Octopus, Trains, Exchanges, Temple

Dear Friends and Family,

We were able to go to the temple today, so that is why I did not email yesterday. I apologize that I did not give a heads up.

Life in the English ward is just getting worse and worse. A member gave us a loaf of fresh homemade bread on Sunday at church for cryin' out loud!

This week we were able to find a new family to teach and it was an absolute miracle! I was actually on exchanges with another Elder when my companion found this family, but as they were meeting with them, they just showed a ton of interest and at the end, as they were leaving, someone mentioned something about BYU and come to find out, this girl is friends with one of the young men in the ward. On Sunday as we talked to the ward council about them, the Young Womans President said that she used to be one of the boys teacher and she knew him pretty well, and as we ate dinner with a member family that night, we found out that the teenage daughter of this family sits right next to this boy in math class. It was such a blessing to be able to have fellowshippers be at their side from just a cold contact and my testimony grew that people will always notice the good or bad that we do, and the need we have to be examples.

On Saturday a member took us to a sketchy chinese buffet and we just had to try the octopus, chicken feet, and tuna. There were a ton of hispanics there, and so I tried talking to Elder Glines so that people could see that we spoke Spanish and he would just sit there and nod and say "si" a couple of times. It was great fun!

Hope you have a fantastic week! Love you bunch!

Elder Arkoudas

Brother Noey Somchay

Dear Friends and Family,

Its been a very rough week. We had Zone Conferences this week and so we had to eat free lunches almost everyday. On top of that, we had member meals almost every night and they gave us seconds everytime.

If that's not bad enough, we had to teach something like 10 lessons this week and we were able to get a member with us to around 80% of those lessons. The price we pay as missionaries...

No, in all seriousness, this has been a fantastic week. I wish that I could tell you all the miracles that we've seen, but I will stick to one story that really strengthened my testimony that the Lord puts us where He needs us.

Thursday night, we had a lesson at the Kitley home, our ward mission leader. He was able to set up a lesson with Brother Somchay, an investigator who is married to a member, in his house and we were able to go and teach him. The lesson went really well and Brother Kitley was so instrumental in helping Brother Somchay understand what we taught him. Brother Somchay, at the end of the lesson committed to baptism if he knew the Book of Mormon is true and left committed to get his answer. In his closing prayer--probably one of the most humble prayers I have ever heard--he asked specifically to know if the Book of Mormon was true so that he would be able to be baptized and recieve the Priesthood. As we talked with Brother Kitley at the end of it, we realized that he moved here from Connecticut just recently and he didn't know why he needed to come here, he just knew that he needed to move to Illinois. Brother Somchay has been investigating for 40 years and the only thing that changed in all that time was Brother Kitley. 

On a less spiritual note, we had one of the most interesting service projects of my life this last Saturday. We were asked to help a family move and so we headed over in our service clothes and on the way, we got a call from the Bishop saying to be careful, because this family has over 20 ferrel cats living in their house and if we were called upon to help catch them, we were to tell them that we were not able to do so. We laughed it off, but when we got there, we quickly stopped laughing. Every piece of furniture in that house was covered in cat urine and cat hair and the whole house smelled musty and as if 20 ferrel cats were living there. It was so bad, that one of the desks we moved was glued to the carpet from years of cat pee that it actually ripped up the carpet when we took it out. The whole experience was easily summed up when our ward mission leader got there and found out what the situation was. Elder Glines was explaining to him the deal with the cats when they saw myself and another missionary carrying out a mattress frame covered in what was mentioned above. I guess he saw the look on our faces, combined with Elder Glines' explanation and he just said, "Oh please no..."

I am so gratful--as always--for all of you. I know I say it a lot, but it's worth saying! I love you all!

Elder Arkoudas

Part Member Families and Feeding the Homeless

Dear Friends and Family,

Despite my preconceptions, the English program is pretty awesome! We were able to visit a lot of members this last week and they are all so nice. Church on Sunday reminds me of a Utah ward.

I really dont have a whole ton to report on this week: the work is what it is and I'm so greatful for my companion Elder Glines because we have so much fun together! I have grown to love missionary work and I give the credit to him!

I just want to give you my testimony of daily prayer and scripture study. It might not seem like a huge deal, but the diligence that it takes to do it is what qualifies us for the blessings. If you aren't reading in the scriptures everyday and praying, please do it TODAY. You will have greater power to overcome your temptations and to do what God wants you to do. I love you all and I want to thank you for your support and for all that you do for me!

Love, 

Elder Arkoudas

A portion of his Email to his father:

I do have a quick thought on Fasting, something President Griffin has talked about that I think is super interesting. When we fast, it should be a way for us to think more about Christ. I'll share a little snippet from a talk they have us read out here, maybe you can get something from it.

