WEEK 3- "I HAD A REVELATION..."

holy cow! what a week! first off thanks to everyone for the letters on DearElder and the packages! i loved all of them! keep them coming too!:) thank you for all the prayers in my behalf...i seriously feel them and know the support from home is helping me out!

WEDNESDAY

Today was a pretty good day! We had a ton of really good teaching and spiritual experiences and the day literally zoomed past! Soeur waldron started out today with a french lesson...verbs, grammar, yada yada...kinda like school but whatevs, but then taught us the importance of the investigators praying! it was an amazing lesson! Personal study went great! i was at the temple on that tuesday and had a question about something so this week i decided that was what i was dedicaing my studies to...trying to figure out what it meant. i studied that and found some stuff out but not everything..Today, our teachers forgot to tell us, but we had TRC...teaching resource center or something? but we essentially go in and teach an FHE lesson in french to a member...i guess i wasnt paying attention to the instructions cause i didn't hear they were already members...so i taught a lesson trying to get them to convert...haha pretty funny...i'm kinda stupid i guess! we literally had 10 minutes to prepare 2-20 minute lessons...and they went pretty well, except for them actually being members... hahah i know i'm a hoot. Elder Beach said nothing both lessons so that kinda bugged me...he would get asked questions by the members..and not say anything back...whatever. i got really in depth with them and was saying things i didn't even know i knew...it was way cool! i got one of mom's packages today and that made me soooo happy!

THURSDAY

Today when we got to class, soeur waldron was waiting for us and writing in her journal. she told us that she was just writing about a prayer that was answered that morning! she told us she'd been praying about her brother, who right before her mission had fallen away from the church and her family. She said she had thought he'd been living in Texas for a few years but never knew and the night before, she texted his friend to check in on him and that that morning he had texted her back saying that he had moved back to Orem and had a good job and was now taking care of his body! she said that he struggled with major depression and had been suicidal in the past. she said that it was a major answer to prayer and that her family was so blessed to be ok. it was a good spiritual experience! She was crying really hard and you could tell of the love she had for him! Then we had personal study and i looked up more about my question, and found a scripture that not only answered my question, but had my exact question AS A VERSE IN ALMA. i was pretty stoked! Then we taught Carmelle, our investigator, without notes! she told us she's been praying and reading and thinking she might get baptized! it was a good lesson! i got another package today from mom! it was good!

FRIDAY

Another good day! we have service on fridays and usually have to work til 845 but we got a new guy this week and only worked til 830! and we didn't have class til 915 so we got to take a nap! it was awesome! since i found my answer to my question, today during personal study i just wrote mom a note...i think i needed a break right;) haha then we had lunch and soeur waldron wanted to do interviews. so i expressed to her my dilemma with Elder Beach and how during lessons he doesn't necessarily help plan them and what not and she told me she'd noticed that and that she wanted to talk to him and make sure he is doing all right. But then after she left Brother pehrson came and today we taught our second investigator...which is him...named Francois. The lesson was on the restoration and Joseph Smith and it went well cause Elder Beach actually talked! and he said stuff! and helped out while we were there! we asked him to pray to close the meeting, francois, and he said not this time...thats ok though! then we set up a time for another meeting and went back to class. it was good.

SATURDAY

Today went by really fast but seemed like it was so long! we started out teaching a lesson to Carmelle, and it went good. we just emphasized the importance of baptism and what not. then after she sat us down and asked how our companionship was going. this was as soeur waldron btw...and asked what we were doing to be a good companionship. she said she could sense that there didn't seem to be a unity between me and Elder Beach so we talked about that and i think that may have helped! after that i wrote her a note saying thank you and stuck it in her bag. i'm glad that i have her as a teacher cause she really seems to care about all of us, as every teacher should right?;) then frere pehrson told us he got a complaint from the building saying that our zone was always off task...which is kinda true but not all the time...i mean we're 18-20 year old kids...what do they expect;) but we got a lesson on diligence which really helped us out a lot! Then we had planning and study sessions. i got a letter from Henry Gardner today! it was really nice!

