Tuesday, December 30, 2014

Hey hey hey,

This week turned out really good. Christmas was the BOMB. We got to watch "It's a Wonderful Life". That movie is also the BOMB. We also had a brunch. Brunches are the BOMB. Everything we did on Christmas was pretty much the BOMB. It's good that our mission is so tiny that getting a zone full of missionaries is super easy. Our dinner was really cool too. We ate with an old lady and her family and she gave us these awesome handmade blankets. Those blankets are the BOMB.

The beginning of the week was slow with teaching but we did get to have a great time caroling to some investigators/LA's on Christmas Eve and Night. Even though the beginning of the week was slower the weekend was awesome. All the investigators that we found were Saturday and Sunday and they were all awesome miracles. They were all pretty similar too. We would go to a potential that we either had met before or set up a return appointment with and we went over and the were super open and willing to read the things we left with them like pamphlets or the Book of Mormon. We hope to be able to have really good lessons with them this week and to see if we can get any of them with baptismal dates.

I hope you guys all had a sick Christmas. I know I sure did. This was my last one of my mission. Crazy. It was also my last Skype home. WUT. #4months #nottrunky

Anywho, remember that you guys are awesome and that oute alofa iate outou! 

Keep it real.

Elder Sanderson
#leavebetter

Monday, December 22, 2014

Dear Friends and Family,

Sorry I haven't been sending out very many of these. It's been pretty hard to find the time to email lately. Things have been real real here. Christmas is just about here and even though this crazy upside down place I'm in doesn't have any snow I'm still extremely happy to be spending another Christmas in the Great California Long Beach Mission. So far things are going great. We've had a few great experiences this week. One was when we were with a member visiting some people. Nobody was there, but as we were standing there the daughter in law rolled up and we starting talking to her and, long story short, she let us in and we taught her! It was awesome! Finding new investigators every week is possible! It's one of my favorite phases in missionary work for sure.

The hustle and bustle is continuing to pick up and I'm sure by the night before Christmas there will be many many creatures stirring around trying to get the last minute shopping done. From the stores with 50% off Christmas decorations to the BOGO sales many many people will be so focused on getting things done before Christmas that they might forget why they're really celebrating. Let's not forget why this all came to be. 

This all came to be because 2000 years ago a baby was born. Lots of babies were born before that and lots of babies have been born since and lots of babies will yet be born, but this one was different. This baby was not just another bundle of joy given to faithful parents. No, this baby was someone else. This baby had a divine destiny that reached far beyond any other baby. This baby was born of an earthly mother but a heavenly father. This baby was a promised gift, a foretold bringer of peace and goodwill. Rather than his birth being announced by just his parents, it was announced by angels. This baby was Jesus the Christ. This baby was the fulfillment of every prophet from Adam down. The birth of Jesus, like any other gift, is not something we should take for granted. "For what doth it profit a man if a gift is bestowed upon him, and he receive not the gift? Behold, he rejoices not in that which is given unto him, neither rejoices in him who is the giver of the gift." (D&C 88:33 italics added) Let us receive the gift of Jesus' birth and rejoice in Him and He who is the giver of the gift, our Father in Heaven.

I love you guys and I wish you all a very Merry Christmas. I hope you all have a fun and safe time. Have fun in the snow for me! (for those of you who are fortunate enough to have it)

Keep it real merry.

Elder Sanderson
#leavebetter

Wednesday, December 3, 2014

Cerritos zone!



I found out I'm leaving Cerritos and going back to Long Beach!! It's a different part though. It's the nice part. :D

Elder Sanderson
#leavebetter

Monday, November 24, 2014

Howdy!

This week was pretty hectic again. This is the last week of having two wards to cover! Woo! It'll be nice to go back to covering one ward. It's been pretty fun to cover two wards but a ton of time was spent driving around. I can't wait to get to bike around again! We also had a lot of crazy stuff happen with investigators and we had to drop some of our favorite investigators because the parents don't want them investigating and even though some of them are over 18 they want to respect what their parents say. That's a bummer but we'll be all good. 

It's starting to cool down here and stay cooled down. It still doesn't drop below 50 and it's usually in the 60's but for here that's considered cooling down. This is my favorite time of year in California. It's the bomb.

This week was a pretty trying week but here I am on Monday again! It's funny that hard weeks seem like forever at the time but looking back it goes by so fast. Heavenly Father definitely helps us through our hard times. If we are so focused on how unhappy we are it's impossible to see the positive side of a situation. There is always a positive side to things. God himself created this world so there will never ever ever be a lack of goodness. It may be hard to find, it may be small, but it will always be there. God will not allow his creations to become overwhelmed with darkness, and that even goes for you too! Remember that we're God's creations too.

Well, that's all for this week. Keep on truckin on! God will not let you fail! E moni le Talalelei!

Keep it real.

Elder Sanderson

Wednesday, November 19, 2014

Hey there erryone,

Things are good. The library is packed. Phones are ringing off the hook. A crazy lady is yelling at people on the phone and spraying very liberal (that is an understatement) amounts of hairspray while staring at a computer that has been on the same webpage without any change for at least the hour or so that I've been here. #SOCAL

This week was awesome. Working two wards is crazy. We've got the system for working down better now but that doesn't always fit the schedule for people we're teaching. I'm fine with that though, I'd rather have a lesson with someone than not so I'm not upset if it doesn't fit our predetermined system. Between the two wards we're doing about as much work as if we we're in 1 ward so we just need to work on being twice as effective so we can have each ward have the productivity on a ward. That'll be tough but we're going to work harder on stacking our nights with lessons so we can get as much done as possible. We're even trying to get members from each ward to do splits with us so we can cover both areas in the same day. If we do that I'm confident that we will see even more miracles. We're looking for and praying for miracles all the time. The Lord will provide!

