ELDER MATTHEW LEBARON - 4/17 - Transfers...

Well... this week has been a wild one! I would like to apologize for not writing last week! there have been some problems with my ipad and my email, and so I haven't been able to write emails with my ipad, so we didn't have a chance to go anywhere on our pday last week where there was computers! especially since we had our temple trip last week, it was awesome but man, going to the temple can really mess up your pdays!

This last saturday, I got a phone call from our Zone Leaders, and they informed me that I was going to be transfered into Filipino work! thats so weird. it was the last thing that I was expecting. for one, I thought that I was going to be in English work the rest of my mission... I also thought that I was going to be on a bike the rest of mission.... well guess not. our area is huge, apparently we cover the whole mission, and even other missions too. I'm not exaclty sure where our boundaries end... becausae we technically have a member in South Jordan Utah that we just got in our area book, so technically we would be the missionaries over them. so look out all my utah goers, I'm gonna make a trip to Utah real quick, oh man I wish that would be cool! but we only have 50 miles a day, so it looks like that member isn't going to our ward, or we are going to be saving up our miles! there are some people that only speak Tagalog which is a little indimidating, I know zero about Tagalog, I hardly know much about being  missionary in English work... oh boy, this is going to be good.

It's funny, because all my dreams are coming true this transfer. a long time ago someone asked me, "where do you want to serve if you could choose anywhere in the mission" I responded back " I would like to serve in Glendale, I would like to have a car, have a huge area, and not have any leadership postions while doing it" they told me it wasn't possible because all the people in Glendale were the Zone Leaders, the Sister Training leaders, or the Assistant to the president. well guess what boy, I'm making my dreams come true, and no one is going to stop me. I have prayed so much for  a car on my mission its not even funny. The biking is good because it keep the weight off, so I decided awhile ago that I just wanted a car for the summer time.... and guess what my friends miracles have not ceased, this very car that I have been dreaming about will be mine for the hot hot hot summer time in SoCal. I deserve this. my whole life has been leading up to this very moment. if you have a dream, go and get it. it's yours for the taking, they said it wasn't possible, they said it couldn't be done, but guess what haters, didn't mess with me back then, but how about now? Alright I'm a little too excited about this, but there will be many good wonderful things that will come from this. 

Well, I don't really have much to report other than the news of transfers, I am currently writing this email from one of our members, and his keyboard is only in Tagalog so I literally can't tell if I am spelling anything write so here are my true colors, I don't know how to spell, I know that I have been fooling all of you for the last 10 months, but heres the real me, haha. I love all you guys! thank you for all the Love and support! if you want to send me nice things, I'm not going to stop you

Elder LeBaron

614 West Foothilll Blvd Arcadia, California, 91006

SISTER SARAH JOHNSON - 4/10 - This week rocked!

Tuesday was MLC, and it was really fantastic. We learned about how obedience is such an important principle to our lives, because that's the only way we can enjoy the blessings of Heaven. We talked a lot about how different kingdoms have different rules and laws, and we have to obey them to be a part of the kingdom. So the Gospel is basically the laws of the Celestial kingdom, and we have to learn to follow them here so that we can be comfortable there. My favorite quote from the day was "As members of the Kingdom, it is your right to see the King. But you have to obey the laws of the Kingdom." Good food for thought :). It was fun to share it all with the zone on Friday. 

AND JOHN GOT BAPTIZED!! :D Saturday was awesome! John was smiling ear to ear, and you could just feel how happy he was. The water was this terrible green color though.... i'll see if we got a picture haha. So many people came and it was beautiful! And John is super excited to get the gift of the Holy Ghost this Sunday (we had to wait because Stake Conference was this weekend >.<). Ah! The Gospel is just so good. 

So yeah, Stake Conference was really good too! We got to see President and Sister Dymock, they're the best! President saw us and spilled the beans on our transfer calls, and Sister Mitchell and I are both staying here in Potlatch and Moscow YSA! :D We are so, so excited! And Sis Cheney is going back to Pullman YSA tomorrow, and her companion is going to be Sis Allen, who is a girl I knew in highschool, and is from my home stake. I'm so excited, because all the sisters in the zone are going to be fantastic, and we're going to hang out all the time for dinners and stuff. I'm really excited to be able to go on exchanges again, too. Haven't done that since I got to Moscow.... 

This week we also got to go out and see Jim in Potlatch! He's the nicest old guy ever, and teaching him is so much fun. He often forgets what we've talked about, so we go over a lot of things again. But his desire to learn is so pure, and he loves when we come over and teach. He had this terrible foot surgery though, and has this nasty pins sticking out of his toes. We've hesitated to talk about baptism with him too much because he can't put his foot in the water right now. BUT! he should be getting the pins out this Wednesday! So Sister Mitchell and I had a mini eye-contact conversation, and decided to ask him if he would like to get baptised before he goes to Alaska this May. And.... He said yes!! :D He wants to get baptised May 6th, and we are so pumped about it! Just have to figure out how to get him to church 3 times before then.... but we think we can do it! I've been doing lots of praying for him, and if it's Heavenly Father's will, things have a great way of working out :). 

