The Last Letter of 2013

Hello!

 We are going to a family for dinner on new year's eve, but other than that I am not sure what we will do. Yes, I got the games. Thank you. I will not be able to play them today but will in the future. My companion opened all his presents right before he was transferred so he did not have to carry them around so I am not really sure what he got for Christmas. I thoroughly enjoyed my Christmas and wish those ungrateful sisters of mine would be thankful for what they have. Many people have much less, if anything at all.

Yes, today on our p-day we are going to the mall, but I will not have to buy any vitamins because the Wards sent me a bunch. It was very convenient. No, my investigators did not come to church. Grrr. My new companion has assorted a collection of good church music and we have a big boombox we listen to things on. Its great. On Sundays after Sacrament meeting we go to the Gospel Principles class, and then usually go with the priests during third hour. There are not many priests and I am pretty much their age. It is good for us to set an example for them.

 And yes, I just opened the package from the Wards. It was great. It had food, a picture from prom, vitamins, and sunglasses. I wash all my stuff often do not worry. I have barely had to pay for everything. We were at the church one day when they were distributing things to people in need and they had a lot of stuff left over. We got everything from fruit, to laundry detergent. I have not had to pay for any part of laundry so far on this mission. There is also a family who has more stuff in their food storage than they know what to do with. They tell us to take whatever we want. I have gotten lots of free food and toiletries from it.

 Looks like I might be in Brazil a little earlier than I thought. It will probably be around mid-February. I just filled out another online form so you do not have to and sent three copies to the travel office in Utah. 

We did not have a lot of success this week. As I said before, most of our investigators told us to come back after the holidays. I have enjoyed reading a book called Doctrines of Salvation Vol. 1 by Joseph Fielding Smith. I plan to read all three volumes. It is amazing all the doctrine that it contains. Tell Dad that I would love to read more books, but I will soon run out of room in my suitcase to Brazil, so unless they're small I will probably not have time to read them or room to pack them. There is one book called Visions of Glory I am excited to read. Dad, you should read a summary and see what you think. Its not doctrine but its very interesting stuff. 

One thing me and my companion do that is fun is every night after coming home at 9, we watch a bunch of old Church-made videos on a little dvd player. We watched one and Elder Miller pointed to an actor telling me he thought he was less active. It was really funny because it was Will Swensen. I told him I am kind of related to him and it was really funny. I hope you enjoy the new year and don't forget Perci's birthday! How old is she? Get my Christmas card? 

Lots of Love,

Will 

Photos From Lacey, WA

My Stuff

They're not beer cans......

My new companion and our apartment in Lacey.

Where I email...the "club house" of the apartment complex

Tacoma Washington Mission Christmas Party

Merry Christmas 2013

New Companion in Lacey

Thanks so much for the Police letter information.  That is great news! That means I will be in Brazil in the next 3-4 months, maybe sooner. But it means I will get there so that is all that is important.

 Not as much sunshine as you think but it has been warmer. Lots of rain. It even snowed here on Thursday but it all melted by noon. Yes, I can see Mt. Rainier. It surprised me one day because I did not know there were mountains around here. Yes, it has been nice and  it is warm (40 degrees), but biking around in the rain is not very enjoyable. We just ditched the bikes yesterday and walked around to our appointments. 

You are correct in the success of younger people. Old people have zero desire to change anything in their life. Whenever someone old answers the door you can expect a swift "not interested" and a slammed door. My new companion is Elder Miller.  He has been out about a year longer than me so he is very good at teaching the lessons. I have learned a lot from him. We have had some success in finding new people to teach this week. We found a new family who wanted us to discipline their child for not being grateful. Using all my years of parenting skills I told him to honor thy father and mother. I am not really sure what she wanted us to say but she enjoyed our company and their whole family is coming to church this Sunday. 

We expect a very slow week this week. We have P-day today, and no proselyting on Christmas Eve, Christmas, New Years Eve, and Jan 1. Most people tell us to come after the holidays so we will not be able to do much missionary work for awhile. We continue to teach Kathy but with no avail. She believes everything we tell her but has a hard time understanding and won't come to church. The hardest part of the missionary work so far is when people tell you a specific time to come back and they are not there. It upset me at first but have since gotten used to it.  We will be Skyping on Christmas probably around 11 or 12 in the morning my time. Just be ready sometime in the afternoon. Send me a Skype account I can connect with and I will look at my email before Christmas. I will probably call you on the phone if I cannot get a hold of you so have mom's phone ready.

 We are having Christmas eve dinner, Christmas breakfast, and Christmas dinner with three different families so we are well taken care of. We do everything with the sister missionaries in our ward so we get invited everywhere. I am glad to hear everything is well at home. I will miss being at home for Christmas but look forward to opening my presents in the apartment. I will send some pictures of where I live and where we email. We have been eating at Subway a lot recently because we get 2$ 6 inch sandwiches because its December. I hope to have at least one baptism this transfer. 

