them, but they all said they weren't interested and to not stop by anymore.  Sad day. We had a member lesson with the Petersons after that about the 40 day fast, and that was really good! And then we called it a night. 

     Thursday morning we had a lesson with Jennifer, who was the lady we found last week during zone finding hour. She had like a notebook full of questions and had read Moroni 10! It was awesome. However, her husband and pastor told her not to pray about it!  I was like, "Who the heck tells someone to not pray? That makes no sense to me." In 2 Nephi 32:8 it says: "8 And now, my beloved brethren, I perceive that ye ponder still in your hearts; and it grieveth me that I must speak concerning this thing. For if ye would hearken unto the Spirit which teacheth a man to pray, ye would know that ye must pray; for the evil spirit teacheth not a man to pray, but teacheth him that he must not pray." We shared that with her and she said it made a lot of sense. So hopefully this week she will pray about it! She had a lot of really good questions about the Godhead and stuff like that, and just random questions from the Bible that people at her church couldn't answer. We have another lesson with her this Friday! After that we went to Quik Trip so Elder Myer could grab some lunch really quick. He got some corn dogs and squirted ketchup on his pants, and then when we got in the car he grabbed my water bottle to squirt some water on it to wash it off and it squirted all over him so it looked like he wet his pants.  I was dying and he was so mad, but laughing, too haha.  It was pretty funny! We had a lesson with Flora at like 1:30 pm, and it was awesome. We taught the gospel of Jesus Christ and committed her to be baptized on August 12! Please keep her and her family in your prayers. Her parents don't know she has committed to be baptized yet. We fasted and prayed for her parents to be cool with it on Sunday. After that the APs were supposed to come up, so went to our apartment to meet them and did comp study while we waited. When they got there, I went with Elder Last and Elder Myer went with Elder Cordara. We went to have a lesson with Matt at his house and also taught the gospel of Jesus Christ and committed him to be baptized on August 26! So we had a sick day because we got two dates set in one day! After that we drove out to Foley and had dinner and lesson with the Cosgroves, and we got to take some pictures with his custom assault rifles haha. We talked about the Sacrament and the importance of taking it each week and how it renews the Spirit to be with us and give us a remission of sins. Elder Bednar gave a bomb talk called, "Always Retain a Remission of Your Sins" that talks about how our baptism and the Sacrament are interconnected. It makes the Sacrament so much more important to me after I read that talk! I would encourage all to read it! After that we had a lesson with Bill and Tasha Gillam. Their basement flooded so we helped them move some stuff up and outside. There was a dude named Donald there and I ended up talking to him and gave him a Book of Mormon and he said we could come by and teach him this week. We showed the "Mountains to Climb" video by Elder Eyring to them and it was super cool. We talked about how faith can help us endure our trials. Bill really seems to like having us over, and I hope we can help him progress and come to church and all that. After that we did service for Sister Nick, and her husband actually came out and talked to us! He was pretty nice and gave us gloves to use to pull weeds and stuff. We destroyed their flower bed and got all the weeds out of there haha.  Then we headed back home for the night!

     Friday morning we had to account with the DLs about their districts and then we went with Brother Hilsgen and Brother Brinley to help one of Brother Hilsgen's friends clean up their farm and get it ready for an auction. They had a super cool/weird farm house and we cleaned out all of it and also some stuff from the barn and moved rocks and stuff. It was super fun and a good workout too, so that was good! It was out in the sticks in St. Cloud area, but it was super cool and we had a good time. We got to talk to a lot of folks there about missionary work.  After that we drove up to Little Falls and stopped by the pastor dude who we talked to a few weeks back. He hadn't read the article we gave him yet, but we had both read the book of John, so we let him know that and told him to get on it! We also had a lesson with the Dobsons. They are not really progressing right now and are letting really dumb things get in the way of coming to church and reading the scriptures and stuff. It makes me sad for them. We then drove up to Brainerd, which is like an hour and half north of where we live. We got there at around 8 pm and I went with Elder Farish and we knocked some doors in the pouring rain. ️ It was super fun though, and we gave a few Books of Mormon away and found a pastor who we set up a return appointment with to discuss religion. It was pretty fun! Friday was long day haha. 

