August 8th Email.... 5 days left !!!!!!!!!

Hey Everyone,

5 DAYS LEFT!!!! And I'm freaking out! I have absolutely loved my mission! I am so grateful for the opportunity to come back out here and serve the Lord. I've learned so much about my Heavenly Father, My Savior, and His Gospel! I have also learned so much about myself and what I need to do to bring me and my future family back to live with Him again. I'm really going to miss being a missionary! I really am living the life out here. I have loved working with people and helping them come unto Christ. This past week has been crazy in the office. A lot of errands to run, a few emergency transfers, and some teaching opportunities. I was happy to have my last Sunday here in the YSA. It's a bitter sweet feeling that I have about coming home because when I get home it will have been 37 months since I started this journey and a good majority of me doesn't want it to end yet. I've met so many great people here and just love serving them and the Lord. I'll see you all this weekend!!

I Love You All!!

Elder Salmon

August 1st Email !!!!!!!!!!!!!

Hey Everyone!

HOLY COW I'VE GOT 11 DAYS LEFT!! It's such a crazy feeling! We got transfer calls this past Saturday and I'm heading up to Tampa 3 (USF Campus again!) for my last 10 days! And I will be serving with Elder Alber and staying with the assistants Elder Cook and Johnson and helping them in the office. This has been an amazing week! We went to visit the Headricks this past week and some of their friends came over and 2 of them came to church and are just eating up the Book of Mormon! I've never seen this much excitement to read the Book of Mormon by someone who has never heard of it. But to them it makes SO much sense on why there were Prophets on this continent guiding the people. Elder Carroll who was being trained in the other side of the Naples area had to go home because his seizures started acting up. He is a great missionary and he is looking to come back in a few months and I hope he does. Elder Nielson is getting transfered up to Winterhaven because he needs to get surgery on his menicus because it is torn and a member of the stake presidency up there is an orthopedic surgeon and President Summerhays is hoping to get everything done while he is out here. Sarah got baptized on Saturday!!!! It was such a great experience! I was blessed with the opportunity to do the baptism and the confirmation! She is amazing! And I'm so excited for her and the things she will be able to do for the church. We taught Angy yesterday and she is still golden as ever. She's afraid of what her dad is going to say because he is really close minded but as we talked with her about we came to an agreement that the best way to handle it is to have her mom talk to him because she is extremely supportive. I'll see you all next week!!!

I Love You All,

Elder Salmon

July 25th --- 19 Days !!!!!!!

Hey Everyone,

19 Days!!! But who's counting right? haha. This past week we were able to meet with Angy and set a date with her for the 6th of August!! She is great! This Tuesday her mom decided to sit in on the lesson and it's going to be about the Plan of Salvation! What a perfect time for her to step in and know that she can be with her daughter and the rest of their family forever! I got a call from Port Charlotte this past week and Sarah is getting baptized on Saturday!! She is so ready and excited. Last night she texted me for some advice. She was upset because she only wanted a few people there at her baptism and some people had invited themselves and she didn't think it was very considerate of her feelings for them to do so. She even contemplated not getting baptized. After talking with her and telling her that I agreed that it wasn't right for them to invite themselves but it shouldn't affect her decision on what she knew to be true. And she agreed and is all good and ready to be baptized on Saturday! We had interviews with President Summerhays this week and it was great!! I love talking with him. It was another laid back interview as always. President and I have always gotten along and seen things from the same view point. We discussed more about what he wants to do and asked about what he should with the mission in the next couple of months. It's great to know that he trusts and respects my opinion enough to discuss that with me. He didn't want to talk about me much because he wanted to save it for my exit interview that will be in 2 weeks. I did however get a committment out of him to take the 4 missionaries that are going home with me golfing the day before we all leave! So I'm pretty excited.

I Love You All,

Elder Salmon

July 18th Email !!!

