Catching Up

Hey Everyone,

Sorry I haven't been too good about writing things for the blog lately... it has been an interesting past couple of weeks! This week was definitely a rough one... yes it is true it’s not always easy and happy and fun to be a missionary haha but don’t worry even with the past couple of weeks I still love being able to serve and I wouldn’t change or trade any of it for anything else in the world. 

The past little while my companion has really been struggling. He was brand new and he had some depression and other issues that he was trying to deal with. He also didn’t really want to be on a mission and was forced to come out. He was such a good person, we got along great and we had a good time together but he was having a hard time. The past few weeks he had really been talking with the Mission President and he finally decided this week that he needed to go home. On Friday he caught the bus to Winnipeg and then he flew home today. I am really sad to see him go. He was great... my only mission son. I always really wanted to train and have that experience and it was sure interesting, but again I wouldn’t change it! I for sure learned a lot from that experience though, I learned how to listen and really pay attention to the spirit in trying to help another person. It is so important for us to listen to other people. It shows that we love them and care about them and it gives us the opportunity to really get to know a person. Always listen to people and help them to know that you care. 

I did get a new companion this week his name is Elder Whetman. He has been out for about 5 months. He is a little be different but hopefully we will have a good experience together.... it’s kind of funny cause I have been praying to be more charitable and patient and I have been asking for opportunities to develop those attributes and let’s just say with this new companion of mine I will have plenty of opportunity for that haha! I’m telling you be careful for what you pray for because God does answer prayers!!! 

Flin Flon is still a great place, I love it here. We are working with a couple of people and lately our less actives have actually really been progressing and doing well so that is good news! One of my favorite things on my mission so far is watching a less active family return to activity in the church, you can just see the difference it makes! 

Lately it has been really sunny and warm outside so that has been really nice too, we are able to go to bbqs and walk around. We are going to start doing some sports nights and different things so that will be great... I love the nice weather, it always makes missionary work 10 times better. We got to eat and try some duck and duck soup this week as well.... it was alright haha. They also made us fried bannock which is super good. The native peoples love their bannock! 

Funny story of the week, yesterday we walked with a bunch of kids to church. They were all little native kids and they all wanted to come to church so we walked all of them there. Of course their parents didn’t come so it was chaos haha. They are all members and their parents are less actives so they have been before but man it was nuts! It definitely prepared me to one day have kids and deal with them at church haha! We were all over the place with those kids trying to get them to sit down and be quiet... craziness and of course you can’t hold them or really do anything as a missionary so it was a challenge but we survived and they all had a good time so it was worth it! 

Other than that things have been going good. lately I have really began to realize that life and each of the situations that we are in are only what we make of them. They can be terrible awful and depressing or we can choose to be happy we can choose to see the good and realize the blessings we have been given. I can tell you that it’s so much better when we choose to be happy and see the good, it’s definitely hard but it’s so much better! 

I hope you all have a great week, I love and miss you all! 

Elder Farnsworth

Bye Bye my son.

Kids playground - construction site.

Loved Conference

Hey everyone, how’s it going this week? 

We had a pretty good week this week, nothing too new or exciting happening. Conference was great like always! I guess before I talk about conference I will tell you more about our week. So we just did normal missionary stuff this week. We tracted and taught some lessons all that good stuff.  We also got to go out this week and do some service. That was a lot of fun. We helped take out a bathroom and do some demolition.

We got transfer calls and I’m staying here with my comp so that is a good thing. We also got another apartment this week so the other elders moved out.  It’s so nice now to have so much space! I missed all the room haha I guess you know your spoiled when you don’t have to share. 

Conference was so good! I loved the Saturday morning session, and a lot of the Sunday sessions were great too. Priesthood was really good.  I definitely enjoyed how much they talked about families and how important they are... inspired words!!! I really enjoyed Kevin R. Duncan’s talk on forgiveness. He talked a lot about how we need to forgive and when we do we will feel free. We don’t need to let hate or whatever run our lives. When we forgive we will feel better! I also liked Donald L. Hallstrom's talk about realizing who we are and that God loves us. One of the questions he asked was do we really know it... I loved that. We have to know for ourselves that God loves us and then, I feel, like a lot of other things start to fall into place with life. I also really enjoyed Bonnie L. Oscarson's talk, do believe it or not. Such good talks. And, of course, Elder Holland's talk. That one was powerful! I just love conference! 

Well I hope you all have a great week, love you! 

Elder Farnsworth

Happy Easter

HAPPY EASTER!

I hope you all had a great Easter weekend. It’s really such a great time of year. The weather is changing, and of course it’s always great to celebrate Easter and the resurrection of Jesus Christ. I hope everyone had a good weekend. 

