Football is back!

Hey y'all, this was another great week here in good ol' Attalla, Alabama.  According to everyone here, the weather is "not normal for August," which I am fine with.  It's usually in the 80s as opposed to the upper-90s, which is still hot but bearable.  Football season has officially begun, and all is well.

This week we were able to see William again.  He has been reading a little bit of the Book of Mormon, and he reads from the Bible pretty regularly as well.  We weren't really sure about his intent in reading, so we asked him a few things about that.  I asked him why he read the scriptures every day.  He replied with a "I don't know, it's just what I do" type of answer.  We talked about if he felt anything as he read the scriptures, specifically the Book of Mormon, and he just said, "No, it's just kind of there."  We then were able to teach him about what exactly the Book of Mormon is - evidence of the Restoration.  If it's true, then Jesus is the Christ, Joseph Smith is a prophet, and the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints is the Lord's Kingdom on Earth.  We then invited him to have a motive or an intent behind reading the book.  That intent should be to discover that it's true, and that it's the word of God.  We taught him about how the Spirit works, how it feels, and how to recognize it.  It was a good lesson, and for the first time since we started seeing him, William prayed at the end of the lesson.  I'm glad we were able to just teach him.  He, like most people, just doesn't seem to understand the significance of the Book of Mormon.  Our intent was to help him understand, and I feel like we did our best at doing that.

Daniel is by far one of the most solid people I've taught on my mission.  He's so awesome.  He came to church on Sunday and we just took him to an empty classroom and had a lesson with him during Elder's Quorum.  It was actually the first real sit down lesson I've had with him.  Daniel was originally a Book of Mormon referral last spring, and so I asked him why he ordered a Book of Mormon.  He said that he had read the Bible, and read lots of other things like the Apocrypha and whatnot, but he just felt that something was missing.  When he came across the Book of Mormon, he ordered one.  He told us that when he reads it, he sees how everything in it is just perfectly in line with the New Testament (which he is very familiar with).  He told us about how he loves coming to church, and he especially enjoys the organization of the Church, specifically how we don't have a pastor, but that there are members of the congregation who speak instead.  We also talked about baptism with Daniel, and basically just said to him that our purpose in meeting with him is to help him make the decision to be baptized by proper authority into the Lord's Church.  We then invited him to be baptized.  Haha that was actually kind of funny what happened there.  Here's how it went:

Elder Vanderhoff:  "Daniel, we want to invite you to be baptized by someone who holds the Priesthood authority of God."

Daniel:  "Oh, okay."

*5-10 second pause*

Me: "Is that something that you want to do?"

Daniel:  "What?  Oh yeah, of course.  Yes."

Haha it was kinda funny just because the invitation didn't get phrased very well, but it was still awesome.  Daniel is so solid.  There are obviously some things that he still doesn't understand, and a few more things that we have to teach him, but he is so ready.  I'm excited for him.

One thing that's real tough in this area is finding.  Elder Vanderhoff has knocked close to every door in Attalla, and if he hasn't, someone else has within the past year.  There were a few people that we met tracting this week, and we were able to talk to them for a while and set up return appointments.  Well, when we went back for the appointments, not a single one of those people were home (or at least they just didn't answer).  That's pretty much how missionary work goes sometimes, and that's how our lives have been lately.  It's tough, but we're working on it.

We saw Patience this week really briefly.  We stopped by just as she was headed out, so we only talked for like 5 minutes.  She told us that she hadn't been drinking recently, and that she had been going to church regularly with her aunt or cousin or daughter, I'm not sure, for the past few weeks.  I always feel kind of bad when that happens, just because I know that while those other churches are good, they aren't the Lord's Church.  They don't teach revealed truths, they just teach the philosophies of men mingled with scripture.  I know what people are missing out on.  However, when Elder Anderson came to our mission last January, he said something like this:  If people don't want to hear about the Restoration, then just talk to them about the New Testament.  If they don't want to hear what we have to say, just talk to them about Jesus.  Help them build their faith in Him.  If they don't want to hear what we have to say, just help them be a good Baptist or a good Methodist or whatever they are.  Just help them to become better followers of the Savior.

