100th Post! Elder Henry's report from Canoas March 4th: Gauchos don't like spicy food.

We took Tori & Spencer to Disneyland--the older kids got to go on all kinds of choir tours and trips as they were growing up and we cut down on activities with these two.  They are such good kids who make good choices we wanted to reward them for making our life easier!

Dear Mom,

I loved the pictures from Disneyland. Looks like you all had a great trip there! Disneyland is definitely on my radar for things I want to do in the near-future. Especially being so close to Long Beach. I'm glad you enjoyed the sun, This last week we had a pretty mild week in the 90's and today and yesterday its raining.

That's great news about Kelsey being re-hired. I figured she would be, I mean who wouldn't want her as a teacher?

Ever since the beginning of this year, all foreign language missionaries had their MTC time cut by a third. So Sherry will stay in the MTC for 6 weeks instead of 9 (lucky...). The new greenies were supposed to come in this transfer but all the Americans got stuck in the US, so instead of receiving 20 new missionaries we got 12. The first 19-year-old Sisters haven't arrived yet. I didn't get an opportunity to buy a new battery for the camera. I'll have to look around today in Downtown Canoas, there should be a shop there that sells batteries for cameras. For my birthday in April, I really don't want a package. I'd rather celebrate my Birthday in July, and go and buy the things I'm going to need for college next year. By the time I get a mission package here, I'll be just about finishing up the mission and won't really need anything.

Mathias Velho is smaller than Gravataí, but not by much. Gravataí had an average frequency of 130 people in Sacrament meeting. Here its more like 100-110. Also our Chapel is an older smaller model, so the sacrament meeting room only holds 130 people, and the last two weeks was packed. I had a hard time finding a seat! Its the same style of chapel that I had in Rio Pardo, more fit for a Branch than a Ward.

The Mexican fiesta was pretty successful overall. We had 3 investigator families there, as well as a couple friends of the young men. We marked to teach all of them this week, and they all have pretty good potential to accepting the gospel. The food was a bit of a fiasco, because nobody liked the taco meat. They all complained that it was waaaay too spicy. I just laughed in their faces as I told them that I didn't even put HALF the pepper that the recipe called for. One thing's for sure, I'm never going to open a mexican restaurant here in the South. Gaucho's (the name for Brazilian cowboys--Southern Brazil/Argentina area) don't like Pepper, end of story XD. I loved the tacos though, tasted just like home ;).

We had a great lesson this Saturday as well with A. She and M have to get married legally before she can be baptised. We brought a member with us named D. He's a long time friend of M and helped a ton in our lesson. Actually I was fasting this Saturday-Sunday specifically for her to have the desire to be baptised, and at the end of our lesson on Saturday she told us, "Look if it weren't for this whole marriage thing, I'd go and be baptised tomorrow!" Unfortunately marriage takes a lot of time here in Brasil, so probably she won't be baptised until April.

We are also teaching a great family, J and L. They are friends of a less active member, and they remind me a lot of J and M in Rio Pardo. 

I just looked through a couple of the letters I sent home to you guys almost a year ago. Haha, what a trip. Its like I went back in time for a few minutes and was re-living the moments when I was writing to you. Something I saw is that the first week I arrived in Gravataí I said, well Gravataí has about 20x more problems than Rio Pardo, and now I'm feeling the exact same way with Mathias Velho XD. Except now looking back its like Gravataí was an AWESOME area, and Rio Pardo was an AWESOME area. Why is it only awesome after you leave?! I was feeling a little bit down this Saturday after the ward didn't really like the food on Friday, but I was really comforted on Sunday. We had 3 or 4 members get up and bore their testimonies about how they are seeing a change in the ward, and how the missionaries that are here now (Elder Henry and Elder Moura) are doing an awesome job. The members that went on splits with us also talked about how their testimonies were strengthened as they went out with us. It was really good to see that there really is a change going on in this ward, even if times are rough right now, the ward is preparing itself for growth, and when the ward is prepared to grow, missionary work explodes :).

I love you guys, I'm really happy to know that you'll had a great time at Disneyland :)

Love,

Elder Henry

Letters home (and Dad's letter) 2/13/12

I had to leave Damon's letter attached, it was just so full of wisdom to his missionary son =)

Dear Mom,

I actually packed long underwear with me. I knew that it would come in handy, so I should be good to go :). The travel department has been very quiet, so no news yet. No electronic or otherwise.

My shoes are holding up for the meantime, but are already starting to show wear and tear. Some of the leather on the back has been peeling off, but the soles are still intact. The place I'm living in now is a gated community so it should be safe to mail to my apartment, although its best to send it to the mission office, because its a lot of fun to have mail come from the mission office ^^. I'm doing really good right now, have an overload of sweets of which I have to blame you and Kelsey :P. So I share with my district. Lots of food in the cupboards and the like.

Do you remember how many times I went to see Episode 1 in theaters? About a brazilian (I think he meant "gazillion" funny typo) times, Tori is right I -am- jealous. Sounds like a fun FHE. While you are going to the movies tonight though, I'll be having FHE with Steve R. and his family, so I'll be having fun frosting sugar cookies with them :).

I got your DJ's Birthday package. Thank you for all the goodies. I especially liked the gummy worms. I can't remember the last time I had a bag of sour gummy worms ^^.

Sounds like Spencer is living it up at Prairie. I can only imagine how much fun he's having playing all the different characters.

You are so funny Mom. The first thing you notice after the new bishopric gets called, is that Brother Tong isn't wearing a suit coat :P. Only my Mom would notice such a thing. You are awesome, and always bring a smile to my face.

This week was pretty much AWESOME!

We had a lot of progress with our investigators this week, and should be getting geared up for baptismal services soon ^^. Of course we are also finding new investigators at the same time which makes me even more excited :).

First I'll start off with the bad and the ugly. Haig will be out of town for the next 2-3 weeks, so we may not see him again if he's not back by the end of the transfer :(. He's doing good, but progressing slowly. We had our ward mission leader, Brother Sharp attend the lesson with us and it made a HUGE difference. Haig found Bro. Sharp inspirational, and hopefully will feel more welcome at church because of it :).

We have a couple new, and rather fun, investigators. First up is Paul. Paul is an middle aged man, who flies everywhere in the world. He calls himself Fed-ex for Boeing. He delivers plane parts for Boeing to places all around the world. This coming week he's flying to Kazakhstan for a delivery, and then he flies home and works on the preparing for the next delivery. He doesn't attend church and grew up Catholic but is much more Evangelical in his beliefs system now. We had a good first lesson with him, but didn't dive too much into the gospel. I was on exchanges later that week for our return appointment, but apparently he showed up with two pages of notes on Salvation, and went on and on about how performing good works is not part of the gospel of Jesus Christ, and all we have to do is confess with our lips and hearts that Jesus is the Christ... Its been really good for my learning of the Gospel, because of his objection I have been able to really dive into the scriptures and understand a lot more of why things are the way they are. I'm impressed by the amount of knowledge I am gaining every day in the scriptures, and have actually come to love the way they are written. I enjoy the poetry and old language that they use. I didn't think I'd ever get to that point in my life, but here I am.

