Homeless - Oscars - Google Translate

11/10/14

Family!!!

Man it's so weird every time you guys say "Maddy is doing this, or Maddy is doing that." it seems like not that long ago she had just left and then to get the whole e-mail addressed to just me and well yeah it's all still taking a little adjusting to, and I'm not even the one that went home! haha! anyway, It really does fly by! I can't believe I've almost been out 4 months already and that's not including my mini-mission! I think I've said this before but the days here are SO long and yet some how each week disappears before you know it's gone and you find yourself back at the library next to your companion, e-mailing home and realizing you have nothing to write about and so you begin to ramble about situations leading up to you coming to the library and then realize you've caught up to yourself in real time already and are forced to end your extremely long sentence. (yeah... I think that made sense? I don't know, I'm just not going to re-read it and leave the interpreting part in your hands. Hope you've all got your Urim and Thummims!)

So anyway, onto real news! this week has been just another average week in Kane'ohe. Still just visiting less-actives, part-members, and active members and trying to find solid investigators from any source possible! It has gotten to the point where I kind of want to just get a soup box and stand on the street corner and preach... but well... all that would attract are the crazy homeless people that we already attract so well and talk to and pray with all the time anyway. They're great! (well most of the time anyway.) It's funny because with how much walking around town we do I wouldn't be surprised if people around here just assume we are homeless as well! haha! But anyway, back to the not quite so homeless people!

We had an AMAZING lesson this last week with S! He's still really been struggling with the idea of only ONE true church and that he can't get baptized and be a part of ALL of them because well, that's just the kind of loving and accepting guy that he is! His door is always open to everybody! Even us crazy homeless Mormon missionaries! haha! But anyway, so we watched the movie Joseph Smith: Prophet of the Restoration with him (keep an eye out for this one at the Oscars during the millennium! It's a great one!) and afterwards the spirit was SOO incredibly strong!! and we were just baring our testimonies and it was just amazing! anyway, so we'll see if he keeps the commitment this time to actually read and pray about the Book of Mormon, but he was very sincere in taking it so we are hopeful! :) We also helped him download the Gospel Library app and he just LOVES that! Even if he mostly only uses it for the Bible and not the BoM, the Bible is still a great book and the app is still a great app!! haha! I'm SUPER excited and anxious to get iPads mostly just for that app and all the resources there in! haha

Anyway, I've probably taken too long already, we've gotta get going, but I love you all and miss you every day. As well I love the Lord and so I must bid you all adieu! Until we e-mail again!

Don't Forget to be AWESOME!!!

Aloha Nui Loa!

-Elder Powell

p.s. I've come to the decision that the Book of Mormon would have been much more interesting and entertaining to read had Joseph Smith translated it using Google Translate! 

p.p.s. Pictures: Kane'ohe zone at our combined zone conference with Mililani, and also just running into a familiar face at that same meeting! :) haha

On the winward side - little plant cells - wild chickens

11/3/14 

WELCOME HOME MADDY!!!!!! And as well Aloha to the rest of the family!!

I'm not going to lie it's been SUPER weird this last week thinking that Maddy is now home and well... back to normal life! (or about as close to normal as I guess you can get in the Powell home! haha) But yeah, so anyway, it's great to hear about all your updates and adventures back home!! It is also fun to hear about the updates and adventures on the Perkins family!! Thank you Dad for all you do!! :)

As for out here in bright and sunny Kane'ohe it's been.. well not too bright and sunny.. as you might guess it's actually been rather dark and rainy! haha! But that's what it's like on the windward side! A TON of rain! :) anyway, this week has just been overloaded with all sorts of amazing stuff that I just can't even begin to know where to start. As far as progress in the work it is definitely still edging along slowly but again every week as we take time to just keep on pushing forward and "Carry on" we find that well, it does progress!

 I actually had a long and very nice conversation last night with Elder Manning (by the way dad I did ask him and he did not recognize any of those Manning names although, to be fair not everyone is quite as up to date on their 5th great grandparents as you are! haha!) but anyway, so we were talking about faith and testimonies and everything and well I kind of made a comparison that I just realized works pretty well for missionary work too! I still can't explain it too well but ... see if this makes any sense.

