Andrew's mission is quickly drawing to a close.  He will complete his missionary service on Tuesday, August 16th and will be reporting on his mission experience during church on Sunday, August 21st at 9:00 am.  He will be speaking with his younger brother, Eli, who will be departing six weeks from today for the Washington Tacoma Mission.

The Church is true, the Book is blue, and Moroni's still on the ball!

Spring is wonderful. The weather in Tri-Cities is great during this time of year. It's so nice to have four seasons. :) Utah just can't seem to have Spring for more than a week or two.

 

The work is going well, we had three investigators at church: two part-member families, the Plumb family and the Morfin family. The Plumbs are doing great! Sister Plumb is now on day nine of no coffee, and we're going to be setting a baptismal date with her tonight, now that she's a little farther along and is committed. Their 16 year old daughter is also really interested and has been asking all sorts of awesome questions about missionaries, the Book of Mormon, and church. She really wants to be a missionary. Which is awesome, except for the fact that she needs to be baptized first. :)

 

The Morfins are doing great too! Erica, the 10 year old now has a baptismal date set for May 14th

. It was going to be May 6th, but not everyone from the family was going to be there, including, her 16 year old brother, who was just sustained to be ordained a priest, and who is going to be able to baptize her!

 

I love the Gospel of Jesus Christ. I know that it has the power to change and fix broken lives, broken hearts, and broken souls. I know that because it has changed me. I have heard a lot of people say that their mission has changed their life, and I would say the same, but even more importantly than that, the Gospel of Jesus Christ has changed my life, and I am eternally grateful for that.

 

Love, Elder Plehn

Hello from Pasco! (for the 3rd time)

Hello from Pasco! (for the 3rd time)

Elder Torgersen and I have had a great week. It's only been five or six days into the transfer, and we have had a lot of great things happen already. Five investigators came to church! The Plumbs, the Morfins, and Frank and Jasmine! The Plumb family has been investigating for a few weeks. Brother Plumb is a less-active member, and he and his non-member wife both want to come to church. We've been working with Sister Plumb to quit coffee, but other than that, they are doing so well! The Morfins are another part-member family who have a nine-year old, Erica, who is ready to be baptized. Frank and Jasmine, a young couple who are living with Jasmine's grandma, who is a member, came as well. 

There are so many good things happening in the Pasco 9th ward! This ward has had a great history of being on fire with missionary work, and they are still on fire. We have been able to involve members in a lot of what we have been doing, especially in bringing investigators to church. The wards here in Pasco North have so much potential to help people progress and to find new investigators. 

Elder Torgersen is a great missionary. He talks to everyone, is obedient, and is so willing to serve and help anyone out. We have been able to do a lot of on-the-spot service and we have a lot planned for this coming week because Elder Torgersen just keeps asking people and is sincere when he asks. I've learned a lot from him already about loving people, and really desiring their salvation. 

I have spend much more time this past week in chapter 3 of PMG, which has been incredible. There is so much to find there. Since transfer day on Wednesday, I have spent at least 30-45 minutes in chapter three everyday except one. And I have probably learned more in my personal study this past week than many other weeks where I haven't been as diligent in studying the doctrine. Over the course of my mission, I have truly come to love Preach My Gospel and the scriptures. They are wonderful. This morning, I spent about 15 minutes answering the question "what do I love about my mission?" in my study journal. I felt the Spirit very powerfully as I completed my list with "I love my Savior" and "I love my Father." As I wrote those down, I thought of a line in PMG on page 151 that says "your attitude toward your mission experience is a reflection of your love for your Heavenly Father and His Son, and your respect for the priesthood." It was an amazing reminder about how much this gospel and my experience as a missionary means to me. 

Overall, I'm doing well, Elder Torgersen in doing well, our area has some amazing things happening, our investigators are progressing and coming to church, and the Church is true!

Love, Elder Plehn

"Through the Atonement comes permanence of purity!"

We got our transfer calls earlier today. I'm going to be transferred back to the Pasco North Zone, which I just left two transfers ago. This will make three transfers in a row where I have been transferred after serving for only one transfer in an area. This will also be my 12th companion and 9th area. As disappointed as I am to leave Richland, and all the investigators we have been finding over the last few weeks, I am excited to be back in Pasco (for the 3rd time). My new companion's name is Elder Torgersen. He's been out for about seven or eight months. I'm really excited to work with him. I've never really interacted with him much, but I've heard a ton of good things about him. 

