Elder (Jared) Sedlacek's first p-day email: "I feel like I am sinning if I am not doing anything haha!"

Well, the first thing I noticed about Elder Jared's emails is that he did the opposite of his brother. Jake always wrote the most detail about his week in his email to his Dad. Elder Jared wrote a small paragraph to his Dad, but saved all the details for Mom. :) 

Thanks Dad,

I am having a good time here. The spirit here is amazing as you said. It's amazing how we can receive inspiration on what to say when we are teaching the lessons with investigators. Read Mom's email and you will hear all about it.

 

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Hi Mom!

Thanks for sending the family pics, is that all of them? They look good. Thanks for sending my meds. 

 

My companion is Elder Neilson. He is a cowboy  from Hurricane, Utah. He has the whole cowboy accent and all haha. He loves hunting and outdoors stuff just like me. We get along pretty well. 

 

We are teaching three "investigators", 1 on Skype named Hailey, and our teacher acting as an investigator, and a guy named Andrew. I am pretty sure that Hailey and Andrew are members, but they don't tell you if they are or not so who knows? Andrew is a golden investigator. By the second lesson we had taught him to pray and he has been reading the Book of Mormon a lot. We are going to ask him to be baptized next time on Saturday. Hailey we don't really teach anymore because of schedule conflicts and because we are leaving here on Monday morning. She didn't go as well, we couldn't really figure out her needs, so she was hard to teach. Ashley is our teacher and the first lesson went okay until we asked her to be baptized. Of course we botched it and she said no because she is baptized and didn't want to be baptized again. We couldn't think of what to say and ended the lesson. We made up for it, though, and she is now progressing. We will teach her two more times and we plan on asking her to be baptized again. 

 

Tell Nicole and Jeff their "from the journal of Jeff" idea is really good and to keep it up, I like it.

 

I love my district here, they are so awesome. We are like family now practically. We all eat together and everything. We are all going to Cincinnati, except for the one set of sisters and our district leader, Elder Downs and Elder Hanks are going to the Georgia Macon mission. We will miss them. My comp and I sleep in a room with all Spanish-speaking Elders and they are great guys! They follow the rules well and they are very funny hahaha. We will miss them, too. It's weird how all the Elders that come before us seem so much older than us, but they are actually our same age hahaha.

 

My camera is not working. Every time I try to take a picture there is a little yellow flashing light on it and then it turns off. It has full battery and the cards are empty so I don't know what to do. I got some pics though before it started to not work anymore, but just a few. I will send them another time, I forgot to grab the card so I could send them. Some of the other Elders will send pics of us at the temple and such. We went to the temple today and it was awesome. 

 

Sundays and p-days are the best here. You can relax while learning and being productive. I feel like I am sinning if I am not doing anything! haha. The days are really long and the weeks are short just like you said. the first full day I was here was the worst though, I was homesick and couldn't focus, but now I am fine. I love it here, it's fun to me haha. The classes kind of suck though, being 3 hours long with at least two of those a day. Gym time really makes up for it though. You can really let off some steam in there and it feels really nice to actually move for once.

 

I can't wait to get into the actual field though, it will be nice not to have super long classes and to teach real investigators. I have seen a lot of my friends here, even Jake Wilkinson who left in June. So did you guys cry all the way home or what? Don't lie to me. 

 

We are singing in the MTC chior with the National Tribute Band. Look up "John's Song" and " I am born." We are singing those with them this Sunday evening. We will fly out on Monday morning. We are leaving here at 4:30 in the morning! And fly out at 9:40 am. So expect a call in between those times haha. You best believe you will get a call haha. I will sleep the whole flight; I am pretty tired! How is everyone doing?

 

Well, I got to go now. I will talk to you more on Monday. Be ready to get a call, I am guessing most likely around 6am maybe a little later. Thanks for all that you do, I love you guys.

 

Being transferred teaches me to be patient with myself.

Emails from Monday, March 30th. 

Hey Mama,

I am doing great! I will be emailing from Milton-Freewater about this time, I would suspect. We email from the church clerk's office because there is literally nowhere else haha. Milton is pretty dang small hahaha. It's really weird for me to be going from a place the size of Kennewick to here. It was honestly kinda of a culture shock, but the people here seem to be pretty nice. 

Thanks for sending me a package! Glad the box got to you guys all safe and sound. I really didn't want to lose the stuff in there. Yep, the temple envelope was made by Mama Splatts. She is awesome! I loved living in her house. It's like the coveted spot in the whole mission, and I got to spend 6 months there. Lucky me huh?

Yep, I wore down those shoes haha. Believe it or not I will have two more pairs of shoes like that when I get home. I have a really nice pair of new shoes that I picked up at goodwill in Kennewick that I will wear @ home.

