Wk 11 FL 'Return With Honor' 4/16/12

Dear Family and Friends,
Thank you for all of your love and support this past week! We can feel
your prayers here in Wellington South the work is going forth! It is
truly amazing the inspiration that the Lord has in missionary work.
Once again obedience is key to absolutely everything we do as
missionaries. I strive to be exactly obedient every single day so when
Elder Shaffer and I return home every night we can "Return With
Honor". We even put a sign up above our day saying "Return With Honor"
so we never EVER forget it! But out here as representitives of Jesus
Christ we are all on the Lords errand, and he needs us to go out and
work hard in His vineyard. Obedience and faith has to do with every
single thing we do as missionaries.
Once again this week in Wellington South we taught a lot of lessons
and are preparing a lot of people to accept the blessing of baptism
into the Restored Gospel of Jesus Christ. I was amazed at the end of
the week at how as we were obedient, hard working, and faithful how
the Lord allowed miracles to happen here in Wellington South! We were
able to teach a total 52 lessons, have 13 investigators commited to
baptism, and find 14 new investigators! It was unbelievable and I know
this is only because of our faith and obedience. We found two amazing
families that we are preparing to be baptized and hopefully one day
enter the doors of the temple to be sealed for time and all eternity
as a family!
But nothing huge happened this week just working hard and helping
Children of God prepare to be baptized! And this week is a bike week
AH!! That means we are gonna push to get a lot of member exchanges!
But anywase we were suppose to have a baptism this week but once again
Elizabeth got scared and this time she was scared to get in the water.
So we will be working with her this week preparing her to be baptized
once again! Oh how I love Elizabeth. A young man named Kevin has a
date for this Saturday as well so we are praying the Lord will help
him be guided to the waters of baptism and I will keep y'all updated
on what happens for sure!
Here in Wellington it is a ward and it is huge!! More people than back
home in the Murray 12th Ward but obviously it covers a much bigger
area as well! But there are rumors spreading that here soon they are
gonna split the ward in two cause it is getting so big but I hope not
cause I absolutely love the members here! They are the greatest
members and we always get fed very well! We actually had seafood
sunday with the Bishop yesterday and it was amazing. But here in
Wellington we are just working hard preparing people for baptism and
trying to get all of our recent converts to stay active so we are
staying plenty busy! And I can't believe in a month this transfer will
be over and either me or Elder Shaffer will leave Wellington and I
hope it's not me cause I love Wellington but I trust in what the Lord
knows is best for me so yea!
I love Jesus Christ with all of my heart and the strength that he
gives me every single day to perform His work! Absolutely anything
that we put our mind to and as we are obedient the Lord provides the
miracle and I love it! This is the Lords work and I know that without
a doubt on my mind. I love y'all back home and everyone out in the
field already as well! V, I'm expecting a letter soon and tear it up
out there bro! Write me whenever you want missionaries love mail!
With Love,
Elder Pond

Wk 10 FL 'Bless 1000 Homes' 4/9/2012

Dear Family and Friends!!!