Oh! And April 6th was Jesus' Birthday, and the anniversary of the restoration of the church! So we made a chocolate cake and sang happy birthday to Jesus. I'll have to send pictures next week.... haha oops. But it was fabulous! 

Anyways, super excited for the new week! I'm glad we get another shot at Moscow, hopefully with no super weird events this time. Haha it's nice to be in the same 2 areas this transfer, now we'll know some people :). 

I love you all! Keep on Keeping on! :) 

Sister Johnson

Here are some pics! We found a ladybug...

and a pic of us at the Stake Conference Dinner. 

And John's baptism!! :D 

And a zone pic from a few weeks ago, I couldn't remember if I sent it, but i think it's funny so if I did, enjoy it again :) 

Also a pic of us waiting for a lesson with Isabeau, I couldn't keep my eye open in the sun, not winking at anybody ;)

And a pic from the food bank we work at on Wednesdays. 

SISTER SARAH JOHNSON - 4/3 - WOAH GUYS IT'S APRIL

And what a fabulous April it is going to be, because it has already started out fantastic! 

Most of the week was good missionary work. Lots of driving to Pullman and back... oh! And we got to meet with John every night last week! We did a lot of review and talking about the commandments :). And he had his baptismal interview on Friday with President Clark, and he passed!! He was so excited, it was so fun to be there. So now we're confidently moving forward with the baptism on April 8th, and we couldn't be happier :)). That's probably the #1 reason April is going to rock. 

Also Conference! I hope you all listened to S Mark Palmer, because he used to run this mission. ;) But I also really liked Yoon Hwan Choi's talk, where he said something about always looking up and opening your mouth no matter where you are. It's a good principle to remember as a missionary. The best part about Conference though, is that not only did John watch 3/4 sessions, but we got to watch a session with Isabeau, and another with Ezra, and Tessa watched all the sessions in her dorm room! Ah! I was so excited that so many of our investigators were able to watch it :). Exra was especially exciting to see there, because he got to meet some of the YSA members, and he hadn't been to church in months with us. But we had a really amazing lesson with him on Thursday, where we straight up asked him if he'd really given the Book of Mormon a chance in the year he's been meeting with missionaries. And he said he hadn't, but he was ready to. I'm so excited for him, because I feel like he finally committed to reading and praying every day, and he'll start making an effort to make it to church and YSA activities. He's just awesome, I'm so excited to keep teaching him too. 

Ok but the funniest part of last week was actually Saturday night. A less active Chinese member in Pullman wanted to take the 3 of us to dinner to "thank us for our service". It didn't take us more than 10 minutes during the dinner to realize he actually knew absolutely next to nothing about the church he was a part of. Basically, we spent an hour being flirted at over a $70 sushi dinner. I'm going to call it, "The Polygadate of 2017", because that's exactly what it was. And when we asked him if we could share a little message with him, he got this panicked look in his eyes and said "we're not actually going to pray here, are we??" Pretty sure he wasn't counting on a message haha. And then, just before we left, I said "Hey, want to come to church tomorrow?" and he made some excuse about homework, and I said "Do you have just an hour for Jesus though?"and he said "Oh, I have every SECOND for Jesus, girl!" It was pretty fabulous. And even though it was 10/10 the most uncomfortable member dinner I've ever been to, we would not hesitate to do it over Mexican food next week. Haha! 

Oh! Also this week we met Makenna, a new investigator in Pullman! She was referred to us by a member, and she's the most golden, prepared person I have ever met. Wow. She had already been reading the Book of Mormon every day for 2 weeks, and in the first lesson agreed and wanted to be baptised! She's planning on May 13 (I think?) so that her family can come! She's already giving her parents Books of Mormon too, and they're considering looking into it. It just feels miraculous to me. Ah! It's amazing how well Heavenly Father leads His children to the Gospel of Jesus Christ. I am more and more convinced that He is aware of each of us the longer I'm out here to witness it. 

Anyways, today is going to be a weird P-day, because Gonzaga (the Catholic college in Spokane) won something or another, and is playing some big championship something or another in football or basketball or something or another.  So, we're working from 2-5 instead of 6-9, because no one around here will be doing anything but watching the game this evening. So it'll be a party! Yay! :D haha

I love you all! I hope things are going well! 

Here are a couple of pics! One of the picture we drew on our miles report for Elder Boehme at the office. Haha! 

And then one of our Polygadate. :D

Also me and a tree, don't remember why. 

A picture of the scenery, looks like a real life desktop screen! 

And then 3 pictures of the marshmallow dodgeball crew!

 I got hit in the neck, it was rather painful.

 Haha and the zone is pretty funny, if we do say so ourselves. :D 

ELDER MATTHEW LEBARON - 4/3 - Conference, bike crashes, and the ghetto

This week is going to be juicy one, well... at least a lot better than
my last couple of emails, I feel like I haven't had a lot to talk
about, but this week I have too much, haha.

