Hello my wondeful Famerrrry............... thats asian for Family!

Holly cow this past week has been one of the best weeks of my whole life......mission life......great life.......happy life.......Yay! :) whats life, how do we live, is living as easy as just breathing, what life have we had to live to be able to live the life we are living life with??????? That reminds me of some craziness that happened this past week and its a long story but i will tie it back to life. So last week on Wednesday Elder Haderlie and i biked downtown at 9:07 AM to help one of our recent converts move some of his elderly fathers stuff to his lodge home and so we were downtown much earlier than we normally are. Well we finished with that and we started to bike home and while on the way we looked over and we saw a young man waiting at a bus stop and Elder Haderlie was like, "Hey, we know him" and i took a second look and was like "yeah, we do know him". It was a less active member from the Young Single adult ward who lives in our boundries and so we biked over and we started to say hi and we asked him whats up and he just looked at us and said "yeah im just waiting for the bus so that i can go to my uncels house and shoot myself." He had plans to kill himself that day. so we did not let him out of our sight, we bused with him to his uncles house in Hampton and His uncle threw down on him and his 'crap'. that man was so bold and profound, it was like there was absolutly no argument with him. This young man's main reason to kill himself was that he said that he knew that he was a good person and he refused to live in a world that was so evil and corrupt. But his uncle just threw out "if you kill yourself then all you gonna do is sink yourself right down to Hell" he threw down in the funniest Southern way. "all you gots to do in dis life is live and survive and hope to God that he will make a man out of yourself so that you can help others". So we bused back to Newport with him and we walked him home and then we bought him a burger at Bronx Deli and we stayed with him for another hour. he showed me some of his raps, he goes to this recording studio here in Newport News and he records his rapps and they are so good. they are clean too. One morning i woke up and i had one of them stuck in my head. He is awesome, and that was partly why we were so scared for him, he is a great guy and he has so much to live for but he was caught on an idea. Well he was okay, we stayed with him until we knew that he was okay and we went about teaching other people that day, we acctualy taught 8 people on Wednesday, that day was a very very good day! I just had the best feeling in the world come over me that i was in the exact spot doing exactally what God wanted me to do in the very momment that i was needed and a life was saved! What a wonderful Feeling! :) So that young man came to church with us on Sunday, a huge step for him, and while we were in Gospel Doctrine class we were learning about our heavenly Family and he purposed a question "what can a man learn that will take him a whole lifetime?"! and the answer came in the lesson "the biggest thing we can learn here in this life is how it is that we will live Eternally" and then one of his questions was "what else is it that i need to learn here in life?" now this young man is convinced that he is a very very good person and i agree that he is a great guy and that he makes many good choices but he feels that he has learned all that he needs to learn and he was ready to move on to the next world. But then in the lesson he just Exclaimed "I get it!!" i am here living my life right now with the knowledge i have and my personallity for one purpose, and that is to teach others" it was so good to hear him say that! so now he is determined to spread the Gospel and teach those that are less fortunate than he! i am so happy for him and for his Life. There you go, Life!

Another Crazy experiences was, well first some crazy news. i am in a trio now! Elder Bauman who was serving in Hampton is now here with Elder Haderlie and I. his companion who is a 19 year old E-5 in the military, almost unheard of, was called back to active duty so Elder Bauman needed someone to be with so now he is with us! YAY! i like Elder Bauman. so the experience! i was on exchange with Elder Bauman in Hampton on Thursday and Friday. well friday morning we get a call from the mission office telling us that there was a brother sick in the hospital from Washington who is terminaly ill and he wants a blessing. so we biked over to the hospital in 23 degree wheather and we gave this man a blessing. his wife told us that all they wanted was for him to receive enought strength to travel back home to Washington, she wasnt expecting a total healing just help. so we gave him the blessing and it was a wondeful blessing and then not 20 second later the Doctor comes in and tell them that all of his tests just came back and he has stabalized enough to merrit a release in the next 20 minutes. The wife couldnt help but cry into her husbands sholder and she told us "now try and tell me that Blessings dont work"! it was a wonderful ecperience! :)