Once again another amazing and inspiring week in paradise!! This week we accomplished once again another miracle as a mission, we blessed 1000 homes in a week in South Florida! That is over 1000 people whos lives were already blessed because of the peace that the gospel can bring into our lives. It reminds me of the song the Spirit of God, and the work truly is going forth like a fire is burning! This is a "great and marvelous work" and I am honored to be a part of it. One thing we try to do as missionaries is just like Elder Bednar has said to act and not be acted upon! I have seen that out here in the mission field there is no substitute for hard work. When trials come you just have to push threw them with hard work, something I definetly learned how to do while playing baseball. I heard a talk that really touched me a while ago while I was back home from President Uchtdorf on working hard. He said, "The Lord doesn’t expect us to work harder than we are able. He doesn’t (nor should we) compare our efforts to those of others. Our Heavenly Father asks only that we do the best we can—that we work according to our full capacity, however great or small that may be...When our wagon gets stuck in the mud, God is much more likely to assist the man who gets out to push than the man who merely raises his voice in prayer—no matter how eloquent the oration." President Thomas S. Monson put it this way: “It is not enough to want to make the effort and to say we’ll make the effort. … It’s in the doing, not just the thinking, that we accomplish our goals. If we constantly put our goals off, we will never see them fulfilled.” As stated by two of the brethren just like Elder Bednar said we need to "act, and not be acted upon"! As missionaries we MUST get out, get our hands dirty and get to work. There is no substitute for hard work.
Elder Shaffer and I definetly worked hard this week to bring people closer to Jesus Christ! This Saturday we taught a total of ten lessons and at the end of the day we had 34 total lessons in this week. Elder Shaffer and I looked at each other at the end of the day during daily planning and said let's push ourselves and get 40 total lessons in this week!! "We can do it," we told each other! So we went out on Sunday after church and went to work teaching absolutely anybody about the Restored Gospel of Jesus Christ and blessing their lives because we did so. Around 7:00 we looked at our watches and saw that we only had two hours left in the day and needed to teach four more lessons to reach our miracle goal of 40 lessons in one week. Of course that just meant that we had to work even harder. We knew if we had enough faith and worked hard then the Lord would provide a way for us to reach our goal! So we were led to a former investigator that we havent been able to see in a while. As we were walking to his door he opened the door before we got there and was really happy to see us it was perfect! We asked if we could share a quick message about Jesus Christ and he accepted. So we shared a message about the Atonement and being baptized and commited him to quit smoking and follow the example of Jesus Christ threw baptism! With the rest of the night we taught three more lessons and the Lord allowed us to reach our goal! I know this is only because we had faith that the Lord would prepare a way and we worked hard. We were almost running from door to door cause we were so excited and pumped about missionary work.

But overall we taught a lot of amazing people this week and are trying to prepare them to accept the gospel threw the blessings of baptism. A lot of people are SOO CLOSE we just must invite the Spirit to push them so they can accept the step and blessings of baptism. Wellington South is amazing I absolutely love it here! Everything is going amazing and mom everytime you write me please write about something other than how you miss me I'll be home in two years after doing the Lords work! There is one thing I really do miss though and that's shredin the slopes.. Everyone in two years we'll all have to go shred again I love you all!! Oh and one thing I do want from all my family and friends is if you guys would get a blank paperback Book of Mormon and write your testimony in the cover and then send it to me so I can find someone who is prepared by the hand of the Lord and you can bless their life threw your testimony. If y'all would do this I would appreciate it thank you!!!!
This is the Lords work and His church as well! Threw faith and hard work anything is possible, and I testify of that. I love our Heavenly Father and this is absolutely his truth! Anyone, absolutely anyone, can find more peace in and threw the Book of Mormon than anything else in this life! Thank y'all for all your support! We finna go home to catch some fish and hopefully eat them as well! Letters are much appreciated!!!

With Love,

Elder Pond

Wk 9 FL 'Miracle of 100 Baptisms' 4/3/2012

Dear Family and Friends!!!!!!!!!!!

We completed the miracle of 100 baptisms in the month of March as a mission!!!!!!!!! When we got news as Wellington missionaries that we accomplished the miracle we were so excited! This is a goal that has never been accomplished in our mission and many other missions around the world and it was amazing that with faith the Lord helped us accomplish our MIRACLE!! I know we saw the hang of the Lord helping us contribute to the miracle here in Wellington. The thing I realized most this week was with faith in the Lord absolutely anything is possible. Miracles can happen just like 100 baptisms in the month of March. I know that it was only possible threw having faith in the Lord and working as hard as we possibly can as missionaries. Something interesting actually happened this week. Elder Shaffer and I went to go visit a less active member that lives close to us and try and get them to come back to church. We forgot what house they lived in but in the complexs parking lot there was a group of people drinking and smoking so we decided that we should go share our message about Jesus Christ. And the one thing that really struck me was how they were so amazed that we could just believe and have faith. Like everything that they said we just knew that with faith anything was possible and they were truly amazed by that fact. But I do know that with faith in the Lord ANYTHING is possible. Once again, threw HIS strength I can do all this!!

