tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12322304641525637552024-03-13T09:39:08.608-07:00Elder Tom Hill's Mission BlogAnonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06841325549295845334noreply@blogger.comBlogger28125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1232230464152563755.post-30014452419834385742014-04-07T14:43:00.002-07:002014-04-07T14:43:34.630-07:00What a week!<div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px;">
Hello everyone!</div>
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It's been quite the week! I am worn out because we've been working like crazy, but here we go for another week. Gotta love missionary work!</div>
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On Tuesday, we went on DePauw campus for the first time. We spent about an hour on campus and we found 3 people who gave us their number and told us they would be interested in learning more. That would have been a good day's worth in Fishers! The students are very receptive and I think that there is some good potential with them.</div>
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We already taught one of the students whose name is Henry. He was very open minded and had all sorts of good questions. We haven't been able to contact him since then, though, so hopefully we can soon. I answered one of his questions very poorly, so hopefully that didn't mess things up.... I'm sure it didn't though. That is the nice thing about missionary work. We are so imperfect! But this is the Lord's work, so even though we are imperfect it still rolls on.</div>
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We were able to meet more of the members throughout the week. They are so great! With lack of a better term, there are a lot of rednecks out here (this Saturday we will hopefully be slaughtering chickens with one of the members), but I love them. There are some really great members here. Even though they are stretched so thin because of it being a small branch, they are all willing to serve.</div>
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General Conference was amazing! I hope everyone learned some good things. I want everyone who gets this to reply with something they learned from General Conference. I was definitely uplifted by all of the talks and received some personal answers to questions I have been seeking. Also, to follow-up on Elder Ballard's talk, if any of you are studying from PMG I would love to hear what you have been studying.</div>
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Continue to be missionaries wherever you are. I know there are great things happening in the Lord's work!</div>
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Have a great week! :)</div>
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Love,</div>
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Elder Tom Hill</div>
Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06841325549295845334noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1232230464152563755.post-44579214417015929172014-03-24T12:27:00.002-07:002014-03-24T12:27:59.316-07:00Hello from Fishers for one more time<div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px;">
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Hey Everyone!<br /><br />If you couldn't figure out from the subject yet, it is official that I am leaving Fishers. Wow. I can't believe 3 months has gone by here. It's hard to believe how much I have grown the last 3 months. This has been a hard area, but I really have loved it and it's hard to leave. Things have started to pick up, and now it's time for me to pick up and leave. Seems like a pattern for my mission so far.<br /></div>
This last week was packed with stuff, I hope I can talk about all of it! On Tuesday we had a lesson with Steve, our less-active we've been working with. I'll probably miss him most out of everyone. We met with him consistently for 12 weeks. And now he's gone to church 3 times in a row and started to break some of his addictions. I believe that we are sent to every area for a specific reason, and usually for a specific person. I know we were sent here to help Steve. I look forward to the future when he can be completely sober and fully active in the church and temple. After Steve, we had a lesson with Melvin, who is 76 years old. He's a funny old man, and in some ways he reminds me of Brother Garber in Brazil haha. We could tell he had some major concerns, so we just kept digging the whole lesson. It was pretty fun. Finally, we got it out of him that he had some books of anti. He brought them out to us, and we boldy testified of the truthfulness of the Book of Mormon. I told him, "Melvin, I looked through this book for 5 seconds, and I already found something that was false. I've also looked through the Book of Mormon for my whole life, and I've found nothing but truth. It's done nothing, but bless my life."<br /></div>
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On Tuesday night, we had a really cool experience. In Fishers, there are all sorts of cultures. It's really a melting pot. The other Elders knocked on a door of a Muslim guy. He told them that if they came to his mosque, he would listen to them and come to church with them. Well, we had nothing to do on Tuesday night, so we went with them. What an experience! They went through their prayer, and after that we sat in a room with some of their leaders who told us about Islam and we told them about our church. It was super educational, and also very effective. They said they would all come to our church sometime, hopefully next week. They were super nice to us and very respectful; I gained a lot of respect for their religion.<br /></div>
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On Wednesday, we taught a guy named Jordan who had a really cool beard. He listened and was respectful, but at the end of the lesson went off about how the Bible is a closed canon of scripture and the last verses in Revelation. We invited him to read the Book of Mormon and pray about it. I love how the opposition against us and against the truth is so complicated, and how the answer is so simple. It definitely adds to my testimony. People are really smart out here, and they also really know/love the Bible. It's made me stretch and grow in my knowledge of the gospel and of the scriptures. It's also really strengthened my testimony.<br /></div>
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Speaking of people being smart and opposing our beliefs, we met with a guy named Daniel Friday morning at a deli shop. He seemed nice at first, but then he went off about how there's so much evidence for the Bible, but not very much for the Book of Mormon. He asked us why we say we're Christians, when Joseph Smith said all of the other churches were wrong. He just kept talking, and didn't give us much time to talk, but we bore testimony of the truthfulness of the Book of Mormon. We told him that if he actually reads and prays about the Book of Mormon, he will see the evidences of its divinity and gain a testimony of it. I asked him if he was just meeting with us to prove us wrong or if he actually wanted to know if the Book of Mormon was true. He said he would like to know if it's true, but we'll see if it goes anywhere.<br /></div>
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Friday evening, we also had a lesson with Mark and Anita. They are way deep thinkers. They really stretch our knowledge of the scriptures and ask tough questions, but we feel like it's moving in the right direction. The power of the Book of Mormon is amazing, and it is starting to resolve their concerns.<br /></div>
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I've just written highlights of the week to spare you from boredom, but investigators are starting to come out of the woodwork and the teaching pool here is really building up. Like I said, just in time for me to leave. :) Haha<br /></div>
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Well, I'm excited for the new adventures that lie ahead. I hope everyone has a great week and I love all of you a bunch!!! :)<br /></div>
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Love,</div>
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Elder Tom Hill</div>
Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06841325549295845334noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1232230464152563755.post-81034710639480179352014-03-10T14:51:00.003-07:002014-03-10T14:51:41.741-07:00Another week in FishersFirst of all, I am so sorry that this has not been up to date. I took on way too much this semester and unfortunately this was low on my priority list, but I will try to be better, because I know that you all love to hear about Tom and I love posting his emails. Please write him!! ~ Paul Hill<br />
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Hey everyone!<br /></div>
First of all, I have to say that I am wearing a short sleeve shirt today! It's almost 50 degrees, so I decided to wear one. It's warming up slowly, but surely.<br /></div>
Another week has flown by, I feel like I was just barely emailing home.... We had some successes this week. Tuesday we had a lesson with our Less-Active member, Steve, that we've been consistently working with. He's doing well, and he even came to church yesterday! First time since we've been here, and he even did it the Sunday of daylight savings time. Tuesday night, we also had a dinner with him and met his non-member girlfriend. They made us some really good food and we watched Joseph Smith: Prophet of the Restoration while we ate. They loved it! He's doing super good, it's exciting.<br /></div>
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We had a Zone Meeting this week that I learned a lot from. Our Zone Leaders are awesome! I always learn a bunch from them. Elder Smith taught me the importance of consistency in obedience and dilligence, and ways to be a more Christ-like leader. I've had great examples through my mission and my life of great Christ-like leaders and I always just hope I can be that kind of example.<br /></div>
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On Saturday, we helped the Sisters do a church tour with one of their investigators, and he ended up just wanting to argue and bash with us. I told him that all he needs to do is find out for himself if the Book of Mormon is true by studying it and praying about it. I don't understand why some people make it so complicated. I've really learned that the Book of Mormon is the keystone to our religion. and is convincing evidence that Jesus Christ's gospel has been restored.<br /></div>
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We had a lesson with Mark this weekend, and he's started to get a testimony of the Book of Mormon. It's been really cool to watch. When we give him a reading assignment he reads it a few times over, and Saturday we committed him to start at the beginning and just read the Book of Mormon. He was really excited about that.<br /></div>
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Yesterday we saw some miracles. Well... I didn't because I was really sick and wasn't able to go to church. Mom, do you remember that time I got sick after Foot Locker my Junior year when I called you at work and told you I thought I was going to die? I felt about like that.... haha, but the good news is that I feel a lot better today. Like I said, Steve was able to go to church which was great. Elder Havertz went with Elder Sabin, one of the 2nd ward elders to church and were able to see Steve there. Elder Sabin had like 6 hours of church yesterday, poor guy. And then at night there was a fireside with Steven Covey's brother, that we invited Mark to. He went and I guess he had a great time. Elder Havertz went with Elder Esplin to that, the other Elder in our apartment.<br /></div>
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I've now been in Fishers over 2 months, it's crazy how fast the time flies. I've learned a lot in this area. It's probably been the most unproductive time on my mission so far just because of the weather and the way the ward is, but it's made me stretch to try to still have success. Like Elder Smith, our Zone Leader says, we have success through our character, not our circumstances. We can rise above our circumstances. Especially when we use the enabling power of the Atonement in our lives. My testimony of the Atonement, and what Christ did for us has grown this week. I can't even comprehend that He understands and knows me, and knows all of us!<br /></div>
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Well, I hope you all have a great week. I love you all!<br /></div>
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Love,<br />Elder Hill</div>
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Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06841325549295845334noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1232230464152563755.post-14028336433955683202013-12-30T09:17:00.001-08:002013-12-30T09:17:30.464-08:00Transferred from Brazil!<div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px;">
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Hello everyone!<br /></div>
I hope everyone had a good Christmas, I know I sure did! The members here were too kind to us! And talking with the family was great. It sure made my Christmas great! An hour seemed to fly by, and I feel like there was so much more I wanted to talk about with you all and ask you, but I was glad for the time we had.<br /></div>
Well I'll start with the biggest news. The dreaded transfer call came last night, and I am officially leaving Brazil. :'( It's crazy how fast time flies. It feels like just yesterday Elder Easter and I were driving into town saying, "Where in the world are we???" and then 4 1/2 months later after lots of adventures with Elder Easter and Elder Wallace, I'm leaving. The hardest thing to leave is all of the people I've grown to love. I will miss the members so much, but I hope I can always stay in touch with them. With so few active members in our area, it made us grow really close to them. I'll also miss a lot of the people we've been teaching. I'm leaving at such a huge time in the area. Brenda is getting married on Saturday, and we'll have at least 2 baptisms this month here hopefully. I just hope I don't get transferred up to Michigan or something so I can still come back for the baptisms. I'll also miss Elder Wallace. The last 3 months flew, but we have become really good friends.<br /></div>
