Monday, December 30, 2013

Ya'da'la! (What the heck!)

Ya'da'la! (What the heck!) Maybe he will get used to braces soon. Otherwise it's going to be a long 2 1/2 years! Ok, so this week was a little slower because of Christmas and the baptism yesterday. We didn't get to go out and teach as much but it was still a really cool week! The two days before Christmas we went out and delivered some toys that we got from a ward in Utah and gave all of them to little kids we ran in to. It was a great way to get our foot in the door and talk to people and it was also great because a lot of the kids here don't get much for Christmas because of the poverty on the reservation. You should have seen the reactions we got from the kids when they got a gift! Yesterday the guy who competes in rodeo's who we have been teaching got baptized with two other converts from the other two missionaries area. It was cool to have 3 people all at once and the turn out was really big! They all have cool members who are there to welcome them into the ward. The funny part of it all is that we tried to fill up the font in Many Farms so we could have the baptisms here but the water was all yellow and gross so we moved it to the building in Chinle. That building is bigger anyways so it worked out well. It's awesome to think how far all of these converts have come since we first met them and my companion and I have nothing to do with their conversion processes. We joke around all the time and say that the Lord borrows our mouth when we teach and that all we have to do is be there. So to see the spirit speak to someone through us and then see that person join the church is something amazing! Well I have a picture for you and then I'm done for today. I will talk to you next week. Love ya!








Monday, December 16, 2013

...we have WAY too much fun all the time...

Things are really good here =) Sorry it took so long to have the picture sent to you. The Anderson's and us are on Mormon/Navajo time these days haha. I told you last Monday that I was going to write letters to you guys but it never happened because we got crazy busy with Elder McCarry and I left in charge of two areas all day. I helped someone move in though  last Monday and it was good. This week was super awesome! The guy we have been teaching who use to be a youth minister has his baptismal interview tomorrow and his baptism this Saturday! He is super awesome and Is going to be a great member of the Church! So.. Elder Nicholson and I have come to the conclusion that we are obviously not doing this mission thing right because we have WAY too much fun all the time haha. The other two elders must think we are crazy because we are always laughing. We have done a lot of finding this week and we have met some really cool people. The craziest part is that we have a really good success rate when we knock on people's doors. We pray all the time for the spirit to lead us to those who are prepared for the gospel and it works just about every day. It's incredible. Anyways, thank you for all the pictures this week and talk to you next week! Love you guys!








Tuesday, December 10, 2013

More proof that I don't do anything on my own.

This week it snowed for the 3rd time and it stuck to the roads finally. It's was a cool view from the church because you could see the mountains in the distance covered in snow and all the mesa's were white with patches and streaks of red! It all melted already and made mud, but in the morning and evenings the mud freezes. It's easier to drive on the frozen mud. Church yesterday was good! A member asked the bishop if he could share an experience he had last week so he spoke for a little bit in sacrament meeting. He saw an older homeless lady in Burger king and he felt he should give her money to buy some food. She thanked him and walked into the bathroom and he waited at his table for 2 hours and she never came out. He said he thought she was an angel and god had sent her to test his Christmas spirit. He also said that everyone else didn't see the lady like she was invisible or something! It was crazy! A member of the high council talked about the true meaning of Christmas and compared Santa to Jesus. Elder Nicholson and I were driving in Valley Store south of Many Farms and we took a wrong turn and ended up knocking on this awesome lady's door who is super prepared for the gospel and talked with us for a while. It's cool because we don't know why we ended up finding her but I know God does. More proof that I don't do anything on my own. It's all him working through my companion and I. Anyways, Thank you for all you guys do and I will talk to you next week!


view from Josh's "house" :)


Monday, December 2, 2013

Thanksgiving dinners :)

My thanksgiving was spent eating at three different people's houses. I was so stuffed it hurt! The first house we went to was an investigator's home and we had a very traditional Navajo food choice with a bit of regular thanksgiving thrown in. We had blue corn mush with steamed corn stew and mutton with sheep ribs and fry bread and tortillas. They also had potato, turkey, ham, and stuffing. The other two homes we ate at were members and the food choice was more like a regular thanksgiving. I enjoyed it all though! I'm glad I'm not too picky with food because I can eat all of it. We had a 4th dinner appointment but when we showed up they were just about done and they saw we were full haha so we just sat and talked to their family. SO! That Youth Minister we teach is asking people from his old church to come to the LDS church here in Many Farms! He has been busy the past 2 weeks so we pushed back his baptism to the 21st of December which is the same date as another one of our investigators (This guy is a roper and he goes to allot of rodeo's. He has placed 5th and 2nd in city rodeo tournaments in the time we have been teaching him.) Both of them came to church so we are more than likely to have two new converts on the 21st! The ward is doing really well and I love it here!

Here is a picture of our truck after it got stuck...


Josh's companions details of thanksgiving : ... we figured since we knew we were going to be eating a lot and it was going to probably hurt quite a bit, we thought we should have a contest. We weighed ourselves in the morning and we weighed ourselves when we got back into the house. The person that gained the most weight was the winner. I won. I gained 10 pounds that day, Elder McCarrey gained 8, Elder Petersen was 7 and Elder Beck was 5. After a few days we all got back down to normal, but man it was terrible! We could hardly move after that. .... We are on pavement a little bit, but most of the time we are on dirt roads. And when I say dirt, I mean that it's pretty much clay, some places more than others. And so when it snows or rains really slowly, the water sinks into the clay/dirt and makes the roads SUPER slippery. And it washes them out really really bad. ....Anyway, in one spot, it was so washed out that there was like a four foot hole in the road. And when little cars or vans tried going through, they got stuck and it takes a while to get them out. We were about to go on this road, cause our pickup made it just fine, and we saw a family out there shoveling sand and taking it over with buckets and dumping it in the hole. We stopped and helped cause we had shovels too and we filled in the hole pretty well and it was all good!"         Elder Nicholson