I didn't remember that Elder J served here a while ago, but now that you mention it I do remember him saying that he served here.

I am DL here over lots of sisters haha. I have 6 sisters, and three other Elders in my district. It's been really fun though, because they are all good missionaries. I am really looking forward to serving them this transfer! I really love to feel the love the Savior has for all his children, including missionaries in my district, so any chance I have to feel more of the Savior's love, it's amazing!

Elder G is a really great missionary. He is super humble and willing to learn. He is just awesome! Willing to work hard and everything. He doesn't really know much about what to do and all that, so it's kinda like I am training him at the moment, but it's good. If I get to help him like that, it's fine with me. I remember when I got Elder R, he was kinda the same way. He didn't have that much confidence, but by the end of our companionship he was doing GREAT! It's nice to help the younger missionaries out. I really enjoy it.

So I live in an apartment with us and 2 Spanish-speaking Elders. It's a pretty nice place. I was kinda nervous when I found out it was a four-man but it's turned out really awesome! They are all great missionaries!

Oregon is super weird haha. Just a dumb law they have is that we can't pump our own gas. They have people that do it for you. You can't even get out of the car to help them. But the good news is that I AM IN A CAR!!!!! It's super nice to finally be back in a driving area haha. It's been a long time. It had been such a long time since I had drove last that it was weird driving again but I am used to it now. We have the car to ourselves. The Elders we live with walk. They have a tiny area.

It is different to be in Oregon but it seems really nice. My area covers some other small towns, like Athena. We also have a small town of Weston. My district covers Pendleton, too, so I went down there this week to do a baptism interview. That looks like a cool place.

 Utes lost!!!! Oh no!!!!

Whaz up Dad,

I am doing great! I have really liked Milton-Freewater so far. It's a pretty nice place. The people here are super. It's just a typical small town environment I am sure I will have the chance to meet lots of interesting people.

The ward is really really huge, but a big percentage don't come. President Ware always tells me to go catch the ward on fire whenever I get transferred, so that's what I am trying to do. I fasted yesterday to know what to do, and I felt like we needed to have our Bishop study Preach My Gospel ch 13. So he is going to read over that and we are going to have a discussion of how to apply it to the ward. It's amazing how much I have learned on my mission. I have learned what helps and what doesn't, so I am just doing what I know worked, and we will see how things improve. I would assume this ward will be my dying area so I'm going to make the best of it!

The teaching pool here is alright. We do have an on-date for baptism who is super cool. His name is _____. He's a senior in high school, and is pretty interested in being baptized. He just struggles with coming to church. He is on date for the 25th of April so pray that he can hit that date! I will let you know more about the teaching pool when I know more.

One thing I love about being transferred is that it teaches me to be patient with myself. It's kinda frustrating for me to not know where I am or who so-and-so is, so it's good to just re-focus myself and work on where I know I can improve.

With being called to DL again, I am really realizing the importance of Christ-like love. I mentioned it in my email to mom, but I really love feeling the love of the Savior for all of his children. Being able to serve as a DL just enables me to feel that even more. It's going to be fun.

We had a cool experience yesterday that reminded me of how God leads us to people who are prepared.

So we were in Milton-Freewater and were just trying by people who the missionaries had taught before, and inviting them to take the discussions again. All of a sudden I remembered that we had a referral for a guy way out in a small town called Athena. It's about a 20 min drive to there, and so we went out there to contact that referral. When we got there, the guy that we had wanted to see was outside so we started talking to him. Turns out he wasn't wanting to talk to the missionaries personally, but he intended for us to come up and visit his friend who has been asking about the missionaries. I thought that was kinda interesting, but he gave us his friend's information, and we went to find him since we had already driven up there. When we got to the other guy's house, he wasn't home, but right when we knocked on the door his neighbor pulled up in a car. We started talking to her because that's what we do--we talk to everyone. Turns out she had never seen missionaries before and was interested in learning more about our religion. How cool is that?!?! We have an appointnment with her this Friday so I really hope it goes well. We really need some more YSA investigators, and that is what she would be. I'm super excited for it.

The name of the sister who brought you my package was Sister N. She just lived down the street from us and had asked me if I had anything to send home, so I put together the package of stuff I had inherited. Glad it got home safe. Yea you can bet that I got every last buck out of those shoes that I could. I wore them until they hurt my ankles to walk in them haha. The giant Rubiks cube I can't solve. It's pretty dang hard. It is fun to play with though. I just didn't have room for it, but I wanted to keep it. Another Elder gave it to me when I taught him how to solve the regular one. It's just something that I try to do with my comps. Teach them how to solve a Rubiks cube. I have been pretty good at it too.

It's too bad that the Utes couldn't pull off the win against Duke. I was hoping they would be able to do it. I knew it was going to be tough though. That's exciting that the Jazz are winning now. I was hoping that would happen sooner rather than later.

