It's Kinda Hot, Though

 นรกสวัสดี HELLo! 

IT'S HOT. The Pacific Northwest is usually a pretty temperate spot. This week? Not so much. 3 straight days in the hundreds, and today is supposed to be 116?!?! Yikes. Despite that, I had a fun week here in Orting.

PIONEER CHILDREN

While we were trying to stop by members, we accidentally ran into one Doc Cleland. He was the first person to walk the mormon trail in similar conditions to the pioneers pushing a handcart. He shared his experiences with us and it was amazing. He wrote a book called "Faith Greater than Pain" if you're interested in that story!

SATAN'S ARMPIT

While we were out in the heat, we tried a bunch of different things. Tried park finding, trail finding, and even just going to member's to try to set stuff up with them. There was a lot of sweat. There weren't very many people outside and I don't especially blame them haha. We did find a weekly Bible study in the park that we'll be joining next week! Being invited into houses was an amazing experience. Air conditioning is a revelation.

LAST THINGS LAST

- We found a friendly deer, so naturally we taught it the restoration. It was more receptive than most of the people out here, to be honest.

- Our friend Steve gave us some giant heads of broccoli and cauliflower.

- I got catcalled for the first time in a while. I've still got it, I guess. 😂

- Take it from an expert on all things related to myself. I love you!

เอ็ลเดอร์ ยังน่ารัก  (Elder is still cute)

Elder Barrett

Dad to the Bone

 สวัสดีครับ Hello!

Welcome back to your weekly subscription of my life. Oddly, I haven't been getting any subscription checks in the mail. But besides that, I've had an awesome week! Lots of exciting news, interesting experiences, and strange interactions. What more could a missionary hope for?

GOOD NEWS! FINALLY SOME GOOD NEWS!

I became a trainer this week!! On Tuesday, Elder Stucki came into the mission, so I get to train him. He's a legend, we're having a great time in our new Orting trio😂 Being a trainer is an awesome experience. It's weird, because suddenly I realized that I do, in fact have a lot of missionary skills. I didn't think I was a bad missionary or anything, but I have a calmness and confidence about myself talking to total strangers and it took me until now to really notice it. Pretty cool to be able to step back and see the things a mission can teach you without even noticing it. Maybe it's just God giving me a hand now that I have to train or something.

SOME PEOPLE

Let me share with you some of the interactions I had this last week, because there were some very memorable ones:

- Mandy is a neighbor of one of our members. She was pretty drunk and outside of the bar but she was way excited to talk to us. While we were talking, the Tacoma Spanish Elders are coming down the street, so there were suddenly just 5 missionaries talking to this one drunk lady. We took a picture, got her number, and she said she'd feed us whenever!

- While we were out tracting, we met a psychic/medium who was very adamant about not being a witch and not a devil worshiper because there is no devil. Riiiiight. She talked for like 30 minutes straight about how she was "called" by the spirit to be a medium and one she was finished, she said, "I guess I'm converting you today!" That's the kind of thing that keeps tracting interesting.

- We said hi to someone across the street and he immediately invited us over for some water. He talked to us about how he has all of the standard works in his dresser and how his son is a member in Arkansas. He was elect... but lived in Graham which is definitely outside of our mission boundaries. Very cool guy, though.

BY THE SWEAT OF OUR BROW

We had a LOT of service this week. We helped out in that same backyard. Cutting ivy, clearing out the ground, ripping out tree stumps, and doing just anything we could. We also stopped by a member's house to find them with a dump truck of manure in the front yard. Naturally, we helped them spread it, even in our white shirts and dress shoes, sorry mom.

LAST THINGS LAST

- Kubb is the greatest yard game.

- I got to put up some shots with Elder Saunders, the BYU commit Thursday morning. I may or may not have outshot him, I'll leave that up to your imagination.

- Happy birthday and Father's Day to the greatest Dad ever, Jeff Barrett.

- I love free stuff on the side of the road, but it's nothing compared to how much I love you!

เอ็ลเดอร์ เป็นบิดาแล้ว (Elder is now a father.)

