Hello my dear and incredible loved ones!! Wow I'm so excited to talk to you today! We have had an amazing week and put Jonathan Santana on baptismal date for June 16th! I'm so happy that you are all doing so well and having an amazing Spring! I'm so grateful for all of the good, happy news that you always send me! Keep it up because it makes me so happy to hear that you are happy! We had an amazing dinner with President and Sister Smith and their whole Family! It was really amazing to be the only 2 Elders but I didn't talk very much because the whole reason that we were over there was to have their oldest daughter ask Elder Mitonzi some questions about growing up in the refugee camp and so he told his whole story and it was amazing! Today for P-Day we are going to have a very amazing day! The temperature is going to soar into the 80s with bright blue skies all day long! We are planning on getting haircuts next week but today we are going to play frisbee with the whole zone at the park with turf and then we are going to Cross Bronx! The weather is so nice and so we are going to take full advantage! I am very excited to email you during the day and talk back and forth!
We had such a fun P-day! We were going to play some sports but we got some unexpected rain the night before and it rained most of the day. We found out that they shut off the water for pretty much the whole day and so we weren't able to do our laundry but we went shopping and then Elder Mitonzi got a haircut. They are so expensive here and so I usually just wait until Jay comes to do them for free. I was able to email while he got his haircut and then we went to Cross Bronx for some delicious pizza! We called Cross Bronx right before leaving and it turns out that they were closed and so we decided to go down the street to 2 Bros Pizza and then we went to see the Hall of Fame of Great Americans and it was so fun to go back! Everyone really loved it and had a fun time! It started to pour rain and so we came back to the apartment at about 3:00 to clean our apartment and rest a little bit. It really helps us recharge after a busy week of hard work! I want you all to know that I know this Gospel is true! I am so thankful for the knowledge that we have to apply the Gospel of Jesus Christ to our lives to become better and be everything that our Heavenly Father knows that we can be. Some people in the world think that all they have to do is tell a Pastor that they beleive in Jesus Christ and know that he is our Savior. It is so great to become and stretch to our full potential and continue to become better! I love everything that a mission has taught me and the chance that I have had to learn so much more about this Gospel! After our P-Day came to a close, we went to a lesson with Joshua, the guy that we taught the day before. He ended up canceling and so we went to downtown Fordham and met a really awesome Nigerian man and he was really interested in learning more! He has only been in the United States for a few months. Then we had some really funny guys come up to us and yell "You guys are the real MVP's! Don't ever let anyone tell you different!" It was really funny! It was a very great day and we had tons of fun!
Thursday was so awesome and really busy! We got a text from our zone leaders telling us that we had a conference call that morning and so we were looking forward to that! The weather was so nice and I got out my short sleeve white shirts and enjoyed wearing them because it was really hot.
️ Then we did our companion study and we talked about the Plan of Salvation and how we can best teach it to Kwame that night. Then we watched a missionary broadcast from President Utchdorf that was recorded a few days prior and it focused on how we can work better with members and help them strengthen their testimonies of the Book of Mormon. Then we had a really great lesson with Justin LeBlanc! It was such a great lesson and the spirit was really strong! He is the man who just walked into Church and stayed for all 3 hours. We taught him the whole Restoration and when we talked about Prophets, I had the prompting to show him a picture of President Nelson. He took my tablet and just stared at it for about 30 seconds and nodded his head. He told us that he knew that President Nelson is a true Prophet. He agreed with all of our teachings and believes everything that the Church teaches. It was so cool! Then we did our big weekly planning session and got everything squared away and ready to roll for the week! We got in contact with a lot of investigators and lots of people want to meet with us! Then we went to do a few lookups near Yankee Stadium! We got a few referrals and so we took some time to call them and knock on their door. We set an appointment with a guy named Bismarck and then we talked to people on the streets and enjoyed being outside in the beautiful weather. Then we went to go get the mail at the Church and headed back to the apartment after a very awesome and productive day!
