Email 07/16/12

Hola, SO Newton is turning out to be a pretty nice area. I really enjoy the spanish potential we have here. I am working really hard with the members to gain the spanish trust and it is working great. We have found really great spanish investigators and the members are taking us to go see their spanish friends. I am the first spanish missionary in Newton in over a year so they are happy to have another one again. I am trying to build a spanish branch here and I think we are really close to having our own here. We had a great few lessons with a guy I met named Jose. He is searching for truth and wants to go to a church to seek help from God in his problems he faces with his family. He was so happy to meet with us because he said he really feels we can help him and the gospel can answer his questions. I am having a good time here and look forward to the next couple weeks here. Elder Jensen is going home in 2 days and it was great to serve with him his last bit before the end of his mission. He really worked hard in this area to gain back the members trust after a very long stent of bad missionaries destroying the area. I knew Newton while i was serving in Rolling Hills and it was known as a dead area and that no one wanted to go there. Great to see Elder Jensen turn it around. It is pretty crazy that I have been out for a year now. Doesn't really feel like it at all. I appreciate the packages and the half-way boxes and the tie. It was pretty amusing. It's been a busy week of going around everywhere and seeing people and been a great time. Not much other to say than I am pretty happy for the new area and second half of my mission. Thanks for everything. Love Elder Roe

Email 07/09/12

Family, So we had transfers. I'm back in the Wichita area. I'm in a city called Newton. I remember the area from when I was in Rolling Hills. Newton was a way lame area and always had a tough time but recently has been getting better. Some other crazy news is that I am in a tripod.....pretty weird. I am with Elder Jensen and Elder Haws. Elder Jensen is deaf, which is pretty interesting. But he has cochlear implants so he can talk and it's all good. He is a great missionary and maybe I can even learn a little sign language along the way. We are in a tripod because Elder Jensen goes home in 2 weeks so he is teaching us the area so that when he leaves, Elder Haws and I can take over the area. Elder Haws has been out for 6 months now and is from Utah, as is Elder Jensen. President Keyes told me that I am here in Newton to create a spanish branch in this area. Elder Haws doesn't speak spanish so I am on my own in that regards. There are a few really active spanish families and they have been waiting to have spanish missionaries in this area for about a year. So I am going to work to get all the spanish active then work on getting more spanish to come and be baptized so we can have a spanish branch in Newton as well as an english ward. The area is pretty good and I love the zone. I know a lot of missionaries in this area. Elder Miller, who I served with in Rolling Hills, is still there; Elder Haws' last companion was Elder Peterson who I knew in the MTC; Elder Haines, my MTC companion is in the zone; Elder Blake, my old district leader in Marshall is here; Elder Lusk, friend from the MTC, is the zone leader. Crazy connections in the zone. Then there is also Elder T Jensen in the zone is from FT Lauderdale, so crazy! Neither one of us have met another elder from Florida or even SE United States. Pretty sweet. Well some really sweet news, A.M. was baptized. Even better, we baptized her the day before I left Marshall instead of doing it this weekend like we were planning. So she was baptized July 4th, because spanish people don't celebrate Independence Day. They don't even know what it is lol. It went really good and she felt great. I was really happy. She recieved the gift of the Holy Ghost yesterday and all went well with that. I talked to her yesterday and she is doing well and is now applying to go to BYU or UVU. I told her to call if she needs help so it would be awesome if our recent convert could go to BYU and I see her there. I have also been calling some old members in Wichita to say what's up and hopefully I can meet with some of the old members I worked with in Rolling Hills. So, this has been a pretty busy week and really good week. We met the ward and I have talked to most of the spanish members and I think that there is a lot of spanish potential in this area so I am excited to work in this area. I think that I will be here for awhile. Found out that Saturday hit a comfortable temperature of 114 degrees. Pretty hot. We had the car thankfully. This area is normally part time car but President Keyes told me that we will have fulltime car so I can work with the spanish and help the Valley Center spanish elders cover all of Wichita speaking spanish and assisting the spanish-speaking investigators. So a very eventful week. I did get the packages and the shoes so thanks a lot for that! Thanks for everything. Love Elder Roe

