My First Baby

Friends and Family, 

To begin this week's email, our story begins Monday evening. In the branch, there is this family that Elder Wilson and I are very close to. The Estrada Family. Hermana Estrada and her kids are members, but her soon to be husband, Jose, is not. He is planning to get married and baptized towards the end of this month. He is really really cool and is practically a member, he just hasn't been able to get baptized for quite some time due to some legal complexities with getting married. Hermana Estrada has been very pregnant my whole time I've been here, and Monday she asked if we could come by and give her a blessing. We stopped by towards the end of the night and talked with the family and somehow made it out of there without giving her a blessing. Later that night we both realized we had somehow forgotten to accomplish what we had originally planned on doing. We thought to ourselves, "Ahh. No worries, we'll just give her the blessing tomorrow."

The next morning at around 6:40am, we were at the gym in the church working out when the sister missionaries run in screaming their heads off about how Hermana Estrada is having her baby and how she needs a blessing. Elder Palacios, Elder Wilson, and I all had our own reactions. Elder Wilson got super excited and happy and started heading out the door almost immediately. Elder Palacios was more like, "Hold up, let me change my shoes." I was very confused and just looked around trying to figure out what was happening. Foreshadowing for what our reactions will be like when we become future fathers. 

We hurried out of the church and rushed home to put on a shirt and tie and then rushed quickly over to the hospital. We got permission to enter her room to give her a blessing and took some pictures with her to capture the moment. We kept telling her. "Smile!" and her response was "I can't!". I guess that's what having a baby will do to you. We stuck around the hospital and helped her and Hermano Estrada out with anything that they needed, and about 5 hours later the baby was born. Waiting in the hospital felt like a TV show or a movie or something. It was cool, I liked it a lot and learned a TON. 

While out tracting in this one trailer park in our area, we ran into a less-active member who attends the English Ward. He had a bunch of really cool swords on the wall and a record player and was a really cool and humble guy. We talked with him and invited him to start coming back to church, and he promised he would! We saw him at the church building yesterday. Goes to show that small and simple invitations can have a huge impact on people's lives. 

Conference this weekend was very enlightening. I went into the weekend with three questions in mind, and had all three answered. I'll just share some highlights that I took away from all of the talks. 

"A loving God is as close as a prayer away." -Carol F. McConkie

"Boys, be ambitious." -Kazukiko Yamashita

"Whatever the cost of repentance, it is swallowed up in the joy of forgiveness." -Linda S. Reeves

"Service is not something we endure to obtain the Celestial Kingdom, it is the very fiber of eternal life." -Carl B. Cook

"Even the darkest nights shall turn into dawn for the faithful." -Evan A. Schmutz

"The gospel is truly about the one." -K. Brett Nattress

and one final quote (not from General Conference) that I saw in a member's home this week that I really enjoyed. 

"Comparison is the thief of joy." -Theodore Roosevelt 

Con Mucho Amor, 

Elder King

UT Takes over Zone Conference

(September 19, 2016)

Friends and Family, 

This past week has been so crazy. Elder Buchanan, one of the Elders that we live with, had to go home to get surgery this past week so Friday morning we had to help him pack up and send him off. It was really sad to see him go, but I'm already so excited for his return. It'll be even better than Lord of the Rings: Return of The King. I'll be Return of Elder Buchanan. 

His trainee, Elder Palacios, is now in a tri-pan with Elder Wilson and I. It is very weird and different being in a trip-pan but super fun because when we are out tracting and street contacting we run from door to door or person to person teaching Elder Palacios everything we know about missionary work. The other night as we were out finding people some guy in a truck just pulled over and got out and asked if we were missionaries. We responded with a classic "claro que si" and he began talking to us about how he wants to learn more about God and come to church so we gave him the address right then and there. 

At Zone Conference on Thursday, I was finally able to meet Hermana Hull. She is serving down in The Dalles Zone and was at UT this past year! It was so much fun to catch up with her on all that is going on down in the Capital YSA Ward at UT and hear about the fun experiences she had there. It was also partially an answer to my prayer. I've been really thinking and trying to decide where to go back to school after the mission, UT and BYU, and she gave her everything at trying to convince me to go back at UT. It helped me realize that either way, everything will all work out! 

