Stormy Weather

These two pictures were taken 20 minutes apart!!

Just another week in paradise!

This week we did a lot of less active work. We drove out to Hillsboro
to see the Willis family. 
We went and saw Brother Robbins, another less active, he had been
working an adding an annex to his garage. But I guess when he was
working his ladder wasn't secure and it fell out from beneath him and
he landed on his side and broke his hip. I feel really bad, we told
him we'd come help him and we came once, but we didn't go back until
after he broke his hip. We are going to come back this week and see
how he is doing and to give him a blessing.

So last Sunday we committed Fabian to church, but we weren't able to
see him during the week because he works. He owns a taco truck that is
open from 8am to 10 pm, so he's pretty busy. But we stopped by his
truck Saturday and he said he would come to church! We had a really
hard time trying to find a ride for him, it wasn't until 9 Saturday
night that someone said they would give him a ride, and we were trying
for days! But  Sunday rolls around his ride goes to pick him up, and
his wife comes out and says he's not coming. So we'll see what's up.

Another person we've been working with is a guy named Mitch, I've
probably written about him before. But he is pretty crazy, we had a
lesson with him and he kept interrupting so it was hard to have the
spirit. But he told us he  going to come by our church, not sure why
he wasn't there Sunday, but again we'll see what's up.

We didn't get to see the Nichols family this week, we tried a few
times, but we were never able to see them. We got a pretty cool
referral this week, a mom of a recent convert from a different state.
We texted and she said she'd love to meet with us, we don't have an
address or anything, but hopefully we'll get to see them this week!

We ate pretty well yesterday. There was a baby blessing and the family
invited us over to eat afterwards. So we ate there at about 4, it was
chicken on rice. Then we have a standing dinner with another family so
we ate pulled pork around 6. Then one of my favorite families, the
Travellers, had us over for a steak dinner, that was at around 8. The steak 
was as big as my face, and brother Traveller always makes sure we get 
fed well. So even after we are full he keeps putting food on our plate, then he gave us doughnuts. I'm not sure if I've ever been that full before, so much food I couldn't fall asleep.

It was a sick week, it's the last week of the transfer. Hopefully I'll
get to stay and serve here for six months!

- Elder Andrasko

Great Expectations

Our Mini

Another week in the life of a missionary!

So this week was pretty good, we had some fun times, and some unexpected things happen. But overall it was a good week!

So Monday, P-day, was a good fun day. Elder Jordan and I decided we wanted to start playing tennis. So for a few hours we were at the court playing, and it was a ton of fun! Not a whole lot else happened on Monday.

Tuesday we had our district meeting, so we had to make the long drive out to Hutch. It's pretty lame, for any sort of missionary meeting we have, we drive at least half an hour. When we go to Wichita it is an hour. So it's lame being so far out of the way, but totally worth it to be serving in a small town like Mac. The only thing that it needs is a branch! One day. After district meeting we came back into town, someone said that if  we didn't have dinner plans then to call them. So we made a dinner appointment for that night, it was with the Travellers. They are one of my favorite people I have met my entire mission, I guess we didn't give them enough heads up about dinner, so instead of ribs we got steak. But hey I'm not complaining.

Wednesday we met a pretty cool college student. She was in our area book, but they dropped her as an investigator for a little bit because she was gone for winter break. So we decided to go try and meet her. Her name was Destiny, she was cool, but she is super busy and so it makes it hard to meet up with her. We've also been trying to meet up with a less-active family. But every time we set something up, they have to cancel of move the appointment because of work or something. So hopefully we can see them sometime soon.

So almost all of this week, the zone was talking about how the Wichita stake is doing mini-missions. Because Utah doesn't do mini-missions I will explain. Youth, 16 and older, sign up to become a mini-missionary, which means they go out with full time missionaries from Friday night to Sunday night. So anyway a few people in the zone were told that they were getting mini-missionaries. But we were in the clear. Friday we had a meeting down in Wichita, they had a big thing explaining what we need to do with the mini-missionaries. Then they told us that we were getting one! We had only a few hours notice! We had zero food for him, we barely had enough for us.

Anyway we went to go pick up our mini, the meeting started half an hour late. Then the Zone Leaders come up and say that ours didn't show up so we could leave. So we start driving home, 10 minutes from our house we get a call saying that we have a mini missionary and we need to pick him up! Luckily the Newton Elders drove him to Newton so we only had to drive an extra 20 minutes instead of 50.

