Missionary Work - Preach My Gospel 101

Hello everyone out there!!! So we had an amazing week this week and the reason of the amazingness is outlined in the stories below.

So this week has been an amazing one!! 

• We are still teaching the same young man and we had a couple great lessons with him this week. The coolest one was the fact that we had a Temple tour and a baptism to attend planned out for him on Saturday and he came to both of them with his mom too - and they had a blast going! They loved the spirit they felt at the Temple and the same with the baptisms. He said that the baptism took a lot shorter than he thought and that he was looking forward to his on the 22nd of November. We mentioned that we needed to get a certain amount of lessons in before his interview and baptism and they said to have us come over everyday!! So we have a set lesson with them Tuesday-Friday until his baptism. His mom is so excited he is wanting to do this. She wants him to go on a mission (We will be discussing it after his baptism, and she wants him to get to the temple, get married in it and have a happy Mormon family)!!! It is so awesome to be apart of it all and to be able to close out my mission with such a solid person being taught, baptized with someone else coming back into the church. He is integrating perfectly with the Young Men and even helped set up and run games at the ward Halloween party!
• Last night we went over to a members house who said one of the kids living with them had a lot of questions about the church and was interested in talking with us. He is interested in anything about God.  We talked and taught him about the Plan of Salvation and he loved the sound of not just a Heaven and a Hell, but that there are "More options" to make sure everyone is happy and where they deserve. So the work is picking up and going great, it is an amazing opportunity to be a part of it all. 

So as you can see great things are continuing to happen here in the Lake Forest Ward!!! I am excited to say I will be staying here for my final 6 weeks of my mission which will be so awesome!! I will have the blessing to continue to work with people that I have mentioned and other people that the Lord has in store for us to find. It is always a long road on a mission, but it is people like these that make all of the tough times worth it. 

In my talk yesterday, I must say, as far as Church sacrament meeting talks go, It was pretty much awesome (Said with much Humility)!!!!  I went a little over my time (20 Minutes, not 20 over, total of 20 assigned 15) so yikes! Lots of people came up and said how good it was and how much they enjoyed it. I had 2 people ask for copies of it!!!   One girl came up after 2nd hour and started talking about how the week was. How she found some stuff out that kind of just make it tougher to go through each day. She mentioned she did not want to come to church today. She then said how glad she was that she came because of the fact that she "felt" my talk was given directly to her. She said she could truly feel that Christ was capable of being in her life and that He knew exactly how she was feeling and was there for her. It was one of the most powerful moments since being out, actually have someone tell you that you answered a concern they had because you had the ability to follow the spirit and be guided and directed to put the things in and talk about and elaborate on the things the spirit guided you to. So that was just a really awesome moment and one that I for sure will not forget...

#challenge completed! #StartingStrong #CaliforniaIrivineMission #FinishStrong

Anyways there is not to much to report on. I hope all is going well for all of you and hope miracles happen for you this week. I started this thing to help keep me focused this last transfer called the 42 day countdown.  I had missionaries write down a challenge for me to complete everyday (Missionary related or not) and today was the first day. The first challenge (Actually applies to every monday of the transfer) is to get up and study from 5:00 am to 6:30 work out from 6:30 to 7:00 get ready from 7:00 to 8:00 then normal studies from 8:00 to 10:00. I did it this morning and I actually really liked it. I am so awake right now and I got awake super quick. I am going to try and do it every Monday Wednesday and Friday, and hopefully by the time I come home I am doing it everyday. My goal with it is 5:00 am to 6:00 am work out 6:15 to 6:45 Shower get ready 6:45 to 7:00 make breakfast and 7:00 to 8:00 eat and have studies. So we shall see what happens and hopefully I am in the habit when I come home. 

Anyways thank you for all you do and hope all is well. Thank you for everything !!!! :)

-- 

"Fourth Floor Last Door"

Elder Amric Zane Sobczak

California, Carlsbad, USA

January 2013-June 2013

California, Irvine, USA

July 2013-December 2014

Don't Waste Time ... 180 days to serve here in California Irvine Mission

Lets see, this week has been a pretty good one, but again still pretty crazy.

