DANG!!!!!!!!!!!

We are idiots!!!!!!

This week was decent haha.... To start things off we had district meetings on Tuesday and afterwards I slammed a guitar on my companion's back (I'll try to send a video below). Then transfers was the next day, we both stayed. I don't know what it is but transfer weeks and holiday weeks are really slow and when you combine the two it (or we) gets stupid.

A while back I told y'all about how an elder in our zone got jumped, in the mix of all that he lost his Charm Card (basically a bus debit card) so we lent him one of ours and he ended up losing that one too... So our task this week was to get that one replaced so we could use the bus and save some miles for the end of the month. After 2 trips to the heart of Baltimore, we finally got it replaced and reactivated. As we returned to the 7/11 that we parked at down the street from where we got the card (the parking in Baltimore is horrible), it then became known to us that our car wasn't there. Flip!!!!!! Turns out that someone towed our car (within 5 minutes of us parking there) and it cost $350 in cash to get it back. In case you aren't aware, missionaries definitely do not have $350 cash on them in inner city Baltimore, or ever because we are poor!! After being stranded in Baltimore for several hours our vehicle coordinator picked us up and luckily his wife had $350 in cash that she lent to us to pay for it. They saved the day!!! Super grateful for Elder and Sister Sturgeon! Now my companion and I are super broke!!!

Now for the missionary part that y'all are actually here to read about: we were in a lesson with our investigator Renee and we took a member that lives nearby to fellowship with her. (BTW Renee and her kids are on date to be baptized on December 17) We taught her about tithing and her member friend did an awesome job testifying of it, the Spirit was very strong in the lesson. We committed Renee to pay tithing after she gets baptized but essentially she said no.... She said she is gonna start paying tithing right now because she doesn't want to wait until she gets baptized to do that! She's a stud!!!

Have a good week!!

-Elder Larson​

Guitar smash on Elder Carlson

CRAMPING IN SACRAMENT

What's good??

This week was awesome! It is starting to get super cold here! It is 45 degrees but with the wind and the humidity it feels like it is -20!!! It's gonna be a long winter, last winter I had 20 lbs more of insulation (fat (Antietam ward members fed really good)) to keep me warm! I'm hosed!!

Anyways, yesterday the Jeghedes were confirmed in sacrament meeting and that took up half of the meeting haha! All 5 of them were confirmed and while I was standing in the circle to confirm them my calf started cramping because we had been standing there for so long!! Dang that hurt!!!! It's okay though, the Spirit in the meeting comforted me. ;) The Jeghedes are way pumped to have the Holy Ghost now and to be members, they were glowing yesterday!!

We had MLC this week out in Walkersville and after the meeting, Brother and Sister Pederson from the Walkersville ward took us out to dinner, super grateful!! I miss the Walkersville ward!! Also we picked up 3 new investigators this week who all seem pretty solid! Shirell was a headquarters referral and the first thing she started talking about when we got there was how she noticed that the world was in an apostasy! Those aren't the words that she used but that's pretty much what she said! Salomon moved here to the United States 3 months ago from Congo, and he is super pumped about the gospel! Then we picked up Larry and it was pretty cool how we found him. We felt really strongly a couple weeks ago that we needed to knock this street so we started knocking doors and literally every single door was either slammed in our face mid-door approach or it was slammed in our face after they swore at us haha it was awesome!! But we kept knocking and at the end of the street we talked to a guy named Steve who said we could come back. So we came back and he wasn't interested anymore... But his dad Larry was there and we taught him!! He said that what we shared with him is what he needed in his life. Super cool!! Also on Sunday we fasted with Renee to help her quit smoking, she's a stud!!

Have a good week!!

-Elder Larson

The squad

Natty-Bo fam

3 MORE ON DATE + CHURCH WITH NFL PLAYERS

What's up guys?

This week was crazy!!! It started off pretty slow not gonna lie... Usually after 1 baptism the missionary work seems to get really slow and we had 5 last week which was like half of our teaching pool... Elder Carlson and I really didn't want the work to die so we were doing everything we could to keep things rolling but things weren't going how we necessarily wanted them to. We had a lesson with the Silvers and we were planning on teaching them the Word of Wisdom but we really didn't know what member we could get to go over to teach them with us that would be a good friend to them. After thinking a lot about it we felt like we should ask a less active lady that lived really close to them to come teaching with us, but it was really risky because she hadn't been to church in a long time! So we went and talked to her about it and she was surprisingly super excited to help out in the teaching and even said that this might be what gets her back into church! Sure enough we taught them the Word of Wisdom (even though I was on exchanges) and committed them all to live it (all 3 of them drank coffee and tea and Renae, the mom, smokes cigarettes) and then committed them to be baptized on December 10. Super sick! The less active lady (Stephanie) came in clutch and gave them all a ride to church yesterday! Super cool!!

I went on exchanges to Jones Falls with Elder Tucker on Saturday and Sunday and I had the opportunity to attend their ward yesterday. This ward isn't like most other wards though... In the Jones Falls ward there are 3 active NFL players that attend when possible, and I got to meet 2 of them yesterday!!! I got to talk to Dennis Pitta and Bronson Kafusi who both play for the Ravens, it was super sick!! Unfortunately Eric Weddle (who also plays for the Ravens) wasn't at church yesterday so I didn't get to meet him but it was still super cool!! This week was crazy!! Also, while we were knocking doors we got some free fried chicken from one of the ladies we knocked into haha!! #BlessingsOfBaltimore

Have a good week!!

-Elder Larson

Service with Elder Carlson at the Wood's

Baltimore from afar!!  It's a lot better looking from far away!!

THE JEGHEDES!!!!

What's up guys??

This week was crazy but amazing!!! To start the week off, I went on exchanges with Elder Tharp (who served in the Glen Burnie ward with me when I was there) and we had a ton of fun! (That was our 3rd time on exchanges together haha). Then we had zone conference and because our car was so clean we won the cleanest car award and got some free Chic-Fil-A gift cards, super stoked about that haha! Then from there I went on exchanges with Elder Head into his area (down in Dundalk and Essex). We had a good exchange! Even though it was a short one we managed to contact a guy named Isaiah and picked him up as an investigator the next day, pretty cool!

Finally, after many crazy situations and madness that I am not authorized to talk about, the Jeghedes got baptized on Sunday!!! All 5 of them!!! It was amazing!!! We had been working pretty closely with our mission president through some things and he told us that he thinks it would be alright for us to get in the water and baptize a few of them which is crazy because he never lets missionaries baptize people!!! And we didn't even ask him either!! So I got to baptize Favour, the youngest daughter. The baptism went really smooth and there was a lot of support from the ward and even the stake! After the baptism Favour came up to me and gave me the biggest hug that a 9 year old can give and she wouldn't let go, it was adorable!! It is always amazing to see the joy that the gospel brings into the lives of those that choose to live it, and the Jeghedes are a prime example of that! 

Other than that we found 3 new investigators this week which was good! One of them, Charles, was actually drafted into the MLB a few years ago but gave it up so he could be with his family. Super cool! A lot of good stuff is happening out here!!

Have a good week!!

-Elder Larson

The Jeghedes and us!!