Friday was so great too! I had a really cool dream that I would love to tell you about! I was walking down the street underneath an overground subway going to an appointment and all of a sudden, I saw Dad on his way to do a house inspection. It was pretty funny and I thought it was so wierd that Dad was in New York City doing house inspections. It was a really awesome dream! I can't remember if I told you this or not but this is a real experience that Elder Bradley had. About a year ago, Elder Bradley got an email from his Dad telling him that his Dad was going to his annual meeting for work. It always took place in Washington DC but his Dad didn't tell him that it would take place in New York City that particular year. So Elder Bradley was walking out of the Manhattan Temple Chapel after district meeting and his Dad was walking down the street right as he was walking out. It would be so crazy to see a family member unexpectedly on a mission! We woke up to really nice weather and planned out another really awesome and busy day! We had some great meeting and even gathered as a zone to hear from the Zone Leaders and they trained us on how to more effectively plan. Then we had an amazing lesson with Jessie Drag at the Church about the Sacrament. We showed a really aweosme video from on of the members in the 70 called "That They Do Always Remember Him" and it helped him a lot to understand the importance of taking the Sacrament each week. Then we had an appointment fall though with Joshua and so we went to knock on some doors near the Church. We talked to this really cool guy on the street and asked us for a DVD called "Finding Faith In Christ" and since we were so close to the Church, we were able to give him one! Then we had a really awesome lesson with a member who hasn't been to Church in a while named Bruce Moore. He is a really great and humble guy but has struggled with his testimony ever since he was baptized in 1978. He loves fishing and so it was fun to talk to him about the times when I went fishing. We showed him one of President Nelson's talks about the Book of Mormon and the spirit was definatly present. He has struggled in recent years because of the trials that he has gone through. He told us that his Mom recently passed away at the age of 100 and his wife passed away more than 15 years ago and lives alone and so he loves it when we keep him company. I was wondering how your day was going and figured that you were probably busy and were watching Puck score some goals! It was a really amazing day and to cap it off, we got in the elevator at our apartment and a really friendly lady got in and told us that she used to date a man who was LDS and she has been to Utah many times and even had contact with one of the past Presidents! She could remember if it was President Benson or President Hunter but either way, really awesome connection! We gave her a pass along card and invited her to come to Church! Love you all so much!
What an awesome day Saturday was! The weather has been so nice recently and the temperature has been rising each day. It has reminded me a lot of last year and just how hot it was when I was in the Bronx. We read lots of chapters out of 3 Nephi for our language study and it has helped Elder Mitnozi a lot because he loves learning new words in English. Sister Smith texted us to remind us about our dinner appointment and told us when they would pick us up from the Scarsdale train station. It was really awesome to have them invite us over for dinner and we were stoked to have that awesome opportunity! Then we talked to a really awesome lady from Ghana at the bus stop who is a Methodist and has lived in America for only a couple of years. The most common nationality in the Bronx is either African, Puerto Rican, or Jamaican. It has been really fun to get to know so many different people. It was such a beautiful day and there were sooooooo many people. The busses were so packed and we all felt like sardines! Lots of people were going to check out the Bronx Zoo and so every single bus was just so packed it was unbelievable. We got to talk to lots of nice people along the way and we met a guy from Cambia and lots of people from Puerto Rico and Mexico. We had a really great time teaching a member who hasn't come to Church due to his health challenges named Norberto Agosto. He is a really funny guy from Puerto Rico and is just a nice guy to be around. He had us see why one of his speakers wasn't working for him to play his Puerto Rican music and so he couldn't reach behind and so we turned his speaker around and found that it wasn't connected and so we fixed it and then shared a conference talk from President Nelson about the Book of Mormon and then headed up to the very top of our area to visit Kadeem and his Mom. I uploaded a picture of our area a little while ago and so I hope that you can visualize where I am at.
they both committed to come to Church and then we walked through a really nice part of the Northern Bronx. It was so nice and there were houses that were just outside our area. So I have a cool story! When I was in Olmstead, there was a guy named Hassan Musa who lived outside our area and so we sent his records off. Well now that I'm in this area, we went to knock on his door and he lived on the very far outskirts of our boundaries and unfortunately, his number was disconnected and he didn't liver there anymore. It was over a year ago and so we assumed that he moved. Then we made the long trek back to the apartment and we were so excited to have dinner with President Smith the next day! I decided to post a really awesome picture on Facebook and it was fun to share it!
