The spirit should do the converting, not the missionaries!

This week was great! We had a baptism of an investigator that we have been working with for a while. She got sick and was in the hospital for a couple of weeks so we couldn't contact her. She finally got out and we got a hold of her. We had to move her date back a week but we got her baptized! Earlier this week we had a lesson with her on prayer and filled out her baptism info. So we got the whole record filled out and got into our lesson on prayer. At the end I asked her how she got here. She had told us before that she used to be super anti Mormon and turned her whole family against Mormons. Which is why no one has supported her. She said a couple years back she had an impression she needed to check out our church. So she asked a neighbor she lived by about us and she claims that all the neighbor would tell her is "you need to talk to the missionaries". She thought it was really odd that they wouldn't just answer the question. Fast forward to 3 years down the road to present time. She got the same feeling just even stronger this time. And a lot of hard life situations made her more open to meeting with us. So she drove to our stake center and asked someone to talk about the church that happened to be there. It just so happened to be our stake president. He called us and told us to call her. We called her and set up an appointment. Our first few appointments she was really closed off and skeptical of everything, but she slowly opened up as we kept meeting with her. So that brings us up to the day we were filling out her baptism info. She said that the thing that really made her want to join wasn't our teaching or the ward members. At first I kind of felt bad, like I wasn't a good teacher and she didn't really need us. She said it was the spirit that really pulled her into the church. Well after this happened I thought about it for a long time. I felt like I was a bad teacher and I needed to change. The more I thought about it though, the more I realized this is what we should want. We want our investigators converted to the gospel, ready to listen to the spirit and the promptings it has. Just like in the missionary broadcast we just had. The spirit is the one that should be converting, not us missionaries. This took me a couple days to figure out but once it clicked I was so happy! We had someone that I truly knew without a doubt was converted to the gospel and not us, the missionaries. This is how all our investigators should be. Willing to say it wasn't the missionaries that converted them but it was the spirit, the true converter. She is super awesome and I'm so glad she was able to be in tune with the spirit and ready to listen to its witness of the truthfulness of this church. I'm sure it's going to take a while to get used to our church since everything is new to her, not to mentions she was anti too, but I'm sure she will be a great new member to the ward.

This is her service dog, so this is what my Sundays are like haha :)

Kami Empey. She has seizures so she has to have a service dog. Elder Watts helped teach her mostly so he came to her baptism. (Front row Elder Watts, Kami Empey, Elder Lange,  Back row Elder Ashcraft)

Elder Lange's mom talking:  A member named Janette Larsen texted me one night and asked if she could get my meatball recipe.  I knew without a doubt Elder Lange had asked her to make him barbecue meatballs.  They were his absolute favorite meal.  So here he is eating a memorial day dinner made especially for him!  He is literally being catered to down there!  And she also mentioned that "so many people here love Elder Lange so much!" 

Find your "WHY"

This week went pretty well. We finally got in contact with our investigator that was in he hospital. We had an interview with her and she has a baptismal interview and passed. We will be having her baptism on the 28th! Elder Ashcraft and I made a goal to have a baptism every month we are together. It might be kind of hard but I think we can get it done if we are diligent and obedient. Other than that we are just trying to do a lot of finding and sometimes it works but sometimes it doesn't. We either have super good days or just not so great days. There seems to be no middle ground. But the good days definitely surpass the not so good ones. It's just really hard to find people prepared in our small towns. Other than that everything is going pretty well. We are trying to do a lot of contacting with new people and weed out the ones that aren't prepared. We are finding people and they seem pretty prepared and want to take the lessons and things like that but when we schedule a time to come back something always ends up happening to them and they can't meet. This has happened at least a couple times with a few people. I can't tell if this means we need to keep trying or if they really aren't prepared. 

