Tis The Season, Light The World

11.27.17

Greetings from the Republic of California! I hope everyone enjoyed their Thanksgiving. It's a great time to be with the people that you are most grateful for... and don't forget the mashed potatoes!! 

Our 5-man here in the Woodland Zone is always a party and I gotta say what a blessing, we are always having a good time (and working hard).

This week was pretty crazy. Since Elder Siebach is the District Leader, I have to go on exchanges 2-3 times each week. Most of the time I have gone into Spanish areas so I have no idea what is being said but it's all good because it all means the same thing! 

All 5 of us had Thanksgiving with a family in the ward. It was really nice of them to invite us. We stuffed ourselves to the max! That was a good and a bad thing. 

Friday was a day of service. We helped a member move his chicken coop and we watched his dog almost kill a chicken... the chicken is alright and no we did not make that happen on purpose. Then we helped another member move. The wife recently had a heart attack and so she can't lift more than 40 lbs now so all 5 of us were glad to help! It was really fulfilling! 

At a dinner appointment on saturday, I gave a spiritual thought about Enos. After Enos gains a remission of his sins, he begins to pray for the welfare of his friends, the Nephites, which is pretty normal I guess. But then he prays for the welfare of his enemies, the Lamanites! How selfless! We all should turn outward like Enos does and our lives will all be so much happier. 

Read the Book of Mormon every day! It will change your life for the better. 

It's been great hearing from some of you! I hope everything is going well with the rest. 

The song of the week is the hit "Young Adult" by Ritt Momney! If you haven't heard it yet, I would highly recommend it!  Making music with that wonderful group of people was some of the best times of my life so far. One good song can change someone's life! 

Turn outward this week, follow the "Light The World" campaign! The videos bring so much spirit into our lives. Rake someones leaves, bake some cookies with your grandma, share your favorite song with someone! 

Have a great week and take advantage of all that you can do during this Christmas season! 

Festively,

Elder Thompson 

Hank's address: (at least until December 19 transfers)

1225 Linford Lane 

Apt. D3

Dixon, CA 95620

D 3 Five at the Hollowell's home

Republic of California

Thanksgiving activities

Thanksgiving in Dixon

11.20.17

Hey group email squad! 
I'd like to start off this email by giving big shout out to YMAD... an experience that changed my life. A year ago today, I was in Chamba, India. Half of a world away, with some of the best friends that I have ever made and helping out some of the best people I have ever met. Which brings me to the song of the week: One Day by Matisyahu. I'm grateful for everything that YMAD taught me and I'm grateful for the people that I was able to come close to during my time preparing for India and actually being there. 

This week was crazy! We spent Tuesday in Santa Rosa and it was really boring except I saw Elder Nate Koelliker at transfers!! It was really great to see him! The next day, we picked up our little boy, Elder Mohler, from Vegas baby! We also picked up two Spanish elders, Elder Abraham from Glendale, Arizona, and Elder Walker from Logan, Utah. They're all super cool and it's been a party in our little 5-man apartment. I'm now chilling here with Elder Kelso from Holladay, Utah.  If anyone knows him, say what's up. 

This week we had a super spiritual finding experience. We each said where we wanted to tract and each of us said different places so we decided to go from the top to the bottom to where each of us wanted to go. In one area, we got a return appointment and then at the park we got a referral from a member and talked to a family playing basketball and then we had a super great spiritual thought at our dinner that night! It was super directed by the Spirit!! 

Most of this week was just adjusting for having 5 people. We had to put together some bunk beds and we had to get some other desks. 

We are working hard every day.  The longer I've been out, the more everything makes sense and I am so grateful for the opportunity to serve in the CASRM! The other cool thing that happened was I was able to see some of the fire damage and some vineyards in Napa and Sonoma valleys. I'll attach some pictures. Have a great Thanksgiving this week! Be thankful for each day! Hug your favorite Pilgrim or Indian! 

Onward and upward.

Love, 

Elder Thompson 

5 Guys Dixon Apartment

Napa Valley

Sonoma Vineyards

Trio: Thompson, Mohler, Siebach

Elders Thompson and Koelliker

Destruction in Santa Rosa

TWO MONTHS

11.13.17

Friends and family,

Yes, it is that time again when I tell you what I have been doing for the past week. It has been a pretty eventful one! 

