January 19 - January 25

I had a great week this week, but I'll just get right into it:

Monday the 19th, we had P-day.  It was a regular old Preparation Day, but the end of the day was the best part, by far!  We met President Krehbiel (member of mission presidency) and his wife at a restaurant and they took us out to eat, and then after that we went to the church and I got a blessing by him and Elder Norris because my back had been killing me!  But now I'm good - that's the power of the Priesthood for you.  It was a great blessing, I'm glad I had that experience.  Then, they went with us to a lesson with the Nieves family where we were able to talk about Conversion and the process of coming to know the truth of things, and to develop testimony about things.  They seemed to understand very well!  The lesson went a little over time, but then we got to go near our house and have another super short lesson about the Book of Mormon with a new investigator we have named Diego!

Elder Hubert and Elder Norris

Tuesday we had District Meeting and it was all about planning, so I used an example from the Book of Mormon, when the Nephite commander Teancum goes into the Lamanite Camp and kills the king.  The first time he does it, he plans for it and is fine!  But the second time, he doesn't plan, goes alone, and doesn't do as well, and ends up getting killed.  But the principle of the meeting was that when we plan, we're able to 'pierce the hearts' of our investigators, similar to how Teancum pierced the hearts of the kings with a Javelin.  :)  I thought it was a good example.  After that, we started exchanges, and I went with Elder Museus on the West Side.  On the bus ride to their place, a bunch of girls on the bus started flirting with me and commenting on my eyes, how blue they are all like "Are those your real eyes?  Your eyes are so pretty!  They real cute!  You're cute!"  And I started blushing...  Yeeeeeeeah...  :P  But later, we got to teach the Law of Chastity to some female investigators - kinda awkward...  But hey, we got through it.

Wednesday we finished exchanges by visiting a Less Active man and teaching him about having family and personal prayer so that he can develop the testimony that he once had.  We exchanged back and then we went and taught Maria Sanchez about the scriptures, and had a lesson with Yaritza about the restoration!

Thanks for the package from sweet friends!

Thursday we did Weekly Planning, and then we went to go and teach a lesson, but totally got stood up for lessons that we had planned.  2 of them!!!  But hey, we did get to visit the Grijalva family, and they fed us which was nice.  They had this super hot salsa that I was eating, and then they had me eat a taco with only salsa in it.  I died.  Almost.  Later, we went and found a bunch of new people over on a street that we've not been to before, so that was good!  And we were going to have a lesson with a lady we know named Angelina, but it cancelled like an hour before so we had to cancel with our member present which is always too bad...  :(  But later, we got to visit with Luis and then got to play Basketball!  :)

Friday, we had to go to the library in the morning because there was something online that our mission president wanted me to look at to prepare for District Meeting.  So, we did that, and then as soon as we were done we went over to St. Vinny's thrift store to do our 2 hours of service, and then we did contacting nearby that street!  We found this guy who was totally white, looked totally American, but turns out he's from Puerto Rican.  Now when I say white, I mean he had curly brown hair and was more pale than me!  :P  But hey, whatever!  We also taught a bunch of other families, all new people, and even invited baptism to one man and he said that if he knew it was true, he would get baptized.  That's always a good sign!  We were also taken to dinner that night to a hispanic restaurant and it was pretty dang good over there!  Then, we went and taught the Nieves family and went to Volleyball at the church for like 40 minutes before going home.

Saturday morning we got a ride to a place that's an hour away from Green Bay and we went to lunch with our Branch President who lives out in the boonies - in farm land, super far away from the city.  I included a few photos of the family, the farm, and of his son who crashed his car a while back.  We were up there for like an hour or so and then came back to Green Bay and we taught some lessons to some people, and sorry this is super lame as an explanation, and then we had dinner with GB1 Elders in our apartment!

Sunday was fun, basically what we did was church!  That's when we heard the sad news that the Nieves kids aren't gonna get baptized because their dad is banning them from getting baptized...  That's way too bad...  But hey, we'll work through it.  Also during the day, we helped some members break into their car because they locked the keys in their car, and then we taught a lesson to some members, and it's a super good thing we stopped by because they were going through a really bad and hard time, and then we taught Yaritza about the Book of Mormon and the Bible, and then we had dinner!

