Miracles happen during exchanges

Since I missed a Christmas letter figured I should do one now.

So Christmas Eve was so fun we had dinner at a member's home with 4 other missionaries so we had a lot of fun, we made cookies played some fun games and laughed all evening! 

One thing that the Hogan family does every Christmas Eve is they eat soup out of Bread bowls and by candlelight. To remind them of the humble birth of the Savior. It was actually a very moving experience. 

Christmas day we had a regular day. plan, study but we had dinner with the hickmas(senior couple in the YSA ward) and we went to visit an assisted living home. It was super nice so many of them literally had nobody come to visit. We basically just sat there and listened to all their stories for an hour or so it was really nice.

We have had a lot of Exchanges this last week 3 in 4 days and we have another one tonight! They are exhausting but there is this weird phenomenon that miracles happen during Exchanges.

Yesterday we were On Exchanges in my old area La mesa 1st with Elder Chelius (super awesome Elder and former companion) we had a day full of finding so we started knocking doors, Elder Chelius felt that we should cross the street and knock on one particular door. 

"Knock knock"

Door opens

"Hey sorry to bother we are..."

"Oh mormons! I see you guys all the time and always wonder why you don't knock on my door come in!" 

We taught a family the restoration and had a really good experience with them, It turns out that they don't know any members of the church but whenever they go camping they seem to always have members of the church right next to them. So this really sparked interest in the church for her and her family!

About 40 mins later the same thing happened... felt to cross the street and we knock on this door and a man comes out onto his porch introduces himself and shakes our hands after about 3 mins of some discussion he invited us into his home to teach him and his daughter the restoration! 

It was really amazing! As we shared the first vision he turned to his 10-year-old daughter and said

"You see Kennedy, this experience Joseph Smith had has Changed their lives and has brought their families closer together, they do not have to be here but they chose to be. To help our family"

He said not to be surprised if we saw him at church this Sunday with his whole family.

The Lords Hand is in this Work, and the Spirit of Christ is softening hearts. We were passing out copies of the Book of Mormon like candy talking about Family History and trying new approaches that worked pretty well. 

We also did a hike with our YSA ward so I will send pictures

2020...I'm almost 20 years old super spooky 

Have a great week

Love Elder Palmer

P.s I'll be home for Christmas.

Do you really care about me?

Good stuff is happening it has been getting chilly here but it warms up to 70 in the day so it gets nice...

This week we did a booth on a college campus and it was a huge success we had a whiteboard with a question, "If you could ask God any question what would it be" and we passed out candy canes with light the world cards taped to them. It was super fun we had a lot of good discussions 

A couple of my favourite answers are,

"How you doing?" (Nobody asks God how he is doing so I will)

"How does a woman's mind work?"

"I want to be successful" (that is not a question) 

But my favourite "do you really care about me?"

Think about your own answer to the question. We even had the police come by and engage in a gospel conversation it was super fun. We even brought a YSA that has his mission call to help him prepare for the mission (he is a super shy guy) by the end he was running people down to give them pass along cards and I mean literally running people down. 

Wish people would have soft hearts year round not just during Christmas. 

Reminder about president Nelson's invitation to us all to prepare for the 200th anniversary of the first vision.

The promise of it being an unforgettable general conference rests upon our diligence. 

Also been studying Hell recently and I have learned that the bible dictionary is very useful. Basically, Hell is actually a temporary state between death and the resurrection. 

When the scriptures say "endless hell" or "eternal hell" it makes sense when it is put into the context of D&C 19:6-12 blew my mind. I hope it blows yours too! 

Love you all!

Elder Palmer

P.s I got a package in the mail and I want to open it been shaking it and I think I know what it is Haha. Don't worry about me this Christmas we will be well taken care of. 

Patanes were baptized

Good good week. We started teaching a girl named April that is a girlfriend of a returning member Nathan. And he came to church and brought his honey!🍯

They are super awesome we had a lesson on Saturday at about 3 and it went very well then as we are finishing up the temple came up and how it has Christmas lights so we decided to go to that too....that night! So we headed for the temple. And had lesson round 2 we talked about the importance of temples and ordinances that are performed inside. It went so well we made the temple a goal right there! 

The Patanes were Baptized!!! It was an super moving baptism with so many people that we had to have the service in the chapel (Samoan family flew in...) the most moving part was when Lorenzo (the father) got into the water to baptize his youngest daughter Lauren he raised his arm to the square and was not able to do the ordinance because he was overcome with emotion. He then baptized his 3 daughters and his Wife (Salvation) it will be a baptism I will always remember and I will be forever grateful that I had a small part in their conversion story. 

This is the Lords Work 

Love Elder Palmer.

I was so cold

It was so cold, it was 60 degrees and raining and I was so cold!!! We had the heat blasting always and I could not warm up. And I was wearing sweats a sweater and my jacket... nothing could warm my souls save the burning desire to play in the puddles. 

We had a busy busy week with transfers. And u feel like every miscellaneous talk come to us for some reason. 

We had two lessons set up for Wednesday with Chad a guy named cooper 1 hour apart at the church. But since chad was an hour late we taught them both together and they have polar opposite personalities so it was a very interesting lesson to say Haha a lot of questions about the old testament which kept things interesting Haha. 

for Pday today we went to the temple as a district and then we went to the Mormon battalion. we have three companionships of battalion sisters. So we decided that it would be a fun idea for us elders to give the Sisters a tour of the battalion. it is scripted but we hardly even looked at the script. the sisters said it was the most entertaining tour they have ever been on. it was a lot of fun there was a number of pictures and videos so I may send one or two your way. 

had a good friend share a scripture with me that I found to be very moving Hebrews 11:25 #Amen 

Love Elder Palmer