First off, I would like to announce that Elder Siebach and I are pregnant! That's right, we will be having a son on Tuesday. We will be trio training a brand new missionary and Elder Siebach will also be the District Leader... so that will be interesting! Along with those two surprises, we will also be gaining two OTHER Elders here in our apartment. They will be Spanish elders, one of them is straight out of the MTC. So three greenies, a district leader/trainer, and a trainer. That should make for an interesting holiday season! So tomorrow I will be spending the day working in santa rosa and it will be different to see everything so burned up. We will stay the night in Foothill Park and then pick up our greenies the next day and go to work! 

We will be passing off Carlos and Rosa, the two Spanish speaking people who have a baptismal date, to the Spanish speaking elders who will probably be pretty happy about that. 

The other family that I have mentioned, the father has come to church without fail for the past two weeks so we are just awaiting the call from Bishop to be able to go over and teach. Bishop says they have had some really spiritual talks together and that things are going well. We are praying hard for them! 

Funny story for the week: on Monday night they took our car to Santa Rosa and gave us bikes, so we have been cruising alllll around the place having a great time. But on Tuesday for Exchanges, the Spanish elder who was with me for the day and myself had to go wayyyyy outside of town for a lesson. This was our first day on bikes. keep that in mind. We get about halfway there and both of our rear tires popped and the other elder's chain snapped in half. So we had to walk about 2 miles to get to this lesson in the middle of nowhere. That night, all of our plans to go to the Spanish part of town went right down that fat drain since we had no way to get there and it was pretty far away. We ended up tracting around our apartment and our church. Nobody was willing to listen except for the last person that we talked to. She and her husband had recently been talking a lot about going to church but they didnt know which one. I pointed them toward our church and told them that they would be welcome to come to ours. She told us that she really appreciates what we do every day. If our bikes wouldn't have broken, we wouldn't have met this woman so that's really cool to me! 

The song of the week is "Leaves" by Miguel and it really doesn't have to do with anything, I just like it and it's been stuck in my head so there's that. 

In Mormon chapter 9, it talks about how God is a God of miracles to all who believe on His name, we just have to have faith and work to be more like Christ and God will give us all that we need. The miracles come after the trial of your faith. 

That's about it for this week, wish me some phaat luck this week with our new additions coming in. Thank you for all of the support over these past 2 months! More to come next week! Onward and upward.

P.S. Huge shout out to Grandpa Roger who is having a birthday on the 14th!  Love you Grandpa, thanks for your example!

Loves,

Elder Thompson 

Woodland Zone Conference

Dixon sunset

Rainy days

People Get Ready

November 6, 2018

I would like to start this email off by giving a shout out to Auden by saying: the bees are dying. 

Things are going well here in the 707, we had some really great miracles this week! We are working hard and gaining more success during each day that goes by! Its "high noon" (as the lax team would say) out here in the California Santa Rosa Mission. 

This week I had the opportunity to attend my very first Zone Conference. It was great to see President and Sister Wright and to be able to learn from the APs and other leaders. Elder Siebach,  two other Elders, and I formed a quartet and sang "The Upper California" for the musical number. It was a really cool song to sing. We learned more about making commitments and following up on people. We also learned how to better set goals and how to productively find people to teach. I would like to tell a story that Sister Wright told us during Zone Conference that makes me so grateful to have the best Mission President in the world. In the midst of all of the fires burning in Northern California, President and Sister Wright were told that they needed to evacuate the mission home. They had only a few minutes to gather some irreplacable documents and other things of that sort. In those few minutes, do you know what the first thing they thought to grab was? A big bin full of snacks and water bottles because they were worried that their missionaries would get hungry during interviews that week. They're the most selfless, loving people I think I have ever met and I am so blessed to have them over this mission. 

Onto more cool stuff for this week! On Friday we were walking around trying to visit some members and less active families. Usually everyone is home and in bed by about 7 which is when it gets dark so we don't have success after 7 most nights. We thought we should stop by this family's house a few streets away. We knocked on their door and the wife answered the door and said that her husband was out of town and her 6 month old baby was sick. She asked us to give her baby a blessing and so we did. We were at the right place at the right time. 