the craziest thing was I got a call Thursday night saying I was going to be having an interview with President Ellis on Friday at three. Well that is all fine and dandy, I had a doctors appointment with the Foot lady Nahid at 10:45 so the plan turned into spend the whole day in San Clemente to do our weekly planning until we came back from the interview. Well, on our way from Mission Viejo to the Stake Center in San Clemente we stopped at the Rubalcava's Elder Byrd and I both served in Dana Point. So we stopped by and ended up having lunch there with Sister Rubalcava and her daughter, it was really fun. So after that we got to the stake center at around 2:30 and we heard President Ellis was a little bit behind in his interview schedule. Well, it got to be about 3:30, and 5 other people who were supposed to go after me had set lessons and so they needed to go ahead of me, by the time all of them were done it was 6:00 in the night time and President Ellis had to do a baptismal interview that was supposed to start at 5:30. So he did that one until 7:00, did the interview of the other person in front of me, until 8:00, then he met with me from 8:00 until 9:15. We then had to take the other elders that were there a ride back home, then we had to stop somewhere to pick something up from some other missionaries in Mission Viejo. We ended up getting home around 10:30, so insane!!!  So that was our Friday, ended up being so insane, out of the newport stake for about 12 hours haha!!! (not appropriate!) its all about being a missionary, The Life and Times of a Missionary - hurry up and WAIT!

Last P-Day we made our district T-Shirts. That is what mine looks like as you look at the pictures. They are pretty sweet, they turned out really great.

Other than that not to much to mention from the week. Had a good exchange with Elder McReynolds who is my zone leader. I will send some pictures from the Marshallese dinner party we had while on exchanges it was insane but it was so much fun.

Today the mission is doing a mission basketball tournament, each stake put together two teams of 6 an A and B team so 14 teams in total and today it is tournament day with double elimination to win the tournament, it should be super fun, I of course am not playing because I suck at playing basketball, but I am going to attempt the coaching side of it. We shall see how that goes. 

Anyways, that is all. Keep up the good work you all do. I really do appreciate all you do for me. I love you so much and thank you again for everything. Hope the house stuff is going great. 

SUU got my scholarship acceptance and deferment request so I am all set to go, just need to pay the commitment fee coming up in the next couple months, after I hear back from BYU we shall decide what will need to happen. But I'm 85% sure SUU is where I should go.  


Have a great week, love you so much and hope your week goes great!!!!:)

"Fourth Floor Last Door"

Elder Amric Zane Sobczak

California, Carlsbad, USA

January 2013-June 2013

California, Irvine, USA

July 2013-December 2014

Easter Promptings Miracles and Traction

So we had a pretty good week out here in the good ole' California Irvine Mission. The main cool thing was that Elder Neil L Anderson came and talked to all of us and then on Sunday for Easter he came to our stake and did a Stake Conference. It was awesome. Some Highlights of his and others from the weekend talks are as follows:

• We are the Salt of the Earth. Salt is put into to bread to raise the bread, we are sent out to "Raise the Faith." I thought that was a really good way to look at that because I have always looked at that phrase as a negative, this is from Elder Anderson.

• Sometimes the Lord knows we have the Faith to be healed and have Faith in Christ to heal us, but sometimes what is being tested is our "Faith to Endure." How well will we continue to be faithful and obedient when we are not seeing the outcome right off the bat of doing the good things. I have determined that that is what is being tested with me right now. Will I continue to do what needs to be done even when nothing seems to be happening. Obviously tweak things that need to but ultimately will I stay obedient or will I say it doesn't matter. So that was really cool, that thought came from our stake president.

• We need to be more thinking of ways to forgive the people around us. I mean come on, Christ forgave the people that were killing Him and the people that were next to him on the cross. This came from Sister Haney I believe, wife of area seventy

• Again, Apostles have seen the Resurrected Christ. Elder Anderson read President Packer's testimony from last conference and even now, I just feel the Spirit confirm to me the truthfulness of His words, his added testimony to that of Joseph Smith. Elder Anderson then said, "I add my witness, I am His Witness, He Lives, I am His Special Witness." Oh man the spirit that was there when He said that, Oh man even now it gives me the chills.

• Elder Anderson talked about all the places he has been and will be going to and basically rebuked the whole stake with out them even realizing it, it was so subtle. He basically said that the people in third world countries are much happier because they are humble. Again I don't have the exact quote but it was much more subtle than what I just said.

Those are the things I remember. It was an awesome Easter Weekend. On Wednesday night right before I went to bed I felt prompted to start a 24 hour fast for better guidance and strength in "finding" and to know how to stay more consecrated. We had Zone Training Thursday and Elder Campbell was sitting next to me, he is another DL in the Zone. He was talking about how he just started a 40 day fast, where you give up a list of like 10 things for 40 days, in the hopes to become more consecrated and become more open to the spirit. I was like; "Oh man sweet I will do it with you". He was like; "you have to start it with a 24 hour fast". I was like; "I already am, I felt prompted to start last night". He was like; "No way, I was trying to find a companion to do it with because mine isn't".  So it was cool to see how following promptings will end up helping someone as well as helping yourself. You have to follow the prompting as they come into your mind.   Don't ever pass up an opportunity to be guided by the spirit.