I thought that was sound advice, and something that applies to Patience very well.  It's fine that she doesn't want to accept the Restored Gospel at this time.  We gave her a chance, and I'm sure that she'll get another one.  What is important is that she has stopped drinking, and is now attending church.  She is also praying more often than she said she was before.  Those are all things that she wasn't doing until we met her a few weeks ago.  We helped her, and that's what's important.  Are we going to keep stopping by, and keep trying to teach her?  Of course.  But if she's not ready, she's not ready.  We have helped her improve her life and improve her faith, and she's better off for it.

One more thing from this week - Etowah High School kicked off the football season on Thursday.  The game started at 7:00, and there was already crazy traffic around the stadium at like 4:30 when we drove by.  We rode by the stadium shortly after the game started, and just walked around outside the gates for a bit.  One guy came up to us and was like, "Are y'all not allowed to go in?"  I said, "Well, we just can't pay for it."  He then reached into his wallet and slipped us a $20.  HAS THE DAY OF MIRACLES CEASED?!  Haha, so we went and watched the game for a little while and talked to some of the crazy high schoolers in there haha.  It was fun.  I'm excited for football like everyone else here in the Bible Belt.  However, I'm not excited for unproductive proselytizing on Saturdays because everyone is too busy watching College Football haha.  It's gonna be tough.

Alrighty, love y'all.  I love being a missionary, and sharing what I know with others.  I know that the Savior lives, loves us, and blesses us daily.  I know the Book of Mormon is true, and that "a man will get nearer to God by abiding by its precepts than by any other book."  I know that miracles have not ceased, nor will they as long as we have the faith to call down the powers of heaven.  I love y'all, have a good week!

Elder Beach

#RollTide

Etowah High School season opener. They played rival Gadsden. The two teams haven't played each other in 9 years, and it was the first game of the season. It was packed. Etowah won - yeet!

We helped a branch member cut down some trees for service this week.

Noccalula Falls is awesome!

The lady that owns this house has a patent on the brick color.  It is literally pink.  So, if anyone uses this same brick or mortar, she can sue them.  :)

Fun days in Attalla!

Bonfire at a member's house.

Our district.

"This is my gospel"

Hey everybody, this was a good week here in Attalla, and I'm looking forward to another 6 weeks here!  Transfer calls were yesterday, and I'll be staying for another transfer with Elder Vanderhoff.  That was good news to hear, and we both look forward to the next 6 weeks.

This week we were able to go see Daniel again on Saturday.  He had told us earlier in the week that we could stop by Saturday morning, but when we texted him to remind him (at about 8:30 or 9 AM) he didn't respond.  So we went over there anyway.  When we got to his house around 10:25 AM, we spent a couple of minutes knocking the door, and nobody answered.  So I pulled out my phone to call him and he had actually texted us like 3 minutes before saying, "I am awake and hungry.  Have you guys ate yet?"  He had just got up at like 10:15 and had no idea that we were on his porch at that very minute.  So we called him and he just said, "Well, it's too early to go to lunch, so just come over at like 11:30 and we'll go to lunch then."  Haha he still had no idea that we were at his house right then.  Anyway, we left for a bit and came back at 11:30, and he took us to a Chinese Buffet for lunch.  It was really good, and for a buffet, I really didn't eat that much, plus I ate lots of fruit and vegetables so I was pretty proud of myself haha.  We talked to Daniel for a while and he told us that he has started to go through the Gospel Principles book, and he is still reading from the Teachings of the Presidents of the Church manuals as well.  He's a pretty awesome guy, I just wish that we could have lessons with him.  His work/sleep schedule is so weird that pretty much the only time we can meet with him is if we go out to lunch.  We're going to work on teaching a week or two of Gospel Principles just so that we can teach him since we rarely get to during the week.  One thing that was a bummer was that he had to go into work after he took us to lunch, and he didn't get done until like 12:30 AM Sunday.  He slept in until 10:30ish again and didn't make it to church.  That was too bad, because it was Stake Conference, and it was really good.

