Keep on Keepin' on!

Heyyy! Welcome home Skylar! That is super weird to think about... and Justin gets home soon too, right? How time flies. Hey Mom, no worries about the return-letter thing lol. I was kind of wondering but it all makes sense now ;) You guys are way nice to write me at all! I am blessed with the best family ever!

Sounds like you had an awesome time in Fruita! And way to be missionaries! =] That is so awesome. I'm excited to hear what comes of the French couple. That's awesome you're going to send them a BOM. Are you going to get a French one from the Distribution Center? I love that place.

This week was stake conference, and it was amazing! There were so many great talks given. Pres. & Sis. Hall spoke as well and did incredible. He is going to be a general authority someday... you can just feel the power as he speaks! It's like his voice shakes the room almost :) Pres. Hall is such an inspired man. So here is the miracle of the week... (well, it entails a couple of miracles actually :) G came! This is G who has a son on the HS basketball team that likes Jimmer Fredette. She's awesome. We had a great lesson with her earlier this week, and the Spirit did the teaching :) We have been trying to help her understand the importance of and commit to reading the BOM and coming to church for a few lessons (she hadn't been doing it). Well, Elder Jensen & I really focused on getting out of the way of the Spirit and letting Him do the teaching this time, and it was great. Things just clicked for her and she understood. Teaching is much more than talking or telling; I learn that again and again everyday. The Holy Ghost can communicate in a moment what we may try to get across to someone for days without accomplishing it. It's a miracle.

So, Sunday morning comes and we call G to confirm that she will be coming to stake conference. She answers and says she doesn't feel well at all. Noo! :( We were way bummed. We expressed our disappointment, and wished her well. 30 mins before church starts we get a phone call and she says she's on her way! Yeah! The Lord hears and answers our prayers! And your prayers :) Thank you so much. Anyway, turns out that she felt bad and knew that she really needed to be there, so she got up and came. I love those little nudges from the Spirit! She loved it, received great fellowship from the ward, and is coming back next week. She has a baptismal date for Nov. 19th.

Hope you know I'm super happy and loving life =] Even though things get hard, it teaches me to just try to find ways to be better. I am so thankful to be here! The Lord is so good and merciful to us, and the work is going forth here. We have been blessed with some amazing people to work with! I love you all, have a great week!

love,

Elder Beckett

p.s. You'll have to send me some pics or get the attachment to work for some recent pics of you guys! I'd love that :P Take care!

The Lord Brings Us Low so He Can Lift Us Higher (eventually.. ha ha)

Good news, I'm sending you a package today with some mail, books, a cd that is awesome (I kept a copy with me), and a tape... sorry it took so long. Anyway, hope you enjoy it! Great news, I got to meet an Apostle of the Lord this week! Elder Neil L. Anderson came and spoke to us. It was amazing, and the Spirit was definitely there! I love him so much, he is very personable and his happiness is contagious. The Brethren just amaze me. He talked to us a good bit about the media and the whole "Mormons are a cult" thing, how to react to it, etc. He also spoke to us about recognizing the Holy Spirit, and then the Atonement. It was very powerful. He told us that in our lifetime (he kinda just slipped in this prophecy casual, but nonetheless I took it as prophecy :) we would see in our country that it would be quite less common to be Christian than we are now. Those weren't his direct words, but that was the jist of it. I found that interesting... Elder Jensen and I were talking about that, and we both felt like when we first got out here the main "competition" the Church had was maybe the Baptists, or the Jehovah's Witnesses. But for some reason I kind of think it's going to be Islam in the final days.. it seems like that is becoming more and more prevalent and Satan is doing all he can to convince people that Jesus Christ was just a normal man. A good man, yes, but just a normal man. I loved how Pres. Callister touched on that in his talk, quoting C.S. Lewis. There is no middle ground; either He was and is the very Son of God, or He was completely opposite of what He claimed to be. He didn't leave any room for doubt or middle ground; He didn't intend to. I know that Jesus Christ is the Son of God, the Savior and Redeemer of the world. I know that He lives. He guides this church through living prophets and apostles, and this really is His work. My testimony has been strengthened of that so much these past few weeks.

