September 16, 2012

Dear Family and Friends,

So we had a great week. We had transfer calls come last night. Everyone was expecting my companion to be transferred but he ended up staying in Paradise with me. My companion is still district leader but we had a lot of changes in our district and zone. Its weird to think that I'm already in my 3rd transfer of my mission and have been out for 3 months. Its gone by super fast, its crazy. I'm thinking I'm probably going to be staying in my first area for about six months.

We're still teaching Elaine and she's doing great. We are beginning to teach her the commandments and we taught her the word of wisdom a couple of days ago. Her son is a recent convert who still struggles with his addictions. We were able to give him a blessing to overcome his addictions. The spirit was so strong and he gave us his chewing tobacco to dispose of it. They both committed to live the word of wisdom. Elaine is really coming along and progressing well. I'm really excited for her and how well she's doing. Her baptism is scheduled for September 28th.

Yesterday at church we had someone call me and Elder Harper out of priesthood and there was someone outside in the parking lot who said she was interested in our church. We gave her the basic introduction about our church and we're going to begin teaching her this week. Its amazing how the Lord works and how he prepares people to receive this restored gospel.

We've been teaching this lady named Kim ever since I've been here in Paradise and she came to church for the first time on Sunday which was awesome. We had 3 investigators in sacrament meeting this past week which was great!

All in all everything is still going great. I love and miss you guys. I hope you all have a great week.

 

-Elder Rosenbaum

Ben with some Missionarys playing Golf on P- day

September, 9 2013

Dear Family and Friends,

I'm glad to hear everyone had a great time at Grandma's on Labor Day. I was definitely thinking about you guys and knew you would be having a good time. It was kind of weird missing it, I'm not gonna lie, I was a little jealous! We had a up and down week to say the least. We had 2 of our baptismal dates drop. Jerry was really appreciative of everything we've done for him and the great love and support the ward has shown him. But he's going to be moving soon, so the probability of his baptism happening before he moves is kind of unlikely, but we're praying for the best. Jerry is literally the coolest, most sincere, kind person I've taught so far on my mission. 

Anne also dropped her baptism which was suppose to happen this weekend. But she said its not permanent. She just wants to make sure this is something she wants to do which is perfectly fine. We don't want to rush her or anything. Anne only has one foot and her other foot is starting to swell up really big and she's afraid of losing it and she was in a lot of pain. We had an opportunity to give her a blessing and I think she was really touched by the spirit. 

Elaine though is doing great. She had the Seventh Day Adventists church call he, trying to reactivate her and try to get her to come back to church. She told them to remove her records from their church and that she was investigating with the Mormon religion. I'm really proud of her for her decision and she's continuing to come to church and we always have great lessons with her. Her baptism is scheduled for September 28th.

Dennis is also continuing to do great and hasn't had any set backs. We're starting to meet with him more and more often as we're getting closer to his baptism. He's just as solid as ever. We're really excited for him. We even picked up one of Dennis' friends as a new investigator this past week. He's not even a member and he's already doing missionary week.

We're going to go golfing today with some other missionaries and we get to go for free which is pretty sweet! Transfer calls will be coming this Sunday and I'll probably be getting a new companion so it will be exciting to see who I get. 

Just in case anyone plans on sending me anything. Send it to the mission office because I don't know our new address and we will be moving out soon to a different members house in our ward.

California Roseville Mission

8583 watt avenue

Antelope CA 95843

Thanks for everything and for you love and support. I love you guys.

-Elder Rosenbaum

September 1, 2013

Dear Family and friends,

We had a another great week. We had zone conference this past week so we got to take an hour drive down to Yuba city. We heard some exciting news from our mission president. He told us that missionaries are going to be allowed to start using facebook for missionary purposes only so we can keep in better contact with our investigators and members of the ward where we're serving. There are 12 missions out of 435 missions who will be testing using facebook in their mission. Our mission is one out of the 12 missions who will be testing this. So within the next week or two we'll begin using facebook during less effective proselyting time which is pretty exciting. Our Mission President also told us that within the next 6 months we'll have Ipads in our mission for sure. So missionary work is going to start changing a little and its going to be a lot more effective and we're going to be able to reach and talk to a lot more people.

We had a solid week. Jerry, who's baptism is scheduled for this Saturday probably won't go through. We're going to have to push it back. His doctor told him he can't be immersed  in water because of his situation. Our bishop even talked to a couple of doctors at his work and they all said that immersion by water would be a really bad idea. So our Mission President is currently working with the 1st Presidency of the Church because there has to  be a way that Jerry can be baptized. He wants to be baptized but its really unfortunate that this is holding him back.

