Because we have a saw.....

There has been some crazy stuff happening this week! We have done a ton of service, its been super fun! Service is fun to a point, but too much and you go crazy! We rocked some service at a member's named Sister Ross. She is pretty dope, and basically I raked a million leaves while the rest of the Berkshire missionaries broke sticks in half and put them in piles. After I raked it all up, on of the other Elders jumped in the pile, and then I told him that there is a ton of dog crap mixed in there. It made my day! Not his...but mine was made! Our next service project was on Saturday. We did it for a non member and we basically partied in the back cutting up wood so they can burn it. Most of the wood was small enough so that you could snap it, but all we had was a wedge, and an electric saw. So we cut everything, and Elder Myers, helpful as he always is...says "you know you can just snap that right?" to which I replied: "...but we have a saw...?" Bottom line is rule #32-enjoy the little things (if you understood that reference then thats why we are friends).

 

The two coolest miracles of the week happened on Sunday! Bishop Sharp texted me to let me know that Theodore Walker (my favorite kid ever) was turning 12 and asked if I could be the one to ordain him to the office of Deacon, and confer upon him the Aaronic Priesthood. Freaking dope right? I got to confirm him a member last december, and now I get to ordain him! I am so darn stoked about it!

 

The other miracle was Jesse. He was a member refferal who was super solid and we were able to teach him probably the best Restoration lesson ever. Midway through the lesson i straight up told him "Jesse, I have been a missionary for almost 18 months, talked to hundreds of people about the gospel, and I will not hesitate to say that you are the most prepared person to hear this message and follow Christ than anyone I have come in contact with." Jesse is an absolute miracle, and I am so grateful for him because he came at the perfect time. Its a lesson that I have to learn over and over. I get really discouraged because we are working so hard, being exactly obedient and earnestly praying but it seems like nothing really goes our way. Then miracles like Jesse come along and it makes it all worth it. So I am very grateful that Jesse found us, and especially grateful that he is ready and willing to be baptized as soon as he possibly can. 

 

So I am super terrible at taking pictures...so I will be sure to take some stupid pictures this week and send them out! 

 

Love you all!

 

Elder Carper

Miracle of Exchanges

This week has been full of very cool spiritual experiences for me! We had zone conference on Wednesday that was absolutely great! For the first time it felt like an actual training instead of a 4 hour long chastisement. I really enjoyed learning from President and Sister Wilson. Being inspired is a great feeling for sure! 

 

I also had the opportunity to go on exchanges with some Elders in my district. It was a good exchange, and it was cool being able to talk through issues and help other missionaries get motivated to be obedient. I really cherished that opportunity because it was a leader in my 2 area that really helped me have a desire to turn my mission around and be obedient, and we were on exchanges when that happened so it was cool to try and pass that along. I also was able to help some other missionaries with issues they are having on Sunday. It was super spirit filled, and it got pretty emotional for the missionary but there was a really strong feeling of love in the room. I am super excited for these missionaries I get to serve! They are gonna make the changes and be the best missionaries ever!! 

 

Sorry that this email is so short, we havent had a whole lot of time to be able to email this week. Hopefully some stuff opens up! I hope yall have a dope week!

 

Elder Carper

I Belong Nowhere......

This week has been super fun for me! On Tuesday I went on exchanges with some Elders in our District. If you are training  you have to go on exchanges for week 3 so I went on an exchange  with these Elders, and then also went with the Zone Leaders since Elder Myers is new. It was a lot of fun, I had to go with the Greenie and basically was told to make sure he was being trained right. So that was interesting, his name is Elder Greene (teehee) and he is also a red head. So you best believe the jokes came at every. single. door. Its algood, it was an easy set up to transition the conversation to the gospel. My favorite game to play with my companions is to choose a random object we see and then relate it to the gospel. Its super fun and it really helps you be able to turn conversations into gospel conversations. So we do it with the members who come with us! 

