6.24.2013

Dear Family,

It is exciting to look back and see how fast the time has gone by. It's amazing to see how much has already happened on my mission. The cool thing is that I still have one more year left to savor! It sure does go by quickly though. As we seek to do our best and adapt to the changes that are coming, I'm sure this upcoming year will be even better than the year previous.

So yesterday was sure exciting! That broadcast was pretty cool. I'm pretty sure I saw President and Sister Willard one time, as well as Matt Eddington in the choir.. Did you see them? It's amazing to see how some branches were able to turn things around in the course of a year. That one branch that hadn't had any convert baptisms in the past three years had an average of 14 member present investigator lessons a week?!? That's crazy. That'd be really really awesome to see happen. The technology changes in missionary work will be interesting to see.. I'm grateful I have been out for a year already and have had the experiences I've had so far.. I think the tracting I've done has built a lot of character! :)

Something exciting happened yesterday besides the broadcast.... Elder and Sister Huff had us over for dinner, which was BLT's. Guess what? I actually ate it, B,L,T and all. So I guess I'm getting over some of my pickiness... Who would have thought that I would've changed so much in the past year!?! ;) Funny, huh?

This past week was pretty good.. It was really stressful in some ways, but it ended up going okay. We had a lot of cancelled appointments, cancelled a few baptisms, and things just seemed like they weren't working out.. But it ended really well. We had a baptism for two sisters!

 

They're super funny girls. We love their family and are super glad we've had the chance to teach them. Because of a family emergency, we had to move the baptism up a few hours, so we didn't have many people from the branch there, but the Spirit was still strong and it was a unique experience. We really enjoyed it. However, the realization that an 11 year old girl was taller than me had a pretty good hit to my ego... HA!

 

We also had a baptism for a 8 year old in the branch. It was really cool! It made me remember little bits and pieces of my baptism... I wish I had a better memory though!

 

Besides that, there hasn't been anything too crazy happening. We haven't been able to make contact with a few investigators, which is kinda tough. I worry about them, but I know we've done all that we can do. We've taught them correct principles, and now they need to govern themselves.

Now we'll just try to apply the information given to us in the broadcast yesterday and see if we can be a little more involved with the members in the work. It'll take some time for the changes to fully come into effect, but we'll just keep on chugging along.

 

Life sure will be different when I get back home. If things keep going like they have the past year, my life might seem a little bit like the movie"The RM"! Just give me a heads up if you have a Samoan foreign exchange student moving in...

Anyway, I don't have anything else too exciting to report. I hope all is going well back home. Love you all!

 

-Elder Hussey

6.17.2013

Hello Family!

What a crazy week... The ups and downs of the mission are crazy sometimes and have taught me a lot about life. So I probably told you about how we had 5 investigators with baptismal dates for June 22nd last week, right? That made our week really crazy! We had tons of people to see, a lot of preparation to do, and a lot of things to get taught so everyone was ready for baptism. The week was going really well and just flying by. On Saturday, we had taught 18 lessons. That is really good for the NYUM. We had set up the baptismal interviews for everyone and they were all set to come for the interviews at the church at 7.
 

But we got a phone call from one of our investigators. He said that he couldn't handle paying tithing and he couldn't go through with everything. He had totaled up the entire amount of what tithing would be for the year and was saying that he shouldn't have to pay that much for tithing and that he could go to any other church for free. We had thought that he understood and accepted tithing really well when we had taught it, and he has such a solid testimony of the Book of Mormon already. In the course of about a month, he'd read all the way up to Mosiah 18. He'd been marking scriptures like crazy and just loved it! So that was pretty hard on Elder Bybee and I.. We've tried getting in contact with him, but we haven't been able to since he left us that message.

 

Just a few minutes later, we had another investigator send us a text letting us know she was having a crazy weekend and she would need to cancel her baptismal interview. After that, she wouldn't answer any of our texts and she didn't come to church.. We still have faith that we'll be able to make contact and get her ready for baptism, but it was a little rough.

 

Luckily, the other 2 investigators had their interviews and are good to go.. Although they didn't come to church. So this past week, we only had 1 investigator at church and there were only 36 people total at sacrament meeting. However, like the scriptures say, the witness comes after the trial of your faith. Elder Bybee and I are just going to keep doing our best and I'm sure we'll see things work out. We really have been working really hard, so it's tough to see things not working out, but there's someone a lot better than us that's got a greater plan than us, so I guess we'll just have to trust him that things will work out.

 

This week will be really good though. We have a baptism coming up, Zone Training Meeting, and a new transfer ahead of us. Elder Bybee and I are amazed at all of the progress that has happened in Massena in the past three months and we're really excited to see where we'll be in the coming six weeks. It'll all be good!

The mission continues to go well. It has it's ups and downs, but it's amazing to see how much I'm continuing to learn about life. Elder Bybee and I are getting along really well and I'm excited I get a 3rd transfer with him. I continue to learn more and more every day about how much God is guiding us and blessing us in our lives. I'm learning to slow down and enjoy the simple things even more. It's just been a really great experience for me, and it's not even half over yet! How cool is that? I have over a year of even more growth, knowledge, faith, and understanding headed my way. That's pretty cool. :)

 

Well, thanks for all you do! I appreciate hearing from you all and I love you all as well! I hope you're doing good and that you'll all attend the special missionary broadcast next Sunday at 4:00 MST. I'm still just waiting in anticipation.. I feel like a little kid at Christmas again!

 

Love you guys,

 

Elder Hussey

6.10.2013

Hey family!

 

It's a beautiful day here in Massena! The past week has been very busy and has a lot of unique experiences. First things first though..........