We had an absolutely fantastic week! One investigator accepted a baptismal date of the 28th of April, and three more committed to be baptized on the 30th. The first one, Jacob, is nine years old. He's number 4 of a 6-kid, single parent, semi-active family. We've been working with the whole family, trying to get them to come back to church, for about a month now. We had Stake Conference yesterday, and all of them came! One cool moment with them was a few weeks ago, we taught them a lesson on family prayer and scripture study, and committed them to read and pray as a family every day. Since that lesson, the only times they have missed are when the 16 daughter was in the ER with kidney stones. We're super excited for them. 

One of the other investigators we have, Tanner, is another 9 year old in a semi-active family. His mom and brother both came to Stake Conference as well. He's the funniest 9 year old ever. He's pretends to be super stubborn and difficult, but really he's just waiting to be baptized and to feel the Spirit more in his life. 

The other two investigators are a mother and a 10 year old son, Elena and Angel. Elena's parents are on date for this Saturday in Omak, WA (used to be in our mission, it's up near Canada). Their missionaries sent us the referral. We contacted them on Wednesday night with our High Priest Group Leader out with us. We had an absolutely perfect lesson with them. We taught simply that God loves them and that the Restored Gospel of Jesus Christ will bless their families more than anything else, then extended an invitation to make that Gospel a permanent part of their lives by being baptized by someone who had the proper authority from God. They were so excited! As we were leaving, Angel said to his mom "can they come over every day?" It was one of the most spiritual lessons I've had on my mission. Brother Rose, the member we had with us, was absolutely incredible. He helped a ton by providing his testimony and inviting Elena to church. 

We also have been in a tri-panionship since Friday. One of the elders in our zone went home before the actual transfer date, so we have had Elder Meteer with us, covering both the Crestview and Duportail wards. It's been fun to be with another elder. When I got to my second area, I was put in a tri-pan for four weeks, so it's been a lot of fun to do it again. 

All-in-all, it's been an absolutely incredible week, filled with all sorts of changes and miracles and little experiences that have deepened my testimony of a loving Savior, who invites us every day to repent and to "yield to the enticings of the Holy Spirit." I studied Mosiah 3:19 this morning, and learned more about how the atonement can change us from fallen man, into the glorious beings we are capable of becoming. In companionship study, the three of us came up with this quote: "Through our own efforts comes temporary improvement, but through the Atonement comes a permanence of purity." 

I know that this Gospel is true, and that Jesus Christ is our Savior, the only one who can give us the personal peace that we need day to day to make it to our Heavenly home.

Love, Elder Plehn

Happy Easter

Hello Everyone! 

For Preparation Day today, we hiked Badger Mountain (it's not really a mountain, everyone from Utah calls it Badger Bump) with our zone. You can basically see our whole mission except for the Hermiston and Walla Walla zones, and the areas out in the boonies. 

Happy lateEaster! We almost didn't have an Easter dinner because our dinner calendar coordinator has been in Ireland for the past week and a half, but our Ward Mission Leader came to the rescue and invited us over. :) We also had a really cool lesson with a less-active family. We were talking about Easter and the conversation led itself to baptism and the nine year old boy pipes up and says "I want to get baptized!" Needless to say, we had a pretty good night. :) 

We found another family to teach! Richland is just popping with families! The sisters in the next ward over gave us a referral for a woman named Rachel who was taught by elders previously, but stopped meeting with them because she felt that her questions weren't being answered. So we have our first lesson with Rachel, her husband Brad, and their 11 year old daughter, and they basically drown us with a fire-hose of questions until we tell them that we have 5 lessons that we teach people and that as they listen to those lessons, and keep the commitments we will extend, including coming to church and reading the Book of Mormon, that their questions would be answered. They loved that idea. :) So we're going back tonight to teach the Restoration. :) 

The work is hastening, and the work is true! I love my Savior, Jesus Christ, and am so grateful for the opportunity to serve him and to assist Him in fulfilling His and our Father's purpose for His children. This weekend will be General Conference, a wonderful time of the year when we can hear from God's authorized representatives and hear what God Himself would say to us. (Amos 3:7) Please make this General Conference weekend special by inviting someone you know who is not a member of the Church or who has not come for a while to watch it with you. It will make your experience so much more meaningful. And keep sharing #Hallelujah!

