Transfers Are Here

Hey everybody!

 

So just to start off to let everyone know.... I'm being transferred!

I've spent the last six months here in Augusta and I've loved every moment of it. My testimony has grown so much as i've been here, I've never been closer to God and my Savior than i've been here. I love the people here and everything that has happened. Augusta will always have a special place in my heart.

 

But now I get to go somewhere else where the Lord has need of me. I'm so excited that i get to go see the church growing somewhere else in the vineyard. I'm not concerned at all (I'm a veteran), but it is a crazy thought that this could be the final area of my mission.

 

Another piece of news that might come as shocking is that this next transfer will only be five weeks long and then the remaining transfers will be six weeks again. So yes I will be coming home a week earlier than planned. Crazy!

 

Elder Tippetts isn't very happy that i'm going. I feel that he's in a stage of denial at the moment and won't accept that i'm going. Honestly haha i think he's taking this a lot harder than i am. He's concerned he's going to get some missionary robot who won't be very caring of our investigators agency. I assured him that i've been praying for a good missionary to come in and so has he so the Lord will take care of it. It's his work. I'm really gonna miss that guy though. We got a lot of work done together.

 

So I'll be sending a good chunk of stuff home today. I can't believe how much stuff you can accumulate over six months. I realized i send home a couple boxes every transfer and i'm gonna have quite the pile when i get home. I'm excited to look through all of my memories of my mission with y'all.

 

Oh! I almost forgot Elder Tippetts and i did our training of goal setting at Zone training meeting. It was intense. I was kind of nervous because we were going to be saying a lot of things that people wouldn't like. I was concerned about what they would think and if we should actually go with what we planned. But then i realized that everything that we were going to say was strictly from Preach My Gospel. We went up to the front and did a roleplay in front of 26 missionaries. We started the roleplay talking how we have all these great investigators and that 4 is an achievable goal. But then we said that we needed to make up for next month so we lowered the goal to 3 (that happens a lot here). Then we talked about how if we lowered our goal to 1 we would go to the temple for sure. Then we said, "yeah we're going to the temple!" and gave each other a high five.... then we turned to the missionaries and said, "now how did that go?"

Everyone was silent. It was such a golden moment! Nobody said anything so we went on to explain how this was common in the mission and that they knew it as well. It's just not always that apparent. So we talked about what a real goal is and why we should raise them according to our hearts desire, our investigators agency, and what we can accomplish. The Spirit helped us the whole time, it was amazing. It's something else to stand in front of people who don't know the gospel and ask them to change compared to missionaries. Especially when Elder Tippetts and i are often looked down upon because some of our views are different haha. But we got a lot of compliments on that training afterwards.

 

Now unfortunately tons of craziness has happened with practically all our investigators since we made our goal of 3. But we will still... well i guess Elder Tippetts will still work hard for 3. And i will never lower my goals in anything. I learned a lot from this experience. The end result is not the most important thing about a goal, it's the commitment and the effort which you put into obtaining that goal that matters.

 

So that's how I've been. Another week gone and by. I love being a missionary.

 

Elder K. Olsen

 

I just wanted to share this picture because of all the familiar faces.  From Left to Right, Elder Cramer, Elder Harding, Our Elder Olsen and Elder Brimhall.  Elder Cahoon is making a silly face behind Kyle.  Love these missionaries.