 

Elder Bybee and I are both staying in Massena for another transfer! That's pretty exciting! I'm glad I get to stay here a while longer. It's really cool getting to see the Massena branch as it is starting to grow and I know it'll continue to do so as we do our best.

 

We had 44 people at church yesterday, and all of them were from within the Massena boundaries. Pretty cool, huh? We had 9 investigators at church, 5 of which have baptismal dates for June 22nd. They are all doing really well and we love getting to work with them. Elder Bybee and I both spoke in Sacrament yesterday, which was really good. I think I've finally figured out how to write church talks... It only took me about an hour to prepare! I didn't feel nervous or anything as I was up there, and I hardly even looked at my notes I had taken. A lady in our branch came up to me after and said I was a really good public speaker, and she wouldn't be surprised if I wrote a book someday! I don't know about that, but that was a really nice compliment.

 

We had a good week with a lot of different appointments, picked up a few new investigators, had a lot come to church, and just had a lot of fun. Elder Lamb came to work with me in Massena while Elder Bybee went to Canton, which was fun. I always enjoy exchanges and it seems like something good always happens on exchange. We had a packed schedule while he was here, and still managed to find a few new potential investigators. Pretty cool!

 

The weather was rainy all week, which is fine by me! When the sun comes out, it gets hot and muggy. One morning, it was about 85 degrees and humid when we walked out of the apartment, and I said to Elder Bybee- "It shouldn't be this hot in the Spring!" to which he responded- "actually, it's June. It's summer." It's crazy to think that it's already summer.... Wild stuff! But I'm good with overcast and rainy weather. It keeps it in the perfect range of 65-80 degrees, which is really really nice. We were tracting and I said it was a beautiful day to a lady, and I got the funniest look from her!.... It was probably because it was raining and we were standing on her porch all wet and she was wondering "why on earth does this crazy mormon kid think it's a beautiful day?" I got a good laugh out of that later.

 

We also had a really crazy/stressful experience yesterday.... A guy we've been working with a little bit lately called us up saying he was super depressed and needed us to come over, because he was contemplating stabbing himself. We ran over as quick as we could, Elder Bybee took the knife from him, then we just talked about what had been going on and how he could get through it. We went on a walk with him and got him to a safe environment where he'd be with people that could watch out for him. It was crazy stressful, although it didn't really hit me until after we made it back to our apartment. It was a wild experience. I'm glad stuff like that doesn't happen very often, and I'm also really glad he called us so that we could help him. It's crazy what happens sometimes..

 

But besides all of that, nothing else too exciting happened this past week. Elder Bybee and I went to a thrift store that was having a sale and got some sweet old ties for 50 cents each! That was pretty cool I guess. :)

 

Well, things in Massena are going good. This week is just going to be really busy getting everyone ready for their baptismal interviews, then next week will be SUPER BUSY getting all of that planned out and put into motion. The work is moving forward here in Massena!

 

Love you all! Thanks for all you do.

 

-Elder Hussey

6.3.2013

Dear Family,

What a wonderful weekend we had here in Massena NY! It was amazing! Definitely an experience that I will never forget. Here's a picture of everybody there.

 

We had 46 people at the Massena Branch opening! It was so amazing! 10 of those people were visiting from other branches, but that means that we had 36 people from Massena there! That was so cool. It was unique seeing the Branch formed and everything that happened there, and then it was a testimony meeting after. There were a lot of very strong testimonies and the Spirit was there so strong! I was so touched that I was about to start bawling like I did when I was set apart! It was really really a great experience. We're going to get this Chapel filled within the next few years.. I can feel it.

 

Besides that, it was still an exciting week! We were out inviting everyone we saw to come and see what church was like. We had "2nd Transfer Training" for Elder Bybee and then a blitz with the Zone Leaders, Elder May and Elder Tibbits. That was really good and I learned some good things from Elder May. We had a reporter come and interview us and the Huff's about the church reopening and we had a front page headline and a 2nd page, colored, big article about it (click on the red to link to it). It was pretty cool, although there is the occasional funny thing here and there that the reporter did. But it was still a very positive experience and we've had people mention the article to us already! The work is moving forward at a quicker and quicker pace every week it seems like. The future is super exciting! There is going to be a very special, worldwide broadcast about missionary work for all members of the church on June 23rd, at 6PM NY time, so 4 PM in Utah. I think it'd be awesome if the whole family was able to watch it. I don't know what it will be about, but apparently the missions are all buzzing about something.. We've been told this will change the way that missionary work works! Whatever that is supposed to mean.. It'll be sweet!

 I'm glad things back home are going well! The talk Dad did the lesson on, "The Lords Way" was really really good. We went through that with a less active the other day and it really touched me. I'm hoping a few people will be "planted" in Massena in the near future to help the branch really grow!

I'm waiting to see about transfers this week.. I have pretty good feeling that I am staying here in Massena, but nothing is for sure yet. And I don't have the massena apartment address with me at the moment. But I'll let you know next week what's happening! I want to stay here and see the branch grow, but if I'm needed somewhere else I'm willing to go. I'm just so grateful I got to be here for the branch opening!

  

I'm glad things are going so well for all of you back home. Know that I'm doing well. I'm feeling the Spirit much more and in effect, am much happier than I have been in the past. That doesn't mean I don't have my rough days occasionally, but it's been amazing to see the change that's taken place within me over the past 11 months.

I CAN'T BELIEVE IT'S ALREADY JUNE!!!

Time flies when you're having fun, huh?

 I love you all! I hope you're all doing great.

Elder Hussey