Miracles!!

April 28, 2014

Tuesday, we met with our "new" investigator and talked to him about
baptism. It was cool because he is so ready to be baptized and get
going with callings in the church. And he knows it too! At the end of
the lesson, we committed him to call us the very next day with his
answer towards his prayer for baptism. He did call us with some good
news! He said after a long night talking with his wife and praying, he
said that he will be baptized along with his wife and son!! WHAT AN
AWESOME MIRACLE!!! We will be teaching the family after his surgery
and recovery on May 28th. This area is starting to progress with the
work!

Friday, we concluded the final new member lesson for Brother Topper...
:( I am kinda bummed out. We have had such a great relationship and
bonding as friends, and to see that change in him grow and progress is
freaking amazing and unbelievable! Bro. Topper is such a great guy. He
is getting ready to go do baptisms for the dead soon, and then sooner
than later receive the Melchizedek Priesthood. Then yesterday at
church we were talking and he wants to get his patriarchal blessing
soon too so we will be talking with him one last time friday about
that.

Saturday night, our ward mission leader, and us miissionaries went to
a less actives house to give her a blessing. Brother Cottle, our ward
mission leader asked me to do the anointing of the oil, and I was so
nervous! He said that I did a great job and I said all that needed to
be said. Also, during the ride back, Brother Cottle shared a scripture
with me that really hit home to me as to what blessings I will receive
while leaving everything behind and has helped be with homesickness
and I would like to share that scripture with you all: This is in Mark
10:
28 Then Peter began to say unto him, Lo, we have left all, and have
followed thee.
29 And Jesus answered and said, Verily I say unto you, There is no man
that hath left house, or brethren, or sisters, or father, or mother,
or wife, or children, or lands, for my sake, and the gospel’s,
30 But he shall receive an hundredfold now in this time, houses, and
brethren, and sisters, and mothers, and children, and lands, with
persecutions; and in the world to come eternal life.

(Mark 10:28-30)

Sunday was pretty sweet honestly. We had one of our investigators come
to church with the bishops family. She hasn't come for at least a few
months so it was good to see her there. Then after sacrament meeting,
one of bishops counselors introduced us to a gentleman who came to our
service because one of his friends is LDS and was curious what the
difference is between the Bible and the Book of Mormon. We will be in
contact with him early this week and to start teaching him! Then to
make things even better, one of our members named the Escolopio's
(They have a son who was a drummer or guitarist for the band 'Good
Charlotte' whom I want to meet soon but anyways:) ) came up to us and
said that her other sons children want to be baptized and the
nonmember wife also wants to learn more too! IT WAAS TOTALLY WICKED!!!


I love you all and no matter what, I love each and every single one of
you. Do not forget that. Have a FAN-FREAKIN-TASTIC Week my peeps!

**NOTICE** From now until May 15th, do not send any letters to the
Prestancia Pl address. Transfers is on may 14th so I could go to a
different area but i am not sure yet. So please send ALL mail,
packages to the mission office: 11700 Falls Rd Potomac, MD 20854

Love always-
Elder JT Ekberg

5 MONTHS- HOLY COW!!

April 14, 2014 

This week has been pretty hectic for me. Not with missionary stuff but
with emotional and personal things that I am doing my best to
overcome. Being away from all the people I love is hard but I know
that I am out here because all the love you have shown me and the
least I can do to repay all of you is to be serving The Lord.

Going back to missionary work, we are slowly becoming more and more
busy. We have been working a lot with the less actives in the ward.
With the spring and the less actives projects they have, we have a lot
of service days for them. I really like helping them out because we
get to get out of our missionary clothes! :P the most recent of those
we are seeing and that I really like, are the Gardners. They live
close by the Patuxent river and the husband said he would take us
fishing out on one of the local docks :) I really miss fishing...

This last week, we went to Sister Margolis' home for lunch and pretty
much had a party! She made like a hash brown crisp kinda thing. It was
pretty good. We thought that was all she was going to feed us, so we
were like uhhhh is this all? Then she pulled out the bubba burger
which are some pretty big patties LOADED with meat and oh. My.
Goodness. I was in heaven! The only thing that was missing was a nice
coke and some of my homemade hash browns... And maybe a steak too.
Hahahaha! While we were there, she asked us if it would be ok if she
took us to downtown DC aka the national mall today. So that is what we
did today! We went to visit the national archives and to see the
cherry blossoms (which they all fell of due to the wind so it wasn't
that great but still was pretty fun). I got to see the original
Declaration of Independence, the bill of rights, and the constitution.
I felt like I was in the movie national treasure!

