Jacob - November 28, 2016

Hey everyone, it was good to hearing from you all. I hope you all had
a good great thanksgiving, mine was pretty good. But I'm going to try
and go through the highlights of the week. So I'm going to start with
Monday. Last Monday we went to downtown Disney as a distract. It's not
Disneyland, but it's like an outside mall right outside of it. It was
kind of interesting, we did lots of window shopping. But at least I
can say I went. I was going to try and get somethings, but it was
really pricey. Then on that following Tuesday we did service down in
Costa Mesa at the soup Kitchen, but that day was pretty strange
because elder Clifford had a doctors appointment and so did elder
messer, so we spent the majority of the morning doing that stuff and
then we had a weird hour between service and finishing the doctor
stuff, so we went to a thrift store that other missionaries do service
at. Wednesday we had district meeting that was pretty good. Thursday
was good, we did a service event at the Honda center, we just helped
them put away chairs and tables, but I got a free shirt so that's
cool. Also that night we ate with the Lopez Family, they cook super
good every time we go over. The meal was really simple, just chicken,
rice and beans. It was a good time though. Friday wasn't too special,
just weekly Planning. Saturday I went on an exchange with elder
Bermudez, I was in his area and we had a good time. We worked hard and
we were kept busy throughout the night. We taught a really powerful
lesson to a RCLA and he ended up coming to church so hopefully he
begins to re-activate, he's going through a lot of trials tough so
it's tough for him. Lastly is Sunday. So the companion of elder messer
got sick so I went to church with elder messer while my comp was home
with elder Schoen. It was fun, I hung out in primary with him while he
played the piano. And lastly we had transfer calls. Not many changes
are happening, I'm staying with elder Clifford for another transfer in
the grove. We then are getting a new sister training leader because
one of them is going home. And then another elder is coming to the
district so there will be a trio with us. It will be an exciting
transfer. But I believe this is it for this week. I love you all! Take care.

Jacob - November 21, 2016

Hey Family, this week was good. I'm not going to have a lot of time to
send personal emails this week so I'm writing to all of you this week.
But I'm grateful for the emails you sent to me, but I probably won't
respond to anything in particular this week. Anyways this week was
good. We taught a good amount of people and saw a few new faces. Also
we had a zone conference where we learned about the Faith to Find, the
new Christmas Initiative and also a lot about Family History. I'm
really excited for this Christmas season and to share the new video
with people, I think it'll bring a lot of success to the mission.
Usually hearts are a little softer during this season too. Also we had
service at the soup Kitchen this week and they got this huge donation
of candy. So we got to take a 40 lbs box of candy home with us, so
please don't send anymore candy plus I still have tons back from when
you first sent me stuff. Also we had a really fun church activity this
week where we ate a bunch of turkey and all the members danced. It was
a lot of fun. I'll send ya some pictures. But that's all for this
week, hope you have a great week!

Jacob - November 14, 2016

Hey mom so i want to start out with a confession, the reason why I did
not write you last week is that I just didn't have motivation to do
anything. It was just one of the P-days, plus we were out and about a
lot so it was a little tough to find quality time to get writing. I
actually did write something that i was going to send, but when we got
back to a source of wifi, it was too late to send something. It's best
to be obedient even in those times when we think something is
acceptable or not. That's something I've learned a lot on my mission,
the difference between a good missionary and a great one. It's tough,
but it's the great missionaries that have an everlasting change from
their missions. the thought just came to me that all the missionaries
in the Book of Mormon experienced the same thing, because of their
decisions, thousands of lives were affected down the road and well
that's something that I would like. So I hope you forgive me for being
obedient. Also thank you for sharing that thought with me about what
you learned at church. Something that i've enjoyed is sharing the
story about the title of Liberty or also a scripture in Mosiah 29:20.
I liked the title of liberty story because the "people came running
together... rending their garments in token, or as a covenant, that
they would not forsake the Lord their God" (Alma 46:21). The people
understood what mattered most, which is faith in the Lord. Mosiah
29:20 says something similar, it talks about humility and how the Lord
prospers those that put their trust in him. So they both go to say
that we just need to have trust and confidence that everything will be
for our good.

Wow not sure where those thoughts came from, i guess it's somethings
that I have thought of hear and there this week. But overall this week
was good. We taught a good amount of people this week and our teaching
pool is looking pretty good. We got some people on all ends of the
spectrum, people that we barely found and also a lady that has been
coming to church and all the other stuff in between. I just hope and
pray that my comp and I can continue to work at our finding so that we
don't run into a shortage of investigators (that's the worse). The
lady i mentioned early has a lot of potential, she has come to church
twice now and the members are super friendly to her. My only concern
is her personal praying and scripture reading to find the truth, but
we will be checking on her throughout the week. Other than that I'm
not too sure what else to mention. I have 2 weeks left in training,
that has been going good, I've seen a lot of progress in my Trainee,
especially his Spanish. I think that's it for this week though. I love
you and hope you have a great week!

Elder Baer

Jacob - October 31, 2016

Hello family, it was good to hear from you. I'm writing a group letter
first to make sure you all know how I am doing, hopefully I'll have
time to write some more personal ones to you. But this Monday is sort
of strange since it is Halloween. The plan for today is to have P-day
till 2, proselyte from 2-5, have dinner and then go back to the
apartment. So tonight will be interesting. I think we are going to
play uno with some other elders that live in the same complex as us.
Also we might bake some cookies, we'll see. But anyways this week was
good. We did lots of finding and things are looking good. We have a
few people that we are working with that have good potential so
hopefully good things happen with them. But we are working hard and
working with members to try and get them to help put in the work. We
just have to follow up with them, we'll be doing a lot of that this
week. Also this week I went on an exchange with Elder Seibold, it went
pretty well. We talked a lot about trying to help the mission and
others find Joy. It was something that we've been wanting to apply
from elder cook's address. But joy is a real cool topic, elder Nelson had some really cool comments about it in his conference talk. But I'm
excited to see what will come to the mission as we all collectively
try and increase the joy within us and within others. But I think that
was the highlight for this week. Everything else is kind of slurred
together. But I love you all and hope you all have a great week. Take
care.

Elder Baer

Jacob - October 24, 2016

Hey family, this week was pretty good. Due to the changes in the
ward/district our areas where moved around a little bit. So our area
was cut in half, definitely a good thing since we our area was huge
and really tough for us to get around on bike. But the changes still
took a lot of our investigators so we are back to finding again. But
we are working hard and I'm staying optimistic. Also this week we had
a mission tour, it's sort of like a zone conference, but instead a
seventy came to give us instruction and council. The seventy that came
was Elder Cook. He spoke a lot about the Gospel of Jesus Christ andalso conversion. Our prepared to learn was a talk by elder Bednar called "converted unto the lord" in Oct. 2012. If memory recalls, I
think Tayler used his analogy in his homecoming talk about the 10
virgins. But it's a really good talk. Also something worth mentioning
is that it rained yesterday and we had to bike to dinner, it was
pretty fun, y comp didn't like it, but I enjoyed it. I miss the rain.
But I'm doing good, everything is well, I'm not too sure what else to
say for this week.. I love you all and hope you have a great week.

Elder Baer