DINNER WITH PRESIDENT SMITH AND HIS FAMILY!!! I woke up and was really thankful for the email that you sent! I absolutely love that quote from President Hinckley and I really appreciated the email! I have been chatting back and forth with Osagie on Facebook and so it has been really fun to hear from him because it has almost been a whole year since I last talked to him. He is doing great and he is still living in Brooklyn and I hope to meet up with him sometime because is a really great guy! After we planned out our day, we headed off to Church extra excited because we had lots of people committed to come to Church! We called and invited tons of people and lots of them told us that they would come. We had an amazing day at Church and I'm so excited to say that we had 4 investigators in Church! Lots happened and we both left Church with huge smiles on our faces! We had some amazing talks about the Book of Mormon and one of the members told a story about how she had cancer in her brain and went to read the Book of Mormon and it told her to go to the doctor. So she went and they found the cancer and then she had surgery and so she told us how the Book of Mormon saved her life. We had Jonathan Santana, Justin LeBlanc, and Gornet Wright in Church and it was so great to have so many investigators come! We got a new ward mission leader named Brother Gerhartz from New Jersey and he served his mission in Germany and is going to do such a great job! He is the former Elders Quorum President and is really excited to lead the missionary work! Then we got asked to present a 5 minute lesson to the whole primary about the Book of Mormon. It went so well and the kids were really smart and gave some great answers! We talked about how Moroni and how he appeared to Joseph Smith and the kids thought it was really amazing! Then after Church, a Priest named Eric Mariano came up to us and asked if I could give him a blessing of comfort. Of course I said yes because I love giving blessings! He is thinking and praying about going on a mission in a few years and he is trying to find a job and so I blessed him that he will be able to find a job. It was so cool to let the spirit guide me and help me know what to say because I didn't know him too well but I was honored that he asked me. Then we had a light snack since we were going to the mission home for a giant feast with President Smith and his Family! I feel bad because I was going to get a picture but then I realized that we didn't get one until we were in the car. Very sorry about that! It was such an exciting day at Church and our Gospel Principles class was packed full and almost every seat was taken. We were getting really excited to travel up to Scarsdale for dinner because it isn't every day that we get to eat with the mission President! We got picked up by President Smith and headed off to the mission home and had a really amazing dinner! They mostly asked questions to Elder Mitonzi about his life at the refugee camp, and how he and his family found the Church. They asked some really great questions and we had a very great conversation about how the Gospel blesses Families. We had a yummy lasagna, salad, peas, corn, and cookies for dessert. I am really going to miss the Smiths and all of the things that they taught me. It will be so wierd to go to the mission home and have a totally different Family living there. We talked a lot about Elder Mitonzi and the experiences that he had and how hard it was for him. We shared Moroni 10:32 and bore our testimonies and then had a kneeling prayer in the mission home. Then President Smith drove us back to the train station and we headed off to our last appointment. He wasn't home and then we realized that our MetroCards had expired and since it was Sunday, we wanted to be obedient and so we had a very, very long walk ahead of us. I wasn't here when the MetroCards were purchased and so I assumed that they bought them on the 1st or 2nd of April. We went to swipe for our bus ticket and it didn't work. Elder Mitonzi wondered if we should just buy our tickets since we were so far away from the apartment and we decided to walk. It was a little over 3 and a half miles and so we enjoyed talking to people along the way! It was such a great day and having dinner at the mission home was an experience that I will never forget! Love you all and Happy Sunday!