Hey Everyone,

3 and a half weeks left!! Crazy!! Sorry these last couple weeks of emails is going to be a little shorter than normal because I'm trying really hard not to get trunky :). So I'm just gonna get on, tell you whats going on then take off to ball it up in Fort Myers. We taught Angy this past week with Sister Leatherwood and Sister Bennett and she is absolutely golden! She took everything in so well and her fellowshippers are amazing. She went over to Sister Bennett's last night to do her reading assignment. We are also teaching a man named Michael. Michael has been investigating the church for some time now and had some problems with our beliefs due to how he was raised in his faith. He has been able to over come those obstacles and come to know that this is the true church. The hold up now is smoking. He has been smoking for most of his life. A lot like Bill. He is living somewhere that we know unless he moves out he won't be able to overcome that addiction. He is being helped by members to find him a better place to stay. The Lord continues to bless us as we are working smart. We have received two media referrals and plan to contact them as soon as possible and hopefully begin to teach them and bring them unto the fold.

I Love You All,

Elder Salmon

Baptism !!!

Cuddling a baby :)

Another Baby :)

July 11 th Email !!! 1 MONTH !!!!!!

Hey Everyone,

Great news!! Bill got baptized this last Saturday!!! It was such a great experience to see him after so many years of wanting to be a member of the church he was able to overcome the temporal things he needed to and get baptized! We have been doing a lot of member work this past week and the Lord has blessed us because of us wanting not only to work but to work smart. We got a referral from a family in the ward who's daughters have brought to church the past 5 Sundays and went to girls camp last week and wants to take the discussions! They set up the appointment for us and just told us when to show up. Her mother agreed to sit in on the lessons! We also just received a family referral from a member in the spanish ward here and we will be meeting up with them this next week as well! Things are going great and I am loving the work!

I love you all!

Elder Salmon

July 5th Email !!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Hey Everyone,
Elder Nielson and I are trying to really get the work going down here in Naples. After a lot of discussing and planning we've come up with some ideas to best approach the work down here. Elder Nielson and his last companion did a lot of tracting and after being in Port Charlotte and seeing how effective working smart was I did not want to tract unless we had absolutely nothing else to do. We have a 30 page roster front and back of members in the ward and their is no way that even half of them come to church. We are calling and/or visiting every member in the roster that is in our area of the ward. It was extremely effective in Port Charlotte and this ward is really capable of expanding tremendously. We already have 2 elders quorums so there is no reason it couldn't be expanded to 2 wards within the next year. We have done a lot of area book work and trying to set up lessons with old investigators and it's looking good. We are gonna start reteaching a girl named Tisha. We've dropped Rosa because she decided she is going to go to a Presbyterian church on Marco Island that is closer as well as that is where her daughter is going and her daughter didn't want to go to a different church and so she wanted to be in the same church as her daughter. We were out to dinner this past week and sat next to an older couple. We started talking and joking around with them and then they started asking us questions on why we are out here and what we are doing. An hour and a half went by and we had taught the first lesson with them in the restaurant! It was a great experience and we will be following up with them this week and hopefully continue to progress them. I've done a lot of studying about Preach My Gospel and applying it to life in and out of the mission. It has everything in there to organize what I am wanting to do and how I can achieve what I want to do in my life both spiritually and temporally. Just like so many successful businesses they have a mission statement, and out here on the mission we too have a mission statement "Our purpose is to invite people to come unto Christ by helping them receive the restored gospel through Faith in Jesus Christ and his Atonement, Repentance, Baptism, Receiving the Gift of the Holy Ghost, and Enduring to the End." I started to think about what is MY mission statement for life. I'm still pondering on what I'm going to choose and I've got a few ideas and want everything I want to do on life and the choices I make to be in harmony with that mission statement I have set for myself. Elder Nielson's knee is still bugging him and got another MRI this past week with contrast and will find out the results this Friday. Hopefully nothing is torn or else he will probably have to go home and have surgery.
I love you all!
See you next month!!
Elder salmon

June 27th Email !!

