God is Good!

     Hello to all my friends, family, and coaches back home, at school, and serving worldwide! Hope this email finds you doing well and enjoying the last few weeks of summer break! I can't believe that college football season is upon us yet again!  Time is flying by! This week was pretty slow but we had some awesome miracles, so I will share all the highlights as usual!

     Monday we went down to Medicine Lake to do P day with the Anoka Zone Leaders and hang out with the Gretz! On the way down we did some work in Clear Lake and Becker. We tracted for an hour in both places and didn't really find anyone. We had some good conversations with some people and got yelled at by others, but that's how it goes haha.  We played basketball at the Crystal building for like 4 hours with Medicine Lake and Crystal and then the Gretz came up and we went to Applebee's and visited and then went bowling with them! It was so awesome to see them again.   And they got to stay with my family in Utah this week, so they got a lot of the Beaches this week.  They're awesome! 

     Tuesday was MLC in Bloomington and that isn't my favorite thing in the world, but it is what it is. We spent like an hour and a half talking about how much exercise time we should get during the day. Elder Nielson, Elder Boothe and myself brought up the comments that we have people playing collegiate sports when they get home and are trying to stay in shape as best they can (myself included). President Barney said he didn't want us working out in the evening (which I do) or getting up early to workout (which I also do).  There was a lot of heated debate about it and no final decision was made on whether or not we can workout more than 30 minutes a day. I'm getting in about an hour and half a day and still proselyting a full day, so I said that to him, and I said, "I get up early to work out, I work out at night, and I proselyte a full day. If it doesn't take out of my proselytizing, then I'm going to continue to do that." He didn't really have anything to say, so I figured I'm good to continue to do that haha. His main thing was he didn't want it taking out of our missionary work time, so I was like it isn't taking any time out of my missionary work time so it shouldn't matter. Pretty much all the Zone Leaders felt the same way, so nothing should change with that.  So Elder Myer and I got home at about 7:30 pm and had time to teach one lesson to a less active family in Becker on the way home. We shared a lesson on the importance of reading the Book of Mormon each day to continually strengthen our testimony of Christ and the restoration of the gospel. It was really good, and the spirit was definitely there!

     Wednesday was a pretty solid day. We worked on our training for Zone Conference, which was on Friday. And then we did some stop bys and stopped by Rustin Bird, who is Reegan's brother. He really has no interest in religion, but he's a good guy and he believes in God and Jesus Christ. We've been trying to get him to read the Book of Mormon, but he wants to read the Bible first. He hasn't seemed to have time to read the Bible yet, though.  He doesn't do much, so I don't know why he hasn't had time yet. We left him a chapter from the Book of Mormon to read though and he said he would read it, so hopefully he does! After that we helped the Broads move their washer and dryer out of their trailer and into their garage and then move an ancient washer and dryer from their garage into their trailer. The washers were insanely heavy and we had to just pick them up and carry them because they didn't have any wheely things to lift it and wheel it on. So that was fun! When we brought the dryer up into the trailer it didn't fit because the pipe that goes in the back was too big and the plug was different than the outlet so we ended up just leaving it there and bringing the washer in too.  It wasn't super organized or anything but we got 'er done haha. We did some tracting after that and met this lady named Ann Marie who is Roman Catholic.  She took a Book of Mormon and said we could come back and teach her and her husband this Saturday, so hopefully that goes well.  After that we had a lesson with Flora and Sister Duncombe at the church. Sister Duncombe had the exact same situation as Flora is currently in. She wanted to get baptized in high school but her parents wouldn't let her, but they finally did after some coaxing. Flora's parents were still super against her getting baptized, so basically those two talked the whole time and we just sat there until we got asked questions about doctrinal stuff that Flora had questions about.  It was really good for them to talk about the whole situation! We had dinner with the Petersons way out west of Sauk Rapids after that, and then came back to stop by some people down in the ghetto part of our area. We stopped by this guy Elders Myer and Slade found on exchanges a while back, and as we got out of the car, this guy walked by so we stopped and talked to him. He said he was atheist but knew some LDS people. As we talked to him, we realized he just had no idea who God was! He wasn't really atheist, he just didn't know who God was or His relationship to us. So we taught him about the nature of God and gave him a Book of Mormon and told him that if he read it, he would feel of God's love and know He was there. It was really cool! After that we stopped by Michael Koch and he was getting ready to head up to Canada for a week to stay at his cabin and fish. He showed us some pictures from their last like 4 trips. It looks super sick up there. Their cabin is right on a lake and they have a dock and a fishing boat. It's pretty nice. We invited him to read from the Book of Mormon while he was up there. He said he might crack it open (haha) so that was good. 