     Saturday morning we worked out (I did) haha and then got to work. I went with Elder Searle and we did some stop bys and met this lady who we talked to for like 30 minutes. She could've talked all day haha. We listened to her stories about how she came to know God and all that. It was really cool! She said she loved to serve others and help them find God too, and I shared Mosiah 2:16-17 with her and gave her a Book of Mormon. She was super happy to accept it, and I told her it would help her with sharing the knowledge and love of Christ with others. She loved it!  After that we stopped by to see Melissa who was a potential investigator they hadn't seen for a while. She was going through a lot of struggles when we talked to her and we shared the "Mountains to Climb" video with her as well! She really liked it and we had a really good talk with her about relying on Christ's atonement to help us get though challenges in our lives. After that we had lunch really quick and then went and did some chalking in a park. Haha these two girls that were like 10 kept walking by and watching us, but wouldn't talk to us or help us out.  I was hoping they could help us but they didn't! I had a blast on exchanges, and we did some good work up in Brainerd with them. We drove home at like 3:30 and stopped by this less active dude in Little Falls who lives way out of town, but his address was no good, so that was a bummer for sure. Oh cool story I forgot. Friday when we were in Little Falls we stopped by another less active, but his roommate was there. His name was Hagar and he is in the military and lives in Duluth, but was down for a few weeks. He joined the church a few years ago after getting introduced by a friend in the service. He had no idea we had a church down in St. Cloud, so we had a member pick him up for church and he stayed all three hours! It was super cool! Back to Saturday. We had dinner with Sister Kennedy and Dave and Dave sent us the articles on Mormons his pastor had sent him. It was anti stuff and it was the Plan of Salvation with a lot of twists making it very not true. One thing I thought was funny was it said in order to be temple worthy you had to follow laws of Mormonism including: keeping a journal, having at least a years supply of food storage, and always reading the Book of Mormon. I just had to laugh. People have no clue what they are talking about sometimes but it is what it is! Dave listened a little more closely this time and didn't argue as much. Some of the stuff his pastor told him was BS, and we showed him that it was. I think that helped him realize we actually know what we are talking about haha.  Like his pastor told him that it says in the Bible you are supposed to baptize little kids and it doesn't say that in the Bible and we showed him that. So I think that helped him a little. He just believes whatever his pastor says and doesn't figure things out for himself, so we are trying to help him do that! After dinner we tracted for a while and found this super nice older lady who had been to temple square and loved it and we gave her a Book of Mormon, and she said we could come teach her some more this week and possibly do service for her too! We then had a meeting with Brother Charter to discuss the work in the ward and how the Ward Council could help! Haha Brother Charter is a hoot and half. 

     Sunday morning we had Ward Council but we left early to go pick up a girl Elder Myer and Elder Cordara found on exchanges. Spencer Baker drove us there and we show up and she isn't there. Her dad was like, "I think she's at her boyfriend's house." So that was a bummer. But Matt and Flora came to church! And so did Hagar, and Mark finally made it as well. The chapel was full once again, so that was awesome. Elder Myer and I both spoke on missionary work and blessings we had seen from the 40 day fast. It was cool, and I'm glad we could speak on member missionary work. After church we had dinner with the Rodebush family. They are awesome and made a bomb burrito bar for us and chocolate lava cake. We talked about college football like the whole time so that was awesome.  After that we had a lesson with Naomi, who was a lady we found about a week or so ago, and unfortunately she wasn't home.  So we tracted for like 2 hours and found like 3 new investigators and gave away like 5 Books of Mormon, so that was awesome! It was a great week and I'm loving life right now!  

