Sometimes God asks us to do hard things but if we trust in Him and rely on Him and just do it, it'll be worth it.

   
  So transfer news! Elder Ledbetter and I will no longer be companions. We were both glad to hear that so that we can be better friends. This transfer serving with him was a blast and I learned a lot from him. Definitely bitter sweet. 
     So I found out I'm going to be leaving the area (kinda) and will be covering Taylorsville YSA. YSA means young single adults so 18-30 year olds will be all I'm teaching and working with so that'll be different. I'll be with Elder Wilcox and I'm super excited. We are going to be zone leaders so that was a surprise but I'm really excited. It should be a lot of fun! I'll be over 40 missionaries so that's a big change from 12 but I'm excited! I'll send our transfer board in this email so you can kinda get a picture of what I mean. 
     Elder Ledbetter will be serving with Elder Miller one of my former companions so I'm excited for him. This week was a great week to end my time with Elder Ledbetter. We had some really cool experiences and lessons with people. We invited both Marcus and Jackson to be baptized this week and they both accepted which was awesome. Super cool kids. There were definitely two major highlights though. On Saturday, CJ got baptized which was really cool. He gave the opening Prayer and it was the sweetest thing ever. I've never seen someone so happy to be baptized in my entire life. He was smiling from ear to ear. Really cool day. 
     On Sunday, we had a musical devotional that was put on by our mission. Elder Ledbetter is one of the missionaries in charge of running it so I got to help set up for it basically all afternoon Sunday. The devotional was amazing. We always have a Polynesian choir sing at it and they are phenomenal. The spirit was so strong there I was crying. It was really cool. The devotional was centered around Easter and Jesus's atonement for us. No better way to end a transfer then celebrating what Jesus Christ did for us with music. I wish you all could have been there. Words can't really describe what it was like. Really cool night. 
     The scripture I want to share this week says, "I am Jesus Christ I came by the will of the Father and I do his will." This scripture is probably my favorite right now. Jesus Christ died for us on the cross because he wanted to complete God's will for Him. He did it because He loves God and He loves us. He didn't want to do it because He thought He might enjoy it or it might be fun, but He knew He had to do it. It's the same for us. Sometimes God asks us to do hard things but if we trust in Him and rely on Him and just do it, it'll be worth it. I've seen it countless times these past 9 months. Pretty incredible. That's about all I got for this week. It's been a great transfer but I'm excited for the big change! It'll be fun. I hope you all have a great week!

Also I thought you might be interested in how our mission does transfers. With everyone having iPads (android tablets for the ones who have been out for 4 months or less) it's really easy to stay in contact with other missionaries with iMessage and stuff. So they call everyone and tell them their transfers on Saturday morning and then then they email the Zone Leader the transfer board and the Zone Leaders send it to the district leaders who sends it to their districts. So by 10:30 everybody knows where everybody is going. It's pretty cool. So here is what our transfer board looks like. Also last night I was talking to Elder Tyler (my trainer) at the musical fireside and our mission president came up to us and started talking to us and was joking about what was God thinking making us Zone Leaders (Tyler just became a Zone Leader too). But then he told us that for most of the process on working on transfers Tyler and I were supposed to whitewash into being Zone Leaders together. But then at my Zone leader's baptism two weeks ago I got to present the 4 minute restoration with Elder Wilcox, who was already a Zone Leader, because his companion, Elder Dolan, was performing the baptism. We present the restoration lesson in four minutes while the person baptizing and being baptized are changing after their baptism. After the baptism, our mission president came up to Elder Wilcox and I and told us that he couldn't believe how well we taught together and how natural it was. So that's apparently why he put Wilcox and I together. Pretty crazy!

There is nothing more humbling then kneeling down and confessing our weaknesses and pleading for help to God.

