Baptism Date Set

 

This Wednesday we had the privilege, as a Muncie Zone, to be able to go and do an endowment session in the new Indianapolis, Indiana temple, which is gorgeous! It was such a spiritual and great experience. Temples are so great! It was about a 1 hour drive from where we are located so its no too far. It was well worth it. We went with the other Elwood missionaries and the Crowders who are legit! They are such a cool couple. Love em. :)

 

Then last Monday we got to go to the worlds biggest ball of paint in Alexandria, Indiana and paint a coat on to the ball, therefore helping break the world record on the biggest ball of paint. It was sick! It started out as a baseball and now weighs almost 5000 lbs. That's insanity!

 

This week was pretty great for missionary work though. We had a huge fast as a whole mission and it works! ;) Miracles everywhere! :D So one of our new investigators, Tyler Adams, (Not sure if I mentioned him in the last email) is SO SOLID! Love that guy. :) He is 22 years old and has a 4 year old kid, Levi. He always believed in God but never went to church really in his life. Maybe 1 or 2 times. And now that he is starting to learn more he is getting super excited and happy to learn more. We have taught him the Restoration and talked a bit about prayer and he text us the next day and said,"I just got done having a nice prayer with Roxy (his dog)" which was the coolest thing to hear! We didn't even ask him if he was praying, so that was legit. Then we also had an awesome church tour with Tyler and he came to church. We extended a baptismal date to him of November 7th, which he tentatively accepted, but we will have to work with him a little more and make it more of a sure yes. But HE'S ON DATE!!!

 

Elder Searle and I are still doing really good. He's great and so obedient and hardworking. I love it! And at the apartment we are able to keep it clean and organized as a companionship which is so nice. I'm not the only one doing ALL of the cleaning by myself! Haha! I'm learning a lot living out on my own. A lot about myself and places where I need to mature and grow. It's fantastic! Also, I cut my own hair on Monday and dyed it on Thursday. I wanted unity with Elder Searle. Hahaha! Just kidding. It was just for fun like usual. It doesn't look too bad though. It turned out better then I thought it would. It's confusing some of the people here so bad. They keep looking at me strange and asking me if there is something different. So many people have only seen me one or two times so they're not sure what's going on. It's hilarious!

 

Super cool week guys. I love and miss you all and know you're all in my prayers. Have a great week! :P

 



Love This New Area

 

 



So this week was pretty good. I enjoyed it for sure! ;) So let me see if I can remember some cool stuff that happened. So yesterday we had this AWESOME Doctrine of Christ lesson/family home evening with some of our members. They all were participating so much, opening up, and bearing their testimonies and it was just a super spiritual experience that was full of the spirit and smiles. :) Ah! They are just such an amazing family! It was in the Hamilton's home but with the mother and cousins and aunts and whatnot there was 10 people there. Nothing puts a bigger smile on my face then seeing families that are such you know,"That family". The kind that you hope your own family can be like in some way or another. Not too often do you meet families like that but I've met a couple on my mission and they are so great. :)

 

So we have quite a few investigators here in Elwood but they are terrible at keeping commitments. They have a lot of potential just never do anything to increase their faith or come closer to Christ. So we are going to have to teach a few commitment lessons this week and see what happens to help us find who we need to focus on.

 

Funny story: So we were asked last minute to teach sharing time in primary this week. It was about missionary work and the primary president asked the question (to junior primary), "What are some things we can do to help the missionaries?" And one of the little girls raises her and says,"We can help them get dressed!" Hahahahaha! Elder Searle and I just about died trying not to laugh. It was so funny.
 

So I totally ripped my pants the other day... Elder Searle had to take a call, so while he was on the phone I was pulling wheelies in the grass on my bike and wheelied over cuz I leaned back a little too much. So we started riding and I felt like my pants were getting caught on my seat. So I felt them and they were ripped all up the back! Haha! Luckily it just pulled the seams out so it was easy to repair. Thank you to Sister Anderson who repaired them for me! So that was an adventure. ;) But other than that we had another awesome family home evening around a camp fire with a recent convert family and a new investigator. That was a lot of fun! We talked about the Sabbath and then had a cool object lesson with ice cream. :) And Tyler and Levi (investigator and kid) were going to come to church but Levi started puking at 6am so they weren't able to make it sadly. :/

  

Anyways, I've only got 2 more minutes... But  I just wanted to let you know Mom, you are so amazing and I love and care about you SO MUCH!!! I miss you a lot and you have had such an amazing influence on my life. So thank you so much for everything. Being out here on a mission and seeing so many different families makes me realize way more how much of an amazing family I have and how blessed I truly am. Thank you so much Mom! Love you to death!