Monday was a great day! We got a text from our zone leaders telling us that our district meeting was moved to Tuesday and so we planned lots of finding during the time that we would have had our meeting. I was thinking about you so much and hoping you were all well and happy! It was so great to get your message and I loved hearing from you! We went to visit Bruce and we got to talk to him about passing him off to the YSA Elders in Manhattan. He was doing great and he was even reading the Book of Mormon and so we were sad to pass him off. Then we did our language study and read some really cool chapter in 3 Nephi before going to our pass off lesson with the YSA Elders. His name is Joshua and he is YSA Age so we passed him off. We met the YSA Elders, Elder Geppelt and Elder Latu, at the Church and then we went to visit Joshua. He is Hispanic and 23 years old and we also met his older Brother, Roberto. We had one of the best lessons ever with them both and it was wierd to have 4 missionaries in 1 room teaching 2 people. It's always so amazing to talk about the Gospel and how it has blessed my life so much and be able to help others understand the Gospel Principles. I love telling people about things that they haven't ever heard of and be able to explain to them that Christ's original Church has been restored to the Earth. We talked a lot about the Bible and Book of Mormon and how they are both equal and we know that both are the word of God. Elder Latu and Elder Geppelt set a return appointment and then the 4 of us went to go grab some deli sandwiches at a nearby deli with yummy Boar's Head brand meats and cheeses! It was a really great lesson and we were so thankful that they could make the trek to join us! Then we went to our Family Home Evening activity and unfortunately, we didn't have an investigator there and so we went to visit a guy named Ocloo who ordered a Bible and a Book of Mormon online and so we delivered him. He was working at his little phone case shop on the corner and he was the only one inside and so we delivered him the Bible and also introduced the Book of Mormon and then he pulled out his wallet to pay us for bringing him "God's inspired words" is what he called them. It was great! We told him that they were free and he was even more excited! Then we walked back to the apartment and even talked to a really awesome guy who knew a lot about the Book of Mormon! A lot of people think that the Mormons wrote their own Bible and that we are trying to get people to believe in our Bible. It always makes me so happy when we can clear up that they are 2 separate books and neither replaces the other. There are so many different opinions and backgrounds of people that sometimes it cam be tricky to determine where someone is at in their spiritual progression. It takes a lot of concentration to determine what the person needs to be taught at any given time. It has been so amazing to listen to what people say and then get to give them a scripture to read. I have loved being a missionary! Love you all and I'm getting very excited to talk to you on Mother's Day! I can't wait!
Tuesday was so great and your email made it even better!!!!! The weather was really pretty and there were lots of people outside going to the Bronx Zoo just down the street. It has been really cool to live near Fordham University because there are lots of students out and about wearing Fordham Rams gear. Yesterday was interesting because we had our district meeting on Tuesday instead of Monday. So after our studies, we decided to talk about Kwame, Kadeem, and Jessie, who are all on baptismal date but we are having a hard time meeting with them because of their busy schedules. We got thinking about transfers that morning while we were getting ready and we played out a few scenarios as to what could happen these next few transfers especially with the mission merger. Elder Mitonzi only has 3 transfers left after this one and so he might be getting transferred this next transfer. Or, I could get transfered so he can show a different missionary around the area before he leaves. I'm still not sure which mission I will be in when July comes but I have a feeling like I will stay in this area until the new mission President comes. We will see! I checked my Skype account and we are all good to go! I really can't even beleive that we are already to Mother's Day and we get to Skype again! I was looking at the pictures from our last call and also our last Mother's Day call and it seems like yesterday. Our district meeting was really great and we are going to pass off Kadeem to the sister missionaries because we can't go inside because he is still under the age of 16. Then we got some exciting news! A day before Mother's Day, our whole zone of missionaries will be travelling up to Scarsdale to have a big youth fireside and we will be teaching the whole in smaller groups how to teach the Restoration! It will be a really cool experience and we are very excited! That night will also be transfer call night and so we will get the news on the train back to the apartment. After we did our language study and read a few chapters from the Book of Mormon, we went to knock on some doors and deliver some Books of Mormon to those who ordered it. We delivered a large print Book of Mormon and Bible and he asked us to call him and set up an appointment. Then we had something totally crazy and unbelievable happened!! In 1 sentence, we got kicked off a bus just because we were dressed up and the bus driver thought we were going to preach and solicit to the passengers. We bought our tickets outside of the bus and walked on and said hello to the bus driver and as we were walking to the back to find a seat, he got on the intercom and said "You aren't allowed to ride this bus. I'm going to shut the bus off and everyone is going to wait until you get off!" We didnt even know that he was talking to us and we thought that it was the last stop on the bus to give the bus driver a break. So a few people got off the bus and so we followed, thinking that the bus driver was taking his break but once we got off, he closed the doors and sped away. We then realized that he was kicking us off and he wasn't happy that we were going to "preach on the bus." It was really crazy! Then we brought a suit that one of the previous Elders left in our apartment and to an investigator named Joshua and we met a lady from Moscow Idaho along the way and she thought it was really cool that Grandpa Evans was from Malad! Then we headed over to the Church for a lesson with Jonathan Santana before we played a fun game of basketball! Then I got some shocking news! Elder Williams sent me a message saying that he was getting transferred within the next few days to Yorktown to be with Elder Rocha. Can you believe that? President Smith called him and told him that he had some really strong spiritual prompting to sent him to Yorktown right away. He was really excited to drive but totally shocked and caught off guard! We later found out that Elder Rocha and his companion had a fight and so they had to be separated because they kept arguing. Pretty crazy! We came back to the apartment and I was extremely excited to read your email and see your pictures AS ALWAYS! Thank you tons for everything that you wrote! I was thrilled to read everything that you wrote! We just got told that our P-Day will change back to Monday within the next little while and we can only go to the Temple twice a year once the mission merges. Isn't that crazy??? I will send out more details once we hear for sure.