SUNDAY

Today was my first fast sunday here! i thought it was going to be hard and long, but surprisingly, 4:30 came around really fast! i fasted for a few different things, but i want to say thank you to everyone who included me, my district, my mission, and even my ring in your fast! sadly i still haven't found the ring, but i am thankful for everything everyone is doing in my behalf! i had district meetings all morning where my branch president had found out about my struggles with Elder Beach and he had my favorite counselor in his presidency talk to me about it! he told me that he was going to talk to Elder Beach and find out if everything was ok. We had mission conference today and had a ton of speakers! so many topics, but my favorite were on temples, courage and faith! it was really good! then we had sacrament and it was just fast and testimony meeting! i bore my testimony, IN FRENCH! it was one of the coolest experiences ever and i felt the spirit calming me and helping me speak. such an amazing experience. then we walked to the temple and it was like 300 degrees outside that's where we took the picture! it was red sunday so we looked like a family taking family pics...:) then we came back and watched mormon messages and wrote in our journals. tonights devotional was really good cause the speaker had people from the audience that were converts come up and talk about their conversion stories! it was really good. then they played legacy as a film tonight so we went to that! i remember watching that like every sunday when we were little so it reminded me a lot of home!

MONDAY

today was uneventful and boring, but good none the less! today we started class by telling everyone why we came on a mission and what lead us to choose. i may or may not have been in tears, it was very spiritual! i loved it though! while the sisters were teaching i decided to read about the saviors resurrection and the turmoil in the americas in 3rd nephi...i learned a lot! Later in the day we had another meeting with Francois and we taught him about the livre de mormon and les prophetes. he told us that one question he'd been asking god about was helping him with his sons. so we told him about families too and how they are central to god's plan and how we can be together forever and we really got him intrigued! at the end of the lesson we asked if he'd come to church avec nous ci dimanche et il dit peut-être! go translate that! (with us this Sunday and he said maybe!) it made us happy hint hint! then we learned about passe imparfait in french which is some sort of language thing that almost makes no sense so pray i get it and understand it! haha i got 6 DearElders today! 2 from mom, 2 from macy, 1 from dad, and one from grandma and grandpa Jolley! love you all!

TUESDAY

today was just another pday! funny thing though...for some reason, i was in the temple session and had this revelation that i'm gonna come home from my mission and dad's gonna have white hair like in the movie! haha i can't wait to come home from and come down the escalator and see his big white head! idk why i thought of it, but i just kept chuckling as i thought of that today!

 

Merci beaucoup pour les prières vous êtes offrir moi! J'ai ressentu et je suis tres bonheur pour vous! Je sais que l'eglise et vrai et Jésus-Christ et mon sauveur et redempteur. Je vous aime! Jusqu'a semaine prochain! (Thank you so much for the prayers you offer me! I am very grateful for you! I know the church is true and Jesus Christ is my Savior and Redeemer. I love you! Until next week!)

 

Elder Libby

WEEK 2- "I'VE BEEN TAUGHT WELL FROM A MOTHER WHO CARES FOR ME"

They have a saying here that says "the days seem like weeks, and the weeks seem like days." And they are not kidding! I cannot believe it's been another week already! Lots happened this week and i can't wait to tell you all of them!

WEDNESDAY

So today went pretty good..we had a meeting at 8:30 with Carmelle, our investigator. we had a little small talk with her....btw she has a cat...named shat...funniest thing of my life. anyway we told her we were going to paris and she got all excited cause that's where she's from and she told us where to visit and then we taught her on the POS and she was way interested and said she'd like to learn more about the resurrection so that was a big highlight! we then asked her if she'd been praying and she said every now and then and so we asked if she felt like she could be baptized and she said if she gets an answer that she would! made me so happy! anyway that was the highlight of today...we just watched mormon messages as a district the rest of the day.

