Man, First off, the most depressing news of the week comes in the form of a transfer call Saturday night.... I AM LEAVING TAPPAHANNOCK!! :( I guess it is not totally awful because I get to sneak in one more area before i head home, but i am definitely going to miss this place, especially the friendships i have made the honestly the great success that is here. This email will includes lots of pictures because I don't have lots of time with having to pack and all, and the fact that there are so many pictures u can look at, u will be able to tell all the fun we had. So i will just let the pictures tell the story for this week :)
Awesome Chiropractor here in Tappahannock!
All these pictures are from a walk we went on behind a member's home when we had Elder Parkinson with us!
We assume this was a deer.... but who knows
HAHAH this was suppose to be VRM for the Virginia Richmond Mission
#ToolTime
Ahhh I love these two! can't wait till he get big
Probably wont like the effect but nice picture with our Bishop
My best friend in tapphannock
This is the clan, that goes down as one of the greatest!!
Elder Parkinson and I
Besties with..... Name tags :)
Only a few more months left in this beautiful land
This is a great friend!! and great picture
Laying on the greens
Another one of those great groups
Us making Jerrell's I'm A Mormon
Definitively fell asleep one day while driving :( sorry
Best invention ever!!
This was a park I hit up with some members while Elder Crowley had his surgery done!
Teaching some guy Family History during the Farmers Market
And last but not least, the Baptism last Saturday!
What up YALL!!! It was great to be able to see many of you last night :) you guys always bring a smile to my face!!
This week as far as missionary work has gone really well. We did have to go up to Richmond twice this week due to a meeting and Dr. Appointment but we were still able to see all our people that we are #soblessed to work with. We have one baptism coming up this week for Brother Gaskins. We are pumped about that..... It has been the first one in like 2 moths!!! So we got to get back on track somehow. Hopefully we can get a lot of other people out to it also. Other than that let me Just say two of the better parts of the week :) the pleassent surprises!!
Brother Dandridge ( a recent convert from two months ago) had a friend come to church with him! A friend that we actually had a lesson with a little before brother Dandridge got Baptized! Cool to see the missionary work come out of recent converts, who have seen the wonderful miracles and power the gospel brings.
We got a phone call from this brother identifiying himself as a less active in tappahnnock branch. Tells us he needs a book of mormon asap. So we promise to bring him one the next day buy also tell him how to down load it. Well we go over the next day and he is like, I have already listened to 2 Nephi 2, AND you need to baptize my wife before you leave. HAHAH so believe it or not, i have heard that a couple times on the mission but usually they dont pan out to anything great. But, we go back the next day to find the wife is just as excited to get baptized as the husband said!! We had a great lesson and is definitely getting baptized on June 6!! #soprepared :) #godshand :) #HollaHolla
Love yall, sorry this weeks is a little shorts, gotta get to work :)
Hahah sorry everyone about the title, u are probably hearing and seeing this all over place and are just as annoyed by it as much as I am, or maybe not :/ but let me tell u, my brain is fried and all over the place thanks to the fact that I spent about 6 hours in the Emergency Room with my beautiful companion. :) haha
Let me tell you, so he was cleaning the fish bowl Sunday after the church. Actually while we were making a cake for one of our investigator's birthday! So yeah, cleaning the fish bowl, drops it in the sick, shatters, and fingers get all cut up (FYI, I did not do good with all the blood :/ ). We go to the local emergency room but granted we are in TAPPAHANNOCK VIRGINIA! Hahah so we sit there for a hour or so and then one of our members walks in and is like "uhhhh no, u need to leave, this place is ratchet" hahah so we travel all the way to Richmond for a decent ER! So All in all it doesn't seem to be to awful, he got 9 stitches total and life goes on.
I'll just run through the rest of the week fast cause like for real, my brain is still recovering.
Fast and testimony meeting went over by like 15 or 20 minutes..... Ahhhh most people are like what ever but for reals????? The spirit leaves when the handbook says to end the meeting, why would it keep going....
BUT one of our most amazing sisters that we are working with that is NOT EVEN A MEMBER bore a very powerful testimony! Like for real, that was an awesome experience for the members to see and us. Love it!!
That cake we made for our investigators birthday that I told u about, it was like a tie did cake, let me tell u that was awesome to make!! Pics included
The Richmond, Virginia Mission will be getting iPads on May 29th. Holla Holla, just if ur wondering, I will not have to buy one. If u go home before November you get a loaner one, so that's nice!
We blitz downtown Richmond this week after we had a meeting there. That was fun, get to see all the cray cray people and such. It's cool, but that is definitely a scary place to raise a family!!
Oh and we went to the dentist this week.... I had not cavities :) but hey, let me tell y'all. This dentist was one of those like older ones so ghetto. So idk how much I trust him that I didn't have any cavities but we will go with it! :)
Cleaned out a giant fish tank this week, like had to drain the water by hose cuz it was so big! Granted this wasn't the fish bowl Crowley got his hand all cut up one, it was still and experience.