Talk to ya on Christmas,

Will

Lacey, WA

No Transfer This Time...but a new Companion

Hello!

   I am not being transferred so I will have this same address for the next 7 weeks. Most people were not transferred because of Christmas.  I am getting a new companion named Elder Miller tomorrow. I have heard good things about him so I am excited.  We had a white elephant gift exchange and lunch at the Christmas party. It was fun as all gatherings with missionaries are. We are going to a members house for breakfast on the 25th, but other than that, I do not know much about what we will do. I have my Christmas cards and will send them home today for you to give to people we know. Sorry they are so late.

    We went on Saturday to some docks in Olympia with an investigator. It was funny to see ocean water to close to where I am. The funny thing was the docks were called  Percival Landing. So I have some good pictures with a big sign that says "Percival Landing". I will send them next week when I can find out how to get them on this computer. No I have not talked, or sung in church. I will Skype on Christmas day and will email you the time next Monday. 

   We have been teaching lessons and I have  improved greatly  in my ability to teach. It was tough learning all that Portuguese in the MTC because I focused all on the language and not really on the lessons. We still do not have anyone progressing but we do have some potentials. The hardest part is just finding a time to teach people that works for them. Everyone is too busy to listen to the most important message of their life. The other really hard thing is getting people to come to church. People will believe what you say and desire to be baptized, but when it comes to actually going to church they make up more excuses than you can imagine.

   I do enjoy the ward here. The people are really friendly and amazingly we still have a member dinner almost every night. The person who took us to the Docks is named Kathy. We have talked and taught her a lot but we decided she only has us over because she is lonely. An interesting part of a lesson we had with her is when we mentioned the atonement of Jesus Christ. She completely changed her attitude and told us what a mess-up she has been her whole life and all the wrong she has done. Even when we explain the reason and importance for the Atonement, she does not want to change her life. Something I have realized out here is every soul knows when it does wrong by the light of Christ and desires to rid itself of that wrong. The reason that people do not wish to cleanse themselves is because they harden their heart to the truth and seek earthly things to make them happy. Its sad to see. 

   The other thing I have come to realize is how backwards these other churches are. We talked to a man who read the NIV Bible every day for 15 minutes for years. The NIV Bible is basically a bible written for people who cannot understand the King James. (Which is really not that hard to understand...) An interesting quote in a book I read says, "For what purpose does man have to re-write a bible, than to change it?" These churches just appease peoples' need for a little religion in their life. They tell themselves they are okay because they go to church every week. 

   I will try to send a present home for Anne for her birthday but I do not think I will be able to do Christmas presents for anyone because I do not have a car or a store to buy any. Sorry. I only get 35$ a week too. I have heard they have stopped calling American missionaries to Brazil. Is this true? A couple other guys in my district have gotten visas so that has been tough to see. I'm out of time so I will say goodbye. Hope everything has been well there. 

Will

Will's Christmas Address 2013

• Elder Will Percival
• 5808 TITLEIST LN SE APT G204
• LACEY, WA 98513-6499

There are so many Pine Trees Here...

    I have had many people tell me that this is the coldest it has been in Washington this time of year for like 30 years so, I guess that is just my luck. It is really not too bad during the day but biking around at night has been a little chilly. 

We do not have a small Christmas tree yet. I will wait until transfers next Tuesday to start decorating since I could be leaving the Lacey Area. I hope I stay here one more transfer but I would not mind going to an area with a car. Most missionaries here are on bikes but this mission has a lot of cars for some reason. The church buys new Toyota Corollas and lets missionaries drive them for 50,000 miles and then re-sells them. So the missionary cars are all new and nice. The problem is they give all the sisters in the mission the cars so there are not many left for Elders.

 My relationship with my companion has improved. He is a very knowledgeable kid and I have learned a lot from teaching with him. Unfortunately we still have not had many opportunities to teach full lessons but he has found ways for me to practice teaching. It is fun to teach the lessons and to be able to share what I know with others. We have been getting fed at 4:00 almost every night but that will change when I leave a ward that has sister missionaries. If we did not have sister missionaries we would not be able to go in the house because the husband is not home at 4:00. There has to be three adults of the same sex to enter a house.

 It is looking like we will not have a baptism this transfer. The one lady named Kathy we have been teaching has not been available and did not come to church after promising us many times she was coming. She made some lame excuse yesterday. Our last hope seems to be in a cool Jamaican guy we met yesterday who is in Washington visiting his sister. We asked if he wanted to get baptized and he was like, "Ya man" so we are going over today to teach him and hopefully put him on date for baptism. 