I have one more thing to report on this past week! We had a baptism on Saturday! :) i dont remember if i told you that we had one coming up here soon but His name is Jay and he was Baptized on Saturday! It was such a great service. we have an elderly man here with an incredible story who bore his testimony and it made me cry, we have a brother here who was acctualy a high ranking member of the Bloods on the east coast that goes all the way up to Jersey, his name is Brother Leak, and he gave a talk on the Holy Ghost and it was so inspiring. his story is so crazy and he could relate to Jay really well and he brought in the spirit so strongly! yeah, that was a great Baptism! I am so happy to have been a part of it! :)

So that was my week! it was a great week! a week full of many great things and many

amazing experiences! i am in a trio now and it snowed yesterday and the whole state was shut down and i may have helped save a man from dying last week and i got to see another baptism and i threw my companion out a window and i helped like 40 people move and My Pets Heads Are Falling Off!! yeah, it was a good Week! :)

I love you all so so so so so much! i miss you guys! i hope you have a very good week and i hope that you see many miricles in the coming days! :)

With love and care from your Missionary Brother and Son!

Elder Anthony Zonts

Hello my wonderful family! :) I love you guys so much! my family is so awesome! they are just the best ever in da whole world! YAY!

 

So I have much to report on for this past week! I am having such a great time here in Downtown Newport News! :) it is awesome! There are many many people out and about all the time so we get to talk to people so much! we talked to two guys yesterday, one on one corner or the block and then we rode three seconds away and had a lesson with another guy on the other side of that intersection, it was awesome! I love being around a bunch of people! I already have some crazy cool stories about where I serve and it hasn't even been a week yet! the first funny thing that happened to me yesterday was that we were riding late at night in da ghetto and a black cat just darted right in front of us and I almost killed it........I almost crashed because of a stupid cat! yeah, the roads are crazy and they are always busy and the people are all super crazy and high on something all the time........ I LOVE IT!! I cant do quite country, its way too boring. I love the city. Downtown Newport Baby! and this might sound terrible and it is terrible, very very terrible, but apparently a cop got shot two days ago and he was killed so now there are SO many cops rolling through downtown so I guess it makes it much safer for us! Elder Haderlie has been here in downtown for 8 months now and he said that before now cops were never gutsy enough to role through the hood until now. so some exciting stuff is happening! I like it! I was able to meet my new branch yesterday as well. our building is a converted old bank building so our library is a vault! it is so cool. the branch itself is tiny and we are like the only white members but it is still awesome! the thing that I am most excited for here is that we stay busy all the time! I love being busy, especially on a bike. I love to ride and I love the city so when I can ride through the city while I teach people about the gospel then all the better. I am just very excited! ohh and I lost my planner in da hood yesterday. I was riding and then I think I droped my planner somewhere and I will never see it again. downtown is so ghetto! there are always people just walking everywhere and they all have dreads and baggy pants and guns and all kinds of crazy stuff. Elder Haderlie told me that for New Years he heard like twenty thousand rounds just being fired off, I wish I could have been here for that! :) ohh and I am back here with Elder Marinos too, he's the man! I was able to play more Oompa-Loompa this morning and there are some crazy changes to my new zone and stuff and I am just so excited. I hope I don't get shot though.........that would stink.....but I would have some crazy cool stories to tell! so that is what is new with me. this last week I had transfers on Thursday and so I came up here to Newport and so on the first day we were out seeing people for seven hours! ohh and our apartment is at the top of our area because it is the 'safest' part of the area but then we bike like 4 miles to get to where we do our work... but its great! :) but it was a great first day. we also helped someone move the second day and then I met some recent converts and then we had some lessons and then I met this guy who was baptized about a month ago and he is the most thug guys I have ever met in my entire life! to get his kids attention he does this hood yell where its like "HEEEEEEAAAAAYYYYYYOOOOO" and his voice is super deep and its so funny! so the Hood life is the life for me, at least for a little while. My companion warned me about getting the 'jungle fever' though.....that's when you start to get attracted to black girls............don't catch the fever............once you go black you wont ever go back..............yep! so that is what is new with me! I am back here in Newport and I am so excited, I'm on top of the world! hey, Pres. Baker changed the music rule so that now we can listen to more music so I am very excited about that! :) YAY! lots of fun stuff happening with me! I am just very excited! Biking in da hood! straight up!

