Wk 71 - Turkey day and Trio

Companion: Elder McNaughtan
Area: Dublin

Happy Elders!
(Love getting surprise texts!)

Happy Black Friday!
(another surprise text!-
not sure where he got his turkey shirt!?)

Eatin' lunch!

McNaughtan got replaced! 

Haha tried to make him sit in the back. 

(Not really it was just a joke!) 

Howdy howdy,

Well this week has been pretty average until we had Thanksgiving of course! We ended up just having "dinner" with a few families at the church which was nice! But Monday we had a couple lessons fall through so we knocked and had a good time!

Tuesday, we spent most of the day at MLC! (mission leadership conference) Mlc is always a good day! Very spiritual and I learn a lot! Probably one of my favorite training had to be by president and sister Stratford! Sister Stratford rebuked us for not using "adjusting to missionary life" which is a sweet book we have that I have a testimony of! But it wasn't like she was mad, it was with love, she's the best. They discussed how a lot of missionaries struggle and it's because they don't see the good in themselves. So when we work with others we need to help them see the good in themselves! I thought it was pretty awesome! Just what I needed for myself and others. Then the assistants gave a dang good one. They talked about testimony, and had President and Sister Stratford bare their testimony on Jesus Christ. Talk about powerful. President shared a very sacred experience that he had with his family and I don't think there was a dry eye in the room. It was powerful and I feel blessed to be there! Then we got to bare testimony to our companions and honestly that was weird, but it made me grow a stronger love and respect for Elder McNaughtan. It was pretty cool. 

After mlc we had a sweet dinner with the Krons. They asked us to share our experience of why we chose to come on a mission! Geez- the day was very spiritual to say the least. 

 

"Two fine looking young men came to our home for dinner tonight.
They both shared with us their touching stories of how they chose to
serve missions. It's clear that Heavenly Father has a plan for each of them.
Thanks for doing your part to raise a righteous generation of Saints!
(from the Krons)

Wednesday we had a pretty good district council! Elder Barnson did a great training that made everyone run!! He did many different things we had to do as companionships. Elder McNaughtan had to pull me on a blanket for a whole ladder. Hahaha then one had to finish exactly at 90 seconds. The whole point of the training is that we don't have to go 90 seconds because that's all the area has ever done. Meaning, we set the pace. We get better and faster. We don't have to follow what the people before us did. We raise the bar! It was pretty awesome! After that we went on exchanges. I got to be here with Elder Barnson! He's a great guy and an awesome missionary! I sure learned a lot! We found a new guy and talked to a lot of formers. We finished the night reading the BOM with Marry and Penny! It was sweet. 

Thursday turkey day we ended up eating with a few families at the church and stopping by some as well. It was a good day mostly because we had some time to empty out the apartment and get a bunch of junk out of there! 

Our project. It's all done now and feels amazing.
Crazy what people leave!

The apartment smells great now!!

Friday we had the usual busy day! But we even got to have a second thanks giving and do some service after! It was pretty sweet! I love getting to know the members! 

Saturday was pretty busy and we finished the night strong! In the morning we got to play ball again! It was good as always! We had president call us and ask if a missionary could spend a couple of days with us. So of course we were excited to do so and we went over and picked him up before a lesson with Daylon! It was pretty powerful, we talked about priesthood auxiliaries and temples. We also had a member come and share his conversion story! The missionary we got is a stud and he's just been going through some things that he gets to go home for a little bit and come back out. He's a stud and its been good being in a trio with him.

Sunday was pretty sweet. Had a good day at church and Daylon came and keeps getting closer and closer. One concern at a time! Had dinner with the Talentinos, who are sweet! It was awesome! He plays basketball with us! One of the few members! 

Today we gotta help move some stuff out of storage. President told us to swing by and grab some pie so of course we did! Haha and we gotta go get stuff done! It's been a good time! 

Well I love you all! Hope you've have a great week and have a good week this week! 

Love Elder Smoot 

Wk 70 - What a week!

Companion: Elder McNaughtan
Area: Dublin

 Got to see some ol pals!

Elder Neeser

Elder Nelson

New comp (McNaughtan) and Elder Olsen

First work out he wasn't feeling too hot

Follow up calls with Mansfield Elders 

The First Wendy's

Chilling with Elder Jaster on the last p-day

Wendy's headquarters

Howdy howdy, 

Well I know it's only been five days but it sure was a good five days! Nothing too crazy happened but I got a sweet companion! The good Lord is blessing me! His name is Elder McNaughtan and he's a stud. He goes home exactly one month from now! I get to send him home so it should be pretty fun! He's from Heber City Utah and loves boating and all that good stuff! We get a long really well and work really good together! It'll be a good four and a half weeks!