This week our mission president encouraged us to make a "vision" for the rest of our mission. A vision is a lofty, long term, overall end state, goal that one makes to try and improve their character and accelerate their progression. For mine I decided to go with the simple phrase "Leave Better". I chose that because there's still a ton of changing for me to do while I'm out here. It's always been my goal to become the best I can be out here but the vision of "Leave Better" is going to help me to improve the most that I possibly can. I encourage all of you to "Leave Better" in whatever aspect of your life that applies to. Whether school or work or finishing some sort of assignment. If you make that a priority the Lord will shape you into who he wants you to be.

As always, I love you guys. I love my mission. You know the rest!

Keep it real.

Elder Sanderson
#leavebetter
 
 p.s. in case you haven't noticed it's kind of a big thing in this mission to use hash-tags even though we don't use social media. I know it's weird. It's just what we do in the California Long Beach Mission.

Monday, November 10, 2014

Hey Homies,

This week was pretty cool. You know just hangin out, getting a new companion halfway through the transfer and having mine get moved to a different ward because an Elder got his VISA, and covering two wards instead of just one. The usual I guess. But for real I got a new companion now! His name is Elder Sheen. He's awesome. He's also from Idaho! That's two in a row. 3 in total. His companion left a few weeks ago to go to Australia and so he was bouncing around the zone for a few weeks but they decided they would put him with me and have us cover both wards and kick Elder Stallings to another ward. It's been cool. It's actually not as bad as I first thought it would be. We just split up the wards every other day and on Sundays we just go to both! It's super cool. 5 hours of church is fun. It makes Sundays fly by super fast. It's weird.

This week we had a pretty cool finding experience. We went to visit an old potential and he turned out to be super receptive. That really hasn't happened to us a ton in this area. We were able to teaching him a little first lesson and set up another time to come back this week. It was cool to see Heavenly Father put someone who was willing to listen in our path. We've had a few of those this week. He was the only one that we actually taught, but we've been able to set up some really good return appointments for this week. We've started to sow even more and hopefully soon will come the time for reaping!

Also I had the opportunity to sing in Sacrament meeting yesterday. It was awesome. I sang hymn 97 "Lead, Kindly Light". It was planned but the person in charge of making the programs forgot, so I thought we weren't going to do it but then they announced a change in the program so it was all good. It was my first time ever singing alone at church! I was only having medium panic attacks as I walked up to the stand. It was a great experience. Hopefully I get to do it again soon!

Well, I hope ya'll have a great week and that all the things you do will be successful!! Love love love.

Keep it real.

Elder Sanderson

Thursday, November 6, 2014

Dear Family and Homies,

This week was bomba. We had a lot of lessons this week and we got members involved more. That was good. Our ward is doing so good. Even the members are starting to notice that the chapel is more full. There have been a lot of less-active members returning and we've been blessed to have investigators coming to church. They all bailed this week :( but that's okay I think they'll be back next week. This week we found this awesome lady named Jojo who is just so solid. She has a strong desire to simply find out what is true and what is not. She recognizes that there must be a true church out there and that it's possible to find out which church it is. One of the questions she asked was, in effect, "which church is true and how will I know it?" Pretty sick right? She just straight fell in our lap too. She flagged us down a month ago, or something like that, and said to come visit her sometime. This week was the first time we were able to catch her at home. We brought a member with us to the first lesson even though the lesson wasn't 100% solid but it worked out and the member was perfect for her. She bore super solid testimony and Jojo felt the increase in the Spirit in her home for sure. It's so awesome to see the out pour of the spirit when strong testimony is born. Something as simple as stating a simple truth will bring the spirit more than any amount of tact or eloquence would ever bring. From what I've seen in my mission, bearing testimony that the Holy Ghost has confirmed to your heart that ____ (whatever you're testifying of) is true brings the Spirit in a way that the person listening will be able to notice it. When Emma Smith (at the time Emma Hale), the wife of the Prophet Joseph, had to decide if what Joseph claimed was true or not, she said she could tell that he believed what he said from the look in his eyes when he bore his testimony. We need to have that conviction when we share our testimonies with others. The question is, how do we get that conviction? We need to receive a witness from the Holy Ghost. It is the only way. So, ask, seek, and knock. You will receive. 

So far things have been going great. The Lord has been good. His blessings really are all around us. If you feel that the blessings are hard to see then ask God to help you recognize them. It's amazing to see what blessings are around us when we have eyes to see and ears to hear. You guys are all awesome and I'm grateful for all of you. I hope ya'll all have a great week and have fun!

Keep it real.

Elder Sanderson

Monday, October 27, 2014

Dear Friends and Family,

Hey homies. This week was pretty cool. We're still focusing a lot on doing service and stuff like that. It's been pretty cool. We helped a lady in our ward move into her new place. She's pretty crazy. She had a storage unit that was straight full of just stuff. I mean lots and lots of just stuff. I don't think she even knows what's in there. There was a cooler full of water that had a string cheese and a sock. Wut. It was so crazy. The member who was with us that had a truck turned around and said "I'm going home" when he saw how much stuff there was. It was crazy. But don't worry he wasn't a mean guy. We had already helped her for a few hours at this point so we just saved it for the next day. It was insane. And this week we're going to help her even more. She has a lot of stuff man.

We had some investigators at church. They all enjoyed it a lot but none of them could stay for class. :( Next week. We're glad that they at least took the baby steps of showing up! All of them got to meet the Bishop so that was good. Our bishop is the man! He is one of the biggest human beings I've ever seen in person. It's awesome. 

