April 3rd, 2013

Dear Mom,

Sorry I am emailing so late this week but we had a special Preparation day this week. We got to go to the temple! Yay! It was an awesome experience and very refreshing for me to be able to be filled with the Spirit an to be rejuvenated spiritually. My love or the Lord an this work is so great all though this area is tough because of a lack of work, we are enjoying every minute of it as we search ways to talk to people an work with them whether it be through service, tracting, activities, etc. 

So yesterday was awesome it was a day filled with service for members and Part member families. We did everything from moving furniture to gardening to washing cars. It was a lot of fun getting to know the members and Less Actives and to build our relationship with them. Hopefully we were able to show them how much we love them and the love the lord has for them through us. Through that open it up so that we can talk with them about the gospel and anything else because they trust us.

Sunday was fun we taught a special lesson in Gospel principles an there was a non-member there. It was on the Plan o Salvation an well we only got through our pre-earth lie an the Atonement because it was Easter. So hopefully we will be able to continue it and continue to teach the non-member this way and any others that members invite.

Saturday was special we had our English Class on Easter an it was good. The best part is that one of our students came back, since this is something we are working on in retention. YAY! 

That is all or this week. Ill do better next. ( I say that a lot, huh?)

Elder Craner,

March 25th, 2013

Hey y'alls,

I think this week has been a reminder of just how much we have to rely on the Lord. I have also begun to understand Grace and the power it has. Although we don't talk about it much it is something we believe. It for me this past week has been the energy that has pushed to do this amazing work as i'm asleep as soon as i hit the pillow and then my eyes fly open at 6:30 to go runn for 20 minutes and prepare for the day and study then to work. Because of this i really want to study the atonement and Grace so I am going to start at one end of the Standard works and go to the other. Should be fun. I plan on strating on Easter, nice day to study of the atonement right?

rather then day by day this time i am going to tell you of two tendermercies that the Lord gave me this week.

Story #1

So the beggining for all who know me should sound a little familiar. So this one starts on Wednesday. So as we were driving on our way to an area to try to contact some potentials and do some tracting. I had an idea to stop by this one apartment complex, that was on the way and put some of our English class flyers up. So we parked i grabbed one of our flyers with the pull tab thingies on the bottom. We went to talk to the manager to see where and if we could hang some up, but.. he wan't home. So we walked out. However, on the way out i noticed this bench with a sign that said all people wanting to advertise put your stuff here, or somethng to that effect. Then another brilliant idea hit me why dont I go aand put some of our little pass-along flyers there too. So i was getting all excited and i ran out to the car popped the trunk grabbed and started folding our pass-alongs. I turned around and shut the trunk. Only problem was that i had instead of putting the keyes in my pocket had thrown them in the trunk so that i could get the flyers. We were now locked out of our car with an appointment with a potential in an hour. Thankfully I had finally started to figure out the area and knew where some members that lived close by were because the mobile area book with the list was in the car too. Did i mention also that neither one of us grabbed the phone. It was in the car also. So we tried one member they weren't home but we talked with their apartment manager, a nice lady from London, England who kindly lent us the office phone and her computer to look up our Mission-office phone number on lds.org. Thankfully again our zone leaders were already up there and that they could bring the spare from HQ. Then we walked acros to another members house (weel call him Bro. Ron) who kindly called another member to pick us up and take us too our appointment. After our appointment fell through Bro. Ron who it turned out was having dinner with us came and picked us and afterword drove us to his home where our car was located. With Spare in hand (Our Zone Leaders dropped it off to us at our appointment) we unlocked the car and went home. Now fast -forward to Saturday. At our English class which i was teaching in walk two Koreans, guess where they heard about our class, that is right from the flyers we placed just before i locked the car. So i taught and then at the end i asked a question about eternal families (because the topic was families) and it led to them asking questions about the differences between theirs and our church. Hopefully it will lead to even more questions and discussions in the future!!

 

Story #2

So this one also begind on Wednesday. This is during the day before the locking of the keyes in the car incident. We were trying to contact a Less active for the Bishop. This was our second-time around. We parked and as we walked up lo and behold their he was cleaning his driveway from the peacock(which i have yet to see) poop. We talked and he told us that he had been thinking about going back to church and that he had talked with his Dad (an active member in Utah) a couple days ago about going back to church and then we showed up. So we invited him out and talked with him and got to know him, then we left. Saturday night we texted him and he said that he would come out. Not just him but with his dad who apparently came out to visit him. Then Sunday came, not only was it Ward Conference and the Stake President spoke who is a very bold man but we had really good lessons in 2nd and 3rd hours and he participated in both!

 

That was pretty much the week write to y'all next week.

Elder Craner

March 18th, 2013

Hey all,

So life has been the work has been hard but it is moving slower than i would like because no one will give us half a second to talk most of the time but it is moving. It is all about being creative and trying to get around their prejudices and preformed conceptions so that we are able to share our message of a loving God and His Son who died for us so that we can live with them again if we but do His will. So that means a lot of tracting and memeber work because we have no progressing investigators. This week however their is a lot of hope just like every week and every day is a new slate on which we can write our stories and build upon the ashes of yesterday.

