The Lord is being really good to Elder Peter and I don't know why!!

(THIS IS TAYLOR'S EMAIL FROM MARCH 21)

The point that I chose to work on and improve was attendance at Sacrament meeting, which was funny because we had a great week with 7 investigators at church!!!! We have really applied teaching shorter lessons and more frequent visits but also we have tried to leave like 20 minutes for commitment invitations and as well as resolving concerns. It has been great and just really trying to help the investigator understand the commitment and the doctrine behind it and it seemed to work. Something profound that I realized is that what missionaries focus on will happen. Like in our zone we focused on finding and we have succeeded in our goal and we are finding all the time but now we are struggling to have those new investigators progress. But whatever we focus on at that moment, it happens and we are successful so my prayer is that I may come to understand how I may still focus on finding and still be successful while being moderate in all things and helping those new investigators progress and come to church and keep commitments. It is a mystery but I know the Lord is willing to shed some light on it if we stay diligent.


In our area things are going great! We have an incredible family that we are working with the Smith's, the are a family of 5 Bro Richard Smith is an officer in the Army and a great father and family man, Sis Jennifer Smith is a stay at home mom with 3 boys Caleb 5 and Mathew 2 Gabbriell 3 months. They were at church this Sunday and they had a wonderful time. We had the High Counselor come into Gospel Principles, Bro Locklear from Laurinburg talked about the temple and they are so excited to in one years time, to take their whole family to the temple. The ward is really in love with, we have been doing all hands on deck and the 3 members that we called were all waiting for them to come and greet them at the door. They have been very involved in the Baptist church they attend, but because of that additional study in the Restoration Pamphlet Sis Smith who said she would never become a Mormon because of another book can't wait to be baptised and then go to the temple, can't wait for her boys to go to seminary, and prepare for missions, it is incredible they are the family I've prayed for my whole mission and they are here. After church Sis Smith said that I thought 3 hours was way to long for church but when Relief Society was over I didn't want to go home, I thought it was too short! Bro Smith kept talking about the unity in Priesthood and the lesson was on Charity he thought, that was something only women speak about but loved how they talked about it in Priesthood. They are just so awesome. We have another date with Sis Addie they are a part member and her and her 8 year old daughter are preparing to be baptised. We received another referral for a part member family who said if the Lord answers her prayers she will be baptised. We just keep finding part members and new investigators. We did our blitz, which was a huge success we had a lot of them report this week that they invited and some accepted and some did not but it was so neat to see them not find disappointment in themselves but a desire to go out and invite again. Our bishop is deployed and his wife invited a family and we are meeting with them this week to teach who they invited, it has just been great, and all of us the ward and us as missionaries are united in our Fathers business to bring to past the immortality and eternal life of man.

Also this week I was able to go on an exchange with Elder Lake he said he has watched a movie at Uncle Kenny's house! He said he took a dance class with Ashley. He is a great Elder while on our exchange we found so much success. It was funny though we first started and we both felt prompted to go contact this guy so we chased him down and I yelled at him excuse me Sir and he is a Hispanic but it is all good because Elder Lake is a Spanish missionary, but it ended up being that he was a Pentecostal Minister. A real bummer but I received some Revelation that Pentecostal believe that the spirit is huge that is their focus which is true but it is just a piece of the pie and the Baptist believe in baptism by immersion and that is what they preach. But we of the Church of Jesus Christ we have it all, all the gospel of Jesus Christ, Faith, Repentance, Baptism, Gift of the Holy Ghost, and enduring! We have it all even the priesthood to bring it all to pass! I tried to explain it to the pastor but he wasn't having it! We taught alot of lessons, heard some guitar, and went to a fish fry and I was able to bear my testimony in Spanish.

We taught the Addie's a couple times this week, we really brought out some true concerns which we will be able to address to the ward and get taken care of. They are a great family he is a fire fighter so that is cool but it was just an amazing week with that family and they came to church.

The Smith's, we taught them with Bro Morrill who is my idol he is a spiritual power house. He invited the Smith's to church with such a powerful invitation and then he taught the Gospel Principle class about the plan of Salvation it was incredible and it all made such perfect sense and they are just set to jet...I am so grateful for wonderful members like them.

We have been biking alot lately because we don't have any miles we planned poorly because Elder Smart said he wasn't going to bike the rest of his mission, now all we can do is bike. It is good though, he just gets really upset, like super frustrated with biking. This morning I felt so bad, we went running and jumped a little chain fence and he fell and ate the dirt, I think a baby curse word might of came out it was funny, I felt really bad for him.

Then Saturday we felt prompted to go visit a new family from Idaho and we did and they had a friend over and we taught him and set an appointment to follow up it was amazing just how the Lord always knows where we are going!

Then a church brother brought two black sisters and we taught them.. amazing! Last night we went to what we thought was a less active family turned out to be a non member and less active family and they are wanting to get her baptised her name is Polly she is from Brazil and makes the greatest cheese cake ever so prayer for the Smith's, Ron, Addie, Polly, and Derek Pilar!!!!!! We will baptize, this is going to change these people, my brothers and sisters lives forever and I am so grateful they are humble enough to listen and feel of the spirit.

Love and Respect,

Elder Taylor Petersen