Alma 29:9

Alma 29:9
I know that which the Lord hath commanded me, and I glory in it. I do not glory of myself, but I glory in that which the Lord hath commanded me; yea, and this is my glory that perhaps I may be an instrument in the hands of God to bring some soul to repentance; and this is my joy.

Wednesday, January 25, 2012

Hi

 This week went pretty good. Corliss did not get baptized and we met with her alot this week to try and get her to get baptized but we can't force them in the water i suppose. She is pretty much a dry member. She doesn't want to let go of her church but i think she knows this church is true. It is just hard for her. We are fasting with her today so hopefully she will decide to get baptized and we can fill the font on sunday right??? haha She told us she doesn'thave a testimony of the BoM yet but i am sure that if she does those three things in Moroni she will have it soon. She is just a cool older lady that should go under pretty soon but we will see.

Just came from the Temple. Love that place. Death Temple we call it because it is the people who are going home's last one. My comp is pretty nervous about going home. Weird to me that this transfer is already practically over exept this last week. If the time keeps going by i will be home tomorrow haha.
We went with the Murdochs alot this week. They are a funny couple. I hope to stay in touch with them throughout my mission and after. They were the one's sitting across from me at the dinner table.

Glad to hear that Colton is almost done. He is going to love it out here. Can't wait to hear where he is going.
Cool to hear that Mike is the Bishop and the new Bishopric. I got a letter from him last week! He sounded like he was doing good so i hope they are. That was good of them to go over to the house to have him set apart. Sandy prolly liked that.

When the s-d card gets here i will just turn around and send the one i got back. Just put them on a file when you get them. Make a Mission folder then put everything in a sub-folder if you would. I have a couple of videos in the car with some sweet music on it but i will try and take some more video of the area and maybe one of the apartment. don't worry too much about getting it here tho mom when i get it i will send it.
Glad to hear that the girls are doing good. Thanks for emailin me.

Well it is perfect here this week so it is very good of you guy's to take all the cold weather and snow. Blue Skies after the Temple.
I am doing good and loving it. Sorry for this being so short right now but other Elder's are waiting for the computer so i don't want to take alot of time.
Tell Katie good luck even tho it is too late.

Say hi to Grandpa and Grandma too me. If ya give me there addresses i might send them a letter. I don't think i got there address's written down. Also can you get me Zach's and Shawn's? i would send one to Micah too but i think that would cost me a lot of stamps but maybe you could get me his too haha
It is crazy how fun missionary work is. I like talking to people and i really like the one's that listen.When people don't listen it is frustrating, because every one needs this gospel whether they know it or not. Even those who has never had religion. The Gospel fills hole that most didn't know were there. Love you all and i will write more next week. Just keep telling me everything. Don't worry about telling me something that you would think would make me homesick cause i am not. Telling me everything helps me. If you have moved rooms yet send some pictures. okay better get going talk to ya next week!

Love Elder Stoor

Wednesday, January 18, 2012

Hello Fam Damily!!

Greetings from D.C.! Weather here is crazy. It is like every other day here. Started out (when i got here) pretty much in the sixty's and it was just perfect. Been pretty much perfect 80% of the time ;) haha be jealous anyhows yeah right now it is only cold because of the wind chill but this jacket i got is pretty sweet cause it cuts the wind so it has been perfect with it on. Every Third Sunday of the month the Visitor's Center or i will call it the VC has Why I Believe program where all the recent converts stand and tell us what ward they are in and when they are baptized and testimony if they want and then two that are on the programs for testimony then they usually have a famous speaker that is mormon but didn't this time i guess. Anywho it was a really spiritual experience and we had Corliss there and she is in love with the temple and i am pretty sure she got her answer after i told her to look at the temple and pray and ask how could it not be true?!

She is just stubborn and doesn't want to leave what she has had for her whole life which in a way is understandable, but she is just stuck on proper authority. Most people are out here.

We have an investigator Kelly who we met with a couple weeks ago don't know if i told ya but the start of the lesson was really bad cause we were standing up and and it was just not right giving a standing lesson and felt all weird and i forgot the first lesson lol but we sat on the floor and then i remembered lol weird how things like standing up can throw you off and anyways worst 5 minutes of the mission haha but it ended up being a really good first lesson we put her on date and she came to church actually got herself to church, that's a big plus cause most people just take a free ride and then don't do anything so the one's that get themselves there is really nice and no one in our area seems to have a car either but there are car's all over the place. The people on the military base do tho.

