3-20-17

Hello everyone!

First off HAPPY (late) BIRTHDAY MOM! Love you!

Okay so this week was really good. Still getting over a bad cold but was still a good week. We still been working really hard here and it's been fun that's for sure! Nothing too crazy happened this week it's just been a good week.  Neena is getting baptized on the 25th which I am super pumped for! She had her interview this week and she did great even with me teasing her that she has to know every prophets name in the Book of Mormon haha.   It's so great to see her excited to be baptized! She keeps asking every male in our branch to be in the circle for the confirmation so it's going to be a packed circle! Can't wait for the 25th!
Oh and Larry is doing great! He's on fire! He reads 30 minutes everyday and discovered videos on the gospel library app and now he is watching those all the time! It's so amazing to see the change the gospel of Jesus Christ makes in people's lives! At church on Sunday I remember shaking his hand and thinking to myself this is a man who knows who truly know the Gospel is true. It's been great meeting with those two this week!
Oh one excited thing is I discovered the worst tasting thing on this planet! It's called Buckley's.
It's a Canadian cough medicine that is just the nastiest thing ever but wow  does it work! When people found out I had a cold here everyone wanted to watch me take Buckley's and I now know why! I have a funny video of me taking it I will try to send. Well that's all the crazy stuff this week. Today we fly to Juneau on a little bush plan for Zone Conference on Tuesday.

Well love you guys!


-Elder Barney


3-13-17


Hey guys!

So it's been one crazy week! It has been really cold up here for
awhile now and I got sick for about the last half of the week so
that's been a bummer. Although it's been a little rough we had a great
week! Man oh man I had one of the best days ever on Thursday! Larry
got baptized!!!! Oh it was so awesome to see him enter back into those
covenants! We have been working with him for a while now and it was
such a happy moment to see him baptized and confirmed and get the
priesthood back. He was a member years ago and rejoined so he got all
of that done back to back. With me being sick I asked him to use his
newly ordained priesthood by giving me a blessing and it was a pretty
special moment. One of the greatest things to see in this world is
someone right after they are baptized, they have this light that just
glows! Larry is not really into big crowds but after he got baptized
he was hugging everyone and shaking their hands. It was so great! On
Sunday it was even better. He bore his testimony and I was so proud of
him. Like I said not into big crowds but he bore one of the most
simple and most powerful testimonies I have ever heard. Hearing him
say the words "I know Joseph Smith was a prophet of God" was one of
the best moments of my life! I feel so lucky that this is my full time
calling to see people change through the Atonement of Christ. There is
a lot of highs and lows in missionary work but just one high is worth
all the lows!

That's really been my week but it's been pretty great! Next week we
fly out to Juneau for another Zone Conference! Well I love you guys
and wish you the best!


-Elder Barney

3-2-17


Hello everyone!

So this has been a pretty darn good week if I have to say so myself.
It was busy as usual but full of lots of great spiritual experiences.
To start off we had some different experiences as well. So Whitehorse
had this World Religion Conference were they had about 7 different
religions represented on a panel to do some questions and answers.
There was lots of different religions like buddhism, Muslim, Jewish,
and Christianity and they even had First Nations (like Eskimo). So
there was a wide variety of different religions. The Muslim faith put
this all together and lots of people came, I would say about 100 or
more. Our branch president was invited to say a few words although
someone else was representing Christianity. It was very interesting to
hear all the different views and truth each person talked about. One
thing I thought was interesting was that no one really mentioned Jesus
Christ until our branch president got up and spoke. It was great
because it shows people we are Christians. It was pretty funny because
for some reason my companion and I were volunteered to take pictures
and set up chairs and bring out food. We literally just came in and
sat at the back of the room and this Muslim guy instantly noticed who
we were and asked us to help out so for the next 2 and half hours we
were running around doing everything haha. It was great to get our
name out there and get some public exposure. So the next day we had a
meeting at the church and we show up and find that our branch
president offered some members of the Muslim faith to use our gym area
for their prayer circle thing. They weren't there long but it was
interesting to see. They really like us missionaries and really wanted
 to take a picture with us. I think it's an awesome picture haha! So
that was a very interesting experience that's for sure.

