Email from Elder Walker 1-11-2010

Some notes to family:

• I havn't heard anything about the baby yet. It makes me nervous because nobody sent me an e-mail this week either. I hope everything is all good. I thought Britnee was going to deliver on the 10th but now it is the 11th please don't forget to call the mission office. If you need the number it is 208-233-0130. My vote is Briggin if it's a boy and... well I don't know for a girl. I'm convinced the baby is going to be a boy though so there is no need for a girls name.
• Mom, thank you so much for the stationary and the letter you sent me. I really appreciate the advice and the concern you have for me. You are the greatest mother in the world. We teach about families in the first lesson because then I get to testify of my family. One of my greatest testimony is that my family is ordained of God. He has blessed me with such a solid family with great standards

From his weekly letter home:

• I just completed the 7th baptism so far on Saturday. Her name is Jenna Miller and she was the "golden" contact. She just moved here to St. Anthony from Washington. She was contacted by ward members and they set up the lessons for us. When we met her the first time we committed her to baptism and just taught her 4 times then she was baptized. I love it when that happens. Well come to think of it, most of the people we baptized we haven't had to "fight" them to the font. Long story short, St. Anthony Idaho is the best.
• I received a package from my best friends! When missionaries receive a package its like we loose all control and rip it open! It's quite funny actually. I got the package from Ashante, Hedy Lu, and Garrett. They sent me all sorts of stuff like sun flower seeds, spider-man crayons, bubble gum, and a puzzle. There was much more than that but that gives you an idea of what was in there. They included pictures of themselves and a sweet spider-man inner tube. Receiving packages makes the day so much better.
• As missionaries we have a teaching pool, or people that we are teaching. The problem that we are running into right now is that we are baptizing everyone in our teaching pool! The members saw how successful we were and how much work we were doing that I think they just gave up on trying to find people for us to teach. After baptizing 7 we now have a teaching pool of 6. Kinda crazy that we don't have that many to teach when we cover 10 wards. The referrals that we do get though are great and then get baptized so I guess I can't complain.
• I get really frustrated with people when they say they don't know anyone or there isn't anyone to teach but there are! Then I think about Colorado where there are more than plenty of people to teach! I didn't do the work that I should have done when I lived in a town with plenty of people to teach and now I'm getting upset with people that really don't know of people that aren't already members of the church. I hope you all back home will try to do your part for the Elders serving you. We cannot fulfill our purpose without the help of the members.
• I hope you all are having a great New Year! I know 2010 is going to be a great year. I look forward to the work that we get to do. By the way our mission had 750 baptisms this last year. We had 80 in December. The IPM rocks. I love you all.
  
  Peace and Love,
  
  Elder Tyson Rigby Walker

Sister Walker Highlights January 2010

SISTER WALKER

• Happy New Year… I can’t believe 2009 has come to an end. Where did the time go? Well, I for one would LOVE for 2010 to be Much slower than 2009 but I don’t think that is going to happen! Maybe if we combined our efforts and prayed really, really, really hard than the next 3 months will go really SLOW! I would rather enjoy that thank you!
• So, this has been quite the eventful past couple of weeks! We had 2 baptisms last week, one of which I never thought I would see the day that he got baptized. I have been teaching Jimmy since the second week I was in Boulder City and he was off and on for all of that time. Finally he decided back in September that he was going to get baptized on Dec. 26th and even though it was still a rocky road he finally made it to his baptism! He is going to be a great member! The other one was a 9 year old genius! Coty was/is the smartest investigator I have ever taught and he has grasped the gospel more that anyone I have ever taught! They were 2 fantastic baptisms!
• Coty’s family has been less active for quite some time but now they are back into activity! Coty’s 10-year-old sister Cami is currently taking the lessons and wants to get baptized in March… we hope to move that up some! Cami has made a huge 180 since we first met her a month ago… she was trying to go down the “gothic” route and now she has turned into a little sweetheart! Their family has been very active the past month or so and I believe they will remain active! They are such a great family and I am excited for the adventures in the gospel that lay ahead! Oh man, I love this work!!!
• Oh, P.S. I have shingles on my leg! Ouch! I guess they are caused by stress or something like that! The doc says they are clearing up though and should be gone in 3-4 weeks! I might miss them when they go. They are rather interesting looking and you all know how I love my battle wounds! Haha! However, I don’t suggest getting them they are extremely painful!
• Guess what, guess what, guess what, I survived another transfer and I am still in Boulder City! I am training again this transfer. Sister Burgess is straight from the MTC!!! Sister Burgess is from Maryland! I LOVE Sister Burgess! What a great missionary! She reminds me a LOT of Melanie Hunter! I am excited be serving with her. She has a solid testimony and isn’t afraid to open up and share it in appointments. Yesterday we had quite a few appointments with investigators that have very interesting questions and she just opened right up and answered their questions without any hesitation! We went to check on a new investigator who ended up not being home and as we were walking back to the car, Sister Burgess noticed an open door to an apartment a few doors down (that I hadn’t noticed because I was focused on who we were going to see next) and she said, “Hey, shouldn’t we go talk to those people.” So, we did! She shared a simple testimony with them, then we gave them a card for Finding Faith in Christ and a Restoration pamphlet. They weren’t interested in us coming back but, heck, I was so proud of Sister Burgess! I have a lot to learn form her!!!! She is going to be a great asset to our mission!
• I am so excited for this transfer! This means that at the end of this transfer I will have done 7 ½ months in Boulder AND I could possibly finish my mission here which means I would spend 9 months here!!! That is half my mission!!
• Oh goodness, we had the best baptisms last week. We had Jammie’s baptism on Thursday and it went so well! Then her daughter Abby was baptized on Saturday and again it went very well. AND… we are starting to teach Jammie’s husband Phil who wasn’t really interested before and then he came to the baptisms and Church on Sunday and now he is totally interested. He has had the first lesson and we are going back tonight to teach the second one! Yay!!! I love when a whole family embraces the gospel! I can’t wait to be in the temple when they are sealed!!!

