Service = Major Blessings!!

Alright so just in case anyone is wondering service=major blessings!!

This is a picture of both mine and my dad's missionary Tags

This week has been like nonstop service!! Like it started on Tuesday and went all the way to Saturday!!  But boy was it worth it!!

So Monday we spent like the whole day with a family making knives, because that's like the cool thing to do and who wouldn't want to make knives??  Anyway so then the next day because the guy helped us make some knives he needed our help moving some stumps and cutting down trees so we were all about helping him out.   

Then the next day we got a call from our recent convert asking if we could help him so we went up and helped with some roofing again and man was the wind blowing!!  We were talking about how we could be picked up like a kite and blown away!!  

Anyway then later that night we had a pretty interesting experience with a lady... we decided to go to Walmart since we didn't go on Monday because we were busy all day but we needed food.  So we went on Wednesday and decided to do a little bit of Walmart finding and talk to everyone!!  We were in Walmart right??  And I'm looking at the mayonnaise because we are all out and we needed some so I'm scoping out the deals when Elder Anderson notices this lady who's looking at us kind of funny.  I look up right as he gives her the head nod and I'm about to say "hey how's it going?" – you know normal missionary stuff.  Anyway before I even say it the lady says, "it's 420 tomorrow!!" And points to a bunch of brownie mixes that she has in her cart then rushes off.  At this point I'm shell shocked 😂 I look over at Elder Anderson and I'm like "did she really just say what I think she said??" So that was an interesting experience 😂.  Walmart can definitely attract some interesting people.  Anyway so that was a blast!! 

The next day was Thursday if I'm not mistaken!!  So one of the ladies we are working really close with owns a thing of storage units.  And she was telling us that this lady and her husband were moving a ton of stuff into one and the husband broke his back a while ago so he couldn't lift anything.  So we were like "we'd love to help!!"  So Thursday was the day they showed up and we helped them out all day!!  It was pretty great.  They're coming back in a few weeks with another load and we're going to help them out again!!  So that'll be awesome!!

Then on Friday we went over to this super old guy’s house in the ward to help him clean up his basement.  Alright so here's the situation, he has a wood stove in his basement and he hasn't been able to clean it up for a really long time.  So there were cobwebs everywhere and everything have a layer an inch think of just straight soot.  Like the webs looked like black yarn hanging from the ceiling and on the walls and stuff.  It was crazy but we buckled down and cleaned it up like crazy and it was a ton of fun!!  It was like a treasure hunt in that house because there is sooooo much history in that house!!  This guy has been around the block a few times and he's got lots of cool stuff he's picked up during his life so it was super fun finding them and asking him about it!!  Anyway so that took up quite the majority of the day!!  Then the next day on Saturday we helped out our recent convert again with his house.  But this time we helped him frame his basement.  It was sooooooooo cold down there 😂 like outside it was the warmest day of the week but in the basement I could see my breath!!  It was pretty sweet!!  I mean I feel like when I help him out with his house I'm learning lots about how to do stuff.  Like I'm paying attention to it all and it's really cool!!  So we did that for most of the day and then we had dinner with a guy who is a commercial pilot and so I was able to talk to him about it for a little bit and get some advice for when I get home and it was great!!

Alright so now you might be wondering what made all this service so worth it??  Well first, service in itself is worth it buuuuuuuut this week we were able to officially get a new investigator!!  We've been working really close to this family and they don't go to church all that often and her daughter isn't baptized yet so we're teaching her now and the first lesson was this week!!  So that was super awesome!!  But wait folks… that's not all!!  Our recent convert got the priesthood yesterday as well!!  It is so awesome that he's got the priesthood now and I'm so excited for him and his family!!  And the last thing is that our investigators are getting baptized this Saturday!!  How exciting is that?!?  

I love this work and everything that comes with it!!  Miracles really happen when you work hard and are obedient!!

Love ya’ all and stay sweet!!

Love,

Elder Zeller

P.O 1883 Bigfork, Montana

Some Don't Believe There is a Father in Heaven but my Heart Tells Me Otherwise

This week has been most righteous!!!

We've seen miracle after miracle this week!!  First miracle, is a couple we are teaching weren't married but on Monday they decided that they needed to get married so out of nowhere they drove up to Kalispell and got married after 8 years of living together!!  They are going to be baptized on the 29th of April!!  So excited there!!

