Many and Its Many Miracles - 11/24/14

This week was good. Not quite as miraculous as last week but good. Hmm what has happened.

Service: There is this guy who is opening a new restaurant in Many and we offered him help. So that's what we have been doing a lot of this week. Setting up a kitchen and remodeling the place. I have learned a few new cooking tricks as well :) He said that he would make sure we eat well there for our service so I'm happy about that :) Also it means that he will now at least love missionaries. 

Moving the Sisters: We also spent a bit of time helping the sisters move apartments since we have a truck. 

Investigators: We taught Mickie about why he needs to know that Joseph Smith is a prophet and why this is the only true church because it's the only church that has the Fullness of the Gospel and the Authority to perform ordinances and minister. And it seems like it finally clicked. I think what his problem now is that he doesn't understand covenants. So we will talk about that next. It was a good lesson though. Our buddy Joseph who we read the Book of Mormon with everyday we walked by his shop and we saw him reading! He really enjoys it and is already in 2 Nephi. Now he is also really interested in our church and wants to come to church with us. Trent and Dickie. Well we had a great lesson with them but they didn't come to church on Sunday which was a bummer. Though Trent really wants to be baptized and is excited for his baptism so that's awesome. 

Miracle Sonic? So we got a little tired of McDonalds and we didn't really want to cook anything so we went to Sonic and right when we get there some awesome members come up and buy our meal and they were like "So that's the reason we were inspired to go to Sonic." So I think its just miracle Many rather than Miracle McDonalds.  Also another really cool miracle was this less active member who didn't really like missionaries coming to his house randomly called us and said he has been thinking about the church and wanted us to stop by. So we did and read the Book of Mormon with him. That book is powerful.

Bonfire: The youth had a bonfire fireside where Elder Sabey and I dress up as Helaman and the Strippling warriors and we acted it out and it was pretty good. 

We still got quite a few lessons this week which is awesome. Now we are just trying to keep it up and make all those lessons meaningful and not just a number.

Happy thanksgiving!

Love Elder Lehr

Miracle Many - 11/17/14

This week has been so awesome. We saw quite a few new people and well lots of miracles in Many.

Lessons: So we got 21 lessons this week which is crazy. I honestly did not think it was possible in Many as many other missionaries in the past have. That is about what we were getting in Sierra Leone. It is so wonderful. 

Converse: We went with Glen Hardy who is the stake patriarch to go see some less actives in Converse which is about 43 miles away from Many. And it's still in our area. He actually took us about 6 yards outside our mission boundary just to say "this is the mission boundary" haha. Anyway it was good to see those less actives and one of them looks just like Santa. Like no joke exactly like Santa.

Miracles at Church: As you know this Sunday we had 13 less actives at church and 1 investigator. We brought Trent our investigator to church for the first time and he really enjoyed it. Also one of the less actives we've been working with Sean Johnson finally came to church! We did everything in our power to help him to come. To knocking on his door at 8am and calling him and reminding him the night before. And it worked! I have found that what really helps investigators keep commitments is having the commitment be the focus of the lesson, not just something that you add at the end. So basically helping investigators really understand why they need to keep the commitment. 

Miracle McDonalds?: Well we went and it failed us. Our investigator there simply doesn't really want to talk to us to much so we dropped him. 

Funny Guy: One of our investigators is this 85 year old man named Guy who talks about how you shouldn't brag or be obsessed with money and that's all he ever talks about is how he has been sooo successful. At the start of the lesson he gave us his resume! Who does that? He is an 85 year old man and we are missionaries. It's pretty funny how he wants to brag about himself to us. Next time we visit him we are going to be like "we have looked through your resume and well. Your application is accepted. You can become a member of the church." haha that will be fun.

Gumbo!: We made gumbo for the first time and it was sooooo good I'm totally gonna make it when I get home as well.

Finding: We tried to contact all the names we don't know on our phone and well we got rejected a lot haha that was fun.

Anywho this week has been great and Many is on fire. 

Love you all 

Elder Christian Lehr

Fun jazz (and a surprise text) - 11/10/14

We got the sweetest surprise text from a member of the Many ward last week. Sister Leone and her son saw the elders walking and invited them to eat lunch with them. They look pretty happy about that. :) Her message with the picture was: "Thanks for sharing your sons with us." Warms Mom and Dad's hearts. I'm sure that Elder Sabey's family was very pleased to get the text as well.