We also had a way fun Halloween Party Saturday night! There was a chili cook-off with the other ward in our building and the guy who won best chili is in our ward so that was pretty cool! I had some chili dogs. And before you get offended Mom and Dad, I got the chili without beans. To everyone else, yes, I don't prefer beans in my chili. I know I'm weird.

Things have been good here. I feel like I've been in this area since the beginning of time but at the same time I feel like this is a completely different area than when I got here. It's been fun to see how big of a change has occurred in this area. It's also fun that we don't have to share the Ward with anyone else. :D 

Halloween is the week! Woooo! Yay for having to stay inside and clean all night. -_- Halloween night is always pretty crazy here. I bet there will be missionary costumes everywhere. Boo sacrilege. Well, our apartment could definitely use the cleaning though. It'll be more of a cleansing. I feel like cleaning is too much of an understatement. There's no roaches though! We roach bombed a few weeks ago. I didn't see that many but I guess my companion saw them all the time. 

Well, everyone have a fun and safe Halloween. Watch out for monsters. They'll be everywhere. Have fun enjoying Halloween. Even if the Jehovah's Witnesses call you a pagan :)

Yesterday my companion stole my favorite phrase (keep it real)  and said it to this black guy in his 20's and he responded with "Always! Never change! Never change for nobody!". It was pretty funny. I was pretty upset because whenever I say it to people they just nod their head or something but the one time my companion says it the guy says that. Oh well. Have a great week everyone!

Keep it real

Elder Sanderson


Tuesday, October 14, 2014

Dear Family and Friends,

Well, it's official. All the Sisters I came out with are going home on Tuesday. That's super weird. Time flies by way fast! Too fast. It seems like just yesterday I waddled into the MTC and sat down and tried not to fall asleep. Things are pretty much the same now. I just waddle around and try to stay awake...Just kidding. The change that I've been able to see in myself is more distinct than I ever though it would be. Now that's not to say that I've changed into this awesome flawless guy, and it's not to say that I'm done with the changing for the better. All I know is that the person I was when I left and the person I am now is different. God can change heart. Now don't get me wrong people can help push in the right direction. It would  be unfair to those who spend their time helping like parents, friends, and even other missionaries, to not give them at least some credit. At the same time we need to see that those people and their actions are just God working through his children to bless others. You really do not know how much good you can do. If you want more evidence of that go and watch the new Mormon Message that's out. https://www.lds.org/media-library/video/mormon-messages/mormon-messages-2014?lang=eng it's the one called "you never know" It shows the impact that one's actions can have. Also it's based off of one of President Hinckley's talks, for those of you who are Hinckley fans.

I found out that Elder Stallings and I will be staying together another transfer here. It should be a pretty fun time. This'll be my 3rd area in a row that I'll spend at least 6 months in! Crazy right? The Lord has a purpose for me here and I'm going to find out what it is! We're still having a great time teaching a lot. We just need to focus now on helping our investigators keep their commitments so they can progress!

Keep on keepin' on! Times get hard but if you can break through it then it'll all be worth it. Heavenly Father sent us here so we could grow and become the best we can be. Let's do it!

Keep it real.

Elder Sanderson

Monday, October 6, 2014

Dear Family and Friends,

This week was super good! General Conference was as good as ever! What was your favorite talk?  Everyone has a favorite talk! I know you do. I think my favorite talk was by Elder D. Todd Christofferson. Even though it starts off quoting a Shakespeare play that confused me because Shakespeare is hard to understand...I'll probably have to listen to that part 2 or 3 more times before I really understand it. Luckily Elder Christofferson expounds more on it. I like how he explains the principal of moral agency and the consequences that come from that freedom. Also, I like how he emphasized the importance of receiving personal revelation. Personal revelation is one of the most important principles but one of the most difficult to grasp. How great is it to think that God, the most supreme, powerful, all-knowing being in the universe wants to speak to you? He has power over all things and yet He uses all that power for you. That is if you will let him. God will not send revelation if you decide to close him out. The power of God will not "distill upon your soul" if you cover your soul with a sheet of rebellion and disobedience. But even so God will not give up on you. The moment you take off that sheet and open up the channels of revelation with him then "he doth immediately bless you". Remember that.

This week was really really good. We had a lot of fun with different activities with the zone and things like that. Also Elder Stallings and I got to go to the Newport Beach Temple so I could be with a Recent Convert from Huntington Beach. I was really close with and he's going on a mission now!! Such a great experience. It was so great to get to be there with him and to see all the awesome members from the ward I was in down there. 

This week should be a good one. We have our zone conference this week and it falls on the same day as my 18 month mark! Crazy right? I love you guys. Keep on truckin. That's what Enduring to the End, the last of the 5 Principles that make up the Gospel of Jesus Christ, boils down to. Keep on tuckin!

Keep it real.

Elder Sanderson

Tuesday, September 30, 2014

Dear family and amigos,

We've been having a great time here. We're teaching a lot more still and been having a great time. This ward is a lot different than when I got here and it's been crazy to see how much it's changed. The members feed us now and come out to lessons with us more. That's a big step up. I'm not sure what changed about the ward but I think it was really that we put more trust and faith in the Lord and so He was able to take over and move his work along. If we don't leave a place in this work for God he won't be able to help us. We need to involve Him in the work in order to have success. God respects our agency so much that he will allow us to stumble around for a while until we turn over our will to his.  So the faster we can stop stumbling around and turn our will over to his, the faster we'll be able to see all those promises in the scriptures come true. It's as easy as that!

A cool experience we had this week was from our Recent Convert Michael, whose niece passed away this week. He said that because of the things he's learned from the lessons and the Book of Mormon it was a lot easier for him to deal with everything. It warmed our hearts to hear him say that. We knew that the Spirit truly touched his heart. It was so cool because he took a long time to really be ready and he was willing but things kept coming up that were holding him back. We could have just dropped him and said "he's not ready now" and just left him alone but we knew that his heart was where it needed to be and that if we kept on helping him and encouraging him he would really be converted. And now he is and we have no worries at all about him.'' 

