14 for 14!

Transfer time! I'll be staying in Logan. It'll be my 14th transfer and I'm getting my 14th companion. yay? I am pumped about my companion though. His name is Elder Bohannan. He's from Alaska, was homeschooled, and is now, I think, tied for most unaccountable missionary in the mission. I'm soo pumped!

Elder Daly is going to Star Valley, Wyoming. I'm pretty jealous about that, not gonna lie. But I think Prez is going to let me die in Montpelier, Idaho [this will be his last area]. It'll be sweet.

This week I went to 2 baptisms. The first was for Brother Dan Roberts. He's 61 and just deciding to get baptized.



Elder Pearson, Brother Roberts and Elder Daly

It was super spiritual. His son had the opportunity to baptize him. We held the baptism in the Logan Tabernacle. We had the program in the chapel, and I got to give the talk on baptism. My ND talk in that chapel. Kinda crazy. The baptism had everyone there. At least 2 former stake presidents, the current stake president, current patriarch, and a handful of bishops, both current and former. It was definitely a great baptism.

Then in the evening I got to go down to Brigham City and see one of my first investigators, Brother Ed Davis, get baptized. Once again, amazing! I started teaching him almost 17 months ago, and now he has been baptized.


Brother Davis when Elder Pearson started teaching him.

 There were 12 missionaries there, and many more who weren't able to make it.




Ed Davis and some of the missionaries who have taught him.

 The turnaround he and his newly married wife have made since I first met them is incredible. I definitely didn't think I'd see the day, but it happened!




Elder Pearson, Nikki and Ed Davis.

Also on Saturday, I had an 80 year old lady try to seduce me. I won't go into the details, but it was pretty epic.

We just had a lesson with a guy named James. James is a stud! He grew up in Texas! After reading just the introduction to the Book of Mormon and watching "Joseph Smith: Prophet of the Restoration" He knows that it's true, and wants to get baptized! He's really excited to jump into the Book of Mormon. We haven't brought up that he'll have to marry his fiancé before being baptized yet. They have a plan for doing that quite a while from now. They both get benefits from military for not being married. :/ But it'll all work out.

We haven't taught Moe yet, but we visited him a little last night, and are going to have a lesson next Monday. I'm pumped. That's all I have for this week. It's been amazing. I am pumped for Bohannan, I just hope the work stays at the rate it's going. We will have to see.

Snowing in Spring

First day of spring and it snowed! Gotta love it. Since the Ogden Tabernacle is getting demolished with the Temple, our Mission Office is moving. The new address is:

Elder Ryan Linford Pearson
Utah Ogden Mission
4380 S Orchard Ave.
South Ogden, UT 84403

We had a sweet talk from a High Counselor, he read from the Apocrypha. It was pretty funny.

We're continuing to Find, Teach, and Baptize. This upcoming Saturday, we have a SWEET baptism. Dan Roberts, who knows more doctrine than me, is getting baptized. It's way cool. He'll be a Bishop pretty soon.

Also, someone who I taught in my first area, Ed Davis, is getting baptized this Saturday. I'm so pumped! I'm going down to Brigham City to go to the baptism. So this Saturday is going to be sweet.

We had a cool experience this week. We went to visit a less active brother, Raymond, who we hadn't seen in a while. We gave him our number at the end of the visit. 5 minutes after we left, we got a call from someone who wanted us to give her mom a blessing. It turned out to be Raymond's wife. Right when we left, she called him asking to see if he by chance had our number so we could go give the blessing. It worked out that we just gave him the number a few minutes ago.

March 15, 2011

This week has been a great one. Funny story from last Tuesday. I was in Hastings with a few other missionaries. I got Branden Heath's new CD. Anyone looking for a cd to get it's a good one. Anyway, while in there a guy came up to me and started talking to me. I'm going to do my best to get the conversation word for word.

"Where are you from?"
"Texas"
"Is today your P-Day?" (we get that a lot because our p-day is on Tuesday instead of Mon)"
"Are you allowed to go into places like this on your p-day?"
"We are"
"Oh, just curious, because in MY mission, we weren't allowed to go into places like this, but then again you were called to Utah. It must be sad to not of been called to a real mission"

And walked away. It was pretty epic. Moral of the story is, make sure you don't become this guy. Don't make assumptions based on judgment and long past "knowledge" I don't care about what this guy said, but those same people are an investigator or less-active member's worst nightmare.

In other news, Elder Daly and I have seen how talking to everyone works. An unplanned contact is when you talk to someone who you hadn't planned on talking to. So it's different than tracting. We have a goal as a mission to get 10 unplanned contacts a day, which depending on the day, can be hard or easy. This last Saturday, Elder Daly and I had a goal of 75 unplanned contacts.

With help of a sunny warm day, we got 79. It was sweet to be able to talk to everyone like that. Saturday evening we got lost and, as we realized we had no idea where we were, asked ourselves, why are we here. We looked around and found our reason. A woman was sitting at her doorstep by herself. We went over and got to know her. As we talked, we found she was a member who hadn't gone to church in a long time. She was working on quitting smoking so she could go through the temple for the first time in a year. We talked for a bit and by the end of the conversation, were able to take her new, full cigarette pack, and tear it up and throw it away. Because we got lost, and committed to talk to everyone we saw, we were able to take some small part in helping her along the way.