Email 07/02/12

Family, This has been a pretty decent week. An update on the branch. The sister that was airlifted, is back home now, but just a waiting day for her. She wanted to pass on at home and with her family. Sad. Then A's mom (guy we baptized a few months ago) now has 5 weeks to live. Not good. He is taking it really hard. Then another member in the branch is also having complications with health. All 3 are survivors of breast cancer and have had it coming back now. Tough time on the branch members but we are trying to keep positive attitudes. As for the work in the area, we finally have A.M., 18, on date for July 7th. That is exciting. We are going to try and work with the father now who is the last nonmember in the family. We have that this weekend, then hopefully the following weekend, Bro U will be baptized. We still have to work with him some more and get more info on him and his readiness. We are going to have the branch president interview him and the member wife. We are teaching a lot of good part-member families. The branch mission leader is really great and getting us to gain member support and have us teach the less-active and part-member families with the hometeachers. It is really going great. I am loving the area now. Transfers is this week, so I think I am going to leave. I am really interested to see where I go because there is going to be a lot of changes in the whole mission come Thursday so I am really excited to see what is happening. It has been crazy hot out here. To make things better, the other day we walked into our apartment beat, from the heat, and it was hotter inside our apt then outside....and our a/c was on. Our room was like 99 degrees. We had a miserable 2 nights and the a/c man cleaned everything and its all good now thankfully. But crazy. We needed it bc it is pushing 110 with the heat index now. Way hot. We haven't had any rain either. But we hear that Florida is under water so shoo some rain over here for us. We desperately need it. The stake has asked that people fast and pray for rain. Thankful for full-time car. I will not be riding a bike in this nonsense. It isn't even humid, courtesy of no rain, so its just dry heat. Lame. Other than that, we are doing really good. Thanks for the shoes and everything. Love everyone Elder Roe

Email 06/25/12

Hey, This past week has been pretty eventful. Rather stressful. We just had the baptism just over a week ago which was great. Then a few days later we found out that one of the widows in the branch, J.H., passed away at 64. Funeral service was really nice to have lots of family there. She was the only member in her family and her sister came up to us and said she wanted to see us more and for us to stop by anytime and talk with her. Nice lady. It was good for the whole family to see what church Jessica went to and what we are all about. Then to add to more bad news, the day of the funeral the branch president told us that another woman in the branch was just airlifted from the local hospital to a more advanced hospital an hour away in really bad shape. Last we heard she was still not doing good at all. Her husband, Bro A is the one who baptized Bro S this past week. The S's are doing good. Sis S had really scary surgery to fuse her back. Thankfully she is doing good and surgery went as planned and she is healing great. As for the other work we have been doing this past week, we are working with Bro U and A.M. Both are progressing toward a baptismal date. We just need to check up on a few things with each and A should be baptized here soon. Work is doing really good and we really being blessed in this area. Marshall hasn't seen this kind of work or blessings in work in quite some time. Really great to be apart of it. We have transfers in just under 2 weeks and I think I will be leaving so I am trying to make the most of it in this area while it lasts. Other than a lot of things going on with the branch, not a whole lot else to say. Thanks for the prayers and support. Love Elder Roe

Email 06/18/12

Family, We had a really good week. The S's baptism went well and confirmation on Sunday went according to plan. So it was a really good experience and they even had some of their family there which was really nice. They are really excited and doing great. Now we are going to try and work with the rest of their family. The branch was really excited to see them get baptized and I think it got everyone excited about missionary work again. After the baptism, one of the part-member family's that came to see it, the 18 yr old girl said she wants to be baptized now. So that is pretty sweet. We are going to be working with them (M, spanish family) and also the Ussery family. When I first got here, we baptized the 3 kids. Now the dad wants to be baptized. We just started teaching him and reminding the family about their baptismal covenants. Overall I think it will be good for the family. They are trying to revamp their excitement and activation in the church so this is exactly what they need. Besides the U's and M family wanting to be baptized (both part member families which is always awesome) we are working with a few more spanish people. We are doing good in reactivating the spanish members and they are doing a lot better and wounds are being healed from past drama amongst the spanish families. Besides that we are doing pretty good. The work is picking up in the area and we are teaching a lot of people. Our mission leader is doing sweet and really helping us out in being more organized and everything. The weather has been pretty moderate this week. It actually rained pretty good for a day or 2. This area is longing for more rain. Apparently the crops and farms are really struggling with the little, well no rain we have had this season. Everything else is doing really good. Hope everything is good with you guys. Love, Elder Roe Picture from Schildmeier's baptism.....suh-weet!