Nothing really else to mention. Except Monday after emailing we saw Kobe Bryant and Fashion Island, a mall here in Newport Beach. He was getting his Five Guys. Pretty cool. So lets see....Oh so I am officially accepted to SUU for Spring 2015. I also applied for the WUE scholarship, the lady over new freshman scholarships told me to follow up in October to see if I am being considered for the scholarship. Still waiting to hear back from BYU so we shall see how that works out. Really would love to go to either one,  so we shall see what happens???

Nothing else to mention. Transfer is going good, already week 4 cannot believe it. Hope all is going well, the loneliness is kind of going away, my comp just goes to bed super early so I never know what to do from 9:30 to 10:30, but I do have stuff to do. But it is going better so I am doing all good. Being on a mission is hard in alot of different ways, even though it is so awesome too.

Love you all so much Hope everything is going well. I have a package to send, but it can wait until I have a new address to send it too. Love you all so much, Thank you for everything you do. 

Oh quick side note, could you send me my cleats? The orange/yellow ones I wore in rugby? we do a lot of outside sport (soccer rugby ultimate Frisbee) so it would be nice to have some traction.Love you all so much keep up awesome work!

 Love you all so much :)

-- 

"Fourth Floor Last Door"

Elder Amric Zane Sobczak

California, Carlsbad, USA

January 2013-June 2013

California, Irvine, USA

July 2013-December 2014

Should you Serve at 18 or 19?

Flat Amric watches with the Parents!

So the SEAHAWKS WON!!!!!! Yes I am so excited to hear about that. Like I said there is a family in the ward the whom I have gotten pretty close with. They are for sure the coolest family!  Their daughter got baptized on Saturday which we were lucky enough to attend. Afterwards they invited us over for dinner with friends and family and actually hit it up pretty good with some friends who live outside of the area but in Mission Viejo. Super cool family that within the next few months I am sure will look into the Gospel. Anyways, to make this story short, Yesterday we did not have a dinner which sucks, especially on Sunday...So after sacrament we talked to this mom and asked if we could swing by and pick up leftovers from Saturday night and she said sure thing. Now, here was the obedience I walk in and guess what is happening? All of them decked out in Seahawks gear watching the game, it was so hard, literally the game was 10 feet away and I did not watch it haha GAHHH SO close haha. Anyways, their son who is 14 kept me updated through out the night so I felt as if I was watching for sure. Seeing as it was a blow out I am not to bummed I missed the game. That is what this new digital age is for right? Re runs and highlights???

 

Anyways...as far as the work, my companionship is difficult. They have figured out that it is 2 on 1 because One hates his mission and has no desire to be out here but refuses to go home but refuses to be obedient no matter what anyone says to him. The other companion is finding it easier to side with that one than with me and it makes it where I am doing about 85 to 90 percent of the work. The plan hopefully is that they can stay together and either shape up or ship out.  Either the one will just continue to hate the mission, with a companion that isn't a hard worker and obedient and decide home is the best option for him. 

Terrible to say but I hate what the church culture does to us, BUT the 18 year old change is the EXCEPTION not the rule. Pray about when you should go.  It is so irritating, I have seen so many 18 year olds come out who are just not ready at all to live the standards one must live as a missionary.  So two weeks left, Zone Leaders told me to call or text them anytime I need to vent or talk to someone who is not my companion so that should make things a little easier.

Consider this taught by JSmith; "a religion that does not require the sacrifice of all things never has power sufficient to produce the faith necessary unto life and salvation; for, from the first existence of man, the faith necessary unto the enjoyment of life and salvation never could be obtained without the sacrifice of all earthly things." taken from Lectures On Faith

Oh I have a Family History Miracle...

So Irie (Trie) Asleson my Great Grandfather, Pops he is your Grandfather. I have been watching his name for the past year. So I was looking at the line on Wednesday and found something. Asleson and guess what??!! I found him! Anyways that was a cool miracle I found and am so stoked to continue to do that work as I move forward.  

Anyways not to much else to report on. Thank you for all you all do and the prayers and fasting you have done.  We have gotten a little rain off and on the past week but no where near what we need, through all the fasting and praying though we will see miracles happen. Thank you family for all you do - hey Ayris you look so happy and I am happy for you. Keep up the awesome work :) Dad thank you and just know everything will work out the way it needs to and we are in Washington for a reason.  Mom...Keep being you, you rock and you mean a lot to me. 

I love you all so much and cannot wait to hear from you again!!  I love letters and packages!!!!