Facebook Pictures (Thanks to Sister Gardner)

Elders

Point! Look he has a tag too

Missionaries singing Called to Serve, see if you can find Elder Draper

End of Transfer with an element of SURPRISE!

Dear Friends and Family, Squirrels, Cats Dogs, Guinea Pigs and others which would take to long to name.

                This has been a good, and crazy, week. We have had good lessons with our investigators and less actives, helping them to see the eternal perspective of why change is good. One of our investigators, named Sandi, got sick and in that time she didn't buy any cigarettes. Because she ran out she decided, "I am sick I don't have any I might as well just try to quit." AMAZING! The Spirit has been working on her a lot. In one of our lessons with her she basically said, "I have no desire to change whatsoever, I am happy the way that I am." However she is starting to do things to change her life and she said the last time we were over there, "You should read a paper I wrote that her teacher said if she could have given a grade over 100% she would have." And I said, "Well Sandi I would love to read that, but you haven't even considered cracking open The Book of Mormon or even the Bible passages we have given you. I'll make you a deal: if we both read your paper, will you read one chapter from The Book of Mormon?" She said YES! So go team go!

                 In meeting with our new less active, named Jasmine, we asked her what was one of her favorite things from the church when you were active. She said "I really love to reach The Book of First Nephi. So we expounded on the first verse of that book which says, "I, Nephi, having been born of goodly parents..." We told her and showed her how much she had been given and how much she could give to her kids. I think she is excited to come back to church. She just now needs the fellowship from the branch, some members to come be a mom a role model, others to come and be the friends that she needs to build her up in positive ways.

                  Next we got to see our investigator Eric, again. He came back after summer break to Doane College. We had a good lesson with him, and basically revolved around God has a plan for us and He has given us all the light of Christ for us to be able to discern the right path from the wrong path. He kept his Book of Mormon which shows he still wants to learn and study! He had so many good comments and personal insight. It is easy to see how God has been working on him through the summer, helping him in his intellectual pursuits for college and preparing him to receive the Gospel.

                    This week has been a good week of spiritual upliftment and insight. The biggest thing is that God has not given up on us and that He never will. We will have to give up on Him first which shows us that it is our agency which turns Him away, not His lack of desire to help us. He loves us. His Son paid the ultimate price for us.

                Well so in transfers, the reason I said surprise is because Elder Jensen left Omaha to go to Sioux City. Elder Barton is training ,which is no surprise just awesome. Elder Smyth, my district leader, was made a Zone leader with an Elder he goes home with in three transfers, which throws things into a bit of a dilemma from the simple human transfer perspective but God doesn't care. He knows what has to happen, but yep that was the craziness. I stayed in Crete and I hope you all have a good week.

Love,

Elder L. J. Draper

Yeah, Pictures!

I got to see Elder Barton again, as well as Elder Johnson. It was a family reunion

Isella and Ramone

The Urquidez family

The WEEKLY Letter of Spanish conference

NOTE TO ALL: This is transfer week. Nothing may happen but something could happen. We know Elder Phillips will train, we just don't know when.
 

Dear Family and Friends this was a very good week for me.

        I am happy to report I am doing well. We stayed in Lincoln then went to Spanish Conference, and I got to see Elder Barton and Elder Johnson which was super nice. They had lots of stories to tell me of their adventures and Elder Barton will most likely be training this transfer, which will be cool to have the Elder I trained train :). So I am excited for him. We had really good trainings. The big message that President Gardener gave us was that we will all face time of disappointment and trial in the mission, just as Alma and Amulek did, but we can overcome. I found it very comforting.

        However during the meeting my heart rate started to rise and I started to stress and feel uneasy for some reason, but luckily I was able to get it down by talking back to my stress. Well we drove home and had dinner with Brother Stoki at De Leon's, a restaurant that was good. I like it. We then tried to see some people.

         Wednesday we did lots of service and that was good for my brain, but I had a difficulty keeping my heart rate in check. I just kept getting stressed because there was so much to do, but it was nice to just focus on the project that had an end. We saw a couple of people that day and it was pretty productive.

            Thursday we went up to Omaha, for me to see Sister Saufley in Council Bluffs, Iowa and that was good. We talked for a while. I liked the drive up there. The Big thing was for me to recognize my stress and do the relaxation exercises, because my stress I have a drug which is the fight or flight drug in my system and that wears down your heart so she said I need to keep myself in check, and if I get good at it I won't have any problems and I will be healthier in the long run because I can control when I let that drug into my system and when I don't. Well I took a detour after that to see the Urquidez family and Isella, an investigator from Omaha who is going to get baptized coming here soon. A cool moment from my conversation with her and her husband was: He said, "Do you know why God let you be so small?" I responded that I didn't know why, he said, "God let you be small because He knows how big you are on the inside." I felt so good, validated by a man who I had not talked to in several months who had not felt much of a need to talk to me either, but He could see that I cared and he cared too. It was cool. I then got to see the Urquidez family. That was amazing. They actually were not at all surprised when I showed up, Tonya the mom said, "Hector said we would be seeing you soon." He apparently had a dream of me showing up and that was cool. So I got a picture with them and encouraged them to stay active.

          Friday we did weekly planning and more service, so that was good I felt happy to be working in a garden. We then went and tried to find people to no avail.

          Saturday we had a good day. We found a less active at Foodnet, or more correctly she found Elder Phillips and we got her address. We are going to teach her and her husband. We saw some other investigators and that was all good.