That's my week, but to copy a phrase that I used last week, we Hubert kids are known for being short, and this email is just proof that I'm staying true to form.  Love you all!

--Elder Nate Hubert

Two Week Update

So I have no idea what happened to the weekly email last week - I can't find it in drafts, sent mail, or anything...  So, I'm just going to go over a few points that happened last week so you know what was going on!  (Note:  This is the week of January 5th to the 11th).

On Tuesday the 6th, we had a Zone Training Meeting that was super awesome!  We have a new Zone Leader who is a very strange guy, but he's still pretty cool and I enjoyed being able to talk about the Book of Mormon and everything.  And the weirdest part is that the day before, I was asked to sing a musical number and be accompanied by one of the Sisters - it was an arrangement of the song "I Know that My Redeemer Lives."  It was great!

On the River

Thursday, we had District Meeting because we also had Interviews with President Cutler.  Interviews were great though, I really love every time they happen.  Basically, during District Meeting we talked a lot about the Book of Mormon and what it means during our work, and then during Interviews I talked with President about stuff that's been going on here in Green Bay with other missionaries, so unfortunately I had to bring stuff up.  But President Cutler is such an inspired man and I love talking to him about our investigators, their situations, and other things, basically being able to seek his advice and ways that he thinks I could improve - I really am trying to be the best missionary I can be.  :)

Friday the 9th we had a huge party at the church.  When a hispanic girl turns 15, they throw this gigantic party for her!  But rather than turning 15, this party was for a lady turning 70 who never had a party when she was younger, and it was a surprise so when she came into the gym and saw all of us, she burst into tears.  It was so awesome to be a part of it!!  But we had to leave early to go and have a lesson with the Nieves family which is always good!  Hubert committed to be baptized on the 31st of this month, to kind of be the example for his whole family.  We're stoked for that!!

Saturday the 10th we had a great day, teaching 11 lessons as we went throughout the day and being able to find a whole bunch of new people, especially families, so we were very thankful for that!  :D  Families are the best!

But now, onto this week...  :)

Monday we were supposed to have 2 lessons with members present in the evening.  The member came to the first lesson, but the investigator wasn't home.  Then, we went to our second lesson and waited for our member, who never showed up, but we still taught a lesson!  Whatever...  :P  Everybody:  HELP THE MISSIONARIES!  IT IS A BIG DEAL!  WE NEEEEEED YOU!

Hungry Elder!

Tuesday we had District Meeting again - this time the Zone Leaders came to the meeting.  It was all about How to Set Goals, and for the beginning of it we talked about goals that we set during the mission, especially goals for our key indicators and numbers.  But then, I decided to take the training and apply it to life in general.  Goal setting is an eternal principle, and I was so thankful for the elders that we have in our district.  I asked Elder Norris - the newbie - to tell us goals that he set to prepare to serve a mission.  Then, I asked some other elders some examples of goals we set during our missions to help us grow.  And then, we have Elder Landaverry, who goes home in 3 weeks, and he told us some goals that he's setting for going home that will help him continue to progress.  It was a great training, and I know that setting goals is so important!  Because it is when we set goals in our lives, for example, to hold a Temple Recommend or to attain the Celestial Kingdom, that we pattern our lives to be worthy of those goals.  Isn't that great?  Okay, but after DTM, we had exchanges with the Zone Leaders!  I went with Elder Lee in the the GB Hmong area (interesting - I'll tell you later) and Elder Cutshaw went with Elder Norris into the Spanish area.  But yeah, we contacted a few people on Tuesday in between our meeting and dinner that night, and then after dinner we had a lesson with this man at a restaurant, and this guy was SO knowledgeable.  He knew so much about so many random things about religion, and it was interesting to call back all of my knowledge of the Old Testament and things I learned in Seminary and Sunday School - and we were eventually able to share the First Vision with him without having it turn into a bash.  I was happy with the way it turned out!