Elder Barrett 

Trainer Assignment

 

 

Jun 15, 2021 

Dear Elder Calvin Barrett,

Congratulations on your assignment to serve as a trainer.  When I make transfers each month, I prayerfully begin by determining which missionaries I will trust with the sacred stewardship to train new missionaries.  Please know that your assignment came as the result of earnest prayer.  Your assignment is evidence of the confidence Heavenly Father has in you.

The time you spend with this companion will have an enormous influence on their mission, for better or for worse.  New missionaries learn from what their trainers say and do.

• If you exercise faith and look for miracles and work with a sense of urgency borne of love, they will too.  But if you simply go through the motions and obey the rules half-heartedly and begrudgingly, they probably will too.

• If you get up on time, they probably will too.  But, if you sleep in, they will likely sleep in.

• If you carefully follow the rules set forth in sections 2.4 – 2.7 and 3 of the Missionary Handbook and obey mission rules with exactness, your companion likely will too.  But, if your commitment to them is casual, your companion’s commitment probably will be too.

• If you look for ways to contact, teach, and help as many people as possible and as effectively as possible, your companion probably will too.  But, if you look for excuses not to work and get out late, and come home early, and linger longer than necessary after meetings and interviews, and stay in if you have a bit of a headache, your companion probably will too.

• If you become a builder of wards who helps establish the Church in a lasting way—a missionary who helps retain new converts, rescues less active members, and prepares people not just for baptism but for eternal life—your companion will likely catch that vision.  But, if you see people simply as walking baptismal statistics, your companion likely will too.

In summary, your companion will develop habits and attitudes with you that will shape the rest of their mission.  Thus, as Paul admonished Timothy, “be thou an example of the believers, in word, in conversation, in charity, in spirit, in faith, in purity” (1 Timothy 4:12).

If you feel that your responsibility is more than you can fulfill on your own, you are right.  Only as you turn to Heavenly Father and plead for his guidance can you truly fulfill this important assignment. (Please read President Eyring’s masterful talk, “Rise to the Call” for more thoughts along these lines.)

The Lord has also provided you with invaluable resources to help you fulfill your responsibility.  In particular, please be diligent and faithful every day in using the marvelous resource the Church has provided you and your companion: In-Field Training for New Missionaries: The First 12 Weeks.  You may be tempted to gloss over portions or skip the role plays, but as you humbly use this manual it will be a great blessing to your companion and you.  It is also critical that you help your companion become intimately familiar with the prophetic counsel contained in the Missionary Handbook and that they study Preach My Gospel each day.

Don’t worry that you may not know the answer to every question and have not mastered every teaching and finding technique taught in Preach My Gospel.  In some ways, it will help your companion to see you not as a missionary who thinks he or she has arrived and already learned all there is to know, but as a missionary who is constantly evaluating his or her work and seeking to improve regularly, as described on page vii of Preach My Gospel.

I invite you to pray with all the energy of your heart for the pure love of Christ for your companion.  As you help your companion become the kind of missionary described on pages 11 and 12 of Preach My Gospel, you may feel frustrated or even irritated when they occasionally fall short.  At such times, it is good to remember President Thomas S. Monson’s wise counsel, “We must develop the capacity to see men [and women] not as they are at present but as they may become.”  Such vision will help you lift your companion with love, treating them with all the respect that is due the representative of Jesus Christ that they are.

May the Lord bless you in this sacred assignment.

Gratefully,

Larry K. Beardall
President
Washington Seattle Mission 

Invading the Soldier's Home

 สวัสดีครับ Hello!

Another week is in the books! It was a fun one, too! We got to see some amazing views, accidentally came face to face with a tank, became a (still unpaid) professional landscaper, and actually taught an awesome lesson!

THE CARBON

We went on a walk with a recent convert this week. He showed us the coolest trail right behind his house along the Carbon River. It was so beautiful. It was exactly what I envision when I think of the Pacific Northwest. All it took was a year of living in it, right? Well, we realized at the end of the walk, we had to make it to the other end of Orting in -10 minutes to be on time for the missionary coordination meeting. So we booked it across town. We were on foot, no car, so we had to sprint it. Elder Hagler struggled a bit, but we made it before it was wayyyyy too late haha. 