Don't give up! God provides a way. Don't look past the simple scriptures! Nephi's example of going and doing may be the most quoted scripture amongst Mormons but that doesn't diminish the meaning of it. Go and do, the Lord will provide.

I love the opportunity to serve. My missoin has been so great so far and it's flying by way too fast! I feel like I just got here and it's so crazy how fast time flies. Gotta make every day count!

Keep it real

Elder Sanderson

Tuesday, September 23, 2014

Hey Homies,

This week was pretty good. We're still having a lot more success than before and we're having tons of fun. We got to go down to Huntington Beach, a stake where both Elder Stallings and I served in, because Elder Stallings got an ingrown toenail removed. Ugh. Poor guy. His toe was pretty messed up the next day so we watched as many church videos as we could. I honestly almost lost my mind. I hope that never 鸛 鳥 士林區 彙 鴿 uhhh...sorry the computer changed to Chinese again. I have no clue why that always happens in this library! Hopefully I didn't accidentally write something offensive. Anyway, I hope I never have to sit inside all day ever again. 0: Another cool thing I did was send home a package with all the stuff that I've acquired over the course of 18 months. I know you're probably thinking "Elder Sanderson, what could you possibly have acquired?" To that I say, all this stuff.


​A member was even nice enough to send it off for me! I tried to get her to not pay for it but she insisted.  

It's weird how fast time is flying! It's been a blast so far and it only keeps on getting better! I hope you guys have awesome weeks this week! God loves you and He has a plan for all of us. No matter how little or how much we understand, His love it's still there!

Keep it real

Elder Sanderson

Monday, September 15, 2014

Howdy Family and Friends

This week was really really good. Elder Stallings and I had a lot of teaching appointments and we were able to find a lot of people. It's been really cool to see all the miracles. We were blessed to find a new family of 4! The family consists of the Mom, Mercedes, twin daughters Desere and Erika, and a son, Alex. They had such awesome questions! They were asking stuff like "why are there so many churches?" and "what happens after death but before Resurrection?" just super golden questions. They are all originally Catholic but they're open and I think they're really interested in the fact that we have answers to their questions. And these questions are questions they've had a for a very long time and haven't been able to have them answered before.

This week we had a La/Pm family we're teaching come to church. We had Alex (LA) and Lilyana (I) Ceja and their niece Cynai (I) and her husband Gustavo (I) along with Alex's daughter and Gustavo's 2 kids. It was cool to see them come to church again this week. We also had a less-active family at church again this week, the Lavulo family. Church was also really cool because we confirmed our Recent Covert Michael Swancy who was baptized last Sunday! That was a really cool experience. The ward has been super welcoming. In fact we already have a dinner planned with a member where we'll teaching Michael a new member lesson after the meal! Super sick. 

There's good stuff going on right now and the way I see it as long as we keep on working hard and don't mess anything up the Lord will keep blessing us with success.

Remember that God is good and that He has a plan for us all. Winston Churchill once said in an address simply, "Never ever ever ever ever give up". Life is too short to give up. Eternity is worth the difficulty of mortality.

Keep it real!

Elder Sanderson

Monday, September 8, 2014

Dear Family and Friends,

This week was pretty sick! Elder Stallings and I had a great time. We were teaching more than usual and we had some cool finding experiences. We were randomly impressed to go by a Less Active guy and see if he's home. He's usually pretty busy and just says to give him a call but we decided to drop by. We talked with him and his fiancee. She's talked with Missionaries before and because Adrian (the LA guy and her fiancee) reads the Book of Mormon a lot and her family are all Mormon, she is pretty familiar with the Book of Mormon and the church. She said that she's thought about baptism before and that she thinks it would be good but she wants to take things slow. So we didn't set a date but we definitely talked with her about it. Hopefully she turns out well.

This week we had a great turnout at church. We had a Less active member bring his wife, daughter, and his cousin and his wife. It was way cool. the Less Active guy has been an awesome missionary to his family by being an example with coming back to church and having scripture study. We moved the Less active's records into our ward so he can get involved with the ward. 

Our investigator Michael came and he was baptized after church!! He's gone through a lot of missionaries and we were super excited to help him finally make the covenant of baptism. After he was baptized he said, "man, I wish I had done that way sooner!" That was a really cool thing to hear because it brought peace to our hearts that he really was converted and his life has been changed. He's a super solid guy and he knows a lot of ward members really well. We were so blessed to be able to have that experience with Michael.

On a bit of a lighter note, while Michael was getting changed we decided to watch some Mormon Messages. Sounds easy enough right? Wrong. What happened was when I moved the tv somehow the DVD player turned off. So, I figured I'd deal with that later. In the mean time I decided to try and get the tv into the center of the room. Well, as I was doing that one of the wheels of the tv stand fell off and the tv was about a second away from falling off...So hurriedly The Bishop came over to help and he held up the tv while I tried to shimmy the wheel back in place. So now the tv is in the center of the room where everyone can see it. Good. After 20-30 seconds of quietly panicking I somehow got the DVD player to turn on. I say somehow because I have no clue how it got turned off or how I turned it back on. Okay, now the DVD player is on, the tv is on and in the right place, now all I need to do is have the DVD run. If only it were that easy. The Mormon Messages DVD we have has it's own little special menu....and it doesn't really work very well. It's sorta ghetto. To add to that the menu for some odd reason doesn't come up on the tv because it's cut off. So I blindly navigated through the menu and found the first video to play. That video plays and it's all good. Now we need to get to the next video and of course out of all 30 of them that are on the DVD I pick the only one that is entirely in Spanish...Way to go. But even after all that everyone enjoyed the videos and the baptism. The Lord helped everything work out in the end. He always does!