 

So Dad, you asked me last week about getting me some dry goods foods yummy stuffs! well my apartment is full of a big huge fat nothing.......I would love some dry foods goods yummy stuff! and we aren't really fed that well here.........so yeah! that would be awesome! :) but nothing sweet, nothing too sweet at least, no candy and no chocolate! Please and thank you so so so much! :) yeah, its pretty crazy here. the apartment is the smallest thing I have ever seen missionaries live in, and we are getting a third companion next transfer.....they usually have a trio downtown but this transfer they had an even amount of missionaries so they only needed the Dream Team downtown! I love Elder Haderlie! He's The Man! and my apartment is called Huntington on the James because I am about thirty seconds away from the James River! IT IS SO SWEEET!!!!  

 

Well, I love you guys so so so so so so much! I miss you lots but I don't think that will be a problem here soon. I love Downtown! I just love being busy, we were not busy in Roanoke and I hated it! so lame! but now I am busy and I love it! I have only been in Downtown for three days now and we have taught more lessons and found more people than we did in two weeks in Roanoke! it was very hard, but now its a different kind of hard, a more fun kind of hard! :D Yay, Excited! I am just so smiley and happy, now that's just weird, I am happy to be in da hood and da ghetto. but yeah! The mission will do that to ya!

 

Ohh and I have big news! My mission president will be coming out on splits with us on Tuesday! Yep, Pres Baker is coming to the hood. at first I was like.........."does he have a bike?" I was picturing him riding with us to our appointments but then I was like.....ohhhh wait, he has a car....." does he want to park his Lincoln or his Highlander in the hood?".......Tuesday is going to be so fun and awesome!

 

So that is what is new with me! lots of exciting things and lots of stuff to do! I love it! I am so excited for it! I want more of it! more work and more people to teach and more fun stuff to do! I am just very excited......if you couldn't tell! ohh have I told you that I am very excited to be here! yeah, I am excited...... but not to get shot....or mugged.....or beaten.....or bruised.....or mauled......by a cat.....or a dog......or a couch.....yeah, I don't want that!

 

I hope that you guys have a great week too! :) I love you all so much! :) I miss you and I want all of you to be happy and don't worry about me, if I die then I will die serving the Lord!!!! I am totally kidding, a missionary hasn't been shot here in like two years.....no worries! hehe!

 

With lots of boats and barges and ships full of love (get it! I am literally like a stones throw away from the James River) from you missionary Brother and Son!

 

Elder Anthony R Zonts

12/2/2013

Well, this past week has been one of the best weeks i have had on my mission so far! this last week was awesome! i had both a relaxing preparation day and a day off on Thanksgiving. Monday was great! i took a nap and did lots of other fun stuff and then on Thursday i week became awesome! on Thursday in first went to a brunch with some of my investigators here and they fed us some very delicious food! it was sweet pork on bread rolls with red velvet cake! :):) it was so good! so then after that we ran to a park here in town to play some Frisbee golf, the park was actually closed for the winter which is really dumb but yeah, we didn’t play but because i tried to play on Thursday, when i went down to Rocky Mount North Carolina on a companion exchange i told one of the members down there that that is what we tried to do they told me that they have a couple of disks that they don’t ever use so they gave me two more disks ( one is a Valkeri and one is a super cool........i don’t remember) but now i have two sets of disks that i can use now, one for me and one for my future companions! :):) yay! that makes me happy! but after we had ran to the park we then went to Thanksgiving dinner with the Hutchings! they are a very wonderful couple and their son came up for Thanksgiving so they wanted us over as well. brother hutchings is the Ward Mission leader! he is old and awesome! so then after that we ran to a Tattoo shop, yep that’s right, we ran to a Tattoo shop to check up on our investigators who had fed us lunch and we got some super funny pictures with them. i swear, its right out of a church comedy movie, we have seven investigators, three potentials, and five sympathizers all from that Tattoo shop! it is crazy! many of them have baptismal dates and two of them will be getting baptized, hopefully, later in the month! :) they are super close! but yeah! This last week has bee great for me!

This last week has been full of great ups and downs! It was one of the best weeks on my mission and that is because I tried to make it so! And it kinda worked! Thank you Thanksgiving! Wow, Paradox!

