Pictures 07/30/2012

Green eggs anyone?
You probably don't want to know how I made them,
but they were yummy.

What do you see? :)

Maxine speaks Spanish.

Elder Durrant...and Maxine

My bicycle. "The Iron Horse"

Peanuts!!!!!!

E-mail 07/30/2012

Hello gloriously awesome family! And sharp looking, too! (Thanks for the pictures)

This week has been awesome! We have been busy running to and fro. It rained this week as well.

We have been helping Bro Dave prepare for his baptism that is the first of August. He is so excited for it. Over the course of our teaching him you could see the change from not interested to all the way in. As soon as he recognized the Spirit he jumped right in. He accepts everything that we teach and loves it. We have fun lessons with him, too. He is very good at speaking in a lot of different accents. His favorite is Australian. He likes doing Brooklyn a lot. He asked that Elder Judkins and I be the witness' to his baptism. He is such a great guy and has a strong testimony. He is having his Brother in law baptize and confirm him. It will be a special day.

I was talking with one of my Zone Leaders, Elder Harrison, and we discovered that he had seen me spinning the sign for Subway. That was really cool to have that connection.

We taught Tom this week. We brought Bro Bishop with us. Bro Bishop is a great fellow-shipper for him. He bore sweet powerful testimony. We read from the book of Mormon, first Nephi chapter one. He felt the Spirit. He was fairly speechless afterwards. Hopefully he will come to church soon.

The members here are awesome! They give us rides, they feed us, they go to lessons with us. I love this ward.

I forgot my brain, I mean planner, so I can't remember everything that happened, but it was a great week.

We did see a kid riding his bike backwards. He was sitting on his handle bars peddling backwards. He wasn't even watching where he was going. It was crazy.

Hope you like the pictures!

May the Spirit be with you!

Elder Durrant

E-mail 07/23/2012

Good Morning! Wonderful family! What a beautiful day! The sun is shining, the temperature rising, and Missionaries are out proselyting.
This Sunday all the members in Indiana fasted for rain. It was really cool. When you combine and focus the faith of that many saints miracles happen.
This last week we were able to teach Tom. He has a lot of questions and doubts, but he tells us that he will hear us out. For example he heard about baptisms for the dead and he didn't agree with it because, we found out, he thought we went to the cemetery and did some ritual or something over their plot. We were able to correct that and he likes the way we do it much better than the way he thought we did it. We taught him the plan of salvation. He's not so sure about all of it, but we keep telling him to read the Book of Mormon and ask God to confirm that it is true. Hopefully he will do it soon.
We also taught Bro Jim. He is such a good guy. He loves learning. But he won't make the commitment to be baptized. In our last visit we read Alma thirty-six versus thirty to thirty-nine with him. We both felt the Spirit prompting us to commit him to baptism, so we did. He sat there for a minute struggling with the Spirit. He knew he should get baptized. The Spirit was telling him to. However he went against the Spirit and declined with an "I have to think about it."  For him, once he opens his heart and allows the Spirit in to testify to him, then he will be ready to make that commitment.
We also taught Bro Dave. He is doing so well. He has quit smoking. He still works on Sunday, but he called and asked us if we could give him a few chapters that he could read while at work from the Book of Mormon. He also told us that he wanted to read the Book of Mormon from the beginning. We are excited for him. He has had a complete change of heart and is doing awesome!
Oh, FYI The car was in an accident, so we will be on bikes for a few weeks while it is getting fixed. Which is ok, because I love riding my bike. :) Don't worry it wasn't us. The other Elders whom we share the car with, were hit by someone else. They are fine, it was a low speed hit which just messed up the front of the car. It's all good, though. When the members found out there were tons of offers to give us rides to places, which is sweet.

May the Spirit be with you!
Elder Durrant

E-mail 07/16/2012

Hello stupendtaculous family!!

What a good week. It has cooled down to the eighties, low nineties. The Mayor has issued a "water ban," so no one can water their lawns; because it hasn't rained a lot here. Missionary work is going very well. This upcoming week is going to be so busy. It goes back to "if you plan busy days, you will have busy days; if you plan slow days, you will have slow days." We didn't meet with Tom this week. He had just gotten back from Lafayette and was really tired. Bro Robert and Shirley, (Shirley is the member that whenever she sees us she says"hello my sons!") They renewed their vows this last week. They invited us to be there. They did it in an evangelical church. That was my second wedding that I have witnessed. The first was at the Bountiful Temple. It was interesting to compare the two. We are excited for them, though, after he is baptized, to be sealed in the Temple. It will be such a good experience for them. We are also teaching Bro Dave, who is getting baptized August fourth, in our last visit we had read part of the word of wisdom pamphlet and he said to us "I don't know if I'm getting ahead of myself here, but I smoked my last cigarette at twelve forty five today." We were so excited, because we knew that he smoked and him saying that showed his great desire to be baptized. Also, after he accepted to be baptized, he got a job. This job requires him to work on Sunday, right when church is. He said to us "this is the Lord testing me to see how much I really want to be baptized." He was able to put two breaks together and come to church this past Sunday. If his boss' heart stays softened Dave will continue to be able to attend church. I love seeing when we put forth the effort required, then God steps in and takes care of what we can't. Dave is so excited to be baptized. Another of our investigators, Bro Jim, came to church. Normally he leaves right after sacrament meeting, but he is going to start staying for gospel principles. It may or may not be in connection with his wife receiving a calling requiring her to stay for the second hour. The Lord works in mysterious ways. ;) I love it here! The people here are great! This is the best ward!

