Semana 32 - CTR6A & Oreos; Houston's Bday; It's True I Tell You!

Dear family!

This week has been really great and full of so many wonderful experiences! I guess I'll just start from the beginning...

Monday we went over to Ramon's house and cut down a tree that fell on his house the week before (it didn't damage anything, thankfully). The only thing we had as a twelve inch saw...but it worked haha. Ramon came home right as we were finishing and was so grateful.


Me & Elder Anderson, a tiny saw, and a huge tree!

Last P-Day we had Elder Gay from the seventy come and speak to us, like I told you last week. Elder Anderson and I decided to put into practice some things that we learned. Wednesday we had a "transfer plan re-evaluation" where we decided to review our transfer baptism plan and re work it to make it more effective. We prayed for inspiration and decided to just focus on a specific trailer park where quite a few of members live. We also picked some potential to focus on as well. Every night this week we worked in that area for 3 hours.

Juan and Emily finally got a court date to finalize everything on the 30th of August...so I probably won't be in the area anymore haha but I'm super happy! Juan joked to us that he wants to do the court on the 30th, get married on the 1st and get baptized on the 2nd ha! What a cool guy!

The CTR6A class sent me a letter and some oreos! That was really nice! (I didn't recognize any of the names though...so many little kids in your ward!!) I am going to send them a reply back soon!

Saturday we fasted for our area. We worked hard all that day and night. Then Sunday came...and we had 4 investigators to church!!! They were these 3 stud 12 year olds and one 7 year old hahah! We talked to them in the trailer park the night before and they all wanted to come to church! The oldest one's (Juan) mom is actually a less active member and his older brother is baptized too. The kids said they all loved church and want to come next week, along with Juan's mom, brother and 4 other youth from the park. It's a small miracle but it had such a huge impact on me. Fasting really works! The 3 kids want to take the lessons and hopefully get baptized. We just need to keep working hard!

I sent Houston a b-day card! Hopefully you get it soon cuz we're pretty proud of it. Hope he has a good one!


Me and Quinonez with the B-day card I sent Houston. (Tell him to press the "P.S." button when he gets it. It's legit.)

The BoM is amazing and it's crazy that I've almost finished it AGAIN! I learn so much everyday it's hard to really keep up! I'd like to share how I know the BoM is true...read Helaman 12:15. It talks of how the earth revolves around the sun. IT'S TRUE I TELL YOU! THE BOOK OF MORMON IS TRUE!!!! Hahaha but for reals, it is:)

I don't hear from Elder Hamilton much at all. I hope he's doing well. I'm glad Elder Johnson is being a stud haha! I knew he would:)

Well, I'm gonna go now! I still need to download and send some pictures to you!

Love you all! Pray for you all too, duh!

Love Elder Heimuli

More Pics:

The newest rap music sensation, The Marietta Mormons (Me, Elder Anderson, Elder Quinonez and Elder Henderson)


Utah doesn't have cool KFCs like Georgia! That is one big chicken.


Wow, even the little chickens in Georgia are cool...

Missionaries carry such wonderful messages, like "The Church is True," "Jesus Loves You," and this one...

"Spay and Neuter Your Pet"

Semana 31 - Working really hard; How to maintain a testimony; Nephi's blessing

Dear family,

Haha it surprised me how short your letter was to me this week but it's a sign that things have slowed down a bit over there? You guys get a break haha?! It's the opposite for me over here in Marietta! Elder Anderson and I have been working really hard this past week. We just finished with our area map (updating members, less actives, investigators and potentials and pinning a flag where they live) about a week ago and it has really helped make our work more efficient. It also helps when there's no one home to tract into from 1-5 in the afternoons, so we start tracking down less actives and visiting members. Our branch currently has over one hundred members on record, but only about 30 are active. Needless to say most of our work this week was tracking down and teaching less actives. Our message to pretty much all of them was that going to church is one of the most essential parts of maintaining a testimony and recieving blessings. By about the third person we taught, we were SO sick of the "I can't go cuz I work" excuse. We were hoping to get 5 less actives to church yesterday, but none showed up. We'll keep working with them as the transfer goes on.