The theme of Stake Conference was all about families.  Elder Bradley D. Foster of the Seventy presided, and he gave a great talk that I just want to share one quote from.  He said, "In the Lord's house of order, family is the enduring, eternal unit."  I thought that was a cool quote.  I'm thankful for my family and the opportunity that we have to be together forever.  I am thankful for my parents every day when I see households with only one parent, or no parents, or parents who aren't the best example to their kids.  I'm just thankful that I was raised in such a good home, was taught the principles of the Gospel, and was around a family who lived them.  Love you guys!  Thanks for being such a sweet fam.

We also got to see William this week and we taught him about the Plan of Salvation.  There were several questions that he asked that we were able to answer.  There were also several things that he just told us that he believed based on logic and reasoning and thinking about things for a long time.  Most of the things he said made sense, but we were able to share with him what we believed.  I basically told him, "William, I want you to know why we believe what we believe.  It's not because we just read the Bible and interpret it our own way.  It's not just because we think about things and come up with solutions on our own.  Everything that we believe has been revealed from God Himself to His servants on earth."  I wasn't degrading him or putting his beliefs down in any way.  I was just sharing the Plan of Salvation - revealed truths - that he needed to hear.  And I told him why we believed that and where our beliefs came from.  It was a great visit, and we were able to answer many of his questions.

If y'all remember Damion from like a month ago, we got to see him this week as well.  We went over to his house and we read 3 Nephi 27 with him.  That is a really great chapter that gives us a very basic but comprehensive view of what the Gospel of Jesus Christ really is.  It also gives us another bit of important information: what Christ's Church should be called.  I'm sure y'all have heard about President Nelson's announcement about how we should use the official name of the Church rather than "Mormon" or "LDS."  Well, 3 Nephi 27 addressed that, and we were able to talk about it with Damion.  In that chapter, the Savior in effect says this: "I'm not sure why you are arguing about what to call my church.  It is mine, it should be called in my name.  It should be called the Church of Jesus Christ.  If it is not called that, how can it be my church?  And if it is called that, then it is my church, as long as it is built upon my gospel."  He then proceeds to explain to the people his gospel.  He explains how he was crucified and how he atoned for everyone.  He explains how we must have faith, repent, be baptized, receive the Holy Ghost, and endure to the end.  He then finishes with, "Verily, verily, I say unto you, this is my gospel."  It's so plain and simple and straightforward.  And it's what the world needs to hear.  I know that the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints is exactly what it claims to be - the Church of Jesus Christ.  The only true and living church upon the face of the whole earth.  The only church on earth with the complete and full gospel of Jesus Christ.  The only church on earth with the correct ordinances of salvation, and the only church with the priesthood authority necessary to administer those ordinances.  I love being a part of it, and I love sharing these truths with others.  I know for myself that they are true.

Alrighty, well, I've got to get running.  I love y'all and I hope y'all have a great week.  You're always in my prayers, and I definitely appreciate being in yours.  This is the Lord's work, and I love being part of it.

Love y'all!

Elder Beach

#RollTide

King Beach!

Nature of God

Hello family and friends, this has been a good week, and here are a few of the highlights/stories.

We decided this week to go and stop by and see Patience.  She was home, not drunk, and actually talked to us.  It was awesome!  She basically has no filter and so she just says whatever comes to her mind, no matter what it is, profanity and all.  She's a hoot to talk to.  Anyway, we talked to her a little bit about how her church was with her aunt, and we talked a little about why there are so many churches out there.  That is something that a lot of people wonder, and something that we have the answer to.  It's because of the apostasy, the reformers, and all that jazz!  Well, that opened the door for us to share with her a brief explanation of the Restoration lesson, and we also showed her a video from mormon.org about the Savior's church and where it is today.  It was a pretty good visit, and though it was filled with lots of sarcastic outbursts from Patience, she said something at the end of our visit that was something I was so excited to hear.  She said, "Alright, well I'm gonna grab my cousin next week and we're gonna go to y'all's church.  I can't promise I'll like it, I can't promise I'm gonna come again, but we'll be there once."  We just told her that that is all we can ask of anybody.  However, we did let her know that she will enjoy it, because we know that she will.  We are going to be in touch with her again soon, but we look forward to seeing her at church.  Prayers up for Patience!