We definetly had a miracle here in Wellington South this week! We actually ended up teaching a lot this week cause we have so many investigators. There was actually one day where we taught 9 lessons and we ended up teaching 28 total lessons this week! But the Lord helped us contribute for the miracle with two baptisms on Saturday! This did not come easy though. The couple that we baptized are Angelo and Shannon and they are the couple who had to get married before they were baptized. This whole week Elder Shaffer and I were working very hard to prepare them for their baptism. Many obsticals came up but as we had faith that the Lord would prepare a way those obsticals were overcame by His strength. Angelo was worried that by getting married his social security money that he gets would be lowered, which is true. But as we taught him that by keeping the Lords commandments, we shall prosper in the land and that the Lord always prepares a way his fears went away. That was only because we brought the Spirit and He taught and showed them the way. Then we sent them down to West Palm Beach to get their marriage license and they got denied because the certificate for the counselling was not official enough and they were closing until Monday. Automatically I was absolutely devestated! But as we met with them that night the Spirit promted us to invite to live in seperate houses until we were able to marry thema and they accepted!! I was so greatful for the Spirit because the next day they were baptized! It was absolutely amazing to talk with both of them after the baptism as well. Angelo said, "Thank you so much Elder Pond. I truly feel like my past is gone and everything is washed clean. I would give absolutely anything to feel this way it is truly amazing." Missionary work is the most rewarding work because of moments like this. This experience was only possible becuase we always had faith that if we worked hard then the Lord would provide a way and He did!! The Savior always comes threw on his end of the promises no matter what!

I also went on exchanges with our District Leader, Elder Shipley this week and he is an amazing missionary! When we went out we taught a ton of lessons and set a date with a guy named Zac!! He needs to give up some addictions but we are helping him threw it to come closer to Jesus Christ threw the restored gospel which WILL bless his life!! Here in Wellington we are teaching some amazing gators! I will be extremely sad when I get transfered out cause I have grown to love it here. One of the Wellington North Elders is actually going home this week, Elder Edwards! So all of the ladies out there who will read this he is now a RM living in the 801!! haha.

But thank y'all for all of your prayers we can truly feel them here in Southern Florida! Family I love y'all and friends as well you know I love ya and am always prayin for all of you no matter where we are!! And everyone back home remember the talk in Sunday afternoon where he talked about writing missionaries in the beginning of his talk! This came from the Lord and we truly do appreciate all of the letter!! Carly Kimball I'm still waiting to see how the big AZ is doing best friend!! And Laboe tear it up in the MTC brotha!! You'll love it there and I'll be writing you soon!! Thank y'all for everything that you do!

With Love,

Elder Pond

Wk 8 FL 'SOO CLOSE' 3/26/2012

Dear Family and Friends,

Thank you all for your mail this week I absolutely love coming home from a long day of missionary WORK, which I absolutely love, and there is mail waiting in our mailbox for me it's the best!! Ahhhhhhh but it is wayy hard to type right now so this email might be kinda short sorry!! We are running wayy low on time cause we have been fishing, going to wallmart, mcdonalds, visiting a less active for lunch, and we have to clean the apartment cause we have house inspections tomorrow morning so yea! And this week I accidently got in my very first bike crash so my hand hurts but of course we are still getting out and working hard no matter what!! And mom don't worry my hand will heal and I'll be perfectly fine. And yes I do get your mail mom, dad, zac, and gabbe it's just wayy hard cause we don't get much free time to write home and do everything that we need to do on P-Days so yea!

As a mission in Fort Lauderdale we are shooting for our goal of 100 baptisms in the month of March which is something that has never been done before in our mission. And we are SOO CLOSE!!!! This past week we hit 88 baptisms so we just need 12 more baptisms by Saturday to see the miracle of 100 baptisms in March as a mission!! Ahhh I am wayy pumped!!

This week I really focused on how as trials got put into the work here in Wellington South, we were just even closer to a miracle happening as we continued to be exactly obedient. We actually got blessed with being able to have a baptism this Sunday and he was very prepared by the Lord! He faced many trials during this past in prepatory to his baptism and of course Brian overcame them all! This week his boss actually fired him because he was getting baptized as well as his mom got very ill and had to go to the hospital. But he knew with all of his heart that the Lord knew best and things would work out for him as he put his trust in the Lord! I am just so glad that we were able to be there for him, and more importantly the Lord was able to be with him this past week. As we talked with him Sunday at dinner he told us, "I fell pure and clean, as well as at complete peace at the same time". Just hearing that we were able to help someone, threw the gospel of Jesus Christ, feel that way made everything worth it. I absolutely love missionary work, and it defientely is hard work!
The work is going forth here in Wellington South by the Lords strength. As we have faith and are exactly obedient, threw his strength we can do all things! We also have a marriage set up for Angelo Jr. and Shannon this week and actually four people with a date for this Saturday so pray for miracles to happen here in Southern Florida! Cause with faith absolutely anything is possible in the work of the Lord! I love ya'll and hope for lots of letters this week! I'll send some pictures of all our recent converts with this email for everyone and be praying for ya'll every single day! Ah and Brew I was just talking on the phone with another missionary that I am wayy tight with and actually goes home in a week, but I was doing the same thing we use to do to Kyle whenever we would drive down to his house. It was wayy funny and reminded me to "watch out for the poison ivy"!! I hope all goes well with ball this week Zac and you should see it here!! It is baseball country I love it!! Listen to conference this week and truly "Prepare for the Prophets" and it will bless your life!! Love ya'll!!

