Tender mercy

Hey! If I was being completely honest, it was a pretty long week! Still a good one though! We went on exchanges both Tuesday and Thursday. One of the 2 days I was with a missionary who doesn't get along well with other people. It was kinda rough but I'm sure we both learned something. I'm pretty sure he realized how prideful he was without me offending him too bad. I'm sure most missionaries could work on having a little more humility.

We had a pretty cool tender mercy happen on Wednesday. So there's a guy named Tony that we just go see and check up and see how he's doing. He's had a very difficult past and doesn't believe in God, he's not interested in the church. That being said, we still go visit him and see how he's doing. We've been going over a few times a week for about 2 months now. On Wednesday we went over and did our normal thing, said hi, joked around him for a bit, just the usual. Well his neighbor asks us to share a scripture with her and her daughter, so of course we do! They then tell us that every Wednesday night we should go over and share a scripture with them. Such an awesome blessing to see our visits with someone not interested lead to someone even being interested. 

We had a dinner with both Ann and some members Thursday night and it went pretty well! Or so we thought... we had really good conversation about the gospel and a whole ton of other things. The next day we send her a message to set up a new appointment for the upcoming week. We get a reply saying she wants to "investigate" on her own. She's still gonna read and pray but she wants to put our visits on "pause." It's too bad but I'm sure if she looks into the gospel with an open heart and mind. She will know this church is for her.

I watched a talk/devotional the other day from David A Bednar titled That We Might "Not.... Shrink." He talks about how we align our will to God's. Like having the faith to "not be healed" in some circumstances. Not necessarily that everything you have faith towards will happen... but that it could happen if it's God's will. And also that you'd be okay with whatever the outcome is. You can find it if you (on gospel library) go to young adults-> worldwide devotionals-> 2013-> that we might "not... shrink." I highly recommend. May we all strive to align our will to God's. As we do, we will not only receive more blessings but we will be more like him. You guys can do it. "Pride is the stumbling block of zion." As we conquer that by being humble, we will all reach our eternal goal.

I love this church and this gospel. I know it's true. I'm so grateful for a loving savior who gave his life for me. I know we have a prophet here on the earth today. I know we can all feel God's love for us. We are children of god. I hope everyone has a fantastic week. 

Love Elder Larson 

Catching crabs at the beach last week

Missionary tag pic

We went to this cool lighthouse 

                                                                   Gotta take a nap on exchanges!! 

"Baptism is a good idea"

Hey guys! 

It's been an awesome week! I had what will probably be my last interview with President Wright. We get a new mission president July 1st. Which breaks my heart because I've come to love President and Sister Wright. They are the most loving, spiritually in-tune couple i have ever met. They have taught me so much and I'm so thankful for them.

We had 2 pretty good lessons this week! One was with Jacob and we were finally able to have the pass off lesson. It started out rough cause we had a horrible lesson plan (we didn't have time to make one). So the 3 of them looked at me and I had to improvise the entire thing! It ended a lot better though. We were talking about baptism and he goes "yeah baptism would be a good idea, maybe I should do that." He didn't totally understand the commitment yet... but we'll get to that tomorrow :) 

The other really good lesson was with Ann. We were able to resolve a concern regarding the 3 kingdoms of glory kind of explaining how we don't think god would set up a pass or fail system. Makes sense in my opinion... why would god set up a system where, if you were "two points short" you're going to fire and brimstone. So we solved that concern and the other one is women and the priesthood... Which may take some time. Other than that she is golden! She is always looking up church updates and church videos on lds.org, her favorite apostle is Elder Holland.... literally perfect. She's reading the book of Mormon, she just needs to be baptized! Hopefully she will progress as we continually meet with her.

Recently I was talking to a friend and also a missionary about how Satan works. Satan gets you to think the LITTLE things are acceptable.... for a missionary, that's something like facebook scrolling, or not listening to appropriate music. For someone not on a mission that might be, not saying a prayer before you go to bed, or skipping out on church "just this once." I promise as you become more aware of the small things Satan is trying to abstain you from, and do it anyway, you will build a foundation on Christ that won't fall. I've seen things like that in the my life where I slowly fall away. Don't let that happen. God needs all his children to return.

I miss you all and love hearing from you. It means more to me than you think. I love you all! Have a fantastic week!

Love Elder Larson 

Random car we saw in fort bragg a couple weeks ago...

Random selfie I took with the glasses

Sorry... I'll try and take more this week. I only took the one haha

New Companion

Hey guys! First off HAPPY MOTHER'S DAY to all the moms out there! Especially my momma! You guys are the best and do so much! Thanks for all you do! I had an amazing time time talking to my family yesterday! I love them so much, they are the best. 

Update with everything in life though... I got a new companion Elder Kelso! He's awesome! He's from Holladay Utah! Probably the greatest guy ever! I love him!! He's been out for 22 months so he's about to go home. Our personalities just clicked so we get along very well.

The area is still great. We have a lesson tomorrow with Jacob so hopefully we can pass him off to UK 1st. Not too many changes with anyone else. Just hopefully we'll meet with one... or all of them this week! 

Something really awesome that I read yesterday morning was Romans chapter 8. At the end it has a powerful testimony of the love of God. It explains how there is absolutely nothing that can separate us from that love. That's such a beautiful thought that no matter what mistakes we make, it never puts us beyond the power of God's love. Never forget that. I love all of you. Keep up your great spirits. Have a fantastic week! 