INFILTRATION 

We had a planned member visit with Brother Brown on Wednesday. We didn't have his address in our area book, but member tools had it, so we plugged it into Google Maps and took off. We wound up at the Soldier's Home in town. We pulled up to the gate and there was a guard post. I rolled down the window and said, "are we good to come in?" He said, "sure!... wait do you live here?" "No, were visiting a friend." "Ok yeah sure, head on in!" As we were driving around, there were cannons and tanks all over the place and a lot of old buildings. I was hoping that the weapons weren't a security measure, because we definitely could've been taken out in a matter of seconds. Turns out, it was the wrong Brother Brown and this one was living in the care unit. We figured it would be best to not bother him and we just headed to our next member lesson. It was pretty awkward driving right back out past the guard post 5 minutes after driving in, but luckily he didn't ask any questions.

THE CUTEST SCRIPTURE 

Genesis 29:20 says, "And Jacob served seven years for Rachel; and they seemed unto him but a few days, for the love he had to her." First of all, that's pretty adorable. Jacob, what a guy. But also, it brings up a very important point. When you're working hard, it can be a grind. But when you're doing it for a good reason, something you're passionate about, it can be a quick yet rewarding experience. Serving a mission can feel like 7 years. It can also feel like just a few days. I just need to remember what I'm serving for, and it'll blow by. Same thing with any of you out there! Whenever you're out weeding the flowerbeds or up late finishing a paper that you pushed off so you could watch Loki, remember who, why, or what you're working for and it'll be a rewarding and enjoyable experience!

LAST THINGS LAST

- Ray is a cool dude, we had an awesome conversation about the Plan of Salvation. He doesn't believe in the Trinity or that it's just Heaven or Hell.

- My favorite English student is coming back to the states... in october when I'll be home already.

- I tried pho for the first time this week. Sorry, Vietnam, but Thai food has you beat easily.

- We finally have short shorts running weather! Break em out, everyone!

- Whether you're a big cereal enthusiast, or lactose intolerant, I love you!!

เอ็ลเดอร์ ตัดต้นไม้ (Elder cut down trees.)

Elder Barrett

Pioneer Children Sang as They Walked...

 ...but my feet are screaming!!!

เฮลโล Hello!

First week of the transfer! And we got a lot done! My new companion is Elder Hagler, he's from Oregon. Made quite the journey to get to Washington haha. We're working hard, and my daily steps are ridiculously high.

OH GOOD

On the way to transfers, Elder Nye told me that the car would have enough gas to at least get us back to Orting. False. We got stuck in Sumner on the way home and had to wait an hour and a half for roadside assistance. So that was a great way to start the transfer. I've always seen people off on the side of the highway and thought to myself, "that must suck!" Well, I can tell you firsthand that it does, indeed, suck.

2 YEARS OF COMMUNITY SERVICE

We did a TON of service this week. Missionaries were in high demand, I guess! Weeding, cutting through a giant patch of blackberry bushes, ripping out tree stumps, cutting off tree limbs, all of that and more! It was a good time, but I'll tell you what, when we have a lot of physical labor to do as well as getting back into running shape, our bodies make strong requests for 20 minute naps. I haven't been this physically exhausted in a very long time, but it's been really rewarding!

THE MEMBERS ARE THE BEST

We have some awesome members in the Orting ward. We've been trying to get into a lot of their houses this week for quick visits and lessons. Only a few have been quick haha. We got to see the Woods, who showed off their gun and knife collection which is, in a word, expansive. We also got to teach a family about the history of the Articles of Faith! I was silently stressing out, because I had no idea how to share about the history of a document to 2-8 year old kids, but it went really well! We got to see a lot of members and I'm hoping that we can keep up with that in the coming weeks.

LAST THINGS LAST

- A random lady offered to give us water whenever we're in the area. Her name? Britta, of course!

- I can still speak Thai, even though I was worried about how I was going to explain the significance of some gospel principles on a whim during an english class. It went well! The gift of tongues isn't a temporary thing, as long as you keep working for it!

- Never forget what I'm about to say, pay careful attention: I love you!

เอ็ลเดอร์ เดินไปทุกที่เลย (Elder walked everywhere.)

Elder Barrett