Elder Alec Jonathan Raymond

Rough Week

2011-11-09T08:05:00.000-08:00

Dear Famiree,

One of the rescue families we have been working with came to Church last Wednesday and yesterday as well. They have a ten-year-old son who has not been baptized. His mother is very supportive. We plan on inviting him this week to be baptized 18 November.

Other than that, this last week was a pretty rough week. We have been having a very difficult time with both investigators and rescue families not coming to Church. We are also having a very difficult time with investigators not keeping their appointments. We have been trying several different approaches to find some way to meet more regularly with people but so far nothing has worked out. We feel that the Lord is trying to help us learn something here and we are trying to learn it quickly so that our investigators will have the opportunity to experience the blessings of the restored Gospel.

We found many new investigators last transfer with whom we feel we have not yet sufficiently followed up. Perhaps the Lord is saying to us something along the lines of "Look at all these investigators that you haven't done anything with. Why should I give you more?" We are unsure if that really is the case, but, even so, we are doing everything we can to follow up with them.

Something interesting just happened. As I was typing the last paragraph, a gentleman walked up to my companion and I, and gave us a piece of paper with his grandson's information on it. He says that his grandson has been studying from the Book of Mormon and would be a "guaranteed one in the pool." We'll see what happens!

By the way, my new companion's name is Elder P. He has been out five months and was trained by Elder K.!!! He's awesome. His dad grew up in the same town and was born about the same time as you, Dad. We wondered if maybe you knew him. (side note... Elder Raymond's dad double dated with Elder P.'s aunt! Yes, he knows Elder P.'s dad!)

I have been studying a lot from the Book of Mormon and the lessons from Preach My Gospel as I prepare to teach our investigators. I love the Gospel and I love sharing it. I just hope and pray to have more opportunities to be an instrument in the Lord's hands in helping some few of his children to come unto Christ.

Love,

Elder Elder Raymond

2011-11-02T08:50:00.000-07:00

Dear Famiree,

This week it seems like we worked a lot but did not see a whole lot of results. Ever since the last baptism in the area things have been a little rough. Although we had many return appointments with potential investigators and many teaching appointments with current investigators one thing or another always seemed to go awry.

We still have many potential investigators and we have faith that as we are diligent and obedient at least a few of them will start to act upon the promptings of the Spirit.

Early in the week we had a great lesson with one of our investigators. She had read a little from the Book of Mormon since our last visit and we feel strongly that the Book of Mormon will play an especially critical role in her conversion. In our lesson we read through 1 Nephi 8 and portions of 1 Nephi 11 and talked about how she can apply the principles taught in Lehi's dream in her own life. When we invited her to Church she said that she really would like to come but she works every Sunday. We asked her what she could do to resolve her concern and she said that she would talk with one of her coworkers and switch shifts with him in order to be able to attend this coming Sunday. We promised her that the Lord will provide a way for her to keep His commandments.

We tried to meet a couple of times with the family we have been teaching but each time they were unable to. They are a wonderful family and we look forward to their progress in the Gospel as they start meeting with us more regularly.

Another investigator, and his girlfriend, said that they would be at Church yesterday. They did not respond to our attempts to contact them Sunday morning and they did not come to Church. Hopefully he was just working out-of-town and his phone died or something.

On Wednesday evening a Bishop gave us a referral for a nine-year-old girl. She attends Church every Sunday with her family but has not yet been baptized for fear of water. We are praying for the Lord to help her overcome her fear so that she will be able to receive the blessings of baptism.

In my Gospel study I have been studying a lot from the Book of Mormon. After reading the October Ensign I have been trying to learn from the Book of Mormon's teaching knowing that it was written specifically for our day. I have learned a great deal and I am trying to help our investigators apply its teachings in their own lives.

We found out transfer info this last Saturday. We had a big surprise! My companion is getting transferred. We thought for sure he would stay for another couple of transfers since he's only been here three months. I'm excited to meet my new companion!

I found out a couple weeks ago or so that the Cards had made the play-offs and then last Friday that they were in the World Series! We found out at the Trunk-or-Treat on Saturday evening that they won!!! We tracted into a huge Rangers fan and I told him he better pray pretty hard for the Rangers because we were going to be praying for the Cards, haha!

It's starting to get pretty chilly here! We've had frost on the ground and the roofs several mornings in a row. And we biked here (to the library). brrrrr.....

I love you!!!

Elder Elder Raymond

Oct 24, 2011 It's Gettin' Chilly!

2011-11-02T08:40:00.000-07:00

Dear Famiree,

This week has flown by! We found many new investigators early in the week and had many return appointments throughout the week. Unfortunately, very, very few people showed up for their return appointments. Our stack of unused lesson plans is growing thicker and thicker. :(

We're teaching a really neat family. They have three children. We taught them the first half of the Restoration and set a return appointment to teach the last half yesterday. The Dad was not there and we did not have a team-up so we rescheduled the appointment for sometime this week. They are not currently attending a church and have accepted the invitation to come to Church with us. Hopefully they will be there next week!

We have still been trying to stay in contact with one of our investigators. He is a 22-year-old that was extremely receptive to the message of the Restoration. He works out-of-town a lot and it has been very difficult to maintain contact with him.

A non-member husband of one of the older sisters in our ward came to Church again. He has been taught by many sets of missionaries over the years. We have been trying to schedule a time to go to their home to teach him.

In my Gospel study I have been trying to do better at studying to prepare to teach the investigators with whom we have appointments during that day. I have also been reading from the current issue of the Ensign magazine as I eat breakfast and lunch. My testimony of and love for the Book of Mormon has grown as I have done so.

I went on exchange with Elder K. in Pigeon Forge this last week! It went very well. Both my companion and I set a goal to focus on finding new investigators during the exchange. Elder K. and I found a couple of new investigators, one of whom accepted the invitation to be baptized. My companion reported that his exchange with Elder K's companion also went well. They found many new investigators. It was really neat to go back to my first area with a former companion!

It's getting a little chilly here! We have had frost on the roof/grass/car several times in the morning.

Anyway, things are going very well here! Hope all is well on the home front.

Love,

Elder Elder Raymond

What I Got Out of General Conference...

2011-10-04T07:41:00.000-07:00

It's been a wonderful week! We found many new investigators at the beginning of the week and look forward to working with them. There is so much potential in this ward. I love the people here in this area. It's definitely the most "country" area I've served in thus far, haha. Everyone has the stereotypical "southern hospitality." My companion is great as well! I don't remember if I had time to tell you much about him last week. His name is Elder Reyes and he is originally from Argentina. His family moved to the states ten years ago. It has been such a blessing to have a companion who grew up speaking Spanish to help me with my rusty language skills. It's come back very quickly and even better than before!

On Thursday we had a mission-wide leadership training meeting in Knoxville that I got to go to. Two brethren--Kelly Mills, director of international MTCs in the Church’s Missionary Department and Brother Steward (I can't remember exactly what it is that he does...whatever he does he's really good at it, haha)--addressed us. They trained us on how to have a more effective and enjoyable companion study and how to create effective lesson plans as we focus on teaching people rather than just lessons.

I really, really, really enjoyed general conference! A few of the many things that stood out to me:

1. The Temple Patrons Fund is an inspired program. (President Monson)

2. Never delay in giving service or following the Spirit. (Elder Alonso)

3. Feast upon the Book of Mormon daily. (Elder Scott and President Eyring)

4. Use technology to build the Lord's kingdom. (Elder Bednar)

5. Being busy is not the same as being productive. (Elder Ardern)

6. Look up! (Elder Cook)

7. People will respond to the invitation to come back. (Elder Curtis)

8. If the prophet's call doesn't bring you joy, you're doing something wrong. (Elder Christofferson)

9. Sign on and speak up! (Elder Holland)

10. Sacrifice is not enough if it is not applied. (Elder Waddell)

11. Don't wait for the water to pass by--build a bridge. (President Uchtdorf)

12. Don't pray for patience and expect it to come immediately. ;) (Elder Hales)

13. Always be worthy of and courageously and faithfully follow revelation. (President Monson)

14. Pick one: Zion or Babylon. Build a house and stay there. (Elder Oaks)

15. Even if they don't understand the message or the doctrine, they understand your love and the Spirit. (Elder Yamashita)

16. There are only two choices: eat the vegetables. (Elder Bennett)

17. The things that are important to us become important to God simply because He loves us. (Elder Cornish)

18. Learn the language of the Spirit. (Elder Cornish)

19. Avoid dwelling on lost opportunities. (Elder Cook)

20. The Church is true!!! (The Spirit)

Love,

Elder Elder Raymond

August 26, 2011

2011-10-04T07:37:00.000-07:00

I'm freeeeeeeeeeeee!!!!!!! Haha! I'm in Morristown, TN about an hour northeast of Knoxville. It is a Spanish area. I'm a district leader and my companion's name is Elder R. He's from Argentina and he's awesome! We had a baptism last week and foresee a great deal of success in the area! Since I'm back in the library to e-mail I once again have very limited time to do so. I always write my e-mail to President first and today when I hit "submit" the whole thing disappeared.... I had to retype it and the computers here are antiques. They're not even running XP yet.... Anyway, it didn't leave much time to e-mail home. I'm super duper excited and grateful to be here and I can't wait for conference this weekend. That's about as long a summary as I can do today, haha. Hopefully things will work better for me next week....

Love,

Elder Elder Raymond

Prayer, Faith, and Baptism

2011-09-19T21:21:00.000-07:00

I have had a couple requests for the story about the sister who was baptized last week. Thus, here it is!

The first I heard about her was at a district meeting a couple of months ago. We were visiting the district to which the sisters who taught her belong. One of the agenda items at the district meeting was a investigator problem-solving. This is an opportunity for companionships in the district to present concerns that their investigators have that they have had difficulty helping them to resolve. Input from other missionaries with varied experience is often revelatory and extremely helpful--it's the principle of counseling together to receive revelation taught by Elder Cook in a leadership broadcast several months ago. He said something along the lines of "participation by all is necessary if the revelatory potential is to be achieved" referring specifically to sisters in the ward council if I remember right (shout out to the wonderful women in the Church :) ). Anyway, during this portion of the district meeting the sisters mentioned that they had an investigator in a care center who had accepted the invitation to be baptized but had serious, seemingly irresolvable health concerns. Her health concerns include an inability to move a large portion of her body, including her legs. The solution that the district came up with was basically to pray for a miracle--it wasn't going to happen without one. Over the next couple months the sisters continued to teach her and this sister's determination to be baptized only grew. Promises were made both in teaching by the sisters and in priesthood blessings from the local members. The sister missionaries had a great deal of faith and helped this sister to develop great faith for herself as she read from the Book of Mormon and prayed continually. Many people started to put their heads together brainstorming various potential scenarios for her baptism. Some of the major challenges included transporting her from the care facility to the location of the baptismal service, finding a suitable location for the service, lowering her into and out of the water, and transport back to the facility. Rather than going through all of the many, many, many scenarios to resolve each of these concerns, I will just say that there was a plethora. I'll describe one scenario that I was intimately involved in rehearsing.... President Irion came up with the idea to strap her to a backboard, which he borrowed from a local fire department, and carry her into a font and lower her down. Great idea, right? ...riiiiiiiiight.... So we went to the Church building in her area to try it out. After rolling me out of a wheelchair onto a row of chairs covered with the aforementioned backboard and strapping me to it with leather belts they ('they' being my companion, 3 other Elders, the mission President and his wife) proceeded to carry me through the bathroom to the font. The entire time I did my darndest to remain absolutely relaxed in every way so as to most accurately simulate the complete lack of support that the sister would be able to supply. I was terrified. When we got to the font they realized that getting a backboard with a limp individual strapped to it around the corner from the bathroom down into the font would prove exceedingly difficult. They tried tilting me up vertically leaving me literally hanging from a leather belt wrapped under my arms with my lifeless legs twisting and dragging on the floor and around the corner. I thought for sure that I was going to die as they struggled to get me down the stairs into the font; or at the very least break both my legs. It was uncomfortable and had no chance of success. Back to square one: praying for a miracle. All of this was going on just a couple of days before the scheduled baptism. We strongly considered postponing the baptism, but felt that we just needed to have more faith...slightly unnerving.... So...we prayed for a miracle! I'm not exactly sure how it happened (I guess that's not an entirely true statement...we did pray for a miracle after all...), but everything just fell into place. We suggested a hotel pool which would have more space to maneuver her into the water. It just so happens that there is a Holiday Inn around the corner from the care center with an indoor pool! After a little inquiry Sister Irion determined that if we reserved a room in the hotel we could use the pool for whatever we wanted. The Irions promptly bought a room for the period of time that the baptismal service was scheduled for. Location resolved! Wanting to avoid the approximately $1000 ambulance fee for transporting her to the pool we searched in vain for other options. Someone just decided to ask to see if it was even a possibility and the EMTs said they would love to help...for FREE!!! Transportation to and from resolved! (Not to mention the great relief it was to have EMTs present for any medical complications.) The EMTs transported her to the hotel from the care center in an ambulance. They backed right up to the door from the pool to the outside around the back and wheeled her in on a gurney. They had lain her on a parachute-like sheet with handles all around it for lowering her into and out of the water. Last problem solved! We had eight elders and a couple local members around her manning the handles. There were five in the water and five standing on the side of the pool. A member from her ward said the prayer and then we all lifted her up. The EMTs wheeled the gurney out from under her, we walked her to and over the edge and lowered her to the surface of the water. After plugging her nose she was immersed and raised back up out of the water. We carried her away from the edge as the gurney was wheeled back under her. She was beaming and crying as we set her back down onto the gurney. The temperature in the room was warm enough that she was comfortable as she lay on the gurney. She was confirmed poolside. After expressing a great deal of gratitude to everyone present she was wheeled back out to the ambulance and driven to the care center a new member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints! It went off without a hitch! It was a miracle!!! So that's the story of the sister who got baptized last week.
Love,
Elder Elder Raymond

Those Darn Cows...