We spent the other part of our time just contacting and finding (trying to at least) investigators. We did find quite a few people that would listen to us, but whether they progress or not is totally up to them. We hope that they do. Carpenter (Spanish ZL) just told us that the whole zone is going up! Anderson and I just pray and work everyday in faith that we will find those people that are elect. We're both getting a long great and both share the desire to work hard! It's crazy how this transfer is already half way over!

Let's see, you're questions...the best thing that happend would probably be our interviews with President Satterfield. He is so amazing. I learned a lot from what we talked about and I have been applying the things he suggested to me like focus my studies more and other stuff like that. Everyday I learn SO MUCH MORE than I have just doing random studies. Yes, it's still super hot and humid and I don't like it at all! But i'm drinking lots of water! I did recieve your package you sent me w the food (thank you guys so much) and Harrison's letter with the pictures. I will try to send hand written letters soon! We had to wait ANOTHER week to hear word about the divorce...so tomorrow we will see. Pray for us! It's cool though, cuz Juan is one of the strongest people in the branch and he's not even a member! Such a stud. I love him. I did get the primary letters...well, 3 of them. If that's all, then cool:) I'll sent a thank you soon!

The reading has been going well for me. I am in 3 Nephi and he is such a good example for missionary work. Nephi does the whole thing with the crowd of people and predicting the murder of the chief judge (starting at Helaman 8:27), and despite that everyone just ends up going their own ways, unchanged. Nephi is walking home alone when god speaks to him and tells him since he was such a faithful missionary. If you see how the scripture is set up it shows that God actually gives him a blessing! God says Nephi's name, states his authority ("I am God") and tells hime that everything that he binds on earth will be bound in heaven and so on. This blessing came about because Nephi labored without ceasing. This is how missionaries should be. Makes me feel like not such a hot shot missionary hahahah but I know that that's something I want to achieve. Pretty cool, I thought.

Anyways, everything is going well out here! Hope you all have a great week!

Love, Elder Heimuli

Semana 30 - People Wanna Talk About Jesus More When They're Plastered, Adios Elizabeth, Alma 24:30

Dear family,

I'm so glad to hear that everyone is doing well! I'm doing well out here too! For the BEST thing that happened to me this week would have to be...Elder (Scott) Anderson and I finished making our map for the area. Now, hopefully, we will be able to work ten times more effectively and maybe see 2 baptisms this transfer! Anderson and I are getting along great. We are actually very similar in a lot of ways and we are working hard to bring some people to baptism. No I didn't get the box yet...I actually haven't gotten anything for more than a week, but I'm waiting!

We spent all Sunday night walking around finding and talking to as many hispanics as we could. The majority of the people we talked to were drunk, but they were really nice and we got some good contacts and set appointments. (It's gonna be funny when we go back in a couple days and they're sober, wondering why we're there wanting to teach a lesson--people just wanna talk about Jesus more when they're plastered.)

This past week we have just been working on that map, trying to contact referals that we've recieved and visit less actives. We haven't had much success on any front besides the map but we're gonna kick it into gear this week.

Recently we've been having some members move back to their native countries--fear of that law is probably what drives most of them. This past week our good friend Elizabeth and her son Alan left to Guatemala. We will miss them!


(Front: Elizabeth & Alan; Back: me, Anderson, Prince, Wood, Henderson and Quinonez)

In the scriptures I am reading the war chapters, so not as much spiritual stuff as there are action stuff. Some things it talks about is the different degrees of wickedness of certain peoples. I believe it's the Zoramites and other dissenters of the Nephites. There is a scripture that says something to the effect of how ones that have recieved the light and knowledge but then fall away are even more hard hearted than those who have never known it.

"Alma 24:30 And thus we can plainly discern, that after a people have been once enlightened by the Spirit of God, and have had great knowledge of things pertaining to righteousness, and then have fallen away into sin and transgression, they become more hardened, and thus their state becomes worse than though they had never known these things."

The most destructive people to the church are those that have gone apostate. There are so many examples of this in the BoM and you can look around and find it still applies today. The ones who go less active or stop going to church are hard to bring back into the gospel. This doesn't mean that I'm not gonna try, but it makes it that much harder. FAMILY: I pray that whoever recieves a testimony of these things and are members of the chruch fortify themselves and stay in the strait and narrow path always.

Well, thank you so much for all you do and I'm sending pictures! Love you all!