Then on Tuesday we helped our recent convert roof his house and man the wind can blow up here!!  Must have lost the tolerance I built up in great falls from all the wind 😅 but it was super awesome and Elder Anderson started singing high school musical on the roof... I may have joined in but that's beside the point!! 😅

It was also super awesome on Wednesday because 1) I gave a kick-butt discussion in our district meeting about the Holy Ghost and major shout out to Elder Anderson’s mom for sending the Holy Ghost light thing!! I was able to use it and it was sweet!!  And 2) we were able to go to mutual with the young men and every single priest was there from what Elder Anderson told me!! And we get along with them all really great!!! :) so that's awesome!!

Then on Friday we had the opportunity to go to a spaghetti dinner at the middle school with a member and we talked to quite a few people and ran into a really awesome member family there!!  Her oldest daughter hasn't been baptized yet and she really wants us to teach her daughter so hopefully we can do that.  She also had us over for egg dying and dinner on Saturday and she took us to sushi!! 😭😍  I haven't had that since I was back home!!  It was so good and I missed it so much!!  I’m not sure her daughters liked it very much 😅  

After that we decided that we needed to take some pictures.  So we took a few and we went on an adventure on this tiny hill kind of thing super close to our house.  We took a few pictures there then on the way back this guy drives his forklift up the path and he stops us and tells us that this is a private drive and that we shouldn't come back... so we have to cross that off our picture taking spots 😅.  After that we found this road and it leads us to this super sweet stream!!  It was awesome and as we climbed higher snow started popping up!!  So we got a bit stuck and then got out.

Then on Sunday we had lots of people come to church!!  (I think Easter played a big role) but it was super awesome.  I don't know what it is but the spirit that I feel when I hear about the atonement is so much different than when I hear about the Book of Mormon or Joseph smith.  When I hear about the restoration and the Book of Mormon I get fired up about it and I'm like "I can tell you loads about these things!!!" But when I hear or talk about the atonement and Christ’s sacrifice I don't get fired up, I get emotional!!  Like what??  But it's true!!  When I was in sacrament meeting I almost started crying a few times, true story.  There's just something about the atonement and resurrection of Jesus Christ that gets me every time.  Just to know that because of him all things are possible.  Without him there wouldn't be a point to it all. We would be stuck with our sins with no hope of repentance and redemption.  We wouldn't be able to live with our Father in Heaven and that's the bottom line.  I know some don’t believe that there is a Father in Heaven but my heart tells me otherwise.  Because of what He did for us we can live with Him again!!  He paid the price so we don't have to!!  We owe our Savior and our Heavenly Father so much yet they ask for so little.   They ask us to keep the commandments... that's it.  Heavenly Father put together an amazing and perfect plan for us and he's given us the opportunity to receive perfect, resurrected bodies.  Christ suffered, died and rose from the dead for us so that we can live with God again and all that's asked of us is to obey the commandments.  We've been given the best deal in the history of forever!!  But do we see it as that?? Maybe, maybe not.  But in the end it's up to us to choose whether we want to live the commandments and return to Heavenly Father or not.

Love you guys!

Love,

Elder Zeller

P.O 1883 Bigfork, Montana

Count your Blessings After Falling off a Cliff!

Monday!

So today was a normal P-day full of laundry, shopping and games.  We had dinner with our bishop and as we were eating I look out the window and I see all these wild turkeys, which is not abnormal.  It's completely normal to see turkey and all kind of wildlife here but something funny I noticed was that there were easily like 15 turkeys.  There were tons of them and out of all these turkeys there was only 1 guy among them all 😂 I don't know I just thought that was kind of funny 😅

Tuesday!!

Today we just did the normal stuff and nothing really too noteworthy happened 😅 like we went and saw a less active and his daughter whose an investigator and we stopped by a few other less active/investigators but nothing really too crazy.

Wednesday!!

So today we had district meeting and I was kind of scared, I’m not going to lie, because we hadn't gotten assignments for it so I was worried he was going to ask us to give a discussion on the fly or something 😅 but we got there and we read preach my gospel and talked about different things that can help us in our missionary work or us as missionaries.  