Things have been pretty rough here. Elder Jensen at the start of this transfer (2 weeks ago) set some goals. A couple of those goals were that we would be more humble, and that we would learn to submit to the Lord's will and timing. Well, we are certainly learning a lot. Lemme tell ya. This has probably been one of the lowest weeks of my mission, when it comes to the numbers. It has been HARD. Yet we have been working harder than ever before, praying more, being exactly obedient, etc. I feel happier, my faith has grown more, and my testimony is more sure than ever before - despite the number results. We aren't quite sure why things are going the way they are. Nobody is keeping their appointments, the investigators we had all won't talk to us anymore, we are having the hardest time finding those who will listen.... yada yada yada. I feel extremely humbled and almost unsure what's going on... aren't the zone leaders supposed to be an example?? I don't know. But, I'll tell you what I am feeling. I am feeling hope. I know that even though things may look bad, everything is in the Lord's hands. I feel peace because I know that. I know that this is the Savior's work, and even though we can't always see the desired outward results we'd like to, we don't necessarily know what is going on inside of people. No effort is wasted. The Lord loves the people in the Lake Reams area, and is sending his Spirit and angels down to minister to them and prepare the hearts of many people to accept His gospel as the time of His coming draws near. Read Alma 13:24. We may or may not ever know the results of our work in this lifetime, but regardless of that I have a love for my Heavenly Father and His Son, Jesus Christ. I will give it my best all day everyday. Even if that includes being rejected, ridiculed, and reviled. I will happily go about the Lord's work because I am thankful to be a full time representative of Jesus Christ. It is a privilege, more than I ever could have thought so. I will forever be indebted to the Lord for the many, many blessings and miracles He has shown me in my life. I love Him, and I love His children! It does make me sad when they reject the truth, especially when I know that they feel the witness of the Holy Ghost. But, that is part of Father in Heaven's plan for all of us - to have the ability to choose for ourselves.

Thank you for your examples, for being a great strength to me in my times of need! I love you all so much. Hope you have a great week!

love,

Elder Andrew Beckett

p.s. Do the Popes know a Sister Brittany McClain from the Oakley Stake? She is a missionary here. Also Sis. Barlow from the Rupert W stake?

p.p.p.s. Happy birthdays Grandma & Grandpa!

Rain rain rain... and some nice weather too =]

Hello! ;)

How has everyone been doing? Sounds like Mindy has been meeting some cute boys. Hmm, not quite sure how I feel about that Sis :P Ha ha just teasin, but you do mention to me "cute boys" a lot in your emails. Just keep them at a distance, you know? That's exciting you got to go eat with Jelly man Kelly & fam though! Sounds fun.

So you're going to Capitol Reef! How fun! Have a very enjoyable, safe trip and know that I miss and love you. That's awesome you got to go to Brian & Karmen's too. Send everyone my love :)

This week it rained for like 2 days straight! It was pretty crazy and everything was soaking (including us). We would just run around with our umbrellas everywhere. I feel really bad for the Elders who didn't have a car, they must have been extra soaked. There were also some really beautiful days where it was nice and cool and the weather was just perfect!

Lately we have been struggling soooo much with finding. Ugh. It feels like we are running out of ways to find here. We are praying for miracles though, and really trying to figure out what the Lord wants us to do. We are having a hard time getting anyone to progress. Like I mentioned last week though, we do have this awesome family, M & L, who are looking fairly positive. They were going to come to church this past week, but then they weren't able to make it unfortunately. Please keep praying for them, that miracles will happen in their family.

We had so many meetings this past week, it was crazy! We had a training we gave to some members on how to teach by the Spirit, and that went well. Then the next morning we had ZLC which was awesome. Those are always just a big Spirit fest. It's great to see where the mission is going. Just to let you know how awesome Elder McClatchy is, I'm gonna brag about him :) We were in ZLC talking about different areas in the mission and how they have been performing, and Pres. brought up that E. McClatchy's area has just been doing awesome. He was like, "We all just need to get a little McClatchy in us." HA ha yeah! It was awesome. He told us he's going to have him speak at zone conference so he can tell everyone how to do the Lord's work :P I'm all for that! It's so fun to be able to talk to him each night during call-ins; he really is such an awesome missionary and I'm really excited to learn from him this coming transfer.