I had a really cool week. First off, we found this 15 year old kid to teach named Marcus and he is super cool. He's one of those kids who tries to act like they are too cool for school but really they aren't. He is a super sincere kid. We had an awesome lesson with him. He told us about this experience he had recently where he finally realized that Jesus Christ is real and is really there. That's what led to us teaching him. He said basically he just woke up one morning and was laying in bed and just felt like Jesus was there and He loved him. So I asked him how that made him feel and he responded with "I don't know I was still tired." Really funny kid. I'm excited to keep teaching him. On Thursday we had something called Mission Tour. Basically one of the leaders of our church comes and visits all the missionaries in the mission and speaks to them. It was super powerful. So the guy who came and spake to us, his name is Elder Christensen and he used to play football for BYU. He is a big dude. Super cool guy. He shared lots of cool thing but I want to share just a couple of them. First he said, that sometimes we want to improve ourselves and we don't know where to start. So we don't really know the question we need to ask God. So instead ask God what is it that I need to improve on? What can I be better at? What are my weaknesses? Questions like that. And then answers will come and more questions will come and then you can go to work. Really cool idea. Another was how we need to be humble. In order to become humble, we have to become less prideful. And the antidote for pride is prayer. I love this so much. There is nothing more humbling then kneeling down and confessing our weaknesses and pleading for help to God. Another really cool idea. Also another thing I want to share is from my training I prepared for my district meeting this week. I taught from a chapter in a book we use a lot called Preach My Gospel. I focused on chapter 6, which is my favorite, which talks about developing Christlike attributes. I came to realize how much they are connected. When we increase in one, all the others increase naturally. So when we strengthen our faith, we naturally have more hope and more charity and more patience. When we gain more knowledge, our faith increases and when our faith increases it makes us want to be more obedient to God's commandments. It was an awesome training and a really cool discussion that I got to lead. I learned a lot this week. With yesterday being Easter, I hope you got the chance to think about Jesus Christ and His sacrifice for you. I spent a lot of time in the scriptures and thinking about my Savior. Church was amazing today. The spirit was so strong. I hope you had an awesome Easter Sunday as well. The scripture I want to share this week is about Easter and is from 1 Corinthians 15:21-22. It says, "21 For since by man came death, by man came also the resurrection of the dead. 22 For as in Adam all die, even so in Christ shall all be made alive." Basically what it is saying is that because of Christ we will all be resurrected again some day. Because of Christ's atonement we can overcome both our spiritual death and suffering as well as our physical death and suffering. That's what makes His atonement the greatest gift. I hope everyone had an amazing Easter! Until next week!

With this Sunday being Easter, I'd like to personally invite you all to remember Jesus more this week in everything you do.

   I had a pretty good week. Nothing too crazy or unexpected happened this week. I got to go on exchanges with Elder Quinnelly this week and that was a blast. It's always nice to get a little break from your companion, no matter how much you love them and get along with them. Elder Quinnelly is super cool and we have gotten really close this transfer so it was super fun to spend a day with him and have a good time. We have basically all the same interests so it was fun to talk about that as well. 
     As far as cool stuff that happened in lessons this week, I had my first lesson with this 9 year old boy named Taz. We taught him once but I was on exchanges so it was my first time meeting him. We talked about the Plan of Salvation, or God's plan for us. At the end we had him try to teach it back to us to see how well he retained it and it was super cool to see him do it just about perfect. He's a super smart kid. At the end we asked him if he had any questions for us and he started to cry and basically asked what's going to happen to his dad. His parents are divorced and his dad isn't making good choices and it was really sad to see Taz so upset. We assured him that he has nothing to worry about and that God would take care of it and it will all work out. As we were leaving he came up to me and gave me a huge hug and it made me so happy.
     It's moments like that, that make giving up two years to come here to serve the Lord so worth it. Bringing hope and love and happiness to people's life through the gospel of Jesus Christ is easily the most fulfilling thing I've ever done. I've come to realize that people are going to fail us here on earth. At home, I used to rely so much on other people for my own happiness. But ultimately unless your faith is built on Christ, you'll never truly be happy. Or at least as happy as you can be. Jesus Christ loves us so much he was willing to live, die, and live again for us. He did that so we can all live again. If that doesn't bring you peace and joy, I don't know what else can. With this Sunday being Easter, I'd like to personally invite you all to remember Jesus more this week in everything you do. Be more thankful for the gift He has given you. Be more thankful for the sacrifice that He made for you. He loves you. I love my Savior Jesus Christ and I love serving Him. 
     The scripture I want to share this week is from John 3:16-17. Very popular verse but it's so true and so great. It says, "For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life. For God sent not his Son into the world to condemn the world; but that the world through him might be saved." Great scripture to remember as we head into Easter weekend. Always remember to give thanks to God for the sacrifice of His son, and our brother, Jesus Christ. Hope you all have a great week!

It was a great day and a cool learning opportunity for me to realize just how important it is to take life slow and help those who are in need.