Well everybody! It was a ton of fun to hear from you and type up this email and reminisce about the past week! I just want you to know how much I love and look up to each of you! Time sure is going by so fast and we are just days away from Skyping! We are going to have a fun dinner that night before or 2 days before Mother's Day to celebrate! It is so exciting to see and hear you and I am really looking forward to talking to you! I am so excited! I hope you all have a really awesome week and have so much fun! LOVE AND MISS YOU ALL SO MUCH!!!!
️
Love You Always!
~Elder Lindberg
We had such a fun P-day! We were going to play some sports but we got some unexpected rain the night before and it rained most of the day. We found out that they shut off the water for pretty much the whole day and so we weren't able to do our laundry but we went shopping and then Elder Mitonzi got a haircut. They are so expensive here and so I usually just wait until Jay comes to do them for free. I was able to email while he got his haircut and then we went to Cross Bronx for some delicious pizza! We called Cross Bronx right before leaving and it turns out that they were closed and so we decided to go down the street to 2 Bros Pizza and then we went to see the Hall of Fame of Great Americans and it was so fun to go back! Everyone really loved it and had a fun time! It started to pour rain and so we came back to the apartment at about 3:00 to clean our apartment and rest a little bit. It really helps us recharge after a busy week of hard work! I want you all to know that I know this Gospel is true! I am so thankful for the knowledge that we have to apply the Gospel of Jesus Christ to our lives to become better and be everything that our Heavenly Father knows that we can be. Some people in the world think that all they have to do is tell a Pastor that they beleive in Jesus Christ and know that he is our Savior. It is so great to become and stretch to our full potential and continue to become better! I love everything that a mission has taught me and the chance that I have had to learn so much more about this Gospel! After our P-Day came to a close, we went to a lesson with Joshua, the guy that we taught the day before. He ended up canceling and so we went to downtown Fordham and met a really awesome Nigerian man and he was really interested in learning more! He has only been in the United States for a few months. Then we had some really funny guys come up to us and yell "You guys are the real MVP's! Don't ever let anyone tell you different!" It was really funny! It was a very great day and we had tons of fun!
Thursday was so awesome and really busy! We got a text from our zone leaders telling us that we had a conference call that morning and so we were looking forward to that! The weather was so nice and I got out my short sleeve white shirts and enjoyed wearing them because it was really hot.