Loving Elwood Indiana

So I got transferred to the Elwood, Indiana area, and it is legit! It's an older town a little more in poverty and going down hill because most of the business' have moved out and it is hard to find a job here. Also, interesting fact, Elwood actually used to be the headquarters for the KKK awhile ago I guess? Kind of interesting, maybe I'll meet a couple in the group? ;) The area is super cool though! It is very flat, not a ton of trees but there are a lot of corn fields and fields of soy beans. It's cool though. :) My new companion is Elder Searle and he is from Heber City, Utah and is the coolest guy! We were in the same MTC district and we sat next to each other on the plane ride here. He is so set on following all the rules, even the little ones which makes me soooo happy! You have no idea! He is awesome. :) We are in an apartment and its not bad. Smaller than the one before but my companion is really clean and organized which I am so grateful for. We share a car with the other Elders in the branch. Pretty small area though so its easy to get around.

So I'm kinda starting to get to know the people a little bit but not super well. One thing moving into an area is you start teaching these investigators that you know like nothing about but they have been taught for awhile so you don't know what they do or anything but your companion does. So its kind of awkward but gimme another week or two and I'll be good with that. :) But we did find these new investigators that are pretty cool! Their names are Ashley, Donald, and Kazen, who is the son, and they are boyfriend and girlfriend and have dated for 10 years (Just get married already right???) ;)

General conference was fantastic though. I loved it! I was really paying attention and trying to get stuff out of it! Priesthood session was super powerful too. There was a lot of cool messages that I liked a lot. There seemed to be a big focus though on a couple subjects. Faith, being temple worthy, listening to the spirit, and being prepared. I especially loved Elder Holland's talk on women. There's so many mothers that don't really get enough credit like they deserve so I loved that. There may have been one or two others that I missed or forgot but yeah it was great! President Monson was getting kind of sketchy though towards the end of his talk he looked like he was really struggling to keep going and looks pretty ill. Hopefully we won't lose him soon as well.

FUNNY STORY TIME! :D So Elder Searle, on our second night, left the keys in the apartment and so we got locked out... BUT, we have a balcony in our back yard, so I decided to climb the balcony and get on the deck to see if our back sliding glass door was unlocked, but NOPE! So when I went to get down, I was hanging off the side and was going to jump and do the whole, jump tuck and roll tactic like many times before (cuz I'm a ninja like that) and well, I failed... I jumped and my foot caught on something on the deck and I fell awkwardly and landed right on my left tail bone/lower back, and the neighbor right below saw me fall off the deck.... AWKWARD!!! :P So yeah, fun fun fun.

The new area is great! I really like it a lot. It's super cool and I like the people too! It's a lot more in poverty than Milford for sure and we've gone into some pretty beat up houses. One of our investigators pretty much has a camping cot and blankets for a bed with no heating, water, or electricity and is about to leave cuz he can't pay rent anymore and whatnot. Rough area! But its good. We are in a branch, not a ward. I barely know anyone cuz I haven't been to church here yet. But there is about as many members here as there were in Milford from what I've heard.  Love you all.

New Comp and New State!!!!

Jordan's new companion is Elder Searle and he is in Indiana now! Yay! 

His new address is: 1775 Antler Ct. Apt. #F3

                                Elwood, IN  46036

He would LOVE letters!

Getting Transferred Tomorrow

Hey y'all! So I'm not gonna write much on this weeks email. Sorry about that. But things have been going alright in the area. We had one day that was fantastic. We taught Scott Van De Grift and it was such an amazing lesson! So one thing with Scott, when I first moved in to the area, you could barely ask him a question without him getting upset or mad at you and tell you off. We went in to this lesson with prayer, fasting, and President Loechinguer (mission presidents counselor) and wow! Miracles happened! He opened up a whole lot and was super close to praying and being put on date. I know he will be there soon enough. I am getting transferred this week though, but am not sure where I am going till tomorrow. But I know Elder Brasher will get Scott there and take care of the area. Love you all!