Other than that we just had some great lessons this week. Hopefully to started baptizing every week in the coming weeks, just got to get it started, that's always the hardest part!
Last but not least, HAPPY MOTHERS DAY TO THE MOMS OUT THERE ESPECIALLY, MY MOM!! And also especially to my friend's moms who were real nice and talked to me. :) love y'all. Y'all are great influences on me and ur homies around u. I will be using "Google Hangouts" on sunday so if anyone wants to hope on, that would be real nice to see y'all's beautiful faces.
Our sweet awesome colorful cake!!
Gotta love making this, hahah It was hard work for a cake
Add caption
The finished project, but i guess not cause we still put icing on... after the ER
This is brother, he is the Rapper i told some of you about
Brother Leise, Larry and Jerrell @
Just some random Selfie in the Apt.
Cool picture in the car window :) #trill
THese are Great brothers, always a plessure to spend time with them
IDK who took this or when but yeah
HAHA i took this selfie while wait for a brother to come out of his house for a lesson
Brothers and sisters, we are coming off one of my most favorite weeks so far on a mission! So last week, we didn't have to many lessons, and we let the members get involved with our investigators. Well this week we were able to continue that trend, and also teach lots! We had 11 investigators lessons taught by Thursday alone. Idk if that a lot for other missions but for ours, that's usually a good number for a full weeks worth! We were able to follow up with those lessons by helping a recent convert completely redo a whole room. We finished ripping out the floor, painted, and layer floor. I was thinking out how our mission president gave us the council to make sure we put our mission on our resume. Well now I know why..... U learn sooooo many skills, it's great! And we have also been working with a few of the recent converts in getting there family history in and names to go up to the Washington, D.C. Temple! Exciting time :)
Let's see, what else went on this week.
I was able to attend a social services meeting this week. That was pretty interesting, fun to give our input.
We had one of our older investigators that we had not seen for about a month, when we sat down this week tell us she is one chapter away from finishing Book of Mormon (starting from 3rd Nephi)
Remember that referral from Arizona, she told us "I want to get baptized tomorrow" :) well obviously that made us jump for joy. Just a couple more things we have to get worked, so pray for that.
A huge tree fell down in front of the church so we took the initiative to take it down . That was had, but another one of those good learning experiences.
Moved a family out of the ward so that was sad :(
But even with all of this. Sunday was still the best day, let me tell you. So it was a regional conference for the North America north east area. So I'll be honest I was shacking in my boats, we had four investigators at church, one being her first time. And u know how regain oak conference is, it's a 2 hour long meeting and different. Well I sucked up my fear, everyone came and lezzz be real, it was awesome! Out stake president was able to address us the first half hour and his talk built upon exactly what I talked about last week. THE SPIRIT IN THE HOME. Just a testament to me that this is a VERY important concept. Without the spirit in the home
"our children learn the dance steps without learning to hear and to feel the beautiful music of the gospel, they will over time become uncomfortable with the dance and will either quit dancing or, almost as bad, keep dancing only because of the pressure they feel from others who are dancing around them."
Then we were able to go over to a member home and had a great lesson and lunch with the sister that we found last week from Swift Creek. The lesson was on the tree of life, it is just great to be able to teach lessons in homes that already have the spirit. Gotta love strong families. AND THEN we came home and the Pack-tron drove us up to witness the Patriarchal Blessing. It was a freaken stellar day! Not to mention i came home to my favorite meal sister Kent makes.... POT PIE :) <3 (:
I love y'all, hope and pray all is going swell! God bless.
- elder cj young
Driving these fools around, Gotta love it
Dinner at Pueblo Azteca. Sorry for the 100% awkwardness
These are some awesome people. Was able to attend the Patriarchal blessing for this great brother!
Oh and here is Jerrell's performance from just a few days ago. He went down to an Audition or something. Pretty Fun, that is brother!
Hey everyone. Haha So today started out like a normal missionary day simply because we had a member out tracking with us last week and all that he did as he knocked on doors was scheduled lessons for us this morning. But oddly enough I actually enjoyed it. Guess I am hitting that point of the mission where p-days are filling up with teaching..... I love it!!
K, cool awesome story this week. So rewind like a year ago. I am in swift creek and meet this 18 year old girl that the missionaries had been teaching for like 6 months and was lined up for baptism. We'll story goes on, she moves out and we lose contact with her.
Our booth at the Farmers Market (Elder Urrutia)
Well u see this beautiful booth. We set it up at the local farmers market focusing on family history. We had a lot of success that day but the most immediate success was this sister showed up out of no where! Hahaha we'll turns out she lives right across the street from the church. She has thought every Sunday about coming over but never did cause she didn't know anyone there. She came yesterday and seemed to enjoy it, said she would be coming back. Even granted it can be hard cause there is not like any sisters her age. But that was a cool miracle and another testimony to me that I am where I am suppose to be.