 We had two dinner's with two young couple with little kids both on base and they were both good. The ward try's to feed us every night which in a way is good but i don't want to gain too much weight. It is fun with the little kids too and makes me excited for the rest of my life haha. One picked us up and started on a story of how when you move on base everyone tells you, When you come out the front gate turn left or right do not go straight. If you see a popeyes you have gone too far and are in a scary place. Well the popeye's is in my area lol It is weird tho if you are black it is prolly not that scary, although some that live here are super scared to even be here which is sad. Every missionary is jealous tho cause this is where all the stories come from they say.

We were walking and my comp found a huge bullet we think might have come out of an AK maybe. so that 
is cool. also we do what we call G-Q or golden question which is street contacting and found these two guy's that made us test our patience but it was funny cause he tried to explain to us that Mary was not a virgin then flipped to a scripture that said young women meaning mary but then took us too the footnotes that said that it meant virgin??? either i didn't follow, he didn't explain himself well enough, or he is just confused haha it was funny and they wanted to just fight so we just left. Also told us the BoM is racist cause the one read it and said when the colors changed it was being racist haha My comp was really frustrated but we just went to talk to other people and just kinda left. He called us babies in what we do and i told him that we don't claim to know everything just want to share what we do know and we all need to learn more and then he was all sorry

It is crazy how time flies i can't believe it is P-day yet and i think it is just going to speed up but i am enjoying it here. couple questions:
How is Colton? and where is he at on his paper's?
Could you get me a new watch band for my ipod? a better one than the one i got one that is more durable cause this one broke.
and do you have an s-d card in the mail so i can just send you pics home? thinking we could just send one out once a transfer or something??
and Mara i don't know a Schapp or whatever his name is yet haha but my zone leader is Elder Pierruci and he was at Utah State and going back and he was a convert there so that is pretty neat and there is a couple more Utah State people we have more Aggies than Cougers haha
Sad to hear from all the deaths but they are in a better place now and i am sure just as happy as can be haha I know it is tough here but we need to think of the eternal perspective and get peace from that.
Crazy about the new bishopric but i guess Bishop Evans has been there for a minute or two let me know for sure on that.

So my first adventure on the mall was today and that was pretty neat. Lincoln Memorial is pretty sweet and the Washington one is tall. I want to go more and see some stuff and hopefully take some tours. If i ever get to serve in DC 3rd i get to take a tour of the white house cause there is lady that will hook us up. and i have not seen that yet haha It is a long ways from the Washington to the lincoln adn that is all i saw of the mall cause we came back. People go there to run, which i would do and watch the sunrise pretty neat. Pretty long place that is for sure but it would be nice to just be able to spend one full day just on the mall i don't think i will get to do that haha


A little fuzzy of the Washington Monument
Lincoln Memorial
Elder Stoor & Elder Fawcett ( I lightened it up a bit)
Tell Chris Banks i met the J.S. Armstrong shook his hand. Said he knew Chris haha He buy's the elder's who serve in his ward a death tie when they go home and so he bought E. Fawcett one. Go to Brooks Brothers which is a highly expensive store that in my opinion i would never shop there cause you could look just as nice in a 100$ suit verses $1000 haha

Elder Fawcett
Well i hope this e-mail finds you all well and just know that i am enjoying it here. it feels like spring tho so that is a little weird. We are either going to get dumped on with snow or we won't get it at all which would be a strange winter. Next P-day is Death Temple so we go to a session on the last p-day before transfers which is called Death Temple haha. One more thing i saw Elder Gleed at the Why I Believe and he is doing good haha Well prolly gonna try and attach a couple of picture's and then send so have a good next week!

Love Elder Stoor

Sunrise pix after the lights are out
P.S. i hope i got the clear pictures on here. The that is dark is of me and my comp and we could not get one to work with the sunlight but his worked but he don't have his camera so i should be able to get a copy from him tho, but i tried one of just him and it worked lol i think you will know which one if i got it right. and another funny story we were walking to the lincoln memorial cause that is the best for sunrise and right when we were by the Washington they shut the lights off from lighting it up and it scared us lol twas freaky okay goodbye

Wednesday, January 11, 2012

First Photos 1-11-12

Elder Stoor FINALLY sent some photos, HOORAY!!!
He didn't add any captions, so I'll try my best:

First Companion Elder Galuvao and Seth in front of Provo Temple

Elder Morris (Ramah, NM), Elder Galuvao (Anaheim, CA) and
Elder Lott (Pleasant View, UT)