Wednesday, we finished exchanges by visiting 2 families that were less active Hmong people, and during one of them I turned on my camera so you guys could all hear what the Hmong language sounds like - it is pretty cool!  I have no idea what they are saying though!  But eventually we exchanged back and we had a dinner appointment at the Ayon's house, right after which we weren't able to do that much work because I was feeling not very good - light headed and sick to my stomach, so we came home and stayed there the rest of the night as I was sick.

Thursday, we weekly planned right after studies, and then went out to go work.  We tried to contact a new investigator named Brenda that we found on exchanges, but she wasn't home.  Instead, we found a lady named Aleida and taught her on the doorstep, and then another woman named Joleen.  She's an American, but she was very interested in what we had to say so that was good!  She wants us to come back and meet her husband.  :)  Later, we also met a Less Active member of the branch, named Brother Campos.  We're not sure much about him, but we're gonna ask the Branch President.  Eventually, we went to the church to have a lesson with the Nieves family, but they cancelled because Lisa wasn't feeling well, so we just played basketball instead.

Friday morning we had a breakfast appointment with the Ponce family from the branch, after which we did studies.  Later, we did our weekly service at St. Vincent's thrift store, which is always fun!  After that, we contacted near the store for a few minutes before catching a bus to go do some contacting on Abrams street, so that was good.  We taught 4 lessons, gaining 1 new investigator, and we were also able to teach Yaritza - a girl that we knew.  We taught her about the Restoration of the Gospel, and watched the movie with them.  They thought it was cool, but don't know if it's true yet.  But then after that, we got dinner!  We were gonna have some other lessons, but they all cancelled, so instead we went to Volleyball at the church.

Saturday we did MUCHO contacting!  We went over to a bunch of streets by the bus station and contacted a lot on them, receiving 6 referrals and teaching 4 lessons!  We did all that by about 3:00 because then we had to get a ride from where we were to the church to get some lunch at Fernando Ramirez's birthday party - so we did!  We stayed there for a little bit, talking and eating, and then we went on our way to go and do some more contacting and teaching.  We arrived at the Nieves family's place to check up on them right as Lisa was on the way to the hospital with a possible miscarriage - but luckily everything was fine.  But she thoguht it was crazy that we showed up right when she needed us again.  That always seems to happen.  But then, throughout the night, we stopped by a few people's houses, and were actually able to enter and teach Angelina and Michelle and Miguel - and we taught them using 2 Nefi 32:3 and 9.  It was a pretty good lesson and it was especially good for Elder Norris to be able to practice.  :D

Sunday we had church, and unfortunately none of our investigators were able to come.  :(  But we're going to keep on trying!!!  After church, we got to eat, do District Phone Calls with the other elders, and then go and teach some people.  We got 5 lessons, actually being able to teach the Ramirez family and just stopping by a couple other places, before we had to head home and do calls with the Zone Leaders.  :)  BUt yeah, that was our week!

It is just amazing to be able to branch out and significantly increase the amount of lessons that we're able to teach just by talking to everybody, by being out of the apartment and putting ourselves in places where we can talk to others.  I absolutely love being a missionary, being able to invite others to come unto Christ and to make the necessary changes to their lives to have Him be a part of their lives, and especially to help them understand exactly what He did for them.  Most people understand that He is important, they just have no idea why because they can't understand the complexity of the scriptures.  But with outside help, they can come to know their Savior.  :D  That's why we do what we do!  Well, one of the many reasons. :)

Thanks for everything everybody!  Love you all!!!

--Elder Nate Hubert

New Year's, Drunk Rampage, Police Car, Baptism, one crazy week!

So basically the entire beginning of my week doesn't matter...  It cannot compare to the pure funny/awesome/crazy stories of later in the week.  Basically what happened is that on Monday we found out where everybody was going because we got the transfer boards!  No worries - I'm still in Green Bay.

Tuesday, we had an amazing lesson with the Solorio family about the 10 Commandments.  What made it so great was because Sister Rios came over with us and helped us out - it was awesome!