First off, General conference was awesome! Maybe its just that I'm
missionary, but It seemed like a lot of conference focused on
missionary work. There were so many good talks, and so many things
that it helped me realized that I could be doing to be a more
effective servant of the Lord. I also noticed that a lot of the
apostles, and even Thomas. S Monson were looking fresh in those grey
suits. I couldn't help but appreciate dieters good looks, man that guy
delivers. Pretty much the whole conference was filled with really
powerful talks. It sucks that its over. I can't wait until next 6
months in October when we have conference again. It's seriously like
the super bowl for missionaries. I love it. I love this church, and I
love our dear prophet Thomas. S monson. I hope that everyone was able
to receive specific answers for themselves, because I know that I did!

This week has been a weird one, again, another bad week for missionary
work. It seems like everyday there was something that just killed our
time. We had zone conference on Tuesday which was too long as usual.
I'm horrible when it comes to long meetings. I pray that I wont have
too many long meetings to attend in my life. Conference is awesome,
but it makes it hard to do missionary work, but I am grateful for the
opportunity to be filled and be taught. Its refreshing, because as a
missionary it feels like you are always the one teaching and helping
people strengthen their faith.

We had a dinner with one of our members this week, that the other
elders in our pad got invited to as well. They talked forever!
Sometimes its hard to get out of members homes, people love
missionaries so much, that they will eat up all your time.q  After we
finally got out of there we were heading home. We were biking through
this freeway underpass, there was some construction and the road was
bumpy, torn up, and uneven. Since I had been on this road before I
knew not to stay in the gutter, because it pretty much throws you off
a little ledge and into a lot of ripped up road. Its a pretty scary
area, the cars pass by you within inches at high speeds. So we try to
avoid it as much as possible. Mitchell and pastrona were ahead of me,
and Granodos was behind. i saw both mitchell and Pastrona make it
safely through, then I went, I thought everything was fine. But
shortly after I heard a crash. I looked behind me and Granodos didn't
make it through, he biffed it and was now picking his bike onto the
side walk. I turned around and   Asked if he was okay. But with one
glance I knew something wasn't right. His arm looked as if it was
dislocated. His bike was wrecked, the whole frame of the tire was
warped, it was definitely unridable. He wall all scraped and cut up. I
picked up his bike and we walked up to a Walmart that was up the
street, the other elders came back, we blessed him, and a member was
already on the way. We called the presidents wife, she told us we
needed to go a hospital. It was a hospital back in my old area, 2
zones away. We arrived at the hospital at 9:45 and didn't leave until
3:30 in the morning. He broke his wrist in 2 different places, and
will be getting surgery this Tuesday I can't believe how easily things
can happen. If you guys get a chance pray for elder Granodos. I'm
pretty sure he won't get sent home, but I can only imagine how hard it
must be for him. It was so weird. I felt wild being out passed 9:30.
Granodos was thirsty so we went to the store to get drinks, it was
like 12 at night. Full pros and no worries.

The next day was kind of hard, after getting use to a sleeping
schedule for 10 months it really messes you up if you don't follow it.
Even though we were given permission to sleep in, it probably took me
2 days to recover from that. It's just funny, because before I came on
my mission I would stay up super late, and wake up early and feel
fine. But now it's just a killer, probably has to do with the strains
of missionary work, there really isn't a time when you can come home
and get a good nap in (especially now that lunches are 30 minutes) but
everything is good, I'm so grateful for the Lord always watching out
for us. There have been times on my mission where I probably should
have been hurt pretty bad, and I know that things could have been a
lot worse with elder Granodos. It kind of sucks because he will
probably soon be emergency transferred to a place where they have a
car, and we're going to miss our little buddy.

This morning when we went to the laundry mat there were cops
everywhere surrounding the flower shop across the parking lot. The
police had their guns drawn, and they had a helicopter circling it.
This place is ghetto man. Not my whole area, but at least the
neighborhood where we live. It's not the first time that I've seen
cops surrounding a place, with helicopters flying around. I've seen
multiple prostitutes around our area, and drug deals... like freak. LA
county is a dirty, hot, and overpopulated place. I would never live
here. But it's a great place to serve a mission! I really love it
here. There isn't a day that goes by where we don't run into really
interesting people, or see something out of the ordinary. You always
want your mission to be a little crazy, but this isn't a place I would
want my family being for sure, haha.

Well I love you guys! Thanks for all the letters and support you give!
Being a missionary is a blessing. The Lord has blessed me so much, I
can't even believe it. I know that the Lord is so aware of us, and the
deep desires of our hearts. He wants us to be happy, this life is a
place where can experience so much joy. So what are you waiting for?
Enjoy ever moment you have, for all these little moments will eventual
make a lifetime, and if you choose, it will be a lifetime filled with
peace, love, joy and happiness. This I know is true, that's all our
Heavenly Father wants for us.
Until next week.

Elder LeBaron

614 West Foothill Blvd, Arcadia, California, 91006