Wk 88 - Life with my Bud!

Companion: Elder Oettli
Area: Newark

at baptism with Elder Paul, his comp and a guy from Delaware!

Ray Fitch (someone we are teaching)

Schofield puppies

Howdy howdy!! 

Well just a few short and very busy days since last pday!! Wednesday night we just said bye to a few of Elder Paul's loved ones! It was pretty busy and as always very stressful to get as many people in as possible! 

But Thursday was a way good day! Its hard to say bye to such a good companion but it's nice when you know the companion you are getting! I'm now with Elder (Bud) Oettli! ( it's pronounced Oat-Lee) Even though he's a Utah Ute fan, he's a stud! I love him a lot! He's from Murray Utah and he played golf and loves sports! Its awesome! But Thursday after we got home and all settled in for transfers we went out to meet a couple of awesome members of the ward and go to work! We ended up going down the Jack and Jessie's road and after knocking on their door without an answer, we started to leave but when we walked over to the neighbors they miraculously pulled in and invited us in! It was such a miracle! We've been trying to get in with them for a while. But they had done a ton of good research on the church and asked us a ton of good questions which provided many opportunities to bare testimonies! It was so cool! 

Friday was insane!! In the morning we got to go play Bingo with Lelah and Jessie! Jessie works there so it's awesome to do service with her. Right after service we walked home and got straight into calls. Then we did a bunch of planning and back to more calls, then back to planning until dinner! It was insane!! I was going crazy in the apartment! But that night we got to get out and go to work! We had dinner with the Argyles and went tracting! Its been good because the weather is getting better! Still not all the time warm, but it's getting there! 

Saturday morning we had a way good breakfast with the Williams! We did the flour and Penny game with Colton and Patience, who was getting baptized that evening! It was super funny to watch! After that we went and walked a huge, nice, neighborhood until we got to call Elder Ashcraft to train him on how to do a District council. Then we got to go to Patience's baptism because I gave a talk! It went really well even though I had no idea I what I was gonna say! But Elder Paul got to come back to baptize her which was sweet! I was pretty happy to see him again! After that we headed to the Tatman's who are now easily one of my favorite families! They're a young couple that have a little girl! He played the guitar with us and we talked a ton about hunting! It was such a good time there! We finished the night finding on facebook! 

Sunday was pretty good! We had a great church service and I got to confirm Patience a member! But after church we came back and had to finish some things up as far as planning goes! Then we had an appointment with the Martensens which is where we talked about how we can best help Jeanne and we also got to play ping pong which was awesome! Then we finished the night at the Schofields with all of their puppies! It was awesome! 

I loved today so far! It's gone fast but I didn't lose a single game in basketball! haha! So it's a good day! 

Well I love you all! Have a great week! 

Love Elder Smoot! 

Wk 87 - Five guys, a hand saw, and a rope

Companion: Elder Paul
Area: Newark

Cane's with Randy

Howdy howdy,

What a week! Well it definitely started off with a boom! We had a pretty stellar district council first thing! It was pretty powerful and we had a cool experience where I kept having this feeling that I needed to talk about following the Spirit and right before it ended I had an opportunity to do so! It came out really well and then Elder Lowry looked at me and said, "Wow God is good, I literally was going to ask you to give a training on that but I felt like it was too late!" man I LOVE God! Anyways that's just one example of how the Spirit works! 

After District council the Mt Vernon Elders came down for an exchange! We went right away to the Rine's and Grime's to help them do some service! Now here's where the title comes into play! They told us they had a couple small trees to cut down. In our heads we pictured like maybe ten feet start up trees that they didn't want anymore. We were completely wrong. We, no joke, had one very dull hand saw, five guys, and a rope to get two, at least forty feet tall trees down! So we started going to town on the roof at the top of the tree to get it trimmed up enough to cut down and not wreck the wires. While trying a rope around it we  pulled it in the direction we needed them to go! It was awesome! We had to keep rotating who was on the saw to keep some fresh hands on it! It was good stuff! We got all but about twenty feet of the bigger tree down before realizing we had no where to put the trees because we were already cutting in the neighbors yard!!! We ended up asking the neighbor if we could use their huge fire pit and try burning very green and wet trees! It miraculously worked and we got almost all of it burnt! After that, Elder Shumway and I headed to the Littles' for dinner. They had some fat steaks! They were soo good! That was probably the most rare steak I had ever eaten but man it was good! Guess you gotta love eating steak out of a puddle of blood!!! We went and had ward coordination after that and then finished the night off Facebook finding! Great day! 

