December 10

The AP's, Elder Christensen, Elder Nelson, Pres and Sis Irion, Andrew

Andrew's in the yellow tie in the far right corner, this is at the dinner following Elder Nelson speaking to the mission.

Hey Mom!

So good to hear from everyone. Life In Tennessee is so so so awesome! Yeah I've been wearing a short sleeved shirt all week the weather is so sweet. Ok so a couple way awesome things happened this week. To start we were visiting the b family, super cool less active family, but they started to come back to church. On a side note they totally have a pet squirrel and we played with their pet squirrel, he totally was eating pretzels on top of my head. Also we tract multi-million dollar lake houses (totally knocked on the door from the CEO of Mastercraft). 

Hmm what else cool happened? Oh yeah ELDER NELSON came and since we are in the mission home area we got to go over the night he got in and Elder Christensen, the AP's, the Irions, ELDER NELSON, and I all got to hang out, eat desert and have small talk for an hour or so. That man is a man of God there is no doubt about it. Then the next day he spoke to the mission. My brain felt like soup after he spoke, it was so crazy! He also left an apostolic blessing on us and there was really nothing like the spirit that was there in that room. 

Also we just got 2 new investigators that are both member referrals. One named Robert and he is really taking the lessons and exploring the church very seriously and he is reading and praying about the book of mormon, such a stud this guy is totally going to be baptized soon. while we were teaching him last night we got a phone call with our other referral and it was a part member family’s home teacher. He called us and said that the wife of the guy he home teaches decided she wants to start taking the lessons because she wants to be baptized! so exciting, can’t wait to teach her!  

Elder Christensen and I have been really striving for exact obedience and we have really been working hard so we are having success. (funny how that works right? -gotta love life lessons) The meal calendar doesn’t have a day on the calendar not filled and we constantly have people wanting us to fit them in somewhere! The work is awesome and I am having the time of my life. The gospel is true and I'm really loving the changes it makes in my life as well as watching the changes in the people around me. 

Tis the season to share of our abundance. not only do we have an abundance of worldly things but also we have an abundance of the gospel. So everyone do yourself a favor and receive the blessings that come from sharing the gospel with those that don’t have it!

I love you all oh and tennessee-ism of the week is -farsee ( a measure of distance: you go as far as you can see. 2 farsees is you go as far as you can see once then as far as you can see again) ha gotta love it. 

Love Elder Bakker