Letter

This week was awesome! We taught some awesome investigators and I'm excited to see them progress more. One thing I've definitely seen a LOT this week is how much people notice their member friends and how good they are. Almost everyone we run into knows a member. The only bad stories about Mormons that I've heard so far were from someone who heard a story from a friend of their cousin's dog!

We have some amazing members in our area. Everyone in a 1 mile radius of their homes know exactly where all of the Mormons live. We left our bikes in a neighborhood overnight and a random lady (who the member didn't know) called this sister because she wanted to make sure we were ok. Never forget that EVERYONE notices you, keep being good examples!

Our mission president had some really awesome specialized training on Saturday. We watched a video about Christ and his last week in Jerusalem. Afterwards our president said something that hit me like a brick wall. He said while in tears: "they crucified my friend". The spirit hit me so hard. He loves me and he loves all of you!

So I forgot to mention transfers last week. Nothing really changed for me. I'm still stuck with the worst companion in the whole mission... JUST KIDDING! Elder Poston is AMAZING, I'm learning so much from him and he's so good at just talking to people and being friends with them. But anyways I'm here in Medford 8th Ward for at least another 5 weeks and I love it here! I hope I'm here over the winter because it's a lot more mild here than Eugene.

Anyhow I need to go, but I love you all! Have a great week!

-Elder Andrew Deppe

Letter

Hey guys! This week was pretty cool. The weather was awesome! We finally got rain! I love it! We got to do quite a bit of service this week. We helped an elderly brother in our Ward fix his gutters and mow his lawn and we helped a sister dig clay out of her garden. She is the best gardener I've ever met!

We got to talk to a lot of people this week. I met some of the nicest as well as some of the rudest (if that's even a word) people. I've also had some pretty cool little experiences this week.  First of all I have been craving pizza like crazy. I know it's kind of dumb but I was like WAY craving it. This week we got pizza 3 times. It is really tiny and stupid and not a big deal but it really showed me how much God cares about me that he answered my pizza craving. (I didn't realize how dumb that would sound until I wrote it.)

Before I left on my mission I really wanted to get called to a third world Country so I could just serve people. Where it's out in the open and I know what to do to help them. And I was thinking about it the other day,  "why would God send me here?"  I know there are people here that I need to teach,  I KNOW that with all my heart, but I was still wondering a little.

As I was thinking about this suddenly the answer hit me. God didn't send me to another Country because that's not what he needed to prepare me for. I'm not going to be living in Africa for the rest of my life. I'm going to be living in America. And he needs me to learn how to show his love to his children that are here. Not there. Needless to say I have a LOT left to learn, but now I know why, and that impression has given me an even bigger drive to learn.

I Love you all! Have a great week!

-Elder Andrew Deppe

Letter

We had some interesting experiences this week. We met lots of cool people and had our bikes die. We bike and walk a lot so we can talk to everyone.  We have lots of people honk at us or yell, some because they don't like us and others because they really don't like us. We kinda just smile and wave back at everyone. 

Our area has lots of hills and they suck to ride up but they are SO much fun to go down! The only problem is that if your tires aren't inflated enough then the bumps between sections of sidewalk can cause your rim to "bite" your tube and make your tire instantly flat. A long walk home solidified that lesson. 

I love tracting! We meet so many interesting people! I found someone who is legitimately nocturnal like as in a way of life not because of their job. Needless to say he wasn't too thrilled that I knocked his door in the middle of the day. I love showing kindness to people who are rude to us, just ask elder Poston.  I've perfected the art of saying with a big smile "have a great day" just as the door is slamming shut. He laughs every time. 

So we've been teaching this guy, Wally, for a couple of weeks and he invited us over to dinner. While we were there we found out that my dad went to high school with their daughter in law! And she lives in our area! So that's pretty darn cool.

Funniest/coolest story this week was Elder Poston and I decided to go tract up on "The Hill" which is a pretty big deal because of how many miles we put on our car to get up there. We tracted for hours and really didn't have a lot of success. Finally we crossed a major road and started tracting there before dinner. As we were about to head to dinner we knocked on a house and no one answered, so we walked away. In the middle of talking to the person who answered the door at the next house someone came out and started yelling "HELLO!", trying to find who had knocked on his door. Elder Poston then yelled back that we would be back in a minute or two. The lady we were talking to wasn't too interested in talking with missionaries, but we are going to send some relief society sisters to fellowship her due to the fact that she is actually an inactive member. 

We then walked back and the previous house, Jerry was a little drunk, and told us so haha. He told us that he's looking for truth and where he needs to be.  We didn't have a lot of time because we had dinner, but we set up a return appointment, and he seemed really excited! After dinner it was late (7:45 but people get angry if we knock on their doors after 8). I was ready to head home and do some new missionary training, but elder Poston said we should knock a couple of houses down. So as we were walking down this street with SUPER nice homes we were drawn to the closest house that had lights on. I'm super scared walking up to it (I was scared they'd get mad because of how late it was) and praying like crazy that God would help this person be happy to see us. 

A boy around 17 answered the door and he was in nice clothes (at first we thought he was a butler or something). It turned out that he had gone to a (Mormon) baptism today for the little sister of his friend.  He explained to us how simple and beautiful the baptism was. We talked to him and he is TOTALLY prepared to hear the gospel! We gave him a Book of Mormon and he said he'd love to read it, we got his number and everything and set up a return appointment!

We knocked on the next house and had a member answer the door. It turned out that we weren't even in our assigned area! God is awesome. Elder Poston and I were joking around that the reason we were put together as two green missionaries is because that's the only way we'd make the mistake of not being in our area on accident and that boy needed us that night specifically. God works so many little miracles in everyone's lives and I'd challenge everyone to take a minute every day to recognize them. You'll be blessed for it and you'll be better able to recognize God's love for you. I love you all, but God loves you more! We all have infinite potential in his eyes! 

P.S. Have mom edit this so it actually makes sense haha 

Note from the editor: Hopefully an edit by his Dad will suffice!  :)

P.S.S. Below is a picture from our zone training meeting: