Colwyn Bay

Hello Family!

I'm serving in Colwyn Bay!! It is absolutely gorgeous here. You will have to look it up on the internet because it is beautiful. It is a coastal resort town in Whales. The weather is perfect and there is practically no ghetto areas. I'm loving it! We even have a solid investigator with a baptismal date, which is not what you expect in an area like this. I hear that the branch out here is a little crazy, so I'm excited for that as well. I have already heard many great stories about what happens in the branch. We meet in an office building, I haven't been there yet, but I'm excited to go this Sunday. I'm serving with Elder Hanks. He is a die hard Ute fan which makes me want to throw up constantly, but we are getting along fine. We just can't talk about college sports. The missionaries apparently just barely moved into the flat that we are staying in right now. I love it. It is way small and perfect for a missionary flat, we even have our own reclinable sofas. This is also my first bus area, so I was able to buy my first bus pass and do some bus contacting! Good stuff. I'll send a few pictures but I haven't taken any pictures of the area yet. I will definitely be sending some soon. There are so many things to take pictures of. Oh, and I'm feeling fine now. I had a cough yesterday but I'm doing great. Anyway, thank you for the emails and it was good to talk to you all, even though I was sick.

Love,

Elder Misbach

Pictures: 1) Me and Elder and Sister Cannon (Joe's parents) 2) Christmas tree in Telford 3) Elder Rapata and I with the Wrekin Elders at the Hoars home on Christmas 4) Elder Rapata and I as I was leaving 5) My new companion Elder Hanks

Baptized!!

Hello Family,

My first baptism!! Woo! It finally arrived, and although it didn't go nearly as smoothly as it should have Craig is now baptised and confirmed. We received 10 inches of snow on the day of the baptism, and England is amazingly ill-equipped to handle snow, so there was a brief time when we thought that we might have to postpone the baptism. Then we realized it was much more important for Craig to receive the Holy Ghost than wait for three weeks just so more members could see it.

After we decided to go ahead with the baptism we started to worry that no one would be there and we were just trying to ensure that we had at least another witness. Luckily we have a strong ward here and there was a pretty good showing, with a lot of late-comers.

Then the baptismal service began and it was certainly less than spectacular, haha. We had a member of the bishopric who had been called just last week. He is very handsy when he speaks and has trouble getting to the point, and he decided to not use the podium when he welcomed Craig to the ward, haha. But we were just grateful he came. We also had a speaker who only joined the church last march and has just been called to be the first counselor in the Elders quorum. He gave a very interesting talk on the Holy Ghost including one part where he mentioned that after Craig was confirmed he would be "invaded" by the Holy Ghost, haha. That was enjoyable.

Then it was up to me. All I had to do was memorize one sentence. I probably said it over 100 times in the two days leading up to the baptism. But when it really counted, I choked, haha. I said "having been commissioned BY Jesus Christ" as opposed to "having been commissioned OF Jesus Christ" I honestly don't know how that happened and I knew it was wrong as soon as I said it, but needless to say it was fairly embarrassing. But then he was baptised and the purpose to the service was accomplished. Craig's Brother and Grandfather came which was good because his mother wasn't able to make it.

Overall it wasn't nearly how I thought it would be, but it was great. And it was on my six month anniversary, which I thought was cool. I included a good picture and a random picture.

Talk to you soon!!

Hello Family!

So I like the idea of sending a general update of myself to everyone and then responding individually. It seemed to work out nicely that one time. That way I don't have to type the same information 3 or 4 different times.

As for Elder Rapata and I in Telford, things are fantastic! We have another dated investigator. We walked to church with him yesterday. He is the most intelligent person I have taught so far on my mission and he is only 14 years old. His name is Craig and he is taking a R.E. (Religious Education) class at his school, which is why his mom said he would be interested. He keeps telling us stories about how he already knows the answers in R.E. because of what we are teaching him, haha. We told him that he probably knows more than the teacher. We are teaching his mom as well, but she doesn't have quite the same commitment Craig does. He should be baptized on the 11th of December! Long time between now and then, but I'm still excited.

The other dated investigator is named Kara and she is the finance of a member's less active son. She is doing really great. She has lived a very rough life so far and she tells us about how happy she has been since meeting with us. She has felt the spirit a ton and loves to tell us about it. She should be baptized on the 18th.

It was a pretty good week overall because of the progress we made with Craig and Kara. We really struggled to find new people though. I haven't experienced success yet, so now that we actually have some, I struggled to schedule things correctly and keep the right mind set. It's tough to go from teaching people that accept everything you say, to out on the streets where people aren't quite as nice. So, our finding was actually the worst of my mission, but we will do better.