In my next area, President has called me to be a District Leader, so just a little bit more responsibility. I feel like every transfer gets a little more challenging, but I'm okay with it. It kind of weirds me out how much I've grown and changed even in the last 6 months. I'm sure in my next area there will be many more adventures though, and I look forward to it.<br /></div>
This week was an exciting one. Obviously Christmas was this week, and that was a blast like I said. Thanks so much to everyone for the packages and cards. They meant a lot. Sorry I couldn't send anything back, I wish I could have! But Christmas crept up on me fast, and I don't have a lot of time..........or money. Anyway, thanks again. I am very grateful for all of the support I receive.<br /></div>
Yesterday, was a good Sunday to go out on. We had 5 investigators at church! Woooooohoooo! My whole first transfer with Elder Easter, we were always struggling just to get one. It's been really fun to watch the area grow and progress. Yesterday, Brenda came with her fiance, Gary. Brenda's daughter came and two grandchildren; Lizzie who's 16 and Frank Jr. who's 7. On top of that, Dave Aukerman was at church. He's the husband of one of the members in the ward, and two of his step-sons are on missions. One of his step-sons was skyping him lessons, but his step-son now handed him off to us. All of our investigators had a good experience at church; it was a pretty spiritual church meeting. Last night, we went to the Aukermans' for dinner. Afterwards we watched Finding Faith in Christ with them and had a pretty good lesson. We were a little bold with Dave, especially because it was very possibly one of my last lessons with him. We asked him about baptism and he said that he's praying about a date. He's a really religious guy, he just has a concern with why he needs to be baptized again with the proper authority. I've really come to love that family as well, they are so good to us! He said he'd get in touch with me somehow when he finally makes the decision to be baptized. That made me excited.<br /></div>
Well, it's been a good run here in Brazil, Indiana. I hope I don't lose touch with a lot of these people. I hope to visit here again someday. But, I also look forward to the things to come. I'll let you know next where I get transferred and my address.<br /></div>
Thanks for everything, and I love all of you! Happy New Year!!!!!<br /></div>
<span style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px;">-Elder Tom Hill</span>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06841325549295845334noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1232230464152563755.post-18971314741785367522013-12-23T12:49:00.002-08:002013-12-23T12:49:49.598-08:00Merry Christmas from Brazil!<div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px;">
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Hello everyone! I added some more people who I thought my like to hear from me to my weekly emails, so if any of you get sick of these showing up in your inbox each week, just let me know.<br /><br />First of all, Merry Christmas! Second of all, I just want to say it is seriously a miracle that I'm even able to email right now. The Brazil library's computers are terrible and we were worried we'd have to take an hour out of our day to drive to the Haute and back (because of Christmas, our P-day is only 3 hours, so that would've cut into proselyting time.) I know that Heavenly Father really does answer prayers of faith, not only in things spiritual, but temporal as well.<br /></div>
Just in case the computers act up, I need to get the most important thing squared away. This is to my parents: I will be able to skype on Wednesday, so let's plan on about 10 am your time? Let me know if that doesn't work. What I'll probably end up doing is give you a call really fast right before I skype so you know when it will happen. Just try to keep your morning open. It might be earlier or later than that a little, but we'll plan on that. If anyone's on right now, let me know really fast if another time works better.<br /></div>
Well now I guess I'll talk about this week. It's been a great week! The time flew by, it's crazy how fast the days go by now. I don't like it. We had some good lessons with Brenda, Barbara and Ashley. They want us to come every day! Every time we go there, Brenda ends up giving us something because she's so nice and trying to clean out her trailer. Here's what she's given us while we've been here: 5 bibles, 4 pictures, 7 pounds of Jolly Ranchers, two candles, 6 books, 2 dinners that were packed with food, and I'm probably missing some things. Haha it's almost a joke how much she gives us. Elder Wallace and Elder Smith, our zone leader (they were on exchanges) reviewed the baptismal interview questions with her, and she knew just about anything. They got a pretty enthusiastic no to question number 5, for anyone who knows what the 5th question is. It fact, she said HECK NO! Actually she didn't even say that.... haha she's a character. We also had a lesson with Barbara where she told us that we have helped her change a ton. We didn't even realize how much she has changed. She used to party a bunch and even do some drugs. She said right before she met us she had thought about going back into doing those things, but she had been praying that God would help her not go back into her old ways, and then she met us through her mom. She kept telling us how grateful she was for us, and that she decided to listen to us. She said she's talked to missionaries before and slammed the door in their faces before. But now she's finally opened up. It just shows you that you have to never give up on people, you never know when their hearts will be softened. Barbara and Brenda came to church yesterday and had a good experience. We had a good Christmas program that we sang in (our ward choir is the funnest to sing in. We have Brother Garber as our choir director, and that always makes it entertaining.) And then Elder Wallace and I taught a Christmas lesson in Gospel Principles that turned out pretty spiritual.<br /></div>
We had another investigator come to church yesterday, named Michael. I'm not sure if I've talked about him before. We met him while walking a few weeks ago. He was in prison about a year ago, but he's working at piecing his life back together. He has a really good heart. He doesn't have hardly anything. He lives in a tiny house without any furniture. He doesn't have very much clothing either. Luckily some of our members were getting rid of some old clothes and we could give those two him. But he's working REALLY hard to get his life pieced back together. He had a great time yesterday as well and the members were really good to him. He gave some great insights in Gospel Principles which is what made the lesson so spiritual. He said when he first met us on the street he was startled when we asked if he had a minute to talk, but when we started to talking about the gospel it was like a "breath of fresh air". He loved church and we're meeting with him again today.<br /></div>
Well, there's so much more I wanted to talk about, but these computers are from the stone age.... Luckily I won't be skyping on them, we'll do that at the Paullus' home. Just so I can get at least a little bit sent off, I'll send this one and maybe try to send a little more afterwards. But if I don't, I'll probably tell you more when I skype you. This has been a great week. I hope I can send more in another email.<br /></div>
I hope everyone has a merry Christmas and I love all of you!!!!!</div>
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-Elder Hill</div>
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PART II</div>
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Hello again everyone! I have a few more minutes, and the computers are doing a little bit better. Here's a forwarded picture from Colton Twitchell, AKA Elder Twitchell who I saw at a mission conference on Thursday. Haha I look goofy in it. But anyway, it was a good conference with the whole mission, it was just super long.<br /></div>
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Two more things I wanted to talk about in my email. On Saturday, we helped one of our recent converts with a project he's working on. He's trying to fix an old house that should've been torn down. It's a nightmare..... It goes against everything Rob taught me last year. But I'm glad I could use some of the things I learned last year to help someone out. The moral of the story: Don't buy a condemned house, especially without going to look at it.<br /><br />Sunday night was a huge night in the mission, specifically in Terre Haute. Bishop Newton's mom got baptized! Missionaries have been teaching her for 37 years and she finally decided to make the jump! I guess she needed sister missionaries in Terre Haute to teach her, because that's what made the change! It was huge, there were hundreds of people at the baptism. President Cleveland even came. Anyway, it was quite the experience.<br /></div>
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Talk to you later, and I love you all tons!!!!</div>
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-Elder Hill</div>
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Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06841325549295845334noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1232230464152563755.post-70292530110965190262013-12-23T12:34:00.002-08:002013-12-23T12:34:30.419-08:00Last week's email<div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px;">
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Hello everyone!<br /><br />What an excellent week! So much has happened, I don't even know where to begin! We've seen miracles this week and I know that the Lord's hand is in this work.<br /></div>
On Monday evening, we had a lesson with Brenda. We were a little bit bold with her, and told her that if she didn't get married to Gary (her boyfriend) or separated, and if she didn't stop smoking that she couldn't be baptized. The Spirit was really strong during our lesson and we could tell that she was really pondering hard about what we had taught her. After her lesson, we went to Brother Allen's house to talk about some things. Before we left the Allens' house, Elder Wallace said a prayer. Right in the middle of his prayer, the Allens' phone started ringing. Elder Wallace kind of cut the prayer a little short so they could answer it. Brother Allen answered the phone and said, "What? You're getting married!? I'm sitting right here with them, you can tell them if you want." It was Brenda. After our lesson she decided that she was committed to be baptized, so after living with her boyfriend for 7 years she was going to finally make it official and get married. We were pumped!! It was one of the craziest things that has happened to me on my mission; it was just like on the Best Two Years. Little did I know one of the job titles of a missionary was wedding planner.<br /></div>
The next morning, she called us during our studies and said, "I threw away my cigarettes last night, and I can tell you right now I'm not going to buy another pack. I can do anything I put my mind to." We couldn't believe it! Two miraculous calls within 12 hours of each other. But of course the adversary wasn't going to just give up. Right after she made her decision to get married and baptized, her family started giving her some major opposition. Elder Easter and I used to call the road she lives on "Jerry Springer Road" and a lot of that is because of some members of her family. We dropped by on Tuesday during the day, and her granddaughter freaked out. She's 18, living with Brenda (or at least she used to), and going through a divorce. Yeah, 18 and going through a divorce! Did I mention how being on a mission has made me so much more grateful for all of the blessings in my life? Anyway, when we dropped by, we mentioned her wedding plans. And her granddaughter said, "What!? You're getting married because they told you to!? I can't believe this!" Brenda said, "They didn't tell me I have to do anything, this is my choice." Autumn said, "Yeah, right. I heard them last night that you can't get baptized if you're not married! I don't believe in your religion!" and she stomped out. We told Brenda that it was completely her choice, but that we knew being baptized into the church would greatly bless her life. When we were driving home from Terre Haute around 8 o'clock that night, she called us again. She was crying on the phone and told Elder Wallace that she didn't think any of her family was going to go to her wedding. Her granddaughter had thrown another tantrum, yelled and screamed, and spilled a pot of boiling potato soup on her sister's leg. Brenda told her to get out of her house, and Autumn stormed out. Not only that, but her son started to give her a hard time as well about her getting married. It broke our hearts! We hurried over there and said a prayer with her. She said that she wasn't going to let it get her down and we told her to stay strong and keep doing what she's doing. She has such amazing faith, it's incredible. <br /><br /></div>
On Wednesday, we had a lesson with her daughter and granddaughter (her good family members) and it turns out they both want to be baptized as well! They are now scheduled to be baptized on the 25th of January, and Brenda's scheduled for the 11th. They're names are Barbara (Brenda's daughter) and Ashley (Barbara's daughter). So, we're going to have three generations baptized! We're so excited. I'm just scared that at the end of the year I will be leaving since I've been here a little while. It makes me sad because there's some really exciting things happening here the next few months.<br /></div>