            Sunday we had church and saw our new less active and her husband from Thailand, who speaks Karen, and that was awesome. We were talking with her and we brought the conversation around and we asked her, "Jasmine, do you believe The Book of Mormon is the word of God? That it is true?" She responded, "Yes I do, and I even kept it even after about seven years of inactivity." She still knows it is true. She has merely lost the path due to bad friends. She will come back around, I know she will and her husband will be baptized soon, despite meeting with the JWs but we will see how that goes. I don't want them to be divided.

                that has been our crazy week

Love Logan Joseph Draper

Spanish Training, Thanks Sister Gardner for taking pictures

Yeah, delicious food!

I can't spill, I can't spill, I can't spill

Look down, look down, don't look them in the eye

I get to sit next to Elder Johnson!

A little to much excitement

Dear Family and friends

        I have currently misplaced my planner, I don't know where to, so I am writing you free of notes relying wholly upon my brain which we know from having served as a missionary for over a year is rather holy in both senses of the word. Well I gave Elder Phillips the phone while we were at the church because I was running in circles in the hall because it forms a loop so I did that. Well after dinner we realized WE HAVE NO PHONE!  So we spent forever trying to get into the church and then trying to get keys, finally we decided to camp out at the Zone leaders apartment for a while to wait for them, since they had a key. They came in handed us our phone and we ran back to Crete so that was our adventure, NO PHONING it Stinks!!!

          So on Tuesday I held on to my phone so we did our service and Elder Phillips and I dropped of packages at the post office. He also got a hair cut, since the place in town that we go to is closed on Mondays. So that stinks but we did it on Tuesday. We then did service at the thrift store then rushed home for a lesson which fell through :( So we went to our assisted living facility and talked with some people there before coming home for dinner.  We then tried a family, and the kids were like come back tomorrow at 4:00 our dad will be home. Then that night we went and helped finish up some service for our recent convert.

            Wednesday we do lots of service for our less active members in Crete, which was tons of fun. I really enjoyed it stocking the store and pulling weeds. It really was therapeutic to do something where my mind could take a break. After that we cleaned up and did our studies, then went to the investigators' house and the dad was like, I am about to go to work how about you guys come back tomorrow at 1:00 that way my wife will be here too. So we went and tried some people and it was good.

           Thursday we altered district meeting times to conform with our appointment and that was good. I had a good training thing prepared. I kind of winged it since the topic/question was "How does inviting others to be baptized fulfill our missionary purpose?"........... um......... our missionary purpose is "We invite others to come unto Christ through.......... baptism um ya that is our purpose so I gave a training on how understanding the purpose and importance of baptism helps us to teach it better/ help us understand the why of inviting. Well we rushed back to Crete had a fantastic lesson then went on to try some other people and that was fantastic. We also went to our next standing appointment, ya they were not available and that was sad.

           Friday we had the Hollists, a family from the Pioneer ward, come down and have dinner with us, then go to visit some families. Only one was home and it was a good visit with the family, I felt like we were really blessed to have them down there with us. After that we went home and taught one of our neighbors and it had been a long time since we had sat down and talked, but we talked of the Priesthood and the Atonement, and how through Christ we can become perfected and it is God's plan to refine us.

              Saturday we had Foodnet and it was good. The only thing of note from that was two people started fighting over the food, it was sad. Pride came out in many different people. It was just a mess, all I could do was sing some hymns to myself as the head person tried to calm the sides down. It wasn't good. Well our appointments fell through, but we had a late lunch with a member and that was good. Then we went and saw our other neighbor, Sandi, and she had her doors locked. Which wasn't too weird, but all her windows were shut which wasn't too weird. Her blinds were all the way shut so when she saw it was us she opened the door and we had a good lesson with her. She told us that some of the neighbors were harassing her because she wouldn't drink with them and then they would name call her when she would take her dog out to use the bathroom. So it was sad we reminded her we were there, we can't do a lot but we can help you out we are your neighbors too. So that was good. She accepted the commitment to read from The Book of Mormon!!!! Not any chapters about doctrine per se, but she said she would read some of the chapters on Captain Moroni. So we are still doing a happy dance!

                   Sunday we had a good day at church and then we went to a dinner appointment in Lincoln, and that took a while. So we got back late and decided to clean up our books in preparation for IPads.

I love you all.

Love, Logan J. Draper

The Week and Interviews

Dear Family and Freinds

       This has been another good week in the imaginary land of Nebraska, because I am the only person that can really testify that it is real. Ha ha ha ha.

      Well this week we tried to put a focus on having better lessons with our investigators. We set up for some member present lessons, and those were the majority of the lessons we ended up having. Everything else this week seemed to fall apart due to interviews, exchanges, and district meeting. However we did have some good lessons.

      We saw our investigator Dustin, with President Kearl, and that was great it was only a twenty minute visit because he was busy but President Kearl committed him to read Alma 32 before we were to return the next day. That was awesome. We went back the next day and taught him about how faith in Jesus Christ will bless his life, if he applies the Atonement, repents, and forgives others, and how he is never alone in his struggles. It was a powerful lesson and a really good conversation with him.

       We also saw our neighbor Sandi, with President Kearl, and that was good. Sandi was a little bullheaded, but that was okay because President Kearl was able to see more clearly how we could help her to progress because she doesn't want to change, at least right now. However she does desire to learn.

      We saw the Alarcon boys and that was super good. They were pretty good at participating and paying attention. This time their mom helped out and she was able to share with them how she came to know the gospel was true, and how she has and does feel the Spirit in her life. We have committed the boys to read from The Book of Mormon, so we will find out tomorrow if they did.

        So those were all awesome, and we hope to have good lessons like that this coming week. As to what I have been up to it has been about the same as every other week crazy studying and finding people, and simply trying to keep up.

           I love you all.

Love,

       Elder Logan Draper