So basically Many is exploding in awesomeness. We have had quite a few miracles this week.

Investigators: So we saw Dickie and had a great lesson with him and taught him the plan of salvation and his son joined in and was really interested. So we came back later in the week and taught his son and he accepted a baptism date! so cool. Then on Saturday we played Ghetto ball again and we taught Mickie's son. He was super interested and really wants to learn more. So cool stuff. 

Less Actives: It was pretty cool how at church there were another 2 less active families that came and then there was another couple who came who said they hadn't been to church in 32 years. And we didn't do too much about that they just came. Also on the way to email here we get a call from Bro. Barber who is a legit Lamanite who served a mission but recently went less active. But he called us and we will see him later this week. And Jimmy Carter came as well. 

Hacking's: Well we saw the Hackings and that was really fun. I Love my blanket. That blanket is like my best friend. I am happy. So that's that. Thanks for the suitcase :) (Elder Hacking's family drove to Louisiana to pick him up since he had completed his 2 year mission. They took some stuff to Elder Lehr for us while they were in Many to see where Elder Hacking had served for so long.  One of the things that Elder Lehr asked for was his blanket from home. "Linus" is a happy camper now that he has his blanket to keep him cozy. hehe)

Focuses: One thing that we are gonna try doing here is focusing on family history as a finding idea. I figure that even if people here don't join the church. If they do family history it will help them a lot.

Miracle McDonalds:  We went to see Nate the guy who works there and gave him a Book of Mormon and encouraged him to read it. 

Truck of awesome: So we got a new truck that really makes me happy :) It's a 2015 Nissan Frontier. It is sooo much fun and comfortable. It has a USB slot so we can listen to all the music on our USB's in the truck. It's dark blue and I guess all I can say is it makes me happy. Oh and I got my temporary license so it worked to get my license back :) I just gotta wait for the real one to come. (His driver license got left behind at the mission home in Sierra Leone since the office couldn't locate it at the time of the evacuation from the country.  So after a lot of work he is finally getting a duplicate license from Utah.)

Well that's this week

Love Elder Lehr

Sick/weird/good - 11/4/14

NSU football game

Watching Marching Band in LA while my family is watching a competition in St. George, gotta love it!

This has been quite an eventful/noneventful week. It started really well Monday when we visited the Webb family and gave Sister Webb a blessing. They are a part member family who wants to come to church. And came :)

Investigators: So we saw Dickie yesterday and had a great lesson with him. We had W.C Hardy our ward mission leader join us and we taught him the plan of salvation and the spirit was so strong. And his son was there and wants to learn more so that was a sweet miracle. I realized that Elder Sabey is really good with object lessons and just relating to everyone here and I am good at finding a scripture for everything. He teaches and I just back it up with the scriptures. This companionship is great. 

We also saw Mickie and taught him lesson 2 and that went really well. The spirit was strong and he just needs to read that Book of Mormon. Chris came to the Halloween activity but had work on Sunday. Marty is still in pretty bad shape so we gave him a blessing. 

Less Active: We saw the guy with the guns and he showed us his 338 Lapua and shot it for us and that is the sniper with the longest recorded kill of like 1.6 miles. Pretty crazy and powerful. It was so strong him shooting it pretty much knocked the breath out of me. We had a few less actives come to church and that was awesome. 

Sickness: So I got a cold. Then Elder Sabey got a cold so we were both pretty much out of commission a lot of this week. 

Football Game: So we got permission to watch the NSU football game as a district and that was really fun. Cold but fun. NSU lost by one touchdown. 

Oh Transfer news: So Elder Johnson is being transferred and Elder Scholes is going home. I really love those two elders. They are wonderful. Everyone in the district is staying the same except I am district leader now. So I get to train and be District leader. fun stuff. I have to say it was nice having that little break of no leadership. But I gotta do what I gotta do. 

Miracle McDonalds: We went to the library to do some online training for Elder Sabey and this guy named Nathen talks to me and asks who we are and he is homeless and has been really searching for a true church. And guess where he works....Miracle McDonalds. haha that's 7 in a row! that place is nuts! I'm lovin it. haha

Well that's all for this week. Love you all

Love Elder Lehr

Elder Lehr and Elder Scholes (District Leader)

The Natchitoches District at the NSU Football game (yes, Elder Lehr has a scripture case between him and Sister Ogden)