Here's some fun pics.

Don't look TOO happy!

Got a haircut.

Helping ward member cut down some trees.

New Investigators

Hey whats up y'all!!! :D

Everybody needs to hurry and send my mother Darlene Silotti a message on Facebook. It is currently her birthday today and needs the wishes! ;) But seriously though.... DO IT! :P

Lets see, so currently our area is still not doing super hot, but we are getting a little better I guess? We don't really have any other progressing investigators besides Scott Van De Grift, but we have a couple who are still up and down. Abbi was doing great but has bailed on us a lot this past week or so which is a bummer cuz she could really use a switch around in life and wants a switch up. I just don't know how much she is willing to sacrifice to get that. So hopefully things will work out for her.

So our mission does this thing called 2-2-5ing where if we go to a persons house and they are not home we talk to the 2 neighbors on both sides of the house, and the 5 houses across the street to ask about that person and then introduce ourselves and see if we can get a new investigator. And we were doing that one time this week and this lady answers the door and the first thing she says to us is "Hey! Wanna come do some dishes for me?" Elder Brasher immediately responds, is there another male in the house? I would love to do it!  (Rules are, there has to be another 16+ old male in the house for us to go in) and she just starts laughing and replies "No its okay, I'll do it. Talk to my son" Then she walks in and tells her 17 year old son to come out and talk to us. It was so funny! Their names are Erin (Mom), Kyle (17 year old son), and Iseaha (10?) and we have an appointment with them I think tomorrow? So that will be awesome. We would love to get another family to join the church!

Lets see, so one of our long term investigators we stop by occassionally needed some work on her truck so I asked what it needed work on. She was like,"It needs new intake manifold gaskets. I've got the parts." So I respond,"I've never done it before but that doesn't sound too difficult", so she let me do it cuz nobody else could in a reasonable time. I was excited. Working on cars is great! So I replaced my first exhaust manifold gaskets and it was fantastic! ;) And because of Gods grace, we were able to give her a tour of the church later that night which is the most progress we have made with her so far, and it went pretty well. :) Hopefully we can teach her again soon. She is super busy. Oh! Her name is Tika and she is like 35-40? And she has 3 kids.

I don't think there is anything else this week, so I will talk to y'all later. Love ya!

2 Weeks Till Transfers

 

So honestly there isn't a whole lot to talk about this week but I will try to hit the more important points. :)

 

So this last week we had what is called a Social Media Split, which is something our mission came up with I think. You get one day where you try and plan the whole day to have members out with you teaching or doing service etc... and the point of is it to have the members take photos or videos to post on social media sites to kind of spread the good word. :) Kind of cool! So Elder Brasher and I did lots of service. We were on top of roofs cleaning gutters, painting floors, weeding, mowing lawns etc... It was a lot of fun. :) Sadly we weren't able to get many lessons that day though, but lots of service is always good.

 

Then the other thing from this week is sadly our area is not doing so hot currently. Our investigators Brianna and Wileen dropped us. Brianna had an attitude with Wileen I guess and Wileen blamed it on us and text us and told us to never come back again. So they are dropped. Then we had our other really good potential, Rhonda Hauke, drop us. Well, her fiancé did, she told us we could call her last night to see if we could start coming by again (fiancé hates Mormons I guess) and so I called her and the Fiance answered. He went off on us which is sad that he is so controlling over Rhonda. She is in her 30's and he is stopping her from even talking to us. Poor Rhonda. She really wanted to keep learning. And as for Tammy, a long term investigator who started progressing, seems to be dropping a little again cuz she has such a crazy life (2 Jobs, 5 kids, and is going to court with 2 crazy ex's) so she has a lot on her plate. But she won't keep any commitments so we may have to drop her soon sadly.

 

And lastly, as for Abby, she is doing good. We had an in home lesson with her last Wednesday. And it went really good, she was excited to read the Book of Mormon.she was going to be at church on Sundy but ended up being out of town longer than planned, so hopefully we can see her soon :)

Oh, lastly! I gave my first talk while on the mission and it went a lot better than I was expecting, It was my first time speaking without my whole talk written out, just a couple bullet points.... Anyways, love you all!