Friday was so great too! I had a really cool dream that I would love to tell you about! I was walking down the street underneath an overground subway going to an appointment and all of a sudden, I saw Dad on his way to do a house inspection. It was pretty funny and I thought it was so wierd that Dad was in New York City doing house inspections. It was a really awesome dream! I can't remember if I told you this or not but this is a real experience that Elder Bradley had. About a year ago, Elder Bradley got an email from his Dad telling him that his Dad was going to his annual meeting for work. It always took place in Washington DC but his Dad didn't tell him that it would take place in New York City that particular year. So Elder Bradley was walking out of the Manhattan Temple Chapel after district meeting and his Dad was walking down the street right as he was walking out. It would be so crazy to see a family member unexpectedly on a mission! We woke up to really nice weather and planned out another really awesome and busy day! We had some great meeting and even gathered as a zone to hear from the Zone Leaders and they trained us on how to more effectively plan. Then we had an amazing lesson with Jessie Drag at the Church about the Sacrament. We showed a really aweosme video from on of the members in the 70 called "That They Do Always Remember Him" and it helped him a lot to understand the importance of taking the Sacrament each week. Then we had an appointment fall though with Joshua and so we went to knock on some doors near the Church. We talked to this really cool guy on the street and asked us for a DVD called "Finding Faith In Christ" and since we were so close to the Church, we were able to give him one! Then we had a really awesome lesson with a member who hasn't been to Church in a while named Bruce Moore. He is a really great and humble guy but has struggled with his testimony ever since he was baptized in 1978. He loves fishing and so it was fun to talk to him about the times when I went fishing. We showed him one of President Nelson's talks about the Book of Mormon and the spirit was definatly present. He has struggled in recent years because of the trials that he has gone through. He told us that his Mom recently passed away at the age of 100 and his wife passed away more than 15 years ago and lives alone and so he loves it when we keep him company. I was wondering how your day was going and figured that you were probably busy and were watching Puck score some goals! It was a really amazing day and to cap it off, we got in the elevator at our apartment and a really friendly lady got in and told us that she used to date a man who was LDS and she has been to Utah many times and even had contact with one of the past Presidents! She could remember if it was President Benson or President Hunter but either way, really awesome connection! We gave her a pass along card and invited her to come to Church! Love you all so much!
What an awesome day Saturday was! The weather has been so nice recently and the temperature has been rising each day. It has reminded me a lot of last year and just how hot it was when I was in the Bronx. We read lots of chapters out of 3 Nephi for our language study and it has helped Elder Mitnozi a lot because he loves learning new words in English. Sister Smith texted us to remind us about our dinner appointment and told us when they would pick us up from the Scarsdale train station. It was really awesome to have them invite us over for dinner and we were stoked to have that awesome opportunity! Then we talked to a really awesome lady from Ghana at the bus stop who is a Methodist and has lived in America for only a couple of years. The most common nationality in the Bronx is either African, Puerto Rican, or Jamaican. It has been really fun to get to know so many different people. It was such a beautiful day and there were sooooooo many people. The busses were so packed and we all felt like sardines! Lots of people were going to check out the Bronx Zoo and so every single bus was just so packed it was unbelievable. We got to talk to lots of nice people along the way and we met a guy from Cambia and lots of people from Puerto Rico and Mexico. We had a really great time teaching a member who hasn't come to Church due to his health challenges named Norberto Agosto. He is a really funny guy from Puerto Rico and is just a nice guy to be around. He had us see why one of his speakers wasn't working for him to play his Puerto Rican music and so he couldn't reach behind and so we turned his speaker around and found that it wasn't connected and so we fixed it and then shared a conference talk from President Nelson about the Book of Mormon and then headed up to the very top of our area to visit Kadeem and his Mom. I uploaded a picture of our area a little while ago and so I hope that you can visualize where I am at.
DINNER WITH PRESIDENT SMITH AND HIS FAMILY!!! I woke up and was really thankful for the email that you sent! I absolutely love that quote from President Hinckley and I really appreciated the email! I have been chatting back and forth with Osagie on Facebook and so it has been really fun to hear from him because it has almost been a whole year since I last talked to him. He is doing great and he is still living in Brooklyn and I hope to meet up with him sometime because is a really great guy! After we planned out our day, we headed off to Church extra excited because we had lots of people committed to come to Church! We called and invited tons of people and lots of them told us that they would come. We had an amazing day at Church and I'm so excited to say that we had 4 investigators in Church! Lots happened and we both left Church with huge smiles on our faces! We had some amazing talks about the Book of Mormon and one of the members told a story about how she had cancer in her brain and went to read the Book of Mormon and it told her to go to the doctor. So she went and they found the cancer and then she had surgery and so she told us how the Book of Mormon saved her life. We had Jonathan Santana, Justin LeBlanc, and Gornet Wright in Church and it was so great to have so many