Well, what can I say, I'm loving the work! There is no time to think, it's just constantly go and do. Sometimes it feels like you're pushing insanity, but the Spirit definitely "renews" our bodies and helps us give more than we thought we could. It's awesome to be a part of it. I love my family soooo much, you are in my prayers and thoughts every single day (not in a homesick, dwelling on it way; just an I love you more than anything way). Keep living the gospel as you do =] I love you!

love, Elder Andrew Beckett

p.s. This Sat we get to have a mission conference with Elder Neil A. Andersen, and Elder Burns! Woot! I am so so so excited. I'll let you know how it goes this coming week ;) Keep smiling!

p.p.s. Also Dad, I know you mentioned you might have an extra jacket? Well I've been looking around and haven't been able to find mine that I brought. I have no idea where it went if it's gone. I'm still looking, but did you say something about having an extra jacket? Just curious; if this winter is like last winter's, then I will need it. Or I can just get one here... it makes no difference to me, but please just let me know! And, there are members in the ward that go back and forth to UT frequently, and they offered to meet up and bring something or take it there if needed. Just let me know :) LUV YA!

Hey ya'll! Life is good. I loved General Conference so much! Wow, that was awesome. Darn, I left my notes at the apartment, but some of my favorites were Pres. Eyring, Pres. Uchtdorf, Elder Holland (Priesthood session... dang. I'm sure you've heard about it by now...), Elder Callister, And some of the others that I can't remember the names. Sister Dalton's was way good too! I learned a lot about later on in life stuff ;) I think my favorite session overall was probably Sunday Morning. I just sat there and was overcome with the Spirit, especially when the choir sang "I'll Go Where You Want Me to Go" and "I Believe in Christ." That was powerful. By the way you said Uncle Jim was in the priesthood choir right? Man oh man was I looking hard for him, but I didn't see him :( I was even praying that I'd be able to find him! But I must have missed him :( Who knows, maybe the Lord had a reason for it... maybe I would've gotten too homesick or something ha ha. Maybe the Lord has a rule about seeing only one uncle while on your mission... :P

Transfers are tomorrow, and I am staying one more here (at least)! Hopefully more ha ha, but I really love it here with Elder Jensen. We have been having a blast. I am really thankful to be able to spend another transfer with him. We still have a lot to learn from one another. Hey Mom/Mindy/Allie/whoever may get on - would you please check on facebook for J or T or any people who may have added me from here? I told Jake to get on and add me so we can keep in touch after the mission. He's hilarious ha ha. B is too, I wish I would've had him add me before he left for school but it's all good, I'll get a hold of him eventually :)

This week has been fun, we got to go on 2 exchanges. On Tuesday I was with Elder Charbadze from Russia, and on Wednesday I went with Elder White from South Jordan, UT. They are great missionaries.

OH hey, guess what... Elder McClatchy is now in my zone! YEAH! He will be district leader in the Winter Garden area! Oh man, I'm so excited. That is just what that area and district needs! He is such a stud, and I am so excited to go on exchanges with him! Good times are ahead =] Good times are now though too of course :) Life is just good all around.

The work right now has been kind of slow. We were out and about working like CRAZY to get as many people to general conference as we could, but we only had one investigator show up :( It was so sad. The talks were perfect for what some of these people are going through too; they would have been so blessed. I decided though that if we can't get them to general conference, then we will just have to bring general conference to them. Thank goodness for the internet and the conference dvds. I think I may buy them, we'll see.

Anyway, it seems like everyone we have has just been bailing out, not keeping commitments, and won't progress. :/ We are really working hard and praying that things will go up; this week we kind of hit an all-time low. Please pray that we can find the truly elect. The good news is that the Lord has blessed us to find some really positive-looking people lately, so I'm excited for that.

I'm glad to hear that you get to go to Grandpa & Grandma's today to see them and help them out! Send them my love :) By the way, the weather here is soooo nice. This weekend there was a cold front that came in and it has been perfect! I'm loving it. Life is good.

Mindy, glad to hear that you're rockin' school again! Keep it up. I am so sorry you are still sick :( I will pray for you even more than I usually do ;) Aaaaand by the way.... oh man, how embarrassing that you guys watched that movie! Ha ha that's alright. I want to see it when I get back. Or do I? Hmmm I suppose it'll be a good laugh if nothing else ;) I remember Goo nailed it though so it's all good!