So this past week on Friday and Saturday we helped at the Palos VErdes Regional Orchestra in their Young Violinists classes to help them prepare and do their recital.  The whole goal of this service we do is to be seen by the asian community and to talk woth them and get to know them. So far we have progressed a little in that people are starting to recognize us and actually talk to us the hard part is that I have to do it in Korean, which is improving but still very limited. On Saturday thoughafter the recital their was a potluck dinner and i sat down right in the middle of the table full of Koreans and talked with them and this little old grandma. I also invited her to our English class i hope she comes out and brings her family with her so that we continue to getto know them and help them.

Thursday we went tracting and met this spititualist from England. That was fun. We talked for an hour she was very kind and listened to us but i don't know how interested she really was.

Wednesday we also went tracting all day.

Yep that was my week i will report on next week with hopefully and prayerfully we will be able to have severallessons and some new investigators.

Love Elder Craner.

March 11th, 2013

Hey,

So this past week has been super crazy in it I have lost 2 companions and gained another one and become Senior companion to a missionary with one transfer left and wants to go home.

Wednesday I got my new companion (2nd) and we went out and did some work and then we went to talk to Pres. Baker. I don't know what for and then we went home and went to bed.

Thursday rolls around and we did weekly planning and prepared for English class. Then I taught English that evening.(nobody showed) but we are working on it the Chinese progam is having more and more sign-up and so all we need to do is advertise more. So i did a quick lesson to practice with them (other missionaries) as students and then we set a vision and goal for this class. Which by the way was super exciting because now i think we have a purpose and way to acheive it to make this a machine that allows people to come and feel the Spirit and to want to know God and to allow us to help them do it. In fun and creative ways of course, through story-telling (listening comprehension), games/activities (application), vocab and grammer. It is fun working gospel ideas into the class without being over-bearing and still helping them.

Friday we went to district meeting and then Pres. Baker calls and tells us to have my companion at the mission office by 8:30pm with his bags. Personallly i think it was something medical because he is hoping to be out in the field as quickly as possible.

Saturday i was with the Zone Leaders all morning(got to speak some Spanish) and then i got my new companion Elder Langi. Who is from Tonga and is on his last transfer of the mission also but we will work hard until the end so that we can help as many as possible.

Sunday was a good day we went and tracted and met members for refferalls and did our calling as servents of the Lord.

I love the work I am doing and all the people i have the honor of serving.

Elder Craner.

March 5th, 2013

Hey Y'all

So today is a bittersweet day. In general it is just a really good day but on the other hand my companion is leaving me to go home to Korea. So i shall be with another companionship until tomorrow when the transfer ends and i get a new companion named Elder Mohiti. So that is exciting, he will finish my training and the funny thing is he just finished his. We Will do good work here in this area. Only problem he is called English speaking. In order to learn Korean I am going to have to study extra hard and work with the branch members and other people in the Korean community. I can do it! So this past week has been super busy with us trying to do as much work as possible and still allowing my companion enough time to pack and get ready to go home. I ended up with a lot of his stuff so i'm good on shirts and even an extra suit (that probably wont fit me but don't tell him that. I'll find someone else with which to re gift it if it doesn't fit) probably until the end of my mission. 

Sunday we went to Elder Koo's (my companion) departing missionary fireside. which is a cool opportunity to allow investigators, less actives and members that you have worked with come and feel the Spirit of all the missionaries who have served honorably and grown so much in the past 18 to 24 months. Plus music from them too. My companion has quite the voice little too much vibration of the voice on sustained notes for me but still really good.

Sorry really short this week but my brain is so scattered because we have been so busy. Will do better next week.

Elder Craner

February 25th, 2013

Hey y'alls

I hope you all are doing good. Mom thanks for the package and the e-mails and the letters. Sorry this is coming on Wednesday our preperation day got moved to Wednesday this week because of the fact my zone had a large service project helping assemble IKEA furniture all morning and till the early afternoon. That was fun and uplifting. The new furniture is there for all of the new missionaries and the apartments thathey have to find for them. We are receiving 37 new missionaries this coming transfer and by this summer i believe we are supposed to be at 250 missionaries from 180. So the areas and zones are up in the works for all these boundry changes. The only sure thing is that i will get a new companion because my current one is going home at the end of this transfer, which by the way ends next week. 

 

Something else that is new and cool is that we have started in conjunction with the new chinese program a English class in our area to use it as a finding tool. We are hoping that this will help us find these people beacuse they tend to be scattered about  and not centralized like other places. It is going well we have had some success. This being our first actual week of it We have had a few non-members and members show up. not much but a few. 

 

Yesterday was an amazing day we had two tendermercies from God because we followed the plan and really tried to follow the promptings of the Holy Ghost. First was our plan was to go and contact members for their birthdays (which we had been doing already) but this time we were going to sit down and actually talk to them about who they knew who would benefit from learning and hearing our message and we got some good refferrals because of that. Ones we will be able to follow up on and hopefully pursue. The second is that we went to contact a Less Active. For some reaon my companion who has been here in the area for a really long time and know it fairly well got turned around and we endedup at her house first instead of going to someone else.  She wasn't home at the time.