  
Bro Lybbert and Bro Farley - teachers at the MTC

MTC District

Elder Galuvao and Elder Stoor pointing to D.C. on the map

The Washington D.C. Temple



Elder Stoor's bed on the right

Other side of the room

Elder Fawcett (Elder Stoor's trainer from British Columbia, Canada)
and Elder Dillon (I think)

View of the living room

View of the kitchen

The World's Largest Chair

January 11, 2012

Will try pictures a little later will get my comp to go to the library later. I think i will have too but i am a the stake center just got done with glow in the dark dodgeball and it was super scary when the lights were out but i think if you get better glow in the dark balls it could work cause you couldn't really see them till they were right there and so we just turned on the lights, missionaries are bad to play with tho cause they were all just being dumb and took things offensive which was stupid but it was all fun still the same. Weird how people take everything so seriously but i just run around being stupid and it was fun but this week was super intense.

On Sunday we were sitting on the couch after we took a little nap and right outside our apartment we heard some gun fire it was super scary we ran to the window, i know stupid but we are so yeah, and seen one guy running off after like 30 shots, seen him run off and all ran outside cause we figured he won and someone needed help but didn't see anyone and seen this one car that got shot. went thru the front window and out the back thru the headrest gap of the driver's seat tho and the projectory of the bullet had to have been 10 feet from our window but when we got out there were people all over and we didn't see anyone hurt which was a blessing i did not want to try to help someone live but it was super intense. but my area is prolly the most bad parts of the mission and super scary i am scared alot but i know the lord is on my side and everyone knows who we are and what we are doing. We are told to be careful every single day. One quick side story, couple weeks ago we were going to dinner but got lost went to ask someone rolling down the window and the first thing he said was "Now Y'All be careful, now" super funny but everyone does it. One guy told us that one of his buddies tried to rob a missionary and he got 12 years lol but every one knows us and it is considered low to do anything to a missionary so don't worry. I am getting used to it but after the gunfire i am a little uneasy if you know what i mean. but two days later we think it was the end of that fight just up the road and over a little bit cops were everywhere again. But the biggest thing i learned is i am not going to be raising my future kids in a city like this.

One day i don't remember exactly when i think it was last friday we get people all the time, (crazy people mostly) come up to us and just say three words over and over Pray for me pray for me so we do tell them to have a nice day and keep on going haha one lady tried to tell us that sex was good, grandma age too and her reasoning was that these days if you don't have sex how are you going to tell whether or not it is a man or woman you are liking on, and she says the only thing God won't forgive you for is murders and not listening to the spirit haha i wanted to ask whether she believed in the ten commandments but didn't and there were kids up the road listening super dumb but after she left went to them and said so the thing you learned from that is not to have sex before you are married. haha they were like 4 10 12 i think haha kids are so fun to talk too cause they are the only one's who are excited to talk to you and when you pull out a card if there are more than one you better have two haha it seems like every missionary out here is super excited to be a dad and i am with them cause kids are fun to teach the gospel too.

Corliss is still is the same spot as before just waiting for an answer. Coming to church did not help cause that was just bad haha okay not really but it was fast and testimony meeting and just to make things short we had one guy up there say a couple things then said let us pray...he prayed about everything from abulance drivers, to women's clothing store, and to all the other fuzz out there LOL but it was super scary when we had investigators there. But Corliss is just being stubborn cause we see her getting her answer all the time and she just won't accept it cause she is tied to her church and formor beliefs which in a way i see cause she is 50 some odd years old and she has grown up in it but i think she will get there.

We dropped Zach so haven't talked to him he kept dogging us and it just isn't worth the time to go over there which sounds bad but true. In the city we go thru many people cause there is alot and if they are not ready right then we hopefully planted a seed for other missionaries later on so we dropped him.