Other than that, things are just going well. Elder Rapata and I get along very well. We haven't had any real conflicts. Because we are both fairly new we have a very similar mindset and we mesh well. It's getting very cold. They describe the cold here as one that sinks into you, and now I get what they mean. It's pretty brutal. Especially with the wind chill on the bikes. Overall though things are great.

Love,

Elder Misbach

Good Ol' England

Hello Family!

First off, thank you very much for the emails, they are the highlight of my week. I don't have a ton of time this week for various reasons, so I'll send a few individual replies, but I thought I would try one big general reply this week.

I'm very glad that everyone seems to be doing well, I hope that everyone had a good Halloween. I'll send a picture that shows the highlights of how I spent mine. We had to be in at 5 because of all the stuff that goes on at night. It is kind of cool right now though, because fireworks are allowed during the week prior to Guy Fawkes Day, so we were able to hear a ton of them and even see a few. Basically I spent the extra time trying to get my "whites" to the point where I felt they were worthy of that title again, reading Jesus the Christ which is just amazing, talking to Elder Holman about the three Nephites and John the Beloved still being alive; Bigfoot; and how incomplete the Bible is, drinking some delicious strawberry milk from a wine glass because I was too lazy to wash a normal one (plus I felt like it was a special occasion), and taking a very lengthy shower. I enjoyed it quite thoroughly.

As for England, it is doing great. It is beautiful over here right now. The weather isn't too cold and the trees are gorgeous. I went on two exchanges this week, one was with my district leader and one was with an assistant to the president. (The assistants came because lately Elder Holman has really been struggling). Both of them were amazing. Elder Craig (district leader) and I taught a Rastafarian (AKA people who justify smoking weed by placing it under the title of religion) who was very interesting. He was very happy. We also went down the biggest hill in our area called Wombridge Way. I have very limited breaks right now so I always just use the grass to slow me down, but I failed to realize the wet conditions. My fenders have been gone for quite a while so I got DRENCHED in mud. It was intense. It took me quite a while to get my suit to the point where I could justify not dry cleaning it. My exchange with Elder Lunt (the assistant) was just amazing and spiritual. He leaves this week and Telford was one of his old areas, so it was just amazing.

Other than that there isn't much to say about Telford. Things are still trying to pick up, and we have a lot of potential, but nothing real promising yet. I should be leaving next week, but you never know what the Lord has in store.

I love you all very much, thank you for the emails and support. I wont be emailing again until either Wednesday or Thursday next week, depending on if I get transferred or not.

Love you!

Elder Misbach

Latest News

Hi-
As for transfers, it is in 2 weeks from Wednesday. I have no idea where I will go, but I'm pretty excited for it. As for Telford things are definitely going better. We saw some success last week but we are really looking forward to this week. I have a good feeling about it. There still isn't much to say, but I'll share some quick stories.

One man I talked to told me about how he had just come out of prison and he believed in God because people die. He said that nothing happens after we die because we wouldn't be able to handle what we left behind, but God loves us, so everything just ends when we die, we don't have to think about it. First time I had heard that one. He then went on to say that just from looking at us he could tell that Elder Holman believes in God more than I do and I that I am afraid of death. He was an interesting character.

Last Tuesday it started to rain and hail so hard that I began to drip inside of my suit. It was the wettest I have ever been.



I met a woman a long time ago that said that she didn't believe in God but she knows that He is there...

I also heard a story about a missionary in another mission that wanted to get transferred right away so he decided to start freaking out the members. Whenever he would have a conversation with a member, right in the middle of it, he would just randomly shake his head and convulse for a second or two and then act like nothing happened. I thoroughly enjoyed that story.

And this week we contacted a man dressed as a woman that said he didn't have time because he was "on the clock." I'll I could think was how badly he needed to get off the clock and into some man's clothing.

Anyway, I'm going to try to send the pictures now. Hope all is well.

Love to you all- Elder Misbach

September 6, 2010 September 13, 2010

Hey mom!

I enjoy the quotes quite a bit. Ya the new place is great. The electricity isn't the best. Our study room and all of the upstairs has a short, so none of the lights turn on, haha. But we get through it. And I'm actually getting my bike fixed today. I'm thinking I probably won't be in a bike area by Christmas, but thank you. I'm excited for my bike to run smoothly. I'll try to remember to take some pictures this week of the new place and stuff.

You should send a shout out to Kacey from me on the blog. It was good to hear from all the family, I didn't even realize they were looking at the blog and stuff.

As for things in England, they are going ok. Elder Holman and I aren't getting along to great right now. I went from Elder Kersey, who was a bit overly strict, to Elder Holman, who isn't nearly strict enough. And I have had issues with both of them, haha. One because I wasn't as in to the work as I should have been, and the other because he feels I am too into the work. I have brought up the issue with Elder Holman and he isn't too happy about it. We tracted (knocked doors) for 5 hours yesterday! and for about 2 of those hours we didn't really talk to each other, haha. We are fine now, and in the end he always says that I'm right (whether or not i actually am, idk) but in general I'm trying to be more obedient and it isn't going over very well for the companion ship. We pretty much haven't had any success as far as the work. I think that is mostly because we aren't getting along as good as we should and because we aren't being very obedient. I hope that my email next week will be a bit more upbeat about the situation.