Thank you for all of your prayers and such! Everything is working out swimmingly right now! :) I feel great and when I feel depressed or sad I can think of you guys and look at some of the pictures you sent me and I feel happy and great! :) I love you so much! Did you take pictures of Thanksgiving? If so then you should send them to me! :)

Thank you so very much for all that you have sent me so far on my mission! I love all of the Packages and the notes and the letters! They make me happy! So very happy! They make me smile and cry and want to fly! I love you all so much!

I don’t know what I want for Christmas yet! Well I want one thing for sure! I want a calendar from uncle Eric! That’s for sure! I want a calendar of his art work! That would be great!! Also, I want my brown shoes! I have a pair of sweet brown dress shoes at home and I can wear them now cause we can wear Khakis’! YAY! But we have to have brown shoes so I want my shoes if that’s okay! If Austin or kaden wears them regularly then don’t worry about it but if not then will you send them to me? :) that would be great! :)and that is all I can think of!

 

hey, did you get my letter about my fight with a candle? any news on that?? :)

I love you all so very much and I will send you a letter in the week! :)

With lots of love and other stuff from your missionary brother and son!

Elder Anthony Zonts  

Hello my amazing, wonderful, fantastic, exceptional, Mathuzanistic, crazy beautiful, smart, growing, fun-loving, super, superb, suave, sophisticated, sweet, smart- I already said that- strong, simply amazing Family!!!

Thank you so much for you emails! :) every time I read them I have a huge smile on my face afterwards! It is the highlight of my whole week! :) and Holy Cow! It is already happening! I wasn't sure when it would be it has happened. When contemplating coming on a mission, the same though kept coming to me; “if you leave, then you will not be home to see your family grow and change” :( but as I have continued to work and to write and to live and to laugh and to love and to grow and to preach, I had yet to see many changes come upon my wonderful family waiting at home. But the time has come!! I mean wow! Kaden is on a soccer team, Xoe needs to get glasses?, Luke is starting school, my dear Mother is starting a nursing program, my wonderful father is working a new job and an EMT program, Austin is in deep bewilderment on what foxes say…………? O.o things are just changing so quickly! :) sniffle sniffle!