On Friday, I had an exchange with Elder Howell, one of the elders in Linton. I learned a lot on the exchange, and we had some adventures in Linton. Linton's a small town in the middle of nowhere. (worst than Brazil, surprising I know.) The famous thing about Linton is a sign that says, "You'll like Linton". I like Linton, but I'm not sure it'd be my first choice of places to live... haha.<br /></div>
On Saturday it snowed a little bit more, so Elder Wallace and I turned into snow shoveling ninja's and shoveled a bunch of people's driveways. Because of that we were able to get in contact with a few of our investigators, Ken and Mona, and Sue. So that was good! Plus it was good to get a good little exercise snow shoveling crazy fast.<br /></div>
Speaking of exercise.... I'm not getting much. Haha I've gained 10-15 pounds. A combination of Hoosier cooking and hardly ever getting a good workout is starting to take it's toll on me. Elder Wallace and I did the math, and at this rate I'll come home at about 205! :) Haha don't worry I won't let that happen... I hope.<br /><br />To end this week out, we had a great day at church yesterday. Brenda and Barbara came to church and had a great time. Ashley wasn't able to make it to church, because she's the one who got the burns on her leg from the boiling potato soup and her leg wasn't feeling too good, but hopefully she can make it next week. We had some good Christmas talks and a good lesson in gospel principles. It was probably one of the best church services for investigators yet.<br /></div>
We've got our Christmas plans figured it out, and the members have been fighting over where we will go on Christmas. We get so much support from the members. I also get a lot of support back home. Thanks so much for all of the cards. Please let the ward know thanks for the support also. I've gotten a few cards from members in the ward. Thanks so much for the support, I couldn't do it without you!!<br /></div>
Have a great week! I hope all of you try to find ways to share your testimony during this season where the Spirit is so strong. Look for opportunities to serve your brothers and sisters, because that's what the Christmas season is all about.<br /></div>
I love all of you!<br /></div>
<span style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px;">-Elder Tom Hill</span>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06841325549295845334noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1232230464152563755.post-68512853222348043442013-12-03T22:37:00.000-08:002013-12-04T05:29:15.338-08:00Happy December from Indiana<span style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px;">Hello everyone!</span><br />
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It's crazy to think that it's December and I am starting my 6th month as a missionary! This week has been a good one and I have a lot to talk about, so it might be another long one today!</div>
On Tuesday, we had a great night! We visited with an old lady named Sue. She is really nice. She's 82, but I would have never guessed that! She looks like she's in her 60's. Anyway, she talked our leg off, fed us pumpkin pie, and then we shared a little bit about the restoration. She seems interested and her cousin's son lives in Utah and is in the bishopric of a ward, so she knows some things about the church. She offered us coffee and iced tea, and the member that was with us, Brother Garber, thought that was hilarious.</div>
After her, we went next door to a less-active guy that we met at the Garber's yard sale months ago. His name is Ken and he was baptized in another ward in Indiana in the late 80's, but hasn't gone to church since he's been in Brazil. His wife Mona isn't a member and she showed some huge interest in the church! We were just chatting with them, and then she said, "Well tell us about your church!" before we could even say anything. He still has a solid testimony and they said they wanted to come out to church. That was an awesome lesson!</div>
Thursday was a really good thanksgiving. We ate dinner at the Griffins who are a family in Terre Haute. We ate some great food and then headed to one of the middle schools and played football for about 2 1/2 hours. In fact one of their relatives took some videos and put them online at <a href="http://xancraven.smugmug.com/Family/Griffin-2013" target="_blank">http://xancraven.smugmug.com/Family/Griffin-2013</a> if you want to check it out. Or you can just watch ESPN sometime this month and I'm sure they'll be showing some of the replays....</div>
Speaking of websites, our mission has a facebook page! I've never seen it though, because we still aren't aloud on facebook.... but you can go ahead and check it out! I believe it's on <a href="http://facebook.com/indymission" target="_blank">facebook.com/indymission</a> . Elder Rogers (my mission grandpa and one of the assistants, he's home now) told me that we had our 4 generation posterity picture on there and that I was in some other pictures, so you'll have to check it out!</div>
Friday was another good day. In the evening, Brazil had a Christmas parade. Just about everyone in Clay County showed up to that, so Elder Wallace and I went and tried to talk to some of the people there. Everyone was busy watching the parade so we didn't have much luck there. About 20 minutes into the parade, Brenda called us. We were so excited because we weren't able to get in contact with her for a week! We hurried over there with a member, Brother Allen, to visit her. It turns out she had a tooth pulled and got a dry socket, so she hadn't been feeling very good. That was a relief to us, because we were afraid she was ignoring us. (She wouldn't answer the door when her car was home, and she almost always answers when her car is home.) It seemed like kind of a blessing in disguise for that to happen to her, as awful as that sounds, because the dentist told her that she couldn't smoke with the dry socket or it would make it a lot worse. She's been doing really well with the smoking. Her daughter, Barbara, was there as well and she showed a lot of interest in the church. We told her about the Book of Mormon, and since Friday she's already read to 1 Nephi 1.</div>
Saturday was another good day where we met with some less-active families and Brenda again. We only have a few more things we need to teach her, but they're pretty crucial lessons for her to live the standards set for baptism. I'd definitely appreciate it if you kept us and Brenda in your prayers; we could use all of the help we could get!</div>
I hope everyone had a great thanksgiving! I have so much to be thankful for. First of all, I'm on a mission! This has been my dream for so long! If I ever get a negative attitude I think, "Holy cow! I'm on a mission! I've been waiting for this my whole life!" I'm really grateful for all of you, my family and friends. These last 5 months I've realized how much I took everything for granted. I don't know how I got so lucky to have so many people around me who support me so much. And one of the greatest blessings I have is the restored gospel of Jesus Christ. It is a gospel of hope and I have that oppurtunity to share this peace and hope with those who need it so badly! I hope everyone has a great week, and I love all of you! Thanks for the support! :)</div>
Love, </div>
Elder Tom Hill</div>
P.S. I'll send some pictures in a minute if I have time.</div>
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Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06841325549295845334noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1232230464152563755.post-45188666479488300882013-11-25T22:28:00.000-08:002013-11-25T22:28:44.503-08:00Another week in Brazil! <div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px;">
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Hey everyone! I have a lot to talk about, this has been an interesting week. So get ready for a long one!<br /></div>
This week started out with an awesome lesson with Heidi. She is our investigator that I was talking about a few weeks ago who heard that we believe we are aliens from another planet and weird things like that. She was really skeptical when we first began teaching her, but things have changed. On Tuesday we asked her if she's been reading the Book of Mormon and how she's felt about it. She said that she had been reading it with an open mind now and praying about it, and couldn't see how somebody could've made up the Book of Mormon. She said she feels the same way when she reads the B.o.M as when she reads the Bible, and she said she feels really peaceful when she reads the Bible. We asked her where she had left off, and she told us she hadn't understood a lot of the things she had read recently. And then she told us she had read all the way to 2 Nephi 27! We hadn't seen her for like 2 or 3 weeks and she had read that far. No wonder she couldn't understand anything, she had gone through all of the Isaiah chapters! At the end of the lesson, she said the closing prayer. She prayed to know if the Book of Mormon was true, and then prayed that we would be able to find more people to tell them the Book of Mormon was true. Anyway, the changes happening in Heidi are no small miracle, and that lesson was incredible. We plan on committing her to baptism this week with a date. I'm really excited.<br /></div>
On Thursday, we had some more exciting lessons. We had a lesson with Bill and Judy. They are an older couple who went to temple square and requested a missionary visit because they wanted to learn more. I can't remember if I've talked about them before, but they just want to learn more about the church. They have no intent of changing.... at least Bill doesn't. Judy seems to have a pretty solid testimony already and she likes the Book of Mormon. Anyway, when we first met with Bill he said, "I don't want to become a Mormon, I just want to learn about it." So on Thursday we had a pretty bold lesson with them. We felt inspired to read 2 Nephi 29 with them and if I hadn't felt like we needed to read that, there's no way I would share that chapter with an investigator who rejects the Book of Mormon. This is the chapter that talks about how foolish it is to think that the Bible is the end of God's words to his children. It's a pretty bold chapter. Anyway, we read that chapter with them, and it really got them thinking. And then I asked Bill, "when we first met with you, you said that you didn't want to become a Mormon. But if you found out it was true, why wouldn't you?" He said, "Wow! You got me there.... I guess it would be my own stubbornness" That question got him thinking, and then Elder Wallace bore a really sincere and solid testimony. It was awesome. We committed them to read the B.o.M. everyday and pray about it, so I hope that works out. We have a good feeling about them.<br /></div>
Thursday evening, we also had a lesson with Brenda in the Paullus's home. We watched the John Tanner story, and encouraged her to drop the crutches like him. (I'm not sure if you've seen that video, but it's a good one) She hasn't completely given up smoking, but she is making good progress. She still needs all the prayers she can get. She didn't come to church this Sunday, and I'm not sure why, but hopefully we can get her next Sunday.<br /></div>
On Friday night, BYU (they came for the NCAA XC nationals) cross country team put on a fireside. It was killing me!! They were talking about racing analogies and all of these things and it gave me the pre-race jitters.... it was weird. But it was really cool! Then afterwards I talked to Jared Ward and Tommy Gruenwalde (aka Elder Gruenwalde back home) and that was cool. Tommy Gruenwalde said he remembered "Bishop Hill" and he said to tell you hi. It was cool to see so many of my role models.<br /></div>
Saturday, we volunteered at the cross country meet. IT WAS SO COLD! Indiana cold is crazy, it feels like it just smacks you in the face. I saw Coach Buhrley there. That made my whole day to see him there! He gave me a hug from him, one from Rob, and one from Mom, so that was cool. I told him we'd take a picture after the race when we didn't have so many layers on and you'd be able to recognize who we were, but unfortunately I didn't catch him afterwards. Oh well, I was just happy to see him.<br /></div>
Before the race, we were able to go into BYU's tent and hang out with the runners and Coach Eyestone before the race. That was so cool! I hope Cody's reading this, because he'll be jealous. :) The only thing that kinda stunk about being at the meet was that none of the other missionaries were runners, so they weren't as excited about the whole thing as I was. They thought I was crazy I'm pretty sure. Haha<br /></div>
Yesterday was an interesting day. We went to the family who we helped move stuff out of their basement and were super nice to us. ( I think I talked about them before.) Yesterday, we decided to ask David, the husband, if we could share things about what we believe. It was like he changed who he was. As soon as I asked the question, my heart sunk and I could tell that was a bad idea. He proceeded to tell us why our religion is wrong for the next hour. We kept trying to leave, but we couldn't. He didn't even really let us talk. He told us how he doesn't understand how we are elders when we are only 18 and 19 and that there's no way we understand what we are teaching people. After he was done, Elder Wallace and I bore sincere testimony to him, said a prayer with him, and left. It was crazy.... But it was a testimony builder to me, because the whole time he was talking to us, I just felt awful. The Spirit was not there at all. But when we bore our testimonies, and I said a prayer, I could feel the Spirit again. After that experience we went to a fireside here in Brazil where we wrote Christmas cards to some of the less-active families in this area and some of our investigators. It was crazy to see the contrast. I could feel the Spirit again and I felt so happy at the fireside! I <b>know</b> the church is true and that Joseph Smith really was a prophet. I thought I had a testimony of that before I came out here, but these last 4 1/2 months that testimony has grown incredibly. It doesn't matter how many people tell me I'm wrong. In the words of Joseph Smith himself, "I knew it, and I knew God knew it, and I could not deny it."<br /></div>