Next up is Chris. I don't know if I've mentioned this or not, but in my area there is a huge university named BIOLA (Bible Institute of Los Angeles), and he's a student there. For the most part BIOLA is pretty anti-Mormon, but we received a referral from the Sisters at Temple Square that Chris wanted the missionaries to come over. So we called him up and set up an appointment. He wasn't at all hostile, but was a little more interested in just learning rather than accepting, but he is in-between churches right now and so I'm hoping that with some good fellowship he'll be able to attend church and enjoy the spirit there. We haven't met with him again since last week, but hopefully will this week.

We also tried to meet with Gaston this week, but his wife answered the door and said that,"He's not interested but just doesn't know how to tell you". We are pretty sure that he -is- interested, but the wife isn't. A hard situation to deal with, but before we stop we want to be able to talk with him. Hopefully I'll have better news about him next week.

Steve H. is doing great! He came to church and stayed for Sunday School! I think this is the first time in 4 years he's ever come to the second hour. He's also reading the Book of Mormon, things just haven't clicked for him yet. There is a lot of pressure from his family, and I think he's rebelling against that pressure so far as baptism is concerned. We are trying our hardest to just stay supportive of him, and helping him on his conversion.

We met with Nicole this week twice. She's a lot more on the basics than we originally thought. She said she knows that Joseph Smith is a prophet, but hasn't received a confirmation of the Book of Mormon yet. She's read through 1 and 2 Nephi, and is in Jacob right now. She also needs to quit smoking, although we found out she's quit much harder things than smoking before so I have full faith that she will be able to overcome tobacco as well. She didn't come to church which is partly because her husband, who is a member, can't come to church because he works Sundays -.-'. A very frustrating situation, so we are working to get her some really close friends in the ward to come with us so she wants to come to church.

Lynn had a major breakthrough this week! She pretty much has a testimony of Joseph Smith and the Book of Mormon, but struggles to get to church because, A) she has a lot of aches and pains and B) she didn't have any friends at church. So this week we asked the Relief Society who would get along great with Lynn, and boy did they give us a golden fellow-shipper. Her name is Sis. Braxston, and her and Lynn just got on like two peas in a pod! At the end of the lesson Lynn said that she could come to church now because she has a friend. I think she'll be baptized pretty soon :). She didn't attend church this week because she went out of town for family, but she'll be there next Sunday.

Steve R. also had a huge breakthrough yesterday :). He had a really hard week last week, and we couldn't meet with him at all, which made me SUPER nervous. When he walked into church I was so relieved that he came, but he looked really down trodden. I knew that the week hadn't gone well for him, and that he had probably smoked all week long. We sat with him at church, and after Sacrament he pulled me aside and said, can I talk with you two before I have to leave to go to work? Of course I told him yes, he is our number one priority. He went on to talk about how he had a huge debate as to whether or not he should come to church that morning. He really didn't want to, he had lots of work to get done, and didn't want to get in trouble from us, but he made the decision to come anyways.

He then went on to tell us that the service had really touched his heart. He realized how wrong he was living his life, and that he needs to change. He felt godly sorrow for his sins and really wants to make the change in his life. I feel like he finally made it to the point where he realizes that this isn't something that he can do by himself and that he can only overcome his addiction if he relies on his faith. Last night we called him up and he said that he had brought the Book of Mormon to work with him, and that every time he had a spare moment he was reading. I know that he's going to be ready for baptism soon, I'm really excited to see the changes he's made in his life, even if he can't see it himself.

That's my week in a nutshell. We should have another great week this week as well! OH! I almost forgot, we officially reactivated someone yesterday. Her name is Sister Smith, and she started coming to church last week, and came again this week, just because we dropped by and showed her we still care :).

Keep up all the hard work on the homefront. Thank you for financially supporting me on this awesome spiritual endeavour. I'm loving every moment of it, and growing each and everyday.

Thank you again for the package :).

Love,

Elder Henry

Dear Dad,

That's awesome that you got to spend the weekend with your Dad. I love just sitting and chatting with you, so I can imagine what a treat it was to spend Sunday just enjoying each others company. That's probably one of the best things about being a missionary is just sitting down and talking with people.
That's the lesson I really had to learn with my last companion. You are right, Heavenly Father does not want to command us in all things. Thank you for sharing that with me, it helps me to realize the kind of person I need to be as a missionary, and hopefully I can just learn the easy way from your experiences rather than learning things the hard way.
You are right, things are hard as a missionary, and you do get the highlights of the week. For instance I'm just about DIEING as a missionary with all the huge hills in my area on bike. My legs are soooo tired all the time, plus we run a little over 2 miles every morning (good old mission rules >.>). Not to mention we have difficulties with some members and other little things. Regardless I love every day as a missionary.
Its so funny to hear you refer to yourself as Elder Henry, because that's me!
I hope you aren't too bored without 4 kids at home. Did you figure out what you are going to do about Elmo? Are you still driving it around?
Have fun tonight at the movies, you'll have to let me know how the new version turned out.
Love,

Elder Henry

Hi Mike,

How are you? We got an unexpected treat this weekend. Grandpa Henry came up and stayed with us. He was coming up on Saturday to see Spencer's performance and his work schedule got switched around so that he had to escort a load out of Portland early Monday morning so he decided to just stay over. It was great to have so much time with him. He and I spent several hours after church just sitting together talking. It's great to have a father son relationship like that, and it makes me happy that you and I will get to continue the tradition :)

I thought of some things that I wanted to share with you while I was walking home from church today. They are some of the lessons I learned early on in my mission and some of them may be applicable to you around this time.

I came out of the MTC fired up and really wanting to be a great missionary, and the one resounding lesson that stuck with me was the importance of being obedient. I was determined to follow the mission rules because I was sure that was the path to success. I was lacking in some of my understanding and ability though regarding the rules.

For instance, I knew that romantic female relationships were off limits on a mission. However, I found myself serving in an area that had many Mormon Nannies. They were my age, and very similar to me, having been thrust into an unfamiliar situation far from home, so naturally they desired to interact with me socially. I was a piece of home to them. In fact, one of the nannies I met on my mission had been in the same ward as me growing up and I knew her and her family. I didn't know how to handle the situation because at that point in my life most of my relationships with girls my age were in dating situations. So early on in my mission I was simply rude to girls who approached me because I could not think of any other thing to do. That is clearly not the right way to act, but there is not a mission rule that explicitly states don't be rude to girls. There are mission rules that deal with not forming relationships with girls. As I matured as a missionary I learned how to have appropriate relationships with girls my own age and stay true to the mission rules.