Faith grows like a little seen right? Well how is it that plants grow? One tiny little plant cell at a time! Sometimes we expect to see big changes or giant growths in a single moment but that's simply not how it works! It more often grows again one, immeasurably small, cell at a time. And just as a botanist would find it extremely frustrating and difficult to observe, measure and record every single cell division that occurs in the growth of a seed into a giant tree so it can also often be difficult, frustrating and discouraging if we are trying to measure and record every single bit of spiritual growth (or growth in the mission area in this case) and in fact it can sometimes be detrimental to the growth of that plant (or spirit). Instead we must have faith that if we continue to water and take care of the plant making sure that it is always in direct contact with the light (reading scriptures, praying, attending church, and doing all things to continue a direct line of revelation between us and our Heavenly Father) than without having to measure each step we can know that IT WILL GROW!! and so... well that's kind of how I've been having to take this area of my mission. While we are not seeing much growth and we definitely have no sign of fruits in sight we're simple moving forward with faith that somewhere some tiny little cell of faith is growing and we are helping to provide the water and light that it needs to continue its slow and yet steady growth back to our Father in Heaven!

Anyway, I hope that all made sense! so yeah, I guess that kind of sums up everything for week 2 of transfer 3 in Kane'ohe Hawaii, in the HAWAII HONOLULU MISSION! THE GREATEST MISSION IN THE WORLD!! :D

Hope you all have a wonderful week! Keep on doing what you are doing, press forward with faith in good things to come, welcome home again Maddy, and to everyone, don’t forget to be awesome!! :D

Aloha Nui Loa!

-Elder Powell

I haven't done a SotW in a while!! So.. yeah, 2 Nephi 28:32 (a great one for those eternal investigators! :) haha)

my makeshift scripture case

This random Chicken we found that some how got SUPER high up in this tree and it was just kind of funny! :) haha Joe you would LOVE Hawaii, there are TONS of just wild chickens running all over and it's totally legal and normal to just chase one down and kill it and eat it! In fact my companion has been talking about getting one soon so we might be having a chicken dinner soon! hahaha!

Walking, talking and other stuff

10/27/14

random scenic shot from a small hike we did

Man!! that's crazy!! Maddy is going to be home so soon!!! for me the end of my mission still seems forever away!!! haha! And yet I've already gone through 1/8th of it!! I know that's not a lot but still it is pretty crazy how time moves! (but I already gave my whole spiel on femto-seconds so I'll spare you the quantum physics this time. :) haha) Anyway, Aloha Maddy and welcome home! I anxiously await the day we will all be together again when I return home (although not TOO anxiously... I'm just getting started! :) haha!) 

So as for everything here in beautiful briny Kaneohe (not the bottom of the sea) everything is going great! Elder Manning is a GREAT missionary and while we still are struggling to get as much done as we would like to cause of walking and.. well.. other peoples agency :P We have had more lessons this week than the past few and have been continuing to try and help the members in doing their own missionary work (since they're not confined to a specific area or zone. haha) and so that's been great!

Elder Powell and Elder Manning

One of the biggest highlights of the week though has to have been the ward Trunk or Treat this last Saturday!! It was a BLAST!! and not only that but it was SUPER successful on the missionary effort side of it as well!! We had multiple less active, part member and even fully non-member families come out and they all had a blast and some of them came to church the next day as well so that was GREAT! We're definitely going to continue to follow-up with those that came and hopefully they can keep coming out and get baptized and then tell their friends and they will get baptized and eventually by the end of the transfer they'll have to split our one ward into two stakes because everyone will be super active and they'll build a new Kaneohe Temple and the church head-quarters will move out here and..... well something like that will happen.. maybe? haha!

Anyway, yeah so that's basically the main highlight of the week not including all of the usual walking, talking and other stuff that we do every week! haha! anyway, so yeah, hope you all have a great week! Sorry this week is kind of short but well, I don't really know what else to write about! haha! But yeah hope you all have an amazing week to follow! again, welcome home Maddy, congratulations Ben, and as always, don't forget to be awesome!! :)

Aloha Nui Loa!

