1st Week in Yuma

Date: Thu, 16 Dec 2010 11:04:11 -0700
From: eric.feller@myldsmail.net

So this email is coming late this week... 1 day late because yesterday, my regular p-day, I had to take a very long car ride after transfer meeting.. to YUMA!

So yeah, I dont really know what to say about my last week in chandler.. EXCEPT ELDER LESH AND I BAPTIZED TWO PEOPLE! Rembember how we took over another missionaries area? Well, the first day we had it, a member called us and said he had someone for us to teach. We go by, and teach him a little bit, come back the next day and his friend is there too. They've both been going to church with this family for a while, and we baptized them last saturday. It was super funny. This whole family and these two kids that practically live with them are all so funny and goofy. But it was a great experiance for them to come closer to Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ. We confirmed them on sunday as well. And then their friends, the family's two brothers, had to bear their testimony in Church and they both were crying, which made Brandon and Zack start to cry and they were all embarased because they're teenagers and it was funny. Then during someone elses talk, she started telling this story about Jesus that someone wrote and Brandon was like, "oh no, here it comes again" and stuck his hands over his face. It was hilarious.

Lets see... what else.

Oh, we also started teaching another person in that same ward, who was dating an older member. He wanted to join the church and marry her. We made sure he was spiritually ready, and then put him on date for baptism for Christmas day. He was so excited. He's a funny guy too. He used to be a marine, then was a bum for 7 years and then got involved with a born-again church that helped him out a lot and he got back on his feet and got a good job in Arizona, and now has a house and two cars. He sees "Mormonism as his next step in his progression, like he's been led here his whole life" hahaha. He's awesome. But I'll miss the baptism now that I'm in Yuma, and not Chandler...

Oh speaking of, my adress in Yuma is:
Elder Daniel Feller
1600 W 12th st #1323
Yuma AZ, 85364

So at least for the next couple weeks you can send christmas packages and letters there, because the mission office is going to be booked! But its ok, whichever still works. And after like.. 4-5 weeks, start sending stuff back to the mission home. I appriciate all the Christmas presents and all the letters and everything I've recieved thus far! It means a lot that people still remember me... because I'm going on 5 months pretty soon!

HOLY CRAP ITS RAINING IN YUMA RIGTH NOW! That means lettuce will be super good this year, because Yuma produces 90% of the worlds lettuce...

Anyways, Uh, not much else happened. I ran into an Anti guy I met a while ago, again. He said Nephi was a murder and a bearer of false witness and God would never tell him to do that. We told him to read the old testament, and gave him some examples of God using the rightous to bring judgement on the wicke.... hahaha. Then he held up his phone that he was looking up bible scriptures on and said, "what do you think this is!?" and Elder Lesh said, "thats a word search." BOOM! We handeled it well but he still left being stupid. I told him if he wouldn't pray and ask God about the Book of Mormon, and not question some 20 year old kids on the street then we can do nothing for him and walked away.

The End!

NEXT WEEK!: Hear more about my adventures in Yuma!

Love Elder Feller

A message I left for some people that we didnt see for a while.

Me, Brandon, Justin, Zack, Elder Lesh. Justin Baptized his two friends on his sides

They're goofy

The death of Elder Lesh & I's companion ship, but not our love.

Daniel vs The Mesa Temple

Date: Wed, 8 Dec 2010 11:07:48 -0700
From: eric.feller@myldsmail.net

This week was insane.... 

We've been super booked every night using tons of miles. We are preparing to Baptize the two teenage guys we met last week, for this Saturday. So I'm really excited about that. I haven't had any baptisms yet because of my area's and stuff. Whitewashing twice and then having a bad trainer doesn't help. But the Lord is blessing me and Elder Lesh a lot, so I'm really excited.

But the craziest thing that happened is that Joram went back to Kenya. He knows the Book of Mormon is true, and he wants to be baptized now, but he didnt have time to do it here, because he wants to have a big party after. hahaha. So he's going back to Kenya like right now. But he's going to find the church there. And here's why. Get ready for the craziest story of the week. We took Joram to the Mesa Temple to see the lights and the visitors center. (Which is AWESOME and a great missionary tool) So we're walking around the inside and Joram's wife sits down and there are these other Kenyan people there, and they start talking, then the all start talking in Swahili and Joram meets all these members of the church that joined in Kenya, including one of his own tribe, who can speak his tribal language. And me and Elder Lesh are like, "yes, this is awesome." Then this white guy walks up and starts talking to them in Swahili. He's a returned missionary who served in... you guessed it- Kenya! So he's talking to all of them, and eventually he starts to tell Joram where the Church building is in Nairobi, the city where he lives. Apparently, its like... in walking distance of his house. like across the street or something. So Elder Lesh and I are freaking out in excitement because now we know he's going to find the church there for sure. And they all celebrate, and Joram's wife gets some new friends from Kenya to help her and support her. And later, Joram tells us that it was no accident that all that happened. And I agree. It was definitely a miracle. Joram is planning on coming back to the United States to get baptized someday.... We told him if that doesn't work out soon he needs to go do it in Kenya. But he wants "his first missionaries to be there" hahaha. So its a way cool story.