This weekend we get transfer calls, which as always catches me off guard. The beginning of this transfer was pretty tough but these past couple of weeks have flown by. Stay tuned for what happens next week!

Con Mucho Amor, 

Elder King

Hearts Filled with Joy

(September 26th)

Friends and Family, 

Transfer calls have come and gone and I will be staying here in Yakima for another 6 weeks with Elder Wilson! It is his final transfer in the mission, so it's super weird that I will be his last companion considering that he was my first companion. When President Lewis called to give us the news, he told us that part of the reason why they kept us together is because I'm the only person they trust to keep Elder Wilson on track for his last 6 weeks haha! 

I feel like so so so much has happened since last time I've emailed you all. Last P-Day Elder Wilson and I put on a big event for the Yakima Valley Zone where we cooked carne asada and played mini games in an Olympic style. It was so much fun. This past Saturday as we were contacting people there was a huge parade going on down Yakima Ave from people from all over Washington. I saw R2D2 and the world's largest shopping cart! Check that one off the bucket list.

Friday morning I got some really crazy news. One of my investigators from Wenatchee, Rafael, was getting baptized that evening at 6pm. I taught him and his family for the entire 6 months that I served in Wenatchee, and to hear that he was finally getting baptized was the biggest blessing. I called pretty much every person I knew in central Washington to try and find a ride, and ended up borrowing one of the High Councilman's car and having a member from the branch drive us up so that I could be there for the wedding and the baptism. It was very very special to be there, and Hermana Villa and Rafael and Emelia were very surprised and happy that I was able to be there with them.

Last night, we had two baptisms in the Englewood Branch. Gregorio was someone that Elder Wilson and I worked with briefly for the past two weeks since we were put in a tri-pan with Elder Palacios. He has a broken foot, but insisted on being baptized last night because he didn't want to miss out on any of the blessings. As we gave him the gift of the Holy Ghost he couldn't help but cry because he was so overwhelmed with joy. Before he said the closing prayer, he started singing hymns to everyone and explained that his heart was filled with so much joy and he knew of no other way to express his thanks to God other then singing. 

"The greatest battle of life is fought out within the silent chambers of the soul.” -President David O. McKay

Con Mucho Amor,

Elder King

Praying for Cow Licks

Friends and Family, 

I don't have a bunch of time today because a lot of stuff has come up so I just want to share a quick story that happened this past week. There is this family that got baptized on Sunday and their wedding was the Saturday night before. All of the missionaries in the Englewood Branch were helping out with setting up and I even got to be the wedding photographer which was pretty cool, mark that off of my bucket list. It was so much fun and so cool to hear the Branch President marry them and then talk about how one year from now they can be sealed for time and all eternity. 

While we were cleaning up after the wedding, the field next door had these two cows that came up close to the fence. I took some of the kids over and showed them the cows and used my special animal powers to get the cows even closer so that the kids could pet them and whatnot. The cow kept licking our hands and it felt so weird and cool and I thought to myself, "I wonder what this would feel like if it licked me on the face? I've always heard of the term 'cow lick' when it comes to hair, and it would be so cool to have a legitimate cow lick." 

Let me just make a quick note, that I love farm animals. I think they are so cool and fun and just the best. With that being said, I decided I wanted to try and get the cow to lick my face. Crazy and weird and gross, I know. But I thought it would be so cool. I leaned over and did everything I could to try and get the cow to lick my face. I called them over, whistled at them, I even put grass up against my face to try and trick the cows by offering them food. None of it worked. I spent a good 5-10 minutes trying to get it to happen, but to no avail. All of the kids had left and my companion was off behind me talking to some other missionaries and I was left there alone with these two cows. The crazy idea popped into my mind. Pray about it. 

I immediately disregarded the idea. Why would I pray about something so silly as that? Why would Heavenly Father care? As all the doubts started flowing through my mind, I started thinking about it in a different way. God is my Heavenly Father. I thought about if I had asked my Dad to help me to get a cow to lick my face, and realized that he definitely would lend a hand. Not only because he has a lot of the same quirks that I do, but because I'm his son and he loves me. The same applies to Heavenly Father. I began to realize that as silly as a cow licking my face was, it meant something to me. Which means it meant something to Him. 