The other cool experience that we had this week: We think God sent us an angel to help us out on Saturday. We were doing a blitz with the whole zone where everyone goes into one area and does a ton of work for a few hours, visiting people and tracting and such. Elder Siebach and I were supposed to visit people on this list of potential investigators. As we approached an apartment complex, we realized that we needed to put in a password to unlock the entrance. We were defeated as we sat down in front of the complex looking on the map for the next people to go visit. Just then, a man rode up on a bicycle out of nowhere and unlocked the door with a key, let us in, and then rode away.... After that we were able to give a Book of Mormon to the woman that we were trying to visit inside the complex! 

About the man in my email last week, he and the Bishop have been talking a lot and we are just waiting to hear from him and his family. He did come to church again yesterday so we are really excited about that. 

Fun fact: Elder Siebach is basically a wizard with the scriptures. He knows them really well and has a ton of stuff memorized. In order for me to learn as much as I can from him, we have been making a "posterity anti-bash Bible" together. The front page is pretty funny, it has the answer to any question that someone might have about the Bible and how it correlates to the Book of Mormon and the gospel of Jesus Christ. 

We are working hard here. Its all good. The song of this week is "People Get Ready" by The Impressions. I would suggest checking it out. 

Let me know how life is for everyone else! It's great to hear from a lot of you.  Also, for the East Lacrosse team, I hope that you guys killed it in Fall Ball... go work hard this off-season so that you can beat the snot out of Corner Canyon this year.  

The gospel is true! God loves us and wants to help us. 

what the geesht,

Elder Thompson

Fenton's famous ice cream

no caption needed

Tracting during the Davis blitz

Spiders In Recliners and Following Promptings

10.30.17

Hey squadron!
 I don't have any more jokes about the fires so don't expect any. Here is this week summed up: Spanish lessons I don't understand but we got two baptismal dates out of them; hot tracting; a lot of calling people; trunk or treat, spiders in recliners; an amazing community; and following a prompting that turned into something spectacular! 

The Spanish lessons: we have been using members who speak Spanish to help us teach Carlos and Rosita and they accepted baptismal dates! I'm praying that they can keep progressing! Carlos comes to church every week without fail and he can't even understand any of the words. It's a really great thing to see his dedication to the Spirit.

 I'm sure that Thomas, Matt, Dallen, and a bunch of others can attest to how hot it is everywhere else but Utah in October. That makes tracting fun because there really aren't any clouds here ever so it's direct sun all day long. All hail short sleeve shirts. 

We also acquired a list of the part member families in the ward. There are over 60! We have been calling a ton of people and setting up appointments every once in a while. Mostly it's either they moved, their number doesn't work, or they do not want to be contacted. But there are a few that are really nice and want to talk to us. 

The recliner thing is self explanatory.... I saw the spider hiding in one of the cracks and so we sprayed it with ammonia and disposed of it.   It was great. 

And finally, the prompting that we followed! Really something that changed my perspective on what I'm supposed to be doing out here. 

So this past Thursday we were out visiting part member families and less active members. Everyone was relatively close except for two houses which were out in the middle of nowhere. Elder Siebach and I said that we weren't going to go out there because it was really far and we were really tight on miles. Somehow we ended up driving out there though.... We found this family's house and we talked to the father for about 30 minutes or so. He is an inactive member and none of his family is baptized but he told us about his mission experiences and how he could never deny any part of the Gospel. He had just strayed from the church over a long period of time and hasn't gone back in a number of years. He said though, that he had been thinking about the church a lot in the days before we showed up, no coincidence!  After we had a good conversation, he said he would contact us if he felt as though he could make the commitment to come back. We said alright and we left. That night, we had a few questions for our Bishop. We talked with him at his house and we found out that the Bishop had been talking to this brother a lot during the past week, trying to get him to come back. The brother had told the Bishop that if he came back to church, his wife and daughter would too and that they would want to be baptized soon after. Through direct inspiration, the Bishop actually extended a pretty demanding calling to this brother. The brother was unsure about this because it was such a big step for him to take, but then told the Bishop that the exact same calling was one that his father held for a number of years. The man told Bishop that he would let him know if he accepted the call or not on Saturday. Saturday came and the man told Bishop that he needed some extra time but would be at church the next day! He came to church on Sunday with his mission scriptures and sat next to Elder Siebach and myself. That in itself was cool! He and the Bishop talked in Bishop's office for the entire second hour of church. After church, Bishop told Elder Siebach and me that the man was going to consult his family about what they would be doing and that they would also like to start having the missionaries over once a week to teach the lessons!!!! I'm so excited to help bring this great family closer to Christ, that is my purpose after all. 