Well, hope everyone else is doing good. I love you all so much. Please keep me posted on all the news of the land... :P

love,

Elder Andrew Beckett

Temples, Great Ensign, Sickness, STROMBOLLI, Confirmation, Security Systems

Hey fam! 8]

We've had a great week! I have been sick, but nevertheless blessed. First off.. P was confirmed yesterday! Brother J, the YM Pres. did it and did a wonderful job. P is great! Sis. H has been putting together these little books to give to the recent converts that have all of these pictures and testimonies from the ward and it's awesome! Church was good, although our investigators we had coming all bailed :( Pres. & Sis H, the Temple Presidents, spoke in our ward yesterday and did wonderful.

Ok, so this month's Ensign is AWESOME! It is all about the BOM if you haven't seen it yet. Elder Jensen and I got our hands on some copies and ate it up! We had it read in like 2 days. I am so thankful for the Book of Mormon, it really is such a blessing from God! I especially loved the articles by Elder Bednar and President Benson (classic...). We bought some extra copies and will be giving them out to our investigators.

We had the blessing of going through the temple and doing an endowment session this week. It was such a great experience and I learned a lot! Guess what else... I got to see Sister W & Sister R from Leesburg, and Sister S from Sumterville! It was fun to say hi and they still remembered me :) Plus, we also were able to participate in Temple Service this week. We planted flowers, lots!

I got kind of sick this week; kind of hit with a cold type thing. Pretty much the same that I had when I was in Daytona Beach. Not fun at all... but I'm almost recovered. Maybe it has something to do with allergies; I don't know. We had dinner with the H on Monday night and.... lo and behold Sister H made Strombolli! Oh man it was awesome. She did a great job too. Thanks Mom for letting her know ha ha, that was so fun! And they made homemade icecream that was SO good too for dessert. The Bishop and his family are awesome, they are so positive and excited about missionary work. J is a stud, he's always helping us out and teaching right alongside us.

So, I have a story. We have a security system in our apartment, but we never use it. We don't (didn't, actually) know the code. But, I often like to pretend I know it and put in a code as we walk out the door to go to work. It makes me feel cool, ha ;) Well, the other night I was playing around with it and I found out the real code! So... like a little kid I figured I'd put it to the test. I put in the code, so the system was armed. Then I decided I'd open the door to see what happens - you know, see if it really worked or if this was just a fake security thing. Well, I open the door (this was like 9:45 at night), and it starts beeping. Beep... beep.... beep.... so I'm thinking, "Great, this is really neat. Now I'll just punch in the code and deactivate it." Well, I put in the code that I found to lock it, and I hear beep.... beep.... beep... Great, it didn't work. Beep! Beep! Beep! Beep! Oh man, shoot, the beeps are speeding up at this point and I'm really wondering why the code isn't working. Then next comes the EEHH! EEHH! EEHH! EEHH! EEHH! EEHH! EEHH! Which, I'm sure by now, our neighbors are now wondering what's going on. I sheepishly yelled (is that possible? Ha ha) to Elder Jensen and told him sorry, but this is what happened... and then started to put my shoes back on to go meet the police or whoever would come to see what's going on and catch the "bad guys" who set off the alarm. Well, Elder Jensen walks over, punches in the code I discovered to arm the place, and for some reason it worked for him! And then there was calm... yes! It finally stopped. And life is good! That is the story of Elder Beckett and the alarm system of the apartment.

Things are going well, right now we are just really trying to build up our teaching pool. We have been struggling getting people to church. Some of our investigators you will probably hear more about in the coming weeks are C & her family, G, M, and perhaps A. If you could keep them in your prayers that they will make it to church, that would be great.

I know that the church is true, I'm so thankful to be out here serving a mission. It is awesome! I can't wait for general conference =] I love you all so much! Thanks for the updates on the wards and everything. Send my love :) Keep on being the great people you are, I love you!