Love Elder Larson 

(Sorry email was so short)

Saying bye to Jairo and Lilly for Elder Boehner 

Bye to Daniel

Bye to Khunes

Mothers day Quote

So.... Glasses?

Hey everyone! It's been a fantastic week! I hope you're was too! So funny story regarding the subject line... it has become very apparent that I need glasses... so I set up an appointment for an eye exam and let me tell you! It was so wild after the eye drops holding a paper farther away than normal so my eyes could read it... I guess that's how actual bad eyesight feels like... but the doctor that did the test kinda chuckled. He told me they were barely good enough to pass a driver's license test... like I was pretty much guessing accurately the smallest few. But yeah I'm getting glasses! On the bright side I don't need to wear them all the time... just in school, or driving, or situations like that. That'll throw most of you off when you see me wearing glasses!?

That took up most of our morning on Wednesday since we had to drive down to Healdsburg and Windsor (about an hour away). Not to mention Elder Boehner losing his Tiwi card (the card that pretty much gives missionaries permission to drive) so I've been driving for the last 2 weeks... 

We had a fantastic district meeting on Tuesday! The spirit was so strong for all of us. Elder Boehner and I were asked to lead a discussion on something and we showed a video called "staying spiritually fit." You can find it on lds.org, but it was so good. We've shown the video to several people throughout the week. There are 2 parts that stick out to me when I watch it. One is when he's talking about when you aren't on a spiritual high and when it's a struggle and you don't want to read your scriptures. But it's the times like those when you still do it, where your testimony really comes from, where your dedication shows. The other part that sticks out to me is at the end when he says "I want to get back to his kingdom and look him in the eye and say I gave you everything I had, I really did, just like you gave me everything you had." It gives me the chills just thinking about it. I love that video and the message it contains.

As far as investigators go, most of our lessons fell through this week. Ann took a 10 day trip, so we won't see her for a little while. Jacob is still golden, telling a lot of people about us and we are still trying to have a pass off lesson with the Ukiah 1st elders. Not too much has happened with anyone else. But they are awesome! I love Ukiah! There was this one lady that the first time Elder Boehner went by she came off... kind of aggressive, didn't like them at all and wanted nothing to do with missionaries. Now she's a friend and tells us to "not be strangers." That's the type of thing that has happened with most of the people here. It's awesome. All the pot smokers at the park now cheer when we start walking up to them, it's really cool. No words can describe the love that I have for these awesome people. I just want them to understand the gospel and God's plan for them.

Transfers came and I'm getting a new companion but staying here in Ukiah! His name is Elder Kelso and I met him at the Christmas Breakfast devotional thing and he's hilarious! I'm super excited to be with him! I really do miss all you guys more than you think! You guys are all awesome and appreciate hearing from you from time to time. I hope you all have a grand week and that you guys can stay spiritually fit! Keep your flame of your faith burning. Talk to you all next week!

Love Elder Larson 

Getting ice cream last P-day at the coast with Brother Lukas

Fish and chips on the coast

Studies sometime during the week haha

Pray for Happiness!

Hey everyone! This past week went so well! I'm sold on the belief of praying for happiness and having a good day. No matter what trials come our way we can find joy through them. I mean... for starters... Elder Boehner and I both gave really good talks yesterday in sacrament meeting for about 15-20 minutes each. I spoke on missionary work/conversion and Elder Boehner spoke on "we are commanded to love." We were even able to get a few investigators to church. It was honestly just a fantastic week. 

On Wednesday we went on exchanges which was a great day! We had another great lesson with Jacob (the one we met on his way to the cemetery). We are supposed to hand him off to Ukiah 1st but we haven't been able to the pass off lesson with them. We mentioned baptism to him and he said he would love to if/when he realized this is the true church. So that was awesome! Then right after that we went over to this storage unit and helped this Catholic lady move some of her stuff out. Even though she wasn't interested, she was super grateful. We then went down a couple units to some other people and offered to help. They too were not interested but said some powerful words. He said "You guys aren't a 'say' church, you're a 'do' church." He too was very grateful for us and our service. 

We were also able to get in contact with 2 of our investigators we haven't been able to. One named Ann and the other named Kim. Ann is just like golden... I'm not sure exactly why she isn't baptized haha but it was very nice to meet her. Kim is the other one and she is deaf but can read lips pretty well. And no I don't remember like... any sign language haha, I can sign the whole alphabet and that's about it. 

I was reading in Helaman 5 yesterday and when I came across verse 30... I got pondering about it. "30 And it came to pass when they heard this voice, and beheld that it was not a voice of thunder, neither was it a voice of a great tumultuous noise, but behold, it was a still voice of perfect mildness, as if it had been a whisper, and it did pierce even to the very soul" I feel we often forget how the Holy Spirit talks to us. Even I as a missionary forget how the Spirit speaks to us. The best thing that we can do is to have the spirit with us. Galatians 5:22-23 shows you what having the spirit it like. Who wouldnt want to have that. This week, try your hardest to listen to the spirit. Just embrace the silence and feel the spirit.  I promise you'll be able to feel peace and joy in the trials you are now facing. I testify that having the spirit will help because I've experienced that for myself.

I love being a missionary. I love the scriptures and the lessons taught in them. I am so grateful for my savior and for what he did for you and I. I'm so grateful for the opportunity I have to be a servant of the lord. What a blessing it is. I love you all and hope you have a fantastic week.

Love Elder Larson 

Funny door frame (sorry about the profanity....)

 Morning run

 I've never looked more asian in my life with those eyes/ morning run pt.2 

Uplifting quote!