Monday, January 5, 2015

Back logged from December 15, 2014 Closing up the Augusta Elders' apartment

(Since I'm a bit behind, I'll leave the editing to a minimum...)
Big Letter!!!

This week went by so fast and it was such a good week! Are you ready to hear about it? Im ready to tell you so buckle up and enjoy this email.

Monday- This was P-day and did all the normal junk we do. We did a nerf war again but it wasnt as fun this time so we got bored of shooting eachother with plastic darts. After P-Day we went to stop by a potential investigator that we talked to on that night where we talked to a ton of people. He wasnt home but his room mates were and we talked with them. They were super friendly and werent interested in what we had to share but they are opening up a local Food Co-Op for organic foods just below our apartment in Downtown Gardiner and they wanted our help with Demolition and stuff. So we will be helping them with that once they give us a call and tell us when. Also at their house was the first time i declined going into a Sauna in my life. We as missionaries cant go into one and he invited us into it and said he has extra Hurley Boardshorts and it was so enticing because it was FREEZING COLD outside but we held our ground and didnt go in......

Tuesday- The roads outside were SUPER ICY. There was a 1 inch coat of ice on the roads and from our apartment we could see tow trucks and fire trucks heading out to the local wrecks. We were told to stay inside because the roads are terrible so we went to the library to help serve there and watch some mormon.org videos and become familiar with the web site. On our walk back from the library which is .1 mile away from our house, 7 fire trucks passed us with their sirens on and blaring their horns! It was crazy! Not alot happened this day because the sidewalks and roads were layered with ice and elder sholer and I tried to walk to the Veregees home to visit with them and we were literally ice skating. It was really tough getting up and over a small hill that Elder Sholer fell 2 times on haha! We eventually got to the Veregees and helped them put up their Christmas Tree and read scriptures with them. We are hoping to motivate them to come to church as well as help them out in their faith in Jesus Christ.

Wednesday- After our District meeting and going to District Lunch at Red Robin, I went on an exchange to Augusta with Elder Stauffer. Elder Landen Stauffer is going home to Layton Utah on his birthday, which is on the 17th of December. He is so excited to see his family and it was fun talking with him about what he learned on his mission and what he will apply to his life. It rained all day and we were walking around Augusta visiting people and trying our best to talk to everyone we walk by....  (who on earth would be out walking in 34 degree weather with pouring rain?) But if there was someone as crazy as we were we would talk to them. We had Tacos for dinner that our Ward Mission Leader Provided for us since its Elder Stauffers last Wednesday night as a missionary. At night time we normally go to bed and sleep at 10:30, Elder Stauffer and I stayed up till like 1 or 2 in the morning just talking about life. I havent had one of those talks in a LONG TIME and it was really enjoyable.

Elders Dahlberg & Stauffer
Thursday- The Augusta Elders area and apartment is closing down so all day we pretty much cleaned up the apartment. I tackled the dirty dishes which filled the sink. (i do NOT do that by the way mom, and i am about to explain one of the reasons why) So i was cleaning the dishes, there wasnt any dish soap left so i used hand soap... hope that wont hurt anyone... But i got to the bottom of one of the sinks and this TERRIBLE smell just starts oozing out of the sink. It was putrid, rank, disgusting, and foul. I havent ever smelled a smell like that in a kitchen, That smell belonged in an abandoned porto-potty out in the desert of Arizona! This smell hurt my nose physically. We opened windows and used fans to blow the smell away. I ended up finishing the dishes after losing my sense of smell for about 30 minutes. That was hilarious but also disgusting... And i was cleaning it in another missionaries apartment.... I guess i was given a blessing that night because a member took us out to dinner at Applebee's and urged me to get a street steak and so i did. That was marvelous! It also rained all day today. 3 days in a row of non stop rain.





Friday- Friday Morning we met up with Elder Sholer and Elder Gray and we had a ward work party on cleaning out the Augusta Apartment and making trips to the Goodwill and to the Dump. There was 4 full trash bags of empty tupperware in their apartment. so if your ever looking for your tupperware, go to a missionaries apartment and im sure they will gladly give you theirs. Now that we moved them out they are living with us for the rest of the week. A member took us out to Denny's for lunch and than for dinner our Ward Mission Leader invited us over for a Lobster, scallop, and crab dinner. I forgot my camera which sucked! We got fed really well this week.

Saturday- It snowed during the night so after our studies Elder Sholer and I headed out in the snow and shoveled out some members of our ward and the surrounding houses in the neighborhood. I really enjoy snow shovelling to be completly honest, tons of people hate it and say you only love it because your a beach bum from California. haha. We also met up with a man named Rick p****** who is one of our new investigators. he is heavily into drugs, alcohol and cigarettes. and on the coffee table that seperated us from him was all that plus more... Illegal drugs... Vodka... Cigarettes.... The whole nine yards. But what we talked about was helping him find Christ in his life. He wants to become better through Jesus Christ but it will take alot of effort on his part and its almost to late. he has so many physical problems due to a life long career of drug and alcohol abuse.  We also met up with the Peters family and read from the scriptures with them and invited them to come to church, they said sure thing!

Sunday- To our surprise the Peters texted us saying we woke up a little late we wont make it to church... What time does 2nd hour start? haha how awesome is that! They came to 2nd and 3rd hour and brought their 5 kids. It went really well and tons of people fellowshipped them, we hope they felt good in the church. We also were introduced to Sister Tarbox's parents who invited us over to dinner that night. They came to church and we sat next to them all sacrament meeting. For dinner we had yankee pot roast and fruit salad. After it we talked about the Restoration of the Gospel and where the Book of Mormon comes into play. he is Seventh Day Adventist and believes only in the bible. At one point in the lesson he held up his bible and said "Show me in the Bible where is says Jesus visited the American continent, or show me some indication of why i would believe in the Book of Mormon at all". So, i opened up my bible to Ezekial 37:19 and also to John 10:16. After reading those scriptures he had an almost immediate change of heart. He was no longer hostile against the book of mormon, instead he was reasonable and said you know what, "ill give this book a shot, i mean i makes sense that he would visit other people other than just the Jews."  That was the first time in my mission where i saw an immediate change of heart. it was really awesome to see and i just felt like an actual missionary seeing that. Being a missionary out here in New England is rough when it comes to teaching and getting people to change their lives according to the Gospel of Jesus Christ. This mans name is Ed B****. Hopefully we hear back from him as to what he thinks of the Book of Mormon.

If you don't know much about the Book of Mormon its another Testament of Jesus Christ and his visitation to the inhabitants of the American Continent, AKA the american indians. There is a good scripture in the book of mormon which shows how much Christ is talked about.   2 Nephi 25:26

 26 And we talk of Christ, we rejoice in Christ, we preach of Christ, we prophesy of Christ, and we write according to our prophecies, that our children may know to what source they may look for aremission of their sins.


Well i got to get going, I hope you all have a good week and i am not getting transferred so im saying in Gardiner with Elder Sholer at least till Febuary 1st! I am also now called to be a district leader and that will let me learn and grow even more as a minister of Jesus Christ. Hope all is well and thank you for all you do for me. I enjoy getting Christmas Cards by the way so if you want to send me something, That would be what i would ask for.



ALL SMILES
Elder Dahlberg

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