Another lesson that I learned early on in my mission was that the relationship you have with your companion is more important than just about any rule in your mission rule book. I was trained by a missionary who was a pretty good guy, but not an extremely hard worker, or especially strict on mission rules. He wasn't bad, we did follow the mission schedule pretty well, but we spent a bit too much time just hanging out with other missionaries in our district or in members houses. I remember spending several Sundays at members houses watching football. It was awkward for me, I did not want to be there doing that, but did not know what else to do or how to handle the situation. All in all though, he was a good companion and we did a fair amount of work and followed the rules pretty well, and there wasn't really any contention. I had one more pretty good companion in that area, but then I got transferred to Queens and my next two companions were both pieces of work. My third companion was just plain lazy and disinterested in doing real missionary work. I really struggled with him just to get him out of bed in the mornings, and I mean by 10am. When he was up, I could not convince him to go out and do hardly any proselyting with me. I was very frustrated. I could not leave my companion and do missionary work by myself, that was against the rules, and I could not follow the missionary schedule and do real missionary work. I was often upset and angry with him. What I found was that my hard feelings for him were more of a detriment to our work as missionaries than any indiscretion in following the mission schedule. I had to learn to not judge him or resent him for holding me back from being the missionary that I wanted to be. I learned that working together with him in any positive manner was better for me as a missionary than holding fast to any of the rules that we were not following. Your relationship with your companion is the number one factor that will determine your success as a missionary (what does that teach you about marriage?) Sometimes you get companions that you just click with, and sometimes you get companions that you struggle with. It's up to you to find a way to get along with and appreciate your companion. In this case, I found something that worked that was a little outside the normal missionary work. We lived in a very old house (over 200 years old) in a room we rented from an elderly inactive member Edith and her adult son Donald (a retired policeman). They expressed interest in remolding the room they were renting to us. They provided all the materials and direction on what they wanted done and my companion and I spent a full week together ripping out all the old and putting in the new. We did not do any missionary work that week. It was the first time that him and I actually worked hard together on something and it allowed me to appreciate him in a new light plus we finally accomplished something positive. We now had a nice place to live and all the missionaries that came after us did as well. After that he still was not especially interested in doing the missionary work we had to do, but our relationship was better and I had more influence over him now. He especially did not like tracting which was really about all we had to do in that area. We did have one subway station at the very end of the line in our area though so we set out together to make up some street boarding materials. Again, this was work that he was quite interested in and we worked well together on it. We gathered all the materiels we needed, easels, tables, and the like, and we made up some nice displays. Once the street boarding materials were all put together it was again a bit of a struggle to get him to go out with me and use them, but our relationship was stronger, and I had even more influence on him, plus we had these great displays that he was proud of that needed to be put to use. I don't recall us ever working really hard together on real missionary work, but we did learn to enjoy each other and to work together with some real harmony which was a very important lesson for me to learn. Also, it would be interesting to hear it from his perspective. Perhaps his story would read, I have this new companion who is impossible to work with. All he ever does is nag and belittle me, he makes me not even want to be a missionary... who knows, it's hard to always see things from someone else's perspective. Perhaps my zeal for the mission rules was making the situation worse, not better.

Just remember this about the mission rules. First and foremost you should always follow them, but realize that Heavenly Father likes to give us less rules not more. He is interested in raising children who can show judgement and discretion. Never allow the rules to become a hinderance to your work. When you follow them properly they will mold you into being the best missionary you can be. When I reflect back on those early months of my mission I remember a sense of trying to force myself into being something that I wasn't. As I matured as a missionary I figured out how to follow the rules properly and it led me to being the best Elder Henry that I could be. The rules helped me to develop my own talents and personality to a point where I was the only Elder Henry in the mission and Heavenly Father could then lead me to the people who needed an Elder Henry, not a robo-missionary :)

Just to round out my story my fourth companion was almost impossible to live with. He had a huge ego. He could not get along with anyone, and by that time in my mission my Mission President new me well enough to trust my easy going personality would allow me to deal with him as well as any missionary he had. We did get along fairly well, and had some success working together, but he had real problems living with anyone. I was able to look past his faults and still enjoy him as a companion. After having those two companions back to back, my Mission President made me a Zone Leader and kept me there for the next year and a half, so I'm pretty sure that I learned the the correct lessons from those early companionships, and I found the rest of my mission much easier and was a better missionary from the experiences.

I hope you are enjoying your mission. Your letters are always so positive and fun to read, but I know that your weeks are also filled with tedious tasks, real disappointments, and extremely hard work and you only share with us the highlights. Even with these type of challenges, the only time that I recall really being unhappy on my mission were times when I did not give my fullest effort, even if it meant spending a week remolding a room because that was the best way I could spend my time that week. That made me much happier than brooding over my worthless companion. Do your best and rely on Heavenly Father to provide solutions to your problems and you will be a great missionary and feel good about yourself. You won't be perfect, but you can be pretty darn good!

I love you and pray for you always.

