Hitting the Ground Running

February 9, 2015

Dear Elder Bailey,

          The other day we were over at the Acheson's picking up some branches to make decorations for Cami's wedding, when Aunt Barbara excitedly asked Bonnie and me to quickly come in the house.  She had just gotten pictures and an email from Elder Race's Mission President.  Race made it to France safely.  But there was something else Barbara wanted to show me.  She said she found on the Lyon France Mission Blog a picture of you with a lady she had never met.  The caption said that Sister Engle (or something like that) was standing with an Elder in Arizona who was the cousin to Elder Race Acheson who was the travel companion of her missionary going to the Lyon France Mission.  Barby looked at the picture because it mentioned Race, and then dropped her jaw!  "That's Mitchell!"  And indeed it was.  What a small world this is!  (Either you have grown a foot or two more or that lady was tiny!)

     

          I have been monitoring the weather where you are and we have had basically the same springtime temperatures.  Seriously, we have had such warm weather the people are going around in shirtsleeves and shorts and the flowers bulbs are starting to come up out of the ground.

This is just plain crazy.  We love the mild temperatures, but we are getting worried about not having enough snow in our mountains.  We are actually praying for snow and colder weather!

          Hope you were able to get your bike fixed.  Perhaps you should not go off the jumps and crash and damage your bike so often.  Please take care not to damage yourself and be nice to your bike!

We think of you and pray for you always!

Love, 

Mom

From Elder Bailey on February 9th

          So this week was pretty boring until yesterday when Elder Legrand was sick.  I spent half the day on exchanges with Elder Kapua of New Zealand.  A less active sister told me that her husband was super sick and could possibly die in the hospital.  He has a condition called DKA or something.  Blood sugar at 300 is really high but his was at 1000 or maybe it was the insulin.  Anyway, I told her that we would go by the hospital to see him.  Then there was a recent convert that I have been working with for a long time that was getting the Melchizedek priesthood and wanted me to be a part of it.  Right after giving him the priesthood we hopped in his car and headed over to the hospital.  We found Bro. Cain in the ICU and he did not look good at all.  He is too young to be in the state he is in.  He is 37 but he looks 67.  He is so skinny he looks like he was a victim of the holocaust.  Mark, the new Melchizedek priesthood holder got to anoint and I got to give Bro. Cain the blessing.  That was cool.  

          Then we went over to where Elder Legrand was and we go in.  (I had found a copy of “The Best 2 Years” in a missionaries’ house and had previously lent it to Mark.)  When we went in to see Elder LeGrand, Mark said, "Wow!  It’s really messy in here, just like the movie."  I laughed pretty hard because I didn't live there.  Then Mark anointed Elder LeGrand and Elder Kapua gave him a blessing.  So, Mark got to hit the ground running as a new Melchizedek priesthood holder.  That was so cool. 

          On a different note, the Sue Sue family is coming up to Provo this week on Thursday or Friday. I am sending some stuff home just because I don’t need it, but I want something in return.  Can you send me some of my weights?  I want my silver dumbbells with 60 lbs on each and one barbell.

How it should be on each bar is: 

     5-5-10-10-handle-10-10-5-5  

     Grey weights on both dumbbells

     and nothing on the bar unless they are willing to take more 

     and send my good bar!

It’s going to be a lot of work but get Orihah to do it, he will!

The Grand Announcement - Ta-da-da-dah!

  From Elder Bailey,      

           We have been working really hard this week and everything has been going well.  Weeks are so long and by the end I feel like the stuff that happened on Monday was forever ago.  We had 19 teaching opportunities this past week and in Gilbert that is hard.  The average up here is like 8 or 9 in a week and we had 19!  If you go down to Florence, 19 is about average because they teach a lot to all the people that get out of prison that live down there.  More people are willing to hear the message there, but in Gilbert that is unheard of.  Usually we try for 15-ish, but we have been doing pretty good.

          There was this guy we tracted into named Charles who is a black Southern Baptist guy that when we were talking to him, sounded really nice.  He wanted us to come back and talk with him, so we went back on Thursday on splits.  I went with a recent convert, Brother Hovland and taught Charles the First Discussion.  It turns out he is a “golden” investigator.  He had already read the Book of Mormon (because people told him not too).  He matched it up with the Bible and knew it was true. He knew Joseph Smith was a prophet and when asked if he wanted to be baptized, said “yes.”  But he moved yesterday!  However, the good news is that he gave us his new address.  So, we will refer him to those missionaries. At least the address is still in the mission -- which is rare!

          It was kind of scary yesterday.  Donna and Roger were in an interview with Bishop because they are having financial issues.  When they came out, they sat down and were talking with us. Donna suddenly got sick or something.  Her back started hurting and she felt as though she would throw up.  We got her out to their car.  She was saying it was probably from all the stress and anxiety of their financial crisis.   It was really scary and Roger wanted to take her to the hospital.  She texted us later that evening saying that she was feeling better.  That was good to hear

          Transfers were good.  Elder Ramon is gone and we welcomed Elder Kapua of New Zealand.  He has been out 4 1/2 months and is doing the "2nd half " training of Elder Falkenberry.  

And, now, for the grand announcement dadadadadadadadadadadadadada (drum roll) -- Elder Legrand is our new District Leader!  Every single one of my companions has been a foreigner who has done one transfer with me and in the next transfer has gotten a district leader call.  We heard from the Assistants via the Zone Leaders that I was supposed to get transferred and go senior companion in a different zone and Elder Legrand was supposed to train the new French elder from Lyon (who met my cousin Race Acheson in the MTC) but we were too effective working together.  They decided to keep us together for another transfer.  Then I think I’m gone in the next transfer.  But that’s ok. 

