Year 2, Week 11: Ahh! It's the Greatest!

Hello Family! This week has been pretty good. Let's see... What has even happened?? We had a cool experience that will be further detailed below. Happy Birthday to Eden! I know I'm super late but I'm trying:) I can't believe it's already half way through October! It's super nuts!

So O, R and S! The lesson went well! S. remembered a lot from Conference and understood the 2 hour church change. O&R fell asleep during it and missed most of it. They liked what they saw but couldn't tell us what happened. 

During the lesson, S. explained to us what faith was, O. explained what Repentance was, and R. explained to us what Baptism was. They all understand those three things so it was pretty easy to teach the Doctrine of Christ!! 

S. said that they would continue reading with R. We downloaded the Book of Mormon app on their Phone so they could listen to it.

O. got a new job at a Mexican Restaurant. He works as a chef. They didn't come to church because they worked this Sunday. They may not be getting baptized this month if they can't quickly change the schedule and get back to church with a commitment to come every week.

They are doing well however! They are fun to teach because they grasp everything very quickly!! 

R and A! We taught them the Plan of Salvation and started teaching them about the Commandments. They are 11 and 12 so they shouldn't have any major problems but it's still possible. R. wasn't understanding the importance of Church, Pray, and Read so we applied to Fortnite! R. said in Fortnite, you need weapons, materials, and medicine to survive. We said that church is where we get our medicine from the Sacrament, materials is what we read in the scriptures, and our weapon is prayer. It helped it click for him. Thir mom's divorce didn't go through so she doesn't have custody on Sundays so they can't come to church.

We had an awesome lesson with a family this week! M, J, J, S, M

We knocked on their door, they let us in! 

We taught them the Restoration of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints! It was great! We haven't taught a lesson like that in a while! We usually schedule appointments for the future so we can have members and such! 

First it was just three of them.  As we taught about the church of Jesus Christ S asked where it was based and where it is now. She resonated with the idea of the Church today! 

M had a beer at the beginning and said she couldn't stop drinking because it would go bad, but, after the opening prayer she felt the spirit and asked her husband to take it away! Haha! 

Half way through M. walked in with J. M. asked them to join; they both did which was pretty surprising! Usually people come and go and don't care to stay. J. believes in Christ as his Savior. 

S. gave a wonderful closing prayer with some help in the beginning and end, all we did was ask her what she would tell her Heavenly Father, she gave lots of thanks. 

J. M and S. all acknowledged they felt the spirit. We told them they would keep feeling it as they read and prayed

We had another lesson with a man named V. and A. from the Dominican Republic! 

A. believes strongly in God. He is a God-fearing man...he knows the purpose of the commandments and has a desire to follow them, he has been separated from a church for a while and we told him now would be a perfect time to come back! He had some confusion about which Church Christ left behind through Peter. He didn't understand that Peter led the Church of Christ and not some other church. 

A. knew that Israel used to be God's chosen people, he now knows that those blessings are freely given to all through baptism in the restored Church!! He accepted our baptismal invitation and so did V! 

V whipped out a dusty old BoM at the end of the lesson from when missionaries taught him years ago! 

When invited to pray and read for an answer, A. said he wouldn't ask... Until he fasted to receive the answer, he said that through fasting we receive answers from God!! They are incredible! 

Alex gave a wonderful prayer at the end, in proper order, just needs help to say the ending 100% properly! 

It's incredible to see what people already know that is restored truth! When we teach further truth, it's so easy for prepared people to accept it! I know that Jesus Christ is my Savior. He lived and died for me! I know that Joseph Smith was a Prophet of God and that the Book of Mormon is an inspired writing. I know that our Prophet, Russel M. Nelson is a Prophet! I know that the Gospel of Jesus Christ can change people's life because of His Atonement and Ransom for our souls! 

I love being on a mission! Being a missionary is a great experience that I wouldn't trade for the World!! My favorite part of missionary life is teaching! Days without lessons are the worst!!! When I first came out, I never wanted to teach because I thought it would be boring and scary. Ahh! It's the greatest! 

Not much else to report! I love you all!! 

Elder Bushman 

 

 

Year 2, Week 4: Every Single One Fell Through

Hello Family!

This week has been great! Not as much success and awesome stories as last week but still good things going on! Lets report on the people we have taught.

J&D. J got sick and went to the Hospital on Saturday night. We called her to confirm that she was going to be going to church and she let us know. She said that she still wanted too and that she would tell us in the morning. When we called her she let us know that she was still feeling sick and couldn't make it. She said she was uncomfortable to just send her kids so they all missed church. We have an appointment with them on Wednesday and we are planning on teaching the Plan of Salvation.