I do have a good story this week. For two days we worked as a threesome because Elder Green from the next area went to leadership training and his companion Elder Huges came to work with us. The first day we worked in their area (which is beautiful, by the way) and it went really well. We had a lot of lessons and the spirit was way strong, it was definitely good. But on the way back to the flat, we had to hurry because we needed to get back to the flat and we were on the complete opposite side of their area. My brakes on my bike don't really work (the reason why it's in the shop today) so I couldn't go as fast as them and I was just about to yell at them when we went around a corner and they were completely gone. It was rather surreal. I decided to go the way I thought was correct and just hope they were waiting for me. I went a little ways and realized they were no where in sight. I then saw two kids walking on the side of the road and asked them if they had seen two men dressed like myself come by on bikes and they said they hadn't. I realized then that I was lost. It was completely dark by this time, it was about 8:40 and it was very interesting. I asked the kid if I could use her phone and she said yes. Then I proceeded to dial the wrong number about 4 times, haha. The girl had to enter a password everytime I dialed too, it was great. Finally, I looked in my planner and it was there. I got into contact with Elder Holman and they came and found me. I contacted a few people while I waited for them as well. We absolutely booked it back (I have never pushed myself that hard in my life) and we made it back exactly on time, 9 o'clock. There were so many miracles that happened that night it's amazing. The Lord was definitely on my side. It's ironic though because out of the three of us, two of us had phones and knew the area, one of us did not have a phone and no clue about the area, especially at night, and that was the missionary that got lost, haha.

Anyway, just thought I'd share that. Hope you enjoy it, haha. I love you very much, thank you for everything, I hope Aspen Grove is fun, and I hope everything is going well. I love you!

Elder Misbach

9/13/10-

The new apartment is going well. The mission president and his wife are actually going around to all the flats to personally inspect them this transfer. This is only the second time they have done this, so we really lucked out. I bet ours will be the cleanest in the mission. Elder Green actually fixed the upstairs lights, which was awesome. We only have one room with no electricity, it's our study room, which is annoying, but it's not worth the hassle of calling the landlord. We just use handheld lights. My bike is fixed, thankfully. I fully fixed it this morning. Ya, depending on what area you are in is what determines what transportation you take There are some areas that have cars, some use buses, and some use bikes. Chances are I won't be in a bike area after this one, and I'll probably only be in this area for another 9 weeks. I really don't need anything sent to me. There are a couple of CD's I would like, but I figure I'll just ask for those for Christmas. If you would like to send me some American candy (sour patch, chewy sweet tarts, pez, starbursts, etc.) (not chocolate though because the chocolate here is actually way better) I would greatly appreciate it. But you really don't need to send me anything, I'm fine. Thank you though.

haha, I love hearing the Cole quotes. I miss you all very much too.

I'm glad Aspen Grove went well. And I hope the birthdays went well. CB seemed to like his and I enjoy his goatee. I certainly hope that school is going well for Cole and Cooper. I got the email from Cooper and thoroughly enjoyed it.

As for England, things are going much better. We had a lot of success this last week. We had zone conference last week and it seems to have inspired both Elder Holman and I. We are starting to do all the little things and it is amazing how much the Lord blesses you when you just put forth the effort. We really have seen miracles. Right now the woman we are really excited for is a woman named Freeda. She was someone I contacted a few weeks before I stopped working with Elder Kersey. I had made multiple appointments with her and she just kept falling through. She always had an excuse and said she was really interested though so I kept rescheduling here. This last week I rescheduled her for Friday afternoon and she fell through again and rescheduled for Saturday morning. This was her last chance. This was the fifth appointment we had made with her. We knocked on the door twice with no answer. We were so disappointed and irritated. We started to right a note to leave on her door and like 3 minutes later the door opens, haha. It was Freeda's daughter who told us Freeda was just in the shower. We ended up teaching her that day. We had to sit outside while she sat inside because her husband wasn't home, but it was an amazing lesson. She was very interested and couldn't believe that faithful young women in our church were virgins until they got married, haha. It started to poor rain and we wrapped it up, but she is very solid. I love it when we find people to teach!

I love you very much. Thank you for everything. I hope that everything is going well and that everyone is happy. I'm going to try and send some pictures, but we will see. I love you!

The girl in these photos is named Gayle Marshal. Elder Kersey and I found her but she was taught in the area next to us. She is the first person that I have found that has been baptized =) it was an amazing baptism. And Guin just wanted to say hi.