     Thursday we did a blitz exchange with the Alexandria Elders so they would already be here because Zone Conference was on Friday. I went with Elder Searle again and we had a blast! We did some stop bys in the afternoon and it was pouring rain so we got soaked, and then it quit raining and was super windy and cold haha. We stopped by this way old former investigator that none of us had ever met. We stopped by and she told us her son had gotten baptized and then left the church after like 4 months. She and her husband had been reading some anti stuff I'm pretty sure because she was like, "I just have a lot of problems with the church." I asked her what her problems were and she said, "Colored people can't have the Priesthood, women can't have the priesthood, you believe Jesus Christ is our Lord and Savior..." etc etc. She also had some other problems that aren't appropriate to mention on here, but I had a good chuckle about haha.  We told her about all those things and that she had been misinformed about all of them. I told her I have a very good friend who holds the Priesthood and is serving a mission just like I was, and he was black. Max, you are the man! Love you bro!  She was blown away by that, and I thought that was interesting. Anyway, she just had a lot of weird ideas about the church. On her teaching record, she had been to church almost 20 times and had been taught like 10 or 11 times. So I don't know how she got all those crazy ideas about the church. After that we tracted for like 2 hours and found some cool people. We met this college age girl named Lexi and taught her a restoration lesson and gave her a Book of Mormon. She is going to school up in Duluth in like 2 weeks, so hopefully we can get her in touch with the Elders up there. Then we met this lady who had read the whole Book of Mormon! No joke. She had some friends in the cities who were Mormon and they had given her a copy of it and she read the whole thing, but felt it wasn't really for her. We asked her if she had prayed about it and she said, "No, I guess not." We invited her to read it again and pray about it as it directs in Moroni 10. Funny story: she said her favorite book was the Book of "Esther". Pretty sure she meant Ether, but I didn't say anything. She then was like, "Yeah! I think Esther was a super bad A with all that killing people and stuff! So cool for a girl to be doing all that!" I didn't have the heart to tell her it was Ether, and he was a guy.  She was way too hyped about it so I just let it be haha. After that we had some dinner with the other Elders at our apartment and then drove up to Royalton and Little Falls with Brother Christie. We went to some way out of the way people, but none of them were home unfortunately. We stopped by this one less active in an apartment building that none of us had met.  We buzzed her box and she answered and said, "Who is it?" We replied, "It's the missionaries!" She then screamed, "I'm not coming to church! Goodbye!!" And hung up.  Sad day haha. We had a lesson with the Dobsons after that and it didn't go super great. Brother Dobson and Zach were mad at each other so Zach never came down for the lesson and Brother Dobson just ranted to us for like 30 minutes about everything. We shared the Jeffrey R Holland Mormon message about the Book of Mormon and invited them to read it each day. If they would, it would help them a lot and bring the Spirit into their home so much more. Keep them in your prayers for sure!

     Friday was Zone Conference in Brooklyn Park. So we got to drive an hour and half one way.  Zone Conference was really good and President Barney gave a training on having the companionship of the Holy Ghost always with our companionship. It was really cool and Elder Myer and I have decided to always pray for the Spirit to be with us when finding and teaching so it can help us. Because just us by ourselves we aren't nearly as powerful! It was fun to see Elders Peterson, Larson, and Boothe again. We had a good time at lunch haha. Elder Myer and I gave a training on obedience. It taught me a lot and made me realize that even though some rules seem stupid and we don't understand why they're there, they all have a purpose and a blessing with them if we follow them. So I thought that was pretty cool! After Zone Conference we blitzed Bloomington with the APs for our exchange this transfer. I had a doctors appointment in Maplewood in St. Paul so Elder Cordara and I went to that and Elder Myer and Elder Last went to a lesson. I got my A1C done and I still don't know the results, so sorry Mom and Dad! After that we went to one of their investigator's birthday BBQs at a park. There was a decent amount of people there. I started talking to this lady named ReRe. She was from Mississippi and we talked about Mississippi and that Jackson is serving in Alabama and about technology and family history work and temples and the Book of Mormon and the Bible. She was really interested in the Book of Mormon and we gave her a copy and promised as she read a page or more a day she would have more peace in her life. She said that is something she really wanted, so we promised she would have that if she read from it each day! It was pretty cool! After that we went and just walked around some neighborhoods and talked to people and stopped by potentials and less actives. We found this park that had a ton of Hispanics playing soccer and hanging out. Neither of us spoke Spanish, so we told the Hermanas to get down there and contact some people haha. It was a really fun exchange and I learned that I should just talk to people and get to know them and stuff before I just straight up say, "Hey! We are sharing a message about Jesus Christ, let us share it with you!" It works way better to talk about random stuff and tie it into the gospel haha.

