Basketball and Bowling

Sorry about the lame, short email, but I am just really enjoying basketball today and we went bowling so currently my right fingers are sore from the lumpiness of my fingers not really fitting in any of the balls less than 92,940 pounds. Yeah almost have nothing to do with missionary work or really anything spiritual.  A family made us Wingers wings as a special treat and another family had a Star Wars sign and named their kids Luke & Leia.  Almost as cool as Strider.  That is what I will name my firstborn in the wilderness.  I will tell you one miracle!!! We were having a day when all our lessons cancelled and we really didn't know what to do... So naturally we prayed!! We went working and following our promptings and nothing happened... No luck.  We went to two more doors... No luck.   We saw a lady walking right around the corner and ran over to catch her just before she went inside and she said she wasn't interested and happy in her faith.  We felt just to ask her "what makes you happy?" & then "if you could ask God any question what would you ask him?"  Pretty soon we had a new investigator!  Really cool and after that we had some energizer bunny in our bones.

Smoked Servants of the Lord

Saying good-bye to Brother Lambert (senior missionary and my favorite!)

This week has been real warm here in Vancouver. Not even the tree coverage could stop the blazing heat.  We were smoked by mid week with farmers tans, sun burnt foreheads and sweaty collars.  The coolest thing about 100 degree weather... Is that missionary work can never be halted.  We had a fantastic week of miracles.  Okay let's talk way cool miracles.  Yesterday we were trying our best
to find people to teach and a less active member offered us water & started to say diet... Then stopped himself because he assumed we did not drink soda.  I piped up "I LOVE DIET" and got a free Diet Pepsi to help my proselyting.  A few minutes later we got out of the car to take a visit to an investigator and two kids were walking by.  We approached them to preach gospely stuff with them and I realized the very same kid was investigating the church while I was in the YSA.  He since then broke up with the member he was dating and moved on... The Lord sent him right to us and he said he would begin reading the Book of Mormon again because he needed something to help get his life back on track.  He even read the BOM with us while we talked in the 85 degree weather standing in the street.  We have been experiencing trouble trying to visit a less  active member of our ward for about 6 weeks now... And we finally grew a brain and decided to just send her a text instead of dropping by 6 times a week and never catching her home.  She accepted a visit the next day and we found out she needs the missionaries and would like to meet with us once a week to take the lessons over again.  I wish I had a bigger brain.  Some missionaries invited us to come help a member of their ward move on Saturday.  We laced the converse up and headed over to help and got the news the move wasn't happening that day.  All 4 of us felt inspired to pray and find others that needed service.  We prayed and started walking to find a nice family hosting a garage sale next door. They seemed to be really excited that we offer door to door service for free. We sensed an opportunity to teach the lessons to a family with softened hearts! Next thing you know we found a new investigator.  We then walked down the street to another member of the church that needed some serious WEEDING.  Farmers tan enhanced and got to use garden tilling weaponry,  what a good day.  My favorite senior missionary got released this week. What a sad day to lose Elder Lambert.  Sometimes I would prefer a senior companion (don't tell Elder Matthews lol). Elder Lambert was  A Washington Vancouver missionary legend to say the least.  We took an honorary selfie (or so he thought it was called a selfie) right before he left. President Taylor leaves at the end of this transfer too.  I THOUGHT LEAVING HOME WAS KINDA HARD?!  The whole mission presidency will be changed next month!  Sad to see them go... But here's a cool thing... The missionary work still goes on!  Heat, rain, loss of favorite senior missionary's... Nothing frustrates the work of the Lord.  Overall it's been a great week and I figured out how to make delicious smoothies in the morning.

Glovka Family Glory

The Glovka family baptism May 28, 2016.