-Elder Powell

Hurricane number 3 - New Companion - Always Remember

10/20/14

Aloha Ohana!!!

Sounds like an extra odd week on your end and to be honest it has been no less odd for us over here! This last week has actually had quite a few odd highlights so yeah, I guess I'll just get started and hope the whole e-mail makes some sort of sense.

So first off probably the biggest news on the actual News is that of our third "Hurricane" in the last three months... but as you might imagine, this one was also rather disappointing. not that not being hit by a giant hurricane is a bad thing, it just was another big scare over something that wasn't that big of a deal, the storm blew just below Oahu I guess so really we just got all the outskirts of the storm which still had it's own little bit of excitement. No crazy winds or anything, just a gentle breeze, and also no heavy down poor and  flooding, but it did rain quite a bit... and by quite a bit I mean A LOT!! As a matter of fact it rained for about 34ish hours strait! It was kind of incredible!! I just kept thinking "man it's gotta run out at some point but it wasn't until just before we were going to bed last night that it actually did!! So yeah, we had multiple "flash flood" warnings go off on everyone's phone during church yesterday which made for an interesting sacrament meeting (at least it kept everyone awake! haha) but despite the warnings no actual flash floods, just the river running and little higher. :) Anyway, rain never stopped the work of Salvation! Sure enough despite all the rain we still got plenty of walking and working done! :)

So we had transfers this week and I'm still here in the "Faithful Fighting Kaneohe 4th ward!" (as our Bishop likes to call it) but Elder Basag got transferred! He's over in Wahiwa in the Mililani stake kind of north shore area of the island and actually is companions with Elder Shalvis, a missionary that was in our district my first transfer here so they're doing great and he's enjoying being in an area where he can teach more Filipino people. :) As for me, my new companion is Elder Manning (no dad, no relation to Eli or Peyton as he has to reassure EVERYONE that we talk to! :P haha!) anyway, yeah he's a cool guy! He's from Utah, he's been out 6 months now so we're both pretty young in mission age, but he's a great missionary! He actually just got transferred over here from Lanai (that tiny little island under Maui with only two Elders on the whole island!) so that's pretty awesome! there's only a small town about 1 square mile long on the whole island so yeah it's a bit of a change for him to be back here on Oahu but we're both adjusting to the change and just doing our best to lose ourselves in the work! :)

Anyway, running a little short of time here, but real quick one thing that really stuck out to me first (and I won't give any names or details for privacy sake) but one of our members after coming to a lesson with us told us some of his life story and well the main thing I got from it is when we're faced with trials I think part of why we are allowed to suffer through them is because when we do over come them we can then in turn help others through theirs! Anyway, it's just a REALLY incredible story but again I just am gonna hold off on details. Anyway, also something that really stuck out from church and throughout the week is that we need to ALWAYS remember both who we are and our potential, BUT also ALWAYS remember that everyone around you... EVERYONE no matter the circumstances of their lives or their choices is entitled to the same royal and celestial inheritance that we have been promised!! NEVER assume that because we are members makes us "choice people" or "greater than those around us" because while we may be closer to achieving our divine inheritance, everyone is entitled to it and God is no respecter of men! He see everyone as his children and his sons and daughters and he loves them ALL, EQUALLY! If you want a perfect BoM example of this I'd suggest Alma 31 - 32 (the story continues through chapter 35 but those are the main two)

well hey I'm about to get kicked off the computer so I've gotta wrap this up but anyway, I love you all so much and pray for you every day and night! keep on doing what you do and as always don't forget to be awesome AND don't forget who you are!! :)

-Elder Powell

p.s. I went to send a picture of me and Elder Manning and realized I don't have one yet!! hahaha! So I just took a picture of him standing next to me e-mailing his family... so yeah, that's my new companion! :) hahaha! Also a picture of saying goodbye to Elder Basag at transfers.

