A little progress, but some work to do

Hey hey.

Man. I have been doing this for too long. I just don't know what to say anymore.. I'm good. I've been SO so tired this past like month. They say you just get used to getting up at 6:30, I'm still waiting to get used to it...

Well.. Hmm.. So the “M's” are doing good. “K,” the 10 year old daughter, is so down to get baptized. She's just got to talk to her parents about it. We told them that it would be much better if they all did it together, but if “K” wants to go ahead and do it, then we will. Maybe the next lesson will be on becoming as little children... Haha but they're so great. 

Anyway, we're at the library today, so I have a time limit. I don't have a whole lot of time left. Um.. We were able to find some sweet people this last week. Unfortunately, none were able to make it to church. It could be because it's so far away, but I don’t know. I'm going to study out some sweet doctrine on church and the sacrament to help boost their desires to come. 

But yeah.. Love you all. I'll try to come up with more next week. 

"Sunrising" and act, don't be acted upon!

What's up what's up.

We went sunrising again today. It was pretty good. Other than the fact of waking up at 5 in the morning.. Oh well, it was WELL worth it. We saw, about 100 yards away from the pier we were at, some dirt that was looking like it was being kicked out of a large hole. Elder “T” noticed first and said it was probably a turtle digging holes for its eggs. We kept looking over but couldn't see anything other than just the dirt flying out of the hole. Right as we're about to leave, Elder “M” goes, 'Look, the turtles coming out!" And there she was, a huge sea turtle coming back out to go to the ocean.. And it was big! I'd say about 4 feet wide and 5 feet long. It was so cool! We got to see it scoot back into the ocean.
Hmm.. This past week was just one of those weeks.. This was one of the hardest working weeks ever. I was super exhausted at the end of the night, I was sweating all day, doing my best, but nothing really happened. “B,” “K1,” “K2,” “K3” and now “D” moved up somewhere else, still in our area but farther away. We managed to catch “K1” and “D” at home last Saturday. That was good. Man.. I don't even know. 

I can't believe Tyler Tempest is home! That's crazy.. OMG I can't believe the Celtics!... That is insane. Man what are they gonna do...

Not much news on progress of investigators. We're going to go see the “M” family tonight. They are so cool. They need to get baptized. They're right there. There are so many blessings waiting for them. I'm not totally sure what to do..

But yeah.. Honestly I don’t know what else to say. I'm glad I'm here. Even though it's a little bit tougher, I will do my best never to take the easy way out anymore. That's not the way God wants it. People are so stupid to think that just because something is right there in front of their face, that's what they need. There's such a thing as too much reliance on God. To sit there and to wait for Him to pick you up and take you somewhere and make you do something. You don't ACT, but wait to be acted upon. And eventually you'll be trodden down and cast out for you foolishness and weakness. You'll never survive. You'll never make it. I don't need to waste my time being around such useless people. I am harder, better, faster, stronger because I want to be. And I know that God will strengthen me more because He can trust me. Because I've set my hand to the plough, and I will NEVER look back.  

"You show your trust in Him when you listen with the intent to learn and repent and then you go and do whatever He asks. If you trust God enough to listen for His message in every sermon, song, and prayer in this conference, you will find it. And if you then go and do what He would have you do, your power to trust Him will grow, and in time you will be overwhelmed with gratitude to find that He has come to trust you."

And the Celestial Kingdom is reserved only for those who God can Trust.

Love you all.

Peace.

Elder JR Thorne

Alma's parable of Faith

Dear Thorne's and such,

Thiss week was goood. I feel like nothing happened out of the ordinary. Just kind of the same old. We got a few new investigators, but not like any awesome super prepared people. Oh, I guess there's a couple. So “K1” and “K2” live in a halfway house (honestly if you just met them on the street, you'd have no idea). The first time we went, we blessed “K1.” We went back to teach, we met “K2” too. Then the 3rd time, we met “B.” Then the 4th time we went over, we met “K3.” haha. All way solid, open, humble guys. “B” is super amazing. We've actually taught him the most. When we first met him, he had a couple questions about like who we are and what we do and such. As we were leaving, “K2” told us that he accidentally took out the book mark that we had left in the chapter we left him to read and asked where he was to put it. I honestly had totally forgot what chapter we left (Elder “M” left a random one). I remember we had talked about faith, so I just took it and placed it in Alma 32... 

So.. We came back the Next day and “B” was outside chillin'. He invited us in and he walks back to his room and he goes 'Yeah I really loved that reading you guys left'. And we were just like.. Um.. Ok. We never left anything with him. haha. But he had read the whole chapter and absolutely loved it. He was like, 'Do you want to read the whole thing, or do you want me to just talk about what stood out to me and what I liked?' OMG. So awesome. He told us about some verses that he loved and things that really hit home for him. He said it was perfect for him. Inspiration from God? I think yes. He's been super solid. His dad is a member, married a Catholic girl; so he grew up in a split home where they kinda just gave up on religion. So we're trying to find out if he's actually been baptized already haha. He doesn't remember. 

Hmm.. Oh yeah so the “M” family.. “B” and “J.” I don’t know if I've told you about them yet. But they are the typical, white investigator family that every Mormon expects us to teach. When we go over, it's the mom and dad and all the kids in the living room listening to the missionaries asking questions such as, "Where did we come from?" "What happens after I die?" and "How can we know if something is true or not?" You know, all those people that are being taught in the Mormon movies. Haha. k that's a little bit of an exaggeration, but just a little.. It's super strange; I kinda don't like it. haha. Nah but I love this family so much. They're great. Missionaries have been teaching them for about 5 months or so. They are 100% totally and completely are qualified for baptism. “J” is so solid, she studies the gospel more than some members I know haha. Pray for them for sure. 

