Training Elder Hohmann

We had a pretty good week over here in Laguna Hills. Tuesday brought the most change seeing as that was the day that we picked up our greenie from the mission office. His name is Elder Hohmann, he is from Tooele, Utah, he graduated high school in June and he plans to go to UVU as a culinary major after his mission. Its been interesting getting used to a third companion again and its been fun showing him the ropes and helping him adjust to missionary life. Its pretty entertaining to see how tired he gets by the end of the day and to remember when I was absolutely exhausted to the point where I couldn't stay awake in the car. I'm still always tired but somehow my body has to realize that it still needs to function even when it doesnt want to and I can stay awake through most everything. It will be fun to work with Elder Hohmann while we are companions and then to watch him keep learning and growing as a missionary over the first year of his mission.

At the same time that transfer meeting was exciting while picking up our "son" it was also sad because I had to say goodbye to my trainer since he finished his mission this week. I'm so glad to have been able to learn from Elder Nielsen and to have started my mission out with somebody who is as great of an example as he is. One of the best things about missions is definitely the lifelong friendships that you develop.

We spent a lot of time this week contacting and tracting to find new people to teach and had some fun and interesting experiences while doing that. We had one man yell at us for interrupting his viewing the democratic national convention, another guy tried to tell us we weren't allowed to knock on his door without solicitors licenses so I promptly pulled out my ministerial certificate and upon seeing it he quickly began apologizing and let us know how much he appreciated what we do for God.The coolest person we talked to though was this mom and her little daughter Ashley. When we first talked to the mom she let us know that she goes to Saddleback Church, a huge born-again Christian church that teaches anti-mormon stuff, but when we told her more about the Book of Mormon she was a little more nice and interested. We told her we would love to share more with her and she told us we could but wouldn't give us her address, which is pretty typical, but before we left she told Ashley to sing for us. Ashley turn four this month but she sang "You Raise Me Up" perfectly and it was probably one of the cutest things I have ever seen in my life and then when we were walking away Ashley waved goodbye and said "see you later." We laughed about and then didn't think much of it but then a couple days later we were in the same area and ran into Ashley and her mom again and had the chance to talk with them more and Ashley's mom told us that Ashley kept asking her when "the boys in the white shirts" were going to come over. We talked more with her and told her we would love to visit them and then Ashley invited us to her birthday party and we told her mom that we would give her one of the Book of Mormon Stories  books (the one with the pictures) so that they could read it together. Hopefully something comes from this and the innocence of a young child can bless that family forever. 

We are continuing to work hard and do all that we need to despite the lack of results that we have been seeing lately. We are just going to carry on and know that we are doing our best and that Heavenly Father will bless when He knows we need it. On fast Sunday the ward is fasting for missionary work in the area and I have faith that we will see some pretty amazing miracles from that. Thank you all for your prayers and love in our behalf, they don't go unheard by God or unnoticed by us! Find somebody this week that you can share the gospel with, its easy, all you have to do is ask them a friend what they know about Mormons, or the Book of Mormon or anything like that and you can start a conversation and maybe even change their life!

Love

Elder Cheever