I'm Turning 19!

to my mama, who kisses hands like a raccoon:)

      I'm Turning 19 mom......... Wow. I can't even believe if it wasn't for the revelation for young men to go out when they are 18 I would STILL be home. BLEH God gave us the BIGGEST tender mercy of the Lord by doing so. Who knows where I would of been right now if it wasn't for that call. 

      I love Alma, You can thank Alma Mom for getting me out on a mission.  I changed up some scriptures in Alma, and I compared them to me and my friends saying.  (Alma 17:2-3) 

2.          Now these friends were with Travis at the time the spirit of the lord first appeared unto him; therefore Travis did rejoice exceedingly to see his brethren, and what added more to his joy. they were still his brethren in the Lord; yea and they did waxed strong in the knowledge of the truth; for they were men of a sound understanding and they had searched the scriptures diligently', that they might know the word of God. 

3.          But this is not all; they had given themselves to much prayer, and fasting, and singing; therefore they had the spirit of prophecy, and the spirit of revelation, and when they taught, they taught with power and authority of God.

           Our investigators are doing well, 2 are getting baptized on march 8th so woop woop! and others are getting baptized this month as well! Well we have to bunch, 

 Love you!

-Elder Herdt

Me Oh My Oh Pizza PieO!

       ME OH MY OH PIZZA PIEO!!!!

       So that statement has nothing to do with my week but it came to mind so that's why I wrote it:)

Life has been crazy and good, Its Crazy Good. We got in with a less active and as I've been getting to know him, we found out that we was a huge rock star back in the 70's. It was great, That's where the picture with the Gibson came from. xP  

       This week we had a Zone Training meeting and it was just amazing Like any other time, President Fenn is going to be an Apostle just you wait. Then you'll all understand why I love that man so much! He taught us about "Prayer and how it is the Laboratory where we learn how to temper our minds"

       For our progressing investigators 2 have taken the spotlight this week. The First is Gianaurre Shaviss, who has been reading the lessons on his own, mind you he is 15 years old and looks forward to our lessons each week more than he looks forward to us just going by! hahaha. The second is Nancy Johnson she is just about the most Golden investigator out there. She reads all of the lessons before hand and studies intently on the Doctrine. She commits herself to do things, like going to church, praying every night and reading the book of Mormon and so on and this past Friday she shot us a email and said she was praying that morning and the spirit told her she needed to be baptized so we are now working with her to set her up for baptism. 

        We also Had Brother Don Coleman's Funeral this week. It was a good one with a lot of non-members there. Elder Palmer Gave the invocation, Brother Filio gave a talk about the plan of salvation and compared it to a GPS or Gods Plan of Salvation. One thing I really enjoyed about his talk was he said in this life to have JOY we must put Jesus first, Others second, and Yourself last. and to improve my saying, It takes a tribe to raise a village idiot. He said "it take a village to raise a boy but it Takes a ward Family to save souls. Don's daughters played one of Don's favorite sons,"lullaby" by Billy Joel and afterward, I gave the benediction. With the passing of Don the thing that has Truly got me through has been the scriptures and the Doctrine of the Plan of Salvation. Because of this Doctrine, I don't have to worry what is going to happen to the ones I Love, I wont worry about where I'm going as long as I know I did my best on this Earth because while on this Earth is when we prepare to meet God and If we do all the needful things while on this earth we will enter into the rest of God. This Scripture from the Old Testament has given me the most strength; Psalms 116:15 "Precious in the sight of the Lord is the Death of his Saints" which was the Psalm that Jesus Christ sang while going after the last supper right before his own death. I know that Jesus is our savior and redeemer and that because of his Death and Resurrection we may all break the bands of death, which I do testify in the name of Jesus Christ amen.

The Plan of Salvation Made Real!

You are my sunshine, my only sunshine, you make me happy, when skys are grey.

    The chapters found in the book of Mormon Alma 36-43 are ranked some of the most sacred of all scripture. I found true comfort through out my life and especially this week.

