The Bee Gees in 1969......Transfers

Salut toute la monde! How are all y'all doing? It's kinda weird to think that it's almost February! Time is just flying by. This week was crazy awesome. 

 

Wednesday we started off shoveling at the church because it snows all the time here and it needed to be shoveled. We were going to use the blower but we were told it was broken so we just did it all by hand and shovel. After we got done shoveling we went and got pizza for lunch and then went out and passed by a couple of our amis. We have a new family we are teaching right now and the moms name is Emmanise. She is from Haiti and is awesome. She has two little boys who are just full of energy but love us. We saw her and talked to her for a bit. She didn't have a ton of time so we left her with a prayer and she told us we could come back Friday. Later that night we got invited to a members house for dinner by their less active daughter. She is 24 years old and hasn't been to church in about 2 years. The other members have been surprised that we have been meeting with her. She told us that she was going to institute the next day and that she was bringing one of her non members friends. We were so excited! As we were leaving, we realized that their house wasn't shoveled so we hurried and did that. She came out half way through to help us too. It was super nice. 

Thursday we got a call from one of the people that we stopped teaching a long time ago saying that she wants us to come over again. We went over to meet her and see how we could help and she wasn't actually interested in learning more about the gospel, she just needed help cleaning up her apartment. We cleaned up the whole place and made it look nice for her. At the end she mentioned a food bank so we asked were that is and if we were able to help there at all. Food banks are awesome service providers that also help us find new people. She gave us the address and hours. That was just proof to me that God will put people or things in our way to guide us to new and better things. After we were done there we passed by a few people and then had dinner with our Mexican family. 

Friday, we started off with district council which was the last one of this transfer. We went on exchanges after that and I was back with elder Musaalo for the day! He is such a good elder and is super smart. We went and knocked a couple houses but then had three lessons planned out too. We started with Emmanise and it was really good. We taught the restoration and she seemed to understand most of it. She asked a couple of really solid questions and asked if she could read the book of Mormon herself. We asked her which language she wants it in and she said French because her son understands French better and she wants to read it to him! It was super cool. We then passed by our buddy Carlos. He had a couple more questions about baptism and how it works. We told him that it could happen as soon as three weeks because there is some things to learn but it could also happen later whenever he feels ready and understands the gospel. He really wants to be baptized because he knows that is important but doesn't feel quite ready yet. After that we went to go check up on our buddy Fanel. He was home! We had though he moved but he was back for a bit. He is moving in 2 months to a town about 3 hours away. We are sad to lose him but the elders and members over there are awesome. He is still reading the Book of Mormon and loves it. After that we headed back home and made some dinner before we crashed. 

Saturday we un exchanged and did some studies and tried to see a couple people but we accidently locked our keys in the family history room at the church so we couldn't leave. Someone finally came to help us out but then we got our hair cut by this member and then ate some food and played volleyball. Our amazing family from Zimbabwe came and brought two more of their friends!! it was soo cool. They all played really well and had fun. We had about 22 people there at one point. After volleyball we got our transfer calls and Elder Halliday and Elder Furness are both leaving and I am Staying here in Mont-saint-Hilaire! I am getting a new elder and will be doing the second half of his training. He has already done one transfer but training is two transfers long so I will be finishing his training. I'm super excited. 

Sunday we got to church early and shoveled more snow and helped get rid of some of the ice too. We helped a couple of the elderly walk inside from their car too. We had a put luck after and most of the ward stayed and talked. It was super cool to see the change that has happened in this ward already since the first Sunday I was here. That night we had dinner with a member who invited our Mexican family over too. They were such a great example of Ministering. They didn't know this family very well so they invited them over for a dinner to get to know them better and gain a relationship with them. Ministering is sooo easy!

Yesterday was pretty good. we started with some studies and then headed over to a sisters house for lunch and to help her finish the backsplash in her kitchen. We placed and glued all of the little tiles in place and grouted it all in place on one wall. We still have a little more to do but we ran out of time. During the service we also talked to her about a couple of different things and shared a couple of spiritual experiences with her which we found out later, really helped her make a few decisions in her life. If we are in tune with the spirit, He will tell us what we need to share and who needs what. It is such an amazing gift that we have been given by our father in heaven. Last night we had dinner with the Dumas family. They made us poutine. It was soo good and then we kinda talked about how we can continue to help the members here because frère dumas just got called as the Elders Quorum president. We have some great things planned and this ward is going to be soo great! 