    For P-Day this week the missionaries got to go hiking again.  Here are some of the pictures he sent us:

     This week was an amazing uplifting week. Especially with it being general conference! What is General Conference? I was lucky enough to get to go to sessions on both Saturday morning and afternoon as well as Sunday morning. I got so much out of conference and got a lot of cool promises and answers to questions that I had. Some things that specifically stood out to me was how much the Apostles especially expressed their love to President Monson. It was just a little thing but I thought it was really cool and goes to show how great of a man he is and how great of a prophet he is as well.
      Another thing that really stood out to me was how often the Holy Ghost was mentioned. Specifically responding to promptings from the Spirit. We must respond quickly and to the first prompting we receive from the Spirit. We tend to overthink things and I know I'm a victim of that as well. Conference was amazing and there were so many other cool things talked about that I wish I could share but this email would be a book if I wrote all the impressions I got over the weekend.
     I do want to share a cool experience I had this week. I went on exchanges with the Zone Leaders this week and so I was with Elder Dolan. He goes home in three weeks so it was cool to talk to him about all I have to look forward to the next 16 months. But as we were driving through an apartment complex we saw three kids cleaning up flour from the road. So we stopped to help them and one of them ran off and told her mom. The Mom then asked us if we could help them move. So we spent the next three hours helping this family of 14 move out of this tiny apartment. It was crazy. Half of them were moving back to Georgia and the other half back to Louisiana. It was an adventure to say the least. But after we helped them for three hours we were able to share a message about Jesus Christ with them. The husband's mom had just come into town to help with the move and was only going to be in Utah for one day and it happened to be a day where she met missionaries and she told us she wanted to learn more so we were able to send her information to missionaries in Georgia which was so exciting. The family was so funny too. The lady who was there for one day was getting what she called "Baptist Excited" when we started talking about Jesus. It was a great day and a cool learning opportunity for me to realize just how important it is to take life slow and help those who are in need. The Lord is ready and willing to use us as tools we just have to be prepared. That's all I have for this week. I hope everyone who got to watch Conference enjoyed it and got something out of it. Have a great week!

It was just a testament to me how God knows each and everyone of us. He knows what we need, when we need it.

The rest of this week flew by. It went really fast. It was a super slow weekend too as far as lessons go. Normally on Thursday-Sunday we have about 10-14 lessons and this week we only had 4 or 5 so that was a little bit frustrating. But we found a ton of new people to teach this week so that was a huge blessing. 

One really cool experience I had this week was to go to one of the many apartment complexes in our area. We were looking for a couple of specific people we are teaching who weren't home during our normal appointment time. I was looking through our areabook (where we keep track of all of the people taught) and noticed this name that hadn't been taught in like two years. And so at first I was like odds are she has moved out because no one lives in these apartments for two years but I kept having that name pop in my head as we were walking around and so finally I was like alright let's try this lady. So we go and knock and she was home and was so excited to see us. She was almost crying. She told us how she lost contact with missionaries and didn't know how to get them to come back and visit her and how she is going through a super tough time in her life right now and was just thinking about how she wanted missionaries to visit her again. It was just a testament to me how God knows each and everyone of us. He knows what we need, when we need it. So that was pretty cool. 

Some other cool experiences from this week were both on Sunday afternoon. I love giving blessings. They are the coolest things ever. On Sunday we gave a blessing of healing to a lady who was supposed to have open heart surgery and then on the way back we got a text from a lady we are teaching named Amy. She just got baptized in January and she is awesome. Her little brother died on Tuesday this week and then her grandfather died the next day so she was really struggling and so we were able to go over and visit with her and comfort her and just really talk with her. And then we gave her a blessing of comfort and wow the spirit was so strong. Truly amazing. Every time I give a blessing I feel God's love for them so strongly. And when I'm the one speaking the words of comfort I can feel God just using me as his mouthpiece and I never really remember what it is I even say to them but the spirit is so strong every time. Hopefully that made at least a little sense. It was a really cool week.What is a Priesthood Blessing? 

Also on Friday, I went to the chiropractor because my hips and hamstring have been killing me lately and he told me my hips were atrocious so hopefully this will help and I won't have any more problems with any of it. But we will have to see. The scripture I want to share this week is from the Book of Mormon in the Book of Mosiah 29:20. It says, "But behold, he did deliver them because they did ​​​humble​ themselves before him; and because they ​​​cried​ mightily unto him he did deliver them out of bondage; and thus doth the Lord work with his power in all cases among the children of men, extending the arm of ​​​mercy​ towards them that put their ​​​trust​ in him." This is a great scripture. Let us all put our trust in the Lord so he can extend His mercy upon us. That's all I got for this week. I hope everyone has a great week! 

Elder Potter

3575 S 3200 W Apt 11B

West Valley City, UT 84119

"He just knows that if he follows God, that God will take care of the rest which is so cool."

My week definitely had its ups and downs. It seemed like we had a ton of lessons cancel which is always discouraging but during the time the scheduled lessons cancelled we were able to find some more pretty cool people to teach and we had some awesome miracles this week.