Love, Elder Plehn

Pictures: 

1. Elder Poulter (my companion) and I
2. Our district
3. Our district
4. The view from Badger Bump. That's Kennewick, Pasco is across the Colombia River, and Richland is to the left (out of the picture)
5. e

#Hallelujah

A good week this week. We had our temple trip today (thus the email on Wednesday). I love the temple. It's such a fantastic place. We are really blessed as a mission to have the Colombia River Temple in our boundaries. And it's only 20 minutes away from most of the mission too. That's nice. :)

We had a fantastic day yesterday. We had a member out with us from 6:00 to 9:30. We a super brief lesson to a new investigator, Steven, invited him to church and set up another lesson for today. We were also able to teach a lesson to a part-member family, the Smiths, who agreed to take the lessons and learn more about the Gospel of Jesus Christ. The member we brought shared his testimony and his re-conversion story. That above anything else we did brought the Spirit to the lesson. It is amazing what the testimony of someone who is simply living the gospel in their daily life can do. And coming from one of their peers, it really impacts an investigator, sometimes in a way that the full-time missionaries can't duplicate. 

We've been sharing the #Hallelujah video with anyone and everyone that we can. If you haven't seen it yet, please watch it and share it! You can find it at FollowHim.Mormon.org. It is a great way to share your testimony of Jesus Christ. As you share it, please remember to accompany the video with your testimony of Christ and a simple invitation to act. It will allow those you share it with to feel the Spirit and be drawn closer to Christ. 

Love, Elder Plehn

In Jesus Christ we can find new life

This has been another crazy week! Elder Poulter and I have seen a lot of great things happen, especially with the less-active members we are working with. We also found a family to teach! At 8:40 on Monday night, we were going to drop by a returning member, and we saw a lady sitting outside smoking. As we walked up to her, she started to say that she wasn't interested and that she didn't really believe in God. We kept talking to her about her experiences with religion, and eventually her husband Ryan came outside and started talking with us. After a few minutes, Jessica (the wife) asked us if we just wanted to come inside because it was kind of cold. After we went inside, they started asking all sorts of incredible questions about tithing, and church attendance, and what it was like to be a member of the Church. We were able to answer all of their questions and testify of the Restoration of the Gospel of Jesus Christ. We are excited to continue to visit them and share with them and their four children (2 sets of twins ages 8 and 9) more about the gospel! As we were leaving the lesson Jessica told us that as we were walking up, she was starting to tell us to get off her property and that she didn't want to talk with us, but the words couldn't come out. They literally choked in her throat. 

This Sunday the Church is beginning a 2016 Easter Initiative. At the center of the Initiative with be a two minute video that testifies that in Jesus Christ we can find new life. The Initiative is going to be focused on the hashtag #Hallelujah. When the video comes out on the 13th, please share it with everyone you can! As missionaries, we have access to it on our missionary portal early, so Elder Poulter and I have been sharing it with just about everyone we talk with. We were invited to teach the High Priests group yesterday. The topic was Chapter 4 from Preach My Gospel. We shared the video after promising them that they would be prompted to think of someone they could help as the watched it, and invited each of them to act on the prompting. It was a great experience.

ZLC and Zone Council were both great experiences as well. As Elder Poulter and I planned for them, we realized that we wanted the Spirit to be the teacher. Almost all of the time in both meetings was spent counseling about what we as leaders and what we as a zone could do to further the work with the members and with the Easter Initiative. As a zone, we came up with a lot of good ideas to build the member's respect. We committed the zone to spend time each day planning how they can use the #Hallelujah Initiative and how they can apply what we talked about in regards to member respect.

Today I got news that my Grandpa Dunford passed away. It was expected and only a matter of time until he passed on. I am grateful that the Plan of Salvation is taught in the Church as something that is absolutely real. I know that my family with be together forever again. I am grateful that I have a loving Father in Heaven who is aware of each of His children, and has called me and so many others to share the good news with those who don't have it in their lives. 

Love, Elder Plehn