This week we also were able to go to lunch with Daniel and one of the members of our branch.  It went really well, and the members here are doing an awesome job of being his friend when he comes to church, as well as during the week.  There are like 5 members who live on the same street as he does, and a couple of them have invited him and us over for dinner together.  Daniel did come to church on Sunday again, and it went pretty well.  We didn't even sit by him in Elders Quorum, he sat by a couple members instead.  Gospel principles was a little wacky again, but we did our best to salvage it.  Haha at the very beginning of the lesson, the teacher says, "Alright today we will be on the very last chapter."  I said, "No, you mean the first chapter, right?"  (Not sure if I mentioned this last week, but last Sunday we had discussed the last chapter, which is exaltation, and the lesson was all over the place, and filled with much deeper doctrine than needed to be brought up.)  "No," he says, "I mean the last chapter, exaltation."  For whatever reason, he wanted to do it again!  Haha, I just said to him, "Yeah, let's just go and do the first chapter, that will be better."  So that's what we did.  The first chapter is called, "Our Heavenly Father."  We basically spent the whole lesson trying to prove to each other that God exists.  It was a little weird, but I guess it's better than talking about exaltation again.  Near the end of the lesson, I just said something like, "I'm pretty sure everyone here knows that God exists.  There is no arguing that.  I think our job at this point is less of proving to ourselves that He is there, and more of trying to understand who He is.  Trying to understand His nature and His character, and then emulating it as best we can."  Based on the many people I have talked to, the many things I have learned, and the many things I have read and experienced, it is pretty clear to me that most of the world has no idea who or what God really is.  If we read any of the creeds that many people follow, (namely the Nicene Creed and the Athanasian Creed) we can basically conclude one thing that the people who believe them believe: that God is incomprehensible, and that it is impossible to really know who or what He is.  We were visiting with a guy just this week whom we asked, "Is God to you a being, or more of just a thing?"  He didn't know how to respond.  He talked about a couple of things, and then just said, "Well, I guess he's more of a thing than a being."  John 17:3 states, "And this is life eternal, that they might know thee the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom thou has sent."  Eternal life is in the balance here!  If we are to have eternal life, we must know God.  We must know that He lives, and we must understand His nature and His character.  Obviously we aren't going to understand it perfectly, but I know that the best place to find that information is in the Restored Gospel.  Because of the Restoration, we know that God has a perfected body of flesh and bone.  We know that He loves us as much now as he did in Old/New Testament times.  We know that He has not ceased to be a God of miracles.  We know that the Heavens are not closed, and that God speaks to us today.  We know that He wants us to become like Him, and we know that that is actually possible!  We know that God is not just an immaterial nothing, but that He is literally our Father in Heaven.  These are all revealed truths that so much of the world either does not believe, or has never heard of before.  I've said it before and I'll say it again:  I'm so glad to be a part of the true church.  In it is found the complete Gospel of Jesus Christ, and everything we need to know to receive the eternal life that has been promised to all who will obey.  You cannot go anywhere else in the world and find that.

Alright, sorry if that sounded like a rant.  I just want y'all to know that I'm grateful for the truth in a world that is so confused about what the truth is.  We don't have to debate about doctrine.  It has been revealed to us.  I love that.

We also were able to see Sonya this week.  Haha I'm not sure what goes through her mind.  Last time we saw her it was blood atonement and false doctrine about how the earth was created.  This week she was talking about how Cain and Abel took to wife some of the spirits that were cast out with Lucifer who had then possessed bodies of their own (not sure where those bodies came from) and that's how their family had started.  She kept telling us that the only other way for Cain and Abel to have children was to take their own mother, Eve, to wife and that's just not true.  It was an interesting visit, and we did our best to just kind of tell her that that stuff (like who Cain and Abel married) was not really that important, but that what was important was reading the Book of Mormon and praying to ask God if it is His word.  She's a funny lady, and her mind is all over the place.  However, she enjoys meeting with us, and she said that she would read the Book of Mormon, so that's good.