Last Wednesday night we had a lesson with Daylon, then went and visited some members so Elder Jaster could say bye. Pretty sad he was leaving but I was glad Elder McNaughtan was coming. It was a solid day. 

Thursday we had to drive to transfers in New Albany. Transfers took quite a while with people showing up late and what not it wasn't good. We had to make sure everyone had things figured out before we could leave so it was good. We got back and had dinner later on. I grilled out in the snow while he was unpacking! Haha it was actually pretty fun! He brought a rice cooker so we've used that almost every day!

Friday we had our first solid day of planning! We figured out the zone focus and had follow up calls! It was a good day! We had a couple lessons fall through that night but it's good because they rescheduled! 

Saturday was a dang good day! To start it off we got permission to go play basketball at 7 am with a bunch of ballers at the church. There are about fifteen to twenty people who come and ball!! It's so sick!! There are only a few members so there are a lot of people coming in the church that know nothing about it! We have had some pretty good conversations with them!! We also filled up the font for a member getting baptized! I couldn't stop thinking of my stud of a nephew Ruger and how proud I am of him for getting baptized this weekend. Its crazy to me that I left when he was six and now he's growing and getting baptized!! Love you lots Ruger! After that we had a lesson with Daylon and it was all about receiving revelation. Daylon is having a hard time seeing God's answer, the things he tells us, to us, seem like it's an obvious yes but he doesn't see it so we've been trying to help him recognize that and see it. He's doing pretty good though.

Sunday was sweet!! We had miracle after miracle again! We only had Daylon come to church but we knew we'd have to find more so we could Baptize this transfer! So that night we worked hard after a huge steak dinner at the Thomas's house!! We ended up finding three people and they were sweet! All of them invited us right back! It was a sweet night! Then to make it better, Elder McNaughtan had a sweet idea to make reporting much, much easier! It made the night go way good!! 

Today is a weird day! First Monday pday in a long time!! But it's been good!! We went to the "Toy Barn" which is basically some of the best cars on the planet all in one place! Then we went to a couple other places including Walmart of course and now we're here! So hope ya'll have a good week!! 

I love you lots! God bless! 

Love Elder Smoot 

Hot BMW and Lamborghini!

Wk 69 - Bye Bye Elder Jaster

Companion: Elder Jaster
Area: Dublin

Saying goodbyes

US!

Transfer board predictions! Haha art credit to Elder Jaster

Bathroom pic!

The cut! Finally stopped bleeding

when I straighten it its got like a hole type thing   

that hopefully will be healed when the muscles grow back! 

Howdy howdy, 

Well it's been a way good transfer!! Definitely one of quickest for me! Elder Jaster is a stud and I'm gonna miss him! But at least my new companion I've heard is sweet! We have transfers tomorrow so it'll be good! This last was sweet and full of miracles!! Gotta love God!

Zone Conference last Thursday was a "Fat pasture"!! Go read Ezekiel 34 and you'll understand!! President Stratford gave a great and inspiring training on that! We talked about goal setting and planning! It was pretty dang spiritual if you ask me! Gotta love Zone Conference! Right after, we had a miracle of coming back in contact with a guy after the Spirit led us all around the block until we "some how" perfectly ran into him walking back to our car! Crazy time! 

Friday we had the usual planning and administrative jazz! That night we had a lesson with Daylon at Panera bread! That was pretty dope! Ran into a member and he paid for all of us! That was pretty sweet. 

Saturday we got to move more stuff from President's house into a senior couple's house with the assistants! That was a blast! The best part was that I gotta back up a trailer and drive a truck for the day! Blast from the past! Didn't realize I truly enjoyed doing that! Haha

Sunday was insane! It was a literal miracle in and of its self! We've been trying so hard to get people to church this whole transfer so we could hit the standards of excellence! We invite literally everyone! Come Sunday we had one person when it started. Daylon walked in like two minutes late so we had two and were pumped. Then we looking around saw a mom and a daughter we've been teaching. So we had four and we were stoked! Then it got better don't worry! As soon as the meeting came the dad of the Venezuelan family came up to say hi! Turns out he was there the whole time and loved it! It was crazy! Then we realized that we spent all our time in lessons and in zone conference and preparing zone conference and on exchanges that we hadn't found anyone! So after church we prayed and went to work to find five people! You already know the Lord prepared a way and led us to five people! What a good day!

