Week 12 Letter

Week 12 Letter 

All:

Another busy week.

Taroon left to college which is sad. He wants to get baptized when he comes home for winter break. Hopefully I'm still here. He's doing great and we're going to send the referral up to the Elders where he's at.

 

We OYMed into a guy over a month ago named Ivan and we got back into contact with him the other day and taught a lesson. he came to church and said he enjoyed it. Hopefully that goes somewhere. he just got divorced though and is moving in a couple weeks. We seem to be good at finding people about to leave ha ha.

 

I don't know if I wrote about Fabian and his family at all. But they are awesome, and hopefully we will be holding a wedding for him and his fiance tonight so they will be living the Law of Chastity (they have had 6 kids together, who are all awesome). It's all last minute and too long of a story to write at the moment. But I pray it will all work out . We've been running around like chickens with our head chopped off. But if there are wedding photos next week you'll know what happened.

 

We had a great talk last sacrament meeting. about climbing mountains of life.

A great thought that came out of that is that "Nothing very vauable can come without trial, work, and patience.

Alma 32:21

 

Love you all. Awaiting your letters.

 

Elder Bryce Johns

 

The Plunger Prophet

The Plunger Prophet

The Story of the Elder Who Broke the Baptisimal Font

Daniel got permission to be baptized from his mother. He asked me to baptize him, and Elder Clark to confirm him. So we got everything ready for the baptism. Chairs, programs, got dressed, filled the font, etc. The font in the Highland building is old, and the rubber gasket around the plug is missing. So Elder Clark stuck a plastic bag around the metal plug to plug the font (as we have done previously) and filled the font. We had a great program. The first councilor bro. Young gave a good talk on Baptism and Brother smart gave an amazing talk on the Holy Ghost. Then it was time for the baptism. So Daniel and I got into the font, and performed the ordinance. That was really awesome. Their was a great spirit there. As we were walking out of the font, i reached down to pull the plug. (the plug had a flip-up D ring for you to hold onto). It didn't budge... I pulled harder. Nothing. I twisted and pulled and much to my consternation nothing was happening. Everyone had been watching this. But elder Clark (while laughing) closed the curtain. I continued to pull, and pull. I even grabbed a string to get my weight behind it. The plug didn't budge. I continued to try for what seemed like forever. Finially I gave up and got dressed. I sat down next to E. Clark who said.

"you didn't get it, did you."...

The rest of the program went well. After the service, I got back into my wet whites, and went back for round two (much to the amusement of my companion, brother smart, and the bishop). But it still wouldn't budge. I couldn't even get a pocket knife or a screwdriver head in between the plug and the hole. We also tried to get a siphon going but no dice. So Brother Smart went and grabbed the toilet plunger. He handed it to me and said

 "here, run this through the ring and try to pry it up"

It didn't fit. But He and Elder Clark took the opportunity to take pictures of me with the plunger in the font. Brother Smart finally said.

"Stay there plunger prophet, I'll go get a prybar from my truck"

So I did. That was probably the closest I'll get to swimming on my mission. He came back with the prybar and some rubber so as not to scratch the tile.

I ran the prybar through the D-ring and levered the plug out. The plug came out. However, the D-ring snapped. So I, Elder Johns, broke the baptisimal font. How many people can say that?

 

I love the mission and I love working with the investigators and members of our wards. Go out and find the Elect. Every member a missionary.

 

Awaiting your letters,

Elder Bryce Johns.

Some Additional Pictures From Baptism

Week 11 Letter (a week late)

Letter from Week 11

Everyone.

Hello, all. Things are going really good in Highland. This last week we've been really busy (as usual) and we had the chance to have a half mission conference with Elder Piper of the first quorum of the seventy. He was amazing. He emphasized the importance of obedience, using doctrine and principles to address questions and finding the elect. It was great, and hopefully I will have some time to write more about his address.

 

"I knew my family history was going to be interesting when I started finding so many names through the prison system" ~Brother Josh Smart

(See pictures and story in next post)

Pictures from Week 10

James' Baptism. (Bishop Denkers of the Highland 1st ward performed the ordinance)

The Redlands temple spire

The fountain at the temple (can you spot the symbolism?)

Elder Clark and I at the Redlands Temple

Email From Week 10

Here is the week 10 Email

All.

Yesterday our Air Conditioner broke in our apartment. There was much lamentation as our former oasis of chill turned into an oven. It's been muggy this week because of some thunder storms that have been rolling through (and starting fires out on the floodplain). So the humidity doesn't help either. 

 

We had James' baptism last week. Which went great. He has a strong testimony (which he bore at his baptism) and I'm sure he will be a great asset to the struggling Highland 1st ward.

 

Daniel Is still on date and we are working hard with our other investigators. A couple have dropped us though. 8(

 

Thanks for all of your prayers and support. I promise that if you write me a letter I will reply.

 

Sincerely,

Elder Johns

Email from Week 9

Note from Dad: Sorry this one is late.  Elder Johns sent this on Tuesday because the Library was closed on Monday.

Email From Week 9

All

Perhaps going to In-N-Out for lunch on Labor Day was not the best idea. (For the record, In-N-Out is really nothing special.) Anyway we got there, ordered. I was order number 25. After a few minutes they called out over the intercom "Order number one is ready now." So naturally it took awhile to get our food.

 

Things have been bustling.

 

James's baptism is set for this friday and I may have to shorten my letter so I can use computer time to write out his baptism's program. He's doing great. We did some service for him this morning, and will be having a lesson tonight.

 

I think I've mentioned Daniel before. He's on date for the 14th. We've been meeting with him and his dad regularly. They are doing awesome.

 

We were visiting a Recent Convert Lisa and her daughter Karena who is an investigator (and mentally handicapped). Karena has had all the lessons and wanted to be baptised but was deathly afraid of water. However, at school they had started swimming once a week. She was able to get comfortable in the water, and even to go under and "practice" being baptized with a nice lifeguard. So we were able to put her on date and plan things out. It was a good and spiritual lesson which we concluded by singing "I Am a Child of God". We have been using hymns a lot in our lessons. They are great for bringing the spirit.  

We had a really cool experience tracting the other day. But I think I will have to write it out next week.

 

DO YOUR HOME TEACHING!!!!!! It is sooo important.

 

Jacob 1:19

 

Please write,

 

Elder Bryce Johns