Got a new one tho but she is moving to our roommates area, dang but she is super sweet. most people come to church cause they get a free ride but we had a nice lesson with her. weirdest start of anyone i have ever taught tho. we were standing up cause the senior couple was with us named the Murdocks, will tell about them later, but thru me so off cause i was standing i forgot the first lesson lol but we sat on the floor and i remembered it haha super embarasing. but later in the lesson she was like so you are trying to get me to come to your church..yeah...okay where is it...3601 Southern Ave. on the maryland side...okay see you there i can bus......Pretty sweet when they get themselves to church which she did. most of them do not do that at all. and we also got her on date too

We had a part-member family which we went and seen across the street names' Crutchfield. wife is less-active with a new year's resolution to come to church(awesome!!!) and her husband picked a date out for him. Feb 19 so we have alot of people right now and we found two family's one we met the dad on the street got an appointment seemed super interested but could not meet us till two saturdays later which is this next one, and also my comp found one that was looking for a church and g-Q'ed them which means golden question so pretty much tracting but we just talk to everyone we see haha we don't knock doors like every we just go talk to people. but i didn't meet them cause my comp is DL and i was on exchanges with people till from Sunday to today which are pretty fun

Went with E. Standing in the North area and we stopped by one of there investigators and he was having some pain attack he told them he gets and he was all over the floor and couldn't stand up just effects from drugs happening too much in his earlier life.They are bad news and that was the strangest thing and scariest thing i have ever seen. Told us not to call anyone and to pray for him so we did and left and we were both just floored what we had seen. Can't really explain it. super scary just wow.

then i went with my roomate Dillon which his cousin is Perry i think his name is. he was in Justin's band haha Call uncle Gus and tell him. Super funny how we found that out. He started to talk about Deary, Idaho haha he is from Middleton but i asked him if he knew Justin Stoor and he was like yeah i played once with there band they had lol so funny funny. but i seen the world's largest chair lol super big got a picture which i am going to send you pic's later when i have to go to the library with my comp. so email with pics coming later.

but that all happened in a week haha there is soo much that happens i can't even tell you guy's half of it. I have not heard so many sirens in my life tho. I think in the first week i heard more sirens than i had my whole life and that is not exagerating at all.

if you have any ?'s real fast and see this before i get to library but tell grandma i seen a package for elder gleed that was from Uncle Virgil and i almost stole it haha

But the Murdock's are great from Mapleton, Utah need to ask if they know Mike and Ruth cause they own a pretty big ranch from what i can tell but they are just the ultimate couple. If my marriage turns out like theres i would be a totally succesful man. They love each other and that love just radiates to us and they are super funny too. Elder Murdock just is funny. During District meeting we poked fun because he was carrying his wifes purse and he yelled back Its a European Man Bag, yelled it in the church and it was just super super funny, another one he was bearing his testimony on tithing and he just said that because they paid tithing they never went without super strong spirit too and told about food never went hungry, and also the children always had clothes, until they ran out the shower naked...during the lesson and we just laughed for a while and they go Nutso over the pinoche which is super good thanks guys but i got to go the stake center computers are shutting down but i have having the time of my life so don't worry

Love Elder Stoor

Monday, January 9, 2012


Happy New Year message to Elder Stoor from his sisters:

WE
LOVE
YOU!!!

Wednesday, January 4, 2012

January 4, 2012

Hello Fam and Friends,
My camera is in my backpack which happens to be in the Zone Leaders car...and so no pictures but i really don't know how to do it with these library computers we have so maybe we could just keep doing the switcharu with them haha then you can put them in a folder on a computer or that hard drive and save them all under mission in each a separate folder send pics home when i get the chance to take them. Cheese means that they are not a solid investigator here in the city we go thru investigators alot. Contact them on the street and then they dog us, which means ditch us, very few times we actually get a good one.

between sex and drugs it can really mess people up and there is alot of people here that are cu co for it. It is really sad to be walking along the streets here which happen to be really trashy anyways and see used condoms along the side of the road it is really sick but it is the culture here. We are in one of the sketchiest places of the mission tho but all the gangs we know we are just the missionaries and are harmless. haha New years Eve was crazy haha had a dinner with our ward mission leader after a normal day and then came home after playing games with there family and just hanging out on base cause it is safe haha i was super super exhausted so we go to bed a little later cause we were talkin and lost track of time and i was out like a rock the whole night and didn't hear any gun shots but everyone else in the apartment woke up to them.