2011-09-19T21:00:00.000-07:00

I don't usually post Alec's letters to me... just the ones to family... however, this one needed to be shared! :) -Darlene

Dear Mommy,

Soooo...on Friday I was driving home from district meeting...going 38 in a 40 mile-an-hour zone...but...apparently it was a school zone and I got zappered in a speed trap by four motorcycle cops on foot. It was actually quite the operation...hiding in bushes and the whole shebang.... I even had to wait in line to get my ticket. Anyway my ticket is $146.50 and I only have $102.06 on my home card. I was wondering if there was any way that I could get an approximate 50% one-time increase in my fundage. That would be exceedingly appreciated.... If not, I can see if I can get permission to pay it from my mission card. I don't spend very much money at all and I have a great deal left over from previous months, but I'm supposed to pay for traffic fines with my home card. I would like to get it taken care of fairly quickly as it is like unto a great anvil hanging over my head preparing to crush me under its elephantine mass of iron molecules.... I am as sorry as a horsie that ran too fast through the field where the horsie did not know that the teacher horsies were teaching the little horsies how to frolic and got a ticket from the cows but did not have enough oats to pay the fine and since it always just eats hay which the farmer said it is not supposed to give away and since it has no opposable thumbs it has no way to gather more oats on its own and has to ask the beautiful show horsies for some of their oats that they won by working hard to win the races and feels very very very sorry that it has to ask the beautiful show horsies for some of their hard-earned oats but cannot see any other possible solution since although the horsie understands English the farmer does not understand horsie and cannot therefore give the horsie permission to pay the fine with hay which the horsie has in abundance because it is very careful with the hay that it does get instead of oats which they horsie has some of because it eats them only sparingly but not enough and needs approximately 50% more in order to pay the fine. That is very, very, very sorry, by the way....

Love,
Elder Elder Raymond

Birthday Wishes!

2011-09-06T20:59:00.001-07:00

Dear Famiree,

Thank you! Thank you! Thank you! I got the boxes and the cupcakes and 17 out of what I assume will soon be 21 letters. I'm not opening them until they all show up.

Everything in the boxes was perfect, thanks!

My brain isn't working very well right now...it's been a long week here too. Hope all is well at school and work.

I love you stinkin' much!
Elder Elder Raymond

P.S. The others came today. They were wonderful, thanks!

He's 21 and not in a writing mood...

2011-09-02T22:17:00.000-07:00

From Alec...(we asked questions and got these responses)

Who is your current missionary companion?

I was in a threesome with Elders Rollins (AP) and Elder T. Smith (Broken-footed-fiend) from 5 April to 2 May. Elder Rollins is my current companion. We've been together since 2 May.

Did you feel the earthquake?

We weren't in Knoxville at the time of the quake. We heard about it, but didn't feel it at all. I heard there was one in D.C. too! Weird, earthquakes on the east coast...haha.

We heard Sis. Irion (Mission Presidents wife) is a wonderful cook... Do you ever get to eat with them?

We eat with the Irions a couple times a week. She is a really good cook. I was spoiled growing up with a professional chef for a mother and I have continued to be spoiled by the culinary craft of two consecutive mission president's and wives, haha.

Love you!

Elder Elder Raymond

P.S. I got my boxes today!!! :) :) :)

Still "Crazy Busy"!

2011-08-24T14:13:00.000-07:00

Dear Famiree (and everyone else too),

Things have been crazy busy around here! Three weeks ago we had four zone conferences during a single week. Two weeks ago we had twelve new missionaries, two of which were last minute additions, and we had to open several new areas. Last week was district leader training around the entire mission. Phew, this week's been a busy week again. Our apartment coordinator has had several companionships move to new apartments. Since we are responsible for such moves we have been driving all over the mission moving lots and lots of furniture and all the other random stuff that builds up in missionary apartments. It's nuts.... I don't think my mind, body, and spirit have ever been so exhausted! I'm pooped, haha.

It sounds like things have been pretty busy with everyone getting ready to go back to school. I can't believe Caiti and Kimmee are juniors!!! That's nutso! I didn't realize that they had started letting 12-year-olds go to high school! ;)

Anyway...sorry for not writing very much. We opened up a second area in our ward and gave them the productive half so that they could have some success. Unfortunately, that means that now we don't have any investigators...haha. We're looking, though! They'll come. They always do!

Anyway, I love you all oodles and oodles!

Elder Elder Raymond

6/19/11 Gimmee an "A" (it's a letter!)

2011-08-24T14:12:00.001-07:00

Dear Famiree,
Howdy, howdy, howdy, howdy! (No I didn't have beans for dinner...just saying howdy...nothing more...)
Today was a great day! I always look forward to the Sabbath. This one was particularly wet and stormy. It had been very dry here since the beginning of June until a couple of days ago. The weather has sure made up for it! We have gotten a ton of rain and some good thunder. Yesterday we had a good bit of hail. It was only dime-size but it lasted for several minutes. We went out tracting after Church today and hoped that we wouldn't get too wet. We were sure surprised when the clouds parted and the sun actually came out for the first time in several days. By the time we went in for dinner there wasn't a cloud to be seen anywhere in the sky. It was quite pleasant if I do say so myself! We had a great lesson with a guy named J. Several weeks ago I was on exchange with one of the zone leaders, Elder Williams. All of our appointments had canceled and I was searching through the area book for the address of a former investigator that I remembered seeing earlier that week. As I browsed, J's teaching record jumped out at me. At first I just kept flipping through looking for the other record, and then went back to look at his. He hadn't really been taught much. He'd never come to Church or accepted a baptismal invitation, but I still felt like we should go see him. Elder Williams and I went to see him and he accepted a return appointment. We went back that Sunday with our ward mission leader but he wasn't there for our appointment. Usually that's a sure sign of a lack of interest, but my companion and I felt like we should keep trying for a while. We went back a couple of times but he was never at home. We gave up for a couple of weeks until a couple days ago. We felt that we should go back one more time to see if we could catch him at home. He was at home but didn't have time to meet with us that evening so we set up a return appointment for tonight. I'll admit that I was a little skeptical as to whether he would show or not, but we felt like we should still give him a try. He was there for our appointment, but was passed out asleep on his couch. We knocked and knocked and knocked trying to wake him up. We weren't giving up this time, haha. Anyway, he finally woke up and invited us in. We had one of the strongest lessons I've ever been in on my mission. He was very very receptive and excited about the message that we brought. He accepted the invitation to be baptized and bore testimony of the truth that he had been searching for his whole life that we had just taught him. He loves the idea of having a living prophet and the restored priesthood authority. He was pretty funny. When we invited him to be baptized he said "you know, I don't really know anything about what y'all believe or even what church you go to or anything, but I feel like there is something more to y'all and I want to be baptized." It was really neat to see the Spirit working in him as we taught him about Joseph Smith and the Book of Mormon. It was a lot of fun! I love teaching the Gospel when the Spirit is present. One of my all-time favorite scriptures is D&C 50:21-22 "Therefore, why is it that ye cannot understand and know, that he that receiveth the word by the Spirit of truth receiveth it as it is preached by the Spirit of truth? Wherefore, he that preacheth and he that receiveth, understand one another, and both are edified and rejoice together." We were all edified and rejoiced together.
I love you all!!!
Elder A. Raymond

March - May "Letters"... At least we know he's alive! :)

2011-08-24T14:12:00.000-07:00

3/13/11

I luv dew! I'm doing pretty well right now. Once the weather starts warming up consistently I'll probably start sending winter stuff home so I don't have to keep packing it every time I move....
Love,
Elder Raymond

3/22/11

Dear Famiree,
Sorry for not righting last week. We had a VERY interesting week. A week ago Friday, we got a call from the MTC that there were five missionaries waiting on their visas to go to Brazil that had been temporarily reassigned to our mission. They were scheduled to arrive the following Monday. We spent the weekend frantically trying to figure out where to put them and how to find beds for them. As it turns out, three of them are staying with us (a companionship of FIVE) and the other two are in a neighboring area (a companionship of three). Needless to say, it has been a little busy around here.

I'm doing great! The work is going very well right now in the mission. We have an all-time record number of baptismal commitments and the success is spread very evenly throughout the entire mission. We are starting to get ready for the mission president change in June. I don't remember if I've already told you or not, but the new mission president's name is Richard Irion. His wife is Elder Russel M. Nelson's daughter. Elder Nelson was the very first Apostle to visit our mission. He dedicated the mission home when the mission was created. There is a good chance that he will pay us the occasional visit. We will be very, very, very sad to see President and Sister Griffin leave, but we are excited to work with President and Sister Irion.

I love you all very much!

Thanks for writing me even when I don't write....

Love,
Elder Raymond

3/29/11

I'm really really sorry! I still haven't had time to write anything longer. Transfers are next week and we're swamped. More to come, I promise!
Love,
Elder Raymond

4/11/11

Dearest Famiree,
It has been an absolutely crazy week! It was transfers week already. I have a new companion! His name is Elder Rollins and he's from San Diego. Elder Lindner was transferred to the other ward in the same building. Not too far. Haha. It's nice to have him close by for when something comes up at the office that I've never done before. It's definitely been a growing experience trying to train a new assistant after having been an assistant for a grand total of a month.... One way or another, things always work out!

It's starting to warm up outside finally! I heard that it got up to 91 yesterday. The weather here is absolutely nuts. Last Monday was in the upper 80s and then we had frost on our windshield Tuesday and Wednesday. Now it's back up again! Oh well. At least we get some warm weather. :)

Anyway, thanks for the e-mail!

Love you'uns!
Elder Raymond

P.S. 'you'uns' is a rare word found only in Eastern Tennessee. It has a similar meaning to 'y'all' and is also found in various other forms such as 'we'uns' and 'they'uns.' Not kidding. :)

4/18/11

Dad was called as 2nd counselor again, eh? :) That should be fun. I'm sure Dad will be a great influence for good on the youth. Bryan's already getting his stuff?!? Man, that is so close!!! Tell him I have around 150 extra ties I'll mail him. Probably after he gets to the field so he doesn't have to worry about the weight when he flies. He's going to the temple in 2-3 weeks!!! I miss the temple so much. He is VERY lucky to have one in his mission. Mom, Good luck finding someone to hire that is bilingual who knows something about music.... I can't imagine there are too many around town. We did get hit with all the muck. We got some cool hail and lots and lots of fun wind! A couple weeks ago we had some major flooding. The main street through Knoxville looked like the Amazon River--three feet of red water from all the construction. Anyway, I love you lots!!!
Elder Raymond

4/30/11

Dear Famiree,
Just thought you'd like a quick note. The storms DID hit us. One of the areas in the mission is completely gone. All of the missionaries are safe and I got some really cool pictures of hail. It cracked our windshield really bad and put dents in the entire car. It was rrrrrrreal exciting!!! Anyway...
Love you all!
Elder Raymond

5/1/11

Hello hello! I'm at the office doing reports and things.... I can't really think of anything to write. It's too late to think clearly. :/ Just waiting for the last zone to call in and I figured I'd shoot you an e-mail!
Anyway...
I love you!
Elder Raymond

P.S. smells like fiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiish...

5/24/11

Dear Famiree,
Sorry I haven't written much lately. Last week was transfers and this week our vehicle coordinator is out of commission with open-heart surgery...so the rest of the office staff has to do all of his stuff too....
Anyways, I'm so excited for Bryan!!! I've been telling EVERYONE that he's leaving next week. A couple missionaries have friends in his mission, but I can't remember any of their names. You got to go to the pink cow?!? We have a member in our ward who makes fantastic thai food. It's really yummy.
I love you all!!!
Elder Raymond

5/27/11

Dear Famiree,
We're doing good. Most everything has been blowing north of us.
Congratulations Caitibug (on lettering in track again)!!! avonapoeiwnvzlknvoiaewbnvoidsn (those are lots of "letters")
Congratulations Kimmeebear (on getting into LVA)!!! waaah wah wahahhaaa wwwwaaaahaaa (that's the sound violins and violas make)
Congratulations Elder Lord Byron of the Swamp!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I'm super duper aliuper excited for you!!!! Set apart already?!? Wowsers!!! Now there are two Elder Raymonds in the world!!! It's nice not to be the only one anymore... ;)
Love you!!!
Elder Raymond

6/2/11

The very end of this month is the mission president change. It's coming up so quick!!! We took Elder Woller to the airport yesterday morning. His two years were up! All the sisters I came out with go home in three weeks. It's crazy! I'm starting to feel old...haha.... :)

EXTREMELY Busy!

2011-03-01T07:19:00.000-08:00

Aloooooooooooooooooooohhhhhhhhhaa!!!

Dear Famiree,

I'm doing grrrrrrrrrreat! I am so excited to hear about Bryan being ordained an elder. That is a huge step. We spend months and months and months trying to help our recent converts prepare to receive the Melchizedek priesthood. Some of them never do. I am so grateful to have a family that prepared me over the years as I grew. It is much more difficult to try to do when you are grown.

I am EXTREMELY busy. I haven't been to bed before midnight in a week and a half. It is a real challenge to balance running an area and running the mission. We plan all of the training of the mission--from district meeting topics to a 12-week curriculum for trainers to zone conference to mission wide leadership training meetings. We run errands all over the mission. We are responsible for moving into and out of new/old apartments. We do emergency transfers. We collect key indicator information (numbers) for the whole mission each week and write the reports that everyone gets in the wards/stakes/missions/Church areas around us. We plan and conduct meetings and conference calls. We do just about everything for transfers. We assist President in deciding who goes where each transfer. We pick up new missionaries and take the departing missionaries to the airport. We speak in sacrament meetings with President. We inspect missionary apartments and vehicles. We help the office staff with their assignments. Pretty much...we try to keep the mission running smoothly. And we baptize in our own area...somehow.... :) In a nutshell, that's what we do. If we have time, we do tract. We have an amazing ward and all of the success comes through President Monson's Rescue Plan.

I am in a different apartment. My area is West Hills. We live directly across the street from the Westtown Mall in Knoxville to give you an idea of where we are at if you google it. Since we frequently have missionaries staying overnight with us during training/transfers, etc., we have a huge apartment. 3 bedrooms, 2 bathrooms, and a full dining room.

Anyways. I love you all very much. I really appreciate your prayers. I cannot do this work without them.

Elder Raymond

Big News!

2011-02-21T07:02:00.001-08:00

20 Feb 2011

Dear Famiree,

I've been called as an Assistant to the President so my e-mails will probably come at pretty random times throughout the week. I usually won't have time to e-mail on Mondays, so I will probably send shorter ones more frequently. I have my own laptop in the office so I won't have to go to the library anymore. Just figured I'd let you know.

Love you!

Elder Raymond

2 Months of Letters...

2011-02-21T07:00:00.000-08:00

13 Dec 2010
Dear famiree,

I almost didn't get to e-mail you today! Our cars were grounded last night from all the snow and ice. As it is, we had a member drive us to the library so that we could e-mail. Apparently this is the most snow this area has seen at this time of year in a long time. You think highs in the 40s is cold...it was seven degrees last night.... ;) That's unusually cold for this area too. Hopefully it will warm up a little bit after all the snow and ice melt. I guess we can only expect it to keep getting hotter and colder as the earth keeps reeling to and fro....