So we were asked to read 1 Nephi for our up coming zone conference. While I was reading I came across the realization that Nephi knew his "why". Laman and Lemuel didn't know their "whys". This is what made it so hard for them. They wanted to do what was right and even tried but complained the whole time. They went back to the city because their father told them to but they didn't want to. Nephi knew the best why and that is faith in Jesus Christ and what he did for us. He wanted to do all he could for our savior. He even search for his "why" to make it stinger and deepen it. "Whys" don't just come from living the gospel and doing what's right. They come from honest hard pondering and praying. I've seen so many good missionaries that are doing what's right but have no idea why they are out on a mission. But like Laman and Lemuel, when they get called to do something hard, they murmur and complain. Nephi searched for his "why" in chapter 11. He wanted to truly know for him self what God wanted. He wanted to deepen his "why". So he got down and prayed. He pray earnestly and hard. He found his why and worked with it. He deepened his "why" each day. So I challenge each of you to find your "why" of living the gospel and gospel standards. It's just going to get hard to live the standards as time goes on. Satan won't stop working on us and he will make us think "the gospel isn't for you", "the gospel is old fashioned", "the gospel is boring or doesn't really work". Satan can tempt us with so many things and this is when we need our why. Our firm foundation in Christ and what he did for us. What he can do for us now. How much he can help us in our everyday lives and when we realize how great of debt we are in to Him, then we will notice how much we need to try and repay him as much as we can. Then we will understand why we live the gospel and how great of a blessing it is to have it in our lives. He only asks of so little for how much he did for us! Stay true to the iron rod! I love you all. Sorry I don't have much to say about how the missionary work is going this week. But here are a couple of pictures 

Arizona sunburn

Elder Lange and Elder Ashcraft just chillin

Elder Lange and Elder Ashcraft

A blurry picure of where we live 

Alec's mom talking:  This was send to me in a text the other night.  Eating cupcakes after dinner, I love how Elder Lange has three on his plate!  Typical. 

The three amigos!

Hey everyone! This week was pretty good. It's started off with a p day that wasn't really a p day. We had to help an investigator move out of an apartment by the next day. She was down in the valley in the hospital so that wasn't very fun. But Tuesday was pretty fun. We started the day off with a ton of service in our area and helping out some others. When we were driving home we thought we would take the dirt road and shoot somethings out of the truck while driving. Well we saw a squirrel and then later on we were skinning a squirrel for lunch haha. We got pretty good with our sling shots. Enough about messing around though. The next day we had exchanges with the APs. Of course my comp doesn't know the area so I had to plan out a super productive day by myself. The day went super good though! We found 3 new investigators. They were all super open to religion and were open to our message. They each had some dumb concerns that didn't really matter like why did you guys practice polygamy back in the day and not now. We told them that the Book of Mormon would answer that question. We read them Moroni 10:3-5. It's the promise in the Book of Mormon that says if you pray with a sincere heart really wanting to know if it's true then you will get an answer. They were kind of confused at first but then we explain that the Book of Mormon is the keystone of our religion, meaning if the book isn't true then nothing else is. But if it is true then those small concerns that they have don't matter. We know that the book is from God and that's the way he wanted the gospel at the time. We of course bore our testimonies of the Book of Mormon and told them to read it and ask if it's true. They all were really excited to read it and find out to know. He told me I'm doing super good and he admires me but I think they are payed the big bucks to tell you that. Because I can't see it. He told me some things I could work on as a missionary which was good because I want to grow as much as I can. And he also gave me some things I could do to help with my companion. He's kinda hard to work with sometimes but he's a super good guy. Well after we had a pretty good day with the AP we took him into Show Low to meet up with some other elders. The next day Wednesday, was ZTM or Zone Training Meeting. We had to plan a 2 1/2 hour meeting and give an hour long training on the atonement. It was a really cool training. I learn a lot about the atonement myself. We also had to train on deeming your "why". What I talked about a couple emails back. Anyways it was super hard because we were supposed be taking turns during our training but he kept forgetting what he was supposed to do next and just sat there and looked at me. It was one of the most awkward things of my life. Our whole zone was just staring at us and I had to keep the training going. The rest of the meeting went good though. The next day we weekly planned forever and got some goals that we want to do this week and then later that night we went to fathers and sons. I didn't get any pictures but it was really fun. There were some non members but it didn't really go anywhere so that's a bummer. We got back Saturday and had a bunch of member present lessons. They want us to be at 90% member present lessons. Which means when we get a lesson we have to have a member there with us so they can keep in contact with them and fellowship them when we are in other wards. Anyway Sunday was good too. It's kind of weird, I used to hate Sunday's but now they have become a delight to me Sundays are always so good now. If you truly try and get as much as you can out of Sunday's and not just go because you are "supposed to" they will become a delight. It's so fun going to church when they are a delight. Our week was pretty good all in all. Just a little bit crazy and stressful. Love you guys. Keep on the straight and narrow! 

A picnic on P day 

Our lunch Tuesday haha

Best mothers day present ever!! (said Alec's mom!)