Dad

Elder Henry 1/30/12

Hey Mom,


Whittier is SUPER hot right now, and we are on bike, and there isn't a
single piece of flat ground in our area.  Its hills up and down and up
and down.  My legs are killing me, between running every morning for
20 minutes, and biking everywhere all day every day, I'm quite
exhausted.  Although I have enough of Dad's blood in me that I'll
probably still end up playing basketball instead of resting today :P.
Bummer for the Ducks losing LaMichael James and Darron Thomas.
Hopefully the Ducks will have some great players to replace them.  I
bet Chip Kelly wants to win the BCS Championship before he goes to the
NFL.
So my new ward is older than the St. Johns ward.  The average age of
the members is 83 years old.  It's awesome XD.  I love spending time
around them, they have so many fun stories and they love the
missionaries.  This area got closed for about a month because a
missionary went home 4 weeks early for school last transfer.  The only
reason President could open it back up is because Elder Dixon and I
are here to fill in the gap as it were.  They are all really excited
to have "their missionaries" back :).  The Bishop (Bishop Luedtke) and
Ward Mission Leader (Bro. Sharp) are awesome and we have a ton of
investigators in this area, all of which are close to being baptized.
Elder Dixon is also a visa waiter, he's waiting to go to Auckland, New
Zealand.  He's a convert of a year and a half and an absolutely
stellar missionary.  He is from Columbia, Missouri and went to BYU
Idaho for a year before coming out.  He played Football and Baseball
in school and loves the church.  He's 100% on top of things,
motivated, excited to work, helpful, teachable, and a fun Elder to be
around.  We should have lots of success here together :).
My District is comprised of 3 visa waiters, 1 Korean, and 2 sister
missionaries.  I live in a four man apartment with the other two
Elders in my district.  Elder Jeon is from Korea, and he's a zone
leader (we have our zone leaders split up in our zone), and Elder
Whetstone also lives with us and he's waiting to go to Sao Paulo,
Brasil.  I finally have someone I can practice Portuguese with ^^.
The two sister missionaries are also great, we just don't interact
with them very often.
One of our recent converts, Ana Pinheiro is actually from Rio de
Janeiro, Brasil.  She moved to the states when she was 8(ish), and she
still speaks a bit of Portuguese.  We got to meet her last night and
she's a lot of fun to visit with.  She was baptized last September,
and we are working to get her son to come into the gospel as well.
We have 6 investigators right now and we got to meet with most of them
this week.  Its been pretty hard opening this area since neither Elder
Dixon or I have any idea what's going on.  Fortunately, the
missionaries before us kept good records in the area book and we've
got at least a handle on where people are at spiritually.
Our number 1 investigator is named S R.  He's in his 30's has 4
kids and a wife.  He's been investigating the church for about 11
weeks now, and wants to be baptized.  The only problem is he has a
nasty smoking habit.  We are trying to help him to quit but its really
hard to stop.  He came to church yesterday, and his wife is also
interested in the church, but she doesn't really want to investigate
until he's committed to stop smoking before she gets gung-ho about it
again.  We are going over to have a Family Home Evening with them
tonight, and S is planning on giving a lesson to his kids on the
Word of Wisdom.  We are really excited for him.
We have another S investigating the church, S H.  His wife and
kids are all members, and he comes to church every week, and has been
doing so for about 4 years now.  He was offended by a couple
missionaries a few years back and now the wife won't let us invite him
to be baptized.  That's the only thing really holding him back.  He
doesn't have any issues with Chastity, Word of Wisdom, Tithing, he
believes Joseph Smith was a prophet, and he loves the church.  Why
he's not a member yet?  I don't know.
Next up is N.  She's in her late 20's and married to a less
active member of the Church, E.  She is having a hard time right
now receiving an answer that the Book of Mormon is true, and she's
tried to stop smoking so many times, she feels really discouraged.
She does want to be baptized, and has a tentative date for February
23rd.  I've never helped someone to overcome an addiction before, and
now I have two smoking investigators.  Any ideas for quitting smoking
would be very helpful.  They both want to change, I just don't know
how to help other than prayers, and reading the scriptures.
We are also teaching a 58 year old woman named L.  She has a lot of
health concerns and loves to talk.  I'm not quite sure where she is
spiritually, but she loves the church.  Her son was recently baptized
and sealed in the temple and that's her main interest.  Her health
problems kept her from church yesterday though, but she does read the
Book of Mormon.  Hopefully we'll be able to get her some friends in
the ward and they will be able to encourage her to come to church :).
There is also a 21 year old man named K, who's Philippine.    We
haven't been able to meet with him yet, so I don't know much about
him.
We were out riding our bikes last Tuesday, our first day in the area,
and we talked with an older man named H.  He invited us to come
back on Saturday and we did.  We talked about the restoration with
him, and also talked about how he could live together with his
deceased wife one day.  The spirit was really strong in the lesson and
he got teary eyed towards the end.  He had to rush off at the end
because his son was picking him up to take him shopping, but we have a
return appointment with him for tomorrow.  I'm really excited to see
him again :).
Thank you for keeping me updated on the home front.  I look forward to
hearing who the new Bishopric will be.  I love you all so much.
Love,
Elder Henry

Elder Henry 1/23/12

 

     It sounds like your talk went really well.  Sorry my E-mail didn't get to you on Monday.  I got your letter Friday Night, and so the next day I asked if it would be okay if one of my members texted you the information, and it sounds like you got everything.  I could have sworn I pressed the little "would you like to include Lisa Y Henry?" Button, but I guess not.  Oh well things are all worked out now.  By the way the guy who texted you is Ben Maluia, one of the Less active members we've been visiting.

     BIG NEWS!  I'm getting transferred tomorrow to Whittier.

For anyone with letters on the way to my current address, my companion will take them to the mission office and then they will get to me.  It will probably just take about a week or so to get to me.

     More BIG NEWS!  I've been called to be a District Leader in my new area!  I'm really excited to serve the missionaries around me, and help them out the best I can.

     EVEN MORE BIG NEWS!  My new companion is also a visa waiter... for New Zealand.  His name is Elder Dixon, and everyone is telling me that he's an amazing missionary.  He's a recent convert of a year and a half, and President Bubert sent me a letter telling me that the two of us are going to be like Alma and Amulek up there.  Although he did specifically prohibit me from any fiery death scenes :(.

     I think that's it for the big news items of this week.  I'm really excited for my new area, calling, and companion.  Still I've had to say good-bye to a lot of my friends here yesterday, and it never gets easier as a missionary to say good-bye.  When you leave to go to the field you say good-bye to your family, when you leave the MTC you say good-bye to professors and friends, when you leave an area you say good-bye to companions, recent converts, less actives, members, all people you come to love, and then one day you have to leave the mission and say good-bye to your calling as a full-time missionary.  I can't imagine any of it gets any easier.

     I lied I have one more BIG NEWS event.  I'm going to be on bike in my next area instead of in a car.  Except I don't have a bike.... and neither does my companion...  I talked to President Bubert about it and he said the Assistants will be lending us a couple bikes from the mission.  I'm really excited to be able to go out on bike everyday, it is going to be quite the adventure.

      It was a really slow week for us as missionaries this past week.  No one has made any progress at all, and we haven't found any new investigators.  Its been a paitience week for us, where the people know what they need to do, and they slowly are making the changes and slowly the blessings are starting to come through.  It's been a week of getting the ward on board with us and setting things up to have amazing experiences.  We've been working with the members figuring out who they will fellowship, when both parties are available, and what kind of an activity will the members have planned (ie Dinner, FHE, etc.).  Hopefully things will start to pan out for the rest of the week :).  I've learned a lot of how to work with members in this area and I'm really excited to take that knowledge to Whittier.

     Thank you for the support, prayers, packages, and letters :).  I love you all so much!  Thank you for helping me to be the young man I am today.

Love,

Elder Henry

(P.S. I got a haircut today, so you don't have to worry about it, I know it was super long)

PHOTOS

1. Final good-bye to Eli, Isa, Matt, Siniva, and Zion

2. Matt with his one year old son Zion

3. Final good-bye to Ma'epu

4. The Sagala family, the Elders Quorum president in the Compton 1st ward.  Amazing members!

5. My District from this transfer.  We had a senior proselyting couple named the Blickenstaffs.  They were amazing, I can't wait until you and Dad can be the couple that all the younger missionaries just love to talk with and be around :)

Elder Henry January 16

I'm glad everything is doing all right back home, I love to hear updates about everyone.  Yes, I'm rather freaked out about Tori going to Church dances.  I still remember picking her up from the nursery for goodness sakes, now she's off to Youth Dances?

This week, well its been a grab bag of really good and poor.

First off I was on exchanges in the Spanish area again this Tuesday-Wednesday.  The first four pictures (the one with 114_ in front of the file) are of Elder Barrea and myself destroying a couch in the Spanish ward. 

 Also we drove by a bunch of cops with a whole city block shut down.  No idea why, but it was pretty crazy.  Its funny, Compton is pretty quiet compared to downtown Long Beach, and we are hardly ever down in main Long Beach.  We are always up north with the Samoans.

I don't have very many fun or amazing stories from this week.  We were able to meet with quite a few people this past week which is good.  The bad part is none of them came to Church.  If you would have asked me on Sunday I would have been pumped to tell you all about how we met with 5 less actives and they were all committed to coming to church. 