That is about it for this week. Not a ton happened but we had a ton of amazing lessons and our amis are still continuing to progress and find the joy that comes from this amazing gospel of Jesus Christ. Keep being awesome and hurry and go to the temple as much as you can before it is closed for a bit. If you live in St. George that is. I love this work and this church and all y'all! 

Love Ya, 

Elder Beckstrand

Not a ton but here they are.

Pancakes with cookies inside

Shoveling

That scene from sled dogs where teddy gets out of the plane and cant move because of the snow and wind.

Hey y'all! How is everyone doing? If I could sum up this week into three words it would be COLD, Walking, and service... yup. It has been crazy but super fun. 

Last Wednesday after we got some good studies in, we went and helped do some service where we did and redid the backsplash of a kitchen. It wasn't very hard but took a while because we had to some super weird angles and stuff but it turned out really good in the end. She was so happy with the results she fed us dinner and we talked about how we can help her and how she can help those around her come into the church. We all shared experiences from our life to help her find new ideas on how to help her family and others. It was super cool to see how everyone is put in different places with people for a reason. We are all with others because there is stuff we have done and gone through that can help others who might be going the same things. Make sure that you stay aware of the spirit and look for way to help others who might be struggling. 

Thursday wasn't super exciting but we passed by a couple people and helped some people learn a little bit of french. 

Friday morning we had district council and it was super good. We all shared our favorite scripture in the Book of Mormon and then talked about how we can use those to help others gain a testimony like us. We also talked about how we can help others better and our motivations behind everything. The best kind of motivation is LOVE but more like Charity. Seeing others as brothers and sisters and doing everything we can to treat them as such and want the best for them. After that as we were leaving, the sisters sneak attacked us with snowballs so we hurried and got them back. The snow was perfect for snowballs because we could pack them but as soon as they hit someones face, it would just explode into powder. Super fun. That night we passed by our amazing friend Carlos. The lesson was going super great and we were discussing baptism and his father came into the room. He was completely drunk and kept mentioning that he was black and that we are white but what we are doing is awesome because his son is not the best and needs to be baptized. Super funny. Carlos is doing super well though and has a really good attitude about learning and knowing when baptism is right for him. 

Saturday morning we had breakfast with our favorite member family. they take such good care of us. We talked a little about some less actives and then somehow got onto the topic of missions because the oldest son is close to leaving on his mission but is wanting to wait. We tried to give him some good advice and he is going to be a great missionary one day. Afterward we wanted to play a little street hockey but it didn't last long because of the cold. It was about -25 but felt like -35 because of the 85% humidity and super wind. That night we played volleyball and had a few new people come who are not members so that was really cool. As we were leaving we all get a text from the bishop saying that church was canceled because of a snow storm that was coming in. We were kinda skeptical about it because it is Canada but it happened. 

Sunday we didn't have church because we woke up to about a foot of snow or more and it was still a full blizzard outside. We had gotten another text from the mission office saying that church was canceled and to not use the car because the roads are too slipper and the engine might not start. They also said that we decide to go out at all that we need to bundle up. So we did. We layered up and walked to the next city over which ended up being about 20 kilometres one way. It took us about 3 hours. It was about -35 and a complete blizzard the whole time. We ended up walking across the frozen river too because we forgot that we had to cross it and didn't want to walk farther to find the bridge. It was super cool but super windy. When we finally got to where we talked to the family and they gave us soup and a ride home so that was super nice. After that we decided just to let the car warm up and drive around carefully. We went and shoveled some snow for an older lady in our ward and then went home to sleep. 

Yesterday morning we got up and just went out and started to shovel. There are this big things that we call Cois tanks because they are just giant tractors turned into snowplows. They do most of the snow removal but we helped a couple of people who don't use those. One of the members we were helping also had a broken door handle that just fell off so Elder Halliday got to work on that too. That night we passed by and visited our family from Zimbabwe! They love us so much. They are reading the Book of Mormon and love what the church and the gospel brings into families!