 

There were two absolutely crazy things that happened this week, the first being that I got to interview a wonderful lady named Debbie for her baptism. It was my first baptismal interview and so I was really nervous, but it ended up being one of the most spiritual meetings of my mission. The spirit was so thick you could almost see it. Everything went perfectly, after the interview I told her that I wanted her to go straight to the chapel so she can feel the spirit, and pour her heart out in gratitude to God. I told her that the happiest times in my life is when all I feel like doing is getting on my knees and thanking the Lord. It really was a super cool experience, she was bawling by the time she left and then ran to the Chapel so the Sisters thought something went wrong so it was super funny!

 

The other crazy thing is that they redrew the ward boundaries in the whole Bakersfield South Stake. So there is no Panama ward anymore....I dont belong anymore I guess. The two wards are Berkshire and Wilson. They took 3 wards and combined them, my area is in Berkshire and so if I stay, I will be with half the members in Fairview. I already served there....so that would be WEIRD. Its whatever though, they will let us know our new areas soon. I hope I stay in my area, I keep having the feeling that I will be here for a long time so I hope that comes true! 

 

I hope yall had a wonderful new year! I watched as the clock hit midnight and thought....wow I go home this year in august. Fun fun! 

 

Elder Carper

Family Reunions

Such a sick week from Bakes! This was totally the best Christmas ever! Yes being able to skype was cool I guess but the highlight was going out with the Sister Missionaries and some other members of the Ward and going Christmas Caroling! It was so much fun and we got so many happy and excited looks from people who I know truly appreciated what we were doing. For instance one guy was crying as he thanked us for coming. He had to spend Christmas alone and he said that we were a huge blessing. It was super cool, we were able to find some really solid potential investigators out of it! 

It was so cool to be able to spend all of Christmas at my cousin Jamies house, she actually gave us a bunch of gifts. It was super funny because she gave us both ties and was really scared we wouldnt like the ties because they spent so long picking them out. They are so great! 

I got to go on Exchanges with some Elders from my District. It was really fun and we were able to find a lot of people. We had a super solid lesson with some investigators we picked up that day, and it was great. We basically had the 1st lesson that every missionary should have! They arent ready to be baptized yet but they want to do it, they just wont commit to a date yet. Thats ok though, we can for sure work with it! Everything else is going well, our District Fast really brought in the blessings! In our area alone we were able to see miracles! Im really happy that things are going well! I hope every one of you have a Happy New Year!

Elder Carper

Merry Christmas

Hey Everyone! It will be pretty short cause I have a lot to do! Its been pretty crazy being over here in the weirdly hot weather at Christmas time! This week was super disappointing in the fact that so many of our lessons fell through! It was way sad, but the other good news is that my Greenie doesnt suck! His name is Elder Myers and he is from Charlestown Indiana, and even though we have nothing in common he is willing to do anything to be the best missionary possible! He enjoys working hard and being obedient so I cant complain at all! 

So this week was also my very first District meeting, and it wasnt a complete disaster....Nah it actually went really well, afterwards the whole District gave the Sisters a blessing so that they can be comforted even though there isnt a whole lot happening for them. Its super weird haha people will text me and ask to leave their area and my first thought is always "why the heck should I care?" then I remember the sad truth that I have to give them permission...which is also super weird. I guess that will take some getting used to! I have a leadership training with the Assistants on tuesday to go over some things. The biggest thing I am trying to do is make sure my district knows how much I love them and how much time I spend in prayer trying to figure out how I can help them. They are super awesome though and the Lord knew i was going to be a terrible District leader so he brought in the best missionaries in the Mission to make my life easier! 

I really want to take the time to wish all of you a wonderful Christmas! I am so grateful for all of the support I have recieved and all of the testimonies that I get to hear that have strengthened mine. Being on a mission has been the best decision of my whole life, and I say that without reserve! It makes me sad that I went most of my life without any real relationship with my heavenly Father, but I am so grateful that I can see the difference it makes in my life. This truly is His church and I know I am serving His mission. I am thrilled to be here and to be able to share his love with the people of Bakersfield! The Church is TRUE!