With Love,

Elder Pond

Wk 7 FL 'Exactly Obedient' 3/19/2012

Dear Family and Amazing Friends,

Thank you for all the mail and packages I recieved this week! It's amazing to hear from all of you and be able to feel of your love and hear what's going on back home! I can tell ya'll one thing though I do miss the snow down here in sunny Florida! Like the weather is wayy nice but I really do love the snow so yea. I guess you could say I am excited to shred Milly up in two years from now! But I hope and pray that everything is doing well for everyone back home! Cause things are doing more than amazing here in Wellington. The field is truly white and ready to harvest here in Wellington I know that without a doubt becuase of the blessings we recieved this week!

This week the missionaries in Fort Lauderdale got the honor of hearing from Elder Gonzalez, a member of the Presidency of the Seventy. It was really inspiring to hear the words of this man especially as we are "Preparing for the Prophets". I really took that we need to focus everything we teach around the book of mormon. As the keystone of our religion everything we teach relies upon this book, and if it is truly taken into someones life it will bring an added measure of peace into their life. So this week Elder Shaffer and I took those great words of advice and applied them into our teaching. In Preach My Gospel it says, the Book of Mormon combined with the Spirit can be your two biggest tools in teaching. The amazing thing that I saw is it really works! As we focused our teaching around the Book of Mormon investigators saw the importance of it and found peace in the book while gaining a testimonty of it at the same time.
One other thing that I learned this week that as we are exactly obedient, the Savior will prepare and lead us to people who not only are ready for the gospel, but need the peace that the gospel brings into peoples lives! The start of this week was very tough because we were working very hard and being obedient but not much was coming of it. Appointments were falling threw, and we even had to drop an investigator that is so close to baptism but just isn't progressing because that full desire is not there. His name is Keith Davis and I absolutely love the guy to death but he just wasn't progressing towards baptism. So we told him that we know if he applies his faith and acts upon it that his life will be greatly blessed, but we can't come around and teach him as much until he truly has that desire to know for himself! But we knew that if we continue to work hard and be exactly obedient and push threw it, that Jesus Christ would lead us to where we need to be threw the Spirit. That exact thing happened the last two days of this week! On Saturday night we were traveling on bike to go visit one of our investigators and a recent convert who just had a death in their family. When we arrived their friends answered the door and told us that they were not home because they were still putting things in order. So we asked them if they would like to listen to a short message about Jesus Christ and how he can bless them in their lives. They very hesitantly accepted and told us to make it quick. But as we got into the lesson the Spirit guided and directed us and softened their hearts totally! Even to a point where at the end of the lesson we invited them to be baptized and they accepted. The only problem that we found out the next day was that they are living together and they are not married. So being led by the Spirit once again they accepted to get married a week before their baptisimal day! I can not even believe the change that they have made in the past two days. Both of them are 100 times happier and just have felt that calm peace more in their lives.. They both also came to church this week and he told me once he stepped inside the building he felt as if all his troubles and trial were left outside that door. That he felt 100% at home and an absolute peace and that he cannot wait for his baptism! He also expressed he is very excited to take his family to the temple in one year and be sealed. He said that will be one of the happiest days of his life! Elder Shaffer and I are very blessed in our missionary lives to be led to people as prepared as Angelo and Shannon are.
Just when we thought it couldn't get any better on Sunday we met a golden investigator! It strengthened my testimony that if we work hard and are exactly the Lord always prepares a way. That the heavens are opened when we do so and miracles are possible. In HIS strength we can do all things! But Sunday a young man by the name of Brian walked all the way to church. We saw him and started talking to him and actually found out that he has been studying about the church for six months already. He has already read all of Moroni, 3rd Nephi, and most of 1st and 2nd Nephi! He was anxiously engaged in all three church hours and because of our amazing ward here in Wellington we were able to get him at a dinner appointment with members that night! There we found out that he has already gained a witness from the Holy Ghost that the Book of Mormon is the word of God. So we invited him to be baptized and he said, "Yes, absolutely. There is nothing more than I want in my life right now!" Brain will be baptized a week after we first met him on next Sunday and we will get the honor of meeting with him every day this week! I know that Jesus Christ himself is preparing people in South Florida for us as missionaries to teach and baptize. This is a great and marvelous work and I am so honored to be a part of it! I love my Savior Jesus Christ.