J&E. Wow... So they are still super awesome but we haven't been able to get in touch with them. We might be dropping them because they didn't come to church either Sundays and haven't answered our calls. We really want to know whats been going on with them and if there is something we can help them with before we move on so... I will keep you posted.

H. We were supposed to be meeting with him this week but he missed his appointment and isn't answering his phone. He missed church as well for unknown reasons. He has 3 daughters who are all baptism age and we are really hoping that we can teach all of them. Again, I will keep you all posted on progress.

We were cleaning up our area book and calling people. We called a girl named M and she answered and asked us to come over. We had a super good appointment with her and invited her to be baptized on the 22nd of September. She accepted and said she would be coming to church. When we tried to call her to follow up, we found out that the phone number we had is her Grandmas and the address we have is also her grandmas. Basically, when we called and went over, it was a super lucky time to catch her and so we didn't know that her information was wrong. She said that she had met people in all Black and gave them her information and they never called her, so when we did, she thought it was them. Anyway, she didn't come to church so we don't know what is happening with her.

We had meetings and other things going on, lots of time was spent trying to have appointments work out to no avail. 

On Saturday, we had 10 teaching appointments! Starting at 9 in the morning and finishing 9:30 at night! It could have been the best day ever but not ONE appointment happened. EVERY SINGLE ONE fell through. It was a pretty rough day. Anyway! I'm doing great!

Love you all! 

Elder Bushman

 

 

Year 2, Week 3: Excited for More!

Hello Fam,

Wow... what a week. In some ways, it feels super super long, and in other ways, it feels very very short! Monday and Tuesday were last minute visits and Wednesday, Elder Warner left to go to Weston. It was a bummer. Elder Neeley, Elder Curzon, and Elder Warner are going to be life long friends and I was a little bummed we were only together for 1 transfer. Elder Fragoso came here and we quickly started working. We started trying to contact part member families. We stopped by one of our members to talk about why his kids weren't baptized but he wasn't home. We went up to the top floor to just knockin his house and we met a guy who let us in. We taught the Restoration and during it, the guy, J, told us he had done some crazy things. He has been in prison for 14 years. He now, has been on Probation for the last 17 years and he gets off of probation December 12th. For people to get baptized, they cannot be on probation. We extended a baptismal date for the 15th of December. The Saturday after the 12th and he said, "wow. That's my birthday. Yes. I will be baptized then." It was a great lesson. We went back the following day and talked with him and his wife and the member who lived on the first floor. We extended the same date to her and she accepted as well. It was super cool how we met them right when his probation is going to end. They didn't make it to church like they said but we will keep trying with them.

Friday, we were making more visits and decided to call J. We set up a time for later that night and asked Hermano De Aza to come with us. We taught them the Restoration again with her daughter D. It was a great lesson and she said she would pay a taxi to bring her to church. Hermano de Aza said that he would be able to pick them up and bring them. We extended a baptismal date for September 15th and they accepted it. They said, "wow. September 15th is J's (the 6 year old son) birthday." They came to church and loved it. D is 11 and she went to Young Womens and J. went to Primary. J came with us to Gospel Principles and enjoyed it. We will meet with them tomorrow and they will be coming to church next Sunday.

Saturday night, we were meeting with a member family to ask if they would help us get in touch with their Sister in law. We want to start teaching her and they said they would help us. After leaving there house, we talked with a guy from Ecuador. His name is H. and he was a little drunk so we just got his info, gave him ours, invited him to church, and left. We called him Sunday morning and he said he was going to come. Well Henry did show up. He came and sat with us during Sacrament. We haven't even had a lesson with him. We will be teaching him this week and extending a baptismal date. I've never had a random person on the street come to church without tons of fallow up calls and arrangements of rides etc. So we have had a lot of success.

The week has been good! I'm doing well! Excited for more to follow!

Love ya

Elder Bushman

 

 

Year 2, Week 1: We Mean Business

This week has been pretty good. We had a lesson with a lady named W. She listened to the entire Restoration and said that it was super cool how Joseph Smith was called as a prophet. She loved the Book of Mormon up until the part where we told her that Jesus Christ came to the Americas and established his church and called 12 apostles. First time in my entire mission that someone has had a problem with another set of apostles. Prophets yes, another book yes, but another set of apostles has never been a problem. She pretty much freaked out and said that we were welcome back to talk with her and she would even feed us, but, she is Catholic and she doesn't want to learn any more about our church. So that was a pretty sad experience.

We did have a super cool lesson with a guy named J. He never tells us when we can come over so we just show up and he invites us in and we share a message. We have done that with the Restoration, Plan of Salvation, and Gospel of Jesus Christ. We have invited him to be baptized and he said when he knows the Book of Mormon is true. We have helped him to realize though that we mean business and we aren't going to just beat around the bush with him. He is super cool though. Hopefully he will actually read etc.