Sometimes God sends us little promptings about something we should do, or who we need to teach as missionaries. Sometimes he is a little more vocal about what we need to do. This week we got a slap in the face from the spirit. Last Wednesday, we talked to a kid our age. His name was Shawn. He was a member, but told us he had a non-member roommate named Moe. He told us he'd invite Moe to church and to meet with us. We get people to commit to do that a lot, but it very rarely ends up happening. We finished our conversation with Shawn and kept walking. Not 5 minutes later we ran into another kid our age. His name was Moe. We knew it was Shawn's friend, so instead of trying to meet with him, we just offered any help and talked for a bit, hoping Shawn would invite him.

It means a lot more coming from a friend than two kids in suits. A few days later, Saturday, we ran into Moe again! He was sitting in a park by himself. We usually wouldn't have walked all the way over to him, but luckily it was our 75 Saturday. We talked to him a bit more. He grew up in LA. And was planning on going to Pepperdine for school. But he got into some trouble, and decided to come to Logan, and try to work his way into USU. We told him it wasn't coincidence us running into each other again, he agreed and said he was thinking about going to the singles ward with his friend that Sunday. We had a good chat with him, and then parted ways, still hoping Shawn would now invite him to meet with us.

Later Saturday we walked down a street we hadn't been on before (we're both still relatively new to the area). We knocked on a random house, and eventually found out it was the family that Shawn and Moe are living with. They weren't there, but if that wasn't the 4th prompting that we need to teach this kid, I don't know what is. We're going to call Shawn tomorrow to see if he's talked to him yet. I'm pumped.

More Snow

It isn't Logan without a few snow storms a week. I'm just happy I'm not driving in this.

Tomorrow is my 18 month mark, and it's just not right. I'll probably only be in 1 more area after this one. It sucks to know it's all coming to an end.



Elder Pearson and Elder Mocke before Elder Mocke left

 Elder Mocke was emergency transfered out of the area to campus to serve with a missionary that needs him now. So I'm in a newish area with Elder Daly. Sound familiar? At least this time I was given 2 weeks to get to know people. Twice as long as last time, lol.

But Elder Daly is awesome. He's from Baltimore, Maryland. We're working hard and getting along great! This is my 13th transfer. And Elder Daly is my 13th companion.

We had an awesome baptism this Saturday. His name is A.C. One Saturday night, AC was praying and asked God what he should do. He got his answer to go to church. So he went to the LDS church for the first time ever, and the missionaries happened to be there. They met up and taught him. He's homeless, but going to college right now. He's like Will Smith on Pursuit of Happyness.




AC, Elder Mocke and Stevie

 He spent a couple weeks in jail for something he'd done a year ago. Got out 2 weeks ago on Friday. Went to church again on Sunday, and got baptized on the following Saturday. It was sweet. I wanna read a direct quote from the talk on the Holy Ghost. It was given by his friend who he's living with. His name is Stevie. "People gonna look at you and say 'Oh, you a Mormon' or ' Oh, you a nigga." I'm not 100% sure where he went with that, but it was funny. I think he was telling him to endure to the end.

I got a letter from the Kynastons. They were in my first area, now they live in North Ogden. Garrett was the first person I baptized on my mission. He's 13 now, and I just heard he's in his Deacon Quorum Presidency! I don't care he's in the presidency, but this means he's active in the Church! His mom is about to start classes to work twards going to the temple! It's always scary when you baptize someone. Because you have no idea if, or for how long, they'll stay in the church. So it was awesome to hear from them, and to hear they are still in the gospel

But anyway. It's cold and snowy, but I wouldn't wanna be anywhere but here right now.

Week 2 in Logan



Lindsay's baptism


What a week. We had 2 baptisms this last Saturday. Then, the following Sunday, we had an investigator, A.C., who last we knew was in jail, show up to church! I've never met him, but he's gonna get baptized this Saturday! It'll be sweet. Everyone in this area is so missionary minded. It's sweet.

We've started teaching a stud guy. His name is Dan Roberts. He's in his later 50's maybe. His son was baptized a few years ago. Then 2 years ago, his son baptized his wife. Now it's his turn. He's been investigating for quite a while on his own, but hasn't been ready. I'm sure he's frustrated many missionaries back in the day. This man gives textbook answers to every question and backs it up withs scriptures. He shares sweet insights. He's a future Bishop at least, if not a Stake President. Our fellowship is a former Stake President and his wife. I love going to their home and teaching, he makes it too easy.

As far as Amanda goes, she has her mom and grandmother say she was confirmed. But we need priesthood holder's witnesses to re-create her record if she doesn't have one (Still checking on that) Otherwise, we'll have to re baptize her. Things are going awesome, soo busy all the time. Which is good right? FO SHO!