March 29, 2010

Hey Family,
This week was awesome. Our prayers were answered and we saw many hearts change. Last night I said some things on the tape I'm making so I'll just touch on a couple things in the e-mail. We did have the baptism! Donald was baptised by Elder Eldredge and I confirmed him on Sunday, yesterday. It was the first baptism for the both of us and it went good.
We also got to go to the Nauvoo Temple on Saturday and we got to go through the temple with Brother Tingley (our branch mission leader) and his wife for their first time then got to see them sealed. I had never been to a sealing so it was awesome. We did not even tell him we were going to be there, but we were able to pull some strings and showed up, and he was so happy to see us there with him. At the last zone conference, our mission president told all the missionaries that with the mission closing in a few months, there would be no more temple trips. We totally forgot that, so we called the President and asked if we could go. He said there were no more Temple trips, but we were working hard and deserved it, so he let us go if we didn't tell anyone. There is a picture of Brother Tingley and his wife, and also a picture of Elder Eldredge and I with our branch President, President Nickles. It has been a very spiritual week.
We have been specific in our prayers, to be able to find a family that knows a family in the Clinton branch and be able to teach them. On Thursday morning we got a call from a member that wanted us to go over to her friend's house to give her a blessing. She is a non-member and so went over to give her one. When we were done she started asking about very deep questions about life and that kind of thing. We taught her the first lesson and both of us bore a very powerful testimony and committed her to be baptised. She said yes and wants her family to be baptized as well. So our prayers were answered that very day. We found and taught a family that knew a family in the Clinton branch.
Our investigators have made huge progress this week. Last week an investigator of ours was scared to pray and did not think he was worthy to pray. This week we came by for the appointment and he started telling us that he had been praying and wanted to be baptised! Another investigator we have is Catherine and Eric. Catherine has been sick for a few weeks and so we haven't seen her for a while. Her boyfriend Eric, did not like us at all. He wouldn't answer the door when we knocked and would always blow off our appointments. So we were about to drop them but thought we should try their door one more time. They let us in and Eric started talking about the Book of Mormon. We got into a huge discussion about it (which had never happened before) and then he said, "You know, I usually don't like people coming into my house and teaching me about this kind of thing, but you two, I like you, you are welcome here any time". I have never seen so many prayers answered and so many miracles come about. The Lord has really helped us out this week and is blessing the people here in Clinton.
I LOVE YOU ALL -Elder Hale
(I can't get the pictures loaded onto this site, they got e-mailed to us in a weird format. Trust me, they are great pictures!)