I love my new area. The whole city has the feel of a military base, so it feels a lot like home.... I don't know if that's weird or not...but.... :) I don't know if you already know, but Oak Ridge (that's my current area) is the location of the Manhattan Project. We only use bottled water here so that we don't risk growing a third arm or something. Apparently this is one of the world's largest stockpiles of weapons grade uranium. There is a lot of really interesting history here. The members here are great too. The vast majority of them work for the Department of Energy, so they're from all over the United States. We have a family in the ward that recently moved from Las Vegas. We have a lot of support here and I look forward to great success. There seems to be a whole lot of potential in part-member work here.

My companion's name is Elder Howe. He goes home in a little under a month. He's a really great guy.

Love you!

Elder Raymond
28 Dec 2010

We have permission to e-mail today since our preparation days have been unusually scheduled, but I'm at a different library so I don't have as much time as usual. It was wonderful to get to talk to you all on Saturday. It's good to know that everything is going well. We just got out of the first day of a four-day training meeting. We talked about the doctrine of Christ and teaching by the Holy Ghost today. I love studying the doctrine of Christ. I am amazed by the relevance and the plainness of His Gospel. It really is true. I love you all!

Love,

Elder Raymond
11 Jan 2011

Dear Famiree,

I'm e-mailing from a winter wonderland! We got around three inches of Sunday evening and another inch last night and it's still snowing! Apparently this is the most snow this area has seen this early in the season ever.

This last week has been very busy again and the next few days show no promise of slowing down. My companion went home on Friday so that he could make the start of the school semester. I'm currently with another missionary whose companion also went home for the same reason. Transfers are tomorrow and I will be getting another, hopefully more permanent, companion. It looks like this will be the biggest transfer the mission has ever seen. We are getting many more missionaries than we are losing, so we will be opening several new areas. Our entire zone will be going to transfers as well. Every companionship is losing at least one missionary (we have two areas that are being white-washed). I've heard that that's the case around the whole mission. It's definitely going to be a big change.

With the end of last year and the beginning of this year, we have been looking at our goals from the past and for the future. As a mission, we had great success. We finished the year with 365 baptisms as a mission, which was exactly our goal for the year. It averages out to one baptism per day for 2010. We are very pleased and look forward to continued success in the coming year.

Congratulations to Bryan on getting to have your wisdom teeth out! Life's about to get exciting! I can't wait to hear more!

I love you all!

Elder Raymond
18 Jan 2011

Dear Famiree,

Sorry for not writing yesterday...the library was closed due to Martin Luther King, Jr. Day. My new companion is great! His name is Elder Carpenter and he's from Arizona. I think that we will have a lot of success together. All the snow is finally washing away today in the never-ending rain. It's a good trade-off. :) I really appreciated your letter this week. Sounds like it was a busy, busy week at work!

It has been really busy here too. The work we are doing will also revolutionize missionary work. Now if we could just get it working.... Applying the eight fundamental principles of Preach My Gospel and President Monson's Rescue Plan has been like trying to stop a train. As missionaries, we learned to teach one way and quickly got set in those ways. Then the missionary department told us that we are really not applying Preach My Gospel at all and need to completely change the way we teach again. It's been very difficult but extremely fruitful. There is not a doubt in my mind that the leaders of this Church receive specific and direct revelation for us. It is actually really, really cool to see how everything fits together and then to see the great success that comes from it as we do it the way we should. Trying to get wards and branches to start applying President Monson's Rescue Plan has been at least as difficult as changing the way we teach. We see so much success from applying these principles, but it is so much work to get it going. Little by little, our stake is starting to get it going. One of the stakes in our mission, the Chattanooga stake, is the model for the entire area of the Church in applying the Rescue Program. President Gonzalez, our area president, told all the stakes and missions in the area to figure out how they do it and to get it running in their own stakes and missions by the end of January. Our stake is getting pretty close. We have a wonderful stake president.

We had a pretty cool thing happen last week. A lady called the Church building last Sunday morning requesting a ride to Church. Apparently she had met with missionaries twelve years ago, but had not been back to Church since. She came last week and set up an appointment for us to meet with her during the following week. When we went to the appointment, we invited her to be baptized and she said that she had already told her friends she was going to be baptized and she just needed to know the date of the service so that she could let them know when to come. She had definitely been prepared by the Lord. She will be getting baptized next Saturday.

I love you all mucho much! Just like a snail loves its new shell after it outgrew the last one, shed it, and spent hours and hours slugging along looking for the perfect size one to allow it to keep growing. That's how much I love you.... (that's a lot...) :)

Love,

Elder Raymond

24 Jan 2011

Dear Famiree,

aaaaaaaaaaaaaalllllllllllooooooooooooooooohhhhhhhhhhhaaaaaaaaaa!!!!!!!!!!

Congratulations on getting a mouth dissection Bryan! ;) It's well worth it. After a little bit of admittedly not-so-fun-ness you don't ever have to worry about them again. Plus, for a couple weeks you will have extra storage space for bacon until the holes close up. I can't wait to hear when your papers are in and everything. That's so exciting! Read Preach My Gospel, especially chapter three, and the Book of Mormon over and over again. That will be the best preparation you could do. Make sure you watch "The District" online too when you get the packet that tells you about it. You'll see what I mean.

We had an interesting week-end. The lady that was supposed to be baptized this Saturday encountered some less-than-friendly reading material from a local preacher. She won't answer her door or her phone right now. We are praying that the Lord will help soften her heart so that she can overcome her concerns.

Not much else interesting has happened this week. I'm trying to write better letters home...but I can't ever think of anything to write.... :/ ...I had a dream about dinosaurs last night...that was interesting...

Anyway, I love you!

Elder Raymond
31 Jan 2011

Dear Famiree,

This week has been very busy! We have been working our tail ends off trying to find people to teach. We have had a lot of success this week as we have worked diligently.

Our mission has had a rough enough winter. The last couple days have been absolutely gorgeous though. Upper 60s and sunshine. We were kind-of hoping it would last for a while.... The weather here can change 50 degrees overnight. You never know what to expect. It definitely keeps us on our toes!

Anyway, I love you all!

Thanks for your prayers!

Love,

Elder Raymond

07 Feb 2011

Dear Famiree,

This week has been extremely busy. I think that the last week has been the fastest week of my entire mission. We have been working very hard trying to find people to teach and the Lord has blessed us for it.

I had a wonderful surprise opportunity on Saturday! We had another Spanish conference down in Dalton. Elder Cornish, our Area Authority Seventy came to speak to us as well. He served both as a missionary and as a mission president in Spanish speaking missions. Afterwards, I got to ride up with Elder Cornish, Elder Woller (my trainer), and another missionary from Dalton to Knoxville. It was quite the two-hour discussion.

Anyways, hope everything is going well back home.

Love,

Elder Raymond

2010-11-30T08:06:00.000-08:00

Here's Elder Raymond's letter this week! He loves getting mail... letters, cards, or packages (via priority mail... I've found the flat rate boxes are the cheapest way to go, they take about 1 week to get to him, if sent any other way they can take a month or more before they reach him)

Dear Famiree,

It's been a very eventful week. You may or may not have gotten the phone call from the mission office on Monday. I'll just go day by day:

Monday - We totaled our car. We were driving down the road, going straight through a green light when somebody turned left in front of us. We slammed on the brakes, but to no avail. KABOOM!!! Airbags smell like burning hair...or that could have been burning hair...not really sure.... Anyway, my companion and I are both okay. Our poor car, not so much. Back to a bike area! :) (Side note: I spoke to Alec's Mission President, he said Alec was driving, the accident wasn't his fault, and other then injured pride and some bruising from the airbags- no bleeds- he and his companion are fine. It's comforting his Mission President is also a doctor! - Darlene)

Tuesday - An AMAZING day! We had a special zone conference with Elder Paul Johnson of the First Quorum of the Seventy. He is the administrator of religious education for the Church Educational System. That means he's in charge of BYU (all of them), Institute (all of them), and Seminary (all of them). He gave excellent training on different ways to teach and learn different types of knowledge. He called my companion and I to role-play to him and his wife as though we had just tracted into them. We knocked, they answered the door and it quickly became clear that they spoke Norwegian...not English. My companion asked them if they spoke Spanish and they said that they spoke a little bit. In Spanish, we asked them if we could watch the Restoration in Norwegian. :) It was pretty fun. After the conference, one of the companionships in my district had a baptism that we went to. It went very well.

Wednesday - One of the elders in my district had a bike accident. He essentially clotheslined himself in the mouth with a three-inch metal bar. He broke several teeth, split both lips and his tongue. We spent six hours in the ER with him.... That was fun.

Thursday - THANKSGIVING!!! We had breakfast with one of the families in the English ward. We had bacon and sausage and bacon and biscuits and gravy and bacon and pancakes and bacon. It was really really really yummy. Then we had Thanksgiving dinner with another family from the English ward. We had all the standard stuff. One of the family's daughters is engaged to a member in the Spanish ward and he made a humongous delicious flan. He and I were the only ones who like it...so...we ate it all.... It was YUMMY.

Friday - I had my last district meeting as a district leader. I trained on receiving revelation through the Book of Mormon. It went really well. That evening, the sisters in my district went home to a flooded apartment. Their water heater had leaked all over their kitchen, bathroom, and hallway. The every-other-day curse continues. Now everyone in my district has had an 'exciting' experience this week.

Saturday - I found out I was being released as a district leader...and called as a zone leader. I'll be leaving on Wednesday. That means I'll have very limited opportunity to use Spanish since there are no Spanish zone leader areas. It should be interesting. (Pres. Griffin said he uses Alec a lot for training other Elders... he said he is a very effective teacher and an excellent example.) :)
Sunday - The elder who smashed his face left to go to Morristown, Tennessee to get his teeth fixed. His companion is in a trio with Elder Kenyon and I until we get transferred on Wednesday.

Monday - I'm writing about my exciting and slightly nerve-wracking week in an e-mail home to my family.

I did get my box! I'm actually wearing one of the sweaters now. I think it's blue...not really sure...but I think so. :)

The weather is starting to get fairly chilly. Right about 30-40 at night and 40-60 during the day. We've been getting lots of rain. I heard everything out west is under blizzard warnings. Is there a chance you might see some white palm trees this winter? ;)

Well, I love you all and I'm going to try to send some pictures so, hasta luego!

Elder Raymond

Pres. Griffin also said he has several Elders in his mission that have NO family support. We are going to send some extra Christmas goodies to Sis. Griffin for those missionaries. If anyone is interested in sending stuff, email me and I'll give you more info on items requested and where to send it. Here is Elder Raymond's "list"...

Dear Santa,

This year for Christmas I would greatly enjoy receiving:

- A CHEAP portable DVD player (President Griffin has authorized the use of portable DVD players for training other missionaries and for watching Gospel DVDs in investigators' homes).

- A CHEAP GPS (to save on time and miles and gas, especially since I'm going to be doing a lot more driving now...) (Santa already got one for him)

- TUNA LUNCH KITS

- NUTS

- JELLY BELLIES

- BLACK GOLD TOE SOCKS

My wish list is not necessarily in any particular order.
Sincerely,
Elder Raymond

2010-11-30T08:01:00.000-08:00

Some things never change! ;)

2010-11-30T07:52:00.000-08:00

First of all, sorry for not writing very much lately...like for several months.... I've been really, really, really busy. I do feel bad for not writing though. The biggest problem is that I can never figure out how to put my experiences into words, so I usually don't even try. This week, I don't have much time, but I'll try. :)

We have a special zone conference tomorrow where I'm hoping to see my package. If it's not there, I'll say something to them about forwarding it to me. Elder Paul V. Johnson of the First Quorum of the Seventy will be there. There is not a single person in our zone that plays piano, so I volunteered to give it a try. It should be...exciting.... :)

I have a breakfast appointment and a dinner appointment and about 15 other offers for Thanksgiving. I'll not be going hungry.

Things are going great. Extremely difficult and frustrating at times, but great. We just had another baptism on Saturday. It was a deaf gentleman. He can speak very well and reads lips, so we were able to communicate. My limited sign-language vocabulary of things you would say to a two-year-old (sit, stop, eat, more, yes, no, and shrimp) was not of much help...but it was fun trying. :) It was a wonderful experience to see someone we tracted into change his life, stop smoking, make the covenant of salvation through baptism, and get the gift of the Holy Ghost. I'll have pictures next week.

As far as challenges I'm facing...pretty much anything Satan can rustle up. It's actually kind-of funny sometimes to see the wacky things he can come up with. He magically dropped off an unopened box of cigarettes and a lighter at the deaf man's house between his baptism and confirmation. He didn't fall for that one, but it was definitely interesting.

We have had great success recently. One of the guys we baptised has received the Aaronic priesthood and hasn't missed a Sunday since his first. Another is doing great. Several other families that were baptized a while ago are finally coming out of the bumps most people experience right after baptism and are doing very well.

The language is fine. I can understand about 99% and have no difficulty expressing myself. It's actually really cool and a wonderful opportunity.

As a missionary, thank you for your help with people investigating the church. One single person speaking under the influence of the Holy Ghost is often (not sometimes, but often) the turning point in an investigator's progression towards baptism. You are a great help to the missionaries there.

One last little blurb from the soap-box: Study the scriptures. Learn what they say. Read them. Learn the history behind the events and experiences of the prophets that have walked this earth. Treasure up the words of life. Learn and apply the doctrine of Christ. It will save you and exalt you. We have to do everything we can to gain eternal life, and then the Lord does everything. We cannot exalt ourselves. Nor can we be exalted by grace until after all we can do.

Tell everyone I say 'hi'!

Love,

Elder Raymond

2010-09-20T11:17:00.000-07:00

Thanks for all the Birthday Wishes!!!

Dear Famiree,

It's MUCH easier to get people to Church in Dalton. We had two come yesterday (12th) and 10 in our district! We committed one of them for the 25th of September and have plans to commit the other this week. He is only 12 years old and we want his parents to be there when we commit him. We actually tracted into his dad who wasn't really interested but wanted to teach his son about God. So, we told him a little about how God is our loving Heavenly Father, talks to us through prophets, sent His Son to die for us, and then restored His Church to the Earth by calling another prophet.... His dad liked what we taught and gave us permission to keep coming back. Now his son has been to mutual and Church and is ready to be baptized. We're pretty excited for the 25th!