 However, we did run into her neighbor and had a really good conversation with him and an invitation to come back. 

 

We also had the oppurtunity to host a mini-missionary from another stake for the weekend. He is 16 and it was a lot of fun as we took him around and did our work from tracting to contacting dinners to having extend a baptisimal invitation. He really looked and talked like he enjoyed it. I hope so because it was a good weekend for us. (I also got to speak a little russian with a member from russia who fed us Sat. night)

Well, that is alll for now.

 

Love Elder Craner

February 18th, 2013

Hey everybody.

So this week was a ton of splits again, but now they are over and My companion and I can focus on our area and our vision for it. Wednesday i went on splits to an area and worked with English missionaries. It was a nice break from the Chinese  We met a 90 year-old who was super spry and still altogether and taking care of his disabled son at home. He told stories of pearl harbor because he was there when it was bombed. That was quite the story.

Thursday we split back and we did our weekly planning. Then we went and contacted some potentials and we talked to people.

Friday i went back to the Chinese program and we did service at the local orchestra because it is mostly Asians (Chinese, Korean, and some Japanese) So it is a great finding tool. We hope we will be able to use it to build their interest and our relationship with them. We also worked on some fliers in Korean for our English class that we are starting up as another finding tool. This stuff has all come about because the Chinese program has become pure Chinese and so they have to really creative in finding the Chinese people and since we are in charge of the Korean program in our area we thought we would tag along.

Saturday we worked on and finalized our pass along fliers and the big ones for bulletin boards at local Asian super-markets. Then we went to the Temple Visitor Center (which i suggest that you all should go  to one. They have really changed and updated them recently.) with our progressing investigator. He seemed to really enjoy it and is really opening up to us and really progressing. 

Sunday we polished the fliers and then we went and talked to a few people and set up an appointment or two. 

Sorry it is so short this week. Will do better next week.

Elder Craner

February 11th, 2013

So this week I have been on so many splits to other areas because my companion is the District leader. First i went to the Chinese program helped them tract and i just smiled when it was a Chinese person who answered and they just went at it in a language i have absolutely no understanding of. It was fun. That was Tuesday.

Then Wednesday i went off with one of the Zone leaders so they could do our splits and check up on us. That was fun i went to their area and worked with someone and they became an investigator and wanted to take the lessons. We also worked with an interesting family but the lesson was good not to say the least bit awkward when the Sister brought up that they weren't being intimate enough, but in other very blunt words. Finally we went over to an Hispanic man's house who had just recently lost his daughter to the flu, in a matter of hours she went from healthy to super ill to the other side. supposedly instead of attacking the lungs it attacked her heart. It was super sad but the faith and hop that this man had was absolutely astounding. We were able to talk to him about doing Temple work for his daughter and he became very excited. He wants to be baptized but there are some legal problems as in he doesn't exist here or in Mexico. But with his faith. i know he will endure and enjoy the blessings our Father in Heaven has for him.

Thursday i was back in my area. We did weekly planning but the cool thing is that i got to take the lead in the lesson on teaching a couple of Recent converts because we went on splits with ward missionaries. The Spirit was so sweet and strong there as they talked and i talked and shared scriptures and, i pray, helped them understand the importance of enduring to the end and going to the temple.

Friday i went on splits again. Back to the Chinese program but this time with a different set of Elders. The one i was with had recently been very ill. So we stayed inside and i studied and he rested but then we went to our dinner appointment. I was still surrounded by Chinese and understood like absolutely nothing. It was a lot of fun.

Saturday. uhh i don't remember the days are all blurring together and i forgot to write in my journal.

Sunday. We went to correlation meeting because the Ward mission leader was out of town. that was fun. We also had the opportunity to teach the Gospel Principles class and it was really good. It was much smaller than usual because everyone is sick right now. But I'm doing just fine, no worries.  We also tried to tract into some Koreans but that was fun as we started out in English and then slipped into Korean.

The language is coming along slowly because it is hard to use all the time because i am surrounded by English all the time and need to use it to communicate with 95% of the people i come into contact with. I am doing my best to learn it though.

I love the work and the days are flying by right now and it absolutely amazes me.

 

Spiritual thought. In response to the question How do i know if it is just me or the Holy Ghost telling me to do something?  Elder David A. Bednar said "Quit worrying about it... If you are being a Good boy or a good girl then every thought you have is inspired" You know many times actually almost always the Holy Ghost is going to prompt us to do something in such a small way that we wont even feel it. Much less actually realize it. In Alma chapter 7 vs it says "And see that ye have ^afaith, hope, and charity, and then ye will always abound in good works." This scripture just reiterates everything that Bednar is teaching us. So people quit worrying about it Follow the commandments trust in God and Hope in all things and you know what you'll do a lot of good with your life

 

Eldert Craner