December 18, 2008

So you say that it was colder in Simi than it was here for awhile, huh?   That’s hard to believe.  It snowed here pretty heavily and the roads were pretty crazy on Tuesday. We were worried about driving up to Reading on Wednesday for Zone Training meeting but it started sprinkling late Tuesday night and the roads were clear by the morning. When it snows here, people slow way down.  Driving on the highway is crazy– people are way paranoid and most just don’t go out, period. They cancel school, too. I remember last year in Frankford it had just started snowing and they let the kids out of school, then in the summer they don’t have good A/C, so they kick the kids outta school again! Kinda funny.

Yesterday was zone training meeting. It went really well. It was a couple hours of very intense training and then we had a Christmas program put on by the missionaries. Then President and Sister Murray had Famous Dave’s delivered. So that was really good.  After that, we played games and things with President Murray. Lots of fun.

My district is doing really well. They all put a lot into the training meeting and in turn got a lot out of it. They work really hard and they have been able to see some great progress in their areas. We all work pretty tough areas and all three of them are very different from the others. Farm land – Very city – and a mix of the both.

We don’t really know what we have going on for Christmas. We haven’t set our plans completely yet. We know that we are having lunch with a family but other than that, not much planned. President suggested that we could get together with our Districts and have a devotional or whatever if it was possible. That would be nice but we’ll see. I might just leave the planning up to the sisters. We are also spread out pretty wide so getting together takes up a good chunk of miles. It would be worth it.

I’m not sure right now what time I will be calling home because I don’t know exactly whats going on. So I might have someone call you or EMail you to let you know. What time would be best for you? Let me know.

Things here are going great, moving forward slowly and steadily. It takes a lot of patience and hard work.

I love you!
I’ll talk to you on Christmas.

Elder Michael Oakford

December 11, 2008

Another week gone.

This week didn’t contain much of anything that was fun or exciting, at least yet. Just the same old same old. We have been trying to track some of the people who we are going to be working with down and trying to make appointments but it has been pretty difficult. This past week at church was rough too. Everyone that we were teaching and even a bunch of members were sick! So our church list was pretty slim.

We did have Zone Conference on Thursday. That was very helpful. We were down in Broomall at 815 and it started at 9. We ended up leaving at about 5:00 or so. So that made for a long day of learning. It was good to see a lot of people I haven’t seen in a long time though. A lot of the missionaries I served with or around are now getting close to going home. So it was nice to see them.

I found out that the Frankford branch was started up last month or so and is now doing really well. They are having much success with a branch with local leadership in that area. For such a small area they are seeing a good amount of people at church. They have only one zip code that filters into their branch and they see about 40-50 people at church a week. Pretty good compared to some of the branches up here in Reading that cover hundreds of square miles and get less than that!

Our district is doing great. Next week we have zone training meeting and like last year, We will only have about three hours of training and then President and Sister Murray have a lunch that they prepare and lots of fun Christmas games. We were all asked to participate in our zones Christmas program as well. Which should be fun. I think Elder Esplin will pretend to play the violin while I pretend to play the piano and will just press play on the CD player and make it look good. That’s about all for talent that we can offer.

Our ward is doing great. The end of the year is coming quickly and they have been doing great with missionary work. Especially in the holiday season. I hope you have as well.

I’ve got to run. But I love you.

Merry Christmas.
Elder Michael Oakford

December 4, 2008

Dear Dad,

For my first two district meetings I have had to use parts of talks that you wrote and sent to me. So I really appreciate you sending me the talks that you write, they have really come in handy. I never knew how stressful it could be to be the District Leader, but I really am loving it. It is pushing me to grow and study harder than I ever have. I love every one of our missionaries. Last Sunday the Sisters called and I knew that they had had some struggles with some things in their area. But when they called and said “Elder Oakford, in the past we have been to meetings and listened to talks and things like that where all our questions that we had had been answered. We don’t know exactly what you are supposed to talk about but we’ll pray for you and we know that if you pray hard God will tell you what you need to say and what we need to hear.” ( or something along those lines.) During the night I had many different impressions and few very clear. One was If you try to solve this concern you’ll do it, but instead teach them where to find the answers. Another was to look to Christ in everything that we did. I had an object lesson pop in my head that I used that went really well. So I was grateful. I was half nervous going into District Meeting but then very comforted knowing that what I was going to talk about is what was needed. It all flowed really well and turned out great.

On Tuesday our whole district tracted in the Kutztown area. It helped a lot to build unity and to strengthen our District. We found a couple of people and taught a few lessons.

On Friday we are going to Broomall for our Zone Conference. I always look forward to them and expect to learn a lot. It’s definitely a time we can use to sharpen our sickle.  Afterward, we have our ward party held at the church. It’s a Christmas Luau? I don’t really understand, it’s freezing cold outside. I told them in California maybe this would slide but it might SNOW! Whatever though. Good food and nice people.

What I am really looking forward to is Sunday. The Christmas Devotional is one of my favorites. Since we do not have a church building, we are getting a ride with one of the members to either Kutztown or Reading . I hope we can get a good amount of investigators to that, I’m really excited for it.

We’ve been teaching a lot of great people. Our area is so big though. We have to be careful where we go or we will spread our miles really thin. Can’t do that!

I love you. I hope you had a great Thanksgiving and are looking forward to a wonderful Christmas.

I love you,

Elder Michael Oakford