      We had a Zone Conference this week which was absolutely amazing.  It made me rededicate and actually love this mission.  I've really had a hard time falling in love with Long Beach, California because I am waiting to go to Brazil.  But the amazing thing is, whenever I turn to Heavenly Father and ask for help, he is there to provide.  I asked Heavenly Father in prayer several times, help me to love this mission like I already love Porto Alegre.  Then last Saturday as I was driving down the streets of North Long Beach, in the sun, I looked around and realized, I really do love this place.  It was the first time I ever felt like, I would like to serve my whole mission here.  Up to this point its always been, well Long Beach, that's not such a bad place to wait for my 'Real Mission'.  Now its, I can't believe my visa could come so soon and I would have to leave here.  Now I'm still really excited to go to Brazil, but I will always miss Long Beach from this time on.  I've really learned on my mission, especially with my visa situation, how to turn to my Heavenly Father and ask him to help me in prayer and know that he's listening.  The answer to my prayer took about 3 months, but it did come, and I'm glad that it did.

     Great news though, because of the hard work of the missionaries in our mission we went from 449 Baptisms in 2010, to 393 Baptisms in 2011!  Well I suppose thats not actually a good thing, but the good thing is, of the 449 Baptisms in 2010, somewhere around 120 of them were inactive by the end of that year.  This year 2011, only 18 of our recent converts have gone inactive in the California Long Beach Mission.  A 95% retention rate!  Absolutely unheard of!  I was so proud to be a part of this great mission when president announced that.  It makes me realize that the hard work we have done working with the members, spending precious proselyting time visiting members rather than just knocking doors has really paid off.

     The last picture I sent you is Elder Galke, B and J, and me.  B and J are  twins that are really special to Elder Galke.  Their Family (minus Be) were all at Church this Sunday :).  J was just down for the Holidays from the University, it was really fun to see the two twins together.  They look exactly the same, talk the same, and are a lot the same person.  It has been fun to get to know them.

     Ohhh Man, OOOOOOHHHH MAN.  I nearly flipped the chair when I saw that picture of Sherry and whats-his-boys-face-6'6".  I can't believe it...  all the missionaries in here all came and crowded around the screen when I mentioned it.  It was pretty funny.  Sherry mentioned him briefly in her E-mail to me, but that picture says it all.  I have never seen her so mushy on a guy EVER.

Well my E-mail is getting cut short because the Family History Center is closing down.  I love you very much, thank you all for the letters and E-mails.  I love hearing from you, it always makes my week.

Lots of Love,

Elder Henry

Elder Henry 1/2/2012

BWAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!  Tell her welcome to the club :P.  Guess who's never going to live that one down XD.

(This was Michael's reaction to Sherry accidentally leaving a pocket knife in her backpack and getting busted by Homeland Security at the airport--of course, he had 5 or 6 pocket knives when he was busted a few years ago, Scouter vs hiker haha)

Dear Mom,

Pictures! 

8544 - We had Pig, Crab Salad, Chicken, and Taro

8550 - Traditional Samoan Pig at the Long Beach 15th Ward New Years Party

Thanks for all the pictures.  Its fun to look through all the family photos :).  It looks like you all had a very happy Holiday season ^^.  My guess is you will see Sherry before next Christmas :P.  Sometimes you just call up your parents and tell them you'll be home tomorrow ;), even when you are living the dream life.

This week has been a pretty rough week to be a missionary.  My guess is the holidays has made it harder than normal to find people at home, although nobody has been using that excuse on us.  We are having a lot of problems with our recent converts (from before I was here), and one of our wards is being pretty uncooperative in the missionary efforts.

Our two best investigators, J and F both can't be baptized for quite a while, and we haven't found anyone new in 3 weeks.  This week though is going to be much better.

We've been working with two less active families recently, E and I, and M and S.  I really love their company, and I sent you a picture of their whole family last week.  I don't know if I've talked at all about them, but I will now.

E and I were found by the missionaries last February and have been working on coming back to church ever since.  Eli is a football player at a local community college, and is looking to get into one of the PAC-12 teams for football.  He could probably play for the Ducks, but he needs a scholarship to afford college.  He did have a scholarship to play for WSU, but because the lead coach recently got fired, his scholarship died with the coach who recruited him :(.  They are working though some rough times, and we have been visting them to help them focus on what is most important.  They are some of my best friends in this area.  They are my age.

M and S are not married, and have a kid together with one more on the way.  S stopped us one day as we were looking for E and I (they live in the same house) and told us that they needed to meet with missionaries.  Neither of them have been to church in a couple years, but both were faithful members in their youth.  They have made some extraordinary changes in their lives since we've been meeting with them.  They are reading together the Book of Mormon everyday.  They went to church on Christmas for the first time in forever, Si quit her old job so she could have Sundays off.  Best of all they are planning to get married in the middle of February :).  We didn't do hardly anything to spur this on.  All we did was walk in, share a scripture from the Book of Mormon about how its never too late for forgiveness, and now they are on their way to reactivation and being an eternal family.  I'm really excited to continue to work with them.

That pretty much summarizes our whole week.  Thank you for writing me every week, I look forward to Monday's I'm sure just as much as you do.  I love to hear from you.

Love,

~Elder Henry

Dear Dad,

You have no idea how excited I was to switch times yesterday :P.  Going from 8:00am Church to 10:00am meant that Ward Council started at 9 instead of 7, so we don't have to wake up early on Sundays anymore ^^.  I don't know why they have church so early here as compared to other places, but you are right every time slot has its up and downs.

     Spencer's new guitar looks pretty sweet.  I hope he has lots of fun with it, and maybe even learns something from playing it.  I'm curious how you play normal guitar hero with it though...

      Sounds like work around the house keeps becoming an ever increasing list of to-dos.  You'll have to let me know this week who won the Rose Bowl.  I heard from someone that they were playing Wisconsin?  The Ducks better win a bowl for once in their career.

      Thank you for writing me every week.  I love hearing about the family exploits :)

Love,

~Elder Henry

Christmastime in the Long Beach Mission

SNOW? In Long Beach California????  (nope, hail!)