Hey Everyone,

I have enjoyed my first week down here in Naples. Work has been a little slow this past week because my companion has messed up his knee and can' t do much because this past week was our bike week ha. He has an appointment to see the doctor this Thursday and hopefully we can get things figured out. We our working with a woman name Rosa, she has a date for this coming weekend but might have to be pushed back a week because she didn't show up to church yesterday. We also have Lauren and Maddy who are amazing! Lauren is Maddy's mother and Maddy is 13 and they are strong Christian people and have a great knowledge of the Bible and have an open mind to other things that could strenghthen their testimony in the Savior. Yesterday in PEC before church I was called on by one of the members of the Bishopric to give a talk. Luckily it only had to be a 5-10 min talk. He told me after it was going to be either yesterday or a 15-20 min talk in 2 weeks and I was glad to get this one. We have 2 brand new greenies in our district and they are a lot of fun to mess with. Don't worry we aren't going overboard but still having a lot of fun with them. Sorry this is so short. But we are running up to Fort Myers to play basketball. I'll see you all soon!!!

I Love You All,

Elder Salmon

June 20th Email !!! LAST TRANSFER !!!

Hey Everyone,

This is my last transfer on the mission!!!! Time has flown!!! Transfer calls were Saturday and I am being transfered to Naples with Elder Nielson for my last hoorah haha. I'm really excited because I've always wanted to serve with Elder Nielson and didn't think it was going to be able to happen before I left. I tried to get him up here to Port Charlotte because I really do love it here. I've really grown close to the people here and I know that I'll be in touch with a lot of them for life. It was really hard saying some goodbyes to some families yesterday and it'll be hard again today. Bill is still struggling. He had been keeping us in the dark about him smoking and his daughter who is a less active but is really supportive of him joining him outted him to us this past week so hopefully soon he'll enter into the waters of baptism. Sarah is amazing! We had some great lessons with her this week. She is going to be one strong member! She is joining for the right reasons and is really taking faith and repentance to heart and is doing it the way we all should. I'm excited for her, she'll be baptized in no time. Yesterday at church I wanted to test where she was at so I told her she better invite me back for her baptism and without a beat she replied of course! She is so ready. Well we had an interesting Saturday outside of transfer calls. One of my companions caught an alligator by the foot on his fishing pole and reeled it in. It was pretty big a good 4 feet long and heavy. Well a neighbor called it. We released it not knowing someone called the police and went inside cleaned off and headed to the car to go out and work for the day and 5 sheriff's and 2 fish and game officer's showed up and I guess catching a gator and all that is a felony in Florida.....one of my companion's has a court date this next month and it'll be for a misdemeanor for "possession of a reptile" haha. We've talked to members and they said they usually just give you a fine and nothing will go on your record. I'm not being charged so I'm clean and good to go thankfully. When all that was said and done looking back it was pretty funny haha we are in the newspaper and as I am emailing you now no joke people are out in the library not knowing we are in the lab talking about the Mormon Missionaries that caught and alligator haha.

I Love You All,

Elder Salmon

Another Gator !!

June 13 th Email !

Hey Everyone,

This past week has been yet another great week. Blessings all over the place! Literally, we have been giving blessings like crazy! Larry was confirmed yesterday and received the Aaronic Priesthood. The Ward is really taking care of him and helping him progress, it's really great to see. Bill has a date to be baptized this Sunday! He's been clean for over a week now and is really wanting to be a member of this church. While we were over at his rehab center for his hip we were given permission to give him the Sacrament and we asked the male nurse for some bread and he brought it in and asked if we could pray with him and his wife. His wife was just diagnosed with stage 4 cancer in her kidney and bladder. They joined us for Sacrament and afterwards we taught them about the Priesthood and the Restored Gospel then proceeded to give her a blessing. Afterwards they were both in tears and knew that they had felt the Spirit of the Lord and we will continue to talk with them as we visit Bill each day. Sarah is doing great! She knows it's true but she just hasn't felt ready to take the plunge yet and that's totally cool with us, so we are going to continue to be there and help her along until she is ready. We had another amazing spiritual experience this past week. A young family in our ward called us over because the wife was 7 months pregnant and she had gone to the doctor and her baby had an irregular heartbeat and her and her husband were both worried and wanted a blessing. I was blessed to be given the opportunity to be the instrument in the Lord's hands for the blessing. I don't remember what was said but I do remember the power of the Spirit I felt. A few days later she went in for another appointment and the baby is totally healthy. The Church is true, our Savior lives, and the Priesthood, the power and authority to act in God's name has been restored on this Earth in this Church at this time.

I Love You All,

Elder Salmon