Magniloquent language

10/13/14

Well as far as this week goes for us over here on the islands, it's been a rather interesting week.  I spent most of the beginning of the week inside being sick and then most of the middle of the week inside with a terrible headache. Anyway, I just concluded that Voldemort was somewhere close by so I destroyed a couple lockets and Diadems, stabbed my companions journal with a basilisk fang and called it good and we went back to work! :) And as far as that work goes we're still just rather trudging along, BUT I did find out yesterday that we'll be getting a fresh pair of feet here in Kaneohe soon!! Transfers are this Wednesday and Elder Basag is leaving!! It's bittersweet for both of us as it always is but also exciting to get a new set of eyes in the area and see what work needs to get done and then DO IT! :)

 ...as part of my continuing effort to gain that testimony (and also because there was a challenge issued by Sister Warner) I started reading Jesus the Christ just this week and WOW it's amazing! :) It's super hard to read and has an abundance of rather magniloquent language (I don't even think I used that right) but it's super awesome! :)

Well I've gotta run, but I love you all! Happy Birthday Mom!! You have done more for me than I could ever put into words! No matter how magniloquent those words are! :) haha Keep doing what you do and don't forget to be awesome! :)

-Elder Powell

SotW: JESUS THE CHRIST!! :D haha 

get the book for free HERE 

and check out this cool website too Because of Him

Climbing trees - WE NEED YOUR HELP - Be Prepared!

10/6/14

Dear family!

IT'S CONFERENCE WEEKEND!! WHOOHOO!!!! well... I guess it WAS at least... so maybe I should be cheering in reverse. !!!OOHOOHW Anyway, sorry I’m being so weird but well... I'm pretty sure I can blame most of that on the family I was raised in! :) haha! Love you all! ANYWAY, back on topic! Conference was AMAZING! :) I especially appreciated all the talks in Priesthood session as always as well as Elder Bednar's talk Sunday afternoon! Anyway, speaking of this week, it's the last week of the transfer!! which means two things! I've almost been out for three months already!! (not including my mini-mission!!) And I will probably be getting a new companion if not a new area very soon!! Crazy how time flies by! One femto-second at a time. :) So yeah, that's pretty crazy.

We also had a crazy awesome experience with ever more service this week! First going back to Pearl Harbor and the USS Missouri to wipe down all the hand rails on the entire ship! And then also doing this huge service project for a member in our Zone Leaders ward. It was crazy how much they trusted us because the project was cutting down GIANT tree's! which I've done before but... on flat land, in the middle of a forest! This was on a steep hill right next to two houses!! IT was CRAZY! Although I really did appreciate the chance to climb the trees and use my knot tying skills (thank you Brother Bang!) to get the rope and everything so it fell the way we wanted it too! :) Anyway, it was SUPER physically demanding but also super fun! 

So yeah, that's most of our missionary news, aside from that we're still just doing everything we can to find people to teach (which not too much success as of now) and also working with a lot of the members trying to get them a little more excited about names as well! I hope you all back home are doing everything you can to help find the missionaries people to teach! WE NEED YOUR HELP! It's SO hard without the members! I've heard from some of my missionary friends back home that the Awatukee Zone (the zone we're in in the Tempe Mission) is actually the hardest and slowest zone in the mission!! And mostly for the same reason it's slow here in our area, we simply cannot find people to teach!! SO I'd hope all the members back home are doing everything they can to help in that finding effort!! because us missionaries need all the help we can get! As one of our members in Yuma once wisely told me after giving us a referral, "I found them now you teach them!" haha! and it works! We are MORE than happy to teach anyone but we need your help finding!

Well I would be remiss if I didn't include a quick message regarding conference in this e-mail as well. While there were MANY highlights (people giving talks in their native language, Elder Bednar addressing his entire talk exclusively to non-members, the missionary choir, etc.) I think one of my favorite parts in any conference is listening to how different themes sort of unintentionally form and one that definitely formed in this last conference was that of being PREPARED!!  Scout motto! BE PREPARED!! and not just temporally (food storage, reserve funds, fast offerings, etc.) but also spiritually! I really liked how probably the most quoted scripture at this conference was Hel. 5:12. It's always been a good one but ESPECIALLY with the way things are going in the world we NEED to be built on the foundation of Christ! If you don't have a testimony of him and his Atonement, GET ONE!!! For some reason as I reflected on all of this a song came to mind that we've sung multiple times in ward choir and one that's always been my favorite, I testify of Jesus Christ. Specifically one line that REALLY stuck out, "When with all flesh mine eyes shall see, my God my unseen comforter, my witness than shall not exceed the truth I know this day." Or something along those lines. But I just LOVE how firm a statement that is! I know that is definitely the kind of testimony I am striving for that I can be prepared to one day see him again and when I do I can say that "my witness then shall not exceed the truth I know this day!" :) 