But now it is my turn! You’ll never guess what has happened to me this week! HA, didn’t think so! My week started last Monday with a super great preparation day. After email and shopping and lunch, the real fun started. You see, being here in Roanoke Rapids, there is not much to do……..at all! The only entertainment found in this small town is a movie theater with two screens! So it is very hard to entertain ones self. The most entertaining preparation day activities I have done so far are going golfing in Rocky Mount, which is 40 minutes away. And going fishing on Lake Gaston, which was pointless because I didn’t catch anything. So I was in a very bleak predicament. What should I do to keep my sanity? So this is what we came up with; let go to the Mall! Yay! Roanoke Rapids has a tiny tiny shopping mall with about ten stores in it and the biggest one being a JC Pennys. So we went shopping! YAY! When we got there however, we discovered something that just made me cry; all the stores but one are closed on Mondays…….:( so we went into JC Pennys so we could look at the ties. It was great though, while we were looking through the ties they were playing music over the speakers which made me smile! It was great music that I use to listen to in my past life……. O.o so it helped my keep my sanity. And after the mall we then ran home so we could relax! Tuesday was great, we had a correlation meeting with my ward mission leader at Carinis again, I ordered Spaghetti with Italian sausage! :) I also had a chance to teach a nice lady at the non-prophet store I serve at. She is very nice and she is very interested. Wednesday was great as well, most of my time was spent with some of my investigators at there home, we helped him with some struggles he has been having with his arthritis, I then traveled down to Rocky Mount to do a baptismal interview for one of the investigators there because Elder Jones is the district leader! Thursday was great, Thursday was an exchange day with Elder Barber from Wilson. We taught Mr. Anthony Hicks and then ran over to the Swanson’s to teach them a lesson. I was able to get a promise from Sister Swanson that she would come to church on Sunday and She Came!! I was told that she hasn’t been to church in almost a year! It was a big deal for quite a few members to be able to say hello and to give her a hug after so long! It was a great Sunday! And then comes Friday!Friday was probably the best day I have had on my mission as of yet! :) Friday was Zone Conference with President and Sister Baker! I drove to Goldsboro and was able to be with the Bakers for about six hours! And my goodness was it a great meeting! These last few weeks have been a struggle for me in a few different areas so I was very eager to receive some revelation and inspiration from my wonderful Mission President! And I can tell you this, in every single area that I have had struggles, it was addressed at Zone Conference! Every Single One! It was such an amazing meeting. A few of the others things that made it such a great meeting were that I got to sit right next to President Baker for Lunch and that he asked me to give the opening prayer for the last session of the Conference! It was humbling and so spiritual to be there and to have everything feel great again! They have also come out with this new booklet for missionaries. It addresses, in great detail, how to adjust to missionary life! It focuses on physical, emotional, social, and intellectual challenges faced by missionaries and how to best deal with them. I don’t have many problems with the other three but I am very excited about the section dealing with physical challenges. These past three months have been hard for me for a few physical reasons. The first being the morning workouts; we are suppose to workout for thirty minutes each day, which I don’t have a problem with; it’s the time they want us to work out which is the problem. I love to workout, as I am sure you know. But when I was home I would normally workout in the afternoon. For missionaries, we are required to wake up, kneel for prayer, and then drop to the floor for pushups………. We are also required to do only ten minute of strength and then twenty minutes of cardio, every time. So on the morning when I wake up and just drop to the floor to do pushups and am really great, I can only get ten minutes of strength in………and then I am running up and down the stairs or jumping rope. But as I was contemplating this, this being a minor thing for me, they then came out with this new health guide and in it, it gives much less strict requirement for workouts! :) Yay! Now I can work out the way I want to! I can actually get a good workout in! I am super excited about that! The other physical challenge I have been facing is that this last week and a half I have been very sick! My appetite had all but disappeared, my stomach hurts a lot, and I have had trouble sleeping. But after Zone Conference I just felt great! I feel great today and I am feeling better and better as the days continue. And then comes Saturday!Saturday was a fantastic day. Saturday was the Ducky Derby in Weldon and the 21^st of September!! Earth, Wind, and Fire!. So a few weeks ago we had seen a billboard advertising the ducky derby last Saturday, so we pulled some strings and made some calls and guess what! Last Saturday we had set up an information booth and for five straight hours we were giving out church material, talking to people about the church, and getting information for potential investigators from loads of people! It was such a great day! After the Ducky Derby I then ran over to the Tupper’s Home to give brother Tupper a blessing! And then comesSunday! Yesterday was just so wonderful. I didn’t have any investigators come to church but it was still fantastic, it actually made it more of a relaxing experience for me. I learned about being a Heavenly Rescuer! And I was able to say hello to Sister Swanson! And hen after church I was invited to Sister Jerry Jones home for dinner! And wow, she has such an interesting house! It is a dome with connecting triangles! It was super good cooking too! I ate some of the most delicious pie I have ever eaten in my life! Mother, I will send you the recipe! So I had such a great week! Things are just going very well for me! I love the people here too! They are just so amazing, and here is an example! Yesterday at church something funny happened that proves what kind of people live here! So yesterday my companion was talking to a Brother Baraccado while I was talking to Brother Fortier not seven feet away. Elder Jones told brother Baraccado that he liked his tie clip so, quick as a flash, brother Baraccado grabbed his clip and put it on Elder Jones tie and would not take it back. Well I had a similar experience. Without knowing what was happening with my companion, I walked up to Brother Fortier and patted him on the shoulder, I then told him that I liked his watch and then it went well with his suit. Well quick as a flash Brother Fortier had taken his watch off and tried to hand it to me, seeing what he was trying to do I simply refused to take it but I did not succeed, he ended up stuffing it in my pocket and refused to take it back with a firm determination. I thought I would win but no! The way Brother Fortier likes to put it is this, “when you’re calling Jesus from the South, it’s a local call! When you’re calling from anywhere else, it’s a long distance call” I love these people so very much! And so now I have another watch………

I love you all so very much! :) and I miss you terribly! Hey, you should tell everyone to write me! I mean real letters! I have received a total of three letters out in the field, and two of them are from uncle Mike! :) it would be very nice! :)

I love you so very much!! I LOVE MY FAMILY!!