THURSDAY

Today was pretty crappy cause we had another meeting with Carmelle and we were talking about the POS again and we were legit only 10 minutes into the lesson and she asked us to stop and come back tomorrow....so we didn't even get to ask her to pray or see if she still wanted to be baptized or anything! it was awful. i never want that feeling again. anyway i was way mad the rest of the day and when i was walking down the hall one of the other teachers that i've come to know really well noticed i was mad and asked what was wrong and i went into a room with him to talk and just broke down bawling....i never want to experience that again cause it made me feel like i failed and i just hated every second of it! but i stopped crying and he just let me talk for like 25 minutes or so and then i went back to class with Frere Pehrson. the very first thing he did was show us a video, from Carmelle, who informed us that she is already a member of the Church, served in the Lyon, France mission, and is now our second teacher! which made me happy cause i knew she understood how i felt and knew she'd be ok starting fresh.

FRIDAY

We woke up and had service again today. Same as last week. We had to clean someone else's residence halls and yada yada yada...but then it was study and prep time til lunch. when we got back Carmelle, or now Soeur Waldron, was waiting to teach us! she is like the happiest person i know and i am way glad she's our teacher! found out she served in Lyon, she is actually from k-town, mom you probably know her parents?, and she's never learned french except from her mission, so there is hope for me! we also had a sub for frere pehrson tonight and he gave us an update on the world and big brother! btw dad...haven't been getting those..who's winning?! but it was a good day! I think i got the packages this day so thank you for those!:) i love packages! hint hint

SATURDAY

Today was kinda another hard day at the MTC...there's been a cold going around, aka the black plague, and sadly i fell victim this morning...i woke up and had a sore throat and cough that killed! but i've been taught well from a mother who cares for me and i knew to down some airbourne:) i need more by the way! I kinda just felt like a prisoner all day haha i've come to realize that the MTC must be a lot like spirit prison...cause all you do all day is sit in the classroom learning a language or studying..which isn't bad, but when there are 3 days a week of 11 1/2 hours of class time, you kinda go insane. and then everyone started getting mad at everyone so we all were arguing all day but whatever! But today i did find out that a girl in my district had a grandma in the mental unit at one of the places i had my CNA rotations! not the DAVIS that's my brother's name! one but another one;) she passed away in april and we got to talk about her for a while!

SUNDAY

even though i can't take a sunday nap on sundays here...i love sunday's! besides Pday it's kind of like a break from everything which makes everything so inspiring. But i did have another catastrophe today...i left my ring on a hook in the shower and when i went back to get it, it was GONE!:( so i guess there was a kid that was looking to see who's it was and i still haven't found him...if someone wants to send me a new one though, i wouldn't be mad;) jkjk don't spoil me. hopefully it shows up soon! i've said lots of prayers in my rings behalf so lets hope so;) the talks in sacrament meeting today were on the atonement, and lets say that i may or may not have been crying the whole meeting. we had a piano interlude of "Tell me the stories of Jesus" that didn't make things any better...but it was the most spiritual sacrament meeting i've ever attended. my branch presidency are the coolest men i have ever met! the one over our district just returned from being the Sweden Stockholm mission president...and yes he knows Erin Swenson and Candace Richins! so if you see president richins at church, tell him he says hello for me! his name is Brother Newell and he is such an amazing man! i love him to death!

MONDAY

Today was the longest day ever! ahhh it dragged on forever and just when you thought it was bedtime, it was 2:45 in the afternoon....wow...haha Soeur Waldron came in and taught us a really good lesson on how to begin teaching at investigators homes. it went well and then we had to teach her again, as Carmelle. it went way well and she agreed to be BAPTIZED! it was an amazing feeling! and even though it took 6 lessons instead of 1 we got her to agree! which was so amazing! the rest of the day was a lesson day with frere pehrson and he taught us about how study habits can reveal the mysteries of god..and it was way amazing! then the rest of the night was a night where we just all got together as a zone and sat in the hallway and talked...haha so even though it was such a slow day, it was a lot of fun!