Good job on work stuff Dadio. Sounds like things are going super well right now.

Sarah driving? Sounds like I need to be praying for the innocent people of Bountiful Utah. haha.

I like your thought on the what and why Dad. Ironically enough, I was thinking about that same thing but only with my investigators. Lots of missionaries get caught up in teaching the what about everything. Over the course of my mission, I have come to realize that it's not the what that is important in the end. It's all about the why. If an investigator understands why we go to church every week, the simple fact of them possibly not wanting to go to church every week isn't going to matter if they truly understand the doctrine behind it. It's really something that Elder Arnold stressed when he visited the mission. Teaching doctrine (the why), and letting the Spirit teach the what. It's pretty cool how it works out like that.

I know that the gospel is true. It is so amazing how it applies to our lives. It makes me SOOOOOOO happy just thinking about it. I really do have such a love for the gospel. I am super pumped to listen to President  Monson this weekend and all the other general authorities. It's going to be SWEET! I know this church is true. I know the Lord loves his children in Washington and Oregon!!!!! It's amazing to feel it. I know Christ lives. I know our Heavenly Father loves and cares for us as his children.

I love you guys! You guys do so much for me. I hope that the vacation down south will be a blast for you guys. I'm sure it will be! 

Love ya Dadio, and all you other hooligans,

-Elder Jake Sedlacek

It's all good.

Right about 11 am MST, I got my very first Monday email! It was fun to email back and forth, because it's almost like talking to him in person. At least, it's as good as I'm going to get at this point in time. :)

Elder Sed: What's up mama? I can email back and forth for about a half hour if you want.

Mom: I'm so happy to hear from you! Tell me everything! :)

Elder Sed: It will be cool to be up here once college starts. Right now there really isn't a lot of people who want to listen. That has been kinda hard. It's all good though. I do need stuff from home. I really need some snacks since I don't have a big budget. I also would like that spiral bound book on the piano with the doctrine of Christ lesson plans in it, a calendar with cool pics like hunting, something to put flavor in my water because tap water is yucky up here, a leatherman knife, and some stuff for my face because I am getting some acne from all the sweating! I don't know if there is anything else but I would appreciate that stuff. Things are good up here but kinda hard. We have 11 investigators that we are teaching, but it is hard to get hold of them. They always have something else it seems. There is an investigator named Jim who we are teaching that I told you about in a letter, but he is going to quit smoking so he can be baptized. He is the most promising one that I have met here so far. Things will get better once school starts. Keep sending me emails and letters. It is what keeps me going haha--literally. I love you guys.

Mom: We love you too! How are you getting along with Elder Rasmussen?

Elder Sed: I like my trainer but he is the exact opposite of me, but we do get along. I have learned some stuff from him which is good. Thank you for all you do for me. You're an awesome parent, same with Dad.

Mom: You are an awesome son! I met a mom in the mission moms group whose son is Elder Parker. I think he is one of the other Elders in your apartment.

Elder Sed: I do live with Elder Parker. He is pretty funny. We live in an apartment with 4 Elders. It's a fun time. We have dinner provided for us most every night. I miss your cooking, though. Some of these small town women don't know how to cook haha! I do have to buy food for breakfast and lunch but my budget isn't that big so can you send me some snacks? I really need some of those.

Mom: What are you going to do for p-day today? Do you have a car?

Elder Sed: We are going to play basketball for p-day. We are in a car area, but with only one car for two companionships so we walk a TON. I don't get to drive yet which kinda stinks. Elder R is not the best driver. I swear I might get killed sometimes haha. He grew up in the country so he isn't used to driving in a city-ish area. We really don't have much in common, but we get along. It would suck if we didn't! Some of the days up here are a struggle and get pretty hard, so I am thankful for your prayers. It means a lot.

Mom: Well, just look for the things you do have common--the biggest one is you have the same goals--finding people to teach! And you are a good cook, so maybe the women need some lessons in cooking. :)

Elder Sed: I wish I could do more cooking up here, but we are very busy all the time so it's hard to find time to do that. I like to cook good food. :) Food is yummy.

Mom: Two families in the ward gave you money this week. I put it in your fund.

Elder Sed: Sweet! Tell them thanks. Our neighbors are awesome!

Mom: We are so PROUD of you! Keep up the good work. There has been a great feeling of unity and peace in our home as we've been supporting you.

Elder Sed: Keep writing letters and emails. I save all the letters. They are a great support. You guys are awesome I miss you all a lot. You are a huge support system to me. I love all you guys so much.

Mom: We love you tons! Thanks for your example to us. Have a great week!

Elder Sed: Thank you Mama! You have a great week too. Tell everyone I love them, and thanks for all they do.