Elder Anthony Robert Zonts   

Hello my wonderful Family!

Well I might as well start right into my wonderful experiences. So lets start with Monday of last week!Monday was a terrible day, it was terrrrible because it was the first Preparation day where I hadn't done something fantastically wonderful! All I did was clean, did laundry, and then I took a nap; all of which was boring and lame. So Monday was fun! So on Tuesday of last week I went to a non-prophet shelter store and I was able to volunteer my time there! While I was there I learned that they were having a 5 dollar bag sale for the coming week (Wednesday to Saturday) where I could buy everything that I could fit into a jumbo paper sack for 5 dollars! Missionary hallelujah! So I resolved to take advantage of that in the coming days! Also I Tuesday I was able to teach a pastor of a local church here! We had a return appointment which went fantastically! He appreciates our willingness to serve our fellow man and he has promised us that he would come to church next Sunday!  Well on Wednesday I then helped the other organization in the community build a house! We have upgraded our improvement to that of almost finishing all the flooring of the house! So four hours later we were done so we showered and ran to a dinner appointment with the ward mission leader! Wait, first off, during lunch that day I ran back to that thrift/community store and I bought NINE pairs of slacks for 5 dollars!! In the end only six of them are salvageable; there is a very nice lady here that does seem work for all da missionaries! So she is working on those for me! I will hopefully have them soon; I found one pair that are just right so I am wearing these until the time comes!  And that brings me to Thursday! On Thursdays I start the day off at a religious livings warehouse, it’s the D.I. of North Carolina. Needy people come in with a city ordinance or from a church and they are able to get the things that they need! I have been volunteering there since I came here and I can honestly say that I look forward to it each week! So after service I then went to lunch with that same lady who is helping me with my pants; I had taken some of the local Elders from neighboring cities while on exchange to her house and we have been attacking her backyard to make it look fabulous! So she wanted to repay us for that so she asked if she could take us to lunch, we went to a new restaurant in the next town over and I ate the most delicious Turkey Melt I have ever tasted! MMMMMMM!!!!!!   And then after lunch I had another dinner appointment later in the day so I went to that; it was an elderly lady and her grandson, they took us to an Italian restaurant which has some super delicious Stromboli’s!! so that day was a great, super, fantastic, wonderful day! And then it comes toFriday, so on Friday I have district meeting so I went to that and then a new Elder in our district came to my area on exchange, this Elder has been our here for 20 months! I mean wow! So we helped the bishops neighbor with some service and then we went over to the backyard my mom-away-from-home and we rendered more service for her and she was so thrilled! She said that she can never do anything to repay us, she is so sweet and funny! She is the classic old black lady sass and attitude mixed with LDS kindness and motherly concern! Haha! And then that brings me to Saturday, Saturday wasn't as busy! We had study, then we had one lesson, and then we went home and planned for the coming week! So yeah, it was a little more boring. But Sunday was excellent! This last Sunday, I had six investigators come to church! Yep, that’s right, SIX! It was so wonderful! They came and they were able to be there for fast and testimony meeting, well at least three of them, it was very powerful and extremely spiritual! That’s a promise with some of these extra small branches, when we get someone to come, they are welcomed so openly and everyone introduces themselves and the lessons are so strong! I actually taught gospel principles on Sunday, I taught about eternal families and it went so very well! And then for yesterday (Monday), I actually was able to play basketball with some of the young boys in the ward and wow do they have some skill! They are near 11 and 13 but they can work ya, it was nothing I couldn’t handle, but others would have been beat badly! So yeah, yesterday was much more enjoyable and this last week has been very spiritually and physically rewarding!

My scriptures for the family are sitting on my desk at home so I will give you extra next week! But here are some from my memory!

Alma 7: 14-16

Mosiah 4: 9-12

Moroni 8: 25-26

3 Nephi 27

I love you all so very much and I can’t wait to hear from you again soon!

Lots of love from your missionary

Elder Anthony Robert Zonts       

Hello my wonderful family!