Email 06/11/12

Family, This past week has been pretty good. We are excited to have our baptism for the Schildmeier's this saturday. They are really excited for it too so it will be really good. We had great lesson with them and the branch loves them already. They are totally ready. Then this week we were able to get into contact again with a spanish referral from church HQ and he is doing well. His name is V.C. and we are working on a baptismal date with him. He had met with missionaries in the past and after he moved he wanted to learn more so we are starting to teach him. He still has some ways to go and we need to work on some things but he is doing good and really wants to follow Christ more in his life. V said that he was talking with a preacher a while ago and he happened to mention that he was learning and taking lessons from the mormons. The preacher told him all this false stuff about the church (which we cleared up with him) and V responded by "That can't be true" then said "You know I have learned more from the mormon missionaries then I have from you or any other preacher I've talked to" Big slap in the face for the poor guy but V is right. The only thing really holding V back now is the word of wisdom and he needs to get married lol. Pretty much all spanish investigators all have a problem with drinking, coffee (big especially with El Salvador), and they just never got married to their "spouse" of like 15 years. So once we figure out how we will get them married, we can start getting somewhere. We also started working with a couple part member families that we have been finding thanks to our new branch mission leader who is awesome. Things are really picking up in the area and we have better support with the branch president and other members here. Change is good and I think that is what this branch needed to get excited about missionary work again. Other than that, all is well here. It is brutal hot but we had a good rain last night which was far overdue and the farmers have been praying for it but still looking out to be a rough summer. Thanks for everything. Love Elder Roe

Email 06/04/12

Family, We have had a really good past week. We worked really hard with the branch to get more of the less-active people to come to church and everything. We were able to work with the Astorga family and got them to church for the first time in a while which is great because we are working to get the husband back in full fellowship again and send him off to the temple to be sealed with his family. So it is really exciting to work with them and see the spirit work in them to increase their desire to come back to church and eventually go to the temple. We also got a new branch mission leader which we are really excited to work with. He came back from his mission a few years ago and still has a urge to share the gospel. I think this is exactly what the branch really needs right now. So we have been working a lot with him this past week and with the branch president to have a better relationship and progress to meet the needs of the branch. So this past week has been a lot of adjusting and helping the branch out more. As for the spanish work in the area, it has been really lagging. It is easy to get new spanish investigators but really hard to actually get them to progress and fulfill committments and return appointments. But we were able to find a few new people to teach. One is a part member family that recently moved in. Only the wife was baptized a long time ago and doesn't even know she is a member and who Joseph Smith is. So the hometeachers of the woman have been teaching her and we were just introduced to them awhile the other day and are going to start teaching the whole family and to remind the wife about what she joined all these years ago. So that is exciting. Plus an update with the Schildmeier family. This is the older couple who the wife had her name removed from the church some time ago but wants to be baptized and she has been coming to church with her husband (never joined) for the past few months. We had a great conversation with them yesterday and have a baptism set for them both on June 19th. Which is really sweet. We are also going to hopefully work with their other family they have in Marshall who aren't members. So we have some real potential in this area. This past Friday we had zone conference in Kansas City. It was really good. Learned a lot of new things and a great time to be instructed and trained by President Keyes and the leaders in the mission. Overall we are doing really good here. Thanks for everything. Glad to hear about Keriann's graduation. Love Elder Roe