After that we went to do some service for a lady in our area.  She needed some help moving a coffee table that she had bought.  So we got there and there was a glass top and the table was separate. She decided that she wanted to move the table first and then the glass second; we agreed and then her husband comes out and starts moving the glass and it's about to fall out of the car so I reached out and snagged it and decided that we would just move that now then 😅 so we start moving it and we are setting it down and when we are about 2 inches off the ground he drops it... like out of nowhere 😂 so it falls and hits the ground and just shatters. So that was a bit awkward.  

After that we moved the table and stuff then took off and got changed and went and helped out a less active member with some service that she needed done.  We were there for a while then we had a dinner appointment so we ran home, got changed and went to dinner.  We had dinner with our ward mission leader.  We had to eat dinner really quickly because we had to get to a lesson we had with one of our investigators.  We finished off the lessons and went over the baptismal interview questions.  Then we challenged him to think and pray for a date that he would like to be baptized.

Thursday!

So today we did the normal missionary stuff then we went to dinner with a super less active lady.  We went to this pizza place that's pretty good and we talked to them for a while and she brought up the fact that her daughter isn't baptized yet and she is super open to that!  So we are excited and we told them that we would be willing to help them out with any service they need!!  

After dinner we were driving around and contacting people when we saw this pretty sweet area to take some pictures, so we pull over for a second and we look at this cliff and there is a super sweet sunset in the background.  And as I'm looking at this amazing sunset my foot slips with all the moss I was standing on and I legit fell off a cliff 😂 luckily I didn't get hurt too bad, just a few scratches.  But my favorite pants got destroyed 😂 I busted a huge hole up the side of one leg and then on the other leg I have a ton of other tiny holes where rocks went through my pants 😅 so I’ve got to count my blessings that I wasn't hurt too bad.  Unfortunately we were able to take any pictures there because I took a spill, so we headed back to the house and I changed my pants and got cleaned up and went out for a little bit because it was close to the end of the night anyway 😅

Friday!!

So today we were getting ready to head out when we got a call from our ward mission leader and he asked us what we had planned for the rest of the day... we had nothing 😅 so when he found that out he told us that our investigator, Nate, needed some help with his house shingling again.  Soooo we decided that the best thing for us to do would be to help out Nate with his house.  As we were talking to brother tanner (our ward mission leader) he told us that he had gone by Nate’s house and had talked to him for a while and had decided that he wants to be baptized on the 8th this month!!  We are so excited because that's the date we had been thinking of but we wanted him to choose.  So we were super happy with that!!  So we ran home after we got off the phone and got changed and helped Nate like all day until dinner.  We to dinner then after dinner we went back to help him out as much as we could!!  It was really awesome being able to help him and just talk to him all day.  Really brings me back to before the mission when I worked construction 😅

Saturday!!

So today was conference!! Oh man there were some really awesome talks and I can't wait till they are posted on lds.org or the gospel library and I can go over them again!! Because it's one thing to listen to them but it's another to read them. I feel like when I read them I'm really able to dig into it and take out a whole lot.  After the sessions of conference we had time to run home and eat really quick before we went to priesthood session.  I really enjoyed the talk Elder Bednar gave about missionary work (go figure 😂) After priesthood we went to DQ for some ice cream as tradition dictates 😂 and we set some things up with Nate to help him some more on Monday.  So I'm pretty excited for that!!

Sunday!!

So today was the last day for conference and it starts out that I lost the phone 😅 so basically I'm an idiot 😅 so we listened to conference in our apartment as we looked for the dang thing!!  But we heard some really awesome talks and there were definitely a few that were just for our investigators.  These guys definitely inspired on what they need to talk about.  I'm excited for when they have them all written up and I can go back over them.  About halfway through the second session we realized that we left our phone at our ward mission leader’s house.  After that session we run over there to get it and we talk for a while and he gives us some names that he wants us to go see.  

Once we're done talking to him we run over to those people and check on them.  One moved and the other is definitely there but we just have to catch them when they are actually home 😅 after that we had dinner and at dinner the daughter had some questions about how to share the plan of happiness with her friend.  It was pretty cool because we started talking about it and then we started talking about sharing a video with them and when we said it a video came to mind and it seemed to fit what she needed perfectly.  It was pretty sweet.  So we showed her a few more videos that deal with the same thing and they were able to think of someone every time that they could share the videos with so I hope that they do that because I'm going to check up on them!! 