That's about it for this week. It has just been really cold and really service driven. It has been so much fun. We also found out this morning that the snow storm we had was the worst one since about 1920 according to the Quebec weather records. They have had that cold before and that much snow but never really at the same time. Super cool. Keep up the awesome work wherever you may be.

Love yall! 

Elder Beckstrand

Ice cream 

The weather

Snow and sunrise

House window

Us on our walk

Snow piled up on a balcony I had to clean off

Side note from Penny...Josh sent me these videos and I about had a heart attack.  He has been reprimanded and told NEVER to do this again.  Please pray for his stupidity.  Also, his Costochondritis has been acting up a lot with this cold weather.  He said that we woke up 10+ times the night before the storm with bad chest pain.  Please send an extra prayer up for Josh's chest pain.  It's going to be a long Winter for him. 

The Three Amigos!

Bonjour! I hope y'all had a wonderful week wherever you may be because we sure did here in Canada. This week was full of crazy surprises.

Last Wednesday it showed all day long. We started our day off at the church doing some studies but we also wanted to shovel the snow off the walk ways so no one else had to. It had already snowed about 4-6 inches so I pulled out the churches snow blower and got about half of it done. Elder Halliday wanted to try it out so I taught him how it worked and let him have a go at it. After that we went to go visit the two amazing families that we are teaching right now. The family Neira is from Peru and Myra and her family are from Zimbabwe. They are both amazing families that have accepted us as their own. We taught them more about the Book of Mormon and told and promised them that they will be blessed as a family if they take time to read it. That night we went to ward council at the church and the work we had done with the snow was completely done because it just kept snowing and filled in what we moved.

Thursday morning we got a call from the Amazing President Phillips. He asked us what our day was like and if we were a little flexible to move things around and that he had a surprise for us. We agreed and set up times to have interviews with him at the church. Before President got to the church we passed by a few people including our ward mission leader for a little update on us and how our amis are doing. Frere Renaud is awesome and cares for us just as much as president does. We found out that he might be moving here soon so that is really sad. They are amazing humans. After that we head to the church and find president has another elder with him. Elder Furness. President told us that we would now be a trio!!!! We then had interviews which were just as fantastic as always. Afterwards we took Elder Furness back to the house and helped him settle in a bit. He is from Taiwan and was called as a Mandarin speaking missionary. He has spent his 18 months here already in English or Mandarin. This is his first French area so we are helping him with his French. He has been studying French his whole mission so he is already pretty good. 

That night we visited the Candia family and helped them with their French after we had some dinner with them. It was really nice because elder Furness can speak Spanish more fluently than us so translating and teaching was a little easier.

 

Friday morning we had district council with the Zone leaders and that other sister team that wanted to be there too aha. It was fun. We went off on exchanges after that and it was Elder Furness, Elder Gomez, and moi meme. We came back up to Mont-saint-Hilaire and did some preaching. We tried to pass by a couple of people but not a ton of people were home. We ended up knocking quite a bit and found a few solid potential people. None of the potentials were Quebecois which is kinda funny. There were all immigrants of some sort so we used that and looked for them more. Elder Gomez has learned a couple of phrases in many different languages so when we met people who spoke either Swahili, Lingala, Arabic, Creole, we could get a connection with them. In D&C 90:11 it says, “Every man shall hear the fullness of the gospel in his own tongue, and in his own language, through those who are ordained unto this power." We are those who have been ordained and everyone is more open hearing their own language. That night we tried to pass by Douglas, one of our other amis, he didn't answer our call so we assumed he wasn't home because he will usually will answer. We decided to go get pizza instead. Two minutes after we walked in, Douglas walked in behind us. We sat and talked with him while we waited for our pizza. At this point in his life he believes in other things and does not like the church and has some big misconceptions about it that he isn't willing to change. He also kept calling us Mormons or the Mormon Church so we corrected him every time he said it. Eventually Elder Gomez cut him off mid sentence to explain it to him. He didn't agree with our name and said he likes Mormons better because we don't focus on Jesus Christ so why call us after him. We Dropped him. We tried hard to have him read in the Book of Mormon and see for himself that it truly is Another Testament of Jesus Christ but he wont read. Kinda sad but it's not his time yet. 