May the Spirit be with you!
Elder Durrant

Pictures 07/09/2012

The Breakfast

Elder Durrant

Over the field

Elder Judkins and Elder Brezenski 

The Zone sitting in the
quarterback suite.

In the Colt's locker room

Elder Valinga, Elder Olsen,
Elder Durrant, and Elder Madsen

Elder Faniaka and Julianne

Elder Judkins, Elder Durrant, and Julianne

Maxine
Thanks Shari for sending me a
girlfriend for my birthday!
The other Elders are jealous!

E-mail 07/09/2012

Hello positively fantactastict family!

I have more time today, so hopefully this will be a good e-mail. If I have not responded to anyone's E-mail it is not because I'm lazy like that, I have just forgot. So if you want to re-ask me something or resend something you want a better response to then feel free to.

This last week has been so awesome! JuliAnne was baptized Saturday and It was awesome. We are really excited for her. The following Sunday she was late and so we were getting worried she wouldn't come. I was sitting on the stand because I was giving a talk and I just so happened to have the phone so I was able to find out she was coming and let the Bishop know. When she walked in the bishop pulled me into the sacrament prep room, which was cool because you only see or hear that kind of stuff happening, but he asked me if I thought we should still confirm her. I said I thought it would be a good idea. He gave the go ahead so she came onto the stand and we confirmed her with me acting as voice. It was a sweet experience.

Bro David, whom we have been teaching for a couple months, came to church for the first time in a while and I almost jumped out of my seat and embraced him, but I refrained. The previous Monday we had set August fourth for him to be baptized. When He came to church he was telling everyone about it. He is so excited to be baptized. I love him.

For the Fourth of July our preparation day was moved to this day. We first had a breakfast with the ward. Then we taught JuliAnne. Then as a zone we went to the Lucas Oil Stadium and toured it. There were twenty two missionaries there. I love seeing missionaries.

We taught Bro Jim as well. We taught Enduring to the end. He struggles with making the commitment to be baptized. He thinks a lot about it. We have been focusing a lot on the gospel of Jesus Christ. His faith is growing. He has come a long way. Before he didn't really care about anything religious, now he is half way through the Book of Mormon, knows it's true, comes to sacrament meeting more often than not. He loves learning. It is really fun to teach him.

Bro Tom. Oh Brother Tom, we went to his house for our appointment and he came out and said he wants to stop our visits, because he is never going to believe some of the things we believe. We tried to convince him otherwise for a minute than we decided to respect his agency and we told him so. That we weren't going to force him. Then something happened, he asked a question and I started to look in the scriptures for his answer. He said come on in. So we did. We sat down and he apologized for coming off strong with his questions last week. He admitted he is looking for a church. He is willing to let us teach him the things that we want to teach. What a miracle! Was his heart softened!

I love serving here! I get to continue serving here another six weeks as well. I am so excited!

I love you all! May the Spirit be with you!

Elder Durrant

Pictures 07/02/2012

That's fifteen!

The District. Left to right front row.
Elder Hiskey, Elder Brezenski,
Elder Judkins, Elder Vang.
Back row. Elder Harris, Elder Durrant

Cool pose

Alma and the Sons of Mosiah
rebuked by an angel

Picture of above

Elders

E-mail 07/02/2012

!Hola! !Familaria!

What a busy crazy week! We have been teaching a lot and we have members going with us to these lessons so they are progressing faster than if they did not come.

Julianne, one of our investigators is getting baptized this Saturday. She is a good lady. If she is not able to attend our ward, because of work, than she will go to another ward for as long as she can. She really wants to be baptized. As we were helping her pick who would do what during the baptism, she is allowing me to confirm her.

I don't have a lot of time today, by the way, so if I don't respond to your e-mail don't think I hate you, I just don't have time. We only have an hour today.

One of our investigators, Robert, is getting baptized September first. We had to move it, because that is when he gets off of parole. We cannot baptize people who are on probation or parole. That is part of their repentance and it would take First Presidency approval to do otherwise. He is a really good guy. A teddy bear would describe him accurately. His wife loves missionaries and whenever she sees us she says "Hello my sons!" She tells us her home is "our home away from home." She is a great lady. She is a member.

We went over to Tom's house and when we walked in he had sitting on the table the Bible the Book of Mormon and about ten sheets of anti. That was fun trying to wade through that. With about everything he said to us we would tell him that he would need to read the Book of Mormon. The answers are in the Book of Mormon. He admitted he hadn't read the Book of Mormon. By the end of the night we had him committed to read the Book of Mormon before we would come back over and teach him. We knew that until he read the Book of Mormon nothing we said would do anything for him. Our next visit is going to be fun. We plan to teach the Plan of salvation after we know he has read the Book of Mormon. I expect to see a visible difference in him after his reading.

It's been a fun week. It's been warm. My birthday was awesome! The mailman was great. He brought the package to us and said he wanted to bring it before we left for the day. How nice of him. Don't worry I will take pictures, but I will tell you what I did with some of the items. The apple I put in a blender with a banana, an orange, and with milk. It tasted interesting. I love the banana bread, it tastes good. And Maxina...my new girlfriend...When I first saw it I was like what in the world is this. I finally figured it out. I buckled her up in the back seat of the car and she has been out proselyting with us, she stays in the car. All of the other missionaries love her. You will love the pictures I'm going to send.

I love you all! May the Spirit be with you!

Elder Durrant