A little while ago we met a lady named Cathy while tracting.  She is an older lady, and we were able to see her this week and teach her the Restoration.  It was a great lesson, and I feel confident that she will read the Book of Mormon.  I'm so glad when people do.  For an infinite amount of reasons, most people choose not to read the Book of Mormon.  However, it is truly the word of God.  It truly contains the fullness of the everlasting Gospel.  It is truly the Book that will prepare the world for the Second Coming of the Savior.  I love that Book, and I love helping people to come to love it as well.

Well, this was a good week.  I'm excited for the people we are teaching, and though it is difficult, we are doing our best to find more of them.  One side note for today that I thought was cool - this morning we went golfing.  We played 9 holes and I shot a 44.  Yeah, I took a couple mulligans, but I thought that was pretty good considering I haven't played in years.  I still slice my drives pretty bad though haha.  Alrighty, well, I love y'all.  Have a good week and don't forget to read the Book of Mormon!

Love, 

Elder Beach

#RollTide

#19Days (til Alabama's season starts yeehaw)

My companion celebrated his 20th birthday this week!  We made a cake to celebrate and wished for baptisms!

Official schedule hanging on our wall.

Crazy rainstorm we got caught in.  We thought we could out bike it, but we didn't make it, so we had to wait it out under the eaves of a middle school.  When it didn't stop, we eventually biked home in it.  It took my shoes 2 days to dry out!  In the words of Bear Grylls, "We were sopping moist!"

Dan(iel) and William

Hello to all of my fam and friends and neighbors and everybody else.  This week has been kind of fruitless as far as finding new people to teach, so I don't really have anyone new to talk about.  However, there are some good updates on people that y'all already know about which is awesome.

So Dan (he actually prefers Daniel, so I'm going to use that from now on) came to church again on Sunday.  It was great!  He's so awesome.  The only thing that is a bummer is we can hardly ever catch him at home.  He tells us work has been slow (meaning he should be home more often), but when we stop by he is never there.  Also, we called him earlier in the week and the phone said that his number had either been changed or disconnected.  We called the referral sisters who have been working with Daniel and they were like, "Well we have been texting him recently and he texts back," so we were just confused what was going on.  However, on Saturday we called him again and the call went through and we talked to him for like 15 minutes.  He told us he would be at church (which he was) and also that he had downloaded the Gospel Library app.  Now, I always get nervous when people find that because there is a LOT of info on there that they might not be ready for.  He said that he had been reading the Teachings of the Presidents of the Church books haha.  We told him that was awesome, but for now probably just stick with the scriptures, especially the Book of Mormon, and maybe like the Bible Videos if he wants to watch those.  It was pretty funny.

Church this week was way better than last time he came.  We made him sit in the front with us instead of in the back in order to minimize distractions, and testimony meeting was awesome.  I get nervous for those too sometimes, for various reasons, but it was great.  Gospel Principles class was not very good (remember my story from the Capitol Ward?) haha it was kind of like that except people weren't yelling at each other.  There was just lots of deep doctrine that was brought up and not really explained very well so it gets really confusing really quick.  But afterwards Daniel said to us, "Well, I've only been here a couple times, so I kinda figure that there are things I just won't understand yet."  That was a relief to hear.  There were also like 5 members that were able to chat with Daniel during and after church, so he felt much more at home and comfortable than last time, which was super awesome.  I'm excited for Daniel, he's an awesome guy, I just wish we could catch him at home.  We're supposed to go to lunch with him and a member on Wednesday, so hopefully that all goes to plan.

Soon after church yesterday we had a teamup with a guy named Dan Browning, and we went to go see William.  We actually hadn't seen him since he came to church, but we were able to talk with him and it was really good.  Dan and William really connected, and we just talked about a few things as well as got some feedback from him about how church was a couple weeks ago when he came.  He basically told us, "Well, I sat in the back, hardly anyone talked to me, and nobody asked me to introduce myself or anything..."  At this point, I just thought, "Oh crap, he hated it," but then he finished with "...It was great!"  Haha that was so good to hear.  He doesn't really like being around people, so I guess it was a good thing that no one really took the chance to come up and say hello.  Go figure.  William has some problems with his balance, and so he thinks that people will look at him and think he's a drunk and belittle him because of it.  (He just has that little shuffle that people get when they get older.  It's nothing major).  He's embarrassed about it, but I guess he actually enjoyed church a lot which was great.  I was very surprised to hear that, and was very happy.