We also have a crazy new zone conference this Saturday! President Griffin has arranged a Spanish training meeting. ALL of the Spanish-speaking missionaries in the entire mission are coming down to Dalton for a 5-hour role-play session with the members of our ward, President Griffin, and Elder Cornish of the Seventy. That means that I'll get to see Elder Woller (my trainer, now an assistant) and Elder Morente! And both the Elders I have trained! It's like a family reunion where we get to role-play teaching the Gospel! We'll probably get railed on by President and Elder Cornish though...as a whole the level of the Spanish-speaking missionaries in the mission is not anywhere near where it should be. That's why they organized this special "Spanish zone conference" in the first place. Oh well...I'm excited! There's a good chance that President Griffin and Elder Cornish will stay for the baptisms that evening. That would be awesome! (a little nerve-racking, but awesome...) We're pretty excited for Saturday.

The members feed us A LOT!!!! For a couple weeks we were getting fed at least twice a day. (Everyone was fighting over who got to feed Elder Rayon before he left) Now it's down to 4-5 times per week. They give us a lot of food too, so we always have leftovers or something in the apartment if we don't have a dinner appointment.

Training is going great! My new companion's a stud! He's definitely green though, haha. He's learning both the language and how to teach really quickly. He has a strong desire to be exactly obedient, to work hard, and to follow the Spirit. I can't really ask for much more! Elder Rayon and I went around picking up all the sticks and wood scattered all over the place and now Elder Kenyon and I get to light it on fire. We foresee great success this month and in the coming months.

Right now I'm reading Doctrine and Covenants and the Book of Mormon again. It's amazing how many missionary applications there are when you look for them. (I guess you don't really have to look that hard in Doctrine and Covenants...) As far as insights go...not really anything specific. It's all truth and there is no darkness in the scriptures. It's all of God. Read something kind-of interesting the other day...not really very insightful, but interesting. See 1 Nephi 21:12 and Isaiah 49:12 as well as the Bible Dictionary "Sinim, land of" I think we might see some really interesting stuff happen once China opens up to the Church.

My "favorite" investigator is a guy named Juan Carlos. He was a referral from a less-active member that we've been working with a little bit. He absolutely LOVES the Gospel. He recognizes truth and has the faith to change his life as he learns the Gospel. When we taught him the word of wisdom and the law of chastity, he cried. He could feel the guilt and shame of sin and was willing to do anything to repent. He just didn't know at the time that what he was doing was wrong. He actually reminds me a lot of King Lamoni's father. He has already been to Church a couple of times and is just waiting for an interview to resolve some special concerns before he is baptized. I always look forward to teaching him because I know he will follow the principles of the Gospel as he learns them.

Love you MORE!!!!!

Elder Raymond

los dos reyes

2010-08-02T13:26:00.000-07:00

I'm in Heaven!!!!! Dalton, Georgia!!! My companion's name is Elder Rayon. He's from Veracruz, Mexico and the only other native missionary in the mission. This is his last transfer, so I'll kill him. :) Of the two native missionaries in the mission, one is my son and I'm killing the other one haha. :) In Spanish Ray is pronounced rey which means king. We call ourselves los dos reyes, or the two kings since both of our names start with Ray. He's an amazing missionary. OUR APARTMENT HAS A DISHWASHER!!!! This area has a lot of Hispanics from all over the place. It's a wonderful opportunity to speak Spanish almost all day everyday. I love it!

Sounds like things have been going well back on the homefront. Flash being silly and Kimmee stepping on deadly reptiles...what else is new. >:) haha

Anyway, no requests for the package this time...oh! More tuna thingies. Those were rockin'! And peanut butter crackers. It's so hard to get peanut butter stuff around here you know.... haha, just kidding. It's like I live in Mexico, but still have peanut butter. :) I'll actually write a letter this week. I have a little bit more time now that I'm junior companion again and don't have to worry about nightly phone calls and stuff.

Oh!!! Guess what my companion and I bought this morning?!? A tongue!!!! A hugenormous 5 lb cow tongue. We boiled it and made it into tacos. It's actually really really really good. It's just like steak, but more tender. The only bad part is that it takes 6 hours to boil. It's solid meat--there's no fat, bones, veins, nothing--just meat. Once you get over the fact that it's a tongue, it's really quite tasty.

Love you all,

Elder Raymond

My 1st Transfer!

2010-07-26T14:07:00.000-07:00

There are MAJOR changes going on in the entire mission this transfer! We are cutting two of the six zones in the mission and combining districts to be 5 or 6 times the size that they are now. Also, our teaching methods are changing. We are now supposed to teach everything directly from the scriptures, simply, and by the Spirit. We teach the doctrine and principles by the scriptures, and the Spirit teaches the applications as we ask our investigators what THEY think they should change/do with their lives.

Also, I'm being transferred! My first transfer haha. I've been out almost 8 months and have had only one area.... :) I'll find out where I'm going at transfer meeting on Wednesday. My boy is trained and going out into the world haha.

2 Weeks and Mystery Meat...

2010-07-20T20:31:00.000-07:00

7/12/10

Poor mommy :( I hope you're feeling better! I'd suggest making a yummy cake to help you feel better, but then I'd worry that you might try to eat it and fly at the same time. :)

How did the yearly cat scan go? They always seem to do funny things at those. (Cats went to the Vet...)

Anyway, here's a funny story. We had a dinner appointment Saturday evening and they grilled up a bunch of carne asada (steak, chicken, corn, etc.). Anyway, I had just finished a bunch of steak and corn and figured that I'd finish it off with some chicken. I scouted out the chicken plate and tried to find the yummiest looking (least boney-looking...) piece of chicken. I stabbed it up and put it on my plate. I certainly did get the least boney piece in the whole bunch! I took a bite and it was squishy and slightly sweet with the texture of stuffing. I quickly started running through the list of all the edible parts of a chicken trying to figure out exactly what I had just eaten...it wasn't on the list. I proceeded to run through the list of all the what I thought to be inedible parts of a chicken...there were several possibilities, but I still couldn't quite place it. I eventually just had to ask.... Turns out it was just a grilled banana that somehow made its way onto the chicken plate. Phew! As a banana, it wasn't too bad, but when you're expecting chicken...it's quite a surprise!

Anyway, I want you all to know that I have a testimony of this Church. I think it was Joseph Smith who once said that the members of the Church will be surprised at the Second Coming to find out just how true this Church is. Joseph Smith is a prophet of God. The Book of Mormon is the word of God. Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God. He is my Savior. God lives.

I love you all! Sorry for my lack of letters lately...it's been kind of rough.... :)

Love,

Elder Raymond

7/19/10

Sorry I can't send a big huge e-mail this week...President sent us all some handy scripture flashcards that I needed to print out after some substantial reformatting...

It's awesome to hear that Bryan's getting all ready! When can he put his papers in?

Love you all!

Elder Raymond

Priesthood La La Land

2010-06-20T08:55:00.000-07:00

15 Jun 2010

Dear Famiree,

I guess it's about time I sent a letter home! Hang on, I have to go wash my fingers, they're sticky from chicken from our dinner appointment.... Sorry, I had to blow my nose too and ended up giving myself a bloody nose... surprise surprise.... Ok, I've got half an hour to write this. You all know how much I like writing letters, but President Griffin told us that we should be writing a "substantial letter" home each week and I ran out of time on P-day.

Anyways, here's a funny story. We had a multi-zone activity on P-day with ultimate frisbee, tennis, soccer, and the like. We got a call from our neighbor that lives above us asking if we had cooked anything that morning before we left. Of course we hadn't (the most cooking I've done is a Totino's pizza a few times a week :) ). Our neighbor said that they kept smelling smoke, but couldn't figure out where it was coming from. I just figured they left a pan on the stove or something and quickly forgot about it . Several hours later, when we finally got home from the activity, we opened our front door reeking electrical smoke smell and a nice foggy bluh in our whole apartment with an oddly hissing thermostat in the background. After a little exploring and investigating, I decided to check the electrical A/C unit thingy to see if anything was obviously wrong. Something was obviously wrong. One of the lines into the house was surrounded by an inch thick layer of frost. I promptly turned everything off and did a little more investigating. I think the thermostat malfunctioned, causing the air conditioner to not turn off when it hit the set temperature. The external unit froze solid, subsequently burning out the internal one which then thought that it would be fun to start spewing smoke through the vents rather than cool air. Now I'm sitting downstairs in a roasting apartment. :] I called the land-lord and he's sending a repair guy pretty soon. It's been a fun couple of days.

Oh! I salted a slug tonight! We didn't have any real salt, so I covered it with jalapeño salt. It didn't like that very much. :\ Okay...what else should I write about?...

Oh! Elder Dino's great! (that's what I named the screature thing) I've gotten several missionaries with him! I take them through the whole "He really likes it when you pet his back" and "He bites if you put your hand in front of him" and eventually get to "He loves it when you pet his nose." I always make sure he's pointed right at them when they pet his nose and they get soaked! It's rather funny....

Oh. I guess you probably want to hear about how it went with Elder Ballard, huh! It was really awesome! It was about a four hour bus trip each way. We left at 10:00 p.m. CST. I had a pretty cool experience before the meeting. As we walked into the building, Elder Ballard and a couple of his escorts walked down the hall right in front of us. I got to see him from about three feet away, which I thought was pretty cool. Then I had to go to the bathroom. It was one of those teeney little LDS chapel bathrooms tucked away in the corner with one urinal and one stall. Anyway, apparently Elder Ballard had to use the bathroom too.... I walked in and crammed into the little bathroom was Elder Ballard, Elder Snow (of the Presidency of the Seventy), Elder Duncan ( 1st quorum of the Seventy), President Griffin, and me! Needless to say, I was pretty much in priesthood la la land as I waited to use the urinal between Elder Ballard and Elder Snow ( Elder Snow had me cut in line in front of him). I peed in the same toilet as Elder Ballard. Haha... that's kind of gross I guess, but pretty cool! I was the only person in the bathroom who wasn't at least an area seventy. That was pretty humbling. Well, I'm out of time tonight. I'll finish writing about the meeting tomorrow morning. Good night! Spiel.

Alright, I'm back. The meeting was awesome! Elder Ballard brought a full squad of Seventies too. Elders Snow, Duncan, Cornish, and McSomething were also there. Their main focus was on how we should obtain a vision by the Spirit of how the work in our areas will be more successful as we follow Pres. Monson's Rescue Plan. In short, use members. They really pounded us hard and called us to repentance and told us we weren't baptizing enough ( which is true). Elder Ballard said that the key to being a successful missionary is to be a "very, very, very good teacher." He talked a lot about finding and teaching methods. I found A LOT of answers to questions I've been having lately. We've been working closely with the ward and the branch PEC to implement the Rescue Plan. Anyway, the meeting went really well. Afterwards we rode back home in the bus, finally got back about 11:30 and crashed. It was pretty intense.

I can't think of anything else to write. (My brain's not working yet). I love you all! Thanks for your letters and packages!

Elder Raymond

Learning Mandarin?!

2010-06-07T07:01:00.000-07:00

The stinkin library was closed for Memorial Day >.< >:(

I got the boxes! Thanks oodles of noodles (that's a lot) :) I love the screature! I named it Elder Dino and drew him a nametag on his back with a Sharpie. :) I so appreciate your letters. It's really nice to see how much the Lord is blessing each of you.

Guess what?!? The whole mission is driving to Nashville (not Knoxville) this Saturday (by bus) to hear Elder Ballard in a bi-mission conference. Elder Morente's brother, Elder Morente, is serving in the Nashville Mission so they'll get to see each other and I'll get to meet him! We're pretty excited.

Hey, in one of the Elder Watson's letters, he mentioned that he went on exchange with an Elder Charles (whichever one's in Argentina). He kind of gave a time-frame for how long Elder Charles has been out on his mission too and I think he might have been my first zone leader in the MTC. Could you ask him if Elder Charles was companions with Elder Healey in the MTC for me?

Anyway, here's kind of a funny story. Elder Morente and I were tracting the other day (duh...) and we tracted into a TON of Chinese people. There's a Chinese circus in Pigeon Forge called Cirque de Chine. We found where ALL of the performers live. It's a row of around 20 townhomes and they are all full of Chinese people. All the vehicles out front had the logo of the circus on them. Most of them don't speak a lick of English. We ran into one that spoke a little bit, so we had him translate for us and then another guy (he was a little bit older, we think he was the trainer) actually called one of his friends who speaks English and she translated over the phone for us. We used the Restoration DVD cover to figure out if they speak Mandarin or Cantonese. The cover has all the languages on it and we had then point to the one they spoke. One guy pointed at the Mandarin, started nodding his head vigorously and started screaming Chinese! Chinese! Chinese!... that was interesting, but we found out they all spoke Mandarin. I learned that my default when talking to someone who doesn't understand English is just start speaking in Spanish...unfortunately that was even worse while trying to talk to someone who only spoke Chinese. I kept trying to explain things in Spanish and English and it just wasn't working. Anyway, I brought it up in Missionary Correlation yesterday morning and asked (without any hope at all) if there happened to be anyone in our ward (50 people in backwoods Tennessee) who spoke Mandarin. A guy in the back said "My wife." One of the counselors in the bishopric started explaining that she probably wouldn't be any help anyway because she wouldn't know any of the Gospel vocabulary in Mandarin since she was converted here in America. Bro. Kurtz then said, "Well she served a mission in Taiwan, so she probably knows the vocab pretty well..." Anyway, long story short, we're going to started teaching a couple dozen Buddhist circus performers most of whom have never even heard the name Jesus Christ. Guess it's time to brush up on my Mandarin... :)

Habave fubun abat thebe beabeach!
Soubounds goobood!

Lobove,

Ebeldeber Rabaymobond

I Met Grandpa's Cousin!

2010-05-25T11:38:00.000-07:00

Thanks for the mail from Grandma, Dad, Mom, and squiblings!

I don't have a whole lot of time left. I had a long e-mail to President this morning.

Yesterday was an interesting day! I had to give a talk in Spanish sacrament meeting on the Great Apostasy (my companion spoke about the Restoration) and in English sacrament meeting on Exaltation (of all possible topics, Bishop assigned me to speak on exaltation in sacrament meeting...) (my companion, who doesn't speak very much English at all, bore his testimony in English--it went really well!). I think they both went really well. I really only messed up my Spanish one once. I used the wrong verb for "to break." I used the verb "to break commandments or covenants" rather than "to physically break something." oops... :) My English talk went really well. I used the story of the Prodigal Son in Luke 15 to relate God's love for us and His desire for our return and exaltation. Afterwards an older gentleman came up to me and asked me who my dad is. I told him, "Jon." He paused for a second and then asked me who my grandpa is. I told him, "Cleve." He paused for another second and said, "I'm Richard Raymond from Mesa, Arizona. Cleve is my cousin!" That was a pretty cool experience. Either he or another gentleman he was with starting speaking to me in Spanish and told me that he was a mission president over the Los Angeles, California mission about 5 years ago. I don't remember if it was him or his friend. Who'da thunk that I'd meet one of grandpa's cousins in a sacrament meeting in Sevierville, Tennessee?

