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Last Few Pictures

January 24, 2017

Picture 1: A dying picture for myself and Elder Prior

Picture 2: My formal dying picture

Picture 3: Myself and Elder Bright with the "posterity tie" and the inherited Elder Falconbury Rasta-dreads and beads

Picture 4: At the transfer van this morning with The Oswald Posterity- Elder Bright (my first son), Elder Schroeder (my grandson), and Elder Cockerham (my second son)

Khan Update

January 24, 2017

Hi guys!

Here's one final Khan update. We kept him through the night in that empty trash can, and then in the morning we got him to his new home. And it's NOT the wild. A kind-hearted member who thinks mice are adorable volunteered to adopt Khan so he doesn't have to live in the cold. So this morning we took him over to the members house and they gave him a home. So I finally got the better of Khan, and he still gets a happy ending.

Khan!

January 23, 2017

BREAKING NEWS

Guys! It happened. My mission is officially complete. The Wrath of Khan is over! I caught him! I caught him with a sticky trap and then used olive oil to loosen him up and wearing a glove I pulled him off. We put him in an empty trash can with some food and water and tomorrow morning when the weather is nicer and when he has had a chance to not be in shock, we'll release him into the wild.

Here are some pictures of Khan in custody. He's covered in oil, and I think a bit in shock so that's why he looks a little weird.

VICTORY!!!

There and Back Again

January 23, 2017

Hi everyone!

Well, I cannot believe this day has come. This is my last missionary P-Day. I hit my 2 year mark on Saturday. I actually ended up having my exit interview on Wednesday, which was actually my original release date before they added a week due to the MTC adding an extra week for new English speaking missionaries. Tomorrow I go down to St. George with Elder Wells for the temple trip and dinner with President Smith, and the closing testimony meeting. And then Wednesday, I fly home. It's really exciting but still so many other mixed feelings.

Unfortunately, my last week as a missionary wasn't the best. In fact, the powers of the universe seemed to combine against me in every way possible. We had a about half of our appointments cancel, including our one nonmember lesson. We had no luck finding, even though we tried really hard, even resulting in straight up tracting, which is everyone's least favorite form of missionary work. We didn't get any referrals. Actually we got one, but then it was actually rescinded when the members realized he probably wasn't ready for missionaries. So yeah, we found no new investigators and taught only a few lessons. And I was kind emotionally compromised for a lot of the week, just a

culmination of everything I've been feeling for the last 6 weeks. And I felt kinda discouraged for a lot of the week. And to top it off, I got sick AGAIN! This is the third cold I've had in the past 3 months!

But I wasn't about to spend my last few proselyting days sick in the apartment so I borrowed some cold medicine from some other Elders and managed to keep it at bay enough that I was able to still do stuff.

But yeah, seriously, just about everything that could have gone wrong last week, went wrong. I'm kinda bummed about it, because I really wanted to end on a high note, but I guess it's alright. I've accomplished a lot of good in these last two years, and one crummy week doesn't change that. And I put forth my effort, which is all I can do. But it just didn't pan out, which happens sometimes, and Cedar West can be kind of a hard area. I've really felt Satan working on me and trying to just make things miserable and trying to make me discouraged and bitter. But I'm just not going to listen to him. I've had a great two years, and a really enjoyable 4 months in Cedar West, and I've done my best. And that's what matters.

And now for transfer news. Obviously I'm getting transferred home to Michigan. Upset, I know right? :)  But as for Elder Cockerham, I was actually a little surprised. I was really hoping he'd stay in Cedar West and keep working with our recent converts and with the investigator who's on date, and hopefully really resurrect Cedar West and get it out of this slow period we're in. But I guess the Lord has other plans. Cedar West is getting a set of sisters, and Elder Cockerham is getting transferred up to the Richfield Zone, covering Salina and Gunnison with Elder Gould. And since AP Prior is one of the group going home along with myself, and Elders Wells, Martell, and Renteria, we have a new AP. And it's Elder Stone, "The Great Stone Dragon"! That's another one that I predicted! Elder Stone is awesome, and I know he'll do great.

And that about does it for transfer news. Obviously, a lot more than that happened, but most of it isn't very pertinent as I'm going home in 2 days.