Pepe's Baptism

Robert's baptism

Dear Mom,
I loved being able to talk with everyone it was like being home for 40 minutes.  I'm really excited that Sherry is LOVING BYU just as much as I did.  I knew Spencer would be psyched to finally have his own laptop.  It's going to be the gift that keeps on giving :P.  Tori is just adorable as ever, I loved getting to talk with her about Dr. Who, I can't wait to watch it all when I come back :).     
     Thank you so much for all the presents.  I never properly thanked you, but you two won the biggest Christmas package in the mission award.  Out of ~140 I had the largest Christmas package :P.  I really really really really like the new pants.  They fit comfortably, look nice (way to remember I like black pants :P), and are machine washable!  All my new clothes are excellent, I can always count on my Mom to buy my good clothes.  Thank you also for sending more toffee.  My companion and I are very excited to munch through it all.  I got SOOOO much candy this year, I'm in heaven :).
     Both P and R were confirmed yesterday.  A very special gift for both of them to receive the Gift of the Holy Ghost on Christmas day.  I'm really grateful for the opportunity to serve here and help people to make sacred covenants with the Lord.  There is nothing better than to help other people to be happy, and this Gospel is the best and only way to receive happiness forever.
      Unfortunately we haven't really found any new investigators for the last couple of weeks so nothing really new is happening in the area.  It's going to be a week of finding, but I know that the Lord will lead us to the people we need to find.
      Christmas Eve was a very special day to me.  I got up that morning and decided that we were going to teach a lesson to someone before lunch.  We had one iffy appointment that I figured would fall through, but I wanted to make sure we still had at least one lesson before lunch.  We went from place to place, meeting people at the door who said they were too busy, or wouldn't find anyone at home.  Our one appointment fell through and I started to remember what Dad had said about Holidays being some of the hardest days as a missionary to do missionary work.  Still we pressed on and went by a referral that we still had to contact.  We didn't find him at home, but two younger Samoans (20's) were out on the porch, and had just cracked open their bottles of Liquor to begin drinking for the day.  We began to teach them, and one of them Jo, wasn't too far gone yet, and he actually had wanted to speak with missionaries because he's trying to find the truth right now.  The other guy, Logo (pronounced low-ngo) was completely gone.  The rest of the lesson went well, although it was kind of comical to teach someone who was completely wasted.  I felt really blessed that I had been able to accomplish my goal to teach a lesson even though the odds were against me.
      Of course the rest of Christmas was just as wonderful as that morning had been with miracle packages, and the Christmas Caroling.  Looking forward to this week as always :)
Thank you again for all that you do for me,
Love,
Elder Henry

Ward Christmas Party

Elder Henry with his "Pillow Tie," so he can sleep during church???  haha.  I'm guessing the crown on his head was made by Kelsey's Kindergartners for him.

Some of the families Michael is teaching

Hey Dad,
     I would be all over those car projects if I were home.  I would love to get
into my pair of coveralls and start tinkering with a car, of course these
things sound like lots of fun when you are a missionary.  If I were home
I'm not so sure I would be quite as motivated :P.  I'll let you know before
I go shoe shopping, I'll ask around this week to find out where one can
purchase such shoes and probably go next week (although that will be the
monday after a sunday holiday, so it may not be until the 9th).
     I'm glad everyone enjoyed talking with me as much as I enjoyed picking up
the phone and calling all of you.  Mom was pretty quick to pick up that
phone when I called, had she been sitting there waiting all morning long?
     I'm not going to lie, I'm surprised that Sherry is getting a car for
college so soon.  I thought you were actually joking when you said that, at
first because I never thought you would give up your Insight.
     I want you to know what a great example you are to me of treasuring up not
the things of this world, but treasuring those things which are in heaven.
Everytime I read in the scriptures and think about how to improve the way
I'm living I always look to you and realize you've been showing me how I
should live my life all along.  It's not about how many toys you rack up at
the end of the day, its how much time you spent with your family and made
sure they are raised the best they can be.
Lots of Love,
Elder Henry

Oct. 24th Letters and Photos from Mike

---

  
Photo from a half mission conference Long Beach Mission, Michael is in the second row, fourth from the right.

Dear Mom,  
     Sunday's are by far the best day of the week.  Since we cover two wards we get to go to 2 sacrament meetings, and 5 hours total of church.  It's so awesome going to church as a Missionary, because it is your responsibility and calling to go and meet all the people you don't know in the ward.  We had an awesome sacrament meeting yesterday in the Pierside Singles Ward, where the bishop got up and asked people to come up and share with us their favorite hymn, and a quick testimony about that hymn.  Then the congregation would sing the first verse of the hymn.  It was amazing!  The spirit was so strong in that meeting, Hymns are just an amazing way to feel closer to our Savior and Heavenly Father.
     We had an interesting thing happen to us yesterday at church though.  There was a non-member who was there and loved all three meetings at church.  We were thinking AWESOME!!!  Golden investigator.  The catch is he's Muslim and from Egypt, and right now we can't teach people from Egypt, because their lives might be in danger if their family heard that they were thinking of switching religions.  Hopefully things will get worked out, because he really loves church.
     I really have no idea what's going on in politics at the moment.  It's crazy to think I'm in the middle of California and yet I have no idea what's going on in the world!
     So MK our favorite investigator went through another rough time last week.  She got fired from her job, and so she moved back to San Jose, California.  We are forwarding her onto the missionaries up there and hopefully she will be baptized up there, but she's out of our hands now.  Its sad to see our best investigator go through so much opposition trying to get to baptism.
     We do have one investigator who is progressing though :).  V had another lesson this past week and is reading the Book of Mormon.  We should be having another lesson this week with him.  Hopefully his wife will come around as well, she's going to be the real struggle, because she's happy where she is at.  Hopefully the Lord will work some magic with her.
     We also have a lot of people with a lot of potential to start teaching so hopefully some more people will be coming our way.  I'll tell you what though, when I get to Brasil, I'm really going to appreciate how many people I'll be able to teach ^^;.
     I had a really cool experience this past week.  We went on exchanges with the Zone Leaders, and they are in the Spanish area.  Well my trainer decided to send me to their area because, "it would be good for your Portuguese".  Man was I terrified!  But I got to the area and a prayed that I would be able to understand and participate in the work there, I didn't want to just sit there and be useless for 24 hours.  During all the lessons we had with the Spanish speakers I was able to understand everything they said.  Portuguese is pretty similar to Spanish, but I don't really speak all that much Portuguese, but the Lord took what little I did know and magnified it so that I was able to understand Spanish.  I'm really thankful for the gifts of the spirit, and I know that without Heavenly Father's help I wouldn't have been able to understand very much at all.
     Well I'm happy everything is going well on the home front.  Good luck with the Job, I'm really grateful for the sacrifice you are making so that I can be out here.  I love you all so much, thanks to everyone who has sent me letters.  I will try and write back as soon as possible, but P-days are SUPER busy, so please understand if you don't get one back quickly.
Love,
Elder Henry
Also this week is transfers, so send all your letters to the mission office instead of my apartment this week.  I'll send you my new address if I get transferred.  The Mission office address is:
 Elder Michael J. Henry
6500 E Atherton St.
Long Beach, CA 90815