Anyway, I better get going.

I love you all!

Elder Raymond

New Library!

2010-05-17T08:18:00.000-07:00

Dear Famiree,

Aloha!

I'm sending my e-mails from the brand spankin' new Sevierville Library! It literally opened two or three days ago. It looks like a cross between a bank and a state capitol building. It's HUGE and REALLY REALLY nice. You oughta Google it to see if there are any pictures of it. Anyways...just thought that might be interesting :)

Here's a photo and an interesting article about the library:
"Sevierville Tennessee’s new King Family Public Library will soon receive its first books to stock its newest library opening May 14th to the public. The first books will arrive by hearse April 20th at 9a.m..
Now why would anyone deliver new books to a new library in a vehicle that is a symbol of ending? Well, Sevierville’s first library opened in 1920. The library was founded by the local mortician Fred Rawlings. Fred Rawlings delivered the new library’s first books from Knoxville by use of his hearse. In 1968 Sevierville built a newer library and Fred Rawlings was asked to symbolically transport the first set of books for the newest library once again in his hearse.
Steeped in tradition, Rawlings Funeral Home will provide its oldest hearse for the delivery of the first books for the King Family Public Library. A Rawlings family member will ride along for the delivery to Sevierville’s newest library."

Thanks for the update! I hope everything works out with the car. It really stinks not being able to drive places when you need to. We are in a car-share in this area and some places in our area take 2+ hours to bike to (including two of the prime Spanish areas...). The weeks when we do not have the car can be very frustrating! I guess it's the Lord's way to teach us how to plan and coordinate with members better. :)

We are kind-of going through a rough patch in this area. None of our most promising investigators have been progressing for several weeks because they have not been coming out to church. They all had dates for baptism that we had to drop because they never come to church. We've done everything we can for them to help them make it out, from to calling them to wake them up and having their ride knock on their door to fasting and teaching the importance of coming to church before they can be baptized. At this point, we are going to have to spend our time with new investigators that Elder Morente and I have found together. We have a lot of promising people we're teaching right now and a couple of progressing investigators who we are committing for baptism this week. We look forward to a lot of success in this area as we work hard, are exactly obedient, and follow the Spirit!

By the way, Sister Griffin did get her flowers. In the middle of zone-conference President Griffin stood up and said something to the effect of , "Let Elder Raymond, Sister Griffin's favorite missionary, be an example to you all: His mom sent her flowers." :) That was a little unexpected. haha! :)

Anyway...I gotta go! yup yup :)

Love you all!

Elder Raymond

I have LOTS of news!

2010-05-03T17:22:00.001-07:00

Okey dokey, here's the big news real quick.

My two transfers with my trainer are over this Wednesday. I'm training now. My new companion's family lives in Kentucky and is all non-members. His name is Elder Morente and he apparently doesn't speak any English at all. His travel is restricted to car, and thus, has not been to nor will be going to the MTC. He's coming straight from Kentucky to me on Wednesday. I think that a couple of the zone leaders in the mission (Elder Woller, my current companion being one of them) are going to give Elder Morente a week-long crash MTC course. It should be interesting. I'm extremely excited and can't wait to start working with him. As a native Spanish-speaker, he will have a huge advantage in teaching the Hispanic population in this area (not to mention my Spanish is going to rocket ;) ) It will be fun teaching him English too!
All the tornados/floods/storms/everything gross have COMPLETELY missed us. Sevierville and Pigeon Forge are nestled in a little valley in the middle of the Smoky Mountains and absolutely nothing makes it over the hills intact. Several days tracting, people would yell at us to go home or we would die from grapefruit sized hail and other stuff like that and then it never even rained. Apparently it all goes north of us.

The Hondurans don't celebrate cinco de mayo. I think it's Mexican Independence Day. There are a lot of Mexicans here too, so, there will be plenty of partying going on. :/ Tracting into drunk Mexicans is always...interesting... :)
Love you more,
Elder Raymond

in His own way...

2010-04-26T07:46:00.000-07:00

Last week I e-mailed a story about the Juan family. We had another similar experience this week.

We have been teaching a guy named Gerardo for a couple months. He's from Guatemala and speaks ZERO English and a little Spanish--he speaks a local Lamanite dialect called Chu. When we first found him he was absolutely the golden investigator. Every time he read the Book of Mormon he cried and his prayers were more sincere than you can even imagine. He's about as humble and kind as it gets. Since day one, he asked us to pray for him to find a better job so that he could support his parents and siblings in Guatemala. We promised him that as he came out to church and committed for baptism, the Lord would bless him with better work. The first time he came out to church, his boss gave him three more days of work, more than double his original two days. He then accepted the commitment to be baptized and confirmed. His boss gave him another day and he started getting double shifts at work. He came out to church again the week he was to be baptized. He was ready for baptism. As we taught each lesson and commandment he expressed his feelings that every thing we taught him was true. He has never drunk alcohol, smoked a cigarette, done any sort of drugs, or drunk tea. He did drink coffee in the morning every once in a while, but only when he had the money to buy it because that's what everyone else did. When we taught him the Word of Wisdom he immediately stopped drinking coffee. When we taught him the law of tithing he said "Wow, I've finally found a way to repay God for all the things He has given me." When we taught the law of chastity he said, "In my country, we would never dream of even dating without specific permission from the woman's father. One of my life's goals is to be baptized in the Church, find a woman strong in the Church and marry her in the temple." The week of his baptism arrived. He was to be baptized on Friday and confirmed the following Sunday. Everything was ready. We had the programs made, the branch invited, the member to perform the baptism ready to do so. We went over Thursday evening with the member that Gerardo had chosen to baptize him. He wasn't there. His roomates told us that after we had left the previous day, he had gotten a call for a full-time job in Virginia, but he would have to start Friday morning. He left early Thursday morning and was already in Virginia when we went to visit him in the evening. He had received an answer to much prayer and more faith. We called him Thursday evening and again Friday afternoon. He is getting settled in nicely in Virginia and has already started work there. Although he will not be baptized in this area and into this branch, we are connecting him with the missionaries in Virginia and are confident that he will continue on the path that he has begun towards the gate of baptism. God certainly heard and answered his prayers. Gerardo now has a full-time job and is able to support his family back home in Guatemala. Although the Lord certainly did not answer our prayers in the way we expected or would have liked, he did answer them with a blessing that is better than anything than we could have hoped for here in this area. God works in mysterious ways, on His own time, and in His own way, but He certainly does work!

Elder Raymond

Power of Prayer

2010-04-19T08:36:00.000-07:00

Alright, you've been asking for a cool story. I guess the Lord wanted to bless me with one. I've changed the names in it but everything else is completely true.

About a month ago, our branch president took us out and introduced us to a family. I will call them the Juanes family. It is the mother, whom we'll call Juana, her two kids, Juanita and Juanito, and her boyfriend, Juan. They are all from Honduras and have been in the States a couple of years. We taught them regularly for several weeks and they were about to be committed to a date for baptism and confirmation. They have all been out to church several times and enjoy learning about the Gospel. About a week and a half ago, Juana got in a fight with her boyfriend Juan and one of their neighbors called the police. When the police got there, they ran Juana's name and discovered that she is on the dreaded deport list. They promptly threw her in jail, to be deported the following week. Juana is pregnant. She was to be deported without her kids or boyfriend back to Honduras where she has nothing and nobody. Her kids were to be shipped off to California by themselves to live with a distant relative under the influence of a less-than-perfect environment in Hispanic California. Juan, the boyfriend, planned to stay in the area where he already has a decent job in order to earn money for the rest of the family. Needless to say, the situation stinked. The family was devastated and our branch president was crying all through church that Sunday worrying about what was going to happen to this pregnant mother and her two kids ages 15 and 9. Also needless to say, there was A LOT of prayer going in within the branch, ourselves, and the family for the Juanes. My companion and I went to the courthouse and subsequently the jail to get some information--at the time nobody had any idea what was going on. We only knew that Juana was in jail and was to be deported. We found out the visiting hours and they told us that Juana would still be in custody during that time, so we were not worried about her being deported before we could visit her with the branch president. The day of the visit finally arrived. We went with the branch president to the prison to visit her and see if there was anything we could do for her or her family. When we got there, they told us that she had left the jail the previous day and that they did not have any more information. We did not know whether she had been released to go home or released to immigration. Honestly, we weren't very hopeful. We decided that we would swing by her trailor on the way home and see if by some miracle of God she was there. She was. She told us that the very hour she was to be deported, she went to court where the judge dropped all charges and released her to return to her family. This was truly a direct answer to our prayers and a miracle from God. Her family is reunited and are again studying the Gospel of Jesus Christ and are being prepared for baptism and confirmation.

The power of prayer is real.

God is truly a God of miracles.

Love,

Elder Raymond

Easter, Dinos, and Art Work

2010-04-06T09:47:00.000-07:00

Happy Easter! or as the Hondurans say: Feliz Pascua!

(imagine a cool picture of an Easter bunny and some eggs or something here)

:) I got my [Easter] box, thanks! I was going to have my companion hide it, but I forgot and opened it (it came on Saturday). Sounds like it has been another busy and fun week! It's wonderful to hear how everyone is doing. Your bowling story provided me with quite a funny mental image. ;) I have to be careful in the library, everyone gives me mean looks >:( when I laugh AT ALL. [The kids and I went bowling with Sarah Bowerman (a lovely young lady from our ward in IL) at the Wilkinson Center (BYU). We started off the afternoon with me falling on my backside when my thumb got stuck in the ball and knocked me off balance. It was hilarious (I didn't get hurt in the least...). I knew I was going to fall and tried to steady myself with what looked like a windmill, then my right foot crossed that dreaded line and I hit the oiled floor, did a strange rendition of the splits and toppled. The kids were all staring at me until I started laughing... then we all laughed so hard, I couldn't get up! Pretty funny stuff.]

I got to watch ALL of conference. We only have three times a year that resemble a vacation: General Conference, Christmas, and General Conference :). We only had a Spanish investigator in the Priesthood session so I got to watch the rest of it in English. I jotted down a couple interesting things to write from conference. First, the conductor for the Orem Institute Choir that sang Saturday afternoon (I think) is one of the two choir directors in the MTC, so I've sung with him many times. He's HILARIOUS!!!! What else...oh! Kenneth Johnson said the opening prayer on Sunday morning :). I bet Grandpa Ken got a kick out of that. I think you were right about the whole back to basics thing because the Church has so many new/inactive members. It's much easier to bring investigators to conference that way too. :) I enjoyed the theme in just about EVERY talk: the responsibility of parents teaching their children. It made me think of my parents and the love and gratitude I have for their strength of testimony and example for me. I was impressed by the influence that parents have over their children and figured, well, I think I turned out all right, so I must have some pretty good parents. :) Thanks!

[Alec requested we send him some dino stuff...] :) Every missionary has their little quirky thing they like (some examples: my companion, Miley Cyrus; Elder Page, cows; Elder Allridge, guitars; Elder Rock, the Book of Mormon :)) and I like dinos.... There's a dino museum here but I can't convince the other missionaries in my district that it would be more fun to run around like a velociraptor and chew on fossils than play basketball on P-day...so I haven't been yet and probably won't ever make it there. :(

Thanks!

Love,

Elder Raymond

Oh, something else kind-of cool. There's an English family we've been teaching for a couple weeks. We visited them a few days ago and one of their boys came up to me and said "When I found out that you work for God, I wanted to draw you a picture, so here's a picture I drew of a truck for you." I hung it up on the fridge. :)

we caught a mouse, I guess...that will have to do. :)

2010-03-29T14:28:00.000-07:00

Dear Famiree,

I can't really think of any cool stuff to write this week, so I guess I will just type and hope something pops up. :)

My first transfer in the field is over! I will have been out 4 months 9 April. I am doing great! When we came into this area, we had literally nothing to work with. My companion and I white-washed the Spanish area and the English area was white-washed this transfer. Six weeks ago there were four different missionaries here! We're finally getting everything settled and have already had baptisms in both the Spanish branch and the English ward. When my companion and I transferred into the area last transfer, the area was the entire county and was shared with the English elders. It was pretty much a free-for-all-modge-podge-hope-you-don't-tract-the-same-neighborhood-at-the-same-time blob. We've got the area split up now and actually have an area book. That helps A LOT!

We're teaching several Spanish families who are close to being ready to be baptized. This will be a huge boost to the branch as there hasn't been a baptism there in upwards of two years.... If the branch continues to grow at this rate, we will soon have enough priesthood brethren to become a ward! The work is starting to pick up some momentum in the English ward as well. Our mission president, President Griffin, has asked us to attend both the Spanish and English units so that we can teach everyone we find rather than handing our English investigators off to the English elders. That means 8 hours of church each Sunday starting at 0800 for English PEC [an executive meeting with the bishop and other leaders]! It won't be so bad after the Spanish block is moved to 0700-1000. Then we'll only have 7 hours of church from 0600-1300. Plus we'll have more daylight to get out and proselyte. The Lord is taking care of us here!

I am super excited for General Conference this weekend. We're in the Eastern Time Zone here, so the Priesthood Session is from 2000-2200...that's after my be-at-home-time.... We have permission from President Griffin to attend--I just hope I won't fall asleep during it! :) We look forward to General Conference as missionaries because it is an opportunity to bring investigators and members who normally cannot attend church services due to work, to hear the words of the general authorities and feel the Spirit.

[questions we asked him]

[How's the weather?]

A little warmer--just means rain instead of snow :).

[Do the Spanish members celebrate Easter differently that you know of yet?]

Every day's a party with Hispanics. The holiday just changes the shape of the piñata.

[Did your companion get transferred?]

Elder Woller's still my companion.

I have 15 minutes left but can't think of anything else to write. I can never remember anything that happened during the week when I actually go to write the e-mails and I never remember to bring anything that I remembered to write down when it happened... :)

Anyway, I still can't think of any cool, fun stories...we caught a mouse, I guess...that will have to do. :)

Thank you all for your support and love!

Elder Raymond

Translation of Previous Post...

2010-03-22T11:34:00.000-07:00

Loosely translated, he said...

