Week 20 Daytona Beach

Wow it's hard to even remember what happened this week. Time just cruises on by. I guess I can't complain because I am pretty blest. 

So this week we had some pretty big changes. I'm sure a lot of you already know but there was a change in the missionary schedule and he way we track our lessons. We now do not have nightly planning because it was moved to part of our morning schedule. We also had companionship study get moved to later in the day. The whole reason this happened is so that we can get more sleep I'm sure looking forward to that! The other thing, we do not track the number of lessons we teach any more. Really he only thing we keep track of is how many New Investigators, the number of people who came to church, people on date to be baptized, and people baptized. It's pretty crazy! I feel like my whole attitude changed. Now it's seems like it's down to the basics: find, teach, then baptize.

Speaking of baptism, we had an unexpected surprise. We got a call from Hunter (an investigator who originally said he wanted to get baptized in March) call us and tell us that his little brother is getting baptized March 4th... and Hunters brother wants Hunter to baptize him. Hunter then said he will do whatever it takes which means he will be getting baptized real soon. We called the Branch President of the YSA branch we cover because Hunter will be in his stewardship once he is baptized and asked for his permission to go through with this. He said yes! Hunter is now going to get baptized on February 12th, get confirmed February 19th, receive the priesthood February 26th, then baptize his little brother on February 4th. His little brother Gavin will be getting baptized in another ward though. Keep Hunter in your prayers so that he can make his date!

Other than that not a whole lot has happened. Brandie and Diente are not looking like they will make their date for February 19th. We have had a hard time meeting with both of them. We picked up a new investigator who I used to teach a few months ago. Her name is Hannah. She was on baptism date but then her family gave her a lot of problems for it. As we were driving around, we got the prompting to stop by her house so we did. She says she wants to try again for baptism!

We continue to see miracles each day here. I was doing some pondering his week on the many tender mercies the Lord gives to us. I take them for granted too often. It's amazing to see his love for us because he is in every inch of our lives helping us along the way. 

Joshua 1:9

"9 ​Have not I commanded thee? Be strong and of a good courage; be not afraid, neither be thou dismayed: for the ​​​​​Lord​​​ thy God ​is​ with thee whithersoever thou goest."

Have a great week!  Elder Goff

Elder Hawkins and Grandpa (holding my basketball I have everyone sign)

Week 19 Daytona Beach

 

I know I say it a lot but I still cannot believe how fast time is flying by. I still feel like I just got out of the MTC! I guess it's true when people say time flies when your having fun. Especially here in the Promised land of Florida.

My new companion, Elder Hawkins is a stud! We are a lot alike. He came out on a mission 6 weeks after I did. He's from Orem Utah and comes from a family of 8. He also loves basketball so of course you know what that means. Since he just came from my last area we have had plenty to talk about. Good old Clermont seems to be holding up pretty well. I sure miss that place. 

Unfortunately Jimbo dropped us this week. We talked to him about some requirements  for baptism namely the word of wisdom and I guess he couldn't handle it. Agency is so hard to deal with sometimes. It breaks my heart. However, Brandie is still doing well. We haven't been able to get her to come to church yet. So if you guys would like to pray for that, it would sure help. Diente is doing well also. Unfortunately he didn't come to church either. It's a struggle! We did have a super cool with Diente though. We taught him about how to repent and then at the end he said a kneeling prayer pleading for God to help him change so that he could get baptized. The spirit was so strong. At the end he said he feels like he is already a member of our church and he hasn't even been to church yet! His date to be baptized is the 19th of February.

The other investigator who we have been teaching a lot is a kid named Hunter. He is a lot like me. His mom is a member and his cousin was just baptized in another ward. He is a lot like me so it's super cool. He said he wants to get baptized in march.

Alma 13:21-23

"21...Now is the time to repent, for the day of salvation draweth nigh;

22 Yea, and the voice of the Lord, by the mouth of angels, doth declare it unto all nations; yea, doth declare it, that they may have glad tidings of great joy...

23 ...and this because of our being wanderers in a strange land; therefore, we are thus highly favored, for we have these glad tidings declared unto us in all parts of our vineyard."

What a privilege it is to be declaring repentance to these people being a wanderer in this strange land of Daytona. And what a privilege it is to have had these glad tidings declared unto me! I hope you all have a great week.