This week was alright. We did a ton of traveling this week so that really wasn’t too fun but oh well I guess. We drove down to Brandon on Wednesday, then we had a training on Thursday. We drove to Dauphin and stayed the night then we drove back home on Friday.  I was so sick of being in a car driving by the end of it all! It took us 10 hours to get to Brandon. We stopped in Dauphin and ate at a members house and then we continued our drive and finally got there.  Then it took us 2 hours of driving on Thursday to get to Dauphin and then another 6 to get back to Flin Flon on Friday.  It was great to be in Dauphin for a while though.  I got to go see some of the members and that was fun!  

Our specialized training was great too. We learned a lot about faith and calling on the powers of heaven. It was a great training! We also got another car that me and my companion get to drive now, and guess what – it’s brand spanking new!!!! It’s a 2016 Nissan Rogue. Its real nice haha. You could say I was pretty excited to be driving a brand new car.  I may have a small car obsession, but this made all the driving worth it. 

For Easter we just went and had supper at a ladies house and did normal missionary stuff haha, nothing too exciting! I do want to just say though that I love Easter! I am so grateful for Jesus Christ. It is through him that we can live again and through him that we can do anything! It’s so vitally important for us to always remember that Jesus Christ is our strength. We need him always and in all things and never ever forget that!

I love you all and I hope that you all have a great week! 

Elder Farnsworth

New Car!

Happy Easter! 

Native Traditions

Hey everyone, how’s it going? This has been a great week for us here in Flin Flon.  This week we were able to have some great experiences and even see some amazing miracles!

This week we went with one of our recent converts and she took us to show us some of the native culture type stuff that they do. So we got to go with her and we met with one of the native elder and we had a really good discussion with her. She told us a bunch about the native beliefs and ways, and we in return were able to share with her a lot of our beliefs and practices. It was crazy how similar some of the beliefs were. We were also able to smudge with them. So what they do is they burn different herbs. So we had sage and lavender and some sweet grass and they light it on fire and then they blow it out and it smokes. Then you take the smoke and you like waft it towards you and it helps to get rid of negativity and just helps you to like purify yourself. It was really interesting! It was definitely a neat experience! 

On Tuesday another one of the recent converts hooped danced for us. That was kind of weird but it’s another one of the native traditions that they do.  Native traditions are seriously so interesting. Definitely a different culture! 

The best part of the week is that we had a baptism! We were teaching this man named Joseph Lambert and he decided to be baptized. It was a great day for him! I am so happy for him and his decision, it was great. He came up out of the water and he just started shouting hallelujah. He was so happy and you could tell it just shined on his face! Sunday he was confirmed and ordained to the Aaronic priesthood, it was a great weekend :) 

This week has really been great, I have felt so many of the prayers that are being said in our behalf and I know without a doubt that God is there and that he will help us. I have seen that and felt that this week. My companion is doing so much better, and the working is really moving along here in Flin Flon. I love my mission so much. I am so grateful for this opportunity I have to serve!!! I am also so thankful for all the prayers that are said and all the support I receive! I love you all and hope you have a great week! 

Elder Farnsworth

Elder Farnsworth asked me to include this link this week.  It is the Easter initiative video.  https://www.mormon.org/easter

Joseph Lambert baptism

The Church in Flin Flon

 Elder Blommaert and Shiann a recent convert

 Elder Davies leaving on the Greyhound for his New York Mission

 Elders Morrill, Blommaert, Davies and Farnsworth - the original four

 Housing in Flin Flon

 Elder Miyashiro who Elder Farnsworth is training

Training

Hello everyone! How was everybody’s week this week?

Our week went ok this week. One of the best things about the week is how warm it got :). It was warm enough that the snow is melting... hooray haha! There is a lot of water and puddles, and there is dirt everywhere from the snow and the plows and everything but spring time is in the air!

I did get my new companion this week. He is from southern Alberta, his name is Elder Miyashiro. He is a visa waiter and will be going to the California Modesto mission once his visa comes in. Training is really a different experience. I really do like it but it’s not exactly what I expected. It’s crazy starting to teach someone from scratch how to be a missionary, but it’s been good and it has also been a good reminder to me on how I can be a better missionary so it’s great!  My comp is struggling a little bit with a few things and has been thinking about going home so please keep him in your prayers. He is questioning if this is really were he should be. It is for sure where he needs to be but just pray for him!!!! It will all work out! 

We were able to do quite a bit of teaching this week. We split the area and so we have some new people to work with and we lost some of the old people we were working with to the other Elders. We are no longer teaching Regan but she is doing good still. We set a baptismal date with a man named Joseph. He will be baptized this Saturday!!!!  It’s going to be great. We will also need some prayers for that to make sure everything goes smoothly. I am so excited for him though he is great! We also had a branch activity on Friday night which was great! It was a dominos night. We had Dominos pizza and of course played dominos. It was fun and there was a great turn out, I think half the people there were investigators or recent converts so that was a huge success! 