TUESDAY

we decided as a district to go to the 7 AM session and we surprisingly made it! it was amazing. i love the temple and the simpleness and stress-free zone that it provides me. i can't wait to see if the paris temple will be built while i'm there! we then just did laundry and took a nap so it's been an awesome day!

Well i am so thankful for all of you! you mean the world to me! i love letters, dearelders, and packages;) i love being in on the loop! so don't keep me out! i am so thankful for you all! please keep in touch and i'll do the same! much love and til next week:) Je sais que l'Eglise est vrai et la benedictions vraiment aidons-nous(?). Je t'aime mes amis! au revoir! (I know the Church is true and blessings really help us (?). I love you my friends! Goodbye! ... google translate hahaha)

Elder Libby

WEEK 1- HAVE YOU EVER GIVEN A STOOL SAMPLE? AND OTHER MISSION MOMENTS.

Hello all the bodies!

 

Wow. What a week it has been. I am so tired but so excited that I'm finally here. This week has been crazy so here we go! Week one has been the fastest and the slowest week of my life. Like I can't believe it's already done, but how is it only Tuesday? On Wednesday right when I got away from all of the emotional people, cause I wasn't one, I immediately stopped crying and they legit sent us straight to work. It was just one thing after another and I legit did not know what was going on. I got my name tag and room key and went to put my stuff in my room and then off to class. Like legit no time at all for anything...haha just one thing after another. but it was definitely good! We had class and meetings and met our zone leaders and teachers and by then it was already time for bed. It's crazy how long the days feel but how fast they go by. We woke up on Thursday at the crack of 6:30...holy cow...getting up sucks...we had a class very first on how to not judge people, which was alright but i didn't really understand the point of it cause he literally jumped around on everything and we watched some videos and he talked way fast and kept turning off the lights but i guess it was good. anyway, we had a 4 hour class for french that day! holy crap! that was a long day..but it was way good cause i actually really look forward to french cause i like learning it. it is really coming along too! maybe i'll bear my testimony at the end?;) but we met our first investigator on thursday and learned about her and then found out that we had to teach her on Friday....in french... so that was good. anyway that night we had a 3 hour meeting with our Branch Presidency and then single interviews...I guess i should've dumbed down just a little bit because guess what that interview did? Made this kid the District Leader of District 46C! Which isn't bad cause that's just a fancy name for the person that gets the sacred privilege of picking up the mail and then attending extra meetings on Sundays... haha on friday morning we had a service project which was just us cleaning another districts dorm...not too fun but not too bad. Today we taught our first lesson to Carmelle, our investigator, and it went alright but we told her notre objecif comme missionaires (our goal as missionaries). Inviter les gens a venir au Christ en les aident a recevoir l'evangile retabli par la foi en Jesus-Christ et en son expiation par le repentir, par le bapteme, par la reception du don du Saint-Espirit, et par la perseverance jusqu'a la fin. go translate it. (Invite people to come unto Christ by helping to receive the restored gospel through faith in Jesus Christ and his atonement, repentance, baptism, the reception of the gift of the Holy Spirit, and perseverance until the end) and when we told her that she asked what expiation is...which is the atonement. i about died. it legit took me 10 minutes how to figure out how to say can we teach you about that later...and that might just be my favorite saying now...haha my french has gotten a lot better since but it's still not perfect. i can pray in french, i can ask where the bread is, and i can sing a few hymns, and that's about all i need to survive right? that was the first night we got mail, and i just happened to find some doughnuts for me;) Saturday started out with another meeting with Carmelle, which went sooooo good. we taught her about prayer. we asked if she had problems in her life that she would like god to help her with and she told us she didn't want to bother god cause he didn't want to hear her problems but that she was looking for a job cause she just moved here from Paris 3 days earlier. we got her to pray but she forgot