This last Friday night when we were going to do our daily check up on Brother Coleman, we found he had passed away on his bed. It was a pretty big shock to the system. I didn't expect him pass away so soon because we were there the night before and he didn't seem any better or worse than he had in the past weeks.  I was happy though that I was the one to find him, because I would of hated if a sister in the ward found him and wouldn't be able to handle it where I could. I felt more worried for my new companion; no missionary, let alone a new one should need to see that. I'm glad this last month and a half I've been studying the plan of salvation because that is what really helped me out in getting through this trial. One of the most comforting doctrine is that the lord will not take the righteous before their time. So I know he was ready to go. I'm happy he doesn't have to deal with the pain anymore.

           So beside that , training is going great, I really Like Elder Palmer, He is a great missionary and really knows his Book of Mormon, he came out pre-trained so It's great! We have been exactly obedient and have been working hard. We have 5 almost 6 people on date! yeah Last week I ran out of time and had to drive up to Schamburg to do exchanges so I didn't get to write a general email. I've been a little busy with being district leader and training but loving the mission.

             

-Elder Herdt. 

Ole!

So I'm Surviving quite well here in Bloomingdale. To be honest the cold isn't too bad, as long as you layer up you're fine. This next Wednesday and Tuesday we're going to get around 22-26 inches of snow! That's going to be crazy! I bet we won't be able to go outside on those days. 

Well teaching is going amazing! We have a family that is going to be baptized and another lady named Nancy! If every investigator in the world was like her, missions would be the easiest thing ever. She studies all the lessons before we teach it to her. She memorizes vocabulary words and when we ask her questions like  "what is the apostasy" she gives us dictionary type answers, Just the greatest. Don the man with the cancer is doing the best for a man with cancer can do. He was going to start another round of chemo this week but because he is in such bad shape he thinks he might just not do it because another treatment might kill him. So we visit him every day at the end of our day to see how he is doing, to check up on him and to tend to his needs. I love that man to death and would do anything for him; even dump a bed pan. I almost threw up. But I did it because he needed it done! Speak of throw up. yesterday we had a lunch appointment with the bishop then a 30 minute lesson with the family who is getting baptized and a dinner with a less active returning to recovery and I over ate... well elder brown was volunteering me to eat more.... and more and I couldn't say no. So as I was backing elder brown out for the persons house I blew chucks it the snow banks, I felt a lot better after but I learned its okay to say I had enough. To answer your question about numbers of people where teaching.... lets just say they will be splitting the area soon:)!!!

We'll I'm happy to hear that you are loving the Harvesters. (A publication his mission president sends out weekly)  President is an inspired man and just being in his mission has changed my life. I've learned things here that I bet I wouldn't be able to learn anywhere else. He Influences so many lives. I am dumb struck every time I see him. I'm really looking forward to this Sunday because he'll be speaking in our ward. 

I'm going to try my hardest to get everyone of our investigators there. 

So transfers are tomorrow and.........

Elder brown is leaving and..........

I'll be training a new missionary!!!!!

I cant believe it! President Fenn must trust me because that is the most responsible calling in a mission. I hope I do well.

Thanks for the ensign talk and I'm going to read it tomorrow! It goes hand in hand with what I studied today which was temperance, which is self mastery .(I told Elder Herdt about an article written by Elder Neal A Maxwell about putting off the natural man and coming off conqueror. It was in the Nov 1990 ensign)

Well love you mom!! I miss you much but I got a hand with a kiss on it to hold me over till I get home! I pray a blessing to be upon our family! 

-Elder Herdt  

All is well in Bloomingdale!