     Cool learning thing from this week: We did a Christlike attributes activity in Preach My Gospel and I realized that I really sucked at having faith. I hadn't ever really thought about that before. I've really been focusing on patience and charity this transfer. And I've improved majorly on those two attributes. So I started studying about faith and how to increase it. I read the talk "Mountains to Climb" by Elder Eyring and one line that he says really stuck out to me. He says, "If the foundation of faith is not embedded in hearts, the power to endure will crumble." That really stuck out to me. I've been reading in 2 Nephi about the prophecies of the last days and how the world will be wicked and people will be complacent and not work to keep and increase their faith.  I realized that I needed to really work on increasing my foundation of faith. I had faith, I just needed to increase it and always focus on that. Faith in Christ leads us to act and to change and to repent and become better. It all finally clicked for me this week and it was super cool. Like I just finally understood what faith means to me. It's hard to explain, but it was really awesome! I would encourage all to read that talk as well as the one by Elder Bednar. They are both stellar talks with great messages. Anyway, life is good, I'm happy, I love sharing this gospel with people and I realized how sad I am going to be in 11 months when I have to come home.  I am really living the life right now and I love it! I love you all and hope all is well for you. Thank you for all the support and prayers. It means the world to me. I definitely can feel the power and strength from them. Thank you all and have a great week! God bless!

Much love,

Elder Beach

#MavUp #10

My workout list.

Exchanges in Brainerd.

Chalking with Elder Searle.

Cleaning out the barn.

Checking out the guns at the C's house!

Sunset on the Mississippi River.

Feeding the ducks with our new friend!

Doing Some Work!

     Howdy to all my family, friends and coaches back home, serving the Lord and at college! Hope you all had a solid week and are loving this beautiful summer time of year .  This week has been really busy and we've done a lot of finding, but have had some really good lessons with our investigators as well.

     On Monday we just did our laundry at the Dohms and emailed and then had dinner with the Caspers. They are super cool! Their two youngest sons, Brady and Noah, loved us haha and we played this funny board game/guessing game with them. Elder Myer was trying to like rush us out the door after dinner, but we didn't have any lessons or anything, and I figured 30 minutes of our time to build a relationship with the Caspers was about as productive as knocking doors. I remember the missionaries I got to go out with and be around and they were really great guys and I had fun with them. I just want members and their kids to see us as representatives of Jesus Christ first and foremost. But also as people who love them and care about them and their lives. So after we left, I explained that to Elder Myer and he agreed, so that was good! We then knocked doors for about 2 hours and didn't really find anyone solid, but we talked to a lot of cool people and gave away like 4 Books of Mormon! 

     Tuesday morning we did some service for Emily Bird, who is the wife of a less active member. She is a Jehovah's Witness but is super nice and loves having us over. We just helped her pull out all these huge plants from her flower beds and trim them up and stuff. It was fun and we had a super good time.  Tuesday afternoon we knocked doors for about 2-3 hours. We've stopped by every single person in our area book who is a less active, former investigator, or potential investigator already. All the ones in Sauk Rapdis and St. Cloud and Sartell haha.  So we don't have a lot to do except knock doors and try to find new people. Some days I get so sick of it, but we always seem to have a cool experience or an interesting story or something haha.  So we also had a lesson with Jared Mastey, who is a recent convert. He is a very interesting person. He's a good guy and he knows what he needs to do in life and he does it. We had a lesson about being accountable with our Priesthood authority and using it to bless others. That's the whole point of having it is to bless others lives! So we talked about that with him to help him understand the importance of getting the Priesthood. After that we knocked doors for another hour and half or so (we knocked for an hour before his lesson) and we met some way cool people. The very last door we knocked on this guy named Enoch answered and was super nice. He told us he was super busy with his kids but took a Book of Mormon and a restoration pamphlet and said we could come back this week! Really hoping he turns into something. Elder Myer and I both felt prompted to knock on his door and it was cool how open he was. After dinner we stopped by some investigators and less actives who live down in the ghetto in St. Cloud. We met this less active named Michael Koch and he is awesome! He has a garage where he works on motorcycles and cars and stuff and he is way good at that stuff. He restores cars and builds motorcycles from parts he buys and all kinds of cool stuff. He wasn't like super interested in church, but we talked to him for like 45 minutes and got a tour of his garage and of his motorcycles so that was sweet!