Wednesday was a last minute day! We were supposed to have service with some members that have a ranch but last minute they had something come up so instead of finishing exchanges we sent the other elders home and video called into Cambridges District council! It was awesome, they have two sets of senior couples in that District and needles to say they are very wise and I got some great insights out of it! That evening was probably one of the best things that has happened in Newark so far. Pat Schofield invited us to take part in giving his son a name because he just got the Melchezidek Priesthood and could do it! So we got to do it at his mom's house and when we stood in the circle the Spirit was so strong and it was really cool to see someone I love like Patrick who's a "big tough" construction worker, have a soft side! He'd kill me if he knew I wrote that but I figured I could say it anyways! After that we headed to the church to teach young men's! It was a blast! They come up with an over all biggest fear of going on a mission. It was knocking on doors, and talking to people! So we talked about it and then we did role plays for a while! It was awesome! They were pretty darn awkward! I forgot how crazy it seems especially because a lot of these guys hardly leave the house besides school! I love them though, they're awesome! That night we went and gave a blessing to Cyndi, who's a recent convert and is going through some health issues. It was an uplifting way to finish the night by exercising the Priesthood! That night the assistants came over for exchanges and Elder Johnston picked me up to go back to Powell! They live just over an hour away so we got back past bed time and I was pooped the next day, but it was worth it cause it was fun to talk to someone I played baseball against my whole life and who went to lone peak!! Haha 

Awe man Thursday was a great day! We started the day tracting! We knocked a bunch of apartments and did something that I had only learned once previously! It's sweet! We ask if they'd be willing to help us with a survey about families and religious things. They usually say yeah and let us in. There's ten questions and they're very inspired! A couple of my favorite ones are, 

"If there was another book of scripture written by prophets of God just like the Bible, would you read it?" and 

"Have you ever wondered where you came from? Why are you here? And where are you going?"! Its genius because we know exactly how to teach them based off of the responses they give! I love it. In the morning we met one lady who needed to plan of salvation! We ended up walking around a couple of different parks to talk to people. We met another lady who just moved here and simply was looking for the right church! I also got to meet one of my Dad's friends from high-school! Then that night we had a huge miracle. We had about an hour left so we picked an apartment complex to knock! Literally the first door!! We knocked, used the good ol survey and a family of three let us in! They each participated, gave us a drink, and we ended up having a full blown lesson and taught them the restoration! It was incredible! So we found five that day even though we were pooped then drove back to Newark! It was a blessed day! I love Elder Johnston, he's a stud! 

Friday! The day of planning and all of that good stuff! In the morning we actually decided to go play bingo with Lelah! It was so sweet! She was stoked! The lady running the thing was someone that we knocked into! So it's was good to see her again and hopefully, she'll let us back in soon! But Lelah ended up winning! It was sweet! But after that we had a bunch of calls and planning to do so we got it done! 

Joseph!

Saturday we had a pretty solid day! We got to go have a lesson with Joseph and had a good chat!! He's recent convert and a pretty good guy. We had a lesson with a guy named Matt who is married to a member. That went pretty well and I hope there's some great potential with him! After that we ended up going back to the tree to finish the job! This time we brought a hatchet! About fifteen hits and the hatchet broke so we defaulted to the back of the hammer and went to town on it! By some miraculous way it worked! We got pretty far when we had another member come and rip the tree down with his rope and his truck! It was awesome! After we showered and changed we went and picked up some Canes! We got Canes for Randy because he's never had it!!! That blew our mind but it was pretty cool to watch him try it out! That night we drove out to New Albany to do a baptismal interview. I got to interview a kid named Brendan and he's a stud! He's 16 and found the church on his own and he knows it's true already! It's awesome!