Monday was a blast. We had Elder Brooke join us in a trio for the day because he's finished the two and was headed home the next day! So we got to spend the last working day with him! It was a blast! He's a stud from Arizona and we had a blast! Taught a guy that loves fishing that we met Sunday. He was sweet. Then we finished the night off with a guy who invited us in and listened! It was crazy! That's so rare! Haha! but it was a pleasure! 

Tuesday we had and interview up in Marysville for someone who's getting baptized and then we dropped Elder Brooke off and got Elder Stephens' companion Elder Renteria because Elder Stephens was also going home! So we've been living it up in a trio this week! 

Today we balled up cleaned and that about sums it up! We'll be having a great night tonight though! Should be fun! 

Well, love you all! Just a reminder that p-day is now back to Mondays starting next week! So talk to ya'll on Monday! 

Love Elder Smoot 

Wk 68 - A Parable

Companion: Elder Jaster
Area: Dublin

Exchanges!

Elder Renteria being him... Haha!

Sweet Acura. Dublin is rich in case you were wondering.
I've never seen more teslas in my life.

The first Wendy's. This is Dave the founder.

Hair cuts!

Good time in the mission home

Danny Boy!

Brother Williams and the Lazy geek!

Crawfords

Howdy howdy,

This week has been a blur!!! Sometimes the days feel long but I can barely remember this past hour let alone this last week!! Thank goodness I have the area book to go back and look through the days!! Last Thursday was a good day!! Elder Jaster and I got to go back to Mansfield for District Council and a mini exchange!! My goodness it was good to be back for a short time!! We got to stop by Danny boy, he's been pretty sick but was super happy to see us! Glad he remembered!! Then a huge miracle happened. So the family I baptized in Mansfield ended up leaving the church a couple weeks after because her "boyfriend" now husband got back in their lives and is forcing her to not go. I know, it's super sad and horrible that it has to happen. It breaks my heart. But on exchanges with Elder Lowery who hasn't been able to meet her, we went by to try. We were pretty nervous at first and didn't know if we'd go so we pulled over and had a prayer. After the prayer we both felt good about it and went up and knocked knowing that her husband was home. Of course he got all "angry" and wouldn't talk to us but she opened right up and came outside in the pouring rain to talk!! It was soo good to see her and to talk to her. She told us that she was going to another church that her husband goes to but she's been reading the Book of Mormon because she knows it's true!! That was sweet!! She'll come back eventually, just has to figure some things out. So we're gonna start teaching her over Facebook because the husband isn't too fond of us coming in! Sweet experience! We also got to stop by one of the best members of course, the Crawfords!! What a sweet family! It was good to see them and laugh and have some fun!

Friday, you could probably guess, a whole lot of planning! We have zone conference tomorrow so it's bee pretty crazy preparing everything for that! Saturday we had five lessons fall through... Oh the joys of being a missionary. Other than that it was all finding and not much happened... 

Sunday was an awesome day!! We had stake conference and it was amazing!! Felt like another general conference! One of my favorite talks was by President Bons, a member of the Stake presidency. He talked about the parable of the Czar's apple tree, which he made up. The jist is that there is a man who is given an apple seed from the Czar's apple tree orchard in Russia and plants it in his orchard. Many come from all over to taste the delicious fruit. Over time, experts begin to criticize its authenticity, leading the grandson of the man who planted the tree to become ashamed. One day he decides to cut the tree down. But an older man who had once tasted the fruit drives up right as he is about to cut the tree down. The older man asks the younger one how long it had been since he tasted the fruit and invited him to taste it. When he did, it brought back the memories of his grandfather and the story of how he got the seed. He had almost cut down something that had meant so much to so many others. Then President Bons compared that to us in our gospel living. Sometimes we don't realize why we are losing the joy we once felt in the gospel, why the opinions and stories of others are hurting our testimony. And then we realize we haven't been doing the things (tasting the fruit) that allowed us to feel that joy in the first place! If you find yourself doubting your testimony or feeling a loss of love for the gospel, I'd invite you to taste the fruit, today... Oh it was sooo good!! The Spirit of love and care everyone could feel was awesome. Daylon was there and he loved it! It was good for him! After church we had lunch with the Thomas's. They are way too good to us and gave us steaks!!

Monday was all basically planning and finding! Not much to tell about.. haha But Tuesday we had exchanges in Marysville, I was with Elder Renteria who is in training. He's a stud. We found three people who were each a miracle! It was a good time!