Monday last week was pretty great though. Elder Cockerham and I went to St. George and got to hang out with Paul Anderson, one of the Piano Guys. I know Paul's assistant, Jeremy, who works for The Piano Guys as their website/operations manager and piano move coordinator. We hung out earlier in my mission (April), and this past week we got it arranged so we could see Paul for a little bit. That was so fun! We talked about a lot of stuff. A lot of funny stuff too. We especially talked about The Piano Guys in general, and especially the recording and videography aspects (Paul is the producer/videographer of the group), which was super interesting. Paul and Jeremy also talked about

their missions and gave me some good advice going home. My favorite bit of advice was from Paul to watch or listen to a General Conference talk a day. So yeah, pretty much one of the best P-Days ever!

Well we still haven't caught Khan. He doesn't fall for any traps! But we're still trying. We've gotta catch him before the sisters come. I really hope we catch him in the next 24 hrs. I will send an update if we do.

Well I can't believe I've come to the end of my mission. It really has been great. I've gotten to go to so many places. I've gotten to learn and experience so many things. And I've gotten to know so many people, and feel a little bit of how the Savior feels about them. Of course there were the trials. I've experienced a lot of sorrow as I've had to say goodbye to missionaries going home, as well as those I've taught and worked with in the areas in which I've served. It's been difficult getting along with a couple of my companions. And it has been especially hard to watch so many people reject the gospel. But it's been worth it. I don't regret it at all. The trials have taught me so much and have brought me closer to the Lord. And the good experiences whether it be with those I've taught or with other missionaries or members, have been priceless. I will not forget those who have been part of my journey these last two years. I will never forget the areas in which I've served. All of these people, places, and experiences have become a part of me, and it breaks my heart to leave. But if there's one thing I've learned from the constant changing of mission life, it's that change happens, whether it's 100% pleasant or not, and if we allow Him, The Lord will guide us through it and strengthen us. I still remember the words of Gandalf that comforted me when I was devastated about leaving Mt. Pleasant and when I wished I had more time there: "But that is not for us to decide. All we must decide is what to do with the time that is given to us". The time that the Lord has given me for my mission is over, and I am happy to say that, though I wasn't perfect, I tried my best and reaped the benefits, and I can look back on that time well spent and look forward to the future, trusting in God to direct my paths.

I want to thank those who have been with me on this journey. Some of those people may actually receive my weekly emails. So you know who you are. I want to thank all the members in Mount Pleasant, Enoch West, Snow Canyon, and Cedar West who I've come to know and care about. Thank you for your friendship and support, and assistance in this great work of salvation. Thank you to my companions and other missionaries, for your service, for putting up with me, and in many cases, for your friendship. Thank you to those whom I taught and who accepted the Lord's call to be baptized as members of His church. I've probably learned more from you than I could ever teach you. Thank you to those back home and in various places who have written me and given me support. I won't forget it. And most of all, I thank my Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ for giving me this opportunity to serve in this capacity. I literally could not have done even a fraction of this without their guidance and support. In all the highs and lows of my mission, in all of the change, The Lord has been the constant in my life, and so He will be after I'm home, and forever.

Now if I could address the whole world, here's some of the advice I'd give. To members: Please realize how important missionary work is. Please assist in that work. Missionaries can't do it alone. And the happiness that comes from sharing the gospel with your friends and family is priceless, as well as the deepening of your relationship with God and the understanding of the gospel that will also result. It can be scary, but have faith in the message and trust that God will back you up. You don't even have to worry about converting people. That's between them and The Lord. It's our responsibility as disciples of Christ, and as friends and neighbors to simply invite. And to those who are not yet a member of our faith: Please give it a chance. Know that we share the gospel and invite others to learn about it because we care about you. It's not about numbers or anything else. The gospel makes us happy, so like anything else that makes us happy, we seek to share it. Accepting our message is up to you. It's between you and God. But please give our message a chance. Really what's there to lose? It's either true or it's not. If it's not, then you really didn't lose anything except maybe a couple hours learning about it, but if it's true, then all the blessings of eternity could be within your grasp, which you won't want to miss out on. All we want you to do is to, in the words of some of Christ's disciples in the Bible, "Come and see".