'Til next time,

Elder Andrew Beckett

Hey 8] (bug eyes...HA)

Hi ya'll! What a fun and fantastic week it has been! Things are going great here in the land of Florida. I'm lovin' it. Great news of the week... P was baptized! As you already know thanks to the awesome people in the ward. It went great, we had it right after church, and there was tons of support there!

It was kind of crazy getting everything set up and ready to go in time (we planned on starting it 15 mins after church got out), but the ward helped out and we got things rolling. Another great thing - P's NM mom and sister came too to support him! They came for all of church as well =] I was just praying that they didn't get too worn out to never come back; by the time everyone was leaving after clean up they had been at the church from noon to about 5:30 or so! That's a lot of time to mingle with members and feel the Spirit! It was great. I think they really enjoyed it, and they said they'd be back. They'll join before you know it =]

The fellowship of P is the daughter of the B's, an AWESOME family in our ward. They are so missionary minded. Bro. B has general authority written all over him. Just wait. But seriously, they are a great family. Their son T is at BYU right now; he used to come out with us when he was here. They are from Brazil and speak Portuguese! I want to learn that language some day.

Things are going well in the zone; our numbers seem like they've been getting lower, but our baptisms have been staying fairly consistent which is good. I guess that means our quality is going up? Lol but now we just have to figure out how to continue to improve and reach even higher! We've kind of broke out of the rut that the zone has been stuck in for the past bit, and so we're hoping and praying that we can just continue onward and upward to where the Lord wants this zone. We are definitely seeing some miracles though and I love it! Right now our area is kind of struggling to find some solid investigators. Please pray for M (ready to be baptized, just needs the ok from mom), as well as that we can find some more solid people to work with. We are working with a guy named K who is great. He is progressing, but slowly. It's hard being a missionary because time is really one thing you don't have, yet we have to work with people at their pace and help them keep on going. We want to help them accept the gospel as fast as they can, but it doesn't always work out just perfectly.

So Allie. That is way funny that Mr. Richardson really told that story ha ha. I don't think I remember ALL of the details, so you should tell me what he said! I'd be excited to remember the good ol' days of Grantsville High! I love Mr. Richardson. Please tell him hi for me, and that me and James McClatchy are here in Orlando and both of us miss and remember him. We were talking about him the other day. Good things of course :)

Like you probably saw in the picture, I got to go on exchanges with Elder Chance Potter from Wyoming this past week! He is the man. He served in Sumterville, and was the VP for State Officers in FFA in Utah (he went to high school in UT). He is an amazing missionary and I learned a lot from him. I think the best part was reminiscing (sp?) about Sumterville and getting an update on everybody there! It was so much fun. He loved it there too, just as much as me! I will always remember those wonderful days there; we saw so many miracles and my faith really grew a lot.

Once upon a time, on a Saturday night, Elder Jensen and I were having our daily planning session. Suddenly, we hear a knock on the door. Huh? That's weird. We have only had one knock on the door, and that was the carpet cleaning guy - who we were expecting. Well, I got up to go answer it and I look through the peep-hole when suddenly I see someone outside that looks an awful lot like Uncle Paul. I look at his shirt, and it says, "Brigham Young University" on it. It IS Uncle Paul! Wow ha ha! Oh man it was so crazy. I was like, "What the? My uncle is outside!" And then I opened the door and greeted him and gave him a big hug and we talked for a bit and got a picture. It was great :) I definitely wasn't expecting that surprise! I think that now the only thing that could top all of the surprises on my mission are if you, my immediate family, were to visit lol. Ummm don't get any ideas ;) It was so fun to see him though.

Well, sorry the email is late today. We were in Ocoee cleaning out an old missionary apartment in the zone with President Hall. Man, that thing is clean. And it was SO dirty before. Disgusting. I don't know how all of the Elders were living there. So nasty... but that was way fun! We got to work side-by-side with President and Sister Hall and talk with them and it was just great. I love them a bunch, they are so fun to be with and really are great people!

Well, I love you all a ton! Thanks for your support and prayers. Thanks for who you are =] Congrats Nate on becoming a Teacher! That is so awesome. Please tell the Goodworths thank you so much for the invite and for the prayers! They are just the best neighbors anyone could ask for. I am way sad they will be moved! That's alright, they'll just be our "across-town" neighbors :)

HAve a great week 8]

love, Elder Andrew Beckett