I started to pray. "Dear Heavenly Father, I know this is probably the silliest request you've ever heard, but it would really mean a lot to me if you could tell these cows to give me a nice ol' lick on the face. I just thought since you're my Father, I might as well ask." As I began to close in the name of Jesus Christ, I began to imagine Christ carrying my prayer up to Heavenly Father, looking through the prayer papers (or however it works) and reading my request with a face of "...what in the world?" I said Amen, and just a moment later one of the cows stepped forward and with his slimy long tongue he licked me right up the side of my face. 

I don't know or understand how prayer really works. I don't know how God decides to answer prayers. I don't fully understand how He answers them either. One thing I do know, is that He is our Father. He wants to hear our pleas, just as any father would want to hear the plea of their child. From the small things like a cow licking a face, to the big things like college, work, family, he cares about it all. You can bank on that. 

Con Mucho Amor, 

Elder King  

3 Voices

Friends and Family, 

Over the course of my mission thus far something that I've somewhat struggled with and really focused on has been recognizing the voice of the Spirit. In Moses Lake I learned something that helped me out a ton with trying to be in tune with the Holy Ghost. There are 3 voices in our minds. The voice of the adversary, our own voice, and the voice of the Holy Ghost. Every thought the adversary puts into our minds ends with an exclamation mark. Our own thoughts seem to always end with a question mark. The voice of the Spirit, however, always speaks and ends with a period. 

The other night as Elder Wilson and I were out in the streets of Yakima, trying by potential and former investigators, we went to a specific former and knocked on the door but nobody was home. As we were walking away, Elder Wilson looked at me and asked, "Well should we move on to a different area or try and do something around here?" I took a moment to think about what would be best, when I recognized a period. "Walk up the street." I told Elder Wilson we should at least walk up the street a little bit and try and find another house to knock. As we walked up the street a particular house stood out to me for some odd reason. Another sentence ending with a period come across my mind. "Knock the house." Almost immediately after that thought, another stream of thoughts came flooding in. "Do I have to? Does it need to be this house? Why can't it be another house? The sprinklers are on, we'll get wet! There are tons of other houses, we can just knock one of those!"

I told Elder Wilson that I really thought we should knock this one house. We started walking up to the door, through the sprinklers, when we heard voices from around back. We walked around and found a these two ladies talking with a young girl. We introduced ourselves and they kindly introduced themselves and we began talking with them. It was a grandmother with her daughter and granddaughter, just sitting out back enjoying the nice weather and spending some time together. We talked some more and got on to the topic of missionary work and what we do as missionaries. They asked us to please sit down and share the message we kept talking about because they wanted to know why it was so important. We sat down and began teaching them The Restoration. It reached a point where I was teaching and testifying of Joseph Smith, and tears started to build in the young mother's eyes. We gave them a copy of the Book of Mormon and invited them to read and pray about it, and they assured us that they would and asked if we could come back again. I don't know what the future has in store for that family, but I do know that the Lord needed us to be there at that time for them. 

Other highlights from the week include a trip in the back of U-Haul with half of the Englewood Branch, playing Skip-Bo and dancing with old ladies at a senior center, and a carne asada party. There are tons of fun and crazy things happening here in Yakima! 

Con Mucho Amor, 

Elder King

The Adventures of Yak Valley Begin

Friends and Family, 

Leaving Moses Lake was so sad. On Monday after FHE my heart was broken when I had to say goodbye to the YSA. The next day after institute, the YSA threw a surprise party for me and attacked me with cupcakes and covered me in icing. I may have lost a white shirt to red icing, but it was totally worth it. Moses Lake 11th Ward and YSA will always be very special to me. 

