Hello Everyone,

It was great to talk to you guys I’’ts nice to see you were all alive and well. Nothing too exciting has happen since last night (yesterday was Mother’s Day and he called home). I’m still doing well and so is Elder Shurtz I think. Well I guess that’s it.

Elder Birch

Hello Everyone,

This week was pretty good, our Bishop gave us some names of less active people in the area we were going to work in and we were on exchanges so I was driving and the other elder was giving me direction to one of the houses and he got distracted and then all of a sudden he said oops missed the turn then right after oops there’s the zone boundary so we left the zone for a minute or so as we tried to turn around and the elder I was with is brand new so that was a big scare to him because we are not supposed to leave the zone. So that was an exciting part of this week and later that week when I was back with Elder Shurtz we tried the same house and this kid he looked like he was in his late teens answers we ask him if the member we are looking for lives there and he said he does but he is busy right now so we tell him that the member who is his grandpa is a member of our church and asked him if he has ever heard of us and he said no. We asked him if he attended a church and he said he has a couple of times with his grandma who is a Jehovah’s Witness but he doesn’t want to join any church since there are so many and he doesn’t want to get it wrong so he just tries his best to do what God wants him to do and that was a perfect intro to the restoration. We gave him a Book of Mormon and our number and he really seemed interested because to him it sounded like Joseph Smith had the same concerns he had and now he wanted to now for himself so we’ll see how that goes. Then on Sunday when we meet with the Bishop and Elders Quorum president and High Priest Group Leader we told them that we were able to confirm that this member lives there and the High Priest group leader said “wait, isn’t that one of the names that I gave you that moved?” the man that answered told us that he didn’t live there anymore and our Bishop said “well people lie sometimes” and chuckled so that was kind of funny that if it wasn’t for his grandson this member’s record would have been sent off so we’ll see how that also goes 😛

Elder Birch

Elder Birch

Hello Everyone,

This week was good, we got to ride our bikes in the little ice storm we had. It was really fun…. After a couple of hours we asked the other elders in our district if we could get a ride back home because we were quite frozen but we were able to get some good work done while we were out.

The less active we had been working with called us on Saturday and told us his car was broken and would not be able to make it to church, we told him that we would find him a ride so he could still come to church. He seemed happy about that so on Sunday when he got to church he thanked us for finding him a ride and when he introduce himself in priesthood he told everyone that he had been less active for a very long time but now his coming back and everyone welcomed him back and it seemed like he enjoyed being back. We learned that he stopped going in 2000 so it’s been 13 years and that my comp knocked on his door and when he saw who it was and he didn’t really want to answer but “something” told him to answer and he is glad that he did.

Oh and the cupcakes were still good thanks for them.

Elder Birch

Hello Everyone,

First off I was able to get my packages on Wednesday and the blanket is really cool and nice to sleep with thanks.

This week we were able to get in with this less active that no one knew lived there. We didn’t have his records when we got in. We got to know him a little bit, it ends up years ago he was offended by someone in the bishopric and asked for his name to be removed. They told him that they wouldn’t but they’ll put his name on the do not contact list and later he moved and that’s why no one know he was here. He wanted to start taking the lessons again to refresh his memory and we got his info so we could get his records. Apparently the whole time he had been less active he would still watch BYU tv and he came to priesthood session which was great to see him there and he came to the morning session on Sunday and the bishop was also there at the church so we were able to introduce him to the bishop and after the session they talked for a little bit and after the bishop came to us and he seem pretty excited that this guy is wanting to come back to activity. So that has been the best part besides conference of this week.

Elder Birch

Hello and happy Easter

This week one of the elders in our district was sick so we switched off going out with the one that wasn’t sick and staying with the one that was because they had a lot of appointments to get to and we didn’t as much but on Saturday they both were better so we went out and did some tracting and we talked to this lady that was on her porch and as we were talking to her we learned that she met with missionaries a long time ago but never joined because she had a church and her whole family has gone to that church for like every but she moved and no longer goes to that church and has been looking for a church and has been praying to God for help and guidance and when she saw us she was hoping that we would come over and talk to her. She was so excited and knew it was because of God that we happened to come over to her.  And later that day we saw a door that had a pass-a-long card taped to the front of it. We tried the door but no one answered and a couple of doors down this really nice lady told us that there is a member of our church right where we saw the cards and his name is Kenny but when we looked at our records there is no known members that lives at that address or anyone with anything close to the name Kenny so we are going to talk with the bishop and keep trying him to see his story.

And I guess the biggest news here in Wichita that everyone we meet keeps bring up is that Wichita State University is in the final four in the NCAA tournament and people here are going crazy about it so that is some nonspiritual news for you guys 😛

Elder Birch

Hello everyone,

This week has been good and a little slow and on Saturday night it snowed so much so quickly that church was canceled and we were stuck inside for most of the day so that was fun for my birthday.  Also Elder Shurtz made me breakfast which was really nice of him. So most of the day we stayed inside and did a little bit of studying and then we played some games until they told us we could leave but everyone we tried wasn’t home.

Oh yea earlier this week we went and met with this investigator who has been investigating for about a year and we talked to him about the plane of salvation and when we got to the end Elder Shurtz told him these are the thing that need to be done so you can enter the Celestial Kingdom first being baptized and our investigator told us well you haven’t answered my question yet why do I need to be baptized first before I can become a member of the church  so we shared a scripture in the Bible and then the Book of Mormon then in the Doctrine and Covenants and told him that is what God has been requiring forever and he said oh well I guess all the other churches have it wrong then the need to start doing that and now I guess all that is left is to pick a date and that took us by surprise and next time we meet with him we are going to help him pick a date which is really exciting .

Elder Birch

Hello Everyone

This week was pretty slow noting really exciting has happened this week. we did have this funny experience on Saturday when we went to one of our investigators house he had a friend over that was signing papers for the place right next to our investigator and when the friend saw us he said “Go KU, Go Utah Utes!” that kind of took us by surprise and our investigator saw and said “you know them?” He said “like yeah I know the Mormons” and said some other crazy stuff like “I’m 59 and I’m married to a 32 year old, I must be doing something right” and then he went back to finish signing papers. The landlord asked “have you been drinking?” and he said “yeah I’ve had two or three beers, I’m a sinner, I know, no one is prefect” but I think he had a little more than two or three because he smelled like beer really bad. And while they were talking he just randomly turns around and throws up in his red hanky and says “I challenge the play it safe and the play is GOOD!” while he was doing some crazy gestures. We were just hoping that when the papers were signed he would leave and we could teach our investigator what we had planned but when he was finished our investigator said “so you’re leaving to go somewhere now?” His friend said “Nope I’m staying for bible study”. We were like ah crap in our heads but we got to talk to him a little bit. While our investigator finished doing something we learned that he met with missionaries in the past but moved here. And when our investigator got back we just read a chapter from the Book of Mormon and his friend was following along which surprised us and when we finished he loved what we read and when we set a return appointment his friend said I’ll be there too and looked really excited. We were really impressed just how calm he was when we were teaching so we are kind of excited to see when we come next time if he is sober how well the lesson will go.

Elder Birch