We currently have 4 people on date for baptism. We have one baptism scheduled a week for the whole  month of September which is super exciting I just hope they all go through. Anne is the one we got on date this past week. Anne is an older later who's really been through a lot of trials in her life. She only has one leg which is kind of cool. She's a really sweet older lady. She's really had a change of heart. We've been teaching her ever since I got to Paradise and she wasn't too interested before but now its something she wants to do so we're really excited.

I had a really cool experience at church yesterday. I was sitting next to one of our investigators named Elaine. She has a baptism date for September 28th but she was still deciding if this was something she wanted to do. She was trying to decide between our church and the Seventh Day Adventist Church. So during sacrament she leaned over and whispered to me, "This is the Church I want to join. This is the one." When she told me that the Spirit was so strong. It was awesome.

Transfer calls are coming up in about 2 weeks on Sept 14th so my companion will most likely be transferred because he's been in this area for awhile. So we're most likely going to be moving into another members house in our ward. The house we're at now the lady is always home alone because her husband is always at work and when we come home for lunch and stuff we're not suppose to be alone with a female, so at the end of the transfer we'll more than likely be moving out. That's what our mission President told us. 

The work though is going great. We had 3 investigators at church this past week. And Jacob, my first baptism was able to receive the Aaronic Priesthood this past Sunday which was an awesome experience. All in all everything is going great. Thanks for all your support and prayers. I love you guys. 

-Elder Rosenbaum

August 26, 2013

Dear family and friends,

Another week has come and gone and we're continuing to have a lot of success and seeing a lot of miracles in our area. We had a recent convert move into our ward so we went over to teach the new member lessons to him and we ended up teaching his mom named Elaine. We taught her the lesson of the Restoration and she had tons of questions. She was a former seventh day Adventist. The spirit was so strong in the first lesson I felt prompted to challenge her to baptism in the that first lesson. She accepted and her baptism is scheduled for September 28th. She came to church with her son and the whole ward was great to her and she had a great time in relief society. She's so excited to learn more and she's reading the Book of Mormon. Her son wants to get the Aaronic  Priesthood so he can baptize his mom. It was truly a miracle.

We currently have 3 people on date for baptism. One of them being Jerry. He's talking to his throat specialists tomorrow and he's going to tell him whether or not he'll be able to be baptized because of the hole in his neck from agent orange. Jerry is really worried about it and how its going to work out. We've been working with our bishop who's a doctor and we're trying to work something out. We're praying for him and hoping everything works out. His baptism is scheduled for September 7th.

Dennis, our other investigator who is also on date for baptism is absolutely on fire. He came to church again for all three hours, He's almost done reading the Book of Mormon and he's just loving it. The work here in Paradise is really just starting to pick up and we are starting to have full days where were running from appointment to appointment. Its been awesome. We taught a total of 30 lessons this last week. We even picked up two new investigators this past week too. Every time I see our Mission President he tells us to pray for miracles and we've been doing that and we're definitely seeing our prayers answered. I'm loving working with Elder Harper. We still get along great and we have a fun time doing the work here in Paradise. We have a zone conference this Thursday which should be awesome. I'll be able to see my companion from the MTC which will be sweet!

Thanks for all your support and prayers for me, it truly does mean a lot and have fun watching BYU football this Saturday. I'm super jealous and be sure to update me on everything. Love you guys!

-Elder Rosenbaum 

August 19, 2013

Dear Family and Friends,

Its been another solid week out here in the mission field and we're having a lot of success. We had a total of 4 of our investigators attend sacrament meeting this past Sunday which is the best I've had since I've been out on my mission. Dennis went to church for the first time and he stayed for all 3 hours and was super attentive the whole time and was asking lots of questions the entire time. We're meeting with him again tonight. We challenged him to baptism and he accepted it and we set His baptism for September 7th. Dennis said he had a great time at church and he looked forward to coming next week. We taught him the plan of salvation this past week and he said everything we taught him just made sense and clicked in his brain but now he has the vocabulary for everything. We're really excited for him. Every time we meet with him he just has tons of questions of things he's been studying.

Jerry is also doing very well. He's been sick so we were able to go over and give him a blessing and he was able to have a very positive experience and the spirit was really strong. He continues to go to church every week and is fitting in really good with the ward. His baptism is also scheduled for September 7th. So we're going to have a double baptism on that day which is super exciting.

Every day I see the Lords hand helping us in our work out here. It seems like everyday we experience some type of success in one way or another. This past week we met with one of our investigators named Kim. We've been teaching her ever since I got here in Paradise. She's been having lots of problems with the word of wisdom so we've been working with her and she's been attending this alcohol recovery program. She's finally starting to study the Book of Mormon which is great and she is committed to come to church for the first time, so we'll see what happens. She is finally starting to progress but very slowly.