An 86 year old lady by the name of Elizabeth is also getting baptized as well this week! She is one of the funniest and my favorite people in the entire world! I love that woman to death! We ran into her harvesting and she has an absolute love for our Savior Jesus Christ. In two weeks we are also hopefully baptizing a Haitian family that has been a blessing in our lives as well! We absolutely love our investigators that our father in heaven has trusted with us here in Wellington.

I know that there in no better place for anyone to be than the mission field! This is His work and glory, to bring to pass the immortality and eternal life of man! And this is the work that is going forth as we speak. Who the Lord calls he also qualifies threw His strength! Once again letters are always appreciated and I love ya'll soo very much! I love hearing about what's happening at home and how everyone is doing! Laboe you better get around to writing me that letter and I heard you tore it up at your farewell man!! You'll be an amazing missionary and I truly cannot wait for us all to come home and just mob it up!! And to everyone else, especially those who said they would write me a letter, I love you soo much and am waiting!! haha. God be with ya'll back home Elder Pond out!

With Love,

Elder Pond

Wk 6 FL 'Ya ALL!' 03/12/2012

Dear Family and Friends,

I kinda forgot what week it is that I've been out so yea. But this week was amazing!! The Spirit directed us to some amazing people and helped us bring people unto Jesu Cristo!! Heavenly Father even gave us the power and authority to baptize and confirm one soul this week!! Even though it was suppose to be three.. But it still was absolutely amazing and I'll tell ya'll about a little bit later. But guess what!? I've been starting to get a southern accent by saying stuff like ain't and ya'll and things like that! Down here in Wellington there are a whole bunch of Hispanics, Jamaicans, and Hatians which makes it wayy hard cause I don't speak Spanish, Creo, or Jamaican!! And yes Jamaican is a language beause I honestly cannot understand our Jamaican investigator Walter sometimes, it really is like he is speaking a totally different language. But I'm still waiting for that Spanish English dictionary so I can actually kinda talk to the hispanics down here in Wellington! The weather down here is wayy sweet!! It will be wayy hot and ya'll will feel the sun beating down on you, and then out of no where it will start pouring rain! They call it the wall of rain down here in South Florida and they say biking threw it is basically like biking threw a swimming pool. I haven't got to experience the wall of rain yet but I am very excited for my first experience. And I never realized how much I loved the mountains until I got here to Florida for three weeks and it is as flat as a pancake!! It's soo different. Oh and we have a bike car share area with the Wellington North Elders. So every other week we get a car but the other weeks we have to bike and I hate biking cause it takes much longer to get to appointments and stuff like that. But they actually bought us a new 2012 Malobu so it's pretty nice. We also get fed very well here in Wellington so I've been having to get up early and work out hard so I don't get chubby!! Cause here in Wellington we have a very special tender mercy of the Lord. The Bishop of our ward is amazing and so are the members!! But the bishop and a couple of members own the McDonalds here so all of the missionaries get free McDonalds any time we want!! I'm already kinda getting tired of it.. So if I ever visit Wellington again I'll have to remember my missionary tag to get free Mickey D's. The members also feed us very well. A week from this Sunday we went over to the Somoan families house and they defiently put out on food it was amazing!!

But I know without a doubt that the people of Southern Florida are ready for the restored gospel of Jesus Christ, and I know it is mine and Elder Shaffers duty to bring that to the people of South Wellington.