OH AND I HIT MY 5 MONTH MARK YESTERDAY!! holy cow!

And Just a reminder, all letters can be sent to my apartment address (4670
Prestancia Pl #108 Waldorf, MD 20602) till about the first week in
May. Don't send anything after that because I won't get it. Any
packages send to 11700 Falls Rd Potomac, MD 20854

Thank you so very much and I love you all!

Elder JT Ekberg

April 7, 2014

April 2nd was transfers and I am staying in my 1st area still. Coming up on 5 months being out. Elder treasure is also staying here too. We got a new Zone Leader Elder Rushton. He is from Oregon and plays basketball too.

Friday I went on exchange in the city because my companion had a leadership training meeting. So I spent most of friday biking around with a cool missionary named Elder Elliot, he was in the group that came out with me from the MTC. Anyways, he gave me a tour of the city and told some cool things that go on down there (other than drugs... Just kidding haha). When the kids get out of school, they ALL go to the courts and play ball. Basketball is SUPER BIG in that area. There is a place called Berry Farms, and that is where Kevin Durant grew up! I was hoping we would get a chance to go down there and play with the kids, buuuuuuutttt we didn't :( 

We had an appointment with a guy named Oscar, and word on the street was that he gives out hats and pairs of sunglasses to missionaries who come visit with him. He gave me a hat that said Yokohama and then gave a war story about that place. Oscar gave me the nickname of 'smiley' because i smile alot. haha he is a cool guy!

Then friday night we went back to our area for dinner appointment. For our spiritual thought, the kids taught us how to play lacrosse. It was fun but basketball is more fun! haha. The kids were telling the parents how good he thought I was at lacrosse. He was like you should play lacrosse!! That family is awesome. 

Sunday was conference and I had a lot of questions and prayers that I need help with. Some got answered and some didn't and that is ok. My favorite talk from this conference was President Monson's during priesthood session. My favorite quote from that is "Just be the same person in the dark that you are in the light."

What was your favorite conference talk?

We watched all the sessions of conference at members homes except the priesthood session which we watched at the chapel.

Hope you have had a great week last week and i hope you will have another great week this week

PS. Thank you to those who have written me I really appreciate it!

Man it gets cold here!

March 31, 2014

The past couple of days it has been raining and then all of a
sudden, last night, Mother Nature thought about giving us another
curve ball in the weather... she made it snow for a good hour. The
good thing is is that it didn't stick so I was happy.
         This week was pretty good. Tuesday, after our studies, we decided to
make some brownies and take them to some members and investigators.
Definitely the best idea to do when you have nothing to do and you
have visited EVERYONE in the area... One of the members was The
Jenkins family. She has a son named Chris who is handicapped and I
love him! He is the coolest person ever! When ever we go over, he gets
really excited and shouts our names and jumps in the air, clapping his
hands. Sister Jenkins takes care of her two grandsons as well, and the
youngest is really hyper haha. They love having the missionaries over
anytime! :)

Love these kids!!

   Wednesday was our temple trip for all the missionaries who are
going home. I had a really great experience there! I love going to the
temple because the spirit is so strong wherever you go in there. That
evening, we had dinner with a Less active, recent convert, part
member. The husband is the less active, the oldest daughter is a RC,
and the rest of the family are non members and they are super cool!
The kids were crazy and all over me! I don't know why kids like
climbing all over big, tall trees but they did make some very funny
faces and I did capture that moment ;)

   Thursday we had an awesome dinner and a lesson with another former
investigator that we are starting to teach again! The investigator is
pretty cool. He struggled in the past with the Word of Wisdom, doing
some pretty intense and crazy things, and then got off of that stuff

Ping Pong P-Day...they think I am a giant!

but started smoking and got addicted to that. He has been doing his
best with quitting that, but it is still very hard for him. He wanted
to have us come over on a weekly basis so we will be teaching him
every week and helping support him with quitting; but he doesn't want
to be pressured heavily into joining the church. We chatted with
Brother Heath (his home teacher) and asked for suggestions on how to
work with him and he said the exact same thing the investigator said.
I think that in a few months, he will realize that he needs Heavenly
Fathers help if he wants to quit the smoking.. We will see though :)
         Friday we put down another New Member Lesson in the books with
Brother Topper. Me and him have established like a best friend
relationship you could say. He says things like "When you come back to
visit, you are welcome to  come over, chat swim, anything. I'd love to
see you again!" and the classic: "I can't wait to watch you play ball.
I would love to come to your games." His family is legitimately solid
:)
        I hope ya'll have a wonderful week! :D Send emails and letters too! I
love 'em both! Love you all!!

-- 

~Elder Ekberg~