Wednesday was the last day of the year, and it was transfer day.  So, I had to say goodbye to a whole bunch of my friends!  Elder Peterson, Elder Pike, Elder Eyring, and Elder Drishinski all left me and went to other places in Wisconsin - so sad...  The weirdest part is that I came to GB with all of them, and then they all just left me!  So I'm still here, and I've been here longer than everybody else...  :P

But Thursday, let me tell you about Thursday...  Thursday began like every other day, you know with the usual studies and then we did Weekly Planning, and it was actually a super good wp session!  And then we set out to go and do some work at about 4.  I know, super long, but that's not the best part.  So, we live on a street called Abrams, and we were walking down the street and contacting people!  We actually found this one LA lady that is no longer associated with the church, and while we were talking to her, some lady in her driveway backed up, and then pulled right into a pole!  We didn't think anything of it, and then we continued onward...  We just kinda though "oh, well somebody is a bad driver."  Then, we went and met this guy named Amado and taught him a lesson, and then we decided to start walking home because we were running late in regards to our daily plan.  But as we were doing that, we saw the same car as before, back out of the driveway all the way into the curb on the other side of the street, and then we saw it pull forward to try and go onto the street, but instead of hitting the pole, it hit a car that was coming from oncoming traffic!  It was a head-on collision, and we were both like "are you serious?!  Is this happening??"  Both cars kinda sat there at a standstill, the one that got hit was honking a lot, and then they both backed up, and the one that hit the other decided to try and run away, so she drove around the guy and fled the scene!  Then, the guy that got hit made a super quick U-turn and sped after her, following her down the street.  They pulled down a perpendicular street and pulled over to the side of the road, and then the guy that got hit got out and opened up the other car door and started screaming at her.  I've never heard so many swear words in the same sentence!  But then, she got out and pushed him around (she was pretty large) and when he tried to get her license plate number, she got back in the car and tried to hit him!  He's all freaking out, and we went over and said, "Don't worry - we saw the whole thing!"  So, we all went back over to her house and she pulled onto a bunch of people's front lawn in an attempt to get back into her driveway, and then she got out of the car and fell over, and then got back up and fell over again!  And after fighting with the guy again, she ran into the house.  So, by this time there's a crowd gathered because she appartently hit a whole bunch of other cars between the two times she hit things that we saw.  SO, she's in the house, and some people outside start calling the cops and then the cops show up!  We're just standing there, waiting to see what we need to do because we're witnesses, and tehn the cops go into the house and after like a 7 minute struggle, they all come outside with her in handcuffs.  They shove her in the car, and she is visibly wasted - completely drunk.  So, then the cops divvy out the various people that need to be talked to - the people whose cars got hit and then us, the witnesses.  So, basically, we spent an hour of our night on Thursday in the back of a Police car (I took photos) giving some testimony to help lock up this lady.  So, turns out, she's got at least 2 years in jail...  She is called a 'frequent flyer.'  She's had some run ins before.  It was a crazy story!

Friday was okay, too, but wait until I tell you about Saturday!

Saturday morning we went to the library and had to make a program for a baptism that was going on.  then as soon as that was over, we went to the church and began to fill up the font.  We set up for the baptism of an 8 year old boy in the branch, who turned 8 in June but waited until now to be baptized.  I've been working with him since I got here in July, and now he finally decided to get baptized, and he asked me to do it for him!  So, the baptism was awesome, and I got to baptize him and I got to sing a song with a sister missionary - sister Kealer - for a musical number for the baptism.  But then the story gets better - the police story.  So, the Sisters left the baptism early because they had an appointment, but they came back to the church a few minutes later.  We were still there because there was a luncheon, and the Sisters were all like "So our appointment got cancelled because it turns out that our investigator was drunk on Thursday night and hit a whole bunch of cars, and now she's in jail because the testimony of two missionaries put her there!"  So, the lady we put in jail, was the sister missionaries investigator!  But we didn't feel bad, because it was our civil duty.  They weren't mad either, they just wanted to give us a hard time...  :)

But yeah, that's why our week was super exciting!  Love you all TONS!

ADIOS!

--Elder Nate Hubert