Well yeah, anyway, I've gotta get going, but I love you all! Keep on doing what you do! Send my love to the ward and to all the family! Have a great week and don't forget to be awesome! :)

-Elder Powell

SotW: HEL. 5:12! duhh! haha

Missed some of General Conference or wondering what it's all about? 

YOU CAN WATCH CONFERENCE HERE

Theory of Relativity, Sunrise Hike, Smiles and Laughs

9/29/14

Dear Family!

WOW this week went by fast! but at the same time it feels like it's been forever since I've written you! Haha! I honestly don't understand time anymore. I've always assumed it was a constant but then again I suppose Einstein's Theory of Relativity has something to say about that! Basically to make it really simple and object moving SUPER fast (like speed of light fast) would pass through time faster relative to those resting objects around it (if you want a good example watch the beginning of the original Planet of the Apes) but it works on a smaller scale as well so when you're up and walking you're actually moving through time just a couple femtoseconds faster than those that are lying around. So moral of the story? if you're ever feeling like life is just dragging along slowly GET UP AND WORK!!! You will literally make time pass faster!! :) hahaha!

Anyway, so yeah it's been a great week! As you might guess, a lot of walking (whoo! We've gotta be at LEAST 0.0000000000000002 seconds (2 femtoseconds) ahead of all you sitting at home watching TV!!) haha! Anyway, but in between the walking we've also done some awesome things! So we did some more service throughout the week. Building clean-up, yard work, that kine stuff. But we also have been getting some of the members really excited and thinking about names and people to refer to us and so forth! so that's SUPER EXCITING! :D Not quite as exciting we did find out that we WON'T be getting iPads for a while, probably late December early January, BUT we did get to have interviews with President Warner (which was GREAT and we just finished Zone P-day which involved a sunrise hike (although the sunrise was slightly disappointing because of the cloud cover :P haha) and then ice-skating, and sports. I really love our Zone! We actually spend a LOT of time with the Zone leaders since they both came out with Elder Basag so they're all really close friends and close to heading home!! crazy!

One more SUPER exciting thing about this week... actually it hasn't happened yet, but, we just found out that tomorrow we get to go to the Laie VC and watch Meet the Mormons!! :D I'm WAY excited! I know nothing about it but it sounds cool! :D haha! So yeah, if you haven't heard about it, look it up! and also you can go online I believe and request to have it show in theaters around you guys too and then you can bring other people to see it and they'll love it and get baptized and go on missions and it will all just be awesome! :D haha!

Sorry I've still got a lot of adrenaline pumping from Basket Ball and everything else we were doing today so this e-mail is rather all over the place and full of smiles and laughs... then again.. I suppose they pretty much always are :P BUT then again I suppose they always should be. I'm on a mission for the Lord.. in HAWAII!!! All I can do is smile and when times get rough I just remember the words of the Apostle Luke in the Bible (one of my favorites I might add) in Luke 6:22-23. Which by the way is my SotW! :) haha! anyway, yeah, I hope all is well and that you all find your own things to smile and laugh about this week! I know one thing FOR SURE that I will be smiling about most all the week love is the opportunity to hear from our Beloved Prophet and the Apostles and other General Authorities this weekend!! :D Well I gotta get going, but I love you all and hope that all is well in Az!! Keep on doing what you do and as always Don't forget to be awesome! :)

-Elder Powell

Oh, I forgot to tell you one of the Greenies that came in last transfer is named Elder Luke so it makes zone meetings VERY confusing! But it also made for a pretty cool picture! :) haha!