Elder Carper

Make It Up to Ya........

This week was super sweet! There were some cool miracles that happened this week! The first being that I was able to go to the Family History Center with Jamie on tuesday! Basically she just showed me a bunch of pictures of our family. She showed me my Grandfathers wedding photo, which was crazy! He had hair, and was rollin with the super skinny tie! It was so cool that we were able to see all these pictures and information! The next part of the week was completely full! We are moving into an apartment instead of the house so we had to DEEP CLEAN the house. Missionaries have lived there for years and so it was a really hard task but we eventually got it done! We moved everything over to our new apartment with is actually right next to the one I had in Fairview! Pretty cool haha. Elder Linford also had to pack for Brazil. We had a super huge ward christmas party, and they asked all the missionaries to sing. So ya we performed in front of the whole ward, the more I have to sing, the less I like it! 

The biggest miracle this week was the baptism of Theodore and Princess! It was such a spiritual meeting and I was so blessed to be able to confirm Princess a member of the Church! It was my highlight of the week! I loved it! 

So transfers are here and I am staying! Elder Linford left for Brazil this morning so I will be getting a new companion. Literally, he will be brand new haha they asked me to train again. The Assistants called me on Sunday night and asked me to be a trainer again. They said "We were really sad to see Elder Linford go and also sad you didn't get to finish training, so President decided to make it up to you." I was like ok cool I would love to train, and then they said "going along with President making it up to you, we would like to extent a call for you to be the District leader in the Panama district." So I guess Presidents idea of "making it up to you" is more responsibility haha. I am actually excited even though I would never have wanted to admit it earlier in my mission. I am really nervous because I want to help the missionaries here as best I can, but I have never been a district leader before...so ya we will have to see how this goes down! I hope each and every one of you have a wonderful week and an amazing Christmas! 

 

Elder Carper

Surprises in South Bakersfield

 

 

This week has been absolutely crazy! We got like no work done in our area but we were busy every second of the day! Tuesday we were on exchanges with our District Leader. We had to do it week 3 so that our District Leader could make sure I was actually training Elder Linford right. I went with his companion Elder Thomas. He was super interesting, I asked him if he liked sports and he said "I only like sports that are thousands of years old." Ya he jousts....Im not kidding. At that moment I knew we had nothing in common haha. On wednesday we figured out that the South Sisters went home, for reasons unknown, and we are taking over their area. This is the second time I have had to take over someones area while keeping my own. Its in no way fun, and its frusterating. The good news is that the sisters were pretty good missionaries and they had planned for us and had stuff for us to do. We inherited their car, its a pretty sick Ford Fusion! Also on wednesday we got a new phone, and the transition took like 2 hours! It was pretty lame we didnt get to work nearly as much as I would have liked. Thursday was a good day, we had dinner with Elder Moyes, the mission medical dude. It was sick cause his daughter married a spanish guy and so we had a ton of mexican food on top of normal stuff! Then we had another dinner with a less active family, by the time we were done I was in some serious pain! Not really but it was hard to go work, all the doors we knocked on were really rude. I dont blame them honestly but whatevs! 

The Highlight of my week happened on Friday! I got a refferal last monday from my Grandma to go see my cousin who just moved to Bakersfield. She gave me the address and she just so happens to live in my tiny area! That is for sure a testimony that the Lord knows where his children are at all times! We finally found time to go over there on friday and I was able to talk to Jamie (my cousin) for a long time about her history with the church as well as some funny stories about my relatives! It was so awesome to be able to meet her. She said that for Christmas her Mom and brother and Sister are coming. So hopefully i get to see them again as well! 

The other cool news is that Elder Linford got his visa. He will be leaving on December 15th. Im super sad that I dont get to finish training him! It has been a really good experience for me! Ill miss that little kid...who is actually older than me. Anyways I love you all! Keep the missionaries in your prayers and always remember that Christ is the center of everything!

 

Elder Carper

 

This is the rough draft of our christmas card!