Elder Goff

 

 

 

Week 18 Daytona Beach

 

This week was pretty normal. We picked up a lot of cool people to teach also. All of our investigators are doing well. Jim was a little sick so we didn't meet with him much but we ha had a lot of great lessons with everyone else. 

Some big news is that transfers are this week. Elder Dummer is leaving to go whitewash a Spanish area. :/ I'm pretty bummed that he is leaving. We got along pretty well. However I'm excited for ,y new companion. My new companion will be Elder Hawkins. He is actually coming from my last area so we will have a lot to talk about. I hear he is a great missionary.

Our days have been packed recently. We went on splits twice this week where Elder Dummer went with a member and I went with another because we had too many scheduled lessons. The work here is great! I hope I never leave! I would say the biggest miracle this week came Wednesday. We have been teaching a kid who is the only member in his family. He has been praying real hard that his family would listen to us. Well we finally got it worked out so we could do so. It was the coolest experience because we got to witness this kid teach his parents about the restored gospel. He bore his testimony to them and they couldn't deny it! As we explained how he Book of Mormon came from ancient American prophets the fathers eyes lit up. He said he has been searching for hat his whole life. The fathers wife only speaks Spanish so as soon as he learned this he started speaking to her in Spanish with a sense of urgency! Walking out of that house and seeing the excitement on this kids face because his family has started to accept the restored gospel witnessed to me again that there is no other place I would be than here in Daytona Beach serving our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ!

Well I love you all. Hope you have a great week this week!

Elder Goff

GRANDPA - Vic

Week 17 Daytona Beach (18 month mark)

We had a pretty good week this week. It seems like I say that every week though haha. It cooled off a bit too. I froze to be honest! It got down to 36 degrees which honestly sounds like nothing but I guess I'm turning into a softy. Someone told me that when you gain a pint of blood when you go up 7,000 feet and when you drop 7,000 feet you lose a pint. He said that it takes about 6 weeks to gain or lose it. So my blood literally has thinned out.  I'm not sure if that is all true or not though.

All of our investigators are doing great! We have 3 people on date for baptism right now. Diente has a date for February 19th. He is a 22 year old kid. We taught him about the Plan of Salvation this week. He loved it! My mom sent me a Plan of Salvation puzzle for Christmas so that's been coming in handy recently. The next is Jimbo who has a baptism date for February 5th. He is still doing super well. He just has to quit smoking. However, he is determined to make it. The 3^rd person we set a date with this week was perfect. Her name is Brandie. We have been teaching a less active family named the Spurlin's. They kept telling us of this friend they had for us to teach. Well we finally got to teach her. The very first lesson we had with Brandie she said she already knew this was true. She basically called herself a Mormon before she even started meeting with us. So to say the least she is super prepared. It's way cool because the Spurlin's bare testimony to her and teach her. In the process of helping Brandie get baptized in February 19th, we are reactivating the Spurlin's. The work here in Daytona is great! We committed Tekeam to a baptism date again this week. He is praying about it however, I am confident he will accept the invitation to be baptized.

Well other than our investigators not much else happened this week. We had a couple good exchanges and are seeing a lot of progress with all the missionaries in our zone. The Lord truly has his hand in this work. It's a privilege to be his instrument in bringing about such a marvelous work and wonder.

Hope you all have a great week and stay warm!

Elder Goff

 

 

Week 16 Daytona Beach

We had another solid week here in the Promised Land of Florida. It was super eventful. We had a lot of referrals this week too. One of which we were even able to set a date for him to be baptized! His name is James or Jim or Jimbo The 3rd. Whatever you want to call him. We found him through a Less Active member of the ward. He agreed with everything we said even though we don't think he understood everything we were talking about. He would just say, "yup" or "yes sir" in a his southern accent to anything we talked about. So when we popped the question about baptism. He responded with a "yup". So then we asked how February 5th sounded... "Yes sir." He is just a cool southern guy who is looking for more of God in his life.

The rest of our investigators are doing well! Jed came to church again this week. He is super solid! We met with him and he was studying the discourses of Brigham Young. He obviously knows a lot about the church. The only thing holding him back is that he thinks he has to know everything about it before he is baptized into it. When truthfully you don't have to know hardly anything at all about the doctrine just as long as you know the Book of Mormon is true and have received an answer from God. We have a few scriptures in mind that will hopefully help him.