I can say everything that I want, but, sometimes it's a little difficult to understand when the people have different and strange accents…. There are many people here that speak with an accent like 'Redneck' only in Spanish. Also, I can read and write in Spanish just fine. I can almost understand everything when I am listening in church meetings. :) Good luck! (assuming he meant translating this)

Questions & Answers

2010-03-22T08:22:00.000-07:00

This week he spent time answering my questions...

Dear Mommery,

Thanks for the letters! I'd love to get cousin letters too. (I told him I would print them off and mail them to him) Were any of them delayed by the earthquake in Chile?

Mom's questions
Elder Raymond's responses

Did you get you contacts we ordered?

I haven't gotten my contacts yet, but I heard that the zone leaders picked up a package for me at the mission office and they're driving down today for p-day, so I imagine they're in there.

What kind of camera do you have? We're still waiting to send a memory card until you tell us...

My camera is the kind that can take pictures...and it has a special mode for taking pictures of rainbows...and other than that I keep forgetting to check it... :)

Are you paying fast offerings on fast Sunday (Pres. Waite told us today in ward conference that he told his son that his fast would not be complete unless he gave to the branch/ward he was serving in. I hadn't thought about it, so I decided to ask...)?

Thanks for the reminder about fast offerings. It says the same thing in the Missionary Handbook (white bible, but we're not supposed to call it that, but just so you know what it is...). This Sunday is Fast Sunday since general or stake or some sort of conference is the week after so I'll have to remember to do that.

How do you like your bike?

My bike is pretty sweet. I have legs like rocks now.

Okay, now for the long one ;) (notice his "numbering" system...pure Alec!):

How are you really doing (if you say "fine" or any other 1 word answer, I may have to reach through the screen and poke you in the eyes! I want details, about your living conditions, eating, physical well-being, scripture study, companion, tracting, language, testimony, etc...)?

!. I'd like to keep my eyes intact

@. We live in an apartment about ten feet off the highway, so we have quick access to the road...I guess.... It's owned by a member, so we have a really nice landlord. It's pretty average as far as missionary apartments go I guess. I don't really have anything to compare it to.

#. We have meal appointments every Jueves, Viernes, Sabado y Domingo with members of the Spanish branch, so we're never hungry then and the English ward fights over who gets to feed us Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday...so...food's not a problem. And man, Hispanics can cook. They can all cook any type of meat to perfection and we always have unlimited tortillas.

$. Physical well-being: I'm doing great! I don't think I've gained or lost any weight yet and my legs are like rocks as aforementioned due to extreme biking ;).

%. I'm still working on the Book of Mormon assignment (I'm in Alma 39) and I'm studying the New Testament along with Jesus the Christ. It's pretty stinkin' sweet.

^. My companion's awesome. He likes to work hard, but still have fun. We're exactly obedient, but not robots. He's a HUGE Miley Cyrus fan...it's actually kind-of obsessive...and a little weird...but hey...I like...dinosaurs...I guess.... :)

&. Tracting's great. Spanish people are ALWAYS super nice and let you in. Unfortunately, there are no more Spanish people to tract into...we've literally tracted every Spanish house in our area. So we tract English in the afternoon and then visit Spanish investigators in the evening when it gets dark so we don't get the police called on us for walking around people's houses in dark suits in the dark...English people...:). We usually get around 13 hours per week. The mission standard is 20 (no more, no less) so 13 is where we should be as Spanish elders since we have 7 hours less proselyting time due to Spanish study every day.

*. Language: Yo puedo decir todo lo que quiero, pero, a veces es un poco dificil para entender cuando las personas tienen acentos diferentes y malos.... Hay mucha gente aqui que hablan con un acento como 'Redneck' en espanol. Tambien, yo puedo leer y escribir qualquier cosa que necesito. Casi yo puedo entender todo cuando estoy escuchando en las reuniones dominicales. :) Buena suerte!

(. Testimony: Never been stronger or growing faster! I'm learning and progressing in my spiritual journey as the Savior did: grace for grace. Thank you for the good example that you and Dad have always set for me. You made it easy to remain active and to become a valiant member of the Lord's Kingdom on the Earth.

). etc.: hmmm...just an interesting fact: the mission average for the Tennessee Knoxville Mission is 4 baptisms per missionary during your entire mission. I've already had one, spoken at another, and have 2 set in stone for April and 7 maybes. When we have a true, sincere desire to bring souls unto Christ and are willing to work hard, be obedient, and keep the commandments, the Lord will fight the battles for us. The Spirit converts. The Book of Mormon changes hearts and lives. The missionaries try to keep up.

Any unique experiences this past week?

Unique experiences...I got to go to another baptism and taught The Restoration to the people attending, while she was in the dressing room changing after the ordinance. That was pretty cool, but hopefully not a 'unique' experience.... I got to participate in a couple of blessings. That was pretty cool.

Anything funny (loved the possibly naked Sasquatch story! Not the getting shot one...I am your mom...)?

Haven't run into any naked sasquatches lately...or been shot at >;).

Love,
Elder Raymond

Mormon Hunters & First Baptism

2010-03-15T09:42:00.000-07:00

Dear Famiree,

Thanks for your letters! Caiti wanted some cool stories to share with her seminary class. Let's see if I can think of one. Hmmm....Oh! I remember an interesting one. A missionary that just got transferred into our district got shot a couple weeks ago.... He was tracting out in the country with his companion (obviously... :)) Anyway, apparently a couple of twelve-year-old kids were out hunting for Mormons that day. They shot him in the back with a pellet gun and ran away screeching.... He thought his companion hit him in the back and then his companion saw the hole in his shirt. Anyway, he's fine. He had to have surgery from a redneck doctor in a redneck hospital. It took them an hour just to find the pellet (with x-rays...) and the doctor wouldn't put him under...so he was awake the whole time.... I can only imagine: "Nope...not there...nope...not there either...ah ha! There's the little stinker!" Makes for a good story though. Not many missionaries can say they got shot on their mission. :) (Yes mom, he was on the other side of the mission, nowhere near this area...) Anyway, there's an interesting story for you.

On a less weird, more mission-related note, I had my first baptism on Thursday! His name is Fabricio. His uncle, the first counselor in the branch presidency, baptized him. True to form, there was a HUGE fiesta afterwards. We didn't even know there was going to be food or anything after the baptism. Fabricio's mom just showed up with a 40-lb caramel cake with whipped frosting that was almost as good as mom's cakes but not quite, 20 liters of soda, hamburgers, hot dogs, steaks, and a piñata.... The ENTIRE branch showed up. We had around 60 people at the baptism. I got to give a talk on the Gift of the Holy Ghost...in Spanish...in front of 60 Hondurans, Argentinaites (not sure what the right way to say it is, so I figured I'd just follow the example of the Book of Mormon), and Mexicans that speak little to no English. That was fun...I'm glad the Spirit speaks to the heart and not to the ears in whatever language that slightly resembles Spanish that I was probably speaking. Anyways, it went really well.

In all honesty, my Spanish is actually progressing very well. I can understand about 70% of everything anyone says to me (including in church :)) and I can pretty much say whatever I want to say; albeit often using weird verbs that don't quite make perfect sense here and there.

Anyway, the work is progressing very well in this area. We're working our tails off and are having a lot of success. We're currently working with the branch priesthood leadership and the stake to change the meeting schedule to 7-10 am so that more members and almost all of our investigators can attend sacrament meeting. The biggest problem we have in this area with members and nonmembers alike is working during church meetings. With this change, we will increase attendance in sacrament meeting by members by around 25% and by investigators by around 400%. We hope to be able to turn the branch into a ward by the end of the next transfer. We almost have the priesthood necessary to fill all the callings and already have as many in sacrament meeting as the English ward. We're all praying for the Lord's continuing support and preparation of His kingdom in this area. I've seen lots of miracles and see lots more to come.

Elder Raymond

A Probably-Naked Sasquatch

2010-03-13T09:20:00.000-08:00

Dear Famiree,

I love my mission! We are having so much success as we teach with the Book of Mormon. I may have already mentioned this, but when we got to the mission, each of the new missionaries received an assignment from [the Mission President]. We are to go study the entire Book of Mormon marking each reference to Christ, His words, His attributes, and each doctrine or principle discussed in the Book and then keep a tally of each reference at the bottom of each page. I'm about half-way through Mosiah. My testimony of the Book of Mormon is growing like a young piglet that recently found a whole lot of yummy food and is eating it all. (that's a lot of growth--just in case you didn't get that :)) The Book of Mormon is Another Testament of Jesus Christ and has real power that every person we teach can feel. It is pretty cool watching the power of the Book of Mormon change lives.

The only hard thing about this area is that EVERYONE works Sundays. Since this is a tourist town, everyone who lives here either works construction (and is currently out of work) or cleans hotels and cabins (and works ALL DAY EVERY Sunday because that's when all the tourists leave to go home). If it weren't for that, we would have 300 more people in sacrament meeting in the English ward and 100 more in the Spanish branch. It's actually really frustrating. We work with so many people that have a testimony of the Book of Mormon and the Gospel but cannot be baptized because they cannot attend church.

Anyways, I love you all and appreciate your letters and the package! The St. Patrick's Day package had a bunch of cookies in it that have to be at least 10000000000000000087 calories each. The package says that each individual cookie is four servings. :) As you might expect from a 10000000000000000087 calorie cookie, they are pretty tasty.

Here is a funny story:

First of all, one of the English elders flew off his bike and hurt his elbow (that's a different story, it sufficeth me to say that he probably shouldn't have been trying to 'buzz' his companion's back tire with his front...) and the doctor said he can't ride a bike for several weeks. Thus, my companion and I have been on bikes in one of the biggest areas in the mission (not to mention we're out in the boonies in the Smoky Mountains) for a couple weeks.

Okay now for the story. We got a referral from [the mission president's wife] on Friday to go see a lady who lives out in the middle of nowhere, but in our area, that the missionaries in Chattanooga had contacted at a gas station. So we rode our bikes out to see her on Saturday. It was a beautiful sunny day and we were riding along the Little Pigeon Forge River over the mountains and through the woods to this lady's house we were going. After about an hour we no longer recognized the street names that we had seen on our map back at the apartment when we were planning our route. We stopped at a gas station and figured out that we had actually passed her street several miles back...grrr.... So we turned around to go find her unmarked, private, straight-up-the-mountain street. We saw a street that appeared to be in about the right place and had the same shape as hers on the map. So we walked our bikes up it (riding up these streets is physically impossible...) and eventually found ourselves at a cabin with a sign out front with the name 'Bearly Naked' on it. We hoped this wasn't the right place and were on the phone trying to call the lady for directions when we heard a really weird sound coming from the woods behind the cabin. It sounded a lot like a cow, only 2 octaves higher. Some of the sounds remotely resembled English words. Fearing a gruesome death by a probably-naked sasquatch, we turned tail and rode straight down the mountain REALLY fast. We went a little bit further up the main road trying to find this lady's street. We eventually found it, but of course, she wasn't home. We left her a note and moved on with the rest of our plans for the day.

Anyway, I want you all to know that I am doing great! I am having the time of my life sharing the Gospel of Jesus Christ with the people her in Sevier County, Tennessee--even the parts when we have to flee before the gaping maw of a probably-naked sasquatch.

I love you all!

Elder Raymond
P.S. Tell everyone "hi" for me! Tell Jake congrats [on starting his mission papers]! That's awesome! It's starting to get a little bit warmer. We've actually had sunshine the last 2 days. It's been glorious!

Food and Sleep???

2010-03-02T20:50:00.000-08:00

Send food...I'm sick of Ramen noodles...haha :)

I'm being humbled and learning A LOT. I've never been more excited about anything in my entire life...it's actually kind of weird...but a good weird! :)
I have a wonderful companion and there couldn't be a better culture to teach. It's impossible to get discouraged when every single Hispanic door you knock on let's you in. Even if they're busy, they'll still come out and apologize and set up a return appointment. :) The only bad part is that it's MUCH easier to recognize Americans who are ready to receive the Gospel. They either slam the door and swear at you or let you in and commit to be baptized.... Hispanics always let you in and they always commit to go to church and read stuff, and then they just don't...but, when they do show up to church they get baptized! We have a baptism scheduled next week and another 27 March (it's part of a family, so the rest should follow :)). This area was hard getting started since we started from absolute scratch, but now the ball's rolling and there are A LOT of hills here for it to roll down...:)
(Alec has several friends serving in Chile and several cousins and friends in the MTC scheduled to head down to that general area soon. This is his response to an email we sent him letting him know his friends are all safe)
... We usually here about EVERYTHING that goes on in South America pretty quickly. We heard there were supposed to be Tsunamis all the way up and down the coast of the Americas and Hawai'i as well. Thanks for the update on everyone's status down there. Hopefully Dave, Mike, and Josh won't be delayed. Right now is a wonderful opportunity to offer service and teach a humbled people...even though natural disasters stink...a lot...especially floods....

Oh! By the way, the Gospel absolutely is true!

Love,

Elder Raymond
P.S. Sleep is overrated... ;)

Lessons from Chile

2010-03-02T20:40:00.000-08:00

What will it take to make us more humble and teachable? Here is an excerpt from a letter President and Sis Laycock (Chile Santiago East Mission) as they wrote home after the earthquake:

"Today, we attended a strong ward where Larry was invited to speak. The entire chapel and beyond was filled. People were so humble and so teachable. Larry taught the importance of doing the small things. He taught about Jesus Christ and the opportunity we have to love one another and to share what we have with others. It was a great blessing for us to be with these beautiful Chilean people. Some have lost their homes...or at least parts of their homes. But they are strong and they want to serve the Lord. He taught of the scripture in Luke 21:11,13 which says, "and great earthquakes shall be in divers places...and it shall turn to you for a testimony." He also welcomed the sweet young woman who was in the congregation with the missionaries...her first time attending church...and then he invited her to be baptized from the pulpit. He asked her to please invite us to her baptism, and she said, "I will." The Lord always knows what His people need. Landon was reading in Alma 15:17 today. He said, Mom listen to this. This is what is happening here in Chile just like in happened in Ammonihah. The people were humbled and "checked as to the pride of their hearts and began to humble themselves before God, watching and praying continually that they might be delivered from Satan, and from death, and from destruction."

Our hearts are filled to the brim with gratitude for all of the blessings we have received in the Chile Santiago East Mission. We see miracles every day. In the midst of great pain and suffering, we can always find our Savior. He stands with His arms open, pleading for all of us to humble ourselves and come unto Him. He loves us. He invites us to accept His gift...the atonement. He invites us to repent. He wants us to love one another and to serve one another. He wants us to bring our families and those we love to Him. We can do it. We can do all that He asks, no matter how difficult it may seem. "With God all things are possible".

Busy, busy, busy!