Other than that, we go around and visit people and we tract and we offer service. We helped a member move into an apartment on Saturday and arranged for him to get a ride to church on Sunday. He is really great and funny. 

On a different note, I haven't driven a car in almost two months and I'm starting to lose my mind. I might just see if craigslist has anything cheap and get my own car. Also, I always have these different songs running through my head that I wish I could listen to. Which leads me to the song of the week: The great Stevie Wonder's "Sir Duke" which talks about how music is a universal language that everyone can feel. It's a really great song so I would suggest you go listen to it. Except for my missionary friends.... don't do that unless you wanna be OC. You guys can listen to anything by MercyMe, specifically "wishful thinking" or "heavens here" 

We are getting smart phones soon which is super weird but I guess the Lord is hastening his work and we can use them effectively in California. 

That's about it for this week, enjoy some of the pictures and let me know whats going on in your lives! I can read emails pretty much any time so say hey! 

A quick shout out to the Geeshter boys from Scrusstown as I'm wearing my Welcome To Scrusstown shirt. I love you all! 

-Elder Thompson

Corn Maze with his district

Dixon apartment and the recliner, pre-spider discovery.

I'll have to send him some Thin Mints to deliver to this house!

Elder Siebach reclining 

I Don't Speak Spanish ~ 10.23.17

What's up friends and family and other people who somehow know me well enough to receive this email!! Another smokin week here in NorCal!! 

This week I went on exchanges with our District Leader who is a Spanish elder. I spent the night in Woodland, California and we were able to do some really effective street contacting. The missionaries here tell me that I'm really good at talking to everyone and that I don't act like a normal greenie because I "look" like I know what I'm doing. I tell them that I used to get in trouble every day at school for being too social but it's working out for me here.  so take that East High. 

I had no idea what was being said when Elder Morais would start speaking Spanish but I could feel the spirit so strongly and that was a really cool experience. The next day, we had interviews with President Wright. Some of you may have seen him on the news in recent days. He is the greatest man ever! He really loves us missionaries and will do everything that he can to set us up to be successful. I have been so blessed to have a Mission President like him. 

The other day, while knocking doors by our apartment, we knocked on this lady's door and she started talking to us. She is a college student studying to be a botanist. She is Pagan and her husband is an Atheist. After about 20 minutes of talking to her about why we go around knocking doors and following a crazy schedule, she invited us back the next day to help her teach her husband about God. That was a cool thing. The next day we went back and nobody was there.... weird. So we went back the next day and she opened the door and was kind of not there in a way. She told us that she had gotten in a bad car accident the day before and to come back like next week. Now, I'm not sure what kind of crap satan is pulling here, but he better stop messing with our potential investigators! We are praying for her. 

One more cool experience this week. We meet with this recent convert, Ron, who doesn't really believe what we do... but he has it really rough and his life has been really hard so we go over and talk to him twice a week. He is in his mid 60's and arthritis is setting in pretty hard for him so he cant do much work. Anyway, this investigator family that we had dinner with one night had a mattress in their front room. We asked them what it was about and they said that now that they have two kids, they can't have this queen sized mattress anymore because they need twin beds so they were getting rid of this pretty much brand new, super soft, queen-sized mattress. They asked if we knew anyone who needed it. We said that Ron would probably really appreciate it because he doesnt have much. Well, we went over the next day and gave it to him and he seemed kind of shocked and speechless that people could be so kind. The next day at church, we talked to him and he said that the mattress was such a Godsend because it was the first day in years when he hadn't woken up with shoulder and back pain! I'm glad we were able to help him out. That's about it for this week. I've written all of the interesting stuff so if you've stopped caring, you can stop reading now. 

I've been thinking about all of my friends in SLC and around the world as well. I've also been thinking a lot about India since our 1 year mark of going there is coming up next month so shoutout to my YMAD fam! Love you guys!

Let me know what is going on in life! Also the song of the week is the acoustic version of "layla" by Eric Clapton. That one has been stuck in my head for the past little while. Everything is going well here in Cali. I think the fires are coming to an end but I'm a missionary so I don't know anything. 

Onward and upward, squad up and squad out, and welcome to Scrusstown.

Love,

Elder Thompson

Companion study in a nearby park

Hank and his trainer, Elder Siebach

Smoky Life In Dixon

10.16.17

What's up everyone who is still reading these?! I'm impressed you made it this far. This week was pretty lit. not sure if that is too soon, but it was actually great. 