Well, love ya!! 

Also so I got some good news this week. P-day is now back to Mondays starting on the 19th!!!! 

Hope you have a good week! 

Love Elder Smoot 

Wk 67 - Happy Halloween!!!!

Companion: Elder Jaster
Area: Dublin

Exchanges!

With Elder Ballard

Classic McDonald's!

Howdy howdy, 

Well to start off this week's been sweet!!!! Wednesday night our ward had the Halloween chili cook off, trunk or treat party! That was a blast! Brother Thomas made some way hot chili that ruined me the next day!! haha! It was awesome!! Daylon showed up with Mahamud and they stayed after to play basketball with the men in the ward! It was good to get to ball up with them for a bit! 

Thursday we went to Elder Stephen's district council again, it was amazing!! It was on working!! Work, work, work. If we truly loved the Lord we would always be working. We wouldn't make excuses, we'd just get it done! It was so spiritual and motivating I loved it!! After words we put in the work. We got right out and found all day. We had one lesson fall through but we just kept working. 

Friday was a pretty crazy day. As usual on Fridays there is a lot of administrative stuff to get done!! It basically fills our time until dinner!! At five we had a lesson with Daylon. I'm not sure if I've ever been with my companion and both of us were extremely bold. The Spirit was so strong and it was an awesome experience. 

Saturday was legit!!! We were blessed!! We found four people that day and they were all pretty sweet! We met one kid who's a senior in high school and he's sweet!! I'll talk about his lesson on Monday. Solid hard working day. One of those days you come home at night and you're exhausted! Gotta love em. Basically has happened every night this week though! 

Sunday we had two at church! Daylon and a member brought a friend that was awesome and said she's gonna come back! Then that night we had a 9 o'clock miracle!!! Crazy story, we knew there was someone in the complex and Elder Jaster and I had the same door in mind so we went! When we knocked a lady named Maria answered and barely spoke English but couldn't stop smiling. We slowly talked to her and eventually pulled out Google translate and they told us to come back when their son could translate literally the next night!! So we set up a time and left them with a Spanish restoration pamphlet! Miracles! 

Monday the miracles continue. We were on exchanges. I was with Elder Ballard! He's a stud that went to Westlake! We ended up finding two people that day and had the amazing lesson with the Klein family, the family who's from Venezuela that we met the night before. Having a translator was so weird!! For the most part they could understand us but they have a hard time communicating back to us. They are such a sweet family and they grew up catholic. Once we explained the importance of the Restoration they were amazed. They said they'd believe it but want to pray first. So we left them with that and extended baptism and they said they'd love to if it's true! So for a family of four, it was pretty sweet!!! 

Tuesday was insane! The beginning of the day was kinda slow, more planning and what not. But come 5:30, things got insane. We couldn't find a 3rd male and ten minutes before we had someone call us back and say they could come so with traffic we were a half hour late. Mind you we have another lesson at 6:30 with Cole! So long story short, the lesson went way good and we put them, Robbin and Marry the two ladies, on date!!! Ran to Cole's who conveniently had something come up and couldn't meet until 7:15 which is the earliest we could make it. The Lord works in mysterious ways!!! The lesson with Cole also went wayyyy good. He's a stud and should be at church on Sunday!! 

Today we moved a bunch of stuff out of the mission home and into a members home. We went shopping and finished the night of Halloween with an awesome game of bowling and talking to the mother and daughter sitting right next to us who were very interested. So they became new people and we gave them a Book of Mormon and set up a time to go back!! 

Biggest thing I learned this week is that God is way more willing to bless those who work, work, work. We ended up finding 10 people last week and were already at 8 this week so miracles have not ceased!!! 

Love you all!! Love you all!!

Love Elder Smoot 

Went for a jog and had a scare.
Apparently a blood clot popped out of my leg so that was crazy.
It was like jelly!
But it's back and almost healed now! 

Wk 66 - Series of Learning Events

Companion: Elder Jaster
Area: Dublin

Exchanges!

  brother Thacker is a sweet ward missionary in that ward!

Elder Webb is the senior missionary in that area

We saw vaughnie from Mansfield

Jimmy Johns! Hot!

Howdy howdy,

Wow I can't believe it's pday again. It feels like it was just yesterday! This week has flown by! We've been so jam packed that it's one thing after another then the days gone and now the weeks gone! But it's been an awesome week!

Wednesday night we stopped by a former and had a sweet talk with her! She asked us a lot of the typical mission questions! Other than that we also had a lesson with Daylon who should be close to getting baptized sometime soon. He's waiting for something but we'll see what it is! Always a good time with him. 

