Yankton #12

Hey everyone! Crazy news this week with transfers! I will be staying in Yankton and will be joined by Elder McCrae AND Elder Hansgen! Elder McCrae is so cool and Elder Hansgen is brand new. So it'll be a party with three of us here and the work will continue to move forward! 

This week was pretty spectacular. We got to meet our friend Jay in person and it was so good! He is so funny and just real and it was so good. We gave him the book of Mormon and he was flipping through and asking us "who's nefee?" And we would explain a little bit about Nephi and he'd go "who's aloman?" And we would tell a little bit about Helaman. He was just so excited to learn all of the stories from the Book of Mormon and couldn't wait. 

Also we talked to our pastor friend Dan! He loves talking to us and learning more about our beliefs. He started pulling out Bible verses about all his beliefs and it was really good because instead of arguing with him we were able to commit him to reading the Book of Mormon with an open mind! The holy ghost is the ultimate missionary and our job is just to put him in a position to listen to it so it was so good.

On Sunday we got 6 inches of snow! It was so much overnight that they cancelled our church. But it turned out to be really cool because we were able to take the sacrament with our friend Luke! He just got baptized so we were able to show him how to bless the sacrament and its importance. 

This week my eyes have really been opened to my shortcomings. At first I was discouraged by how far I have to go, but then I realized that God will be with us every step of the way. We learn in 1 Nephi 3:7 that the Lord provides a way for every commandment that he gives us, and Ether 12:27 says, "And if men come unto me I will show unto them their weakness. I give unto men weakness that they may be humble; and my grace is sufficient for all men that humble themselves before me; for if they humble themselves before me, and have faith in me, then will I make weak things become strong unto them." And it is true! It is not a bad thing to receive correction from God, because that is how we can progress. I definitely felt the Lord showing me my weakness and he will help all of us turn weakness into strength! Have a great week

-Elder Olsen

Yankton #11

This has been a little bit of a different week but it has been rewarding!

We had A LOT of lessons fall through this week. So we had to get creative and figure out how to find and talk to people during that time. So our facebook page runs some ads and people will respond and request a bible study or something and it works really well. But we decided to message all of the people who liked our ads but didn't respond. This had been suggested to us and the other Facebook admins a couple of times, but nobody had really tried it yet and honestly I didn't think it would work out. There were also some other hang ups that I thought would make it not work at all. But we tried it and messaged about 60 people the same message just asking if they would be interested and we saw miracles! Almost immediately one guy messaged back and said that he didn't need a bible or anything, but wanted to go to church! So we got him all set up with the missionaries and it was just so cool to see. We also got around 7 or 8 other responses and were able to send all these people out to be taught by missionaries. The Lord really trusts us to be creative in helping gather Israel and he makes our efforts work! 

We also went up to Sioux falls SD for a Zone conference and had a sleepover with about 16 missionaries. We were all just sitting around talking when a guy in a mask kicked open the door holding a pistol in one hand and a rifle in the other and they were both pointed at us! He yelled a couple times asking things like what we were doing. But then he put his guns down and took the mask off and had a big smile. It turns out it was just Phil. Phil is a member who has tons of guns and likes to mess with the new missionaries sometimes. It was so funny to see everyone's reactions to what just happened. 

And then we had Zone Conference the next day! On the way we drove through a crazy snow storm with huge flakes. In October. It was so weird but beautiful. And it was so good to see all the other missionaries in zone conference and I felt that I am part of something big. I learned tons about how I can improve and be a more effective missionary. We also were able to help some people move into their new house and it was just a solid week. 

Something I've been reading about recently is the war chapters in the Book of Mormon. We can compare these chapters to our fight against satan. In Alma 49 the Nephites had prepared themselves and when the Lamanites came and attacked them they were able to gain a great victory. Thousands of the Lamanites were killed while only about 50 Nephites were injured and the rest of the Lamanites were scared away. I can imagine if I was in their situation I would want to celebrate and take it easy for a while. They had just won and the Lamanites were too scared to come against them. But that's not what they did. Alma 50:1 says that they did not stop making preparations for war. They built even stronger fortifications in every land. They even built new cities. And because they had prepared for hard times even when things were easy, they were ready when the Lamanites came against them again. We need to do the same thing in our lives. You might feel like Satan is attacking you with all his armies or it might feel like you have things pretty easy right now. But either way keep coming unto Christ and you will be so blessed and prepared for those hard times that come. And it says that this was the happiest time in their history. And the same can be true for us as we become more like Christ and stronger spiritually. Have a great week everybody

-Elder Olsen

Yankton #10

Hey everyone! Has it already been 10 weeks? Time flies on a mission. 

Our friend Luke was baptized this week!! He got an amazing opportunity to see his family, but wanted to be baptized before he left! So we had a small baptismal service and it was so cool. Luke doesn't show tons of emotion very often, but from the moment he took his mask off to be baptized until he left he was smiling ear to ear. He absolutely loved it and we were able to give him the gift of the holy Ghost and the Aaronic Priesthood as well! It was such a special experience and the spirit was definitely present.

We also delivered groceries to a boat. The people we delivered them to were definitely very high and one of them immediately started telling us about her anger problems and the time she's spent in jail and how she just wants to kill people sometimes... and just going on and on. It was quite the conversation. Apparently they had been just kind of left to live on the boat until they become fat and sober. And then they just randomly showed up when we were studying outside a couple days later! We're going to start teaching the other guy because he seems super interested! And they're sober now so that's a definite plus as well. 

I just read alma 41:7 and it says, "...they are their own judges, whether to do good or do evil." I think that is so cool. We hear about how we will be judged at the last day, but really we are judging ourselves right now. Are we doing good or evil? This judgement is constant and as we continually strive to be better, we won't need to be worried about the final judgement, because we've already been doing righteousness upon the earth. Not sure if that made sense, but I thought it was way cool! 

I hope you all have the best week ever!!

Love, 

Elder Olsen 

Yankton #9

Hey Everyone! I think I've fallen in love with South Dakota this week. Everyone here eats tons of corn and everyone says y'know all the time, and people love Jesus Christ with their whole hearts and it's all just awesome. I don't have tons of time today so I'll just give some highlights.

4 of our really loud neighbors showed up to our door asking us to baptize their two year old... We weren't sure what to do, and they were all talking at the same time and in different languages and it was just crazy, but hopefully we can keep building a relationship with them and start teaching them!

We ate amazing steaks with a pastor! He was super nice and respectful of our church and we had a good civil conversation about the differences between our religions and why we believe what we believe. We even gave him a Book of Mormon and he said he'd read from it!

We're teaching someone named Luke who was supposed to be baptized this coming Saturday, but was super stressed about everything and unsure. But we talked to him on Saturday and he told us that he has an amazing opportunity to see his family for the first time in years and is leaving saturday, and he wanted to move his baptismal date earlier so he can receive his blessings! All of his fear and stress was gone, and instead he is so excited. He was telling us about how he's been baptized into two different churches before, but this is the last time! And we were able to watch some of conference with him! It was amazing because as soon as he started watching, all of the talks seemed to be directed right to him and to his concerns. Every one of them. God works in mysterious ways and blesses us. 

I absolutely loved conference, especially Elder Anderson's and President Nelson's talks. Elder Andersen talked about how we need to have Christ at the center of our lives and President Nelson talked about letting God prevail in our lives. If we do these two things, God will give us so many blessings and we will be able to become like him one day, through Jesus Christ! If you haven't listened to conference I invite you to and if you did, I invite you to change what the spirit prompts you to in your life. I definitely felt the need to be more Christlike and more humble in my actions. God will help us to do these things. Have a great week!

-Elder Olsen