Hey Dad,

This week was a little bit rough, but it ended on a good note which always kind of wipes away any bad feelings.  We spent a lot of time last week trying to find new people, and we are getting a lot of people who could have potential.  Hopefully we will find some new people to teach soon.
     We get to go to the Ward Trunk-or-Treat this weekend and I'm SUPER stoked!  I really love to two wards I'm in and I'm hoping I don't get transfered this week because I finally am getting to know the members and making relationships with them.  I feel like we are on the verge of a huge surge of investigators, and hopefully baptisms.  It's super exciting to be here right now.
     I really like the Road to Damascus talk.  Paul is my hero when it comes to being an awesome missionary.  He's such an amazing example of how important it is to talk to everyone and always be moving to find new people to teach and baptize.
     I actually haven't played basketball since I left the MTC.  P-days are really busy for us because we have to drive other missionaries around so they can buy groceries and the like.  Although today we have a sporting activity so maybe we will play some Basketball.
     I don't know if you remember how much it means to have members feed you, but I think it is always one of my top 3 things I look forward to in my day.  I love being able to meet with the members and eat food :D.
     I'm really excited to go to Brasil, and I actually met someone this past week who served a mission in Porto Alegre back in 1978-1980.  It was a ton of fun talking to him about how he had to wait in the MTC for his visa, but how awesome it was down there.  The most important part though is not to waste a single day of my mission, regardless of where I am.  I never want to look back on my mission and think I didn't give it my all.
     I'm glad things are going well, I better e-mail mom before I run out of time.  I love you dad, thanks for all your support,
Love,
Elder Henry

Elder Henry (right) with his MTC District at the Provo Temple.

 There is picture of a can of Bird's nest drink that I tried, which is a drink that they make in Asia from a bird that gathers up all sorts of stuff into the nest.  Then they take the nest and make it into a drink, it was quite... interesting.

 My District at the MTC, with my Professor Irmao Villanova

  MTC District with Professor Irma Gonzales

My companions in our NOW clean (thanks to Elder Henry) apartment You would be so proud of me, I came into the apartment and I have been cleaning it bit by bit until its up to Mom(ish) standards.  It was a pig-sty when I first came in.

Elder Henry Week 3 in Huntington Beach (he isn't starving!)

Dear Mom,
I did get lots from everyone thank you all for your help.  I promise I won't starve ^^;.  I'm really glad to have been able to go to college before my mission and understand how to cook for myself.  Otherwise I don't know how I would survive
This morning at 4:30am we got up to go to the 6:00am session at the temple.  The Newport Beach California Temple is absolutely gorgeous.  Although it is super tiny.  The Temple usually isn't open on Monday's and so we usually have P-day's on Tuesday for when we go to the Temple, buuuut our stake had a special day at the temple.
I've never heard of this before but our Temple President lives in our stake, and apparently for a couple of years, once a year our stake will go on a monday and Staff the entire temple.  Our stake provides all the workers, and the attendees, and it was absolutely packed there.  There wasn't a seat open in the 6:00am session and when we left there was no room in the parking lot.  It was really neat to go and see all familiar faces in the temple.  There is nothing like going to the temple with a bunch of friends, when you recognize the temple workers, realize the stake president is sitting right next to you, and all the rows are taken up by friends, there is a feeling of love and commradery in the temple that I have never before felt.  I highly recommend to go to the Temple with friends.
This past week has been really busy for missionary work.  We taught 30 lessons this last week which is a record for my area, and we picked up a couple new investigators.
The first big news is our Investigator Mckenzie, who dropped us 2 weeks ago text us yesterday and asked if we could meet.  She's been coming to church still and wants to resume taking the lessons.  We haven't committed her to baptism yet, because we don't want to overstress her again, but that is definitely her goal.
Second big news is our other investigator, Bobby, who also dropped us said we can come by and still do service for him.  It's not a baptism, or even teaching the lessons, but as we learn from Ammon in the Book of Mormon, we just need to serve.  When we serve we show our love for people, and their hearts will be turned eventually.  Missionary work here certainly isn't a meet someone, and they are baptised two weeks later.  All 5 of our recent converts took about a year to 18 months to finally commit.  The important part is that we each take the effort to help people along at whatever pace they need, just like heavenly father allows each of us to turn to him on our own time.
Third we picked up a new investigator family.  They were a referral from one of our ward members and they set up a dinner appointment.  They were really friendly and we taught them the First lesson.  Lydia and Vas are the parents names and you couldn't have two friendlier neighbors.  Vas is from Romania, and Lydia is from Canada (Toronto for you Canadians reading this e-mail).  Hopefully they will continue to investigate, but they have awesome fellowship regardless.  There is nothing better to hear from a member, than to show up at their house and have them drag you to their neighbors and say, "Hey what are you doing monday night.  You need to listen to these guys and we'll make dinner out of it."
The best way for missionaries to work is to have the members invite their friends to activities, or to invite friends to meet with the missionaries.  Also, DO NOT WORRY about missionaries offending your friends by being overbearing.  We are very aware that sometimes people have friends who are just coming over for dinner.  Just let us know ahead of time what you expect, (i.e. just a spiritual thought, or teach them the 1st lesson, or they just have a couple questions) and we will tailor the lesson to that individual.
I'm happy to hear that the new job is working out for you, especially financially.  That's so cute that Tori is so excited for Halloween.  I certainly miss Tori's enthusiasm for such events.  It's so much fun to go into the houses of members and meet their kids and their families.  It always makes me think of when we were little kids and how excited Tori would get for Christmas, Birthdays, and all other manner of Hollidays.
Catalina Island is in our mission, but it is a closed area right now.  Its much more of a tourist trap than it is a residential area.  There is a small branch that meets there but president doesn't have missionaries there right now.  Also update on the picture front.  I am allowed to upload pictures onto the computer and e-mail them to you, but we just came from the Temple and I didn't bring my camera with me.  So for sure you will have pictures next week of our adventures.  Although to be honest I only have like 3 pictures in Huntington Beach right now, so I'll make sure to take some this P-day so I have pictures to send home.
If you just put money into my account that works for me, I just don't know how much is in there and if you want me accessing it.  I have survived on less at college, it just isn't very fun ;).  Also I'm finally stockpiling a little food here and there so I at least have something to eat.  Also I never saw Bobby's son. My comment about needing food was to a certain Kelsey Mills who has been promising me a care package for 3 weeks now and I still haven't received one :P.
Anyways I need to E-mail President Bubert.  I love you all, thank you all for your letters and support.  I love to hear from everyone, it's so much fun to get a letter from someone back home.  I try my hardest to reply to everyone who sends me mail, but sometimes P-day gets too busy.
Thank you,
Elder Henry


Dear Dad,

Yesterday was the Primary Program in our family ward here as well.  It was super awesome because one of the members brought a friend he's been working to teach with and the kids did an excellent job of teaching the Gospel.  It was a perfect sunday for a non-member to be there.
That's exciting news about the 100 visa's being aproved for Brazil.  Hopefully I will be able to leave for Brazil soon, but I'm enjoying my time in Huntington Beach as is.  The work here is doing great, and you can't beat the weather down here ;).
Mitch sent me a copy of his travel adventures in the mail, so don't worry too much about losing your copy to forward.
You know I can understand a little bit more how Mom and Sherry work being on a mission.  I know that they love each other and that Mom wants the best for Sherry, and Sherry wants to be a good daughter but there is still friction.  I'm having a bit of the same experience with one of my companions right now, where I realized I really love him and I have to focus on that rather than things that bother me. 
I hope that makes sense.  I know that my companion, as trying as he can be on my paitience, was put with me for a reason and that I know one day I'll meet back up with him and it will be like we are long lost brothers, but relationships are not easy, especially with random people.  I'm just lucky to be born in a day where the standards for missionaries have been raised and I have really hard working companions.