Daylon after church

Thursday we went up to Marion's District council. It was pretty solid. It was all about Christ's atonement, and how much do we really love him? At the end it was sweet, Elder Ballard, the district leader read part of a talk and it talked about letting everything go! He related it to us as missionaries. He had us bring balloons and said I want you to put everything thats stopping you from being a consecrated missionary in this balloon and we're going to go out side and let it go. It was so cool!!! I loved it. 

After that we went on exchanges. I stayed in Marion with Elder Pay and Elder Jaster came back to Dublin with Elder Ballard. Here's where the unfortunate part comes in. Here we were, Elder Pay and I, having a good time on exchanges going about the Lord's work, when we found our selves in the left turn lane getting swiped by a school bus!!! What the heck! Haha Luckily I wasn't driving. But the stupid bus lady was all angry at us like it was our fault and she told the police officers that we went into her lane and hit her even though we were stopped... Hmm weird. All in all we still had a great day and attitude is everything! But who knows what will happen because no witnesses stopped its our word against hers so they have to send it in to see who gets the citation. Elder Pay is a missionary originally from the Cleveland mission and he's been out 15 months as well.

Slowly but surely it's healing. Yes we got the stitches out. But it still wasn't healing. There was a bubble and it wouldn't stop bleeding. They had me go to the Columbus stake president's clinic and he ended up cauterizing the cut. He said the skin that formed would have bled forever and wouldn't heal, so chemically cauterizing it would allow it to for the right skin.
It was pretty crazy. 

Looks nasty!

Friday was a crazy busy day as usual. Again a lot of administrative stuff. Haha That night we went and knocked some apartments when a member texted and told us to meet her at Max and Erma's for dinner. So we went and had some way good burgers! We also got to go over to the Stratford's to finally take my stitches out!! Hallelujah! So we got the rest out and finished the night off strong!

Saturday was a little bit of a drag, we were supposed to give a church tour and the people didn't show up!! We ended up being able to have lunch with Herbert, the man I baptized in my first area, and Tom! Herbert was asked to speak in stake conference which made me so proud! He's such a stud! The rest of our time was spent inviting so many people to church. We probably went through our whole area book trying to contact people! We also had another lesson with Daylon which was even better than the last. 

Dinner with Herbert and Tom Bower!

We had one person come to church this week which was cool, Daylon is 20 and he's a stud! After we had lunch with the Thomas's which is always a party. We had two lessons fall through so we ended up finding and getting some more stuff done that we had to get done.

Miracle Monday!!! Monday was sweet! We had a goal to find three new people and we ended up finding four legit people! It was so sweet! We just had miracle after miracle. One dude was Muslim. There was a mom that's was pretty cool that had four sons. A catholic lady and another one that was probably one of the coolest contacts on my mission! She was sweet and super sincere.

Tuesday, man we ended up making a video for the zone to get pumped but haven't quite finished so well get it done soon! We had to go clear down to London, Ohio about an hour away to the Columbus stake presidents doctors office to check out my wound because it wouldn't stop bleeding. They ended up chemically cauterizing it which was pretty sweet to watch! Haha So hopefully that fixes it! We also had a return appointment with the last lady we found last night which we were stoked for. Then we showed up to the apartments and didn't see her car and she didn't answer! Broke my heart until I figured out why, we needed to meet a man named Zaid from Jordan. He'd recently converted to Christianity which was crazy because you rarely see that, but he was sweet! We gave him a Book of Mormon. This guy was so sensitive to the spirt he started to tear up at one point. Said he'd read it. The only bad part was he might be getting baptized in another church this weekend so we'll just have to get him out of there! Haha But we got to go out with Mitch Thomas again. He was with us all night. He's such a stud. He's gonna be a dope missionary.

London!

Today we just walked around the mall and a couple other stores all day! Not much else. We got the Trunk or treat at the church tonight so that'll be sweet! Free chili! Holla! Every ward out here does a chili cook off I swear! Haha it's so cool though. I'm excited. 

Well everyone, miracles do not, have not, and will not cease. I love this gospel, it's perfect. I love my mission, its truly the best two years! 

Love you all, hope you have a great week! 

Talk to you on Halloween!  

Love Elder Smoot 

The Apartment: 

(couch is being used as a hide a bed--why?
don't you need a couch?
'no because we don't sit!')

(when asked how he gets on that tall bed-
he said 'just run and jump! or step on Elder Jaster's bed!)