I know God is real, and that Jesus is The Christ, "The Son of The Living God". I know that He lives, and is our Savior. I know more than ever that they love us and know us personally, and desire a relationship with us. This gospel that I've spent the last 2 years preaching, it is true, and sharing it is their work. The church, the Bible, the Book of Mormon, prophets and apostles Joseph Smith, Thomas

S. Monson; it's all true. And how I have loved being a full time messenger of that truth.

Well, that's about it. I still can't quite believe my mission is coming to an end. I've spent my whole life looking forward to a mission. And now it's about over. I've gone there, and now I'm about to go back again. Now my task is to remember these experiences, and continue to learn and grow throughout the rest of my life. To the Utah St. George Mission, and all those who have been a part my experience in it, it has been a pleasure and a privilege.

I bid you all a very fond farewell.

-Elder Oswald

Chilling with Paul Anderson and Jeremy Crawford at Piano Guys HQ in

St. Geezy (1/16/2017)

One More Week!

January 16, 2017

Hi guys!

Quite a lot happened this past week. Firstly, the work is still going about the same pace it's been going. It's not bad, we are teaching, and it's going well, but we are desperate for more investigators to

teach. And we didn't find any. But we did get Katie (our new investigator from the previous week) on date! That was an awesome lesson. We taught The Plan of Salvation and we planned the baptismal

invite really well, and Elder Cockerham delivered it just about perfectly. Throughout the lesson, we both said some things that I'm pretty sure were inspired, our fellowshipper was great, and the Spirit

was super strong. Katie is on date for the 18th of February. It still feels weird that I won't be here for that.

We also did get a few more referrals. I'm not sure how solid they are, but it's at least something to keep us going.

Khan was tricky this week. On Tuesday, a mouse had gotten himself caught in an empty trash can (he was walking and just sort of fell in) and we thought we'd finally caught Khan. But then three things came to mind: 1) We've seen Khan a lot, and this mouse looked smaller than how we remembered him, 2) This mouse was caught in an area of the house where Khan never hangs out, and 3) Khan is a grand master champion of avoiding detainment, but this mouse literally caught himself, in other words, this mouse seemed a little amateur. So I set some bait near the two places Khan tends to frequent, to see if they would get eaten. If they disappeared that would mean Khan is still in the house, but if they didn't, that would mean we had indeed caught him. So we released the mouse we caught into Cedar Canyon to live out his days in the wild, and for the whole day, that bait was entirely undisturbed, so we thought we may have actually caught him. But sure enough, we'd been

bamboozled! Early the next morning, I heard scampering noises, and when I checked, one of the pieces of bait was gone. Later that day, the other bait had been disturbed, but not eaten, and then by the end of the day, that one was gone too. The evidence was conclusive: we didn't catch Khan, we caught his crony (or maybe just some poor sap just passing through). I like to think it was a set up. Khan knew we were after him, so he got this other mouse to be his fall guy and make it LOOK like we had got Khan, but actually it was just a clever decoy. I know mice probably don't think like that at all, but it's more fun to look at it that way. Plus Khan is pretty smart... Anyway, a few days later we saw him again gorging himself on some of our cookies (which we didn't want anyway, so I guess it's just as well someone's enjoying them). So yeah. He's still here. Hopefully I'll be able to catch him before I go home.

Now getting back to more spiritual things, we had a great weekend. On Saturday we had Ashton's baptism. Unfortunately, Quentin apparently isn't getting baptized anytime soon because he's still in Arizona, and apparently his parents are dodging the law or something. So that really stinks. But at least we did get one baptism. And it went so well! There was a huge turnout. We actually had to do it in the chapel since the room we usually hold baptismal services in was too small for everyone. He had a lot of family members, a lot of people from school, and a big ward turnout as well. And Katie came to the baptism too, so it was cool to have an investigator there to learn and also see what it actually is that she'll be doing in a month. It was just really great. I'll include pictures with this email. It's myself, Elder Cockerham, Ashton, and his uncle who baptized him.

And that was actually my last baptism as a missionary. Nobody else is scheduled (or ready) to get baptized before I leave in just over a week. I'm glad it went so well. And Ashton is just awesome so he's a fitting final mission convert.