Saturday morning we unexchanged and then passed by a couple of people that we haven't seen in a while. We then visited a less active who was at the hospital for the last 4 months to see how she doing. She is a lot better but has a couple things she needs done at her house so we helped a bit and set up other times to come back and help. We played volley that night and had about 16 people there. It was soooo good. A good amount of less actives and non members too. 

Not a ton happened on Sunday.

Yesterday we got up and left early because they needed to fix some things up in our bathroom. After some great studies we passed by our amazing buddy Robert at his fish shop. His buddy there asked about us so we got a cool little teaching opportunity. He really liked us and what we do. We then dipped to another buddies house. Léo is cool but wasn't super interested anymore so we might try again later and help him cut some more wood for him too. Later in the day we had a member call us and tell us that this nice store in the mall is closing and has really nice deals on bags and stuff because we complemented her once on her bag. We took a quick trip there to see what was going on. We ended up all getting ponchos that were kinda similar. They are all made from alpaca fur and made in Ecuador. This dude brought them here and tried to have a store but is going out of business now. The ponchos were a good deal so we took em. That night we joined the youth and some non members on a short hike up the little mountain here. We all wore our ponchos and it was really fun. Yesterday we also were going to have a lesson with our buddy Fanel but we got news that he just moved to a different city. Super sad but we are going to find out if he is really there and have the missionaries get with him because he is still on date for baptism and we don't want him to get lost. 

This week was kinda crazy here with a couple of amis being lost, many others being found, new comps, interviews and ponchos! Being in a trio is so much fun and the faith of three working together is so great. We are seeing miracles. I hope y'all are having a wonderful week and take some time to go to the temple or give some service to others. I love y'all so much. Have a great week.

Love Ya,

Elder Beckstrand

Trio and street contacting aftermath

Snow!

Pics from the mountain with my St. Gezzy poncho and the giant cross.

Trio and more snow

Exchanges

Why can't we be friends, why can't we be friends

Salut! How is everyone doing? I hope y'all had a wonderful week and found some way to share the gospel or give service to someone! This week here in good ol' Canada has been really fun and we had some really cool miracles happen. 

Last Thursday we spent most of the day passing by peoples houses and checking up on them. We tried to contact two new referrals that we got but only one of them was home. Alice is super nice. She is from Côte D'Ivoire and is super accepting to us and the gospel. She is just kinda busy and wants any lessons to be with her and her husband. Kinda tricky but we are trying our best to find times that work for all of them. Later that night we swung by the chapel to check out a game night that one of the members set up! It was super cool and there were a few non members there. Members have such an influence on non members and other members. 

Friday was amazing. We tried to go see a member who lives in that sketchy part of town where we almost got robbed last week. We thought ahead and decided to park a couple of streets away and walk so no one saw our car. 2 minutes after we parked this tall dude came walking up the street and kinda gave us a weird look and surveyed our car.  He then walked around to the back and was reading our licences plate for a good two minutes and then walked back down the road that he came up and disappeared behind these other cars. We hurried and drove off and hid our car in a mall marking lot about a kilometer away and then walked. We didn't see anything while we walked there. After the lesson we walked out of the building and started heading down the street and Elder Halliday tells me to cross the street immediately so I follow but also check my surroundings and the little Latino dude is watching us from the widow of his apartment. Super creepy. We hurried back to our car and left for the next place which was on the other side of town. We were going to drop off a book of Mormon to a potential and then dip because we had something to do with the bishop but they invited us in and asked us all these questions about the church and the book. The whole family gathered around to here what we had to say. There was a mother with her 2 daughter and 2 sons from Zimbabwe. They are so cool. We gave them a Book in Swahili and they loved it but asked if they could get one in English. They love speaking Swahili but hate reading it. They all speak about 5 or 6 languages. Once one of them asked for an English one then a couple of the others did too. They are amazing. At the end of the lesson we asked if we could pray before we left and they said yes. After the prayer they clapped and told us how much they love us. They told us we were part of the family already and to stop by whenever. We gave them our information and they tried to read Elder Halliday's doctor scribble and then said, " Elder Halliday et Elder.... Je ne sais pas l'autre nom." I don't know if that was because of his writing but almost everyone here has trouble saying my name. It's kinda funny  though because if they speak English then they can say it pretty easily. 