 

 We'll, this week has been an interestingly hard one. Even though
Elder Brown and I didn't have that many lessons this week, 100% of those
lessons had a member present at the lesson. One of which was a miracle
because she moved the appointment we had scheduled with her. We lost
the member who was going to go with us and we had to have a male with 
us. So after trying and trying and calling and calling we couldn't get anyone
to come out with us, so we decided that we would go anyways and tell
her in person that we couldn't meet. When we were about 5 minutes out
to the appointment a member called and asked if we need any help, we
told him our needs and he said he could be there in 5 minutes and he
would bring his wife. When we pulled up to the house we offered
a prayer of gratitude that the Lord blessed us with this member to
come out with us. We had 3 investigators who have just been snatched
up by the ward and the only reason is because we carefully and
prayerfully choose "Amuleks" for each investigator. One of whom is
sister Johnson, who is just by her self amazing.  She has 3 note books,
one for questions, another for answers to those questions and anything
she feels prompted to write. She even takes notes while we teach her,
which is something I've never even heard of. The members just love her
because they see how invested she is to learning more and wanting to
join the church which makes the members more pumped! The other 2
investigators are the Shaviss Family who the Ward just loves. The ward
is more involved with them than we feel like we are sometimes. The
young man in the family who was the first investigator has been going
to all the mutual activities and has been to every basketball game since 
we have found them and the mom who is a single mother has already got help
with food, and help with her water bill, and the bishopric gave her a
blessing. All of this was done with out our knowledge. The "Amuleks" we
found for them are going to be throwing the son a birthday party and
hang out with him often, Its great. I truly feel like their family
has been helping them out more than I've ever seen members help out.
To add a cherry on top for the week we got to see 6 people at church
this Sunday, 3 times as much as I've ever seen. I Feel so blessed
being in this area. I have truly seen some great miracles in this
District. I think one thing could say is what blessings Elder Brown and
I have seen since we have been here. The Zone Leaders pulled some
pretty cool math and said that the first week of the month our
district sat at fulfilling 6% of the standards of excellence and now or
District went up to 52.5% That made Elder Brown and I very happy
because It shows that we have had made a difference as district
leaders to our district and I hope we can keep up the growth.

All is well in Bloomingdale!
Elder Herdt

Charity Never Faileth!

      

   Well Elder Brown and I are going amazing in Bloomingdale! We saw quite a few miracles this week! Most of our miracles have stemmed of this one bases that our ward mission leader has felt we need to as missionaries and a ward needs to implement, is the need to do service.  That if we have the mind set to serve others we will bless so many lives this year. So, on Monday night we got a call from a member who out of the blue decided to move.  We went over to help her and a neighbor boy of her's came over and helped too.  Through serving with him he said that he wanted to start going to church and that next week he wanted to come to church and wants a ride to church.  That's a Huge miracle!  Second, her son, a less active member, was moving to Arizona and he wanted us to give him a blessing.  We did and he thanked us so very much for it;  another miracle. 3rd, while moving, her other son came out, a non-member who hates the church and missionaries, and helped us taking things out. Afterward, we got to chat with him and really made a bond with him.   It was so out of his character that I know it was only though serving this family did we see these miracles come forth. 

       The next act of service that bore fruit miracles happened on Wednesday night. We were teaching this young man that the Hermanas Tracked into, and at the end of the lesson he told us that he and his family had not eaten in 2 days, (his mom, brother age seven and sister 6 months old.) We then hurried to the apartment and grabbed all the spare food we could give. After delivering the food his mom called us and  thanked us and thanked us and told us that she didn't know what she was going to do.  She had called  friends and family all of them being in the same situation and couldn't provide aid. We told her it was nothing. Later that week, the same investigator got picked up by a member and played basketball for the ward; they even won! Afterward they went  to the same house that we helped move early that week and moved some stuff for them and picked up a piano to take to the church. We just happened to be at the church finishing up weekly planning when we saw them moving the piano in. It was great, he really looked like the ward had enveloped him and they were having a blast. We served them, he helped serve with us, the spirit of service was with us this week.

        To continue on this week we were at a recent convert's home, the one with the type of cancer the Elder McConkie passed away from, and made a fire for him in his fireplace. He said that the night we lit that fire was the first night he had a uninterrupted sleep in a long time and had 10 hours of strait sleep. we were in his home for not even a half an hour and we had the opportunity to bless him for hours to come.  