Saturday with our mini missionary we went out to show him what missionary work is like. We had one set appointment and a day full of nothing. So we knocked on a bunch of doors! It was kinda fun? But at the end of the night we went to see Jim and Gayle and told our mini missionary, whose name is Thomas, that he had the lesson for today! He was kinda freaked out, but he told the restoration the best he could :) Jim and Gayle also had a visitor, and 8 y/o neighbor. She seemed a little interested, and liked the story of the restoration.

All in all it turned out to be a good, fun, week. We found out that Jeremy, the father of the family of seven, is a pastor. At the most popular church in town. So we aren't really sure why he is meeting with us. And the mother of the Nichols family, Theresa, got a job this week, which she attributes to the power of prayer! The Nichols family is cool, we just have to make sure they make it to church this week!!

It was a great week, with more to great things ahead!

-Elder Andrasko

Mighty Change of Heart

Hello from Kansas!

This week was meeting-filled! We had interview with our Mission President on Thursday, Zone conference on Friday, and General Conference on Saturday and Sunday! Needless to say it was a revelation-filled week!

We had some good lessons with the father of one of our families. We left him with a Book of Mormon to read last week, and when we came back he was about 20 pages in, and had some notes of questions for us. We were able to help him with most of his questions, but there are a few that we needed to do more studying for. It seems like he has a genuine interest, but he is also very rooted and involved in his current church. Hopefully as we continue meeting, he will continue to read and he will have a "mighty change of heart" and come to find out for himself.

We've been working a lot to try and find new people, which is always a struggle. But I think as we make and follow a plan we will see miracles! 

We met another cool family this week. Well part of a family, and actually we found them last week. But we were able to talk a little bit more, the Dad's name is Rod and he's pretty big, not fat. He's a really nice guy who has met the missionaries before. It's a little hard to meet up with him because he goes to Hutch every Tuesday and Thursday for his free mason meetings. I have been really surprised at the amount of free masons around, I don't think I even knew anyone part of the masons before I came to Kansas.

We started meeting with another family that I met a few months back. One of the boys and girls said they have been reading the Book of Mormon, and they've read quite a bit. But when they went to get it they couldn't find it, so I guess we'll see if they've actually been reading haha. But we finally met the dad, and wow he is huge, he might be the most muscular person I've ever met. Hopefully we can get down to Moundridge more often to see them.

Today Elder Jordan and I decided we wanted to play tennis. So that's our new p day activity, since there's not a whole lot else to do around here haha :).

Not a whole lot going on, but we'll have to go to Wichita again this week! That makes 4 times in 2 weeks.

Looking forward to this coming week!

- Elder Andrasko

Change the World

Transfer week!

We started off the week with just a bunch of goodbyes, a Elder Tolley was sad that he was only here for one transfer, but I am happy that I get to stay.

Wednesday we drove down to Wichita to do all of the exchanges and what not, and Elder Colemere was there! He told me that he is going home one transfer early to play soccer, so he only has two transfers left. So the end for him is coming up quick. Wednesday night we didn't have any plans so we go to a potentials house when we knocked on their door her mom came out and looked pretty annoyed at us. She asked us, "what are you doing here?" And as we told her what our purpose is as missionaries her heart was softened, and she invited us back to share more of our message. It's a family of three and they are super excited to learn more about the gospel. We are gonna see them tonight!

So a few weeks ago we offered some service for someone we saw working, and he accepted our offer. After we finished he invited us over the next week, well the next week he rescheduled for this last week. So we went over on Thursday for dinner and a lesson. Well they are a family of 7 and the father, Jeremy, has had a lot of experience in the church, he had friends growing up that took him to stake dances and seminary and stuff. We had an awesome lesson on the restoration!

So we were looking through the area book and there was a guy whose address was "royal ct, black truck" so we look up royal ct, and there isn't a street with that name anywhere near us. So we just type in r court, and we found a ranch court. So we decided to drive over there and see if we saw a black truck. When we got there almost every home had a car in the driveway, but none of them were black. But we decided to knock the whole street, and the second house we knock on was the guy we were looking for. We got a return appointment, and there was another house that we are going back to as well.

Elder Jordan and I are getting along pretty well, we are planning to make this the best transfer yet! There's not a whole lot to talk about this week. We had a lot of people bail on us, but we met a ton of potential. Like the family of three, the Nichols, and the family of seven, the Bowers.

Looking forward to an awesome transfer!

- Elder Andrasko