Welp.. Other than that. Life is good. I like it. TLund looks (good) :) hahaha tell him to write me. I love him. Huge example to me. Can't wait to see him again. I miss you. I love you. K bye.

 

Elder JR Thorne

Habiendo sido comisionado por Jesucristo...

Dear family and friends.

“K” got baptized! Ah man it was so so good. She was all set. We didn't have to make sure she was good or boost her desire, she was just prepared from the beginning. She invited her family (her mom and dad) and they are from Peru. They speak really good English, but pretty much everyone at the service (her family and her bf “A's” family) are Latin, so we decided to do the service in Spanish. Which is fine. Except.. I was the one to do the baptizing... So yeah. I did it in Spanish. It was pretty sweet. I was way nervous at first, but once we stepped in the water I was fine. I had memorized it, but we did tape up a little help on the wall. I looked at it just right before, then did it with no problem. It was pretty sweet. The whole thing was very spiritual. “A” was even crying at the end, and he's a big tough guy haha. So good. 

Other than that.. We seem to be struggling to find new people. So that's what we're working on. Actually, we did find a couple pretty sweet guys. Oh wait. First of all I'll tell you about my new comp. His name is Elder “M.”  He's actually Elder “B's” cousin! (Who I actually received a wedding invitation from!) Anyway.. He's from Rexburg, ID. He's even more quiet than I am; or used to be. He's been out for about 6 months (I keep getting newbies..). We don't have like anything in common, but we get along fine. I get along with just about anyone anyway.. But yeah. He's cool. I love him.

Ok so back to the guys. On Wednesday, the first day with Elder “M,” we ran into this cool guy named “K.” He's about 23 and he actually had just walked out of his door to light up a cigarette. We blessed his home and invited him to be baptized, and he said maybe. We set up to come back the next day (we didn't realize that it was 4th of July). We were late going over there because of a flat tire -__-.. and we caught him right as he was leaving to watch the fireworks in downtown West Palm Beach. We were disappointed, but I had a really good feeling about him. We tried a couple more times the next couple of days with no luck, but then on Saturday in the early afternoon, we stopped by and were able to meet with him. His roommate, “K2,” answered the door and invited us in. “K” came out and we invited “K2” to sit in with us, which he did. We had a powerful lesson about God being our loving Father in Heaven and prayer. They felt it so strong and “K2” prayed at the end. He had said that he does pray often, but he didn't know who or what he was praying to. We taught them the steps of prayer, and he said such a good, humble prayer to end us off. After the 'amen', his face just shone. It was so amazing. I loved it. 

Def the highlights of the week. Other than that, we just need some more people to teach. haha.

But yeah. Life's good. I like it. I don't want to come home. But I do. Nah I just want music and movies. Haha. So things I want when I get home: 1 Beats (those are a must) 2 iPhone 3 Camaro SS 4 new laptop 5 actually i think that's about it. haha. I'm not trunky.. Those are just things I miss most other than fam :) I miss you guys the Most and I love you so so much!

Elder JR Thorne

FFLM Testimony of Jesus Christ Part 1

FFLM Testimony of Jesus Christ Part 2

Florida Storm

Sweet fam. 

This week was ok. Not a whole bunch happened. Just seemed like the same old. Good news is, “K” has a date for next Sunday! We're very excited for that. Oh. Except for Elder “W.” Because he's transferring. And I'm staying. So.. Yeah. The craziest things from this week:

I don’t know if you watch or discuss the weather much, but if you do, and you saw or discussed Florida weather, then OMG. You saw or discussed the crazy rain we've had the past few days. The first real bad one was on Friday. We were riding along, and there were tons of dark clouds in the sky. We figured it was going to start raining bad, so we decided to go into Target to go to the bathroom. We came out, looked out the glass doors, and saw that it still wasn't raining. Elder “W” was like, 'Well looks like we're still good'. And me, having been through situations like this, was like, 'hold on'. In literally 10 seconds... Floods and lightning and thunder were all around Target. It was Insane. People came running in and they were drenched. So we hung out in Target. We walked around and looked at the toys. The lights kept flickering on and off. Then the power went out, but the generators kept the lights on. All the cash registers turned off, so they had to start back up again which took forever. So we were in the toy section, and we hear this HUGE crack of thunder, then all of a sudden, the generators died. I don’t know if you've ever been in a windowless super store with the power out, but it is PITCH BLACK. It was black for about ten seconds before the power came back on. It was crazy. Finally it lightened up after about 45 min, I bought a camera case and we left to go see “T,” a recent convert. We were at his house from like 6:50 to 7:30, headed out and right as we leave his apartment complex, same thing. Except now we were outside, on bike, riding to our car. We decided to just keep going since we had a meeting at 8 at the church. We got obliterated by water.. I haven't been that wet in forever. We were waiting at an intersection right by the car, and I look down the street, and about 150 yards up, I see a bright white light above the street. I'm thinking, ah man is that pole going to get struck by lightning? Then all of a sudden, BOOM! A power box exploded and the whole street went dark! I started freaking out and just booked it to the car. Haha. Ah wow. It was insane. I love Florida :) We had to stay in the apartment on Sunday for like 5 hours because of the storm. We were in the other elders apt and played some games. It was ok. Ha. Days like that are pretty annoying. 

But.. Anyway.. That's about it. “D” is still awesome. “W” is still awesome. Our investigator's are doing alright. “K” is the story of the week. Look for pics/update next week :)
K love you all! Have a good week! Miss you!

 Elder JR Thorne