     Wednesday was interviews with President Barney at the St. Cloud building, so we were there from 8:30 am to 3:30 pm. It was a long day haha. Interviews went well and I honestly love President Barney already. He is such a loving guy and has a great heart and vision for the mission. I don't feel like he is going to be a stickler, "letter of the law" Mission President, which I really like. He feels that we can make our own decisions about how we spend our time and I like that. But he's awesome. We went to both district meetings too, and it is funny to see how each District Leader runs their district meetings differently. I've really learned how to accept others' ideas and opinions, and I've realized that there isn't always one right way to do things. There's lots of ways to accomplish something and everyone has their own ways of doing it. I've really come to appreciate that on my mission, and working with lots of different kinds of missionaries! After all that got done we had a few people we found tracting that said we could come back to, but none of them were home, so we just tracted the other side of the same street. The first door we knocked on we met this lady named Amy who was super nice, and we taught her a whole restoration lesson and gave her a Book of Mormon. She said we could come back this Wednesday afternoon to teach her some more! We've seen a lot of cool miracles this last week off of our backup plans. I've gained a good testimony of making effective backup plans as a missionary.  We had dinner with Brother Peterson (his whole family is in Idaho except him because of work) and he is really cool! He's in marketing and finance stuff for a company in St. Cloud, and I talked to him a lot about sports marketing and that may be something I look into for a career when I get home. He said it's a really competitive market but really fun. It's not my first choice of a career, but it seemed interesting to me! After that we drove out to Foley to visit some people out there. The Gilliams weren't home unfortunately, and the Cosgroves cancelled our meeting on the way out. So we had a few other people we wanted to stop by. We stopped by the Nicks family and met Sister Nicks and her daughter. Her husband just one day decided the church wasn't true and took his name off the records and won't let missionaries or anyone from the ward come into their house. We talked with her and her daughter outside for like 30 minutes and sprayed her weeds in the front yard. We are going back this week to pull them all out because there is a ton and they are huge. We also did some hula hooping with her daughter haha and she had a blast.  It was cool to see them just laugh and have a good time. She looked really sad when we first got there, and they both had a smile when we left so that was awesome.  Great way to end a day!

     Thursday morning we had a zone finding hour from 11am-noon. We knocked this street in north Sauk Rapids by President Baker's house. We knocked the whole street and no one talked to us the whole street so we just took a left at the end and kept knocking. At like 11:45 am we knocked on this door and this lady named Jennifer answered and came outside to talk to us. She said she was Orthodox Catholic and that that was the true church and they had the Priesthood and all that stuff. We listened to her and then explained our point of view (thanks for tip mom! Works great!). She was pretty interested in what we had to say and she said she would take a Book of Mormon and read it and pray about it, and if she felt it was true she would join the church. Just straight up that's what she told us haha. However, she said we needed to pray about her church being true. So we agreed to do that, and I haven't felt that it is true. It's hard to do that when I know spiritually and intellectually that this church is true. Like I can't deny this is the true church on the earth. So I'm hoping she can come to know that, too! Thursday afternoon we were going to do a bunch of stop bys but we got a call from some missionaries in our zone who were worried about a struggling missionary, so we had to talk about that and make a game plan for them. It took about an hour to get it all worked out but I'm hoping we helped. After transfers we will know for sure because our plans involve transfers. We knocked some doors and walked around and talked to people for about an hour and half after that. We then had a lesson with Matt, who is one of our investigators. He has been to church for 8 weeks in a row but hasn't really been super open to meeting with us. We finally got a lesson set up and weren't sure what to expect going in. Anyway, Brother Roback came with us and they really hit it off. Brother Roback joined the church like 10 years ago so they talked about how he joined the church and how he came to know it was true. Matt told us he has been reading the Book of Mormon daily and is 3/4 of the way done. He said he feels so much happier at our church than his old Catholic Church. He said he knows this is the true church and wants to get baptized but he just got named the Godfather of his nephew, and is supposed to raise him in the Catholic ways. He doesn't want his joining the church to create family tension anymore than it already is, so he said he doesn't know what to do right now. We all shared stories of where we put the Lord first and did what we were supposed to, even though it was hard. I know that when we do that then God will always bless us. King Benjamin teaches that in his sermon. He says if we follow the commandments, then God will immediately bless us. I love that promise by a prophet of God. Brother Christie took us up to Little Falls after dinner to have a lesson with Barby and the Dobsons. Barby was this lady in a wheelchair we met last time we were up there. She rode her motorized wheelchair like 2 miles to the store to get groceries.  She was super nice and said we could come visit her this week. So we met with her and taught about the restoration and shared the Prince of Peace video and gave her a Book of Mormon. She was really happy to have one and to talk to us, too. Hopefully we can keep teaching her and help her feel of the joy the gospel brings. After that we read part of Mosiah 2 with the Dobsons and it was really good! They came to church on Sunday so that was awesome! That's the first time they've come since I've been here. They're doing well.