So I want to jump straight into my experiences this past week! So on my preparation day last week it was very relaxing! I watched the Joseph Smith movie and wrote some letters and then cleaned a little! Yep, relaxing! As soon as my preparation time was over I then ran around looking for some people to find and teach and Elder Jones and I ran to Brother Murphy’s home. Brother Murphy is a less active member who is also a double amputee! It was very humbling to meet him and to talk about faith in our trials, he has been struggling since his wife died and then he lost his legs so things have been very hard for him! I am planning to go back this week and check up on him and see how he is doing! Well, on Tuesday, after study, I had lunch with a Pastor of a congregation here in town, I cant remember if he ever told me which church he preaches for or if he is Baptist or if he is Methodist but we had lunch with him at his home. After lunch we made a rather successful transition to talk on religion and we then spent two hours with him doing a question and answer session on our beliefs and on his! It was very rewarding for me because its not every day or with every missionary that he or she gets to let a preacher of a different church know what we believe! I bore strong testimony and he made us a promise that he will read and pray about the Book of Mormon because he said that he doesn’t like to live life as a ‘closed book’ and that he wants to meet again next Tuesday! Elder Jones and I have a suspicion that he is trying to Save us so he wants to keep meeting so we will se what happens! Also on Tuesday I was able to meet with a nice younger women who has a very remarkable story: we were told by her and the Bishop that a couple of Wednesdays ago she was working at her shop and she then went over to Sonic for no reason, but when she got there her car was having troubles and it wouldn’t start, so after another frustration which added to multiple that same day she just decided to start walking, she had had a very hard day and she was not sure what to do so she just started walking, she said that she was just fallowing her feet and when the sidewalk ended she looked up and she was at the door or the Church!!! It was a on a Wednesday so there were people there for mutual so she walked in and asked a young boy where she was, he told her where she was and he then took her to the Bishop! So we got a call from the Bishop after talking with her and he told us her story and we were able to meet with her and her sister last Tuesday for the first time! J we had a very good lesson on the Restoration of the Gospel and she says that she believes it all happened without a doubt! I am very excited for her yet a little skeptical and I will let you know why later! So that brings me to Wednesday, well on Wednesday I started my day off with six hours worth of service for the Habitat for Humanity crew, we were working on the foundation of a new house so Austin, I am building a house from the ground up! Hehe! Well after working with them and after some study time I then ran over to a less active family and I trimmed their trees in their front yard, as a reward they fed me some delicious chicken Catchatori! And then comes Thursday, Thursday was also a day of service, after volunteering at a non-prophet shelter for a couple of hours we were then recruited by the bishop to help him move a piano! After that I then had another lesson with Crystal, well actually we had a lesson after a rather exciting tour of her tattoo shop, she forgot about our lesson so we had to run to her shop to try and catch her so we got to meet her husband who is a very nice man, he is very very nice and they are both prime investigators to the gospel! So after taking a quick, yet kind of awkward, tour of their tattoo shop she came with us to the church and we had a fantastic lesson with her! She is the closest investigator we have to baptism and her husband wants to meet with us very much! So it has been a wonderful testimony for me when thinking about who is ready to receive the gospel and the places we will all go to spread the word! We have another lesson planned with her tonight so wish me luck! So on Friday we had district meeting and then we went on exchange, one of the Spanish elders from a neighboring area came with me to Roanoke and I got to drive for the first time on my mission! Thank you for sending me my license and my driving record! Did you get my letter? So on Friday I had actually set up a dinner appointment with a less active member who is from Puerto Rico, so we had a lesson and dinner with him and his Spanish speaking niece so that went very well, Elder Sanchez has been out for 16 months and speaks fluent Spanish! After dinner we then ran to another member’s house and we destroyed her jungle, we weeded and hacked at her plants in her back yard! We are going back to her house this Friday so we can finish! And that brings me to Saturday! Well actually not much happened on Saturday, we had a surprise lesson with the Grandmother of an investigator who wasn’t home so that went well! We have a return appointment for this Tuesday! And then we held a weekly planning session and some contact calls and the adult session of stake conference which we only saw a small portion of cause of computer issues, so a slow day compared to the others. And then Sunday! Sunday was stake conference and my mission president and his wife bore their testimonies so it was an excellent meeting! I love how stake conference and ward meetings and everything else still holds in store the same experiences and the same organization! It is very exciting! And then I went to bed and then I woke up this morning! Today we have a lesson planned with Crystal and we are heading over to the home of a youth here who wants to play basketball and ping pong with us so that will be exiting! And those are my experiences, things have been picking up and getting better here and they only seem to be improving! Wish me luck on my continued success and I love you all so very much!