Saturday was really fun. We had breakfast with the family Dumas. They are amazing. We had a full buffet breakfast and then played a little bit of street hockey afterwards. We then had some stuff to give to less actives and that took up most of the time. That night we played volleyball. We had all of the youth from the ward there along with a couple non members. Rachel is the daughter of our old ward mission leader and she and her friend Jorgon used to be super against the church but enjoyed the missionaries. We met with them a couple of times but always said that they love to talk as long as we don't try to get them to try to come to church because they wont ever come. We talked to them a couple of days before that and told them about an English ward just 25 minutes away and they said they would think about it. They came to volleyball and had a wonderful time. 

Sunday was super cool! The two hour church is super nice but it comes with a lot of responsibilities. We need to make sure that everyone is doing their own personal studies during the week so that they know what is going on at church and so that they don't get left behind. This new change also puts an emphasis on family nights. These don't need to be strictly spiritual and I hope that they aren't. Make sure that y'all are spending one night a week as a family doing something fun and having something spiritual go along with it at the end that prepares y'all for the next weeks lesson at church. At church we had testimony meeting and it was great. Our old ward mission  leader got up and bore testimony on his family because Rachel and Jorgon went to the English church on their own free will. It was super cool to know that they went and that there is a change happening in their hearts. You never know the difference you are making. That night we had dinner with a less active family. We helped watch the kids and cook because the dad was asleep because he works weird hours and the mom had back problems so we helped as much as we could while we were there. African food is soo good. 

Yesterday was really cold. We went and got sushi with this single sister in the ward for lunch because it was her birthday. She is super nice and fed us well. She has two totally less active daughters that we are trying to help her with so it was nice to be able to sit down with her and run ideas around on how to help. We might be having them at volleyball this week. After that we went over to this other single sisters house to try to help her jump start her car. She just bought it from someone but apparently it has been siting for 6 months and the battery is completely dead. It was fun but we were freezing our hands off trying to push the cold metal car with our hands. That's our fault for not grabbing our gloves though. After that we did some street contacting as we walked to our church so we could finish a update document for our bishop so he can see the progress of the people we teach and the less actives we are working with. It was about -15° but with a ton of wind. Really cold. 

We woke this morning to about 7 inches of new snow! It's just going to keep getting colder and snow more and more. I'm really excited for it. Well... that's about it for this week. Make sure y'all have family time this week and go to the temple. Je vous aime beaucoup! 

Love Ya!

Elder Beckstrand

Here are some pictures of street hockey and a picture of us the other night when it got really cold and we had to suit up.

Sushi from the other day and a hamburger that I ate earlier today.

Stanley Yelnats OR Let your light so shine...Like a cabinet on fire!

Salut mes amis! How are y'all doing? I hope you all had a wonderful New Years and made some super resolutions for this 2019 year. This week here wasn't as adventurous as last week but it was still amazing nonetheless. 

Last Thursday we had some studies before we went to go help bishop get ready to move. He needed help cleaning out his shed and deciding what to bring or what to throw away. We ended up burning quite a few things that he didn't want anymore because it was easier that way. We threw a big wooden cabinet on the fire and it took pretty quick. Later that say we went to the church to help set up a wedding reception for a ward member. It was actually pretty fun. They even let us cut and prep the flowers for the bouquets. That night we had dinner with a family that we are teaching. The Neiras are from Peru and absolutely just adore us. We tried to ask if there was anything we can do for them and they shut us down and said that just visiting them and having their two kids see good people like us was good enough. It was super sweet. We asked a few more times how we can repay them and  they actually have a room in the basement that isn't finished and asked if we can help. We took the chance and will be helping with that soon. It was amazing to see the joy and happiness that the gospel can bring into family's. We are all born with the light of God inside of us, it is our responsibility to keep that light burning bright like a cabinet burning on a fire so that others can see it and have that desire to brighten their own light within themselves. Don't let your light get dimmed because you never know who might be lost in the darkness and is in need of your light. 