I hope everyone has a great week! Don't forget to count your many blessings this thanksgiving season. We all have so many!<br /></div>
I love you all!<br /></div>
<span style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px;">-Elder Tom Hill</span>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06841325549295845334noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1232230464152563755.post-14638385128652356602013-11-04T21:04:00.000-08:002013-11-04T21:04:11.989-08:00Brazil!<br />
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Hello Everyone!<br /></div>
Sorry if this email is short, in advance, but this has been a really stressful day so far! Our washing machine still isn't fixed, we had to do a lot of things to prepare for this week, and to add on that Brazil library's computers aren't working. (No surprise there... that library is ridiculous.)<br /></div>
Anyway, enough of my rant. This week has been really good! Just busy with different things. On Tuesday, we had exchanges on Indiana University campus in Bloomington with the Zone Leaders. It was right when I needed it and it really helped me out. Serving on campus is really fun, and I hope I can serve in a campus area sometime on my mission.<br /></div>
This week we had a couple of lessons with Brenda. She's doing really well! We're teaching her the Word of Wisdom on Tuesday. I'm really nervous about that, but I have faith it will work out. We're teaching that lesson in the Paullus's home, and Sister Paullus quit smoking when she joined, so that will help. Speaking of Brenda, she made us a pie. We ate a little bit of it, but she made it in her house and we could seriously taste cigarette smoke in the pie....that's how much she smokes! But it was a nice thought of hers. Also I finally got a camera, so that's nice. I bought the exact one I had before, so I'll try to send home more pictures.<br /></div>
Thursday (Halloween) it rained so much! (that explains the other picture where I have an umbrella with Elder Wallace.) We got SOAKED! We decided to be men about it and still go tracting in it. We were blessed for our efforts and were able to teach two lessons and find some solid people.<br /></div>
On Sunday, Brenda and her grandson, Frank Jr., came to church again. She had a pretty good experience! She's really loving the people at church. We had another investigator that almost came, named Tim. Our Assistant Ward Mission Leader, Brother Allen, went to pick him up. Right when they were about to leave, one of Tim's friends pulled up and told him one of their friends got really drunk the night before and had committed suicide. Talk about really bad timing..... So he wasn't able to go to church. Hopefully we can meet with him and help him pull through, sounds like it will be really hard for him.<br /></div>
We have met some really funny people out here. There's never a dull moment in Brazil. Elder Wallace and I have a lot of laughs. I really do love this area and I love the work. It's really beginning to pick up!<br /></div>
Have a great week! I wish I could be more detailed!<br /></div>
Love all of you!</div>
-Elder Hill</div>
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Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06841325549295845334noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1232230464152563755.post-88994423539592126352013-10-30T10:21:00.001-07:002013-10-30T10:21:42.307-07:00From Brazil<br />
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Hello from the beautiful metropolis of Brazil!<br /></div>
This has quite possibly been the best week I've had so far in Brazil! It was exhausting and busy, but that's why it was so good! We taught the most lessons we have this week and we've seen a lot of our investigators begin to progress!<br /></div>
Brenda has been doing great! I can't remember if I've talked about her before, but she's our investigator with a baptismal date. She came to church yesterday with two of her grandsons! We're teaching her son's family too who lives next door, but the parents haven't seemed really excited to come to church or keep any commitments, but their kids wanted to come. I heard from the sister missionaries that Brenda even stood up in Relief Society and bore her testimony. Woohoo! We're shooting to have her baptized in the middle of December, but depending on how the next few lessons go we could move it up. Next week, we're going to teach the Word of Wisdom and help her stop smoking. If any of you have experiences from your mission that helped people stop smoking, I'd love to hear them, because I haven't done this yet as a missionary.<br /></div>
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Elder Wallace and I have been getting along really well here. We have a lot of laughs and a lot of fun, while still working hard, so that's nice. One of our best laughs this week happened on Friday. The Sisters in Terre Haute found a headquarters referral hidden in their area book and texted it to us on Thursday night, so Friday morning we decided to go visit it. We were really excited and hurried over there to talk to this referral. While we were walking down the road we saw a burned down house, and I said, "Oh no..." Sure shootin', the house number, 31 south, was still visible on the house. It must have been a pretty old referral.... We had a good laugh about that one.</div>
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We had one disappointment this week with an investigator named Joey. We went to teach him on Thursday and he didn't answer the door. We visited him again on Saturday and he came and talked to us. He says he's not sure if he still wants to meet with us because the church he goes to told him that the Mormons take him away from the truth and all sorts of things. To add to that, they told him to rip up the Book of Mormon they gave him because they said it was a bad book. This church gives us a lot of grief because they are very anti. Another one of our investigators goes to that church and she has heard all sorts of weird rumors about us. It's kind of crazy to me that we would get so much opposition from some people when we're two guys that aren't even 20! Anyway he said he'd pray about it and let us know if he still wants to meet with us, so I hope it all works out.<br /></div>
The members here are very supportive like I said before. Our washing machine broke down on Monday, and we were told it would be fixed pretty quickly, but it still hasn't. Brother Spencer let us come and do our wash, so that sure helped. To add to that, he gave me a cake, card, and a box of pop-tarts. He's a super cool guy! The members here are the best, and they're all very close to each other and the missionaries. There's not a lot of members here in Brazil and the surrounding areas, and all of them except one are converts, so they love missionaries.<br /></div>
My birthday was great. Thank you so much to everyone for the things that were sent this week. I couldn't do this without all of the support back home.<br /></div>
Well it's been a great week and I hope it's been a good week for everyone back home! Love you all! :)<br /></div>
Love,<br /></div>
Elder Tom Hill<br /></div>
<span style="font-family: Helvetica;">P.S. I added some of you to my weekly email group because I thought some of you might want to get this each week. If you don't, just let me know. Adios!</span>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06841325549295845334noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1232230464152563755.post-3182839456476373022013-10-22T20:22:00.003-07:002013-10-22T20:22:56.840-07:00Hello from Brazil<span style="font-family: Helvetica;">Greetings Earthlings!</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">I say that because this week one of our investigators told us that she</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">had heard Mormons believe that we were aliens before we came to Earth!</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">I hear some crazy stuff out here! Anyway, hello family! :) This has</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">been an awesome week here. We got lots of work done and we had some</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">great experiences!</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">Tuesday night I got a call from my pops (Elder Ernest) and he told me</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">Ben was going to be baptized on the 26th and so that was awesome! And</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">then Saturday morning he called again and said he decided to move it</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">up a week! So we had a late night expedition to Avon to see Ben get</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">baptized!! Elder Ernest baptized him and it was easily the best</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">experience of my mission. The last lesson I had with Ben, I bore my</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">testimony and also sang hymn 136, I Know That My Redeemer Lives. When</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">Elder Ernest left Avon two weeks ago, he did the same thing but sang</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">Lord, I Would Follow Thee. Those were the two songs Ben chose for the</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">service. It was a great night and it was so cool to be a part of that!</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">When I was in Avon, Ben told Elder Ernest and I that he would keep in</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">touch with us, and I hope that's true.</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">This week we had quite a few lessons. We meet the most interesting</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">characters in Brazil. It always keeps us entertained. We taught two</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">guys yesterday that kept saying I looked like Eli Manning and Elder</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">Wallace had nice eyes. I would rather be Peyton Manning, but that</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">works too I guess. There's actually some potential with those guys</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">though, they were saying that we were different than what they had</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">heard about Mormon missionaries. And that's a good thing, because they</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">hadn't heard too good of things about us. They were excited when we</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">gave them each a Book of Mormon to read. We're meeting with them again</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">on Tuesday, so hopefully that works out.</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">Brenda, our investigator with a baptismal date of December 21st, has</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">been doing pretty well. We are starting to meet with her twice a week</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">now and she's already started to make changes in her life to prepare</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">for baptism. She didn't come to church on Sunday, but we will talk to</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">her tonight and see what kept her from coming.</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">One really cool experience this week that I know lots of people back</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">home will be jealous of is, is that I volunteered at the NCAA Cross</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">Country Pre-National meet. It would've been cooler if I was with my</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">running buddies, because the other elders didn't see the big</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">excitement was about a bunch of people running, but I still had fun!</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">We saw Utah State there, but they only had their top-7 with them. I</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">looked for people I knew, like Austin Costley, but he must not be in</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">their top-7 or wasn't able to make it or something.</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">After the Cross Country meet, we went to a pig roast that our Bishop</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">has every year. He's a judge in town and he seriously knows just about</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">everyone who lives in Terre Haute. So there were a lot of people</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">there, and it was a good experience. Our Bishop is an awesome guy</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">along with the other members. They're very supportive of us and I hope</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">I don't leave here anytime soon, because I'm starting to get attached</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">to them.</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">It's been a great week here. Thanks for the support! I love all of you</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">and I'm grateful for all you do for me! I hope you have a great week!</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">Love,</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">Elder Tom Hill</span><br />
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Elder Hill, Ben, and Elder Ernest</div>
Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06841325549295845334noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1232230464152563755.post-8540083541426129102013-10-10T05:46:00.000-07:002013-10-10T05:46:59.274-07:00Conference and Transfers<span style="font-family: Helvetica;">Hello family!</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">This has been an awesome week! Conference was the perfect way to end</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">it! Maybe it's just because I'm a missionary, but I think it was the</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">best conference I've ever heard. Anyway, I'll talk about that more in</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">a bit!</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">I'll start with the biggest news! We got transfer calls last night and</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">I am staying here in Brazil. That made me happy because I feel like</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">there is a lot of work I can do here, and I'm excited to see it</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">progress. (It also made me happy because NCAA Cross Country Nationals</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">and Pre-Nationals are in East Terre Haute in November and December and</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">our Bishop said he could get us in to volunteer there. Awesome,</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">right??) Elder Easter is leaving and both of us are training new</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">missionaries. So on Wednesday we will go to transfer meetings and I</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">will meet my first born in the wilderness. I'm excited to train, but</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">also nervous. It's a lot of responsibility, but I know the Lord will</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">help me out!</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">Conference was incredible! I feel like Saturday's sessions were</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">focused on missionary work! I loved Elder Perry's talk about members</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">being key to the work. Something we've been trying to do with members</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">is to help them create their own family mission plans with specific</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">goals of people they will talk to, numbers of people they want to</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">invite to church and activities, and gospel discussions they will have</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">with coworkers, friends and family. I'd invite you to do the same</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">thing! If there is a plan, we can accomplish so much more than if we</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">just go into something blindly. This is especially true with</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">missionary work! President Monson announced that there are 15 million</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">members in the world now and 80,000 missionaries. I want to change</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">that a little bit. There are 15 million missionaries in the world now</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">and 80,000 of us are focusing on it 24/7. That changes perspective a</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">little bit. Imagine how much missionary work could be done with 15</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">million people all trying to share the gospel! Pretty incredible.</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">Just like any week there were some set backs and frustrations. We</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">invited three people to come watch General Conference with us, and</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">they were all pretty excited to come, but none of them came and didn't</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">answer our calls when we tried to call them. It was a little</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">frustrating, but that's just a minor setback. The work is starting to</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">get rolling here in this area, and good things will start happening</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">these next few months.</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">I hope everything's going well back home! I've heard some people tell</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">me things about conference already, but I'd love to hear everyone's</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">insights. I know the men and women that addressed were inspired and</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">that those messages can greatly bless our lives and the whole world. I</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">know President Monson's our prophet upon the earth today, and that the</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">other apostles really are the Lord's apostles and are guided and</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">inspired by Him.</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">I love you all, and I hope you have a great week! Being a missionary</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">rocks! (<--- exclamation point!) :)</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">Love,</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">Elder Tom Hill</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Helvetica;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Helvetica;"><br /></span>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06841325549295845334noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1232230464152563755.post-44327227876693008692013-10-01T22:54:00.001-07:002013-10-01T22:54:22.808-07:00Brazil <br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">This has been a pretty good week here in Brazil. It was definitely</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">better than last week, but that wasn't really hard to beat. We got 5</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">new investigators this week, and I think the work is really starting</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">to get rolling here in Brazil.One of our new investigators is named</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">Reni and she seems really solid! We taught her about the first vision</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">and the Spirit was so strong as we were talking about it. We asked her</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">what her thoughts were on it and she said, "I could see how that could</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">really happen." It was awesome! She's so cool. She told us the reason</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">she wanted to meet with us is that she wanted to know why Mormons are</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">so happy. She was committed to come to church yesterday, but it rained</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">like crazy yesterday morning! She called us about 10 minutes before</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">church started and told us that she wouldn't be able to make it</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">because of the rain and she was worried about driving because her eyes</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">aren't very good. I couldn't blame her! My eyes are pretty good with</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">my contacts and I was kind of sketched out driving! We'll meet with</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">her again sometime this next week and I'm really excited for that,</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">because she is definitely our most solid investigator in this area.</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">Speaking of this area, I got some bad news about my last area from</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">Elder Ernest. He sent me an email today and told me Ben hasn't met</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">with them since we met with him last. He also told me the momentum</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">that started to get going in Avon has kind of died off, but hopefully</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">it will start going again. It made me sad to hear that, but he says</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">Ben is still coming to church at least, he's just not progressing past</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">that.</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">Last night we had a fireside with the members that just live</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">specifically here in Brazil. It was great. They had Elder Easter and I</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">give a message on missionary work, and it was probably the best we</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">have taught together while we've been here in Brazil. The Spirit was</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">really strong. The members here are very supportive and they are</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">excited to have missionaries again. I wouldn't be surprised if in less</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">than a year, Brazil has a branch again. The work is definitely</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">starting to hasten in this area, and the members can tell too. I just</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">hope I can stay here a little bit longer so I can see this area start</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">to have some success. I'll find out on Sunday what's happening.</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">I can't wait for conference! I think it will have a totally different</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">meaning to me now that I'm a missionary. My testimony of the</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">Restoration, prophets, the church organization, and Heavenly Father</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">have sky rocketed these last 3 months! Which reminds me, my three</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">month mark is a few days away. Crazy right? It's an eighth of the way</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">done, so it's like the first lap in a 3200m. That's kind of crazy to</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">think about.</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">Thank you all for the emails and letters. I've received a lot this</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">week! I love all of you! :) Have a great week!!</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">Love,</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">Elder Tom Hill</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" />Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06841325549295845334noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1232230464152563755.post-85762997265718937452013-09-23T08:43:00.001-07:002013-09-23T08:43:31.291-07:00From Brazil<span style="font-family: Helvetica;">Hello Family!</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">So first of all, I just have to say that I'm really grateful that I</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">can even send an email today! This library and its computers are a</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">pain in the neck, but it all worked out. We had to show them proof</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">that we actually live here by showing them mail that we've had, so we</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">sent ourselves a letter with our names on it. They almost didn't let</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">us use them because it just said Elder Easter and Elder Hill, but not</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">our first names. Anyway, just thought I'd go on a rant about it, but</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">the main point of that is that I'm really grateful that it all worked</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">out and that I'm able to email.</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">This week has been awesome! We talked to a lot of people this week. We</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">knocked so many doors, that I had to start knocking with my left hand</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">because my right knuckles were getting sore. That sounds dramatic, but</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">I'm serious! We set up a lot of lessons for this next week, so we're</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">excited to see what happens and I hope they all go through. A lot of</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">our lessons this week fell through, and two of our investigators</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">dropped us, so hopefully next week goes better in that regard.</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">We got two new investigators this week. They were headquarters</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">referrals from temple square. They had visited Salt Lake City and</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">wanted to know more about the church. They are an older couple named</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">Bill and Judy and they are really nice and interested. They say they</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">just want to learn more, and don't have any desire to change anything,</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">but we'll see what happens there.