2010-02-22T20:45:00.000-08:00

Hola all!

First of all, I want you all to know that my mission is already the best time of my life and the hardest time of my life. I've never been so tired and my testimony has never been stronger. We have a wonderful opportunity to live today in the Dispensation of the Fulness of Times. The fulness of the Gospel of Jesus Christ and the exact same Church He set up during His ministry on the Earth is restored. I know this.

I'm out of time, but I love you all! I'm alive... :)

Elder Raymond

The 1st Week...He Only Thought He Spoke Spanish...

2010-02-16T21:39:00.000-08:00

Alright, time to answer questions!

Tennessee is great! It is really really really cold here. It's snowed EVERY single day since I got here and it's humid, so the cold penetrates all the way to your bones.
I am in the Pigeon Forge area of Southern Tennessee. I'm in Pigeon Forge Branch (all Spanish :) I understood about 20% at church on Sunday). Our area covers all of Sevier County, all the way to Smokey Mountains National Park. It's super duper pretty here. It's like a combination of St. Louis and Little Rock. Pigeon Forge is often described as a mini-Las Vegas. We're super close to Dollywood (which is strictly forbidden to missionaries haha :) ) and there are all kinds of weird buildings, hotels, and museums. There are a few Hispanic areas in town that we tract a lot.
Our apartment is actually just north in Sevierville. Our apartment has two rooms: upstairs and downstairs. Downstairs we have a couple tables for desks, a couch, and a kitchen. Upstairs is the bathroom and our beds. The apartment is about 10 feet from the highway. 3 weeks ago a car on the highway lost a wheel and plowed through the apartment so a lot of it is new. The elders weren't home at the time (which they actually got in trouble for since it happened at about 2145) and no one was hurt but the apartment was...como se dice...totaled :). Wednesday was the first day that it had power and water again--just in time for us to move in :). The other elders had been living in a hotel for a couple weeks.
The first day we stayed at the mission home, had dinner and a couple of orientation classes. The next day we went to transfer meeting, got a companion and off we went. My companion is Elder Woller. He's from Oregon and he's awesome! He's been out 6 months and is our district leader. Our district is actually really small, just us and the English elders in the same area. Their apartment is down the street.
We cover a HUGE area and only have a set number of miles that we can drive each month (we share the car with the English elders) so we do a lot of biking and walking. Oh! That reminds me. Our helmets got stolen (yes they were locked up mom...:) ) so we had to buy new ones...that was fun.
I do get delicious food! We have dinner appointments every night and it's all super tasty. 95% of the branch is from Honduras, so we get some really interesting, but really tasty food!
Anyway, President thought it was pretty cool that he was in my line of authority.
I'm having the time of my life out here on my mission. I've never been happier or closer to the Spirit! Each day is like a week of normal spiritual progression. You learn so much so quickly it's hard to keep up with yourself. :)
Eeek...I'm running out of time. We type e-mails at the library (which was closed yesterday, hence the e-mails today) and they have a one hour time limit to write e-mails and our weekly report to President Griffin.
Tell Grandma 'hi' for me if she hasn't left yet.

Thanks oobers for the Valentine's Day package. :) It had all my favorite things in it (including socks...) :).
Bryan, Good luck with your Board of Review, I'm sure it will go well!

Swine cat (Mori got out again, we spent over 2 hours looking for him, finally found him huddled on the neighbors front porch)...at least the neighbors moved...now you can open the windows at night :).

Love,
Elder Raymond

Made It!!! (11 Feb 2010)

2010-02-16T21:27:00.000-08:00

Here is a letter we just received in the mail with the attached pictures! One is of Alec with Pres. & Sis. Griffin, the other is with his first companion in the field, Elder Woller!

Dear Famiree,

I made it safely to Knoxville. The Area is beautiful. The mission home and office are beautiful. President and Sister Griffin are AMAZING! I feel really good about being here and I'm very excited to get to work. There are 20 Spanish-speaking missionaries here and 3 Spanish-only branches and several Spanish/English wards. I don't have a companion yet, but I have eaten real food. :)

I'll write you all on P-Day (Monday).

Elder Raymond

Last Letter from the MTC!

2010-02-04T07:46:00.000-08:00

The Coolest Family Picture Ever!!! Cousins... Elder Alec Raymond, Elder Josh Day, Elder Mike Watson, and Elder Dave Watson all pose in front of the famous "Where Am I Going Map" at the MTC! This next year will add 2 more Elders to the families list... soon to be Elders, Jake Watson and Bryan Raymond! What an exciting time for our family!!!

(side notes are in Italics)

Dear Famiree (and friends),

This week's letter is going to be disjointed and unorganized because I didn't have time to write it out beforehand and my thoughts are all over the place.

First of all: AWESOME!!!!!!!!!!! Dad, check your line of authority, you'll notice a James E. Griffin--that's my mission president!!!!! My line of authority runs through my mission president!

Okay, next item... from now on you can send me letters to:

Elder Alec Raymond
11320 Station West Dr. Ste 101
Farragut, TN 37934

I leave for Knoxville early Tuesday morning and will arrive there in the evening. Speaking of which, I'm a little sad but a LOTTLE excited! I've received a testimony that Knoxville Tennessee Spanish-speaking is my mission. I'm called of God to serve the people there and I cannot wait to get there!

Thanks for the pictures! Everyone's been bugging me to get pictures of my family. Of course, everyone says Dad and I are twins...

Next, I ran into an Elder Sever the other day headed to Switzerland (I think). Yup! It was Trent (he's a friend of Alec's from IL and is a huge runner). He looks really different but still runs like a maniac.

Dad, thank you so much for your work and dedication as a ward mission leader. As a missionary, I can really see how much more successful the work is when the missionaries and the ward work together (it's infinitely more successful). Thanks for your unfailing testimony and example. Love you!

Bryan, CON-STINKIN-GRATS!!!!!!! (Bryan just finished his Eagle Scout project) Your welcome to my pocket knife...keep it away from Jakey, he's a weirdo... Love you! (the cat has a fascination with Alec's pocket knife and keeps trying to steal it, Bryan asked Alec if he could use it... the knife, not the cat)

(left out personal messages to Mom, Caiti, and Kimmee here, although sweet to the intended parties, they wouldn't make any sense to everyone else...)

I hope you can see how much the Lord is blessing you. I'm so grateful that the Lord is watching over, protecting, and uplifting you all. I know that in His hands and Dad's hands, I never have to worry about you all. Thanks for not being a distraction! I can just love you and look forward to seeing you in two years. Love you!

-Elder Raymond

I Love the Gospel!

2010-01-27T18:02:00.000-08:00

I love the Gospel!

I feel like Lehi after he partook of the fruit of the Tree of Life and had the desire to share it with his family. I was studying Lehi's dream in 1 Nephi 8 this morning. There are some very interesting points made when you study it from a perspective of missionary work.

Sorry if this letter is kind-of random.

I had a really cool little blurb of revelation on faith the other morning while I was studying the Holy Ghost. It was nothing new or unusual (revelation never is :)), but I was able to really comprehend what faith was and what place it has in my life as a missionary. (I am a missionary by the way! :) I have two little name placards and everything. And they're even in Spanish!)

Everything about the Gospel is really coming together. I can see clearly how my life fits into God's Plan for His children on this Earth. It's such an opportunity and a privilege to be entrusted with the Lord's invitation to come unto Him. I'm eternally grateful for His help.

I can't really think of anything else to write this week.

Oh, by the way, I haven't received my travel plans yet, but I should get them within the next 2-3 days. I do know that I leave exactly 2 weeks from today! I'm the last person in our district to leave. :( As much as I love the MTC, I'm pretty excited. I trust that as long as I do everything I can here and now, the Lord will pull me the rest of the way so that I might be the most effective tool in His hands that I can be. I can't wait to get to Tennessee! I know that's where the Lord wants me to serve and I'm super excited!

Anyway, it's good to hear from you all.

I love you all!

You're in good hands--the best hands.

Elder Raymond

P.S. I'm back with my two companions. Elder Seppi flew off to Guatemala Friday morning. :)

P.S.S. I'm 100% healthy and it's slightly stinkin'licious!

P.S.S.S. I speak Spanish.

P.S.S.S.S Just saying...:)

2010-01-23T14:04:00.000-08:00

Where in the world... got a picture of the three cousins in the MTC by a map!
Elder Mike Watson is going to Argentina, Buenos Aires North Mission(he's pointing to both locations his mission covers), Elder Alec Raymond is going to Tenneessee Knoxville Mission, and Elder David Watson is going to Asuncion, Paraguay Mission! They don't look excited do they!

Cousins together in the MTC... actually it took a bit of planning to get this picture. Their schedules don't exactly match up! Great to see them together though!

The Foursome (Elder Watson, Elder Watson, Elder Day, and Elder Raymond) We asked them to make sure they got this picture. They said it was pretty tough finding a time they could all be there. Four great missionaries!

A Powerful Testimony!

2010-01-20T18:32:00.000-08:00

(Elder Raymond is only allowed 30 minutes on the computer each week and then it shuts down, whether he is done or not... so he is always rushed when writing...last week it went down completely, then shut down again just as he was about to hit send.)

Dear Famiree,

I really hope e-mail works today. I guess if you're reading this, you'll know that it did. :) I'm currently sitting in the doctor's office awaiting the verdict on my new companion. Oh! By the way, I have a new companion! He's from the district that just left on Monday, but was held back for medical reasons. His original mission call was to Guatemala City North, and today's the day that he finds out whether or not he can still go to Guatemala or if he's going to be reassigned. Oh, and his name is Elder Seppi. He's pretty much a perfect companion, except we're always in the doctor's office. :) This afternoon we have to go off campus for a doctor's appointment. Eeek! We're hoping for the best, but at this rate he may not even leave until after we do. Since he's been here three weeks longer than me, he's an excellent resource for both Spanish and teaching experience.

Anyway, since we went straight from companion study to the doctor, I haven't had a chance to read any of my letters, so I'll respond to those at the end (I guess that's pretty much what I usually do anyway). Hopefully you all got my letter last week. This week has been wonderful. In the MTC, each week tends to have some sort of focus. It's never planned out, but the topics we study in class, devotionals, meetings, and personal and companion study are always at least related if not the same. It's amazing to see the Lord's hand in His work as leaders, teachers and missionaries alike follow the Spirit in selecting study topics.

This week's theme is the Book of Mormon, and especially how we should teach from it. The Book of Mormon is truly the word of God. It contains the fulness of the Gospel of Jesus Christ. It is the keystone of our religion as Joseph Smith taught. With it, everything stands; without it, everything falls. I can testify that everything stands. I'm so grateful for the opportunity to hold in my hands and study all those things necessary for the salvation of myself and all those I teach. The power of the Book of Mormon is real. I'm so grateful for the opportunity I had to grow up in a home where the Book of Mormon was read, understood, and shared. If anybody that reads this does not know for themselves of the truth and power of the Book of Mormon, you need to. You absolutely need to. Moroni's promise is real! Read the Book. Desire to know. Pray about it. Act on the answer. I've done it, and I know the Book of Mormon is the word of God. Follow President Hinckley's advice: if you want to know if the Book of Mormon is true, read it! I've read it and I know. The Spirit has borne witness of the truth of the Book of Mormon to me. The Book of Mormon holds the answer to every question of the soul. It contains the Plan of Salvation, a second witness of the Savior and His Atonement, and all things necessary for all men to return to live again with our Father in Heaven. I cannot express my gratitude for the opportunity I have to know these things. I feel like Moroni. My writing is weak, but I do have a testimony. I don't remember if I wrote my testimony last week or not, but I suppose it doesn't really matter since I still have it. :) God lives. He loves me and helps me more than I could ever know. Jesus Christ is my Savior. He has truly redeemed my soul from everlasting destruction. He is my Older Brother, my Perfect Example. The Gospel of Jesus Christ has been restored in its fulness to the Earth today. Joseph Smith is the Prophet of the Restoration. I'm so grateful for his strength and perseverance. The Book of Mormon is the word of God. It is powerful. It is an ultimate source of truth. I have a testimony of the power of prayer. It is ever amazing to me that God listens to me and even more, that He answers me. It is the ultimate opportunity to receive guidance and help from Him. I know that the Spirit of God witnesses of truth. I've felt that witness many times. The Spirit is the source of testimony. It is the primary means of communication betweeen God and individuals. I'm eternally grateful for the opportunity I have to receive personal guidance and revelation in my life. The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints is true. We are led by men called of God under the direction of the Savior Himself. Their words and witnesses are the words and witnesses of God. I've had the privilege to hear dozens of them bear solemn witness of the Savior. I'm so grateful and humbled that the Lord would trust me with a part of His work. There is no place or time that I would rather be.

I love you all and will write responses to your letters when I get to read them.

2 hours later...

Alright. Doing laundry now. :) I got lot's of letters this week. :) It's always wonderful to read your letters and see what you're all doing. First, answers to questions (I'll just go in the order I read them):

Caiti: My roommates are awesome. They are all either current or "ex-companions." And yes, they eat my food. :)

Mom:
1. The whole mail on P-day thing came down from our Branch President. It's not MTC wide. I get my mail throughout the week and hide it in my bottom drawer until Wednesday. :)
2. Haven't heard about any In-N-Out
3. I've gotten letters from Grandma Raymond, Ken and Nanna, Carlene.
4. I'm feeling much better.
5. I'm actually two-thirds through the MTC. 3 weeks left exactly. :)
6. Don't need anything.
7. Don't need cold stuff.
8. I've taken lot's of pictures including some with Elders Watson and Elder Day.
9. I'm in beginning Spanish.
10. No I don't mind answering questions. (mind-reader) :)

No more time eeeeeeekkkkk!!!!!!

Individual parts are gonna be short sorry.

Dad, I love reading you newsletters. Love you!

Mom, Thanks for your love. Love you!

Bryan, Congrats on your Eagle! Love you!

Caiti, Work hard, then the Lord will bless you. Love you!

Kimmee, Don't procrastinate. Love you!

Animals, Don't be idiots or pee on each other or die. Love you!

Elder Raymond

"Wishful Thinking"

2010-01-16T12:00:00.000-08:00

I got five ties from Mr. Mac. I have since named all five of them except one... sort of. Their names are (in the order I wear them):

"Anderson" (I was wearing it when Elder Anderson came),

"Perry" (I was wearing it when Elder Perry came),

"Speedairman" (Spiderman, said with a Spanish accent),

and "Tartar Sauce" (because I dropped a tartar sauce covered piece of fish on it the first week I was here).