But speaking of the Mesa Temple, it is such a beautiful place. We went through it today. And we've been there twice taking investigators to the Christmas lights. If you ever have the opportunity to go there for Christmas, do it! We are going all the time this time of year. And during the Easter Pageant, which is hear is also amazing.

Thats all for this week. Next week we'll have baptism pictures and all sorts of fun things! 

Love, 

Elder Feller 

Daniel vs Two Areas!

Date: Wed, 1 Dec 2010 10:54:12 -0700
From: eric.feller@myldsmail.net

I have no idea what to say this week! Not too much happened...

... oh we only absorbed another area so we cover 5 wards and have whitewashed twice in one transfer.. new record. So we're super busy. And our area is now 20 square miles... which, p.s., is kinda huge. Which is good because we're super busy.. and bad because we're super busy. Its kinda stressful. Especially on my OCD companion. hahaha. And we were out of miles in our car for the last couple days, because we live 1.5 miles out side of our area and 5 miles to the closest residential neighborhood in our area. It was super fun to bike there on NOT my bike because the pedal fell off again! So I have to use a bike I borrowed from our Zone Leader that is super slow, hard to pedal and uncomfortable. So i'm going to get that fixed in Tempe... AGAIN. But taking over there area for at least 3 weeks isn't that bad. We had a member call us up like the first day and say, "hey I've got a kid living with me, who has been going to church a little bit and wants to hear 'the discussions' and will most likely be baptized." So we meet, teach a little bit, come back the next day and he's got another friend who has been going to church for 4 years and wants to be baptized. So we are most likely going to reach our baptismal goal of two for this transfer because of that. Our other prospects are not looking too good right now, unfortunately, and I think this is the Lord blessing us to meet our goal, because of all our hard work.

So the problems with the other two people from Africa we were going to baptize are: 1. Rosemary's work schedule got messed up royally, so we couldnt meet last saturday, like usual, and set up a date, and its been really hard to contact her. and 2. Jorem is now saying he was already baptized, and doesnt need to be again. We're working on that, we told him to pray about it last time and are going back soon.

thats pretty much it...

Love Elder Feller

This week was pretty awesome, to say the least

Date: Wed, 24 Nov 2010 11:02:38 -0700
From: eric.feller@myldsmail.net

On Sunday they asked us to teach Gospel Principles at the last minute. So we teach on Alma 7 and talk about the Atonement a whole lot. We had two investigators there. So after we taught a super spiritual lesson, one of the investigators, who we already talked about Baptism with, came up to us after and said she wants so bad to be baptized, that everything we said made her feel like this is what she needed, and she didn't want to have to wait for her family to come into town anymore, but she still is. So we're probably going to have a baptism in like.. two weeks or so. THEN! The other investigator there, Jorem, the Kenyan guy, was also really touched by the lesson, and that night we took him to Tempe to the Mission President's Fireside. President Howes gave a good talk about how we're all children of our Heavenly Father. After we were making our way through the crowd and Jorem was having a great time meeting all these other missionaries. One of them asked him if he was a member of the Church and he said, "No, but I am becoming one, I just need to be baptized!" and me and Elder Lesh were silently freaking out in excitement. Then the missionary asked him, "Oh, so when are you getting baptized?" and Jorem said, "When Elder Lesh asks me! or would you like to set a day right now?" and the missionary got all excited and was about to do it but Elder Lesh stepped in and said we should confirm with his wife. Then Jorem met President Howes, and we dropped him off at home, while he talked about finding the church when he goes back to Kenya. It was so awesome! Then, the next day we took him to the Mesa Temple Visitors Center, and he got to see the temple, and go around the visitors center, and watch the Joseph Smith movie. Then he was looking at some exhibits and the guy asked if we were the missionaries who wanted to see if we could watch the Joseph Smith movie in Swahili, and when we told him we were he went and got us a Swahili book of Mormon and we gave it to Jorem. He was so happy! We never even thought about getting him one because we totally could have, but his bible is in English and he speaks English just fine. But on the car ride home he didnt say a word, he was just tearing through that Book of Mormon. The next day he told Elder Lesh he knew it was true, but I was on exchanges at the time with the Spanish Missionaries! Which was also super fun. I got to listen to Elder Miguel, a missionary temporarily reassigned to Arizona while waiting for a Visa to Mexico, teach a whole first lesson in Espanol and I followed along! Even though I couldn't add anything. But yeah, the whole day was pretty fun. Its been a good week, and we have 3 Thanksgiving dinners tomorrow! Oh my goodness...

