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

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

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

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

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

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

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