You'll notice only four were named. This is because I wear the fifth every Tuesday in the hope that it will get a name at the evening devotional. That's when the Apostles come. I've been doing this so long without success that I've come to call it "Wishful Thinking." Well, last night (12Jan10) an Apostle finally came! Funny enough, my tie is still called "Wishful Thinking." Elder Perry came again. :)

Stay tuned...

2010-01-13T22:05:00.000-08:00

So, Alec didn't write this week. Bummer. He's halfway through his time at the MTC now. We'll just have to wait to hear from him. Stay tuned for more from Elder Raymond next week (hopefully).

He's Sick :-(

2010-01-07T07:45:00.000-08:00

Mom's note: I usually take out the special notes Alec writes to specific family members. I left a couple in this time because it is such sweet counsel from a big brother. I did remove the name of who he wrote to (you can kinda tell anyway...) Also, a little background... I tried to get him to pack a family picture and more than one pair of white socks before he left; he refused. He ended up requesting I send him more socks...

Dear Famiree,

This week's letter is going to be fairly short for a couple of reasons. One reason is because I spent most of the morning opening a package, setting up a camera, changing my pants (they're perfect by the way), putting sockies on (I was 100% positive that I'd get an I told you so on that one :)), and reading wonderful letters from my famiree, thus, I don't have as much time as usual to write. The second is because I've been sick for a week and it's very difficult to have meaningful spiritual experiences to write about when you have a constant throbbing sinus headache. Anyway, I'm feeling much better now and I was never nearly as bad as my companion. Four elders in our district (myself included, unfortunately) got what the doctors simply called a "severe viral cold" which they told us was completely untreatable and would take weeks to recover from...ugh.... Not fun--especially the four days that I couldn't even talk. A lot of funny stuff and good stuff has come from all of us being sick though. The branch president asked us to wear yellow masks in class because we were all coughing so much. We were quite the site :). The best thing that came of it though is A LOT of hope and faith and as a result, a stronger testimony (opposition in all things, right?)

(special notes)

You're in my prayers (all of you are every morning, every evening, and several times in between, but especially dad right now :)) and I know that whatever the result of your introspection, you will only be closer to your Heavenly Father. I just hope that some day I can catch up to you. Love you!

Thanks so much for your letters and your love--oh, and by the way, everyone thinks our "spiel" is awesome and wants you for a mommy. Oh, and they want to see a picture of my family...so do I now that I think about it. Love you!

I can't wait for you to have the opportunity to serve a mission. The world needs you! Love you!

Keep up the good running! Watch out for cars, they're bigger than you are (and they're really mean)! Love you!

Regardless of what school you're in or where you want to be, do your best where you are. Only your best effort is worth anything to anyone. Other people can benefit from your gifts and talents infinitely more than you can. Do your best for them! There is a word I like to use to describe people who know more than everyone else: teacher! Love you!

Tosca, Stop being stupid and stay alive! Ya dumb dog! Love you!

Thank you all so much for your letters and your love! It means a lot to me!

Elder Raymond

P.S. Mom, I know it's really cold Provo. Trust me, I know...:)

P.P.S. Sorry that this e-mail came later than usual...like I said...less time...but the temple's finally open!

P.P.P.S. I saw an Elder Watson! Not sure which one though honestly.... His residence is in a different building, but his classroom is just down the hall from mine, so we should run into each other quite a bit.

Last Hola of 2009!

2009-12-31T08:55:00.000-08:00

It seems like I wrote the last letter yesterday. Time is literally flying by. I'm so grateful for your letters. It's good to hear from everyone. Oh, by the way, I think I have enough Pringles now...and Jelly Bellies...although one of the missionaries in my district seems to like Jelly Bellies even more than me...I keep catching him sneaking into our room and eating them :).... Anyway, I'm so excited for David, Mike, and Josh to come next week. They're in for the time of their lives. I wish I could have been at the temple with them. It's awesome that they live so close now...for another week, I guess, then they'll be REALLY close to me. The temple here has been closed for the last two weeks for the holidays...it really stinks. We had a district leave yesterday morning but I think we're supposed to get a new one today. We're supposed to be getting a couple of Elders from Canada sometime today, don't'cha know? That's pretty cool, eh? Hopefully David, Mike, and Josh will at least be in the same building, but more than half the MTC is Spanish-speaking. I've only run into Elder Ward and Elder Roundy twice each.

It was awesome to hear from Carlene--I can't believe Cooper is already going on temple trips! That's so cool! Oh, and in answer to Carlene's question: my favorite flavors are cheddar cheese and pizza, but they're all wondrous...:).

It sounds like you all had an awesome Christmas. Sorry, but mine was better :). Elder Anderson came on Tuesday night and gave an EXCELLENT talk and then Elder Perry came on Christmas even and spoke about Christ's birth and the wisemen. It is the greatest opportunity of my life to be here to learn at the feet of Apostles and members of the Quorums of the Seventies. I'm so grateful for the simplicity of Christ's doctrine. I love 2 Nephi 31. I'm so grateful for the Savior's example and the opportunity that I have to know and follow it. I've been studying and learning a lot about faith lately. Elder Packer of the Quorum of the Seventy said something last night that was especially poignant to me. He said that when hope, belief, and desire are founded in true principles, they will blossom into faith and testimony which will become unshakeable through experience by knowing and applying the same true principles. I wish I had gotten his exact words--it loses a lot in my summary. I'm so grateful for the MTC. Here it is more like the butcher's knife and the surgeon's scalpel as we are prepared for the refiner's fire.

All the rumors about better food during the holidays are a myth though HAHA. Christmas Eve meals were just like normal meals (to be expected) and Christmas Day was just hilarious. Breakfast was cold cereal, lunch was a slice of turkey and a scoop of mashed potatoes and about 1000 scoops of broccoli, and dinner was a ham and cheese sandwich, chips, and a can of soda from a brown paper sack :). The real feast was during the devotionals (see 2 Nephi 32:3ish I think...)

The music I get to do here (other than singing approximately 12 opening and closing hymns each day (give or take 10)) is singing in the MTC Choir. But I guess singing to an Apostle is pretty cool too, eh?

Thanks to everyone who sends me packages! I've got more food than I know how to eat!

Elder Raymond

P.S. I like Pringles slightly less than last week, but I still love them!

P.P.S. It's been snowing for 48 hours straight and we have about 6 inches of snow and it's still snowing :)

P.P.P.S. Love you all!

Hola!

2009-12-23T11:49:00.000-08:00

Dear Famiree, (Yes, I'm still weird Caiti >;) )

I love you all and hope you're having a wonderful Christmas. I'm sorry you can't be here with me because if you were here, you would definitely have a wonderful Christmas. It's not an option here. :) I'm having the time of my life here. I'm so grateful for the opportunity to learn and progress at the feet of the Lord's servants--to include the Apostles.... Elder Neil L. Anderson came last night and gave an excellent talk on the condescension of God. I'm so grateful for the Spirit and the witness and expounding of truth that it bears. I studied Doctrine and Covenants 93 yesterday (it's pretty much the best section in the entire Doctrine and Covenants) and I'm so grateful for the opportunity that I had to be brought up in light and truth. I'm so grateful for the opportunity to learn as our Savior did--grace for grace. I'm progressing so much here under the constant influence of the Spirit. Each today, I can see how I've changed and grown from each yesterday. I look forward to thousands more todays both here on my mission and afterwards.

Thank you all so much for your letters. I'm sorry I can't send you stuff more often; but that's not what I'm here to do. I can only send and read/open stuff (including e-mail) on P-Day (Wednesday). Also, I only get 30 minutes online to read and write all of my e-mails, so it would be much easier if you sent me letters through DearElder.com rather than e-mail because I can read those anytime on P-Day.

I love and miss you all! Thanks for the package--the Christmas tree is decorated and on my desk and the stocking is hanging from the top bunk of my bed.

Elder Raymond

P.S. Pringles are pretty stinkin' awesome...just in case you were wondering...my companions think so too...and the rest of my district...and the zone...and every missionary who's ever served a mission... ;)

P.P.S. Study the scriptures every day...they're REALLY stinkin' awesome...yes, that's better than Pringles...

P.P.P.S. I love you all!

First Letter Home!

2009-12-16T11:40:00.000-08:00

Yay! It's finally here! Notice how he is already slipping into Spanish as he writes. :)

From Alec (aka Elder Awesome):

Hola! I guess I'll start with the administrative stuff. P-Day is Wednesday so that's the only time I can write and send and read mail.
Anyway, I want you all to know how awesome the MTC is. I have a testimony that this is the right place and the right time for me. I have two awesome companions. Elder McDade is a mixed martial arts fighter from Colfax, California and Elder Franklin is a huge football player from Houston, Texas. They both have awesome testimonies and are a great example to me. Our district has seven elders and three sisters. Our distict is amazing. Every single missionary brings something unique and vital to our district. Las hermanas bring an extrememly inspiring spirit to our district. All three of them are here because they know they have been called of God and are excited about the Gospel.
The saying here in the MTC is that a day is like a week and a week is like a day. Each day is like a week of spiritual and personal development, but looking back on our first week, it seems like a single day. I'm so grateful for this oportunidad to learn, grow, and teach. Our purpose as a missionary is to invite others to come unto Christ by helping them receive the restored Gospel through faith in Jesus Christ, repentance, baptism, receiving the gift of the Holy Ghost, and enduring to the end.
I love you all and want you to know that I'm doing awesome! I love everything about the MTC. Spanish is going very well. All of our prayers, testimonies, hymns, and talks are in Spanish and I can read, write, and understand it all. The Spirit is amazing in its power to loose our minds and tongues.
I want you all to know that I have a testimony.
Yo sé que Jesucristo es el Hijo de Dios y mi Salvadore. Yo sé que el Evangelio es verdadero. Yo sé que José Smith fue un profeta de Dios y yo sé que Presidente Monson llamado de Dios. Yo sé que el Libro de Mormón contiene las palabras de Dios. Gracias a mi testimonio, yo sé que nosotros podemos volver a nuestro Padre Celestial. En el nombre de Jesucristo, Amen.
Los amo!
Elder Raymond

2009-12-10T14:04:00.000-08:00

Alec is now in the MTC! Here are some pictures taken just before we dropped him off!

Mike Watson, Alec, Dave Watson

(my cousins going into the MTC in January!)

Dad, Alec, Uncle Mark Raymond

Mom, Kimmee, Alec, Caiti, Bryan, Dad

Alec and Grandma Raymond

Elder Alec Raymond!

Alec's last Sacrament Meeting in Arbor View Ward (for 2 years anyway)

2009-12-01T18:53:00.000-08:00

Cliff and Gina Watson stayed the night with us and came to our meetings! What a meeting! The topic was Gratitude. Bryan spoke first and talked about the importance of feeling gratitude at all times. He told the story of when our house flooded and expressed gratitude to all the friends from church that showed up, waded through mucky water and helped save belongings and then came and helped gut and rebuild our house! He also expressed gratitude to Heavenly Father for watching over us during such a tough time. He quoted Pres. Monson when he encouraged all of us to "Think to Thank". He closed with a strong testimony. What a wonderful young man that is on the path to becoming a fabulous missionary! Alec spoke after Bryan. He gave an incredible talk that brought a strong spirit. He talked about 2 ways we can apply gratitude to our lives, first by feeling gratitude and second by expressing gratitude. He gave us 4 ways to express gratitude. First, by thanking all who assist us in any way. Second by thanking our Heavenly Father for all He has done for us in prayer. Third, through obedience to our parents, teachers, and our Heavenly Father's commandments. Fourth, by serving others (going on his mission helps show the gratitude he has for the gospel by sharing it with others). Alec also quoted Pres. Monson, "This is a wonderful time to be living here on earth. Our opportunities are limitless. While there are some things wrong in the world today, there are many things right, such as teachers who teach, ministers who minister, marriages that make it, parents who sacrifice, and friends who help. We can lift ourselves, and others as well, when we refuse to remain in the realm of negative thought and cultivate within our hearts an attitude of gratitude. If ingratitude be numbered among the serious sins, then gratitude takes its place among the noblest of virtues." Alec ended with his testimony of the importance of gratitude. Alec was followed by Kimmee on violin and Ashley Butler on viola accompanied by Sis. Piet playing "A Poor Wayfaring Man of Grief." They played beautifully... very touching. We then got to hear from Michael Hansen who recently returned from his mission. He gave examples from his mission of how ingratitude cripples your spirit and keeps you from feeling the spirit and how gratitude brings you closer to Heavenly Father. He did a wonderful job and was the perfect "wrap up" to a very uplifting meeting!

Shortly after Cliff and Gina left (for their overly long, bumper to bumper, twice as long as it should've taken, drive back to CA) , Chris, Jennifer, Jake, Cole, and Cash Watson showed up at our door to say hello! What a surprise to see them! Thay said they got out of church and decided to drive down all the way from Utah Valley! We visited for a couple hours and then they headed back on their five hour drive home. Thanks everyone for such a memorable weekend!! We love you all!

Open House

2009-12-01T18:10:00.000-08:00

The blessings of living closer to family! It was wonderful to see Bart, Sharon, and Gail Leavitt, Ashly and Chris Hunter, and Cliff and Gina Watson! There were lots of phone calls and messages from family and friends that wanted to be there but couldn't make it. It was a fun filled evening with lots of yummy food and great music (the jelly bellys were the biggest hit)!

Alec gave a mini concert on his bass and he and Kimmee tried their skills at Bohemian Rhapsody it was amusing... Kimmee gave us a preview of her solo she would be playing the next morning in sacrament meeting. Cliff pulled out his camera and got some really great pictures of the family! There were lots of hugs and well wishes. It was a wonderful evening. Thanks to all who made it great!

2009-11-14T18:48:00.001-08:00

Elder Raymond and his Mom!

2009-11-14T18:46:00.001-08:00

Elder Raymond and his Dad!

The Temple

2009-11-14T18:44:00.000-08:00

2009-11-12T20:08:00.000-08:00

Alec will be going to the Las Vegas Temple on Saturday, November 14, 2009 at 3:00pm. More to come...

Farewell

2009-10-27T11:06:00.000-07:00

There will be an Open House at the Raymond's on Saturday, November 28, 2009 from 5-7pm. Elder Raymond's "Farewell" will be held on Sunday, November 29, 2009 at 9:00am. All are welcome to attend.

The Call has come!

2009-10-23T10:46:00.000-07:00

On Thursday, October 22, 2009, Alec received his mission call to the...

Tennessee, Knoxville Mission

where he will be sharing the gospel in the Spanish language!

He will report to the Missionary Training Center on Wednesday, December 9, 2009.

and the story begins...