What a week to be a missionary.  I know I say it every email but I’M NOT KIDDING.  You just gotta hear about this week.  Baptisms, birthdays and temple tours.  Elder Matthews has a birthday today and we are celebrating by proselyting from 6-9 PM.  I made him pancakes with a special message on his oj.  We will be having a BBQ with some of our favorite members from the ward.  One of the members helping today said "I never really came home from my mission".  I can attest to this statement, because with him we basically have a third missionary in the ward & it's awesome.  What a help.  I am pretty sure when I come home I will never really come home.  I see happiness in this member I don't see very often.  I want to continue serving after my mission like him.  ANYWAY… NOW FOR SOME GOOD STUFF:  Yesterday we taught some members of our ward the techniques of building a family mission plan and figured out it was the birthday of one of the family members AND ELDER MATTHEWS B DAY IS TODAY. Therefore, they invited us over for Sunday evening cake / ice cream.  As we arrived, this wonderful member was putting on a silly red jumpsuit and stuffing it with balloons.   He told us a family tradition of his is to wear a red jumpsuit stuffed with balloons and you have to pop them all without using your hands.  I was privileged to watch this member and Elder Matthews perform this daunting task.  Classic!  NEXT GOOD STUFF : BAPTISM OF THE GLOVKA FAMILY. These swell people changed big time to be baptized.  They went on a tour of the temple grounds with us Friday evening before the baptism.  COOL THING FROM THE TEMPLE TOUR:  About 5 weeks ago Elder Matthews & I received an email from sister missionaries in Florida wanting to ask us if we knew anyone from Florida we could refer to them.  We were a little confused because we don't know anyone in Florida that we wanted to refer besides Pitbull the singer.  Well, the sister missionary giving us a tour of the temple was from Florida!  She happened to be praying for a while concerning how she could share the gospel with family members back home.  This was the answer to her prayers.   How cool!! The next day we participated in a great baptism.  The Glovka family all entered into the waters of baptism with little to NO problems at the baptism.  We even had Costco cheesecake to eat after the service.  I baptized Katie.   OKAY, NEXT COOL THING/LESSON LEARNED:  This would be the finding of a new investigator late in the evening hours.  I was on exchanges with an Elder that wanted to fill up gas at 8:30 pm ( DURING PRIME FINDING TIME!)  My heart  grieved at this desire.  Nonetheless, I followed his desire to fill up gas.  As we began fueling, we felt promoted to talk to the other young lady filling up gas beside us.  She openly told us she had prayed for the first time only about a week ago.  She found Christ for the first time and loved the feeling.  She actually had a friend pass away about a month ago and was pretty stoked to hear about the spirit world. What are the odds?! How DOES HEAVENLY FATHER DO IT?!  Heavenly Father is watching very closely over you and he knows each one of you.  Never forget that truth!  Well, I still blow dry my hair, I still like diet drinks, and I love being a missionary.  Greatest two years of my life, since I first bought my Mitsubishi Lancer. Have a good week and make sure that you always pick Iron Man over Captain America.

Another Swell Week

Elder King and family friend Rick Jarvis.

Yet another really, really, really great week here in Fisher’s Landing.  I will share some miracle stories with you and relate some funny happenings of the week.  I have purchased a supply of American flags to fly around the apartment wing and in our car.  Not confederate, but American flags.  They are adding to the spirit of the room.  Cool miracle #1 was definitely finding Sarah, a cool investigator, the other night.  The week before, we were tracting at about 8:55 pm, and saw Sarah walking across the street.  We bolted over and talked to her and even made her remove her headphones.  She was quite a “golden find” and interested in the gospel.  We neglected to get a return appointment or her number for future contact... We prayed over the next week that she would be taken care of and guess what happened the other night?  We were out again working at 8:50 pm knocking doors and we felt inspired to go knock on another door at 9:00. No luck... but we felt good!  We felt the spirit.  No it wasn't caffeine, it was the spirit!   We were driving home a different way than usual because Elder Matthews felt inspired to take this route home and guess who was walking down the same street?  Guess who accepted another lesson and gave us her number?  Yes, Sarah did just that!  Now, I shall explain another great event we participated in.  It is called the Washougal 5K stride run for education.  Some of the people that run in the event are members of the church and asked us to participate /volunteer in this event.  We ensured that no runners were clobbered by cars and we acted as cheerleaders for the younglings to spring to the finish line.  After the event and during the event, many people were asking each other "what did our name tags mean?" And all sorts of other questions.  There were tons of missionary opportunities and I even told people if they finished the race and read scriptures they would get blessings.  I don't think I was supposed to do that, but I did it anyway and I even cried out like a wookie every now and then to keep people’s spirits up.  I also met someone this week (I actually had dinner with this someone just last night)  that grew up with my Dad! Rick Jarvis, a good old family friend of the King family.  Yes, they lived in the swamp together down in Louisiana!  What are the odds?  Well, I heard more about the south than I ever wanted to know and I heard some good stories to talk to my father about.  A few of those stories I need to verify with my Dad to make sure he really was the criminal mastermind his friend described him as.  It was one of those moments where I knew this mission was my place to serve.  I think I'll just leave it at that and tell you this week was awesome.  We have a baptism this upcoming weekend for one of the greatest families known to mankind.  We have been exceedingly blessed with delicious smoothie joints nearby our home and many people to teach. Old spice hair paste is the best and Old Spice Swagger deodorant.