After dinner we checked on some other people and then we decided to go check out this national park (there's like a million of them 😅).  We found a little river that flows into the flathead lake. Anyway so we had the plan and idea to dam the river 😂 we did a freaking good job of it too and we would have stayed out longer but we were losing light fast so we decided to head home and hopefully we will be able to swing by tomorrow 😅

Love,

Elder Zeller

P.O 1883 Bigfork, Montana

P.S. I found a Missionary plaque at the ward building with my dad's old Mission companion's name on it... Pretty cool!!!

They will make it to the Temple... I just know it!

Monday!

So today we spent majority of the day making knives out of old files and deer antler!! That was freaking cool!!  I mean I'm basically a knife making master now!!  So that was freaking sweet!!  Then after that we went and visited one of the older members of the ward.  We normally go over every Saturday and stack wood for him buuuuuuuuut his sheds roof collapsed so that's not happening anytime soon 😅 but we still go over to visit him because he's a cool guy 😅

Tuesday!

So today we helped our ward mission leader with some service at his place.  We moved a bunch of wood planks that he uses for his outdoor hockey rink... yes... our ward mission leader has a legit hockey rink outside his house... it's freaking nuts!!  But we were doing it and the planks like absorbed a ton of water so these things were heavy!!  But as of late the snow has been melting a whole ton!!  Like there isn't hardly any snow anywhere anymore.  So because of this the ice is melting also!!  So we're walking on this ice moving these heavy boards and I step over a board and I go to pick it up and my foot busts through the ice 😂 it went like almost to my knee and it was the coldest water ever 😖

Wednesday!

So today our dinner had to pick up her daughter or something from Kalispell so she dropped it off to us which was totally fine.  We decided that instead of just eating at our apartment that we would take advantage of the beautiful area we are in and so we had a bit of a picnic out on the side of Flathead Lake!!  It was super fun and we started goofing off with the ice after we ate.  Then we had a lesson with one of our investigators and we taught the articles of faith... also we taught chastity 😂 which was a blast!!  Spirit was strong!!  After the lesson we talked about how we wanted to fast with him so we told him that we would start Saturday so we will see how that goes!!  We also told him that we would help him shingle his roof on Saturday!!  So we will see what happens there.

Thursday!!

Today we had to cancel a few lessons because we had our zone conference and that required us to wake up a bit earlier than the norm to be able to make the drive into Missoula on time... we were still a bit late 😅 but hey all’s well that ends well right??  We received a lot of training on how to become better teachers with those we teach and it was really awesome because that's what we're working on with our ward mission leader!!  He's always challenging us to be better teachers, so both just fit hand in hand.  After that we made the trip back and we didn't have a dinner so we just ate at our place and decided to go out exploring for a little while!!  We found this spot in the river we're the water is moving suuuuuuper quick and super high powered... so what do two teenage boys do with a river moving at high rates of speed??  We throw random crap into it!! 😂😂 so that was fun!!

Friday!!

Today we had a lesson with some of our other investigators and we taught the articles of faith again and I love teaching this couple because she always comes with questions that she needs answered and we do our best to answer them and she asks us questions throughout the whole thing and the spirit is really able to teach her when she asks questions!!  She's a bit worried she's not ready to be baptized as far as knowing about the church is concerned.  She knows that it's true she just doesn't feel like she knows enough.  So we're trying to help her with that through teaching.

Saturday!!

We went over to our investigators (Nate) house and helped him shingle his roof!! Man it was a blast from the past!! I felt like I was back home working construction 😂 good times!!  We helped him for a good majority of the day.  We had a few things lined up for the rest of the day but they kept getting cancelled soooo we figured it just meant that we needed to be there helping him out.  We did that until about 6 that night.  As we were leaving we talked to him a bit more about starting a fast.  We explained that we normally start a fast with a prayer and we ask for questions to be answered and whatnot.  We then asked him what he's fasting for and he tells us that he already knows that it's true.  He said that he's going to fast for his family.  Spirit immediately filled the room and it was so awesome!!  So we kicked off the fast and headed out.  We didn't have much planned since we didn't have a dinner soooo we used our dinner hour and the opportunity of being in service clothes to go on a short little hike to this cliff!!  So we got up and took some pictures (including a name tag picture just for you mom 😘) anyway after that we got home and cleaned ourselves up and got out to working again!!

Sunday!