investigators come! We got a new ward mission leader named Brother Gerhartz from New Jersey and he served his mission in Germany and is going to do such a great job! He is the former Elders Quorum President and is really excited to lead the missionary work! Then we got asked to present a 5 minute lesson to the whole primary about the Book of Mormon. It went so well and the kids were really smart and gave some great answers! We talked about how Moroni and how he appeared to Joseph Smith and the kids thought it was really amazing! Then after Church, a Priest named Eric Mariano came up to us and asked if I could give him a blessing of comfort. Of course I said yes because I love giving blessings! He is thinking and praying about going on a mission in a few years and he is trying to find a job and so I blessed him that he will be able to find a job. It was so cool to let the spirit guide me and help me know what to say because I didn't know him too well but I was honored that he asked me. Then we had a light snack since we were going to the mission home for a giant feast with President Smith and his Family! I feel bad because I was going to get a picture but then I realized that we didn't get one until we were in the car. Very sorry about that! It was such an exciting day at Church and our Gospel Principles class was packed full and almost every seat was taken. We were getting really excited to travel up to Scarsdale for dinner because it isn't every day that we get to eat with the mission President! We got picked up by President Smith and headed off to the mission home and had a really amazing dinner! They mostly asked questions to Elder Mitonzi about his life at the refugee camp, and how he and his family found the Church. They asked some really great questions and we had a very great conversation about how the Gospel blesses Families. We had a yummy lasagna, salad, peas, corn, and cookies for dessert. I am really going to miss the Smiths and all of the things that they taught me. It will be so wierd to go to the mission home and have a totally different Family living there. We talked a lot about Elder Mitonzi and the experiences that he had and how hard it was for him. We shared Moroni 10:32 and bore our testimonies and then had a kneeling prayer in the mission home. Then President Smith drove us back to the train station and we headed off to our last appointment. He wasn't home and then we realized that our MetroCards had expired and since it was Sunday, we wanted to be obedient and so we had a very, very long walk ahead of us. I wasn't here when the MetroCards were purchased and so I assumed that they bought them on the 1st or 2nd of April. We went to swipe for our bus ticket and it didn't work. Elder Mitonzi wondered if we should just buy our tickets since we were so far away from the apartment and we decided to walk. It was a little over 3 and a half miles and so we enjoyed talking to people along the way! It was such a great day and having dinner at the mission home was an experience that I will never forget! Love you all and Happy Sunday!
Monday was a great day! We got a text from our zone leaders telling us that our district meeting was moved to Tuesday and so we planned lots of finding during the time that we would have had our meeting. I was thinking about you so much and hoping you were all well and happy! It was so great to get your message and I loved hearing from you! We went to visit Bruce and we got to talk to him about passing him off to the YSA Elders in Manhattan. He was doing great and he was even reading the Book of Mormon and so we were sad to pass him off. Then we did our language study and read some really cool chapter in 3 Nephi before going to our pass off lesson with the YSA Elders. His name is Joshua and he is YSA Age so we passed him off. We met the YSA Elders, Elder Geppelt and Elder Latu, at the Church and then we went to visit Joshua. He is Hispanic and 23 years old and we also met his older Brother, Roberto. We had one of the best lessons ever with them both and it was wierd to have 4 missionaries in 1 room teaching 2 people. It's always so amazing to talk about the Gospel and how it has blessed my life so much and be able to help others understand the Gospel Principles. I love telling people about things that they haven't ever heard of and be able to explain to them that Christ's original Church has been restored to the Earth. We talked a lot about the Bible and Book of Mormon and how they are both equal and we know that both are the word of God. Elder Latu and Elder Geppelt set a return appointment and then the 4 of us went to go grab some deli sandwiches at a nearby deli with yummy Boar's Head brand meats and cheeses! It was a really great lesson and we were so thankful that they could make the trek to join us! Then we went to our Family Home Evening activity and unfortunately, we didn't have an investigator there and so we went to visit a guy named Ocloo who ordered a Bible and a Book of Mormon online and so we delivered him. He was working at his little phone case shop on the corner and he was the only one inside and so we delivered him the Bible and also introduced the Book of Mormon and then he pulled out his wallet to pay us for bringing him "God's inspired words" is what he called them. It was great! We told him that they were free and he was even more excited! Then we walked back to the apartment and even talked to a really awesome guy who knew a lot about the Book of Mormon! A lot of people think that the Mormons wrote their own Bible and that we are trying to get people to believe in our Bible. It always makes me so happy when we can clear up that they are 2 separate books and neither replaces the other. There are so many different opinions and backgrounds of people that sometimes it cam be tricky to determine where someone is at in their spiritual progression. It takes a lot of concentration to determine what the person needs to be taught at any given time. It has been so amazing to listen to what people say and then get to give them a scripture to read. I have loved being a missionary! Love you all and I'm getting very excited to talk to you on Mother's Day! I can't wait!