We are starting to see a lot of miracles with all the investigators we are teaching. Tekeam is starting to get back on track. He was suppose to be baptized the first of December but then looked up some anti videos. Bret is still waiting for the court to get back to him about the date for his probation to end. He will be baptized after that. We also found Errol this week! Not sure if you remember him or not but we were teaching him a lot about 2 months ago. He didn't have a solid address and he lost his phone so there was no way to get in contact with him. Well we were driving down the road yesterday and just happened to be at the right place at the right time and found him walking down the road! He was so excited to see us! It was a miracle that we happened to find him!

With the New Year here I hope we all take the prophets counsel when he says, "Choices determine our destiny." We must choose the path to eternal life. Although there are many things attempting to sway us from the path, "I would that ye should be steadfast and immovable, always abounding in good works, that Christ, the Lord God Omnipotent, may seal you his" - Mosiah 5:15

Hope you have a great week! Happy New Year!

Elder Goff

Exchanges with Elder Hale. We have a cool Less active we teach named Brother Ryan who has some crazy pets.

 

Week 15 Daytona Beach

Christmas is always one of the best times of the year. We saw a lot of Christmas miracles this week. It was just a good all around week.

Of course the highlight of the week was getting to talk to my family. The more I look around the more I am reminded of how blessed I am to have a family who cares so much for each other. 

We had a super sweet miracle happen this week. We were doing some finding on Friday and just didn't feel like we were seeing any success. Everyone was shutting the doors in our face. After saying a prayer, we went to a former investigators house to see if they still lived there. It was an apartment. As we were walking over to find the door we saw this lady standing outside so we started talking to her. She said she was Buddhist and wasn't interested but that her son right around the corner was a member of our church. So of course we went over and talked to him. Right as he saw us his face lit up! Apparently he had just moved here from Washington State for the winter, and he said he had been investigating the church for 6 months now! He thought the missionaries in Washington had talked to us and sent us over to see him but we just happened to be in the right place at the right time. It was a complete miracle! He came to church with us yesterday and we are meeting with him again tomorrow. His name is Jed if you want to keep him in your prayers.

Christmas was super fun! We got up and played Santa clause for someone! It was super cool. There was a member from out of state that donated a suit and some other stuff to him. It was super fun! The rest of the day we went to church and ate. And ate. And ate. We had 3 1/2 meals between 1:00 and 7:00. I felt so Sick! We had some phillipian food, then regular southern food, then a little more southern food from another family, then some Spanish food. I felt so fat!

Elder Goff

Richard - A Member in the Ward

 

Week 14 Daytona Beach

This week was a pretty good one.  Nothing super exciting or new happened. Well I take that back, everything about a mission is new and exciting but it's just the same new and exciting stuff as normal haha. The weather here has been like paradise. It stays between 65-75 degrees all the time.

I guess that one exciting thing that happened this week was that we had A Zone meeting. I gave a training on how to find people to teach. It's pretty cool because a lot of that is simply just faith. There is an eternal law about faith: Desire -> Action/obedience -> blessings/ miracles. The way to change your desire to receive blessings to receiving blessings is through hard work and obedience just as it says in Ether 12:6 as well as D&C 130:20-21.

I had an exchange with an elder on Saturday that was super cool. We went to a place called Bunnell which is about the same size as Beaver and the people act a lot the same so I felt right at home. They are teaching a guy who loves to hunt (especially alligators). I got to meet him. His house is literally filled with animal mounts. The best part about it all is that he is getting baptized on Jan 7th. 

Our investigators are all in a decision stage I guess you could say. They are all on the verge of either progressing towards baptism or being dropped. It's super frustrating. We do however have one investigator who is super solid. His name is Brett. He hopefully gets off probation this month so he will be able to be baptized the first of next month! Darren Mitchell is doing well also. He says he wants to become a Mormon but he is just super busy this time of year. He works at the racetrack here in Daytona so it's hard to meet with him. He was trying to set something up for us to go teach him during his lunch break at the Speedway so that would be cool. He also said that anytime I want to go to a race, he will get me free tickets for the fancy booth up at the top where they serve you food and all. If you could keep him in your prayers that would be great!

I hope you all have a Merry Christmas! I can't believe it's already that time of year again. Love you all!

Elder Goff

This is the Murray Family! They are super cool and are going to get baptized. Unfortunately they just moved up to North Carolina so it's not going to be us baptizing them.

Exchanges with Elder Haderlie