Talk to you later,

Heart, Elder Feller

Another Letter from Elder Feller

I dont have too much to say this week. Just working and working. Thought I'd send some pictures home. I'll try to send a video too but they're usually to big to send though email...

Uh, we taught some good lessons this week, and I went on exchanges and got to hang out with a Zone Leader for a day. My companion asked a guy who wasn't even sure if he believed in God to be baptized because the spirit told him too. hahaha. It was crazy, because the spirit told me not to say anything and just let it go. And I did. We're meeting with him again tonight so I hope we can do something good. He's a really good guy, but is scared for some reason to act to come to know anything.

But yeah, my exchange was good. We walked everywhere all around his area and talked to people inviting them to the Mesa Temple Christmas Lights. Which is apparently a big deal. I'm really excited for it.

Then Yesterday because we are almost out of miles in our car and my bike decided to break, we walked to dinner. We started at one, and a mile and a half later we entered our area. then at 4 o clock we got into the neighborhood. Then they almost cancelled on us! But we talked to a lot of people. Did a little tracting, and got a ride back home from our dinner. Oh, funny story about tracting. Tracting is something a lot of missionaries in this mission refuse to do because it is ineffective and they can teach people based on referrals from members. But because my new companion likes to do it, and we don't have a massive teaching pool, we do it every once in a while. So we knock on this door and this lady answers and is like "sorry guys, we don't accept solicitors" and pointed at her no soliciting sign. Then Elder Lesh says, "Oh good, because we're not solicitors, we are not trying to sell anything, we come with a message about Jesus Christ" and then waited a while because she was so flabbergasted and then spurted out, "...well... I know Jesus" Then Elder Lesh started in again and told her that we also brought a message of Prophets and the usual missionary stuff. He invited her to learn more and to accept our message over and over and she just dodged it. Finally she said no and he said "ok, then have a good day." It was so funny because he will go until the person will actually say no, and reject our invitation. And she was so surprised and threw out a common phrase. But as long as we're inviting, we are fufilling our purpose as a missionary as stated in preach my gospel, "Our purpose is to invite others to come unto Christ, by helping them receive the restored gospel through faith in Jesus Christ, repentance, baptism and receiving the gift of the holy ghost." I know that because we have to stand and quote that every morning a long with Joseph Smith's "Standard of Truth" and Doctrine and Covenants 4. Pretty fun stuff!

So yeah I'm doing good except for a broken bike and sore feet and low miles. But hopefully I can get my bike fixed today, because we're going to Tempe for a little bit. wooo

Love Elder Feller

The Snowflake temple!

Me and CJ!

I drove that. And tore a house down! 

To win his tie back, Elder Turley was wrapped to this pole, and then Elder Gunter put a Jabanero pepper in his mouth.

The Karate Kid poles outside our house in Saint Johns

Me and Bro Pearce before I left 

Elder Russ and CJ the night before we left.

Daniel vs Kenya

From: Eric Feller eric.feller@myldsmail.net
Date: Wed, 10 Nov 2010 20:31:30

"Sacramento California? ... Do they let you go home on the weekends?"

That's a quote I forgot to include last time. But it was said to me in Saint Johns. I also forgot to mention one other thing last week. My last Saturday in Saint Johns we spent all day doing service. In the morning I got to drive a huge Track-Hoe and knock down part of a house. Ill send pictures of it later. next week... I forgot my camera again!

To answer some questions: I dont know how cold it gets in Saint Johns, but I know the snow doesn't stick for very long. But its still a heck of a lot colder than in the Tempe area.

It slows down in the Winter in the mountains, but in the valley it speeds up. Because its not hot anymore, and the Mesa temple does all this visitors center stuff. Soon we'll be taking people to see the Christmas lights and go through the visitors center. Sending stuff through the mission home is still best, just because its safest and it doesn't add to much time. The AP's in our mission right now are alright.. hahaa. People make fun of the APs no matter what though. They are both spanish speaking missionaires right now. One of them is built like a rhinoceros, but is kinda clumsy. But he's a really good guy. The other is just a normal guy. He kinda looks like Klark Kent with his glasses on. He's what missionaries call an "aspire-er" because he stayed on his mission an extra transfer to be AP. But they're just kidding. Anyone who "aspires" to leadership is made fun of a lot... Its kinda like a running joke all the time. I don't know how to explain it..