     Friday was weekly planning and then we tracted this street that is a newer development out on the east side of Sauk Rapids. We found this lady named Sammy who was outside with her kids, and we talked to her about the Book of Mormon and Joseph Smith, and we were able to give one to her and she said we could come by this Friday as well to share some more with her! We also met a guy named Joshua who has met with missionaries before, but wasn't super interested. We had a great conversation about what we do as missionaries and how we are called by God through his prophet to the mission we serve in. It was really cool! We had dinner with the Bridensteins after that and it went really well. We are starting to build a better relationship with Goerge (he's the dad and isn't a member), so he's opening up to us a lot more and pays better attention during the dinner messages haha.  Hopefully we can keep helping him become more interested in the church and eventually get baptized and sealed to his family.  We had a lesson with Mark McAllister after dinner at the church and that was really good. We did a lesson about recognizing and understanding the Spirit. He has a hard time with that, so we tried to help him learn how we feel the Spirit and how we can know if it is the Spirit or not. We had a really awesome discussion about it! We shared "Voice of the Spirit" Mormon message and it was really good. He is into Alma in the Book of Mormon. He has missed church the last few weeks because he falls asleep before church. So we are working with him to get to bed on time on Saturday nights and wake up on time on Sundays.  After that we went to the Beckrich family's house to visit them. They are a less active family in our ward but are super awesome. Brother Beckrich is super fun! They love to go camping on the weekends so during the summer they never come to church. We shared the talk by President Monson about the Book of Mormon and challenged them to read the BOM each day. Brother Beckrich invited us over to help them sand and stain their deck the next morning, so I was super hyped for that because I love service! 

     Saturday was hotter than heck. ️ It was like 95 with like 75-80% humidity. We went over to the Beckrich's to help them and he wasn't ready for us to get going on it, so we ended up moving this big wooden porch swing and pulling up concrete slabs underneath it. It was huge, and we discovered a large family of maggots and ants under the concrete slabs so that was pretty great! They also had a rope in their back yard for climbing and stuff so I got to do some rope climbs (CrossFit workouts). I hadn't done one for like a year and half, but it actually was easier than last time I did them so that was good haha. After that we did another zone finding hour in the dead heat of the day, 2-3 pm. We tracted this kind of nicer area in Sartell that we had never been to and talked to a ton of people. We also found another family who had taken their names off the records of the church. We talked to the dad and he served his mission in Mexico and then took his name off like a year or two ago. We've found 3 people who have served missions and then left the church in the 5 weeks I've been here, and two of them live next door to each other and don't know they both used to be members haha.  It makes me really sad to find people like that. I don't know how you could serve a mission and then at some point leave the church. I think it all comes back to the complacency thing. Keeping your faith strong isn't hard and for some people - the simplicity of it is too hard. It really comes down to going to church, praying daily, and studying your scriptures daily. I feel that if you diligently do those things you will always have a solid foundation of faith. Obviously other things factor in too, like serving others, and living the gospel and going to the temple regularly. But I just feel very strongly that if we do those things, we will stay firm in our faith. Anyway, we gave away 4 Books of Mormon and it was pretty cool! We had dinner with Sister Kennedy and Dave. That was a bummer of a lesson.  Dave's pastor has been giving him anti stuff, so Dave straight up told us he won't ever believe the Book of Mormon is true. I find that odd because the whole time he told us he has an open mind and is open to what we have to say, but he just listens to what his pastor tells him. He told us his pastor said in the Bible it says you can baptize children, and it literally says that nowhere in the Bible. I was a sad pup for Dave. He needs to figure things out on his own and not trust in the understanding of men. Keep him in your prayers for sure. After that we had a lesson with Flora at the Dickerson's house! That went really well. We taught the Plan of Salvation by drawing it in chalk on their driveway (thanks for the chalk, Sister Gretz!) She really liked it and Laurel, Jared, and D'Shaun all helped us teach it, so it was great! Super good way to end a Saturday.