So for some reason this fast was way harder than before 😅 I was starving the whole time 😅 oh well though!!  No worries!!  So church was super awesome!!  One of our investigators wasn't able to make it but the others were!!  We had some good lessons and after church there was a baptism for an 8 year old in the ward and we were able to take our investigators to it so they could see a baptism and it was super awesome because I was watching one of them and when the boy went under and came back up she was just smiling and it was so awesome :) apparently she gave him a flower after which is so awesome!!  Then after it was all over we were talking to our other investigator and as he was leaving I just knew that he and his family were going to make it to the temple!!  I could just feel it and I could see them there!!  It was awesome!!

Then we went home, broke our fast, had a quick snack and then went over to our ward mission leader’s house and we talked a bit and met his grandsons and man they were wild!!  One of them was putting us in like choke holds and all this stuff and he's like 5!!  It was crazy!!  But it was kinda funny too 😂 the other grandson was freaking smart!!  We were giving him tons of math problems and he was getting them right every time and just begging for more!!  

After we did that we went and got changed out of our suits and into something not quite as formal 😅 gotta keep the suit lookin fresh 😂 anyway we went and tried contacting a person we talked about with our Ward Mission Leader and it turns out he moved #storyofmylife then we went and talked to a less active member who wants to baptize his daughter.  So we talked about the Book of Mormon and some evidences of it nowadays.  Then we went to our dinner appointment and man this couple is funny!!  First off this guy has the sickest beard hair combo I've ever seen!!  His wife kept joking about how he's a Viking and he literally is!!  But we had this super good chicken!!  Like it was way good!!  But we talked to them for a good while then we shared a quick message and took off!! Then we did our normal thing!!

Love,

Elder Zeller

P.O 1883 Bigfork, Montana

St. Patrick's Day, "Shenanigans" and Well Wishes

So this week started out pretty slow and I was really bad about writing about every day, so this email is going to be different than the past few weeks, but I'll pick it up this next week!!

So towards the end of the week our mission president was in town and we had our zone training like normal where we learned a lot.  Anyway after that, Elder Anderson and I had our interviews with president and it was super awesome!! President and I talked about a lot of stuff that I needed help with and so it was really nice to be able to talk to him.  I always enjoy interviews with president because he definitely receives inspiration during the interviews.  

After the interview I’m sure you all know where we went… that’s right, we went to Chick-fil-A 😍 I could honestly eat there the rest of my life and be happy 😅 it's so good and I missed it like you would not believe!! 

Then later Friday night we had a lesson with one of our investigators and we talked about the word of wisdom and he was telling us that he actually gave up caffeine like 2 weeks ago and that included coffee and all that jazz so it really worked out!!  And that was about it for Friday!!

Saturday we had our stake conference starting so our first meeting was at like 4 so we did our thing for the beginning of the day, but then we went to those meetings and I learned a lot because like the theme for the conference was all about temples and missionary work I swear.  Either that or that's what the spirit wanted me to learn about. Anyway so we went to those two meetings but right in the middle of it we had like an hour or so for dinner and whatnot so we went with our district leader to his dinner appointment since we wouldn't be in town for ours.  It was fun because their oldest daughter was heading out to prom that night so their whole family decided to mess with the kid 😂 they like pulled out all these guns and knives and swords and stuff and were messing with them it was pretty funny but I felt bad for the kid because he had no clue what he was getting into 😂 if I were him I'm not sure I would go for a second date 😅

Then after we had a lady who wanted to give us some cookies for helping her with moving so we hurried over there after dinner and got those and our district leader was there with us and while we went to go get these cookies they decided to hijack our car.  So as we were walking back they took off in our truck... and we spent a good 5 minutes waiting for them to give us our truck back.  It was pretty funny :)

We got to that last meeting and it was super good. Then we went over to the zone leaders to spend the night!  Sleepover!!  Always a good time!!  We had some missionary "shenanigans" that happened 😂

After that the next day was Sunday and we had stake conference.  We had the temple president and his wife, a member of the seventy and our mission president!!  Definitely a lot of spiritual power there!!  They talked a lot about the temple, missionary work and conversion.  It was super cool!!  Then later that day we had a few lessons and talked about tithing and fasting.  It was pretty funny but on the way home we saw tons of roadkill right??  Well we saw a deer that had been hit and someone tied a balloon onto it and it said get well soon 😂 funniest freaking thing ever 😂 anyway that was my week hope everything is good with you all!!

Love ya!!

Elder Zeller