So for some really awesome spiritual experiences, we have a baptism coming up on Thursday. It's not a convert baptism it's a rebaptsim of a member who removed his name years ago. When I first got here he was suppose to get baptized but he had some problems come up with the Book of Mormon. We have been working with him ever since. I have bore my
testimony to him over a dozen times and tried to answer his concerns the best way I know how but he still just couldn't get past it. So earlier this week we were over visiting with him and testifying to him and I made a joke that we had a baptism coming up and we could throw him in while the font was full and he laughed and said sure, then it got quite. We just looked at him and said wait for real? And he said yes. He had been praying about what we said and got an answer to go to another church so one Sunday he did. He told us that as he sat there in another church the spirit told him how true the Mormon church is. It's kinda of a weird answer to a prayer but hey I'll take it. We met with the Branch President and got everything good to go for Thursday.  We are really excited! I have truly grown to love this man and am soooo excited to watch him enter back into the fold!  So another really amazing experience we had happened Saturday night.  So we had a dinner planed with some members and a potential investigator and the. We had appointments after. Then just before the dinner our plans for after called and canceled but I now know why, because we needed to spend some time teaching with potential investigator. So during dinner the lady says she is starting to have doubts that God is even real. We testified to her but she still had some questions. After the meal my companion and I both felt we needed to change our lesson plan and go a little different route. I was a little nervous because what we changed to was to combine about 4 different parts from 3 different lessons. It all went great! It was one of the most powerful lessons I have ever been a part of. At the end of the lesson we answered every single one of her questions and more all with scripture and the power of the Holy Ghost. During the lesson my companion invited her to be baptized but she declined but hat was okay because the spirit was still there. At the end of it all the member suggested watching the short restoration video. Oh my goodness the spirit filled the room!! After the video we asked what she thought and she said it was true! We gave her a soft commitment of baptism and she softly said yes but we will see. The best part was it started with her not believing in God to believing He appeared to Joseph Smith all thanks to the spirit! Man I love my job!!! A mission is the most amazing thing ever! I love this kind of experiences. It makes all the hard times sooo worth it! I want you all to know that God lives and he know you perfectly! I love you guys and hope you all
have a great week!

P.S. Love you grandma! You are in my prayers!

Elder Barney

2-27-17
Hey guys!

So another fun and exciting week in the great white North! So first off we made it safe back from Juneau. Oh first off last pday was awesome! It has been sooo long since I have had a pday with other missionaries! It was nice to actually play sports and have fun in a actually gym. Anyway the flight to Skagway was beautiful as always. I feel so lucky to be able to fly on those cool planes and see the sights I see! God is good!
So our drive back was a little frustrating. So we get up to the Canadian
border and the guy was a little rude and I may have argued with him just a little bit and  we got detained! So here we are two Mormon missionaries detained in the  guard shack in the middle of no where all because we didn't have the "right papers" and because the guy was a jerk. It was absolutely ridiculous! After about 45 min to an hour he finally let us on our way. It was pretty stupid if you ask me but that's okay because everyone is a child of God. So that was our fun little adventure there. Then later this week we had Rendezvous which is a Yukon holiday. It was sweet! The tiny town of Whitehorse exploded with lots of people just to see all the cool snow sculptures and fun activities. They do log throwing and axe throwing and stuff like that. It was lots of fun and they had some sweet sculptures. On Saturday we had a family come from Dawson City come down to baptize their 8 year old.  Also a senior couple from a year ago came up and they are awesome!



I love those guys and wish they were still here. All and all it has been a super fun week. I am really excited for Neena's baptism! She is sooo golden! After seeing the baptism on Saturday she was pumped to be baptized! Well I love you all miss you guys! Bye!

-Elder Barney