Baptism interview

Sunday we had an awesome block of meetings! Right after church we met with Jeanie! She's a 16 year old member's girlfriend. She is awesome! That's the third time we met with her and she's finally ready to pray about a date! We're excited for our next lesson! Afterwards we had a meeting with our Bishop! It was sweet! We visited the Garbe's and they were cool but man they loved to talk! Then we took Bennett out, who's a youth, to go find some one who had just moved in. It started snowing and we ended up knocking the whole apartment and finally found the room he was in but he wasn't home. So we're gonna try another time. We headed back to the Rich's house to share a message and they ended up feeding us some way good Irish food! It was pretty sweet! 

Bennett

Monday morning we got to go do service for the Powells for a while. We did a bunch of dry wall and insulation! It was awesome! We love being around them, they're always good for life talks! That evening we stopped by Rupert who just lost his son. That went pretty well. After that we stopped by a guy named Matt. He was previously a member but hasn't been for over fifteen years but he did serve a mission! It was a good experience to talk to him!

Tuesday we got to go out to the Powells again to help finish the job in the basement! That was fun as always. Afterwards we took Randy to meet Ron and had a great lesson. We took Randy to give a blessing to someone in the hospital. We got to feast at Arby's that night which was awesome. Then we had a good ol ward coordination! After that we headed to a sister's house with Bro Eppich. She told us she needed her housed blessed and that there was some evil spirits! Shiver me timbers she wasn't kidding! There was definitely someone not of God there. But I'll tell you what, the moment we blessed it there was a lot better feeling in the room!

Today we went mountain biking and hit some sweet jumps! Even though we couldn't do much... haha But we also played disc golf which was sweet! And of course we had to hit up the East West Chinese Buffet! What a way to finish the transfer! Oh how I'll miss Elder Paul! Sure love that man! 

I love ya'll and I hope you have a wonderful week!

Love Elder Smoot!

Wk 86 - Go Bucks!

Companion: Elder Paul
Area: Newark

Elder Paul trimming the nostril hairs...

District Activity!

Elder Morse from OSU

Apes coming in clutch

Howdy howdy!

 Well this one will probably be a lot shorter than last week! This week has been wonderful! We have been crazy busy, out of town going on exchanges and all those faith building experiences! To finish off the day last Tuesday, we went and met with Randy for his new member lessons. Which was good as always and after we headed to the church for ward coordination. It was a pretty good night and a good way to end a good day!

Wednesday was sweet! We got to go to OSU campus! It was awesome! We started the day off with their district council which was sweet! It was very good! I got to go on exchanges with Elder Morse who's a stud that wrestles for UVU! I came out with him from the mtc! We walked a ton and talked to a lot of people! Had a sweet lesson the next morning. We definitely had a great time wrestling that night! Haha he's a stud and I love that man a lot, I learned a lot from him. We had one sweet experience...we walked with this girl for like 30 minutes and gave her a bom, at the end. She was so grateful, she gave us a hug and we had no idea what to do! But it was a great day!

Thursday we headed back and got back to work. We got back later in the day than we thought. But that's just the life of a missionary! And I guess life in general really! Anyways it was a great day, we ended up going to a part member family's and blessing their house. We went and stopped by the couple people in our apartment complex that we've been meeting with. Then we finished the night off playing basketball with the Elders quorum and a couple of non members! It was a blast! They started doing it every week so we made it a goal to get someone there every time.

Friday was a busy planning and reporting day as usual. Having follow up calls and all of that jazz. When the evening came around we got to go over to the William's house and meet with Colton again. He's such a stud! I definitely look up to that kid a lot! Afterwards to finish the night we went over to visit Randy. Had a good talk with him and set up a time to do family history so we could get him a name to go to the temple! Aren't we sly?! That night we ended up driving out to Westerville to spend the night with the Nepali elders for exchanges! There's four Elders in the apartment so it was a pretty fun night and Elder Paul and I ended up sleeping on the floor!!