Hello my dear Family!

I am super happy to hear all of that! I love being able to hear from you every week! It always makes me super happy! And I already feel very surreal…….. like a twilight zone! I miss you very much and I love you with my whole heart! I am approaching my two month mark and it feels like I just walked out the door! Holy Cow, so much has happened! And I cant wait for more news on everything which will be happening soon. 

I am having lots of super fun experiences here in Roanoke! That young man whom I was talking about earlier has not yet been baptized. He just two days ago went out to school at Campbell University here in NC so we had to do a transfer of missionaries but he is coming back up here to be baptized on the 24th of this month or the 7th of next month! He actually came with me on a nonmember exchange of sorts and we had a lesson which was so super powerful! He has been progressing so very much and he cant wait to be baptized! I have also been teaching a man and his son who are just as close to being baptized, he is a former member and his son has not been baptized but they are very close! I am super excited! I have placed about 13-14 Book of Mormons and I have exhausted all of the Book of Mormons in my house!!! Yeah, it has been super spiritual to be out here with real investigators and real door rejections and really hardcore Baptists! I use to feel bad for those Russian missionaries and those Chinese missionaries but I would like to see them try to convert a stanch Baptist…………yeah……….but it is very powerful to see the fruits of my labor! I have a ward of about 70 active members and all but 30 of them are strong convert of ten to twenty years ago or such!!! Last night I attended a ward mission fireside and it was an amazing experience! I love the people here and am looking forward to continue to serve them! They have accepted me as a member of there family and I can see that they trust me and love me very much! I bare strong testimony and I serve with love and that is the key to having a lasting relationship with others! I have been on four or five different exchanges since coming here and I have met and got to know many of the missionaries in my district and my zone, two days ago I went to Goldsboro to exchange with my zone leader and I like him lots! While I was at the Goldsboro home I saw a picture that made me stop in my tracks! Mother, you should look up the picture by D. O. Christensen in 2002, it is a picture of two missionaries getting ready for the day and one of them is looking in the mirror and that missionary looks a lot like me! It was crazy; you should look at it and let me know that I am not crazy! I have been having so many serving and teaching opportunities out here and they come more and more every week! I love being here!

So here are my scripture of the week! I am sorry if I have already sent some but these really came to me this week!

-Romans 15:13

-Mosiah 28:3

-Alma 27: 24-26, 31

-D&C 78: 17-19 a personal favorite of mine!

-D&C 76:1-10

I want all of you to think of these and how they apply to you there in Idaho! And how my amazing family can be further strengthened! So how has your reading been going? I hope you have at least read my homework assignments to you! I usually send them cause I have a feeling that you need them, call it inspiration if you will but I have been having some promptings lately! Will you all please make a commitment with me, yourselves, and with our Heavenly Father that no matter what, you will do Family Home evening every week and will try to fit scripture study in as much as possible! Being here makes me love my family so very much and I would hate to find out that something has been keeping them from upholding their legacy!! :D I love you with my whole heart and I am actually getting choked up right now while I am typing this cause I Love You So Very Much!! There is only one thing in this whole world that would keep me from being there with you and that would be this call to serve, so lets both make the best of what we know we must do cause the Lord only wants the absolute best for us and that can only be found when we serve him and when we grow spiritually! I want you all to read these talks that I read this week, you kept popping into my mind as I read! The first is “These Things I Know” by President Packer and the second is “A Sure Foundation” by Bishop Dean M. Davies! Read and ponder and ACT on your promptings, I want a report from all of you in the next letter, if it is not there then I will not respond……….maybe……..!! I love you all so very much!  

You should look up the “missionaries epistle to the dead letter writers” written by the San Antonio missionaries a few years ago!! I like it a lot!

Thanks for the pictures!  

I Love My Family Beyond Description! Have a great week and review what I have asked, and don’t forget to read, pray, ponder, study, love, learn, laugh, play, and grow!

Lots of Love from your missionary

Elder Zonts