Alec's mom talking:  So we got to talk to Alec on mothers day and it was the best ever!  So I didn't really think I was going to get an email the next day.  But to my surprise he sent me the lovely letter that pretty much melted my heart. <3 <3 <3

"But I forgot to tell you in person. I LOVE YOU MOM! I wouldnt have been able to come anywhere close to where I am today. I am so grateful to be able to call you MY mom. You don't know how many people I have met in my life that say "oh your mom is Alana Lange? That's awesome I wish she was my mom!" And all I have to say is I know I got pretty dang lucky. I don't think I could ever repay you with enough gratitude. Hopefully me being out on a mission is something that makes you happy. The last thing I would want to do is let you down. You are a big reason why I came out on a mission. You were/are one of the greatest examples to me. I often go to bed thinking about how you put up with me and sometimes even why you did but all I do know is that I'm grateful. I was blessed immensely to be born into a family with you as my mom. I'm sure there were a lot of people in heaven saying I want to be in her family. Actually I know that's true because people still say it to me haha. I can't even comprehend sometimes the love you have for everyone. One thing I love about you is that you love everyone. And if you don't you can't tell because you never show it. There are so many times when you spent a lot of money and time on me with all my hospital visits and the accidents I have. You always put your family first. The way a real mom should. You bought me a brand new bike one year for my birthday. You bought us an Xbox. You paid for my xbox live all the time. You paid for dates I went on. You are paying for my mission. And so many more things that might not seem like a lot but make the biggest difference. I don't know how many other people can say this but I HAVE THE BEST MOM IN THE WORLD! I love you mom. Keep being you!"  

It's crazy being a zone leader!

Hey everyone! This week was super good! It's been pretty crazy lately though. We had transfer so that is always crazy, more so when you are a ZL. Then we had a meeting down in the valley. It was stinkin hot down there! I'm so glad I'm serving in the mountains. I realize how blessed I am each month when we go down to the valley. Anyways the meeting was really good! We learn a lot about the atonement. The hard part is now I have to give the same training to my zone because only zone leaders and sister training leaders go to the one in the valley. That has been stressing me out pretty bad because I want it to go well. I'm doing that Thursday. I'm going on exchanges with the AP tomorrow. And trying to set up a baptismal interview for one of our investigators. It's going to be pretty stressful. She's in the hospital right now and I don't really know what's wrong with her. But she does have seizures so that could be part of it. Then the next week I have to go out on exchanges to New Mexico! That should be pretty fun. I heard it's super pretty over there so I might have to take some pics. Then the next week we have a zone conference that I have to conduct. My new companion has only had one baptism his whole mission so our goal is to get one every month. He doesn't believe it can happen so it's good I have the faith for both of us ;). He is a really goofy kid but I love him. It's kinda weird. I thought he would be super weird and we wouldn't get along at all but for some reason we get along pretty well. Maybe it's just the Lord blessing me with his love for him. We are gonna do some major work together hopefully. So now that I'm pretty good with sling shots we decided to go hunting today. We woke up at 5:30 and started then. We came back and had studies then went back out and we have been hunting all day. We saw a bunch of squirrels but any time we chased one down it just hid in a hole. Well next little while should be pretty crazy but it will be fun and help me grow :). Love you guys! Have a great week! 

This is Dot. She's one of the coolest dogs.

Transfers!

Hey everyone! 

This week was pretty sweet. We taught a bunch of good lessons Monday-Thursday. The baptism didn't happen this Saturday though because one of her sisters got life flighted down to a hospital in the valley. So we will baptize her sometime in May probably. Our other investigator that we have on date had a super good lesson this week and told us she can't wait to get baptized. Which is super cool because the first time we met with her she was super defensive and closed off. Now she loves meeting with us and loves the gospel. Anyways, Friday morning was transfers. So I picked up my new comp. Elder Ashcraft! We stayed and saw that everyone made it to their new areas ok and then we drove back to our area and went camping! Haha it was so fun. We went on the fathers and sons and are going again the 13th and 14th. It snowed on us over night. I miss camping a ton but I'm willing to give it up for a small time to be on a mission. So Elder Ashcraft is my zone leader companion as well. He is from Hamer ID. It 30 minutes west of Rexburg. He has been out for 22 months and so I will probably be with him until he dies. (Mission terms for going home). He has never been a zone leader or district leader so I'm going to have to train him on that. He is a pretty cool and love Nerf guns so he has like at least 15. I'm sure we will do some work together. Love you all. 

So I guess I'll never stay out of trouble. I broke a window but they said I didn't have to pay anything so that's good. 

Elder Lange and Elder Ashcraft

Father son camp out