to ask her help finding a job so we challenged her to pray for that. Saturday I memorized notre objectif comme missionaires! all of it! I was pretty happy about that. then we had gym and one of the childers in my group, elder wells, self proclaimed himself as my personal trainer. so i've been getting some good workouts in and may not come home as fat cause he's going to Paris too! Sunday was just like any other sunday... we woke up and went to meetings all day...i had 3 extra meetings cause im district leader but it went good. Sacrament meeting went good. Here at the MTC, each missionary has to have a talk prepared, in French, every Sunday, cause they randomly pick speakers. Luckily it wasn't me this week! but after sacrament meeting we went for a walk to the temple, and i'm probably not supposed to say this, but i really don't think the Provo temple is all that pretty, and the whole way up i was kinda like,,,ehhh but i kid you not. when we were up there just silently walking around and taking pictures with everyone, the spirit of the Lord was so strong and i've never realized the true beauty of a temple. not once while we were up there was the temple ugly to me. it was a good time to feel the spirit and i am so glad i got to experience that. we then headed back to have a devotional and film which were way good. First off for Monday, HAPPY ANNIVERSARY MOM AND DAD!! 25 YEARS!!! ok now onto the important stuff;) jkjkjkjk i woke up and as a district we've decided that the last one on the floor after the alarm clock goes off has to pray so that's pretty good i guess! We then had another lesson with Carmelle about the book of mormon and she agreed to read it! we realized that every other companionship had asked if she'd be baptized exept for us so we decided to ask her and she said not yet...but we had her pray again and she prayed that we'd have confidence as missionaries, that we'd learn our french, (not sure if that's a compliment or an insult) and then that if God was real that he might help her to find a job. The spirit was amazing and i'm so glad she's praying. we then had class and brother pehrson had asked me to pretend to be Carmelle, (not sure if that's a compliment or an insult) and that he was going to answer some of the questions she'd asked us. i never have felt the spirit so strong as when i did when he was teaching me. it was quite an amazing experience that i won't soon forget. then today....wow...today has been interesting to say the least. first off, which is not bad at all, i actually am so glad i got to go!, we went to a temple session. then we got a nap, HOLLA, then laundry and ***********SPOILER: ANYONE WITH A SENSITIVE STOMACH SHOULD NOT READ TIL THE STARS :) we got a note from the MTC presidency on like friday or so saying that all those serving in the Paris mission had a mandatory visa meeting to attend today at 1. those at the MTC who have experienced this before call it the Happy Tuesday. well we heard that it was for the Belgian visa and that we needed to get our blood drawn to see if we had parasites and worms in our system...which was true we had to give blood, but also a stool sample. yup i have officially donated a stool sample in my lifetime now! pretty much the most disgusting thing ever... but it's over and done. and i'm glad!**************

K well that's all for this week! thank you everyone for the letters and emails! i'm trying to write to everyone but an hour goes so fast here!!! Je t'aime et je sais que l'Eglise est vrai. A semain prochain! (I love you and I know that the Church is true. Until next week!)

Elder Libby :)

LAST WEEKEND HOME

SUNDAY- Tanner's farewell. Thanks to everyone who came to support! He loves you all!

MONDAY- (Last) Family Stay-cation. We decided to do a quick overnight camping trip. Like, really quick. All for the memories, right? No pictures though :(

TUESDAY- Had a yummy lunch, hit a movie, took some pictures and said goodbyes. Thanks to everyone who stopped by one last time! He sold the Honda to help pay for his mission so we had to snag a few pictures because it was both of ours first car. Tanner was set apart as Elder Libby at 9 PM with a really neat blessing given by President Richins.

 

 

 

WEDNESDAY- We woke up early and made one last stop at Fiiz and then headed to Provo! He chose to have his Last Supper at Cafe Rio and then we walked around and took lots of pictures to kill time. There were a lot of mixed emotions, but Tanner kept us laughing all morning. Definitely more laughs than tears :) The drop-off was rough, but he was smiling the whole time. We love Elder Libby!