</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">A really cool experience we had happened on Saturday. We were walking</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">down a road on a way to visit somebody that afternoon. We saw a guy</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">sitting and smoking on his porch and decided to talk to him. He showed</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">no interest and told us he was Roman Catholic. We asked him if there</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">was anything we could do to help him out and he said no. But then his</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">wife came out, and she was carrying a box, so we asked her the same</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">question. Again she said no. But then she thought about it and said,</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">"one second, maybe you guys can help." She went back inside and said,</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">"sure come on downstairs." It wasn't actually their house, but it was</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">their daughter's and her husband's house. We helped them move all</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">kinds of things out of their basement for an hour. They really opened</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">up to us. When we were done, they told us we had to stay for dinner,</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">so of course we accepted. The lady we met on the porch asked us about</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">our missions and she said, "That sounds like what the Mormons do!" We</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">told her that was us, and we had some good conversations. They really</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">appreciated it, and told us they would call us when they moved into</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">their new house that they were moving into in a month. It was a great</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">experience, and I could tell we had planted some seeds there. When you</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">plant a garden, you first till up the ground, plant the seeds, water</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">the seed and take care of the plant, and then harvest the fruit. This</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">is just like missionary work! The tilling of the soil is like breaking</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">down the walls that people set up when they first start talking to you</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">because they don't know who you are. After you do that, you can plant</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">a seed by sharing something about the restored gospel with them. I</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">feel like we did a lot of those two steps this week.</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">We had another interesting experience yesterday. One of the first days</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">we were here, a guy named Tom came up to us and told us that he was</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">just starting up a Christian church on the main road, and invited us</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">to come to one of their services. We told him we would try to make it</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">on one of the Sundays. Yesterday night, we decided we would go. It was</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">quite the experience! They were just a small congregation of about</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">20-30 people. They started out by singing some hymns. They sang "Count</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">Your Many Blessings" and "I Need Thee Every Hour". That was cool since</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">we know those ones. And then they started their praying and their</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">hallelujah-ing and amens and all of that jazz. Then, people stood up</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">and started "speaking in tongues" and shouting praises to God. It may</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">sound mean to say, but my testimony of the Apostasy and the</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">Restoration of the gospel of Jesus Christ shot through the roof! Then</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">one of the preachers stood up and preached a sermon about different</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">things. It was pretty intense! I would probably classify it as more of</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">a pep talk or something like that. We think he indirectly threw some</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">jabs at us, but we're not sure. But anyway, it was quite the</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">experience! And it was good because we got to introduce ourselves and</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">meet lots of people.</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">Well everything's going great out here, I hope everything is good back</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">home. I love being a missionary, and I think I say it out loud just</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">about everyday. The experiences we have here in Brazil are something</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">else, and there's never a dull moment.</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">I love all of you!</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">Love,</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">Elder Tom Hill</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" />Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06841325549295845334noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1232230464152563755.post-15201994764782756122013-09-09T10:40:00.002-07:002013-09-09T10:40:55.146-07:00Hello from Brazil<br />
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Hello Family! (again)</div>
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This computer has a timer on it, and it says 17 minutes right now, so I'm going to type really fast, and hopefully it doesn't boot me off, but if it does, I guess you still have that first email I sent.</div>
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So this last week has been really exciting. The first couple of days this last week was filled with meeting new members, knocking doors, and trying to find people to teach. The last elders didn't leave very detailed records, so we basically had to start off fresh. We found lots of people who had a desire to learn more, and also found 2 more investigators this week!</div>
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One investigator that we met is named Kendra. She lives in a pretty big trailer park on the south side of town that we visited a few times last week. We have 1 (now 2) investigator in there and lots of potentials, so we're in there pretty often. People a lot of times are out of their trailers doing things, so there's an oppurtunity to talk to a lot of people. Kendra was out talking to her neighbor, and we went up and talked to her. She told us that she had seen us around and had wanted to talk to us and find out who we were, but she never got a chance. She agreed to meet with us a couple of days later. We came back and taught her about the Restoration and invited her to be baptized. Before Elder Easter could even finish saying it, she said yes. It was awesome. We thought she'd come to church, but she didn't make it, so something must have come up. We're meeting with her a few times this week, so we'll work out her concerns when we meet with her.</div>
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Another one of the investigators that the previous Elders were teaching is named Heidi. She is really shy and hard to read, but as we taught here she really opened up. She told us that she had felt something that she hadn't felt with the other elders, and we testified to her that that was the Spirit. She said that it sparked her curiousity and that she would read the Book of Mormon, pray, and try to find the answer to if this is true and that she should be baptized. We're really excited to see what can happen there.</div>
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I haven't been in contact with Elder Ernest or Ben, but if I have more time today, maybe I'll shoot Ben an email. I got a few questions on how the area is doing, and I have some of the same! But I imagine everything's going well, and I wouldn't be surprised if Ben is baptized either this Saturday or the next, but it's hard to say.</div>
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And one last thing, in case I don't get a chance to email just Mom. My address is 115 N. Franklin Brazil, IN 47834. There are a few things that I've been thinking that would really help to have, but I'll either include that in another email or write a letter home today if I run out of time.</div>
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There's a lot of potential here in Brazil, and I'm excited to see what miracles we see this week, because we saw plenty this last week. One that really stuck out to me, is that with all of these people with so much potential and desire to learn, we've been going through our Book of Mormons (Books of Mormon?) like crazy, and we were almost out. We're not getting more supplies in a few weeks, so we started praying and looking for more copies of the Book of Mormon. Then that day that we were praying and looking for more, a member gave us 4 copies! Always look for tender mercies! (1 Nephi 1:20)</div>
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I love all of you!</div>
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Love,</div>
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Elder Tom Hill</div>
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Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06841325549295845334noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1232230464152563755.post-20673522926986250422013-09-03T09:50:00.001-07:002013-09-03T09:50:15.346-07:00Hello from Brazil! <br />
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Hello from Brazil! I didn't think I'd be serving foreign! Just kidding..... kind of. Wednesday I found out that I would be transferred to the Honey Creek ward, which is a ward in Terre Haute. The ward covers 2 counties though, and our proselyting area is Clay County which is where we live; Brazil, Indiana. The reason I said I was just kind of kidding about serving foreign, is that Brazil is quite the place. It's a really old city, and the people are pretty poor, but it's a really cool place. There used to be a branch out here in Brazil, but it didn't end up working out, so it just became part of the Honey Creek ward. We are the second set of missionaries to be here, and before us there haven't been missionaries here in Brazil and Clay County for over 10 years! The other Honey Creek missionaries wouldn't go out that direction very often, because it's about 30 minutes out of Terre Haute, so there's a lot of work for us to do here.</div>
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My new companion's name is Elder Easter. He's been out 3 and a half months (and I've only been out 2, crazy I know!) and we got double-transferred in. Which means neither of us were in this area. So last week was a little stressful to figure out where we were, and how to get around, and who people to visit were. To add on to that, the last Elders didn't leave very good records, so we basically had to start out fresh. We're starting to figure out why it is that we got double-transferred in; we've heard and realized some interesting things about the last Elders.</div>
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Last week, we met with the Honey Creek Bishop. He is a really nice guy. He's a judge here in Terre Haute, and pretty much everyone in town knows who he is. He's very missionary minded, and he put us right to work, visiting lots of people out our direction. He invited us over to dinner on Sunday for a fish fry. There we ate fried catfish, snapping turtle, and a raw fish salad. The people out here are definitely what we like to call "true hoosiers".</div>
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I'm going to rewind a little bit. On Tuesday, before I got transferred, we had a lesson with Ben. He told us that he felt like we were pushing him to be baptized, and that he didn't feel quite ready to be baptized on the 7th of September. We had a really spiritual lesson and told him that this was all about him and if it felt like we were dragging him to be baptized on the 7th, than we were doing our job as missionaries poorly. He said he'd keep reading and praying to find answers. I'm sure he will be baptized, it's just a matter of time. At the end of the lesson, I sang "I Know That My Redeemer Lives" and bore my testimony to him for one last time. It's been really cool to teach him and to share my testimony with him, and he know he was one of the reasons I needed to serve in Avon those short 6 weeks. It was hard to leave just a few weeks before he'll be baptized, but I know I'll keep in touch with him for a long time. (The first picture is me with him. The picture was kind of taken at a weird time, so we look like we're fake smiling, but the other one was blurry, so I guess I'll go with this one. And the other picture is Elder Ernest and I with a Muslim guy we were teaching named Feroze Ohab who was really cool.)</div>