     Saturday morning we drove right back up after working out in the morning. The APs had a weight vest in their apartment that no one uses, so they let me have it.  We mowed Connie's lawn again when we got home. She had us prune her trees and bushes and all that good stuff. So that was fun! After that we had a lesson with Mark, our last one because he is heading home to Iowa this week since his internship is over.  I'm really going to miss him. He has changed and progressed so much since I got here. He has started coming to church every week and reads like 5 chapters of the Book of Mormon every day. He even told us he is considering serving a mission, too. We had a lesson about temples and he said he would talk to his Branch President about getting a temple recommend and going through the temple when he got home! It was awesome. After that we went to Kwik Trip and got Matt some donuts for his birthday. Tate Roback got baptized on Saturday so Matt came to that and it was awesome. The whole time I felt the Spirit so strong. It was seriously one of the strongest times I've felt the Spirit on my mission. Tate Roback asked Elder Myer and me to be in the circle to confirm him, and I was pretty much bawling by the time it was done. I was just feeling the Spirit super strong and could feel how much love God had for Tate and how proud He was of him. It was super cool.  Matt loved it, too, and is excited to get baptized in a few weeks. His date is the 26th, but is still a tentative, so keep him in your prayers that it will all work out for that day! After that we had dinner really quick and went to Brother Charter's house to share a lesson and do our weekly coordination meeting. While we were doing the lesson, his wife just got up and left, and she's like, "Sorry, I just farted and it smelled really bad!" Elder Myer looks at Brother Charter and says, "Must run in the family!" I died.   I was laughing so hard for like 2 minutes and so was Brother Charter and like everyone haha. It was way funny.  

     Sunday morning we went to Petra Lutheran church with Dave. He invited us to come and check it out, so we did. It was really different. I've never been to another church so it was a new experience for me. It made me realize how different our church must be to people investigating our church. Their whole service was just scripted out of a textbook thing. All the prayers were rote prayers and it was a lot different than our church! The people were really nice though, and quite a few people said hi to us. After that we went home and did studies and then went to church. Matt, Flora, Mark, and Dan Smith came, so we had a full house again. It was awesome! Matt said he was trying to get his parents to come to check it out, but they didn't want to. His dad is all for him getting baptized, just not his mom.  Anyway, church was awesome, and I really enjoyed it. After church we stopped by a bunch of people in this neighborhood we had tracted. We ended up talking to like 10 people there that we hadn't met before because everyone was out BBQing or doing stuff like that. We met this guy and his wife who were making homemade wontons on their front deck and they gave us some. He was wearing a Vikings jersey, so we talked more about football and then the gospel haha. It worked way better. His wife gave us some wontons and they were dang good!  After that we had Mark's going away dinner with the Rodebush family. They've been his fellowship family in the ward, and have had him over for dinner a lot and friendshipped him at church. It was a really good dinner, and I had a ton of fresh corn. Super tasty! After that we did some stop bys but no one was home or interested, and then did some tracting and met this guy named Adam who was way cool. He was working on a big project in his garage and he talked to us for like 15 minutes.  We are helping him with remodeling his bathroom on Tuesday morning! Then this lady named Glynnis walked by right when we left his place, and we talked to her for a little bit and shared a Book of Mormon with her.  She gave us her address and said we could come back in a week.  After that we had a lesson with the Birds and Emily had read like 3 chapters of the Book of Mormon, so that was awesome. We talked about 2 Nephi 31 and left her to read Alma 7 so we can talk more about the atonement of Jesus Christ next time! Sunday night at around 10 pm Flora texted us and said her parents had signed her baptism record/form thing so she could get baptized! Elder Meyer and I were literally hugging and jumping around for joy. It was like the "Frolic in the Surf" from Rocky 3 haha.  It was such a great way to cap off the week. We are planning on her getting baptized the 19th and then Matt on the 26th! 

     I'm so happy to be serving a mission right now! I'm loving the work and it is so hard, but I love the small moments of success we have where it makes it all worth it. It's weird how so many hours of rejection and hard work and sweat and tears all seem to be worth it when someone texts you and says her parents will let her be baptized! I don't know how that works, but it seems to work out somehow.  Cool thing from this week was I've been struggling a lot with why I got sent to Sauk Rapids. I've been praying to know that answer a lot, and to see it in the work. I realized this week that Mark was one of the reasons I got sent here. We've really connected and been able to open up and share our feelings and insights and questions with each other, and we've been able to help him be active and want to prepare to go to the temple and possibly serve a mission! That was such a tender mercy to see that this week in the work. Just be able to see how much he has progressed and increased his faith and testimony. I know this is God's work and nothing will stop it. I know we are led by a Prophet on the earth today, and that this is Christ's church. I know that God lives and loves all of us, and I know the Book of Mormon is true and was brought forth by Joseph Smith in these last days to bless us and bring us "happiness and hope in the travail of the last days." Love you all, and have a great week!

Much love,

Elder Beach

#MavUp #10

Mark with the Rodebush family.

Tate Roback's baptism.  He is awesome!

Elder Slade, Elder Boothe and me flexing.

Me and Elder Boothe.

The Sauk Rapids Sisters wanted to take a selfie.  Elder Myer and I didn't...

Elder Cordara on exchanges.

Me and Elder Boothe flexing our lats.

Me and Elder Larson.

Trying to help Elder Larson get his coat on because his lats are so big! 

All 4 Type 1 Diabetics in the St. Cloud Zone.

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!