Saturday I came back to Newark with Elder Gloschat! He's been out about a year and has been speaking Nepali for about six months. He's a great missionary! It was a good day. In the morning we did some Facebook finding and comp study because the rest of the day was packed! We went to a lesson at noon that was with Jackson who a student at Dennison. It was weird to be on a college campus again! But it was a pretty good lesson! Afterwards we had service at the Powell's putting insulation on the ceiling! The after math was that it looked good but all the fiber glass on us and in us was awful! Then to make it worse Brother Powell asked me to give a talk in church the next day! We came home and showered, ate and went back out in the pouring rain! It was awesome! We stopped by Logan and talked to him for a bit. He's doing good. Then probably the best part of the day was when we went over to the Sesser's, someone people us and the sisters kinda tag teach, not sure how or why, just was happening when I got here. But we went over there and watched "Joseph Smith, The Prophet Of The Restoration"! It was so good. Every time it talked about Joseph receiving revelation Travis kept getting the chills and was like "what is that?!" It was awesome! Well anyway, finished the night of good running home in the pouring rain!

Sunday I gave a talk in church! I really didn't have to much time to prepare but it went really well I think, at least according to Elder Paul! We had a couple people there and it was awesome! After church we got home did some study's and went and gave an awesome women in our ward named Cheryl a blessing. She was baptized a couple years back and has been trying to help her husband join! He's an awesome guy! The blessing was pretty sweet and was a good experience! We brought brother Hall with us and he brought us to Sister Gray! She's in a nursing home and we got to bring her the sacrament. She's awesome! Just a ball of energy and gratitude! I love Lelah! After that we went to the Powell's!! Some of the realist homies in the ward for sure! Haha I love them a lot and they're always good for life advice! We then headed to Randy's to help him out with family history with Brother Taggart but he had it all figured out so we ended up talking to mama most the time! Which was awesome cause she hasn't been too much of a fan of other elders but she likes us we hope!

Monday was sweet! For district activity we went out to Mt. Vernon! We had the activity at the ward mission leader's house who used to be an Amish family but read the book of Mormon and now are members. Long story short, but it was awesome! They made us some dang good food and we got to play baseball with their kids! It was a good time!

Well I love you all! Sorry for the late email but I hope you know I love you and you're in my prayers!

Love Elder Smoot!

Wk 85 - Temple Tuesday

Companion: Elder Paul
Area: Newark

Elder Paul, Smoot, McIness, & Merrill

Elder Paul & Elder Smoot

Elder Paul, Smoot and the Halls

Elder McIness- with Bisquit (Stratford's dog)

Howdy Howdy! 

Wow what a week!! Nothing much really happened after pday last Monday, we just went out finding! But Tuesday was a rocking day! In the morning after we did our morning schedule, we ran to the library for a discussion with the Jws. They didn't even show up! It's all good though I wasn't really in the mood to meet with them. Plus we also got a lot of administrative stuff done that we didn't have time for! After noon we went over to Ray's and had a nice chat with him. I love that man so much! We came home to get Elder Ashcraft's stuff all packed up and loaded in the car because he was going to get a new companion that night. When we were out at the car I ran to go check the mail and there was a nice lady and her son with a sweet dog who were getting their mail at the same time and we started talking! We ended up setting up a time to give her a Book of Mormon! It was pretty sweet! From there we went to the Williams to have a lesson with Colton who just got baptized and Brysen who is working towards baptism! It was pretty awesome stuff. We headed to ward coordination after that and that went way good as always! Then we headed home to meet The assistants and Elder Ashcraft's new companion Elder Valdez! That was a pretty solid last day!! 