M and J  have gone on vacation with their family to Washington so we haven't been able to meet with them at all.

J wasn't able to come to church yesterday and he hasn't been able to meet with us so we haven't taught him any of the new convert lessons.

We did meet a super cool lady named J. She is from Puerto Rico and we met her while knocking doors. We gave her a Book of Mormon and set up a time to come back. When we did she was ready to talk with us. We taught the Restoration and invited her to be baptized. She said she would and that she would also come to church. She didn't make it to church because he kids got sick but she said she would come next week.

I hit my year mark this week. Elder Warner and I went to Texas Roadhouse to celebrate and we each got 16oz Steaks! The country music playing in the background was definitely the best part of the experience with steaks and 2 Cesar salads as sides coming to a close second. Peanuts were good too.

We also went to Wings over Worcester this week. The Best wing place in Worcester!! $14.99 for over 1lb of chicken covered in their signature sauces. I got a super hot buffalo sauce and a another spicy one so the sugar content wouldn't be too high!

Anyway... I'm kinda rambling on and on. It was a good week.

Love ya

Elder Bushman

Year 1, Week 10: She Agreed to be Baptized

Hey Fam!

This week has gone by super super fast. Tons of random things have happened including some miracles and crazy stories. First the crazy story that leads to the miracle.

On Sunday, after church, Elder Curzon and I were knocking doors and not many people were answering there doors. It was about 3 O'clock and it was hot and tiring. We came up to this guys house and knocked on it. This guy came out and started asking questions like who we were, what we wanted to share with him, and how would our message bless his life. We started sharing the message of the Restoration and going to tie in the Book of Mormon and bear testimony of how the Book of Mormon has blessed our lives but he started asking questions that he wanted specific answers to like, Who is God, if God exists then why doesn't He show himself to us, etc.. Elder Curzon and I both knew that it could come to arguing so we both answered the questions with as much respect as we could. He asked if we had a picture of Christ and we gave him a pass along card with Christ's picture on it. The guy we were talking to asked if the picture we gave him was a picture of Christ or an interpretation of what Christ most likely looks like. We said that it is a painting of what Christ most likely looks like. He started asking rapid fire questions where during one answer he wouldn't let us finish and asked more questions. He then got to the point of that Christ isn't white and the reason he isn't white is because he doesn't exist. He then went on to through out this whole scientific reason of why Christ isn't real and that God is fake. He then tore Jesus's picture in half, used half a dozen cuss words, and told us he would have us arrested for soliciting if we didn't get off his porch. I wanted to just straight up tell him that he was bringing damnation upon himself but felt that I should just leave peacefully. After Elder Curzon and I left, we said a prayer asking for the Spirit to be with us as we continued on. It was super sad to see someone completely deny God because he hadn't seen signs in his life. 

About an hour later we met up with the Zone leaders so they could drive us to an appointment that we were already late for. We got in the car and told them the story of the guy and Elder Tebbs said, "Just keep your heads up, when opposition comes, you are close to seeing good things happen." After we got out of the car we headed up to a lady named Maria's house. We met with her and found out that she had taken missionary lessons before and that she still had the Book of Mormon that they had given her. She explained that she was really close to getting baptized but somehow, something happened and she didn't get baptized. We talked about the Book of Mormon and re-extended the baptism invite. She agreed to be baptized and then Elder Curzon felt impressed to extend a date. He asked if she would prepare to be baptized on November 18th and she said that she would if she is ready. It was a great lesson and really lifted me after our run in with the other guy. Elder Curzon and I set a return appointment and are going to invite her to church this week. If she comes to church and continues to receive the lessons than she could be baptized next month. 

Another crazy story. We were walking down the street and this guy stopped us and started talking to us. He was super drunk but he kept saying that it was a good thing what we were doing. He kept saying that he knew God didn't want him to continue to smoke crack or drink but he didn't want to. Reminder!! This Guy was drunk out of his mind. He then went on to tell me that he loved me and then gave me a hug. He told me that I was his grandson... Doesn't really make sense but it's what he said. By the time we walked away I had received about 8 hugs from this random, super drunk, SHIRTLESS, sweaty dude!!! Elder Curzon and I had some good laughs about it. 

Temple days are every 6 months. The first one I have is on Wednesday!!!! The Hartford Temple is not in my area. I'll be going to Boston.

 

Anyway, I hope everything is going well back at home:) Love you all!!

Elder Bushman

 

"Faith in Jesus Christ, when solidly anchored in our souls, brings true conversion ... and enduring righteousness."

—Neil L. Andersen, "The Book of Mormon: Strengthening Our Faith in Jesus Christ"