March 28, 2011: Eric's President's Letter (and response)

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: Eric Nelson
Date: Mon, Mar 28, 2011 at 11:26 AM
Subject: my last letter to the mission president
To: Kevin Nelson


This is my last letter to Pres Satterfield

Hello President Satterfield. How are you doing where you’re at? Here in the Kennesaw Mountain area we are doing fabulous. We did what we could last week; a lot of people were out of town for some reason. A few weeks ago Elder Fisher went on an exchange with the Powder Springs Elders and I was with Elder Fruean. We did a lot of work. And felt pretty accomplished at the end of our exchange. Last week we were on an exchange with the Lost Mountain Elders. I was with Elder Calcote and I learned a lot on how to become a better teacher. Sorry I am just telling you about them now, I didn’t know I was suppose to tell you about the exchanges until the other day. Yesterday and today I have been here in Kennesaw Mountain area with Elder Teulilo. He is an amazing missionary. Out of all the exchanges, he is the one that I have learned the most from. Every time he bears testimony, it invites the spirit because it is just so pure and sincere. We had a great time learning from each other. We had the spirit so strong with us last night when we were able to shed the spirit forth to an investigator with our Ward Mission Leader present. We began with a kneeling prayer and invited the spirit. Next we used beginning teaching to help get across our purpose. And then throughout the whole lesson it was an intense spirit there, and towards the end, I felt prompted to invite her to be baptized! So I did for the first real time here in the mission field and she accepted! It was amazing! And then I had her pray the way we as Latter-Day Saints pray, and kneel at the end. And I told her, “Reney, when you ask to know these things are true, stop in your prayer and listen for the spirit to confirm the truth of it unto you. And if you are really sincere you will get an answer!” She prayed and stopped after she asked, at this time I don’t think I ever prayed so much for the spirit to manifest himself unto her. She stopped and started to cry and sniffed a few times and ended the prayer with thanks towards Heavenly Father for answering her prayers and sending us (Elder Teulilo and myself) to her. It was an amazing experience! It was such a great exchange! I learned so much from Elder Teulilo, such as being a better missionary! He is a great Elder and I am so thankful I had the opportunity to serve a day with him! It was such a humbling time. Elder Sly from Lost Mountain is coming to spend the rest of the exchange with me today. I have a feeling it will be awesome also. Just like all of the other exchanges. I learn so much every time. Thank you. I hope you have a great week President! I love you and hope to hear from you soon.

-Elder Nelson

Here's his response:

"Thank you for sharing that wonderful experience you and Elder Teulilo had while teaching Reney. You are learning such great and valuable lessons as a young missionary. Keep that spirit with you your entire mission. Do not ever let any other missionaries influence you to do less than your best or to accept not being valiant! You are a great missionary and I am very excited to have you here in the mission.