This week I was reflecting on obedience and my thoughts were turned to a bunch of different things that I would love to share with you. One was a talk written by President Monson entitled Finding Strength through obedeince. He says, "There is no need for you or me in this enlightened age, when the fulness of the gospel has been restored, to sail uncharted seas or travel unmarked roads in search of the fountain of truth. For a loving Heavenly Father has plotted our course and provided an unfailing map—obedience!" Then that helped me turn and think about the Sons of Mosiah and once again the great example they are to me. I can relate to them cause in my life I had a turning point where I decided to follow Christ more and I saw the happyness that the gospel of Jesus Christ brought into my life, and I wanted to share that same happyness with other people. I love the 17th chapter in Alma where it kinda talks about the conversion process of the Sons of Mosiah. In Alma 17:2-3 it reads:
 2 Now these sons of Mosiah were with Alma at the time the angel afirst appeared unto him; therefore Alma did rejoice exceedingly to see his brethren; and what added more to his joy, they were still his brethren in the Lord; yea, and they had waxed strong in the knowledge of the truth; for they were men of a sound understanding and they had bsearched the scriptures diligently, that they might know the word of God.

 3 But this is not all; they had given themselves to much prayer, and afasting; therefore they had the spirit of prophecy, and the spirit of revelation, and when they taught, they taught with power and authority of God.

That brings me to the point that as we do those things we are suppose to do as representitives of Jesus Christ and be exactly obedient, we will teach with power and authority just like the Sons of Mosiah and will convert thousands unto the truth. The only way that we can do that is threw exact obedience.

One thing that I have come to know on the mission is how hard of work it really is. But I have seen exactly why we need to be obedient at all times. Because I know if we are exactly obedient, then we can call upon the powers of heaven to help us and that will bless many peoples lives, and blessing peoples lives just gives me so much joy!

This week we saw much success in harvesting as we strived to reach Presidents commitment of 15 blessings! We helped a lot of people come closer to Jesus Christ and one lady even cried during the blessing she loved it so much. She said that she knew we were sent from God to help her and her husband. One way that I saw how being exactly obedient helped me to call upon the powers of heaven was during harvesting. Elder Shaffer and I always do everything that we can to be exactly obedient in every way. I know because of that God blesses us to be led by the spirit while blessing a nonmembers home. Because almost every single home that we blessed expressed their gratitude to us and they knew that blessing was from God because it related to every single one of them. By listening to the Spirit we are able to be BOLD and promise blessing in peoples lives if they but follow Jesus Christ more fervantly in their lives.

The person that we got the privilage of baptizing this week is a Haitian man named Amos. His famlily was baptized three weeks ago and I know threw the Spirit we were able to bring him the restored gospel of truth. Just as the Sons of Mosiah the Spirit allows us to teach with the power and authority of God. I got the honor of baptizing Amos and it was such a spiritual experience. For all of my friends and Zac who are either on missions and havent baptized yet, or about to go on missions I cannot wait for you to have this experience. I felt soo much JOY by even being a part of this baptism and am eternally greatful that the Lord has lead us to two souls who were ready for the gospel of Jesus Christ already in my mission!!

El Bellion and Kyle if you guys are in Orlando you better be comin down to Wellington!! haha just kiddin President Anderson would kill me. But ya'll will love it in Florida and Laboe it's insane that you are leaving so soon!! You're farewell is in a week!? I better be recieving a letter with your addresses and everything bro!!

P Payne what's been up with you bra!? I'll be sendin ya a letter here soon to see don't worry.

And of course Big V!! I'm waiting for your letter to inform me how Milly is doing without the Brighton Boys thank you!!

Ah I love you all and thank you soo much for the prayers for me as well as the people of Wellington! I miss ya and think about ya'll every day!!

With Love,

Elder Pond

Wk 5 FL 'Sons of Mosiah' 3/5/2012

Dear Family and Friends,

This week was once again an amazing week and I hope and pray that everyone is doing well at home! Once again this week I strive to do everything I can to be 100% obedient because I know it is only then when the heavens are open and we are given the power to convert thousands of souls unto Jesus Christ just like the Sons of Mosiah. I look up to the Sons of Mosiah every single day. Their mission was probably one of the hardest missions in the history of the world, but as they trusted and had faith threw the strength of heaven they converted thousands. I hope each and every day to just get closer to as good of missionaries as they were. But here are the best experiences that happened this week!!