Anyways I better e-mail mom, I love you Dad,
Elder Henry

Michael's first week in Huntington Beach!

Greetings from Huntington Beach, California!

My address is:

320 Nashville Ave.

Apt 14

Huntington Beach, CA 92648

Where do I begin?  This past week has been crazy!

Last Tuesday I flew into Long Beach Airport and met my Mission President and his wife, AP's and had a quick orientation.  Our mission is apparently the second to smallest proselyting mission in the whole world.  Second only to a mission in South America, (possibly Mexico City or Santiago, Chille I can't remember which at the moment).  Upon arriving at the mission office we were told that 2 of the 3 of us would be serving in Spanish speaking areas.  I lucked out though and got sent English speaking :).  I'm serving in the Huntington Beach 1st ward, and the Pierside YSA ward and I absolutely love them!  These are probably the two best wards in the world to serve in.

After I got to my new area with my two new companions, Elder Matthews (from Spanish Fork, UT) and Elder Stringham (from West Valley, UT) we then went to work that night at 5:00.  Well if you consider eating with members work ;).  We met with the Bishop from 1st ward that night and talked with him about how we could help the ward.  We've been working really closely with the Ward leaders in both Wards.  Our Mission President wants us working almost exclusively through member referrals down here so we have been spending lots of time getting to know the members and earn their trust.  My two companions have done an excellent job before me, and the Pierside Ward especially is on fire with the spirit of Missionary work.  You have no idea how much it means to a missionary to receive a referral from a member.  Missionary work is so much better being able to already have that friend base there when we have lessons with investigators.

One thing that my Mission President told me when we came in is we all need both a Spiritual and a Social Conversion to the Church.  People aren't going to want to come to church where they can receive spiritual revelation if they don't have any friends there.  The Prophet Gordon B. Hinckley also told us of this need.  He said every new Convert needs a Friend, a Calling, and the nourishment of the good word of God.

This week we were supposed to have a baptism.  Her name is MK and both Elders were super excited for her to be baptised, but she didn't show up to our appointment last Friday, and we haven't really talked to her.  Apparently she moved down to Oceanside, CA near San Diego yesterday, but is still going to come up to Huntington Beach for work and school.  We are all really disapointed because she really wants to be baptised.  Hopefully she will make contact with us again and will be able to make that Baptisimal covenant with the Lord.

We've had some really good experiences last week though.  We've been able to contact a couple of less-active members last week and they said that they felt the spirit during our lessons.  Hopefully we will be able to bring them back to church, and they will be able to turn their lives around.

We are working with and excommunicated member of the Church right now come back into full fellowship with the church.  I'm not quite sure the whole story, but we met with him on Sunday and he's a huge WWII buff!  What a perfect match for Elder Henry ;).  The missionaries have been working with him for a while now, and I'm not quite sure how close he is to being reinstated and rebaptized, but we are all very hopeful for him.

We also had the opportunity last week to give priesthood blessings to 3 non-members, which sounds like a lot but they were all inspired by the spirit.  Its a little scary to rely on just the spirit and try and follow those subtle promptings, but my trainer Elder Stringham is an excellent example for me.  Each non-member felt the spirit and power of the blessings we gave and hopefully they will be able to continue and make progress.  We are on the verge of a very exciting time here in Huntington Beach.  There are a couple of families looking to start investigating the church, as well as some Young Adults who are friends of the Pierside ward.  I wouldn't want to be any place then here right now.  I'm soooooo excited to continue working this week.

I love you all, thank you for all your support,

Elder Henry

Hey Dad!

How exciting was conference this time, eh? I was super excited to hear about the new Provo Temple. It should be being completed sometime around the same time I get back home. At least I hear it takes them about 2 years here in the states. I was really bummed out that the Provo Tabernacle burned down while I was in Provo. I don't know if you know this or not, but when we went on our tour to Utah in the Boychoir we sang in the Provo Tabernacle. It was a beautiful building.

     I'm really glad you got the oppertunity to go out and visit Sherry. That's really cool that Sasha got to come with as well. I know how much they enjoy their time together. Every session of conference I would think about how you and the rest of the family was watching, and it made me feel like I was close to you all because we were doing the same activity together. Kind of a strange thought, but I quite enjoyed it.

     I'm not quite sure what is in store for me this P-day but I sure hope it includes basketball. I'm itching to hit the court.

     I'm really blessed with a trainer who is super obedient and just loves the work. Elder Stringham also speaks Spanish so we can converse pretty well. We also had the privilage of being fed by one of the families in the Spanish branch on Sat/Sun Lunch between sessions and I was able to understand about 70% of what they were saying, although they made fun of my Portuguese :P. This Tuesday I'm going on splits with the Zone Leaders, and they cover the Spanish Branch, so I'm going to have fun speaking Portuguese to the Spanish speaking families. I hope I don't die XP.

      Anyways I need to write my Mission President. I love you all, I hope you have a safe trip home,

Love

Elder Henry

Elder Henry is in Huntington Beach CA!

    We heard from Michael from the airport this morning!  He sounds awesome and very well prepared to serve the Lord in Long Beach--except he is having a hard time remembering his English grammar (he couldn't remember how to say "me too" when talking with another missionary in English).  Apparently his Visa was sent by the Missionary Visa office through Los Angeles.  Normally they are sent through San Francisco with Northwest missionaries, and explains why its taking so long.  He could be in Long Beach up to around 4 months but he does expect to eventually get to Brazil. 
     His mission area sounds like it will be really nice, of course he can't enjoy the beach but he might be able to walk along the paths near it and enjoy the views.  The area of the mission includes Catalina Island, wouldn't it be neat if he was able to tract out there on that beautiful island?  
     He's looking forward to getting to work and utilizing his missionary skills he developed as Ward Mission Leader as well as in the MTC.  His younger siblings enjoyed visiting with him (once they woke up a bit) and hearing his voice.  Spencer sounds almost exactly like him now!
    (At 5pm) I just heard from his Mission President's wife.  He will be serving with a pair of Elders who are already in Huntington Beach, they are giving him an hour of language study each day so he can keep up his Portuguese, he will be in a car and well fed every night by the Church members there.  They've had many Brazil visa waiters in the mission, and the longest so far has been 7 weeks.  Lets hope he doesn't set a new record ;o)  but he will have a wonderful first part of his mission in Huntington Beach!
   His Preparation Day is Monday.  The new address to send letters is:
Elder Michael Jordan Henry
c/o 6500 Atherton St.
Long Beach, CA 90815
You can also use DearElder.com, and have it sent to the Long Beach CA mission.  I'm not sure how you pay for letters through them I assume they either set you up an account or charge you the postage each time.
Thanks for all your prayers!
Lisa and Damon