Hump Dayyyyy!!!!!!!!

6-23-14

It's weird to think that I'm at a year already!  It's all felt slow, but fast, as well.   At times I feel like I've learned so much, and then at other times I feel like I don't know hardly enough.  We get all of the Ensigns on our iPads through the gospel library app., so don't worry about sending me one.   I haven't had any really different or exciting experiences for the last week or so.  The baptism date that we had set for the 28th is postponed for now because the family had to take care of some personal issues, but I think that we are going to continue working with them this next week and set a new date for them.  We have quite a few people that we are teaching, but not all of them are progressing.  We have about five that are actually keeping commitments and are working towards baptism in the future.  We have transfer calls coming up on July 5th and I don't know if I will stay or go or if Elder Lawless will stay or go either.  He has one more transfer left till he is done, so we will see what happens.
It sound like that was a pretty good talk that Logan Jacobsen gave at his homecoming.  When we had our Zone Conference with Elder Clarke, Sister Cusick talked a lot about the language of prayer and how we can show greater respect for Heavenly Father as we offer our prayers.  She gave us a few points.
1- Always use the correct words such as: thee, thou, thy, and thine.
2- Don't say Heavenly Father's name multiple times during a prayer.  It's only needed at the
    beginning.  Nowhere else.
3- When praying in a group, make sure to say "we" and not "I".
4- When you close your prayer in the name of Jesus Christ, do it slowly.
I have been implementing these things in my prayers and it has helped make them more meaningful and not so repetitious.  Something else that she challenged us to do is to have a prayer of gratitude where we only pray to thank Heavenly Father for the things we have received.  I usually try to do this every Sunday and it helps, as well.  That sounds like a really good book that you got.  How has your reading in the scriptures been going for yourself and for the family?  I hope that you are all still doing family prayer and scripture study.
It's good to hear that Dad is slowly getting better, and I hope that they're able to find some insights as to what's going on with him.
Thank you for all that you do and for letting me know how things are going at home. Sorry, I don't have any inspiring stories at the moment, but I will let you know as they come.  Thank you for the year mark wish and I will be praying for all of you.  Have a great week!

Love,
Elder A. Whaley