First of all, tuesday was a great day because of what happened at the end of the day. We had been working hard all day and not have anything come of it. But what I have noticed just two weeks into my mission that if you endure those tough times, then you will be lead to success. So we came home for dinner and I was sitting at the door waiting for Elder Shaffer so we could get back to work and I got prompted to grab a Plan of Salvation pamphlet, not knowing why but trusting in the Spirit I did so. Then we went out harvesting, which is basically knocking on doors and asking them if they would like a blessing from Jesus Christ to put a peace and comfort on their home, and we blessed three homes in a half hour with a bunch of new investigators that seem really solid! Then at the end of the day when we were about to go home we starting talking to this guy on the street and seeing if we could leave our Savoirs peace and blessing upon his home. By talking to him we found out that he lost his daughter a couple of years ago and because that happened his belief in God dwindled to unbelief. It was then that I remembered the Spirit had prompted me to grab a Plan of Salvation pamphlet and I was obedient. So I gave it to him and we committed him to read about it and truly ponder what it had to say. I know because of this experience that if we are 100% obedient we can draw upon the powers of heaven to let us know what to do. Because when all we can do is done, we still need the powers of heaven to bring souls unto Jesus Christ. We cannot do this work on our own. Just as Ammon said when he came home from his mission in Alma 26:12, "Yea, I know that I am nothing, as to my strength I am weak. Therefore I will not boast of myself, but I will boast of my God. For in His strength we can do all things...".
This week we met so many amazing people harvesting though! There is a man named Mike who has an incredible amount of faith in Jesus Christ and knowledge of the Bible. We blessed his home and taught him the restoration. Then of course we asked him to commit to be baptized and he wasn't sure. But he recognized the Spirit when we were there with him so we asked him to bring the question before the Lord, and that we know if he goes before Him with faith that he will recieve an answer. Oh and Mike is 100% blind!! He has endured so much threw Jesus Christ in his life and even played football in college while he was blind! Also on Friday we had a great day of harvesting! Thursday night we set high goals cause we knew if we had faith that the Lord would provide a way to accomplish our goals.  Then in one hour of harvesting we got three blessings, seven new investigators, and three people with baptisimal dates! It was such an amazing experience and helped me realize that with hard work and faith that Jesus Christ will be along our side helping us do His work, absolutely anything is possible! With faith anything is possible!

Overall I have learned so much this week and know that if I trust in the Lord with all my heart that he will direct my paths, Proverbs 3:5-6. I see it every single day out here in Wellington. One talk that has been on my mind a lot this week has been the Character of Christ by Elder Bednar. In it he says that we need to develop the Character of Christ as representitives of Jesus Christ, and His character is to always turn outward. When the natural man would normally turn inward and start thinking about himself, Christ would turn outward and think of other people and that is exactly what we need to do as missionaries in this great work!  I have grown to love every single person in Wellington no matter if they accept the gospel of Jesus Christ or not. It is their choice and they have the agency to do so, but it is my choice to bring them this great gospel that has blessed my life so much!

So the work in Wellington is doing amazing!! We have two baptisms scheduled this week that as long as everything goes as planned Saturday and getting tthey should be getting dunked on he Holy Ghost this next Sunday so I'm super pumped for both of those! We also have a lot of good progressing investigators that we really just need to push over that edge and get them to get baptized! I really wish everyone out here would see us as who we really are, representitives of Jesus Christ and accept us as that. So you could say I'm trying every single day to be more like Jesus so that more people will see me as a representitive of Jesus Christ. But mission life is amazing I love it down here in sunny Florida! The people and culture down here is what I love the most! But to answer some of your questions so you guys don't get mad at me for not answering them my companion is from Springville Utah. He is a really great guy but he frustrates me a lot of the time cause he doesn't always wanna work hard and be exactly obedient. He said he follows "the spirit of the law" when you are suppose to be 100% obedient but I'm just working my hardest!! I love serving the Lord and have never experienced more happiness and joy in my entire life that helping souls come closer to Jesus Christ! I love you all family and friends and please write letters. I accept letters from everyone I promise!! You all are always in my prayers and pray for the people of Wellington to soften their hearts for the message of the true and restored gospel.

With Love,

Elder Pond