I will take pictures and send them in an email next week. We made some pretty sweet Christmas cards with a professional photographer here in the ward. I will send them home when we print them out and you can distribute them to people in the ward and a couple of my friends. I really like the ward here in Lacey. It is a big ward and the members are really nice. We go to Ward Council every other Sunday. And yes the members always give us food so I am careful not to eat too much. I have realized that being a missionary means that everyone calls on you to do service. I have moved two pianos, an organ, and a freezer so far. We also spent 3-4 hours helping someone who owned a  house that had been fore-closed. It was sad because the people who lived there had absolutely trashed their home, and we had to carry a bunch of junk out before the police came and closed the property. It was really sad. It made me think of how fortunate I was to have a father who taught me how to take care of my stuff.

 I have had some good salmon for dinner recently. The seafood is good here because it is freshly caught in the Sound. I do not really think about going to Brazil that much. I try to focus on where I am and why I am here. It is tough to hear about elders in my district who have gotten Visas but I have decided I will be happy to be there by my birthday. The tree at home looks great! Is that a new table in the room? Why on that side of the room? There are so many pine trees here I think I will just find a small one and cut it down. 

As far as doctrine goes I have been reading Jesus the Christ and a book called Gospel Doctrine by Bruce R. McKenzie. I have also been studying how to teach the lessons in Preach My Gospel better. It is amazing how simply the Book of Mormon states gospel truths compared to the bible. Here's what people say when we knock on their doors and tell them about the Book of Mormon.

 Enjoy.

   6 Thou fool, that shall say: A ^aBible, we have got a Bible, and we need no more Bible. Have ye obtained a Bible save it were by the Jews?

To that I want to show them "the rest of the story.."

 7 Know ye not that there are more ^anations than one? Know ye not that I, the Lord your God, have created all men, and that I remember those who are upon the ^bisles of the sea; and that I rule in the heavens above and in the ^cearth beneath; and I bring forth my ^dword unto the children of men, yea, even upon all the nations of the earth?

 8 Wherefore murmur ye, because that ye shall receive more of my word? Know ye not that the ^atestimony of ^btwo nations is a ^cwitness unto you that I am God, that I remember one ^dnation like unto another? Wherefore, I speak the same words unto one nation like unto another. And when the two ^enations shall run together the testimony of the two nations shall run together also.

love, 

Will

A Good Thanksgiving

Well its good to hear you got rid of the tank. Hopefully it was not too hard to get up the stairs. Did they take the lights too? Also did Davis ever come get my Xbox? We have had some good weather here in Washington. It has been about 50 and sunny for a couple days and that is pretty rare here. A lot of people we have talked to told us that it was going to snow today but its sunny and about 50 right now. We had a slow week preaching the gospel due to the holidays but I had a great thanksgiving. We woke up and played in a turkey bowl. Even though My team got smoked every time I had a good time. We ate dinner with a family that was a little strange but the food was really good. It was the usual Thanksgiving dinner, no squash though. You always made the best squash. The real fun came when we went to a family in the ward's house and played cards. It was a really nice house and they had a nice set-up for card games. We played a game called scum and it was lots of fun. They  had lots of desserts and leftovers we took with us when we left and have eaten over the last couple days. I wished I was home but had a great thanksgiving. 

 We have a couple prospective investigators but have had some bad luck when it comes to teaching them lessons. One time we went to teach a lesson and the guy's kids got in a bad car accident 10 minutes before our lesson. The other lesson we had with the guy who was in prison fell though because he had pneumonia. So that has been a bummer but we found some interesting people last night that we will be able to teach. I am not sure if I have mentioned it in an email so far but the second largest army base in the US is in Tacoma so a lot of people we talk to are in (or were in) the military. Its amazing how the military will and has destroyed so many people's faith in Jesus Christ. A lot of people we talk to tell us they used to believe in a God, but after what they have seen, they do not believe a God could let those things happen. Its sad to see how their service has really impacted their life in a negative way. Some guy with major PTSD invited us in one night when we were knocking and I thought he was actually interested. He then went on to tell us how we should not be knocking so late an no one wants to hear our message, (it was 5:30 pm). You could tell his brain was fried from combat and I was pretty sure he was going to stab us so we just agreed with him and left.

 We have a mission Christmas party on Dec 10. It will be fun to see the kid from my district in the MTC. I am on page 500 in the Book of Mormon and will finish this week. Thank you so much for the package I opened it just before I wrote this email. The article about the Jok brothers is incredible. I will have to find a way to watch an Iowa basketball game. No word from Talia and Max  but I have not writtem them anything for a while. The article about the planets is really cool too. That's really cool you remembered the poker too haha. I will not need anything else for a while;  we have a washer and dryer in our apartment so that has been really nice. Its only a 1 bedroom apartment and the rent is 960$ a month. Tell Anne and Kate I will send them letters I just have not had much time to write them recently. We exercise each morning for 30 minutes but biking around all day is where I get most of my exercise. I hope this week will be better for teaching but I am doing much better. It is nice to hear that everything is well at home. Hope school is going well.

Love,

Will