October 17, 2011

Dear family,

I'm doing great, as always! You have to know that I'll say that I'm doing great pretty much every letter unless I had an absolutely horrible week - which hasn't happened yet. So I guess to be more realistic, I'm doing just average. But don't worry, that's a good thing :) I'm just truckin' along out here in the OTM and I'm still alive. I'm not sick anymore, so don't worry too much. But yes, I'm a happy missionary and I love life.

Before I forget, transfer calls were this past Saturday!! Any guesses?!? Any guesses??? Hmm???????? Haha jk :) I'm staying here in Springdale and my new companion's name is Elder Capitan. I don't know much about him, but from what I've heard he's a fun missionary with lots of experience, he's Indian, and he's from the Four Corners area. We'll see if that's all true this coming Thursday, but the one for sure thing is that Elder Navratil is going home. It was super funny when the Assistants called us because they told Elder Navratil that he's "being called home and you'll be junior companion to the woman of your choice." It was pretty funny. I'll tell you more about Elder Capitan and his awesomeness and diligence and un-trunkiness next week.

Anyways. Thanks for sending the Ensign! It's seriously one of the best Ensign's ever! Our apartment has one (it has to stay in the apartment), but it will be nice to have my own copy wherever I go. I love it when you send me stuff in the mail :)

I'm sure jealous of your little kabob get-together. Sounds fun! We get fed well out here, but I could always go for a kabob. And that's sweet that Daniel gave his farewell talk. I wish I could've been there. He's going to be a great missionary. Wish him luck for me!

Elise is engaged? To a redhead? Hahaha sweet :)

Wow, I'm really impressed with the cake, Mom. I really like it. But I wish I could've had some of the cake trimmings. It's little things like that that make me miss home...

As to answer your question, every Sunday we go to Gospel Principles for class, because that's where all the recent converts/investigators go. Sometimes we teach the class because Bro. Lieutard (the teacher) is gone for work a lot. The story of Paul is sure a great one. It must've taken a lot of courage to preach the gospel in such hostile environments. That makes the OTM sound like a cake walk. We use stories like his (as well as other apostles) to show people that people were converted to the gospel through awesome missionary work, but eventually the apostles were killed off, thus leading to the Great Apostasy. Interesting stuff. Mom, I'm proud of you for bearing your testimony. It just shows that sometimes it's hard to harbor the beast of a testimony you have :)

This week was stake conference for the Springdale stake. Elder Navratil and I sang in our ward choir, and so it was double legit. It was one of the better stake conferences I've been too, and the spirit was very strong the whole entire time. Man, the members here are so awesome! President Phillips (1st counselor in the stake presidency) gave a really great talk about missionary work and being examples to those around us. He brought up some of the stuff that's been said about our church lately. I really loved one of the analogies he shared, so I thought I'd share it with you:

Just imagine yourself walking into the forest. You're carrying a jar full of honey. You walk for a long time, until you are in the middle of the woods, and you place the jar on the ground. Then you walk away. Now imagine yourself walking back the next day and finding the jar again. It's honey is all gone and you notice that the jar is even tipped over. Whoever ate the honey must've really liked it and gotten quite a good share. Maybe there were multiple partakers of honey.

We can relate this jar of honey to ourselves and even more specifically - members of the church. We've got the honey. And people wonder about our honey. It's a very peculiar honey, and a very special honey. Some people can say bad things about our honey, but others take a taste due to curiosity. Some even taste it when we aren't looking. Are our jars full? Full enough that if you tip it just the slightest bit, honey drips over the edge? (I laughed at that one. He was VERY descriptive and just overall hilarious) We need to have our jars full, because we never know who's watching. And yes, there are many watching. Some are watching our every move. For others, we are "the only Book of Mormon they've ever read", or the only honey they've tasted. Keep your jars full, place them out in the open, and let people have a taste. Remember, we have the honey :)

We weren't able to get any investigators to stake conference, but at least we got Nichole to bring Kevin. As I've mentioned in the past, Kevin has slowly but surely been coming back to church. Yesterday was his first Sunday back at church, and I could tell that he absolutely loved it. He even got emotional sometimes. Either way it was a perfect stake conference for someone like him. They're totally going to get sealed in the temple! We've been making plans with them to make a "map to the temple." They're thinking about a date next year when they can go, and the map is to help them achieve that goal. I'm so excited, and the ward is too. There are quite a few less-actives out here, but when we get a couple like Nichole and Kevin, the ward gets excited.

We tried to get Betty and her family to stake conference, but they weren't able to make it. It's starting to look like they weren't as golden as we originally thought, but our hopes are still high. She had to cancel our appointment yesterday afternoon, but she mentioned that she has a lot of questions after watching the Restoration DVD again with her kids. She's still very interested and very intrigued. We'll see what happens.

On Saturday I got my first flat tire. Hooray! I hit a curb too hard and it slowly went flat. It took us a while to get back home, but I was able to repair the tire when I woke up this morning.

I love you so much! Thanks for all you do and for your prayers. 

Talk to you soon.

Love, Elder Atkin