Sharing "He Is the Gift"

December 29, 2014

From Elder Bailey:

                  It was cool, right after the Skype call, Brother Young gave me a football.  And I really wanted a football!

                  This week was really slow.  I went on exchanges with Elder Falkenberry from South Carolina.  He is brand new and being trained by my last companion.   (He was having a hard time, but I got to show him around his area.) During the Christmas season, we were promised that if we devoted our time to sharing “He Is the Gift” we would double our teaching pool.  We worked very hard.  He will be a really awesome missionary.  

                  We contacted 2 out of 3 referrals and got return appointments with 3 people and that’s really all that happened this week.  We are almost over on miles and it really stinks that we will have to ride our bikes.  Our area is too big for just riding bikes and we don’t have enough time.  At dinner yesterday a 5 year old thought that it would be funny to put a bow on my head, stand on my shoulders, pull on my ears really hard, and yell “ELF!!!!!!!!”  I was about ready to see how far I could punt a kid, but all is good.

January 5^th, 2015

From Elder Bailey:

                  My early morning work-outs with Elder LeGrande are very chilly in anywhere between 27 and 35 degrees.  It’s really fun this week.  Not!  I dislocated my left pinkie on New Years Eve.  I got to set the bone myself and that was cool.   It is still pretty swollen but my mission president is a physical therapist and said I should be fine in a few weeks.  

                  We put Donna and Roger on date for baptism on the 24th of January.  I have been working with them on and off for 4 1/2 months, so that’s awesome!  We taught a really awesome lesson and resolved a few concerns of theirs.  Then we prayed together.  Roger prayed for a sign and I think Donna did too.  After we left, they were listening to music and a song came on called "There Must Be Something in the Water" which is about Baptism.  So, the next time we saw them they said,  “I think we are ready.”  That is soooo awesome!  

                  We have a bunch of new investigators and referrals, so we are trying to stay busy.  Transfer calls happen today, but they have not come yet, so we are tense right now.

This was a Very, Very Interesting Week!

From Elder Bailey December 8^th, 2014

So this week was very interesting-- very, very, interesting.  On Monday we were playing soccer and some guy tried to fight my companion.  My companion got a black eye.  Then on Tuesday, we taught one of the most powerful and spiritual lessons of my entire mission in the rain.  I promised this 16 year old kid named Josh (who just showed up to church one day and was just curious about the church) that if he went home and read the Book of Mormon he would find his answer.  Then the next day we got a text saying, "Thanks for the spiritual experiences and I will keep some scriptures from the Book of Mormon in mind as I explore other churches.  See you after the holidays."  He just wants to see if he feels the same at other churches as he does at ours.

On Wednesday we had to go get our car washed because we had car inspections.  We couldn't get the bike rack off, so we had to sit around for forever to get our car hand washed when we could have done it our selves.  We were a half hour late to interviews with President Natresse but everything worked out ok.   On Thursday, we taught a lesson to a less active girl who was going to go on a mission but then got offended by the Stake President.  She wanted to take her name off the records of the Church.  But then at the end of the lesson, she wanted to go on a mission again.  It was a crazy lesson and super stressful.  

On Friday, well I don't remember Friday.

(From Mom – On Friday, Elder Bailey and Elder LeGrand were at some sort of party where a member snapped a picture of you both with the Chick-Fil-A Cow.  She sent me the picture just when  I was at the hospital meeting Zakarian Michael Bailey who had just been born.  I quickly texted back that Elder Bailey was an uncle again -- of the 20th of his nephews and nieces.  That’s how Elder Bailey was able to find out about Zak before any of his siblings.  Awesome timing!)

On Saturday, we had to leave the mission boundaries to go to the funeral of a recent convert that helped my companion stay on his mission when he was a greenie.   That was sad for him.  We actually got lost on the 202 twice.  We were frustrated and at the end of the day we used 70-ish miles when we usually use 20 miles a day.  Then we had a service project that was a disaster.  We were asked to help set up for a festival venue thing.  We were helping hot air balloon people set up their baskets.  They wanted us to come back and help deflate the balloons later.  It was crazy packed with people.  We were wearing service clothes and our tags and we had to park on the other side of a Mall that is kind of like City Creek. We walked through it and at the festival thing we reviewed the situation and determined that we probably should not have gone to this service project.   We informed the other missionaries and did our best to hide our tags so as not to look apostate as we got out of there, ASAP.

We then had another lesson with the less active girl from before.  She had gone to the Mesa Temple Christmas Lights and got annoyed by all the Sister Missionaries.  She wanted to get excommunicated again.   We did our best to talk her out of it, but we don’t know if she did or not.  We saw her again on Sunday and we just don't know.  

We have 3 wards, so we went to a lot of church on Sunday.  We went to dinner then tried to meet with a family we had tracted into.   It didn't work out.   Then we decided to go to the Stake Center (right next to the Temple) to watch the devotional.  Just as we pulled into the parking lot and get out of the car, up came these two guys on bikes and one of them asked, "Hey, can you teach?" We said, “Yes!”  So we went into the church.  They explained that they had just go out of rehab.  One was trying to come back to Church and the other was interested in learning about the Church.  We taught them.   The less active guy knew his stuff and was really good help.  We challenged him to baptism and he said yes.  It was just a really cool experience and we will  try to meet with him again.

So that was our week.