Headed To Shreveport, Louisiana!!

Hey everyone! This week was pretty interesting!

"Dinner, dessert, and a great lesson from Elder Larsen and Elder Pierre tonight!!!" - Sister Alhalteh

On Tuesday we went on exchanges with the Zone Leaders and that was good, in one of their appointments we went to the son of the guy they were teaching, walked in and sat down, started talking with us then we were about to start teaching and he pulled out a note pad and started writing down everything that we were saying. I was amazed haha if only that happened with every investigator...

Happy Birthday to Elders Hendrickson and Hainsworth!

Wednesday we had District meeting and it went well! After at lunch, we went to a restaurant called Papitos and it took us literally 3 hours to get out of there it was so bad.

Thursday we were just working here in Canton and had an appointment with Joseph, we committed him to coming to church so it was a pretty good lesson!

Friday we weekly planned for hours and went and tried to visit a few people. Then we were trying to find somewhere good to eat here. Turns out there is this mexican restaurant that I have never seen before. It was so funny hahahahaha. We walked in and music was just blasting, they were having karaoke night hahaha, and there was a tooonnn of people there. It was hilarious and the food was probably one of the best mexican places I have ever been it was sooooo good. A perfect combination of good food and people watching hahaha, Mom you would have loved it!

THE best Mexican Food Ever!!!

Saturday we went to an appointment with Brother Ueki to visit a friend of his that he works with and on the way to that appointment President Olson called and told us he was shutting the area down, kinda sad, but that’s ok.  I bet you have never heard of someone opening and closing the same area haha.  We went to dinner at President Comans house and I had to break the news to them about no more missionaries in their area. It was pretty awkward, they weren’t very happy after that, I felt bad. They are awesome though!

Dinner with The Wonderful Ueki's!

"Wonderful 'Last Supper' with the Missionaries.  Sorry to see these guys go but oh did we feed them well tonight!!"  -Sister Comans 

                   
Sunday we went to church in Madison and said goodbye to everyone there. They were so much fun to be with. I am grateful for all of the families there. They took great care of us!!

"Saying goodbye- your son is headed to Shreveport, Louisiana.  Wherever he is in life, he will be a success.   You have a great son."  -Sister Bradburn

I am doing great!  Guess what! I am getting transferred! I am going a llll the way across the mission haha to Shreveport, Louisiana and President called me as the new Zone Leader so that’s gonna be scary!!!!!  I am excited, it will be good!  I am sad to leave this area. It was a great area as far as all the members go. They were so awesome!!  Elder Pierre-Louis is going to Purvis to a real Spanish speaking area! He has been fun to be with. I will miss him!  We didn’t have anyone too serious that we were leaving behind. Here in Canton things have been a little rough. We haven’t been able to get anyone to really progress the whole time we have been here. That’s ok though I hope that one day missionaries will be able to do productive work here!  I am excited to continue to learn and to grow! I can’t wait for the adventures that lie ahead!

President tells all the Zone leaders their new companions before the transfer.  My comp is Elder Lovell. I don’t know anything about him though, except this is his last transfer before he goes home.  My area is more in Bossier City.  I will let you know the address when I get it!  The mission is huge!!! I don’t know how it’s so big haha. They should honestly split it in half.  I will be in a full car still. I will have to do a lot of traveling...

A mission is full of challenges and full of hard experiences. But if you look at it a mission is just like the "furnace of affliction" Nephi was talking about in 1 Nephi 20:10. As we go through the course of our missions we are being refined. Elder Pierre-Louis and I were talking about this the other day, how a mission is basically another rebirth because how much change takes place in you and in your life while you are serving. Keep working hard and let the mission mold you!

These past few months have been great! I have learned a lot and been able to grow a ton too! So the other day we got a call from one of our investigators and he said "Hey don’t we have an appointment today at 3?" We weren’t going to make it so we rescheduled with him for 5 and he said "alright make it here as soon as you can because I have some of my friends here that want to talk with you"......... So we went into this knowing that he was going to have some of his friends there that wanted to bash with us, so we show up and sit down and start reading from the Book of Mormon and the guy that was there just started laughing and said "So you mean to tell me that Jesus Christ after he ascended into heaven came down here in the Americas?" We told him yes and explained to him about everything. Then he started going off about how no Prophet ever was white and that I was wrong and from the lineage of Esau and how Caucasians aren’t supposed to even have any part of the gospel and were never meant to know about Jesus Christ. He started to tell my companion that he was a disgrace to the African American race because he was with me and believed what I believe. He was pretty crazy. After he was done going off we were like ok, well we appreciate you talking with us and we will talk to you later. It was very hard not to talk back to him. Soooooo the moral of the story.... The south is crazy and they don’t like white people.  They were like recording the whole conversation too haha.... But I have been doing so good. I have truly been so happy and I love being able to serve the Lord!  It’s been really hard but it’s been awesome!!

Love you so much!

Thanks for all that you do!!:)

Hope you are all doing great!!

Elder Larsen

Hey Mom!! I am able to watch the bball game!!! GO KASS!!! Send someone over to the other side of the court so I can see them on camera!!:) I am watching the game right now and was able to pick Dad out of the crowd sitting as he usually does haha. Does he have on a white shirt?! I will be praying for them!!  I hope that they do good. They are playing good right now. It might be time to take Kennedy out though. Up by 20 I think that she should start getting rested haha.

Tell Kass good game!!!!