 We were finally able to reconnect with Tony this week after a super busy couple of weeks for him with work so that was awesome. He told us how much he hates smoking and how he is embarrassed by it and how he hates that it is his crutch and he can't do without it and it really got me thinking that we all have our crutches that we can't go without. Before I left for my mission I had a ton of crutches, or so I thought. My music, sports, tv, social media, staying out with friends and none of those things are bad things. Really they are all good things that I'm really excited to be able to have again when I come home. But I have definitely realized over the past eight months that none of those are really my crutch. I love all those things but they aren't what is the absolute most important thing to me and what I just can't go without. My crutch is Jesus Christ, the Book of Mormon, and the Bible. Those are the things that I can't go without. Those are the things that I rely on everyday to help me through the hard times and to help me appreciate all the good things that I have in life. And I love how much I've changed because of that these past eight months. I'm still the same goofy, rambunctious kid at heart that I was before my mission but I can definitely see how much more of a true disciple of Christ I am. I'm still not where I want to be and am still not perfect by any means but I love the progress I'm making. 

We have also started teaching a guy named Frank who is super cool. He is originally from Brazil but now lives in Boston but was told by God he needed to come to Salt Lake. So he has been coming out here for a few weeks at a time for the past two years to learn about Jesus Christ and about the Mormon church. He has some really interesting ideas about religion in general but he has so much faith it is unbelievable. He just knows that if he follows God, that God will take care of the rest which is so cool. 

We have General Conference coming up here pretty soon too so I'm really excited for that. We have some tickets and I'm excited to get to take some of the people we are teaching. The scripture of the week this week is from Mormon 1:15 and it says, "I was visited of the Lord, and tasted and knew of the goodness of Jesus." What a beautiful way of describing that. We all must taste and know of the goodness of Jesus and how important He is in our lives. Great scripture. Hope everyone back at home is doing well! Love and miss you all! Have a great week!

Elder Potter

3575 S 3200 W Apt 11B

West Valley City, UT 84119

"If we all will eventually confess before God that His son, Jesus Christ is our Savior, why wait?"

I had an interesting week to say the least. Lots of crazy things happened.  First off, Elder Ledbetter and I will be staying together in the same area for another transfer and I'll still be district leader. So it should be an interesting next six weeks. We had a ton of lessons cancel this week which is always a little disappointing but we were still able to have a couple of great lessons.

We taught the guy I talked about last week who I really connected with about sports. His name is C. We taught him and his son CJ and his daughter Heavenly. It was one of the coolest lessons I've had so far on my mission. I love that family so much. Chris is such a great guy.  We taught them about how we have a loving Heavenly Father and about how he has given us so many things to show us his love for us like families and the gospel and the scriptures. It was cool to hear CJ and Heavenly name off things that they felt like God had given them to show His love for them. It was super humbling and kinda funny too. They said things like carpet,socks, and water. That made us all laugh. CJ wants to be baptized and will be towards the end of April which is exciting and Chris just has to wait until he is off of probation and then he can. Not quite sure how long that will be but hopefully pretty soon! He is so ready to take these next steps closer to God.

Besides that I learned a huge lesson this week. I found myself facing some negativity and it makes it really hard to stay positive and stay focused on the work. And I've found myself slowly getting less patient and getting frustrated with others these past few weeks. But throughout the day Saturday and Sunday I had a lot of thinking time. As I was thinking I realized that Jesus spent His time with a lot of pretty negative people but that didn't change his outlook on doing the work and on the people He served. He even had to deal with the super annoying Pharisees who were always looking for an excuse to try to expose Jesus as being a fraud. Even His apostles were sometimes pretty negative. When one of His apostles, Nathaniel, found out about Jesus and heard that He was from Nazareth, Nathaniel said "Can there any good thing come out of Nazareth?"  But that didn't get in the way of Jesus accomplishing what He came to do and so I shouldn't let anything get in the way of me accomplishing what I came to do either. So I'm going to focus on trying to just be positive all the time and focus on what it is God wants me to do and then do it. I'll  challenge everyone to try the same thing. It's definitely easier said than done but it'll be worth it. 

I'm learning so much out here in Utah I can't really explain it all in emails. This mission has helped me so much in somany different ways. Some ways I didn't expect at all. But I've definitely learned that the Lord works in mysterious ways. Another scripture I want to share this week is from Philippians 2:11 and it says, "11 And that every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father." So if we all will eventually confess before God that His son, Jesus Christ is our Savior, why wait?

I hope everyone has a great week! And with March Madness starting this week I gotta throw in a GO DUKE!

Elder Potter