I love all of you tons, at least this much |-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------| Imagine how much God loves you.

Keep it real

Elder Sanderson

 Oh, p.s. after 8 transfers (for those of you who are not missionaries that's a little under a year) I've been released from serving as a District Leader. It's a bittersweet change but now the Lord wants me to be back to focusing all my attention and energy on my area and my companion. Being a District Leader has been such a great blessing for me and I'm excited for this new change!

Lovelovelove

Monday, September 1, 2014

Dear Friends and Family

Sorry this is going to be lame but these computers barely work and I don't have much time. We're emailing at the church today because all the Libraries are closed for Labor Day. That's always fun. 

This week was a little slow but I still had a great week. Missions aren't perfect but they sure are the best thing that a person can do with their life! I absolutely love my mission! It's been the most life changing experience of my life. I'm so glad that I've been able to be here. 

I love all of you! Keep on truckin'!

Keep it real

Elder Sanderson

Monday, August 25, 2014

Dear Family and Friends

This week we had our investigator Michael at church with us. That was way good because now he's been to church enough to where we don't have to push back his date any more. He's looking pretty solid for baptism this weekend. The only thing we're going to change for his date is from Saturday to Sunday. There's a ward party on Saturday so it'll work better to have it Sunday instead. He's shown a big change from when I first got here. He's come to church 3 times in the last 4 weeks and he's been reading and praying. We're really hoping that right now will be the time where he goes through with baptism. He's all interviewed and we just need to finish up a few more lessons with him and things will be all good to go.

Elder Stallings and I had a great week finding wise. The hardest things has been to have meetings every week with our investigators. A lot of times we have a really good 1st lessons and then they kind of drop off for a week or two. People here tend to be a little bit flaky when it comes to appointments and stuff but a lot of the lessons are way solid when we can meet with them.
We also got to speak this week in Sacrament Meeting. That was pretty cool. It was crazy though because we had to fill up the whole entire 十]火苗 杘 uhhh sorry the computer got turned to Chinese somehow...Anyway we had to fill the entire meeting. Elder Stallings spoke for a good 12-13 minutes and I have the remaining 35 to talk...I decided to start off with a joke. I told the congregation that because of the excess of time that I would be reading all of Preach My Gospel to them. After an outburst of loud laughter, more like a general light chuckle, I started my talk. I think it went pretty well. I focused a lot on how to do member missionary work. There's 3 major things I hit on. 1) Fellowshipping Investigators, 2) Sharing the Gospel in Your Social Circle, and 3) Being Involved in the Ward's Missionary Work. Those three principals will be major stepping stones for success as a member missionary. If you implement those three things into your character, into who you are, you will be able to have success and see the blessings of sharing the gospel.
I love all of you. Ya'll are super awesome. Keep up the good work. Alofa le ali'i!
Keep it real,

Elder Sanderson

Monday, August 18, 2014

Hello Erryone!

Not too much time this week but I figured I may as well write something since I don't want to miss 2 weeks in a row! This week was way good. I had a great time. Elder Stallings and I get along really really well so that makes things really good. Here's a fun picture for you all

​Our ward doesn't even know our names...It's supposed to be Sanderson and Stallings...  Yay for us

I hope ya'll have awesome weeks. May the Lord bless you in all the things that you do! I love all of you!

Love

Elder Sanderson

Monday, August 4, 2014

Dear Friends and Family,

This week was super good! Elder Stallings and I get along so well! He's a really good missionary. I feel like we have a very equal role and neither of us ever dominate. It's very refreshing. The ward is doing really well. We had more people that usual at church today so that was way good to see. Some weeks the ward is super sparse but not this week! 

This week we were blessed to have Michael, one of our investigators, and also his 2 grandchildren. Micheal's been investigating for about a year now and he's been dropped and picked up I don't even know how many times. We set a date with him for August 23rd and it seems like things with him will finally lead to baptism. He said that he had a lot going on in his life the last time he had a baptismal date, but right now he feels like baptism will help him overcome his challenges. We brought our ward mission leader over to one of the lessons we had with Michael this week and he did such a great job of testifying about his own conversion and the importance it's made to his whole family. His grandson's love church and learning about Jesus. Hopefully next week Michael's wife and daughter will come with. They were on a cruise this week. I hope we can get the whole family involved. Teaching families is the BEST.

I'm so glad for all that I've been able to do so far. So many miracles have happened. I've definitely learned how to see miracles even if you aren't seeing crazy miracles. Miracles are everywhere but if you're expecting to see the blind see every day of your life you're going to miss the little miracles like finding a new person to teach because their uncle that's an investigator isn't home. That's what happened to us this week. We were looking for our investigator Darrel and he wasn't home so we got to teach his nephew Rick. It was such a cool experience. And now Rick has a baptismal date for Sept 6th. The Lord always rewards us for our efforts. Sometimes it takes 6 weeks of working your tails off but the blessings still come.

I love you all! Have a great week!

Keep it real.

Elder Sanderson



Monday, July 28, 2014

Hello Family and Friends,

I hope you all had an awesome week. For us this week was a little slow but that happens sometimes. My companion is getting transferred! I'm staying here and getting a new comp that I've met a few times before when I was in Long Beach and he was there too. I'm pretty excited to get to serve with him. He's a cool guy. Turns out that my District is getting changed up a little. The companionship of sisters are both leaving and a set of Elders is coming in. So now I'll have a Bro District again! yay! Right when I finally got used to Sisters again. I'm kinda bummed the Sisters are leaving but now I'll get to work with more Elders a little closer. There's not too much I can do to help out Sisters. I just kinda leave it up to their Sister training leader and check up on them every once in a while. It's very different...