Wednesday was so good! We had the Cambridge Elders here for exchanges! I got to go with Elder McIness! He's a stud!! I was companions with Elder Collier right after him and Elder Collier were companions so we had a lot to talk about! It was awesome! In the morning we biked a whole half a mile out to Ruperts and had an interesting chat with him. He wasn't very willing to pray specifically! You don't get answers to your prayers when you don't pray about something specifically. I'm pretty sure it's because he knows it's true he just doesn't want to change which is pretty sad. After him we all got to go out to the Powells for service which was legit as always! We split logs the whole time from one of the huge trees we cut down last time! It was awesome! They even gave us some pizza after! After we got home we went to go bring Tia, the lady at the mailbox, a Book of Mormon when we got stopped by a nice lady named Julie! We just said hi and then a whole conversation started from there and ended by giving her a Book of Mormon! She was super excited and grateful. She has known a lot of members and was excited to learn more! After we went to young men's and had a discussion on being a missionary and how we survive with the small amount of money we get and what not. It was pretty fun! Afterwards when we were on our way home at about 8:45, we drove past this house with some big dogs out and out of the corner of my eye I saw a cigarette lit up. I had a pretty strong promoting and in all honesty I had to fight it for a bit. But then I ended up turning the car around and we went back! Elder McIness and I jumped out to go talk to this person! It was a huge miracle. We ended up talking to her for a while. Her name is Gracie and she was telling us that she's been through a lot! But she knows God can help her and she told us she wanted to get baptized and that she used to go the our church! It was crazy but long story short is she knows she needs to get baptized because of her 11 year old cousin Colton who was just baptized has been telling all of his family how it helps! Crazy how the Spirit works! We called Kevin Williams, the grandpa, after and I'll never forget how happy he was to hear that the Spirit lead us there! It  was a huge miracle and we referred her to the sisters because there is rarely a third male in the home. It was awesome! 

Thursday was a long but great day! We got to attend four district councils, one after the other, have lunch at Panera Bread with President and Sister Stratford, and interviews!! It was a great day! They were each very uplifting and the majority of them were about the things we discussed with Elder Bennett and how we can better apply them. My interview with President Stratford was a very spiritual experience and I love that man a ton! He's with out a doubt a man of God! We got a ride home with the Mt. Vernon Elders and got to go on a short exchange! Elder Lowry and I went out and stopped by a couple people that were close, Julie and Tia. Then we went to some out door basketball courts to see if anyone was open to coming to play ball with the ward at the church! Well there we found Derek at the dog park next to the court! He wasn't able to come last week but he said he'd come this Thursday! We will see though! He was a pretty cool guy! 

Friday was a pretty packed day. It started off pretty normal with planning and updating records and all of that until we got on calls with the Assistants, we got a text saying that we were able to go up to Mansfield at that moment to say good bye to someone I was very close with. Mama Vidra, she's been sick for a while and now she finally has been able to graduate into the next life. I felt a lot of peace and relief as I was up there. We had to go on an emergency exchange and I got to go pick up Elder Green, the stud of a missionary I trained in Mansfield and we got to go together. It was good to be there for Brother Vidra and it was definitely a blessing we got to see her one last time before she passed just a short few hours after we left. I definitely would not have felt peace if I did not have a testimony of the plan of salvation that Heavenly Father has for us. It was definitely a special day. 

Saturday in a nut shell, we had a lesson with the jws that we've been meeting with and they gave us one of their Bibles. We ended up dropping them and inviting them to read and pray! There's no other way they'll find an answer unless they actually want to know! We had a good chat with Ray about baptism later on in the day, which was really cool. That night we had a good lesson with Colton at the Williams! They always have a snack for us! Some fudge or what ever but it's always good! 

Sunday we had three people come to church! Ricky, Jeanie, and out of no where, Logan came! That was pretty sweet!! He even commented in the second hour! That night was way cool! We got a referral for someone on the Dennison Campus! It was sweet!! That College looked way sweet!! We found the referral's dorm and called him up because you needed a key to get in, he ended up answering and running down to meet us! Turns out one of his old roommates was just pranking him and signed him up as a joke! The best part was that he was actually interested when we explained a little more because he had some friends that were members form back home! It was pretty cool and we set something up to meet with him! After him we were walking and we ended up walking up this sweet hill! It almost felt like I was in the mountains again! 

Monday was pretty solid! We didn't have anything set up until later on so we just stopped by a recent convert named Joseph for a bit and talked to him about the temple. We found and had a dinner later on with the Schofields! We got to teach their son Luke who hasn't been baptized and talk to the parents about getting sealed! Which is coming up! It was a great day! 

Today we got to go to the Temple!!! It was awesome!! The Spirit is always strong and I love the peace that comes from it! We went with the lovely Halls of course and had a great time! I love Newark, I love being able to serve the Lord! The church is amazing and true! I love you all and hope you have a wonderful week!

Love, 

Elder Smoot