Les see, what else did I do this week.... We actually didn't teach to many people this week. But in many ways that was a good thing because we saw our solid investigators more than ever. Instead we gave the members the responsibility and they stepped up! It was great to see the member interacting with them at church, Wednesday night activities, and even out side of church activities! Gotta love that!!
So the work is moving forward here! I am grateful to be a part of it! Just some other fun things that went down this week: - Other elders worked with operation inasmuch doing service in the community - We got two meals where the restaurant paid for them. - Went to a crazy ton of less actives this week. - Drove Spanish around to there apt cuz they crashed there car like a couple months ago haha classic. - Hung out with sensaie, but now he is back in Utah! So if u see him say hi! He looks like a Buddha :)
Love y'all, Take care, Be safe, Good luck -elder cj Young
Ps was told I am coming home August 12, so I assume homecoming is the following Sunday. Would love to see u there!!
So sad story, a bird pooped on a Book of Mormon Near us
K I just have to say that yesterday alone was probably the best day in the mission field and honestly nothing like crazy happened! We truly had a great fast and testimony meeting! Like as a missionary your always scared to bring your friends to church cause lezzz be real, some completely blow! Anyway, yesterday's was phenomenal! We even had great testimonies from members about there missionaries experiences they have had! And to make it the best is we had all the investigators there that we were praying for! One of which should be getting baptized next week :) his name is Keeth and he is a chill dude. I actually taught him last time I was in tappy town, but no missionaries saw him after I left so hey, another reason I had to come back!
Idk if I told y'all but we have been asked by the stake president to work on finding over the next 3 weeks. Well he set a lofty goal but hey, he has the "keys" for the missionary work so we went for it.... It was inspired! We have focused on finding this week for a reason! There are more people PREPARED in this area than ever before. We found 6 new people to teach. But even better, these aren't just new people to teach but truly people that are prepared to enters the baptism soooo soon!
Ahhhh I am just so grateful for the chance I have to be hear. Included in my fast yesterday was a fast of gratitude (I actually learned the idea from a brother in Staunton we reactivated). I am so grateful to be able fast and the many different way I can show God my gratitude to him! I love to do the lords work, and especially for the knowledge I have gained so I am truly able to do this work HIS way.
I hope y'all are have a blast out in Utah. It's great weather here so I assume it's pretty good out there for y'all! Take care, god bless, deuces!
- Elder CJ Young
So this was one of those ties my dad took on his mission!!! So i bought these stance socks like two weeks ago..... Well i wore them yesterday and then had to pick a tie and it was a no brainier!!! #matching #toocute
This pic looks completely trashy but here u go anyways
Nice river we drove over. It has some Indian name
So we had a Tamale Making Party with Hispanics and it actually turned out pretty well!
Nice House we found on a lake
This is Sensaie
Holla Holla, while we are fishing our cares away
This brother is a dime of a dozen!
Ps something I came to last week. If we are not using this technology, guidance, and inspiring we have received in this dispensations, and especially in this era (ex; indexing, Mormon messages, all our family records, bible videos, and any more)..... We are a waste! We could have been born a thousands years ago and it would not have made a difference. But hey, we were saved for these latter day! So do something great with it!!
Hey y'all, hope u had a great Easter! Ours was a little different, not only being on a mission, but because of general conference! But hey, general conference was awesome. The past couple conferences I have felt kind of the roller coaster effect as I watch. With some talks I really loved, then others that I just have to smile through :) but this conference there were just a lot of solid, consistent, good talks. I hope that y'all were able to see some of them. If not, definitely worth it to go back and read! I am excited for the ensign.
The missionary work this week was different. We did not teach to many lessons which was odd. We actually did do a lot of service. We cleaned up that ladies yard that we found last week on the beach (that lesson with her was the worst thing of my life). Then we also cleaned the most filthy house I have ever seen! Like for real, let me tell u! Five people lived in this place and to say they didn't take care of themselves would be an understatement. Haha I was joking; even if Christ walked in here, it would be hard to keep the spirit. Probably a bad joke for fur real! The spirit can not dwell in unholy places, let alone place that make u hurl the second u step inside!!! ;( We also helped moved some furniture, prepared Easter decorations, and helped take down two giant trees in front of our house! So that was cool to see! We still have some really great people that we are working with! No one set with a baptismal date; but by the end of this week we hope to have 2. Just so y'all know, now it holds me accountable.
Well again, I hope your Easter holiday was awesome. I am grateful for this church and how of has helped me gain vast knowledge. Especially grateful for the brotheren that we are able to sustain as Prophets, Seers, and Revalators. God Bless!
- Elder Young
One of the Trees
Ratchet nasty house
I bought this outfit at Good will about an hour before this picture was taken haha
HAHA Gotta love getting a ride places
Elder Packer, Simkins and I
We were past out tired from a day of service
Oh and Transfer calls came in. Elder Crowley and I are staying together one more transfer! That will make three! But elder Simkins is leaving. Pray his replacement is cool!