I forgot my camera today so no cool pictures this week. :( Next week. Maybe. If I remember. I might not. I'll do what I can.

I found out today something that blew my mind! A guy that was Baptized when I was serving in Fountain Valley got his mission call to Guatemala City South!! I'm super excited about that! It's pretty cool to see how things work. That one person gets baptized and then they go out and serve and help tons of people also. It's super cool to see how big of a difference can be made when you give your all to the Lord and he helps you along with the rest. The Lord works through small and simple means. A miracle here, a miracle there, a baptism here and there. He always watches out for us. I'm so glad that I've been able to be a part of His work.

I hope you all have a great week! I love all of you!

Keep it real.

Elder Sanderson

Monday, July 21, 2014

Dear Family and Friends,

This week was good. The week started a little rough but we pushed through it and were able to see some success at the end of the week. On Thursday during weekly planning Elder Renguul and I were talking about how we hadn't been able to find a new investigator yet that week and how hard it was going to be to meet our goal of 3. We decided to sit down and do an analysis of what we could do better and tried and come up with some ideas to be able to find better. I don't think there was 1 thing in particular that we did that was the 'missing puzzle piece' kind of thing but I think that the barrier analysis helped us to be more focused on looking for finding opportunities. On Friday we were able to find 1 and Sunday night we were able to find 2 more, one of them being a member referral that pretty much came out of nowhere. Our ward mission leader texted us Saturday night and set up a lesson with his friend for after our dinner appointment on Sunday. We had dinner with Joanna and then taught her the 1st after. She agreed to being baptized but wouldn't accept a date yet. We'll work with her on that. She said that she wants to take it slow and even though we tried to explain that it was a goal that she could set to exercise her faith she was pretty set on taking it slow, which isn't a terrible thing, at least she still wants to meet again this week. Like I said, we'll get there with her.

Things are going really well here. It's not been as hot lately so that's good. Apparently it's supposed to heat up a lot in the next coming months so that should be interesting. On a sad note, I lost my flashdrive that had a ton of talks and music. :( Sad times. Hopefully it shows up somewhere.
I love all of you and I can assure you that our Heavenly Father loves you all even more. I cannot imagine how much love God has for us all. He loves us more than we can imagine. The prophet Enoch shares with us his knowledge of the love of God for us all in the Book of Moses:
"And it came to pass that the God of heaven looked upon the residue of the people, and he wept...And Enoch said unto the Lord: How is it that thou canst weep, seeing thou art holy, and from all eternity to all eternity?...The Lord said unto Enoch: Behold these thy brethren; they are the workmanship of mine own hands, and I gave unto them their knowledge, in the day I created them; and in the Garden of Eden, gave I unto man his agency; And unto thy brethren have I said, and also given commandment, that they should love one another, and that they should choose me, their Father; but behold, they are without affection, and they hate their own blood...wherefore should not the heavens weep, seeing these shall suffer?" (Moses 7:28-37)
God's love for us is immeasurable. He weeps with us when we weep and he rejoices when we keep his commandments. No other being could have such great love for us. Remember God's love for you.
Keep it real,

Elder Sanderson

Tuesday, July 15, 2014

What it is??

I got to go to the LA Temple today! That's why I'm emailing today..You all though I forgot didn't you! I never forget. Just kidding I do all the time.

This week was a slow one again but I'm starting to feel like things will get better. To be honest I'm not sure what is going to get better or how but I really think if we keep working things will be better. Hopefully our investigator pool will increase more. We've been dropping people like it's hot right now. No worries though, we're just going through a bit of a dry spell. The Lord's work will move on. We've been working hard. I think this is the hardest I've ever worked on my mission in regards to really "hitting the pavement" so to speak. I've never worked this hard on the things that are considered by many to be the "dirty work" like street contacting people in between visiting houses, or knocking the houses around potentials we have, or things like that. It's been good. I feel good about how hard we're working so that's really all that matters. Once we can figure out how to take away people's agency then we'll just baptize everyone but until then hard work and faith-filled prayer will get us through it!

This week I was thinking a lot about the Atonement. I was thinking about how Jesus Christ died for everyone on Earth, not only for those who would follow him. As I was thinking about that I couldn't help but be a little taken back by that thought. Who could love so deeply and so truly that a feat like that could be done. The atonement is as far reaching as it is incomprehensible. But just because it's next to impossible to understand doesn't mean that it's impossible to use. The atonement is a gift and as the Doctrine and Covenants says "for what doth it profit a man if a gift is bestowed upon him, and he receive not the gift? Behold, he rejoices not in that which is given him, neither rejoices in him who is the giver of the gift." (D&C 88:33 emphasis added) When we accept the wonderful gift of the Atonement, then we can comfort others, we can comfort ourselves, we can be the hands that lift up the weak and the support that others need. We can make sure that Christ's atonement wasn't in vain.

I love each of you more than I can express. I'm so grateful for the experiences that God gives us to help us grow. I hope ya'll all have a sick week! I know I'll be having one! 

Keep it real

Tuesday, July 8, 2014

Dear Friends and Family

This week was a pretty good one. Our 4th of July was as normal of a day as possible really. We rode around and talked to everyone that we saw, we offered to help people set stuff up (they all said no >:|), and we knocked on a lot of doors in hopes that they would be home and, by some miracle, have a little bit of time to spare so that we could teach them. Unfortunately things did not go as smoothly as we had hoped but we still had a fun day and at the end of the night I felt like we had done our part. We visited an investigator family and got to talk to one of their friends about what we do as missionaries and some of our basic beliefs and stuff like that. A few days ago we had a lady stop us and try to tell us, in a surprisingly kind way, that we were not Christians unless we believe in the trinity. So, I kindly replied by quoting some of my favorite verses from the Gospel of John and telling her that if the Trinity was true then the Christ and the Apostles would have preached it, but alas, they did not. The scriptures show that very clearly. I felt like I was back in Whittier when she was talking to us. People that that are funny.