I'm continuing to love it out here. I'm having a lot of positive experiences and I've learned a ton so far in the two months I've been out on my mission. My testimony of this gospel has grown tremendously. I feel like I understand the concept and the true meaning of what charity is. Sacrifice is charity and sacrifice brings the blessings of the Lord. I feel like I'm truly learning to love the people I teach and the people I run into. I love and miss you guys. Thanks for your love and your support.

-Elder Rosenbaum

August 12, 2013

Dear family and friends,

First off thanks so much for all the emails I always look forward to reading what you guys have to say and it keeps me going. So my ward mission leader is super into tennis and we went and hit a couple of days ago and it was a blast. It was probably the most competitive tennis I've played since state. It was good to be able to pick up a tennis racket again! So we had another great week. The days are starting to blend together and its seems to be going by so quick! As of today I'm already two months done with my mission so I'm 1/12 of the way done which is super weird to think about. I still feel likes I just barely got out.

So the investigator we have that is still on fire is Jerry. He has awesome fellowship from the ward and I love meeting with him. We were able to get a baptismal date for September 7th for him. He's so excited for his baptism and we can always count on him to be at church. Our bishop is a doctor and so we've been working out a way with him and our mission president so we can figure out the procedure to baptize him. He has a hole in his neck from agent orange from serving in Vietnam. We've been meeting with Jerry basically since the first week I arrived in Paradise.

Our next promising investigator is a man named Dennis. We've only had two lessons with him and he's already read like 1/3 of the Book of Mormon and asks tons of questions and he's just really interested. He's about a 30 year old man which is kind of cool because we teach a lot of old people here. 

We picked up a investigator this past week named Tony. We were going over to teach his wife and she was asleep so we ending up talking with him for over an hour. He's a tattoo artist and he's been in and out of prison and jail. He used to be a drug addict and now he's been drug feel for over a year. He was telling his whole story and how he felt changed through the atonement and how he had to rely and put his full trust in the Lord. We introduced the Book of Mormon and the restoration and he wanted us to come back and get more into it and teach him and his wife.  

Me and Elder Harper have been working really hard and we taught a total of 29 lessons this week. We've been doing a lot of less active work and working a lot with part member family's. Its crazy how many less active people we have here.

Marie's baptism which was scheduled for August 24th has been postponed, so we don't currently have a date and we haven't had a sit down lesson with her for awhile because of all the problems they've been having with Eddy being in the hospital. He's finally getting the help he needed and the total amount of seizures he had is 119 and it was all within 3 days. Its a miracle he's still alive. Your body can't normally take all that in. Its amazing what the power of the priesthood can do. 

Thanks for all the support. I love and miss you guys.

-Elder Rosenbaum

August 5, 2013

Dear Family and Friends,

This past week has probably been the  craziest week of my mission so far. I'll start off by telling you about my 1st baptism of my mission which we had on Saturday. Jacob had so much support there from his family and friends. We had to end up having the program in the chapel and then all cramming in the room for the actual baptism. It truly was an amazing day. There was about as many people at his baptism as we have at a regular sacrament meeting. I even saw this girl from my high school that I knew at the baptism which was kind of crazy. Jacob has been off and on with meeting with the missionaries for about 8 years and it's truly been a miracle. It was the perfect way to end my 1st transfer of the mission.

We were able to set another baptism date for August 23rd with a man named Jerry. But he talked to me at church and he wanted to push it back a couple more weeks because of some personal reasons. We're now meeting with Jerry on a consistent basis. The guy is a stud. We're really excited for him and for his progression. We're trying to figure out a way for him to be baptized because he has a hole in his neck and if we baptize him it will drown him.

We also are going to have to push back Marie's baptismal date. Her Dad is suffering from a very serious disease and is in very critical condition. Marie's Mom has asked us to be at the hospital and give him blessings on a frequent basis. He ended up getting sent down to Sacramento because they couldn't figure out what was going on. He suffered from 36 seizures in less than 24 hours. I was with him in the emergency room when one of the seizures started and we had to get a nurse. So we're not sure when we are going to be able to meet with Marie again, but we're just keeping them in our prayers and doing everything we can to help them.

I had another opportunity to take over the area because we went on exchanges. We've been doing a ton of service for our investigators and for members of the ward. I'm getting pretty darn good at splitting and stacking wood. We were able to pick up another solid investigator this week named Dennis. We have a lot of hope for this next transfer. With Marie and Jerry's baptism and plus we have a couple others if everything goes according to plan. We could end up with about 4 baptisms this next transfer if everything goes according to plan. The Lord has really blessed us with finding people to teach.

We got transfer calls last night and I'm still in Paradise with the same companion and everything. But we had a lot of changes in our zone, so it will be fun to get to know all the new missionaries in our area. We're going to go play soccer today so it should be fun. I hope all is going well at home. I love and pray for you guys. Thanks for everything!

Love,

Elder Rosenbaum