We also got to have exchanges this week with Elder Featherstone and Elder Quayle in Gadsden.  We had lots of fun biking in the rain and eating lots of food.  

On Thursday we had interviews with President Sainsbury.  They went well as always.  It's always good to talk with him and Sister Sainsbury for a while.  

Today, Pday, we went on a hike with the district at Noccalula falls in Gadsden.  It's a big waterfall with a giant cave behind it that you can go back into.  There are also lots of running trails and hiking trails that we went on for a couple hours. It was pretty cool, though it was unfortunate that we are not able to swim as missionaries.  There were some spots in the river that would have been so nice to jump in and cool off.  That's alright I guess.

Well, this was a great week.  We did have one unfortunate incident in which we got locked out of our apartment, basically had to break in, and later had to have our deadbolt replaced, but that's okay.  Our blender also stopped working, so that was wonderful.  We also sweat lots as always, and I think today is the hottest day of the year so far.  In the words of Ham from The Sandlot, "I'm baking like a toasted cheeser!"  It is what it is, I guess.

Well, I'm thankful for the chance to be here in Bama and preach the Good Word.  I was very nervous that Daniel and William had negative experiences at church, but I can now testify that the Lord definitely had His hand in that.  In my mind, they hated it.  But in reality, they both had wonderful experiences.  God is good, and He definitely has a big role in the work we do as missionaries.  His influence is always there.  Love y'all, have a great week!

Elder Beach

#RollTide

Fun p-day hike to Noccolula Falls in Gadsden, Alabama.

In the cave behind the falls.

Our dead bolt broke on our door, so we patched the hole with the plastic off of our Ensign magazine, cardboard from a pizza we cooked, and a picture of the First Vision. :)  Elder V drew a picture of a handicapped sticker because our door was definitely handicapped until we got it fixed!  It is now fixed, and we are able to get in and out of our apartment once again!  (Whew!)

Fullness of Doctrine

Hello all, this has been a great week and there is lots to talk about, so I'm going to just start writing.  I did most of this email on my phone instead of a computer, so if there are typos, I apologize.  The work here in Attalla is tough, but we are working hard and doing our best to find the elect and bring them unto Christ.  Here are some things we did this week - 

This week we met a lady named Patience. She was just chilling on her porch and we went up to talk to her. One of the first things she says was, "Don't even waste your time on me." She was clearly down in her life, and kind of told us a bit about some of the bad things that she had been through. We just sat and listened and testified and talked to her about the Savior and His love for us. She obviously needed help, but she told us that she "wasn't in it to win it." She didn't feel like she could get over some if her problems, even if she wanted to. Long story short, we talked to her for about 20 minutes and we basically convinced her that there is always hope for her because of the Savior. We told her that there was nothing that she could ever do that would put her beyond His reach. We told her that the Church has an addiction recovery program and that we would look into it for her. She cried a good bit and I could tell that she just doesn't really have a lot of people in her life who tell her that they love her. That's what people need a lot of times - they just need to be told and shown that they are loved. We did our best to help her realize that. We also introduced the Plan of Salvation to her briefly and gave her a pamphlet. Throughout our time talking to her, we asked her a couple of times if we could come back and share more, to which she always responded, "No, I just don't want y'all to waste your time." By the end of that first visit, she did finally consent to letting us come back again the next day. We really just wanted to help her, and I think she was finally able to feel that. Anyway, we made an appointment for the next morning at 10.

Well, the next day comes, and we show up. She had a guy over to fix one of her broken windows, and so she just told us to come back later, around 2. Well at like noon she calls us and tells us that she got called into work and so we would have to make it another day. We tried calling her twice or so and she never picked up. Finally she calls us back a day or two later, and just says, "Guys, I talked to my aunt, and I'm gonna start going to church with her. I'm a Baptist, and y'all are Mormons, and that's just not gonna work." Dang, I was so sad. Just 2 or 3 days before, we helped her see that there was hope for her. Hope that she probably had not seen or felt for years. I know that she felt that. And then she just turned around and abandoned it that quick. I can almost guarantee that her aunt told her something about us that she didn't want to hear, and that turned her off towards us coming back. We will still try and reach out to her in the future, but it always just makes me sad when people reject what we have to offer them.