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Well things are going great out here. Change is hard, but it's also exciting. I'm excited for this new challenge, and Elder Easter and I have already seen miracles.</div>
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I love all of you!</div>
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Love,</div>
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Elder Tom Hill</div>
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P.S. I'm emailing today instead of yesterday because of Labor Day....but you probably figured that out. Just thought I'd let you know! Love you!</div>
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Elder Hill and Ben<br />
August 2013<br />
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Elder Hill, Feroze Ohab, and Elder Ernest </div>
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August 2013</div>
Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06841325549295845334noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1232230464152563755.post-47880216632557748622013-08-26T10:49:00.003-07:002013-08-26T10:49:57.833-07:00Transfer Call!<br />
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I'll start with the biggest news, which we got from transfer calls last night. I am leaving Avon. It's pretty crazy, and it was the last thing that Elder Ernest or I thought would happen. It was a hard call to receive, because I figured I would serve in Avon for at least three transfers (4 and a half months), but I'm getting transferred after my first one and Elder Ernest is staying. This transfer is going to be hard, because I've really come to love the people here, even though I've only been serving here for a little over a month. I've learned to love the people we're teaching and the members with my heart wide open, and they've started to become all of my focus and prayers. I just hope and pray that I can stay at least somewhat close so that I can see Ben, and any of our other investigators, be baptized. I'm not sure where I will be going yet, but I'll let you know next Monday.</div>
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This last week was packed, so I'll try to write about some of the highlights! Tuesday and Wednesday I went on an exchange with Elder Rider who is our district. He's a super cool guy. We were way busy, and we taught tons of lessons. One of the lessons we taught was with one of our investigators named Barbara. She's an older lady that has had a lot of health problems recently with cancer. When we were teaching her I asked, "will you pray to ask if the Book of Mormon is true, and if Joseph Smith was a prophet?" She said that she already had. I asked her, "so... did you receive an answer?" And she said, "Well I'm still meeting with you guys, ain't I?" Elder Rider and I laughed and I said, "So you know it's true?" And she just smiled and nodded her head. It was a cool experience. The member we brought with us told her he would pick her up for church on Sunday, and she agreed. Unfortunately, on Saturday she sent us a text that said she didn't feel like she was quite ready to come to our church. That was pretty disappointing, but hopefully we can continue to help her learn and progress. She's always very enthusiastic about coming to church and things when we meet with her and she feels the Spirit, but when we leave she feels a lot of doubt. Keep her in your prayers, and hopefully Elder Ernest and his next companion can help her progress. She's one of the people here that I've grown to love, so I hope that she can come to church and eventually be baptized.</div>
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This week we also met with Ben twice. Both lessons were really good and the Spirit was really strong. On Friday, he said he wasn't ready to be baptized on the 31st, so we talked about it and decided on September 7th instead. He said he would go home that night and pray about it. The next morning, he sent us a text that said he had prayed about being baptized then, and he felt awesome. However, on Sunday, he sent us a long text that said he wasn't sure he'd feel ready by then and that he had felt pressure from his family. He said he wanted some more personal time to study the scriptures and decide if what we had taught him was true. We told him that I'd be leaving, so he agreed to meet with us at least one time this week. Hopefully we can resolve some of his concerns there and help him out.</div>
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One last highlight was with an investigator named Nate. We found him a couple weeks ago in a trailer park, and taught him on Saturday. It was a very spiritual lesson on the restoration, and we committed him to be baptized on October 26th! His response to the 26th was, "Why not now?" It was super cool. He does smoke and have some other things that he'll have to work through, but he said that he's been looking for the truth and he has a strong desire to learn.</div>
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Anyway, this has been a long week, but a good week. I hope my email made sense, because there was so much this week I wanted to write about! I hope everything's going well back home. Love ya!</div>
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Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06841325549295845334noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1232230464152563755.post-38165085652130461122013-08-19T17:15:00.002-07:002013-08-19T17:15:13.125-07:00Another week in Indiana<br />
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This has been a good week, and it's been perfect weather! So everything's been going great! We started up waking up a little bit earlier and going running too, because Elder Ernest wants to get in shape these last 6 months, so that's made me pretty happy too.</div>
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We had a busy week, full of lots of meetings. On Wednesday, we had a conference with the whole mission. They said general authorities would be there, and we knew Elder Holland was visiting the Indy North Stake on Sunday (I'm in Indy West), so we were hoping he would be there, but it was are area seventy who came and visited. Which was still super cool, he taught us a lot, and it was cool to see my MTC buddies there. I also ran into an Elder from West Point that's serving out here! His name is Elder Lowe, and he lives in that neighborhood just across the street where the Garvers and Johnstons live. It was pretty crazy. I don't really know him, but I recognized him from high school, so that was pretty nuts.</div>
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On Thursday, we had interviews with President Cleveland. He's a super cool guy. We were supposed to have our interviews at 330, and we ended up having them at 630....just shows how super friendly he is. The whole interview he asked about me and my family, what I liked to do, and all that stuff. It just really showed me how good of a guy he is.</div>
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This week we came in contact with four of our investigators: Lee, Barbara, Spencer, and Ben. All of our other investigators were hard to reach this week (we have 13 total now, all of our tracting and finding efforts are starting to pay off.). We invited all 4 of them church, but only Ben showed up. That was kind of disappointing, but at least he did. One of them, Lee, straight up told us that he wouldn't come, but the rest said they would. Spencer, is the guy I talked about in my first email that's been investigating for a long time. He's a super nice guy, in fact he's going to give me a water bottle holder and tail light for my bike, but he's still not sure he wants to make that next step of being baptized. We had two really spiritual lessons with him, and we thought he'd come for sure to church, but he couldn't make it. We haven't talked to him yet since then, but hopefully we'll figure out why he couldn't come and have him come next week.</div>
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We had an awesome lesson with Ben last night. The Spirit was really strong. We taught him about some of the commandments, and he got emotional when we talked about them. Then we highlighted how by repenting and being baptized we can be washed clean from anything that's happened in our past, through the Atonement of Jesus Christ. It really meant a lot to him. He basically said that he's been looking for direction like that his whole life, and he could really see why we have those commandments and the blessings we receive from them. He hasn't decided on a date to be baptized yet, but he's still praying about it. He is excited to be baptized, and it will probably be August 31st or the week after. I'm pretty excited about it too.</div>
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Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06841325549295845334noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1232230464152563755.post-40242842053945642812013-08-12T18:48:00.001-07:002013-08-12T18:48:52.764-07:00Hello from Indiana<br />
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Hello Family! It's been a pretty eventful week out here, and I'll try to tell you some of the highlights! The first one, that has to do with the picture is that I went on exchanges on Thursday with Elder Ratu! (Also, check out my super nice haircut. Elder Ernest and I cut each other's hair, and it turned out....okay haha) Yeah, the one from Fiji! It was sweet! His companion is a district leader as well, and they both had to go on a meeting, so I went on exchanges in his area. I'll tell Paul more about it in my email to him, but he's an awesome guy.</div>
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On Friday night, Elder Ernest and I went on exchanges with the Zone Leaders again and we blitzed our area. Elder Petersen and I, had a lesson with Ben, who is our investigator with a baptismal date. It was a really good lesson, and he's loving all of it. He came to a baptismal service with us on Saturday and came to church on Sunday! We were a little worried about church, because Gospel Principles kind of turned into Gospel Doctrines, and they were sharing scriptures from the Pearl of Great Price and going super deep into things, but he ended up loving all of it. He told us he came to church with little expectations, and left with so much. He also told us that he feels like Elder Ernest and I are some of his good friends and he can tell us anything, and that meant a lot. A tricky thing with him (there never ends up being a perfect situation...) is that he actually lives outside of our ward boundaries, but is friends with a family in our ward. So we're currently working on getting that all worked out.</div>
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On Saturday, I got kind of sick in the morning, and we didn't leave the apartment until like 3. And then for dinner we went to a Sri Lankan family in our ward and they fed us true Sri Lankan food. It was pretty good, but it was definitely a tender mercy that I was able to eat all of it and not get super sick. They just kept piling food on my plate, and I still wasn't 100 percent yet, so it was definitely a little miracle.</div>
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Another cool family we've been teaching is a couple named Steve and Jill. He's a Seventh-Day Adventist minister who goes to the Middle East and converts Muslims to Christianity. He's interested in learning, but he definitely knows his bible. We took our Bishop with us yesterday because some of his questions were super deep. It's been interesting to teach him, and it's definitely stretched Elder Ernest and I to study and teach him.</div>
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Anyway, everything's going great. Everyone do your member missionary work! Because the work can't be done without the members. Love all of you!</div>
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IMPORTANT: Tom said that his email inbox is swamped with emails. He is really happy and grateful for all the messages, but he requests that rather than email that you write him letters so that he can write you back individually. Please don't be offended if he doesn't reply to your emails. </div>
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Elder Hill and Elder Ratu, whom I knew in Fiji. His family was in my fourth area on my mission! Two great missionaries!</div>
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<span style="color: #666666; font-family: Helvetica;"></span>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06841325549295845334noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1232230464152563755.post-66932089880884031552013-08-05T21:07:00.000-07:002013-08-05T21:07:22.912-07:00New email from Elder Hill<br />
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Hello!</div>
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Anyways, this has been a pretty good week. We didn't have as much success in finding people, but one of our investigators is progressing super well. His name is Ben, and I think I mentioned him last week. He came to church last week with some members, and we taught him the first lesson there. Since then, we've taught him the next two lessons. He loved it! He's already read some of the Book of Mormon, and yesterday he told us he loves being able to see the connections between the Book of Mormon and the Bible. And he loved 3 Nephi 11 and 2 Nephi 31, which were some of the things we invited him to read. On Monday he kind of brought up baptism on his own, and after we talked about it, we invited him to be baptized. And he said yes! He's committed to be baptized on the 31st of August, and I can't wait. I feel like I've really connected with him, and I'm excited for that day. He's 24 and he's a college student. He's majoring in Spanish, which is crazy because the family that he's friends with in the ward don't speak a lot of English, but speak Spanish. He says he didn't know why he needed to speak Spanish, but he knew there was a reason for that. Since then, he's gone on service missions to Mexico and done all sorts of other things. He's a super cool guy, and I can't wait to see him continue to progress.</div>