In  Australia  missionaries  would  come  to  me  frustrated  with  their efforts  to  overcome  their  lustful  thoughts.    They  had read  Preach  My  Gospel.    The  book  suggests  that  the  mind  is  like  a  stage.    In  our  minds  there  can  only  be  one  actor on  stage  at  a  time.    So  if  the  actor is  a  lustful  thought,  we  can  push  this  bad  actor off  the  stage  by  choosing  to  have  a wholesome  thought.    In  our  minds  we  can  choose  to  recite  a  hymn  or  scripture  or  prayer.   The  missionaries  would  often  tell  me  that  they  were  trying  to  follow  this,  but  they  were  still  having  lustful  thoughts.     I would  give  them  three  bits  of  advice. First,  I  would  share  that  I  have  spent  my  entire  life  trying  to  do  this  very  thing.    I  have  tried  to  watch  myself,  and  my thoughts  and  words  and  deeds.    Sometimes  I  have  had  moments  of  victory.    Yet  the  hormones  in  my  body  are powerful.    The  thoughts  keep  coming  back. Over the  years,  however,  I  have  noticed  something  important.    Because  I  have  tried  so  often  to  fight  the  battle,  it  is now  a  habit  to  fight  the  battle.    May  I  repeat  that?    Because  I  have  tried  so  often  to  fight  the  battle,  it  is  now  a  habit  to fight  the  battle.   This  means  a  surprising  transformation  has  occurred.     The  negative  thing,  lustful  thoughts,  has  become  a springboard  into  the  presence  of  God.  The  negative,  lustful  thoughts  trigger  me  into  the  positive  and  spiritual  work  of entering  into  the  presence  of  God.   

In that light, it is the same with fasting. The negative thing, or hunger, really becomes a positive thing IF we focus on Jesus Christ everytime we have the temptation to eat. Instead of just feeling hungry, we can change the attitude of fasting by simply creating the habit of thinking of Jesus Christ whenever we are hungry. Then fasting becomes a time when we can focus more on Christ than on any other time.

I have such a strong testimony of fasting! I don't know if you remember, but right before the Leyva family got baptized, Brother Leyva couldn't get work off and Sister Leyva still wasn't too sure about being baptized. They had to go to church the next 2 weeks in order to be baptized on their scheduled day, but Brother Leyva had to work and he said that it would be impossible to get work off because it was mother's day and that was an extra busy day. So we taught them about fasting and invited them to fast with us so that they would be able to come to church. They agreed and that Satuday we fasted. It was also the day that we biked about 25 miles and did a service project and by the time that we went in for dinner that  night, we just collapsed on the ground and slept. The next day at church though, they both showed up! From they way they explained it, Brother Leyva just told his boss that he needed to leave for an hour and his boss told him he could and so they came to church. It was so much a miracle that it convinced Sister Leyva that she needed to be baptized and still to this day she talks about that story.

I hope that all of this helped. I'm not really sure what to say about fasting, other than it works. President Griffin has said that fasting is even the secret of this church and I hope that you'll be able to find what you're looking for. Love you dad!

Da Big Change

Dear Friends and Family,

Wow, it has been a week! I was transferred to a new area this last week near the city of Woodridge and it is an English area so I guess I'm basically an English Elder now with my new companion, Elder Glines. It has been a crazy ride with all the transfer details, but we are finally settling in and to be honest, I've had the most fun this last week doing missionary work than in any other time of my mission.

One night we were driving back late from a lesson when we decided to stop and go and contact some people. Elder Glines has a goal of inviting someone to be baptized everyday and has been going strong for almost a year (he's such a cool missionary!) so we hopped out of the car and walked into the train station. When we got there, there were probably 3 or 4 people in there: one lady was sitting on the bench quietly, there was another standing by the window looking at her phone, a man talking to himself and swearing in the middle of the room and another guy roaming around the back just waiting. As we walked in, we were laughing and talking about how cold it was and we all split up and talked to different people. I talked to a guy named Troy for a while and was able to give him a Book of Mormon (I gave him one that my brother Max had written his testminony in--Troy loved it) and invite him to be baptized, and by the time that we left that train station, everyone in there were best friends! We were all laughing together, talking--the guy in the middle who was swearing had a ball of socks we played catch with (i think they were clean socks) and it stood as such a testimony to me of what the Spirit and of what the Gospel can do. I think we brought a little piece of Heaven to that cold train station, and that was a miracle.

Like always, thank you for your love and support and thank you for your prayers. Love you all and wish you the best! Stay warm!

Elder Arkoudas