Friday morning we woke up to freezing rain so we called the other teams to stay in their area for district council and we came to them because the roads were way to icy. Freezing rain is when it rains while the temperature is still below freezing so as soon as the water hits the ground, it turns straight into ice. It's super crazy. The roads and sidewalks and everything was covered in a thin layer of ice. We left early for district counsel and slowly got there. After that we went on exchanges and I stayed down in Lemoyen and worked with Elder Calheros. He is amazing! He just got here 2 weeks ago and is from France. It was really fun and he spoke to me in English to practice his English and I spoke to him in French to practice as well. We had some good time to go finding and snuck in a lesson about the Book of Mormon and how it can and will bless you if you read it. 

Saturday we did some studies and then re-exchanged. Our amis named Fanel doesn't have any winter clothes because this is his first winter so we have been looking everywhere. We got inspired to ask one of the sisters in the ward if she had any and it turns out that she did! Power of the Spirit! We stopped by her place and ended up getting fed a big lunch and then leaving with two big bags of clothes for him. We went to go drop them of that the house that Fanel lives at because we thought he was at work but he was home! He was super happy to see us and to get nice winter clothes. We also gave him a Book of Mormon in Haitian Creole and he loved it. He loves the Book of Mormon so much and expressed how much that meant to him. We then talked for a bit and found a date for him to be baptized! He wants to be baptized on the 16th of April on his birthday. We talked to him and told him that he could be ready sooner and he kinda liked that idea as well. He is so amazing and has such a desire to do good and be a member. 

Sunday was pretty chill. Not a ton happened. Church was great and we set up a ton of activities and dinner appointment and fun stuff like that. We then had good studies. The rest of the day we did street contacting and some knocking around Mont-Saint-Hilaire because we were completely out of clickes and couldn't drive too much. 

Monday we started with breakfast with our ward mission leader because it was his birthday. It was with him, his daughter and one of their friends. The other two are not members but have been asking us questions and have been sharing the gospel with some of their friends too! They are all amazing. Later that day we went spent some time with a ward members family for new years. They are super nice and funny. We finally met the youngest who isn't active anymore. She was super nice and hopefully we get to see her back at church some day. That night we went bishops family party with his whole family and some others. It was super nice. We ate food and played some games. We then had to dip because of mission rules and I couldn't even stay awake until the new year if I tried. 

Yesterday was pretty uneventful because everyone we tried to talk to was asleep still or super drunk. We had a big breakfast with this member family from Haiti. We got there just as everyone was waking up so we cooked some of the breakfast. It was really fun. That night we bought some donuts for some people that don't have a ton of family here to be with for the new year so we went over and spent time with them. It was really nice but we had a sketch experience when we got to their house. We parked and this small Latino dude came on wandering up to our car and then was looking inside and then saw us and kinda just started at us for a while and then walked away. He kept looking back at us and then joined this really big African dude. They were just kinda standing by this building and then pointed at us. They both started walking at the car and looked around it and inside. Once they saw us, we waved and they waved back and just stopped and talked to each other for a second and then headed back to the building. We were so scared. We had to go into the building that they went just went into so we parked the car a couple of streets away and snuck in through a back door. We didn't see them after but it was super sketchy. Kinda fun though. 

That's about all I have for this week. Some super cool miracles and progressing amis! Big thanks to everyone who sent me Christmas gifts because I don't think I've thanked you yet! Thanks! I hope y'all are starting this new year off on a spiritual high and always looking and praying for ways to serve those around you. There is someone out there who needs your help and your light. Make sure you are listening to the spirit and placing yourself in situations to help and lift others up. Keep being awesome! Je vous aime beaucoup! Have a wonderful week and a new year!! 

Love You!

Elder Beckstrand

We went sledding for new years eve with the Family Gaboriault! It was such a small hill and you had to walk back up. Nothing like back home in Brianhead with a giant slope and a tow rope but still super fun.