This week we also went to another Bible study at First Baptist Church in downtown Attalla. Last week when we went to Siberton Baptist, we just sat and listened, but we actually participated a little bit this week. There are lots of things I could talk about in regards to this visit, but I just want to talk about one: the fact that the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints is the only church with the FULLNESS of the Gospel of Jesus Christ. Everyone else has their parts, but there are definitely gaps in their doctrine. Here's the story:

One of the teenagers there asked the guy doing the teaching a question similar to this - "Last week at our Bible study, you said something about how after Jesus died, he descended somewhere or something like that before he was resurrected. Where did he go? My mom and I have looked all week for an answer and haven't found a definitive one." Well the teacher thinks about it for a second, and says, "Well, I guess y'all will just have to do some research and I will as well. There are lots of opinions about this..." and at that point I kind of just whispered to Elder Vanderhoff, "Yeah there are lots of opinions but there's only one doctrine." Earl was the guy's name who was teaching, and he's like, "What was that?" I restated aloud that there are lots or opinions, but there is only one doctrine.  I then took the opportunity to teach them very simply the part of the Plan of Salvation that is a very Biblical doctrine, but one that most non-LDS people have never even heard of before: the spirit world.  I basically said this: "There is obviously a time in between death and resurrection. At death, our spirit and body separate, and at resurrection they are joined again. At death our body gets buried, but where does our spirit go? It goes to a place called the spirit world. And what happens there? Well, let's go to the scriptures. John 5:25 says 'Verily, verily, I say unto you, The hour is coming, and now is, when the dead shall hear the voice of the Son of God: and they that hear shall live.' What I know to be true is that during the period of time in between the Savior's death and resurrection, he was in the spirit world, preaching the gospel to those who hadn't ever heard it in this life. God is perfectly just, and so it is completely logical and scriptural that everybody who did not have the chance to hear and accept and live the Gospel in this life will have it in the next. As such, the scriptures teach that that is where Jesus went immediately after his death. He went to those in spirit prison to teach them the Gospel and give them a chance to accept or reject it." Earl kind of tried to argue a little bit, and asked if that was the only reference to the spirit world or spirit prison, to which Elder Vanderhoff responded by quoting 1 Peter 3:19, 1 Peter 4:6, and Isaiah 42:7 (all of which mention very clearly the doctrine I was trying to teach). Everyone in the class was just speechless, they really had nothing to say. They just kind if brushed it off and moved on after that. Interesting that people will reject or ignore doctrine that they have never heard before, even when it completes the gap that they couldn't fill before. Anyway, I was happy to be able to teach those people a doctrine that is very obviously biblical, yet one that they had never heard before. I hope it was enlightening to them.

We talked a lot about that Bible study over the next couple of days, and there is a concept that we talked about which I have always found interesting. It is that there are so many people who either 1) want to believe what we teach, or 2) actually do internally believe what we teach. However, they often refuse to accept that they believe it because it is not what their church teaches. As we were riding home that night, Elder Vanderhoff just said, "I'm so glad that I'm part of the true Church." Me too. I know that the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints is "the only true and loving church upon the face of the whole earth" because it has in it the fullness of the Gospel of Jesus Christ. You cannot go anywhere else in the world and find that.

This week I also was able to finish "Jesus the Christ" by James E. Talmage for the first time (finally). I started reading in in Scottsboro and I read like two thirds of it and then kind of just stopped for a while. I picked it back up like 3 weeks ago and finished it on Friday. It's a long book but it was so good. There are so many things in there that I just didn't really pick up when reading the New Testament that Elder Talmage explains. In fact, after bible study at First Baptist, I went up to the teacher and I said, "Hey, I've got a book that I think you might like. It's called "Jesus the Christ" by James Talmage. It basically is just his scriptural commentary on the entire New Testament, as well as some other things about the Savior that aren't in the New Testament. Look it up, it's awesome." And it is.