So Chandler is going pretty well. We have a nice apartment and a car so I cant complain to much. But I will because the car doesn't have enough miles and this area is pretty dead because of the missionaries here before us. That and the fact that the wards are kinda hard to work with. We had a good day at church on Sunday. We ran out of one sacrament meeting in order to knock on an investigators door to remind her to go to church. She made some excuse, and we made it back just in time for the closing song. Then in one of the ward a recent convert from Kenya brought her husband to church. We talked to him and arranged to meet later that day. We showed up at the house, talked a lot about the Book of Mormon and he said " Well, if its the word of God, I'll read it." He is an awesome guy, with tremendous faith in Jesus Christ. He even helped my faith. And when we left my companion, Elder Lesh, was so excited, and he said to me "do you know who this guy is?" I came to find out that our new investigator, Jorem, was a retired Colonel in the Kenyan army who was displaced when his plantation was burned down by a waring tribe in Kenya, that his wife belongs to. He told us he escaped when the mob was within 50 meters. He is so awesome. We are seriously going to baptize him before he leaves in a week.... I think we can do that. Except the last time we went to his house he had decided to try to learn some things about the Mormon Church on the internet. So naturally, when we met with him he had a lot of questions about some stuff. We mostly talked about how he needed to seek answers from God, because that will bring him to the truth. Then his wife came in and bore testimony of the Book of Mormon and how she found her answer to know that it was true, and pretty much told him that he was going to find out that night. So then we left and were late to our dinner appointment. But it was totally worth it.

Thats pretty much the most exciting thing to happen in Chandler this week... Oh, that and the fact that while a missionary was staying with us during a big leadership meeting in Tempe, the three of us got a free portrait from as a gift from our apartment complex, posing in the same exact was at the first presidency's portrait, so in a week we'll get a 10x13 picture and we're going to hang it up in the mission office next to the picture we're imitating. Its going to be awesome!

Thats all for this week.

Love Elder Feller

Daniel vs His First Valley Assignment

From: Eric Feller <eric.feller@myldsmail.net>
Date: Thu, 4 Nov 2010 00:07:25

So my transfer predictions were completely wrong... I'm now whitewashing another area in .... Chandler AZ! Shoot. I'm kinda sad I didnt get my six months in Saint Johns... but I'm excited to be working in this area. My new companion, Elder Lesh from Washington state, said this area is pretty dead... so I don't know how its going to work out, but I have high hopes.
Saying goodbye to everyone in Saint Johns wasn't fun though... We made some people cry. And Chad was really sad to see us go, because he liked us so much. When we told the stake president I think he could tell that we were frustrated about it and he sat us down in his office and told us that it was what the Lord wanted and that we were awesome missionaries and he would miss us, and he even got a little teary. The spirit was really strong there, and he promised Elder Russ that he would not spend only one transfer in his next area.
 And it is really frustrating because neither me or Elder Russ stayed in Saint Johns, so now all our investigators have to get used to Elder Gunter, who is amazingly STILL up there, and his new companion that came out the same time as me... So in my opinion that is all bad. They still should have kept me and Elder Russ up there. Or me and Elder Gunter. Hahaha, and I'm not just saying that because I want to be up in the mountains, I'm really concerned about this area... And honestly a little concerned about how inspired these decisions were. I can say that because The Zone Leader told Elder Russ and me that if this one missionary in the zone hadn't wrecked a car, and then gotten emergency transferred to Saint Johns then a lot of stuff would be different... Elder Gunter would have left, The guy who crashed a car would have stayed, and his companion would have left, and their District Leader down in Show Low would have stayed. Now, Gunter is still there, with the whole city and a greenie I don't think the people there are going to like, Crash's companion had to become a district leader and show someone else the area so he could leave next transfer, and the district leader down there became a Zone Leader. So its really complicated but no one is happy. And I'm seriously worried about some of the investigators me and Elder Russ had. Some are really close and we both felt like we needed to get them there. So both of us are mad. And my good friend, Elder Russ is whitewashing ANOTHER area in the San Tan Zone... which is a zone that nobody wants to go to..

But I just went shopping and am all settled in at my new apartment in Chandler. Its much nicer than the Haunted Yellow Double Wide trailer in Saint Johns. But it doesn't have as much character.

I forgot my camera cord again! So no pictures this week. But mucho good ones next week.

That's all I can think of right now...

-Love Elder Feller

Part 2:

I forgot to mention that the Littlehat family broke up. She took her kids back to Wyoming. We went over there on Friday night because I got an impression while looking at our area book. He met us outside and was a little teary eyed and Elder Russ said he smelled of alcohol. He told us what happened and also said that he felt uneasy about our visits because he thought it was just a distraction for her. Which looking back on it makes sense because she never had anything to add or any questions about anything... Its sad to say but true... And now both of the missionaries he knows, his only contact with the church, are gone! This is really frustrating...