Tuesday was so great and your email made it even better!!!!! The weather was really pretty and there were lots of people outside going to the Bronx Zoo just down the street. It has been really cool to live near Fordham University because there are lots of students out and about wearing Fordham Rams gear. Yesterday was interesting because we had our district meeting on Tuesday instead of Monday. So after our studies, we decided to talk about Kwame, Kadeem, and Jessie, who are all on baptismal date but we are having a hard time meeting with them because of their busy schedules. We got thinking about transfers that morning while we were getting ready and we played out a few scenarios as to what could happen these next few transfers especially with the mission merger. Elder Mitonzi only has 3 transfers left after this one and so he might be getting transferred this next transfer. Or, I could get transfered so he can show a different missionary around the area before he leaves. I'm still not sure which mission I will be in when July comes but I have a feeling like I will stay in this area until the new mission President comes. We will see! I checked my Skype account and we are all good to go! I really can't even beleive that we are already to Mother's Day and we get to Skype again! I was looking at the pictures from our last call and also our last Mother's Day call and it seems like yesterday. Our district meeting was really great and we are going to pass off Kadeem to the sister missionaries because we can't go inside because he is still under the age of 16. Then we got some exciting news! A day before Mother's Day, our whole zone of missionaries will be travelling up to Scarsdale to have a big youth fireside and we will be teaching the whole in smaller groups how to teach the Restoration! It will be a really cool experience and we are very excited! That night will also be transfer call night and so we will get the news on the train back to the apartment. After we did our language study and read a few chapters from the Book of Mormon, we went to knock on some doors and deliver some Books of Mormon to those who ordered it. We delivered a large print Book of Mormon and Bible and he asked us to call him and set up an appointment. Then we had something totally crazy and unbelievable happened!! In 1 sentence, we got kicked off a bus just because we were dressed up and the bus driver thought we were going to preach and solicit to the passengers. We bought our tickets outside of the bus and walked on and said hello to the bus driver and as we were walking to the back to find a seat, he got on the intercom and said "You aren't allowed to ride this bus. I'm going to shut the bus off and everyone is going to wait until you get off!" We didnt even know that he was talking to us and we thought that it was the last stop on the bus to give the bus driver a break. So a few people got off the bus and so we followed, thinking that the bus driver was taking his break but once we got off, he closed the doors and sped away. We then realized that he was kicking us off and he wasn't happy that we were going to "preach on the bus." It was really crazy! Then we brought a suit that one of the previous Elders left in our apartment and to an investigator named Joshua and we met a lady from Moscow Idaho along the way and she thought it was really cool that Grandpa Evans was from Malad! Then we headed over to the Church for a lesson with Jonathan Santana before we played a fun game of basketball! Then I got some shocking news! Elder Williams sent me a message saying that he was getting transferred within the next few days to Yorktown to be with Elder Rocha. Can you believe that? President Smith called him and told him that he had some really strong spiritual prompting to sent him to Yorktown right away. He was really excited to drive but totally shocked and caught off guard! We later found out that Elder Rocha and his companion had a fight and so they had to be separated because they kept arguing. Pretty crazy! We came back to the apartment and I was extremely excited to read your email and see your pictures AS ALWAYS! Thank you tons for everything that you wrote! I was thrilled to read everything that you wrote! We just got told that our P-Day will change back to Monday within the next little while and we can only go to the Temple twice a year once the mission merges. Isn't that crazy??? I will send out more details once we hear for sure.
Well everybody! It was a ton of fun to hear from you and type up this email and reminisce about the past week! I just want you to know how much I love and look up to each of you! Time sure is going by so fast and we are just days away from Skyping! We are going to have a fun dinner that night before or 2 days before Mother's Day to celebrate! It is so exciting to see and hear you and I am really looking forward to talking to you! I am so excited! I hope you all have a really awesome week and have so much fun! LOVE AND MISS YOU ALL SO MUCH!!!!
Love You Always!
~Elder Lindberg
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