     Sunday was a crazy day haha.  We tracted for like 2 hours Sunday morning and found 2 potentials. We met this dude named Tom who was heading out the door to go to the cities, but we taught him about the Book of Mormon really quick and gave him a copy. He said we could stop by later this week and share some more with his family. Then we met this lady named Teresa outside watering her flowers. She was super closed off and didn't want to talk when we first walked up, but I tried my momma's great advice to listen first, then talk. So I just starting asking her about her flowers and her dog, and if she had a belief in Christ and if she had met the Mormon missionaries before. She opened up a lot as we let her talk and then finally she started asking us what we were doing on missions and then the conversation took off.  We talked about the Plan of Salvation with her and gave her a pamphlet for that. She said her and her husband were looking for a church to go to, so hopefully they realize this would be a good one.  Anyway, as we were talking, her dog, a Boxer, freaked out and ran out in the road and just started attacking this lady's dog that was walking by. It was the most insane thing I've ever seen. The boxer dog was super nice to us and then when that lady with her dog walked by, it just took off and like superman attacked the dog and started biting it and clawing it and stuff. Teresa was like "Hey!! Get off!" And started yelling at her dog to stop and it literally just stopped and went inside. Weirdest thing I've ever seen on my mission.  It sliced the other dog's nose open so it was bleeding everywhere, and we were trying to help it and it got blood on us and stuff, and the lady walking the dog was freaking out and it was chaos.  So anyway, we ended up having to leave to get to church, but it was nuts haha. So at church we had 4 investigators there, and 3 less active families came! It was a full chapel, too. Attendance has honestly like doubled since I got here. My first Sunday there was like 50 people and there was like 90-100 this week so that was awesome!  It feels good to see a lot of people you work with at church! After church we had our coordination meeting with Brother Christie and Brother Charter and it was pretty good! They got off on a few tangents about random things, so we had to bring it back to missionary work a few times haha. After that we had dinner with the Brinkerhoffs. Sister Brinkerhoff was out of town and Brother Brinkerhoff is in the bishopric, so he was crazy busy. They have 5 boys and they are insane. He made us burgers, chicken, beef hot dogs, fruit, pasta salad, and cheesecake. It was soooo good! I was so full after haha!  We fasted on Sunday, so I was ok with pigging out a little haha. During dinner, we were inside with Brother Brinkerhoff and Mark McAllister talking about work and stuff and then the oldest son comes running in and he's like, "William and Spencer are killing each other!" So we look out the window and the second oldest kid (he's a big kid) and the middle kid (he's a lot smaller and skinnier) were literally going all out fight to the death on the trampoline. It was crazy! They were choking and throwing punches and kicking and body slamming each other.  So Brother Brinkerhoff runs out there and grabs the bigger kid off the small kid and like threw him on the ground, and I couldn't really see what else happened because some bushes were in the way, but Mark and Elder Myer and I were dying.  It was crazy haha. So we shared a quick message and then took off! We tracted up in north Sartell in some new neighborhoods for about an hour after dinner and found a few people. We met this family who knew the Otis's and we gave them a Book of Mormon and they said they would talk to the Otis's some more about it, so that was fun! And that pretty much wrapped up Sunday!

     This week has been long but fun, and we did some good work.  It's so satisfying to see less actives and investigators at church. It makes me so happy.  I'm very grateful to be serving the Lord at this time. Each day brings new adventures, and you never know who you will meet that needs the gospel or a kind word or a quick uplifting message or something. I love being able to just bring the Light of Christ into someone's life who needs it. There isn't too many other things that bring me joy like that does. I know this church is true and I know that Christ is the head of it and President Monson is His chosen prophet on the earth today. I'm very blessed to be a part of it and have all that I do. Love you all, and have a blessed week! Enjoy the summer, it's flying by. Thanks for all the prayers and support! 

Much love,

Elder Beach

#MavUp #10

I love meeting new friends in the mission! Mark McAllister and me.

Teaching the Plan of Salvation to Flora at the Dickerson's with chalk.

This is the story of my life... :)