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On Saturday, I had an exchange with one of the other elders in our district (because Elder Ernest is the District Leader). His name is Elder Mills, and it was an.... interesting exchange..haha. He serves in the Indianapolis 3rd Ward, so I was in southern Indianapolis. Anyway I learned some good things on that exchange, and patience was probably one of those things. But I did learn lots from the exchange.</div>
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Yesterday, on Sunday, Elder Ernest and I were hoping for 5 of our investigators to show up at church, but none of them came, not even Ben. So that was kind of disappointing; all of them had things come up. At church we were able to see the members starting to get more excited about missionary work, though, so that was exciting. Once we have the members helping us out here, the work is going to pick up big time.</div>
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Well, everything's great out here. I hit my month mark on Saturday, so that's pretty crazy. I'd say I can't believe that it's already been a month, but I can...It's probably been the longest month of my life, but I've loved it. All of the missionaries say the first month is the longest and then it starts picking up. But I do love it out here, and everything's going great. Love you all!</div>
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Love,</div>
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Elder Tom Hill</div>
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Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06841325549295845334noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1232230464152563755.post-54322421484432659682013-07-29T14:15:00.002-07:002013-07-29T14:15:42.490-07:00Pictures<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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Tom and His mission parents, President and Sister Cleveland</div>
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Tom and some buddies in the MTC<br />
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Tom and his trainer, Elder Ernest. This picture was taken to show my mom that Tom is still eating his vegetables.<br />
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Elder Hill, Elder Greenhalgh, and Elder Boyle</div>
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Tom's district in the MTC</div>
Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06841325549295845334noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1232230464152563755.post-34156887117191210352013-07-29T13:46:00.002-07:002013-07-29T13:46:33.743-07:00Hello from Indiana<br />
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Hello Family,</div>
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Sorry last week that I didn't have enough time to email everyone, with it being my first P-Day, I didn't really have much time to email. We were super busy. And so my email probably didn't make much sense either, I was trying to hurry super fast.</div>
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Anyway, this week has been incredible! At the beginning of the week I went on exchanges with one of the Zone Leaders, Elder Cannon. We went onto the IUPUI campus, and that was really cool. I hope I get to serve on a campus sometime during my mission, because it's way exciting. We did a whole bunch of personal contact with people walking around on the campus. It really helped me open up and be more comfortable talking with people I'd never met. We also taught some really solid lessons to some of the college students.</div>
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The rest of this week in Avon has been really cool too. It's been filled with ups and downs, but the ups definitely beat the downs. We got 7 new investigators this week (last week we only had 4), so that was pretty huge. We met a lady on Wednesday named Eileen and her two kids who are 9 and 11. At first they weren't super open when we met them on their porch, but Elder Ernest really connected with them because they had a bearded dragon, and he had one back home. Once she opened up and we told her that we had a prophet upon the earth and a few other things, she agreed to meet with us the next day. So we went and taught her and her kids on Thursday. She told us that she'd been praying for 20 years that her husband would become religious and that they just moved into Avon so she'd been praying that they'd find a good church to go to. I've always heard of mission stories like that, but it's cool to be part of one. Her two kids agreed to be baptized. She hasn't yet, but it's because we didn't fully explain proper authority and she was already baptized baptist. But I feel like this will go really well.</div>
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Yesterday at church, a guy named Ben showed up with his girlfriend that is a member. So during sunday school and priesthood we taught him and answered some of his questions and he just kept saying: "That's so cool. That makes sense." We teach him this evening and I can't wait. It just really showed the difference between an investigator that a member finds and one that we tract into. He was super open and receptive. It was super exciting.</div>
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Well enough about mission work, I'll tell you a little about the area and my companion. Avon is beautiful. I love it here. Imagine West Point, without the mountains in the distance, and plus a lot more green, and random forests, and you've pretty much got it. There's a lot of people here, but it's a farm town that has recently had a lot of development. So, some places there's a lot of corn fields and soy bean fields, and other places just houses. We cover one ward, the Avon ward with Sisters. The ward is awesome, I can really tell I'm going to come to love the members here, especially since I'll probably be here at least 4 more months.</div>
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Elder Ernest is a great guy. I've learned a lot from him. He's a goofball (as you'll see in some of the pictures I'll send home in just a bit), but a hard worker and knows how to teach and connect with people really well. We get along well and really compliment each other.</div>
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Anyway, have a great week back home!!</div>
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Love,</div>
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Elder Hill</div>
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Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06841325549295845334noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1232230464152563755.post-37170535653165777612013-07-25T08:15:00.003-07:002013-07-25T08:15:23.784-07:00Lead Me On: A Missionary TributeThis is Elder Hill and some other really special young men who will soon be serving missions. Please listen and enjoy! Share with your friends!<br />
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<iframe allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="270" src="//www.youtube.com/embed/kS-H5n-b3a0" width="480"></iframe>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06841325549295845334noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1232230464152563755.post-72554285888085785932013-07-23T08:31:00.001-07:002013-07-23T08:31:14.764-07:00First email from Indiana<br />
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I'm in the mission field! I can barely believe it! I have so much to tell you, but I hope I can get it all down in time! We have lots to do today, so we're kind of in a rush, but I'll tell you what I can!</div>
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Tuesday morning, I woke up at 2:15 (yes in the morning, luckily there were no shower lines at that time.) to go to the travel office with Elder Wilson. We got there and were bused off to the airport to begin our adventure. I called you guys, which it was great to hear your voices, even if it was 6 in the morning and you all had groggy voices. :) And then we were off! The first faces we saw off of the airport in Indiana were the assistants, and President and Sister Cleveland. They greeted all of us with hugs (other than Sister Cleveland of course) and they were just awesome. Then we spent the night in the mission home. There was 38 of us, so it was pretty cramped, but still an awesome night. I slept like a rock. President Cleveland had a little meeting with us, and he's the man! You can definitely tell he was a basketball coach. One of the Elders described him as Clint Eastwood mixed with Mitt Romney mixed with Elder Holland. He definitely pumps you up when he talks. Anyway, I can already tell I'm not making a lot of sense in this email, but there's just so much I want to tell you! Also, Sister Cleveland's cooking is way good! But of course, not as good as yours Mom. :)</div>
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The next morning we woke up and headed straight to transfer meeting. There I met my trainer, Elder Ernest, and found out where I would be serving. I am serving in a suburb of Indianapolis called Avon. I'll talk more about the area in a minute. Elder Ernest is the man! We get along super well, and he's a goofball! But he's also super spiritual. He's taught me tons! He's a great teacher, and he's really good at talking to people and breaking the ice when we knock on doors. That's something I've really been trying to work at. Because Avon's a new area (there was a set of Sisters here before, but last transfer they added a set of Elders too), we're really in the finding mode. So we've been doing lots of door knocking and going through the former investigators. We're really trying to get the members here to help us find people to teach, because it's hard to find people that are interested. Avon's a pretty rich place so there are a lot of people that aren't really open. There are also some really poor parts, like a few trailer parks, and that's where we get the most doors opened up. So please do member missionary work back home! I've realized more while I've been out here how important the members are to missionary work!</div>
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We were able to teach a few lessons this week, and there are also some other notable events. On Friday we taught an old man named Lee. He's like 84, and he's super hard to teach. He's really nice, but he just kept on rambling on. We taught him most of the restoration, especially Joseph Smith's story, but right after we'd make a point he'd change the subject. So I didn't think much sunk in... He's a Quaker, and he's written his own books on religion and leadership and things. He's an interesting old guy. Here's one of my favorite quotes from the lesson: "You know, China's always trying to give us bad things! I had two cats that died from cat food sent from China, that the Chinese poisoned. And Betty lost 5 cats from the poisoned food!" Anyway, that kind of gives you a taste of Lee.</div>
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Saturday was an exciting day. We were out tracting and it started sprinkling a little. We knocked on a few doors, and then it started pouring. And I mean a total down pour. It's like someone had a huge bucket and just dumped it all out at once. We were completely soaked. We kept knocking on doors for a little while in it, but then realized people probably wouldn't even open their doors it was so bad. I've never seen rain like that in Utah, that's for sure. And Elder Ernest says he's never seen it that bad here either, and he's been here 17 months. We went back to the apartment and changed. Everything was wet. Luckily our scriptures and books were good, but it was pretty crazy. And we waited out the storm at the apartment.</div>
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That night, we taught Spencer, who is a guy that's been meeting with the missionaries for 7 years. He's been pretty sick lately, and he told us that it made him really think about not putting it off anymore. We invited him to be baptized, and it's looking pretty good. He didn't say yes, but he said "I'm sure you guys know this scripture, but there's something in the Book of Mormon about not procrastinating the day of your repentance...Maybe it's about time I did get baptized." It was an awesome lesson.</div>
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Anyway, I hope this email made sense. I love all of you, and I love this gospel! Stay true, and always be a missionary!</div>
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-Elder Tom Hill</div>
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Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06841325549295845334noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1232230464152563755.post-27328507756253557262013-07-16T07:42:00.001-07:002013-07-16T07:42:04.146-07:00On the way to IndianaWe got a call this morning from Elder Hill at about 6:15. He was calling us from the airport in SLC and told us he would be flying to Detroit and then on to Indianapolis. He said he was flying with 26 missionaries to Detroit and then they'd go their separate ways. Apparently this week about 970 missionaries are leaving from the MTC and entering the mission field.<br />
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Tom told us that he met lots of friends in the MTC including this guy:<br />
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I'm sure he would like lots of letters and emails. We'll post his address as soon as we know it, so that everyone can drown him with letters of support.<br />
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~PaulAnonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06841325549295845334noreply@blogger.com0