Elder Walker Letter January 4, 2010

ELDER WALKER:

• So I am very excited to be staying in St. Anthony. I love the people here and the work that we are doing. I am creating this bond with this area that when the time comes to leave I really wont want to. When President Colton was talking about splitting this area I had a hard time with even thinking about other missionaries "poaching" my area.
  We are still seeing a bunch of success. We set another baptism date on Saturday which brings our total to 5. Our goal is to beat Decembers baptisms with 7 instead of the mere 6 we had last month. haha
• While tracting we ran into this boy named Shawn. He was visiting a member family for Christmas. We asked if we could share a message with him and shared a brief restoration. He had wide eyes the whole time and his response was that he thinks it is so great that God would call a prophet once again to lead and guide us today. We gave him a Book of Mormon to read and he already read the chapter we gave him (Moroni 10) and prayed. He said that his Mom is Christian and his Dad Catholic; his whole life he has been confused. When we went back today we taught a more detailed 1st and asked a few more questions. His answers were so profound and so genuine. He's 14 and had more interest in the gospel than most adults we teach. The only problem is that he lives in L.A. and was flying back home today. He said that he would really like to continue learning from us and that he wished we could keep teaching him. We said, "that's alright we have missionaries in California too." He had no idea the church was around the world. We described the L.A. temple and said that was a temple of our church. He was so excited. Too bad he isn't our investigator anymore. We just set up a golden investigator for the L.A. mission.
• Yesterday I experienced my most spiritual low of the mission. We have been teaching a boy named Carson H___ for a while and yesterday when we went back to teach him his Dad came to the door and told us that Carson wasn't interested anymore and that we shouldn't come back. I get sad thinking about it because Carson is such a great kid and knew so much about the church. We don't think that Carson actually said that and that his parents are still bitter towards the church. It's terrible because Carson's dad served as an Assistant when he served his mission but now is less active and doesn't like the church. I was asked just the other day by our Zone leaders what the hardest part about serving a mission is. My response was that It's hard to see somebody's potential and then watch them not reach for it. That's how it is for Carson only worse; he has great potential but his parents are restricting him from achieving it.
• Here in Idaho we teach so many over aged youth and part member families. Most of our converts are teenagers or pre teen kids. It really makes me appreciate the way I was raised in the gospel and the structure I have. Some families are so closed minded and restrict their children from growing. As a missionary you really want to sit the parents down and tell them how to raise their children but we don't necessarily have the authority to do that.
• Yesterday Sarah Ferwerda, one of our investigators with a baptism date, bore her testimony in church! It was her first Sunday in her new ward and the first time we heard her say that she knows that Joseph Smith is a prophet and the Book of Mormon is true! Elder Call and I sat there with our jaws hanging down in our laps. We were about to fall of the bench out of shock! The Lord works in mysterious ways...