Elder Dallin Talbot's Mission Fresno California 2015-2017

Thank you so much, that sounds like so much fun things for the week.  What makes a good ward mission leader, that is a good question.  Going out when he can, but the biggest things are the relationships with the ward, if he knows people who will make great team ups, or good for fellowshipping that person.  Another big thing is working with the bishop and other people in ward council to get them excited about missionary work.  It needs to be a group effort, not the crazy missionaries and ward mission leader, the circle of people has to get bigger.  Kayla's mom is having a hard time, but she says she wants to try and stop this week, she told bishop Beckstead she would so we will talk about it on Thursday.  I never could understand how hard it could be until my companion and I decided we wanted to eat healthier and try and lose some weight, so we gave away the cookie dough we had.  Then I made more and couldn't stop eating it but for me the thought of thr...

My companion is Elder Toombs.  We got transfer calls and we will be staying together so that is exciting.  He is from Utah but actually attended an academy and did summer sales here is the central valley.  He likes basketball, teaching people. and eating( we both love eating cookie dough).  We had 8 lessons this week.  We taught a less active, brother Beatty and his wife who is not a member, we shared a scripture and they seemed friendly.  We also met a Lima family, we thought they were less active, but we had a wrong address and they are not actually members, so we will try them again this week.  We saw the less active Scotts family and had dinner with them, sadly they did not keep there commitment to read Helaman 3.  Brother Scott has forgotten how important daily scripture study is, so we are trying to help with that.  We then went over to the Mccartney and had Kayla teach us about the plan of salvation, so we can mark off that her new mem...

Wow that is so much fun, thank you for keeping me updated.  First off with planking, I can do 2 minutes when I want to, it is mainly a mental thing that gets easier as it becomes a habit.  At the moment my exercising  is off and on, it is so strange that having my companion up reminds me to do things, but when he is not it just doesn't feel as important for me and I get distracted much easier.  One of our recent converts hear, Kayla Mccartney does our laundry every Monday.  We check our emails on the 3 computers for clerks at the church.  The terrain seems similar familiar with stuff in town and then people out in bigger houses and more spread out.  The strength is that the ward is small and wants to grow, the weakness is that they don't know most of the people on the ward directory and the ward counsel makes up a lot of the ward and its a big load for them.  I am slowly getting to know the members better but they do a good job of keeping it rever...

Recently I have been studying in Alma and it has been so awesome to see the amazing examples of Alma, Ammon, and the other missionaries, seeing how much hard work they had to put in, there mighty prayers of faith and the joy it brought them.  Now they have just headed out again to reclaim the Zoramites and Alma gives them all a blessing that they might have success and it says they worked hard going door to door and talking to everyone and then they began to find the humble people who want to listen and know what to do, I am hoping to restudy it and go into more detail to see what things I can apply to my mission.  We don't knock many doors just tracting as we have been told that is not very effective so we try members we don't know in the directory and potentials and former's in our area book.  I had a fun exchange on Thursday with my district leader Elder Jenson.  We were not able to teach anyone, but we knocked on lots of doors, found people who had moved, not int...

Thank you for the pictures, it is so wonderful to see you all.  I think I definitely underestimated how mentally taxing a mission would be.  We are still working with just some recent converts and less actives at the moment so we are still trying to find as always and to help more members get involved in the work.  I am sorry I don't know what else to say.  I went on an exchange with Elder Hopkins and we ran into your average crazy less active who hasn't been to church in 10 years.  It was sad to see that over time he had lost so many truths and now doesn't understand who Christ is or the purpose of the scriptures.  Thank you for being the best, I can't wait to see you soon.