This week looks good. We have members lined up for splits on Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday. We don't yet have very many appointments set but hopefully we'll be able to set some up and if not, be able to still have really great experiences. I know that whenever members come out with us, even if there's nothing set, always brings awesome miracles. Hopefully our prayer and faith will be sufficient. The ward is really firing up with missionary work I think. We've been stopping by a lot of members in between teaching people for around 15-20 minutes and every time we've been able to get some sort of assignment from them and we leave them with something to do. It's been working really well and I hope that we'll be able to have some good experiences with the members.

My little nugget I want to share this week sort of has to do with the story with the lady I mentioned in the first paragraph. It is this: If you want to be happier, if you want to learn more about the gospel or if you want to bear your trials better you need to know for a certainty the character of God. 
Joseph Smith taught "It is the first principal of the gospel to know the Character of God with a certainty." (History of the Church, 6:305.) If we can not only know, but strive to seek the character of our Father in Heaven all aspects of our lives will be better. There comes a time where all of us need to know God more fully in order to love him fully. Know him, be acquainted with him, recognize his hand in your life. Now, I am not and I will not pretend to be a person who knows God perfectly, but I can tell you the best way to know him better is to use the atonement of Jesus Christ. When we feel the burden of sin gone we can feel His comfort where that burden once used to be.

I love all of you. I hope the Lord will bless all of you. Have a great week!

Keep it real
 
Elder Sanderson

Monday, June 30, 2014

Dear Friends and Family,

This week was a bit of a flop...That happens sometimes. We had a ton of stuff cancel but we were at least able to have a few good things happen. We had a super good lesson with our investigator Sarah, who is dating one of the guys in the ward. She's super ready to be baptized but she needs to get passed off to a different ward before she can get baptized. We're going be having a lesson with her at the Mission home this weekend because Sarah lives like way close to it! It'll be sick. Her boyfriend Jake is the man! He helped us teach a bunch of the lesson. Also another fun little fact, Sarah plays water polo and yesterday her team won the Junior Olympics qualifying tournament for the US, so her team is the #1 team in the nation and will be representing the US. Sick huh?

We also received some great instruction from our leaders this past week. It was a really good meeting. I'm super pumped to try and implement some of the things that we learned from them. They focused a lot on how we can accurately get information down to all of the missionaries we're in charge of. It's not very easy sometimes. It's sort of like playing telephone sometimes but it doesn't have to be that way. 

We've been working hard and talking to everyone we see. Luckily people here seem to walk a lot. Not only do people walk a lot but the normal people walk too! In my last area in Long Beach plenty of people walked around but they were usually crazies... But here it's better. One of the things that Elder M. Russel Ballard told us to do while he was here was to have each companion contact 10 people each. So 20 per companionship. That's something Elder Renguul and I are really trying to work on and it's been great so far! Whenever we put in all our effort we have a promise to the best blessings the Lord has to offer. A common misconception about obedience is that there is either obedience or disobedience. That's not always true. Sometimes it is but not always. Our level of obedience guarantees our level of blessings. Disobedience does not cause God to turn his back on us and not bless us, He just can't allow us to receive his most choice blessings because He cannot go back on his work. "There is a law irrevocably decreed in heaven..." (D&C 130:20) God cannot take back his laws and we cannot afford to break his laws. When we do we "have no promise" (D&C 82:10) We need the Lord's promise. Let's make it so.

I love all of you great people. I appreciate your love and support. As Elder Jones says, "Be happy." Have fun! Heavenly Father gives us so much, use it! 

Keep it Real,

Elder Sanderson

Tuesday, June 24, 2014

Dear Family and Friends,


Lakewood is sick. There's so many cool thing here. There's a B-Dubs. Pretty pumped about that. I'm going to go there every day. Just kidding I haven't even gone yet. Soon! My new companion is fresh out of the training program. It's different.  I'm used to having companions that are right in the middle or close to it because that's what it's been for 6 months. I've forgotten how different greenies are. I hope I don't mess him up at all...

This week was good for church attendance! We had two investigators at church. One is named Sarah, she's dating a guy in the ward and she's been to church a ton. She wants to get baptized but we're passing her off hopefully this week to the Los Alamitos Sisters because Sarah lives in that ward. From what I understand in the past it's been something that the family and the missionaries saw as something to deal with later but we're going to fix it as soon as possible. The other investigator is named Michael. He had a baptismal date in the past and this is the first time he's been to church in a while. He's looking like he's ready to commit a little more. We just need to make sure that he's really committed. 

This week was really good but really stressful. We're trying to put a lot of pieces back together from a bunch that happened last transfer here. The missionaries didn't keep records hardly at all and my new companion was still in training at the time so he didn't know what to do either. It'll all get fixed though. Nothing, not even bad record keeping, will stop the work from progressing.

We had a really cool experience. We saw a potential that Elder Renguul said he'd been trying by a ton and we said hi to her as she was walking into her apartment and as we were on our way to visit someone. The person we were going to visit wasn't home and so we decided to visit the potential, her name is Nikki. However my first thought was "this is going to be weird, we saw her walking home and now she's going to think we're chasing her down" but we went over. Turns out she was really cool and really open and we had a really strong spiritual lesson with her about how God will answer her prayers whenever she needs it and how He'll be there even when she tries to do things on her own. I swear the best experiences come whenever something makes you feel uncomfortable at first.
I'm excited for this transfer. I already know it's going to be a little tough but there's a lot of work to be done and not much time to do it. We need to make the best use of the time we have. We have a lot of lessons set and it's going to be crazy getting around to all of them quickly. I'm back on bike again! Sick. I'm kinda used to being in a car though. That makes getting around different... Even though we have a lot of teaching appointments we are also going to work on planning to find every day.