Sunday was good too. We had Ashton's confirmation which went really well. Again, a lot of good family and ward support. And later we got to observe a ward split. Up until now, the Hamilton Fort Ward had been enormous. But yesterday they split it into the (new) Hamilton Fort Ward and the South Mountain Ward. It'll be cool I think to see if that stirs up any missionary opportunities that were previously hidden due to the ward being so huge, boundary wise and population wise. It will

definitely provide some opportunities for the wards to reactivate people, since now there's more need for callings, and again, less room to hide.

There were also some really good thoughts shared by some of the speakers yesterday. The theme for the whole stake seemed to be The Sabbath Day. I'd like to share one thought I really liked. If you had

a day to hang out with Jesus Christ, what would you do with Him? Where would you go with Him? What would you talk about? Well, even though we don't get hang out with Him in person just yet, that's really what the Sabbath Day is. It's a day to spend some personal time with The Savior. We should imagine the opportunity to literally hang out with Jesus and what we'd want to do with Him, and then do those things for the Sabbath. There aren't a whole lot of specific things we're told to do or not to do on Sunday. It's supposed to be a day of rest and of worship and we should try our best not to work or purchase things on the Sabbath if we can help it. The only thing we're really commanded to do specifically is to go to church and take the sacrament. The rest of the day, we have a lot of personal choice as to how we're going to make the Sabbath special. So, what would you do if got the opportunity to hang out with Jesus for a day?

Well that's all for today. And I can hardly believe it, but I only have one week left. Well, a week and a couple days, but yeah. That's scary. And exciting. And sad. And just plain crazy. It's a lot of things. But regardless, I'm going to make this final week as fantastic as I can. Have a great week everyone!

-Elder Oswald

Another email that I don't have a clever title for (too tired to think of one)

January 9, 2017

Hi guys!

Well this letter might be a bit shorter. It's not that nothing happened this week, quite the opposite, there's just not a lot of specifically noteworthy things to cover in great detail.

We've had a pretty great week. Only one lesson fell through, and we taught more nonmember lessons than we have in a long time. Most of them were to Ashton who is getting ready for his baptism on Saturday, but we also picked up a new investigator, Katie in the same ward. And both of them were at church yesterday too! We've been getting more referrals and really making headway with some of the members and things are really starting to come together nicely.

It is an odd feeling though that Ashton (and hopefully Quentin if his family ever gets back from vacation) will be my last baptism on my mission. Everyone new we pick up will be getting baptized after I'm gone. It's weird, and kinda sad.

In fact as the 25th approaches, it's really beginning to weigh on me. Yes it's exciting, but more and more, I'm aware of how much I'm going to miss these two years worth of places, people, and experiences. I've been feeling kinda sad about it. Not really just sad though. Sad doesn't really describe it. It's more of a subtle heavy feeling that just keeps slowly building. I can't find the right word to describe it.

As far as Khan goes, this week has been more of the same. He recently helped himself to some cookies that we had sitting on a table next to the ficus that he plays in sometimes. Honestly though, he did us a favor because we still have too many cookies and sweets. We've seen Khan a few times, and he's adorable. He really is a cute mouse (and a noticeably well fed one). Our efforts to catch him this week were lacking, partially because we were just too busy, and also partially because it's been very cold and snowy and we didn't want to cast him out into that. But we will continue trying to catch him now that the weather is a little more favorable.

And speaking of weather, it was really bad for a few days. Thursday night it snowed several inches right after a very slick ice storm. Our piece of garbage little car almost couldn't handle it. That night we got stuck in the middle of a couple intersections, we got stuck in our driveway the next morning, and during the storm, we almost had a major accident. We were coming up to an intersection, and even though we were careful to start breaking long before we got to the intersection, we still slid right through it, as someone was about to drive though the intersection perpendicular to us! Luckily, that guy was going very slow and was able to stop before he hit us, so we didn't die. But it was scary!

And that's pretty much it from my end. Other than that I'm just tired. That's good, it means I'm working hard. But wow. I just feel worn out. I guess two years will do that.

Have a great week everyone!

-Elder Oswald