       Last week we were going out of an appointment in an apartment complex and we saw a man packing up his house and was struggling to get up off the floor. We only saw him at a glance be we had the instant urge to go back and see if he needed help. He then told us that he was fine but said if we came back next Thursday he was moving and we could come help then. Lucky enough that was the same day that we were going back to the same investigator for another lesson so it was going to work beautifully. We went back on that Thursday to help and he invited us in but he told us he was going to move the next morning.  He started talking to us and showed us all of his war medals and as we sat down and got to know him we found out his religious background and he started getting interested in our religion. We taught him the restoration, and he was agreeing with all of the things we were teaching him. We left him with a Book of Mormon and restoration pamphlet and went back the next morning. When we got there we were the only ones there and moved about 75% of his apartment to his truck.  He was so impressed on how we got the work done. By the time his other movers got there, we were about to leave.  We gave him our contact info and gave him a hug.  He gave us a hug that you would think we had been best friends with him his whole life. As Elder Brown and I left, we were left wondering what was going to happen to this man.  My mind quickly related the story found in the Ensign this month "Latter-day Saint Voice", 'May I Read That Book?" I know our part was fulfilled in his Journey back toward his heavenly father and hope someday I will hear what happened after the day we left him. 

        So because of all of these miracles we were seeing this week through service, at one of our dinner appointments we decided we were going to share this Mormon message with one of the families in our ward called "Gordon B Hinckley lessons I learned as a boy" 

http://www.lds.org/media-library/video/2009-01-01-gordon-hinckley-lessons-i-learned-as-a-boy?lang=eng

We then shared our experiences and read from The Book of Mormon Moroni 7:43-48 about Charity being the Pure Love of Christ and how Charity Never faileth.  After the dinner appointment the Husband of the Family came out with us to a lesson and while driving there we drove past a man whose car was broken down in the middle of the road.  The member stopped, hooked up his truck to the mans car and pulled him to the gas station. As we helped him with his efforts I thought, I've never seen a lesson applied so quickly. We pushed the car to a stall and while our member was filling his tank we gave him a card with our contact info on it. We invited him to church and he said he'll be there. 

How we look after working a long day!

       This week Elder brown and I have really felt blessed and felt like we just worked our selves out this week with how busy we were.  Or, to quote Elder Brown's favorite scripture D&C 123:12-14 "13, Therefore we should waste and wear out our lives in bringing to light Hidden things of Darkness", and it was all because we implemented our ward mission leaders vision of, "service". 

-"For Charity Never Faileth"

Elder Herdt

It's COLD outside!

 Oh my goodness, is it cold. hahha I don't think, 1. I've ever been in weather this cold  and 2. would ever want to live in Weather this cold. -15+windchill= a really cold missionary. But instead of settling for the weather making it not so great for missionary work, Elder brown and I are trying to make the best of it by being creative, shoveling driveways and contacting in the cold and such, we have truly seen miracles and blessing from the sacrifices in this cold season. We have increased our new investigator pool already for the month by 400% Its amazing! Another miracle was we got to see one of our investigators that hasn't came to church for months come, we had to dig him out of half a foot of snow to get him to come but he got there none the less its was great! The district is doing amazing as well, a Set of Hermanas sadly lost an amazing investigator to a stroke but gained their entire family and then some as new investigators and then some. The lord is truly blessing us and our district. 

Elder brown and I have had a a great week full of learning, praying and sacrificing for the lord and our brothers and sisters. I found Great comfort this week in Gospel Doctrine class this week. The teacher relayed a story to us about king Louie the 3rd and how he and his wife were murdered leaving the 3 children heirs to the throne the first son died and the second one was persistently trying to be corrupted by those who killed his father, they gave him every kind of sin and lust in the world, exposing him to vast profanity and sexual sins of every kind but the prince did not give in. The corrupters after putting him through temptation after temptation with no success finally asked him, why won't you give in to our temptations and he turned and said to them, I was Born to be a King, that's why. As I pondered on that story and thought of my self I realized why the teacher shared with us that story. I am son of God and as such I decided I will not sully myself to the temptations of the devil because I have been called to an amazing calling and I not forfeit the calling for pleasures that wont last. so I ask you, how great is your calling and what are you to become? will you give up what matters most for something you want at the moment?

~Elder Herdt-Spiritual Ninja