I love it here. The mission really is two of the best years anyone could have. I worded it that was to avoid using the "best two years" cliche but it's just not the same. It really is the best two years! I absolutely love all of you. Ya'll are the bomb! 

Keep it real!

Elder Sanderson

Monday, June 16, 2014

Dear Family and Friends

Well, transfers are tomorrow and I'm going to be leaving Long Beach. :( I'm going to a place called Lakewood. I'm pretty pumped because I've heard it's super bomb. Also I'm going to be companions with my half grandson!! His name is Elder Renguul. My son half trained him while in a trio because Elder Renguul is a Visa waiter. I'm freaking pumped!

This week was way good. Our investigators are doing really well. It's amazing to see how much more this area is rolling along. When I got here things were pretty dead. The Lord has definitely blessed us a lot. Especially in this last transfer. We have 3 people who have dates set for baptism. Super exciting. Hopefully I'll be able to go back to them. As long as they are in this next transfer I can go back. 

I got a ton of awesome aka (pics) with the members here and also a few missionaries that I saw at the departure fireside yesterday. Super cool.

Well that 's pretty much it for this week. I don't have too much time. Alofa ia te outou!! Faatali mo le Atua!

Elder Sanderson

Monday, June 9, 2014

Hi!

This week was sooo good! We honestly killed it. The Lord has been pouring out a lot more blessings on us and our area. We found 5 new investigators this week when we usually struggle to find just 1 new each week. It's been such a blessing. We're helping a lot of really good people. We had a new person at church along with the regulars who come. Her name is Vannessa. We actually found her last week but this is the first time she came to church. I think she liked it but I think sitting through 3 hours is something she's not used to and she'll need help getting used to it. We'll work on it with her. We also have some pretty solid stuff set up for the next week so I'm super pumped about everything. The leaders of the ward are getting super pumped up too.

Alofa ia te oe ma manuia le vaiaso!

Elder Sanderson

Monday, June 2, 2014

Mo Pele aiga ma uo,


This week we had a good turnout for church. We had our investigators Tony and Tai as well as another investigator named Damien. There was also the father of a little girl who got baptized yesterday at church and he's not a member. We talked with him for a few minutes. He doesn't seem too interested but we'll see how things play out. We also had an investigator whom we dropped about two months ago randomly show up at church and so we set up an appointment to meet with him this upcoming week! It was really cool. This week looks really good. We have some solid stuff set up and right now we are just working on finding members who can come out with us. It should be a great week. We unfortunately were not able to reset Damien's Baptismal date but we will be able to get that done this week. He wasn't able to be baptized yesterday like we originally planned. The hardest part is getting times to meet with him during the week. Apparently he goes to school until like 6 o'clock. 

On Saturday our whole mission got together and we got to hear from Elder M. Russel Ballard from the Quorum of the Twelve! It was sick! He said a ton of super cool stuff. He focused a lot on talking with 10 people a day independent of tracting, teaching investigators, and working with members. That's a little hard for us seeing as we are in a car all day. I know that's a silly excuse but we're getting there. The experiences we have been having over the last few weeks of trying to talk with more people, have been great.  We're trying to get past the mindset of "I can't teach this person because they're not Samoan so it's not worth it" because that's a silly way of looking at missionary work. We are all on the same team here! The call to serve isn't just to serve within your assigned boundaries, (while you should definitely stay within your assigned boundaries) it's to invite everyone to come unto Christ! That's what leads to happiness and success. That's what will bring blessings!

I love all of you. Remember that. More importantly, remember that there's One who cares for you and loves you more perfectly that I ever could. "Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends." (John 15:13 italics added)

Ou te alofa ia outou ma manuia lava le vaiaso.  Tata le fata.

Keep it real

Elder Sanderson

Monday, May 19, 2014

Dear Family and Friends,

This week was pretty slow but also super good. We set 2 baptismal dates! Sick! One of them is for June 1st and the other June 29th. The first is a new investigator we picked up this week. He's been coming to church for the last 3 weeks though. He's way cool. He's a youth named Damien. His cousins and grandma started taking him to church and he loves it! He's probably 16 or 17. The other is with our investigator Zane. It's not super solid but we gave it a try. Hopefully everything works out with that. I'm pretty excited for this week. Hopefully things go a little more smoothly this week. A lot of people were busy. There were a few parties this week so a lot of Less-Actives and members were busy this weekend. That made things a little slower.

 Honestly other than setting those two dates we didn't have much success teaching wise. Next week will be better. I don't have any pictures this week. I left my camera at home. Sorry I'm not perfect. I got a hair cut today. It looks pretty good. I got it cut by a Mexican dude. That's always a bonus.

Here's my two cents this week. I want to bring up discouragement. Discouragement in every day life, in missionary life, or even in other people's lives. Discouragement exists not because God wants to see us struggle but because he wants to see us stronger. It's not there so that we can be humiliated, but that we will be humbled. When discouragement comes remember that our Savior Jesus Christ suffered all so that we don't have to. "Be of good cheer;" He says, "I have overcome the world" (John 16:33). I hope you all know that there is a plan out there that is bigger than any one of us. God's plan is perfect; we are not. If we lean on our own ideas we will fail. If we lean on His we cannot fail. Remember that.

I love all of you. Being on a mission has made me appreciate things I never really did before. But now I do. The Gospel is true. Jesus is the Christ.

Have a great week and as always:

Keep it real.

Love,

Elder Sanderson