This Sunday I gave a talk in church and the topic I picked was facing the future with faith and hope. Just a few thoughts.... sometimes the future is scary and looks dark and dreary. Sometimes life just isn’t fun and it’s a little miserable. You look at the world and see all the horrible things going on and it can be depressing, but in reality it does not need to be. If we have faith in Jesus Christ, if we obey the commandments and we do what we are supposed to do, the future is bright! We have hope in eternal life. We have hope for good things in the future for blessings and for miracles. When we are sad and getting down because the way life is sometimes we need to remember that it will all work out. There’s a quote by President Hinckley that I really love. "If you do your best, it will all work out. Put your trust in God.  The Lord will not forsake us." It’s true, he will never forsake us!!!! I would invite you all to read Neil f Marriott’s talk called yielding our hearts to God. That is a good one :)

Well I love you all. Thanks for all your love and support. Have a great week!!!! 

Elder Farnsworth

Finally Training

BIG NEWS...... I will finally be having a SON!!!!!! I got a phone call on Friday and I was told that I will be training a new missionary. I am so excited!!! I have wanted to train for the longest time and now I finally get the chance to. It’s going to be such a good experience. My trainee will come in on Thursday. It’s the middle of the transfer which is kind of crazy but now my comp is going to be in a tripan with the other two Flin Flon missionaries and it will be me and my trainee in the other Flin Flon area. It’s going to be an adventure, since I have only been here 3 weeks I am still learning the area myself and now I will have a brand new elder. It’s going to be great!!! I am excited.... to say the least haha! 

This week has been a good week for us teaching wise. We were able to find a new investigator, and we taught a few other people, some of who we have been trying to work with for a while. So that was a huge blessing. The lessons all went pretty good, they all understood what we taught and they agreed to the commitments so that is always a good thing. We hopefully have a baptism coming up on March 19th which will be really good!!! We are praying and hoping that it will all work out and come together. 

This week we went to a native girls birthday party and it was quite crazy haha. Their parties are much different. It was fun though.  They give the kids what’s called birthday bumps. They grab their hands and feet and they put them in the air and then they bump their butts on the ground haha. It looks painful but it was pretty funny. We also walked a ton this week. Flin Flon is a really hilly area and my word my legs were so sore. I guess it’s good though, I will be all in shape for when I come home. 

The weather has been ok. We were walking on Saturday and it was a really nice day. Everything was melting. We were walking on the side of the road and totally got splashed by this car that drove through a puddle. That stunk but it was pretty funny. Now today it’s snowing and cold again. We are supposed to get like 7 inches so that’s bad news. 

Lately I have been thinking a lot about gratitude and how we always need to be grateful for the things we are given, especially the experiences and the relationships that we are blessed with. God gives us so much. I think a lot of the time when we think of being grateful its more for material possessions but there is so much  more that we are given. One of my favorite gratitude quotes is, “What if the things you thanked God for today were the only things you were given tomorrow.” Something to think about... always be grateful!!!! 

Love you all. I hope you have a great week! 

Elder Farnsworth

Elder Morrell

Beautiful Flin Flon

Margaret

Snow snow snow

Prayers Needed

Hello this week, how is everyone?

This week was a great week for us, we were able to meet with a lot of our investigators and things are really moving forward here in good ole Flin Flon. It’s such an interesting place. I have thought about it the past few days and it’s so humbling to be here and to see the way life is for some people, it makes me so thankful for the way I was raised and for the things that I have. It’s crazy here the way people treat and raise their children, they are all pretty high or drunk and they just don’t pay much attention to them. We will go to houses and there will just be little kids hanging out with no real adults home or sometimes they will be home but their just sleeping or doing whatever not even taking care of the kids. It’s sad, but its sure eye opening. 

I do love it here though. We get to talk with the little kids and give them CTR rings and things and it is for sure planting seeds within their minds.  One day they will remember us and talk to missionaries when they are older. Its great too cause when we teach those families, you can really see them change and watch how the gospel makes them into a better person. The gospel really does change lives, it’s amazing to watch! 

We do have a few people we are working with that I would love you all to pray for. Regan is the first one. She has a baptismal date for the 11th of March and just recently started having family problems. Noella, she has been taught for a long time and is Regan sisters. She suffers from a lot of addictions, but we really want to help her so please pray for her. Also Sandra and Shianne, they are sisters. Sandra is investigating and will be baptized in August once she is off parole, and Shianne is her sister who is a recent convert. But they need extra prayers right now!   Thanks for praying for them, I know it will help! 

I love you all and I hope you all have a great week. Don’t forget to count your blessings!!!!

Love you! 

Elder Farnsworth

One of the cute natives showing off her CTR ring!

(I am laughing at a couple of things -- first of all it is 45 degrees below in Flin Flon and this cute little girl is in shorts -- I clearly am a wimp in my coat at 50 degrees.  Eli also pointed out the finger with which she is showing us her ring.  We both laughed!)