Haha I hope y'all remember my devil dog story from last week. Sonya is the lady's name, and we went to go see her this week. We didn't have a whole lot of time, but we were able to talk for a bit, and believe it or not, her story gets even better. She said that when they pulled the car out of the ravine, IT WAS STILL IN PARK. So yeah supposedly her car was in park when it DROVE UP A HILL and then into a huge ravine. I dunno what to say to that. Pretty crazy. Anyway, Sonya used to live in Salt Lake for a couple years, and so she thinks she knows a little but about the Church haha. She asked us a few things about what we believe that she supposedly was told by members of the Church while in SLC. She asked us if we really believed that Malakite (?) was being chased by giants when he was jumping from planet to planet, exploding the planets he was jumping on, and then those fragments somehow came together to form this earth. Haha, what? No, we told her that that was false doctrine, and we definitely believe in the Biblical account of the creation. She also asked, "What's your opinion on Brigham Young?" I just said, "Well, he was a prophet." Then she told us about how it was all in the history books that he had killed lots of people and families for doing bad things. I didn't know what she was talking about, but after I thought about it, I actually know exactly what she was talking about. It's just some anti that people throw around that Brigham Young taught and lived the so-called "blood atonement doctrine" in which the blood of murderers must be shed in order to atone for themselves because the Atonement of Christ doesn't cover them. The doctrine itself isn't necessarily false (I'll explain), but the idea that it was ever practiced in this dispensation is false doctrine. In "Mormon Doctrine," Bruce R. McConkie explains that the doctrine of blood atonement cannot be practiced unless the civil and ecclesiastical leaders of the day are the same people. Therefore, it cannot be and has not been practiced in this dispensation. However, it was in effect in like the Law of Moses. You know, an eye for an eye, and a life for a life type of deal. Basically capital punishment was commanded as a way to make restitution for certain sins. But it is definitely not practiced today nor was it in Brigham Young's day. Sonya was not trying to bash us, she was just trying to clear things up. I actually love when people do that. I'm glad that at least some people will come to us with their questions rather than look to outside (and often false) resources. Sonya's doing alright and we are going to see her again this week. 

I mentioned that Dan and William both came to church last week.  Unfortunately we were not able to see William at all this week for various reasons, so we haven't had a chance to talk to him about church.  We were able to talk to Dan on the phone, but not in person.  He just said that he understands that church isn't always like that, and he knew that he would have to come several times to really get the feel for it.  I was relieved to hear that, however, he didn't come this week.  I was actually bummed that neither of them came to church because sacrament meeting was so awesome.  There was a great talk given in which the speaker talked about the hierarchy of our lives, and how different circumstances in life make us change what we are focusing on, or change what is most important to us.  However, at the top of our hierarchy (or what is most important to us in our life) should always be eternal life.  That is the greatest gift of God, and that is what we should be striving towards always.  It was a talk similar to the "Good, Better, Best" talk given by Elder Oaks a while back.  I know that as we place God first, and do all we can for that gift of eternal life that is promised to all who live his gospel, everything else will fall into place.

We also were able to meet with a guy named Matthew this week.  He was one of our potentials that we had been trying to see for a little while and we were finally able to on Saturday.  We read with him 2 Nephi 31, and invited him to be baptized on September 1.  Now, there's a lot of things that still have to happen for that to work, but I'm willing to work as hard as it takes to help him make that date.  If Matthew is willing as well, we will make it happen.  I love 2 Nephi 31.  It is one of my favorite chapters in all of scripture.  It so simply and clearly lays out for us the Gospel of Jesus Christ.  Nephi often says, "I delight in plainness," or "I will speak plainly."  That chapter is about as plain as it gets, and I love that.  In a world where so many people think they can just "interpret" the scriptures to fit their liking, I love how the Book of Mormon so clearly states what needs to be taught.  In "Preach My Gospel" there is a line that says something like, "You shouldn't just teach clearly enough that they can understand, you should teach clearly enough that they cannot misunderstand."  The Book of Mormon does that.  I love it.

Well y'all, this has been a good week.  We're hitting that grind trying to find more people to teach, but I'm thankful for the ones that we are already teaching.  Whether they realize it or not, they need what we have, and I love teaching it to them.  Love y'all!

Elder Beach

#RollTide