--Elder Heimuli


One more pic (above): Elder Heimuli & Elder Charlesworth (he's the greenie in the district, but Helam affectionately calls him Prince)

Semana 29 - Transfers?...Oh, Canada...Look Out, Refrigerators!

Hi family,

Well, it's Tuesday now and I'm writing this today because we couldn't get to a computer during the 4th of July! Everything is going good here down in...MARIETTA! That's right, I am here for yet another transfer hahaha! It's my 4th one here in the same area and I was positive I was out. Actually, everyone in our district thought Henderson and I were the ones leaving--turns out we were the only ones that stayed haha! Everyone else in our district left. I'm excited to be here and continue the work that I've been doing since the start of my mission. My new companion is Elder Anderson. He is from Cardston, Alberta, Canada. He says it's about 15 minutes from the US border? Anyways, it's kinda crazy because he is only one transfer ahead of me. So, that means we are both terrible at Spanish...that also means we'll learn a lot this transfer haha! I am really excited for the challenge and I've actually been hoping for something like this just to see how well I can handle it! Pray for me!


Elder Anderson from Cardston, Alberta, Canada

4th of July was really great! P-day was extended until 8:30 (usually 6:00) and we didn't email either, so we had a lot of time to do stuff. We went thrifting and I got a super cool grey suit and some skinny ties (if you guys find any cool skinny ties, send 'em my way!). We had a barbecue with everyone in our ward which was also a going away party for one of the members who is moving back to Guatemala. Sad but very exciting at the same time! Then we just played sports to end the night. I am very sore right now. We played with a kid named Angel who is an Atheist, but he likes hanging out with us so we'll see what happends with that!

The whole past week Anderson and I have just been working our hardest. We have been doing a mixture of less active work and visiting members. We recieved a referal for a guy named Jorge and taught him the other night. He was worried about the second coming and what he needs to do to be ready for it. We taught him about the Gospel of Jesus Christ and the five steps within it in our broken Spanish...we think he understood everything ha! It went well and we are going by again toinght. Sunday night we planned a whole 3-4 hours to travel up to Ackworth (30 minutes away) and contact 7 referals we had up there! We were so excited! It turns out we only spent one hour because NO ONE answered the doors! Frustrating!

Still working with the court for Juan. Still not even close to being fluent in Spanish. Bummer.

Houston is getting ready to ball it up in conditioning, huh? The only advice I have is to work hard. Try everyday to improve YOURSELF. Run faster than you ran the day before, beat one more person than you did the day before, lift harder than the day before, slack off less than you did the day before :) You want to be able to look back and say, "that's what I did," instead of, "that's what I could have done." Listen to Dad. He's old, therefore he knows (I'm joking Dad! You're the best!)

Everyone is so busy and growing up so fast! I feel sad I'm missing it haha but I know I'm here for the best reason in the world and I'm still here in Marietta for a reason! Houston driving? Oh no, tell all the refridgerators on the roads to look out! Hahaha get it? Cuz that one time that Houston drove...hit the fridge...ha...it's funny.
(Note from Mom: Actually, it was our deep-freezer. When Houston was 13, his 16 year-old sister decided -- without our permission -- that it was time for Houston to drive. He was trying to drive into the garage...got the gas and brake pedals mixed up...and drove into the freezer...with his sister/driving instructor in the passenger seat...nice.)

Well, my BoM reading is going well. My favorite part this past little while have been about the missionary work (I may be biased). I found lots of "missionary scriptures" that help me focus on my purpose and continue to work. I don't remember the reference and I don't have my scriptures here but I loved the scripture of Ammon (?) talking about his mission and how at first they didn't have success among the Lamanites and their "hearts were depressed" and they began to go back home. Then, the Lord told them to turn back and continue to work and he will give unto them success. (I feel like I may have written this in my last email home, but if not, then great!) I know that I need to work hard no matter where I am, and as I do, the Lord will GIVE success. Being humble enough to realize I can't do anyting for myself, but that I must rely on the Lord for EVERYTHING, has been the hardest thing for me. I am learning and trying everyday to improve myself, though, with the help of the Lord. I love this gospel!

Some things that I would like to request: spam, cornbeef, and maybe a Tongan grammar book or something like that. I cannot find anything like those out here...we have some white boys here who want to be Tongan (including me haha!)

Anyways, love ALL of you guys! Hope everything is going well and thank you so much for your support, you're amazing!

Love, Elder Heimuli