They started at 11:55 and didn't stop till 1 in the morning and it was constant gun fire! they took a video that i heard and it was crazy glad i slept thru it but i dreamed about someone shooting me haha but the gun fire did not stop...so the biggest prize that an Anacostia missionary can get is gun shells...hehe so we were searchin like crazy the day after cause mostly everyone had a hangover anyways so just the drunks were out walking the streets and we only talk with them if we want a laugh, this one we talked to and our phone went off and told him to show us some dance moves so he did some kinda drunkin routine it was hilarious haha,

but we walked over to the best member ever sis garvin who is doing missionary work and we go and role play with her to helpe her and to also help us and it is good to see her service in the work she is talking to almost more people than we are haha good way to get people to teach too. but in the parking lot by our apartment my comp found the led out the bullet and i found 11 penny's haha bank and later that day we found to gun shells, then later found 8 more then the next day i found 6 haha got a lot of gun shells so i will send some home maybe for you guy's haha

It makes me laugh as i am living in the hood right now to back to high school and all the people who tried to be thugs cause they have no clue how to be one haha we make fun of it between missionaries and we sound ridiculous but when the black people use it here it sounds cool and normal. Had one older guy speakin ibonics yell at us that jesus was in hell and we just smiled at him and told him that we know he did because he was teaching the people there haha it is funny to see corliss try and fight us on some topics and we win everytime when we explain stuff too her but she is still progressing and hopefully will be baptized on her date the 22.

she tried to pull out that no man has seen god because it says it in the bible and both places are just talking how they rejected jesus and did not see him as a god and other stuff that we can explain to her to just let her know we really have the facts. the visitors center is a really good tool and she is hooked on the temple it is cool to see her feel the spirit so strong and she zoned out at the temple three or four times when the spirit was way strong and she is starting to feel like that may be her answer but zack who was supposed to go with us there too dogged us and we are hopefully going there tonight so cross our fingers.

We have eated at some people's names who are the Forson's, called you from there house on christmas, really generous family who are just pretty sweet and cooks real good food and have done it for twenty years think we go there once a month. :] need to start working out in the morning so i don't get fat cause people feed us real good. had one lady call us after we ate dinner one night told us to come get food (lives across the street) less active named Crutchfields and they have a new years resolution to get more involved in the church so hopefully that works. so we had two dinners that night which was a blessing cause i was starving that night and it was fried fish and cole slaw and corn bread tis good. other than that we didn't really do much it seems cause every one we talked to was busy so we have a bunch of appointments this week.

Today we rode the metro and the station closest to my house is Congress heights like a five minute walk here is my address to my apartment cause Sarah Taylor send me a letter so i got my address 1905 Savannah Terrace #102 Washington D.C. 20020 but please just send all my mail to the mission home and they can forward it too me it helps because i don't know how long i will be in each area. I hope i am here for a while beacue the ward is pretty much like home. except for the fact that the members don't seem to have a lot of knowledge on how to work a ward haha it is different but the spirit there is so strong and everyone has a bond it is strange. Black people just are friendly and welcoming for the most part and always have a openness to smile at the elder's or the jesus people haha ESPECIALLY DON'T SEND PACKAGES TO MY APARTMENT CAUSE THEY WILL GET STOLEN HAHA

but i am doing good having fun and this last week went by super super super fast it was crazy how fast it went by days feel like weeks and the weeks feel like days nobody can understand that until they serve a mission haha Tell Chris Banks i heard of the J.S. guy to all the missionaries that served around him he buy's them a tie from Brooks Brothers which is a really really expensive suit store ties are like 80$ and that is why we rode the metro it is my trainer's dieing tie haha, it was crazy to see white people today cause i don't get much of them anymore we laugh because all the white girls we see seem to be really pretty for some reason and my comp is worried every one of them is going to be that way when he gets home haha

and most likely in those pictures on facebook he prolly seems real big but he has lost 95 lbs. since coming out and is trying to lose more i think but not sure name is Darrin Trask Fawcett to clarify the facebook stalking lol. Sorry about the no pictures thing but i don't know how and to my sisters you need to tell me what santa brought you geeze, and also have you moved me out and re arranged the rooms yet if so send me pics of those you guy's know how and i will just send all my pics home thru mail cause when i do get them here i most likely won't know how to put them on. but i like mail and the emails so keep them coming getting mail is just a god feeling haha loving it here and the weather has been nice till today and yesterday has been super cold but not unbearable and no snow still seen four flakes yesterday but that was it dunno what you guy's want out of my emails so if i am not doing it just ask and i will

the dates and times should be on there haha we have a zone activity next p-day glow in the dark dodgeball, then first zone conferance on thursday so in two weeks i will go take sunrise pictures at the mall with everyone so that should be cool especially since it will be my first time there but i have to go right now so i will talk to you all next week.

Happy New Years can't believe how much my life has changed since a year ago to now grateful for this gospel and the happyness it brings to people! talk to ya next week glad you all are having fun and that sucks on being sick but happy to know that you are all getting better.

Love Elder Stoor