Life down here in the wonderful valley of Yakima is going well. My purpose here is the same purpose I had in Moses Lake, to invite others to come unto Christ by helping them receive the restored gospel. It's very different here in many ways. Hispanic culture is so different! For member dinners, the wives slave and cook SO much food the whole time and the daughters run around and wait on us and get us anything we need. It is so different. We aren't even allowed to stand up to put our dishes away! We get fed authentic Mexican food every night which is a huge blessing. My stomach has a little bit of adjusting to do, and I'm going to have to be extra sure not to eat everything they get me, but my tongue is super happy with it all. 

We are working with this really solid family right now, the Valencia's. Elder Wilson has been teaching them for a little while now and they just recently started getting super interested and serious about learning more. The Mom already has a testimony of the truthfulness of everything, but she's just concerned that after baptism she'll fall away and she really doesn't want that. It's awesome to see that she understands the importance of enduring to the end and how that ties in with the gospel of Jesus Christ, however she's holding herself back from enjoying the rest of the blessings that come from the doctrine of Christ. We're really focusing on her needs and what more we can be doing to help her feel more sure of herself. 

Her oldest son Christian has previously never been involved in the lessons, but the first lesson we had with them this week he came out and we got to talk to him more and he really opened up and started asking some really great questions. It is so much fun to see the whole family working together to learn more, and how they are all at such different levels in their own testimonies. Teaching the family gets real interesting and engaging when we have to teach to the needs of every investigator and they are all so different! 

A really cool little miracle that happened this past week was on the day of transfers, while at the Quincy transfer site I was talking to Elder Wilde and I found out that a family that we found and taught back in the day in The Dalles had their hearts softened and are now working towards baptism! It really strengthened my testimony that people are ready at the right times, and that the Lord is "able to do mine own work." (2 Nephi 27:21)

Con Mucho Amor,

Elder King

RIP King's Row

Friends and Family, 

Transfers struck. Something completely unexpected happened and I am getting transferred from Moses Lake to serve in the Yakima Valley Zone. It was so out of the blue and unexpected that I would be transferred after only one transfer here in Moses Lake. I absolutely loved it here. My companion Elder Roe had become my best friend and we had so much fun together. I grew so close with so many of the members here, especially in the YSA, and now it's already time for goodbyes.

Goodbyes stink. 

I will be serving with my trainer, Elder Wilson, again. It is going to be so crazy being his companion again. I guess we didn't do a good enough job together the first time. Our area is the ulta-ghetto of Yakima. We cover some of the top neighborhoods in the US for gang violence. We aren't allowed to wear certain colored ties on certain days because the local gangs will shoot us if we wear the wrong color. There should be some crazy adventures up ahead for me! 

Elder Roe and I have seen some incredible miracles this past week. On Thursday we received a call from a man named Ramon, informing us that he had just moved to Moses Lake from Warden and wanted to start meeting with missionaries and work towards baptism. Our jaws dropped while we listened to the call, and set up church tour for later that afternoon. We met with him and showed him around and at the end of the tour we took him to the baptismal font and testified of the sacredness of that ordinance. The Spirit was so thick in that room you could cut it with a knife. I challenged Ramon to pray right then and there about September 2nd for his baptism, and he knelt down and asked Heavenly Father if it was what he was supposed to do. After the prayer he stood up, looked at us, and just smiled and told us that he really felt that September 2nd was what Heavenly Father wanted for him. We had a mud football activity later that night for the YSA and he came to that and came to church on Sunday and started fellowshipping himself and meeting all sorts of new people! 

On Friday we met with Jonny, another one of our investigators. We knocked on his door and right as his roommate let us in, he showed up and walked in the door! He was so happy to see us and apologized for being a little bit late. He went and grabbed both his Chinese Book of Mormon and English Book of Mormon and we sat at the table and had a study session with him where we read the introduction to the Book of Mormon and he was taking notes on it the whole time! So cool. Earlier in the week the Relief Society President in the 11th Ward threw a BBQ and invited Jonny and he came and I was able to talk with him about the Olympics and China and taught him how to make s'mores for the very first time! 

Serving here in Moses Lake has taught me so much about the kind of person I want to become. I learned so much from Elder Roe and from the friends I made in the YSA, and they will always hold a very special place in my heart. 

Iré, haré, seré, 

(I will go, I will do, I will be,)

Elder King