To start off, I'm sure you're all wondering about the fires. We haven't gotten any word from the mission about it besides what we hear from Facebook.  It's business as usual.  We got a lot of smoke here on Wednesday and Thursday but then it got way windy so all of the smoke blew away. That probably wasn't very good for the fire though. We are continuing to pray for everyone affected by the fires. We have seen some amazing people though, families that have lost everything but only focus on how they can help others. It's incredible. 

We have been told to be ready to evacuate at any time so Elder Siebach and I each have a suitcase ready to go,  but we won't put them to use I'm sure. 

Last Tuesday after district meeting, we went to do some community service. We ended up building a park for the city of Winters... it was a crazy park too. We were carrying around and setting these 16 foot posts into the ground. It was really good service and it was also really difficult. 

Here in Dixon, our main focus in on part-member families because there are a ton here. We go and visit people and mostly people aren't really interested but there have been a few that invited us back! One family invited us to dinner and then expressed their concerns about the church. They were pretty tough concerns so Elder Siebach and I are taking this week to study out their questions and go back to answer them. We also do things like help this family make shirts for the wife's job because she does a lot for the community. She is the only member of the church in her family so I think she likes having our influence in her house. 

On Wednesday, we got an investigator to commit to coming to church! It was a really great thing to see. She says she is bringing a little girl that she cares for next week. That should be great! 

I can tell I'm getting better at talking to people because I was able to secure two return appointments while tracting within just a few houses! It was a good feeling. 

The 13th of this month was my 1 month mark in the mission. It went by so quickly looking back at it, especially this week. It's crazy how this works. Saturday we helped a family in the ward move a few blocks away. Another good workout. 

Two great experiences this week!! 

1: Yesterday, after church, we were going to an apartment complex that we had tracted the week before to go to a return appointment for a guy named Rudolfo. sadly he wasnt there.... so on our way back, we passed this part member family's house who we had been trying to contact for like two weeks. We saw the mom walking into the house! Score! We walked up to the door and knocked and there was no answer.... keep in mind there are like 6 people at this house at a time but they just seem to hide from us. We knocked a second time out of habit and still no answer.... as we were about to turn back and go tract but Elder Siebach had the feeling that we should knock a third time, but both of us at the same time. Unheard of! haha. So after a good 7-8 second long knock, one of the daughters came to the door! It seemed as though we had woken her up from a nap but that's okay, this is more important than a nap. We talked to her for like 30 minutes on the doorstep and got her phone number and facebook information! She said she would be more open to talking on facebook so we said great! That was a cool thing.

Experience 2: This morning while at Walmart, we pulled in and saw a guy pushing his car. I walked up hoping to be able to help jump start him but after a further look, it seemed that he had a bad starter. We walked back to our car because it seemed like we couldn't help him. We then saw him start to push his car again, which was weird because we're in Dixon where there is nothing and Walmart is a few miles away from anything. I felt like we should help him. Elder Siebach and I ended up pushing the car about a mile on the highway while the guy steered. What a workout!! We finally got to the shop down the road and the guy got out and gave me the biggest Canadian hug ever. He was so grateful and I was really happy to have been able to help someone out. There's no way he would've been able to get the car there himself. We were at the Walmart at that time for a reason, to be able to help someone! Turns out we had helped him out more than we knew, he was driving from San Francisco to Reno and his car broke down in Dixon, so he spent the night in his car in a Walmart parking lot not knowing where he could get help. That was a cool experience this morning too. I got a really good cardio/strength workout too. 

Sorry this is long, if you made it this far I'm really impressed. 

We can withstand spiritual fires by relying on Jesus Christ as our foundation. Everyone watch the mormon message "Daily Bread: Experience" by Elder D. Todd Christofferson. It really is amazing! The Gospel is true. Go Jesus! 

(p.s. we had a fire in our sink because we felt left out here in Dixon. Just kidding, we actually just had to get rid of some member information because we got an updated area book, so we did what any missionaries would do, set the old papers on fire in our sink! (now you have to put the picture of it in, mom:) )

Love, 

Elder Thompson

"The Dixon Fire" (not what a dad who owns and manages apartments likes to see)

"It's flat in Dixon." 

View from the front door.

Fire engines headed to Santa Rosa, a common sight.

The sun is orange or red every day and the smoke makes for some pretty sunsets.