Huntsville, 9 Weeks out.

Hey Yall!

This southern accent thing is starting to take a hold of me down here! "yalls" and "aints" its like a plague man! Its alright though because im already in a white shirt and tie when its 105, i dont need to stand out even more ;) The other thing that people say is "have a blessed day" I really like that one though because it shows that so many people are keeping christ in their minds! Thats really important! Whatever you have on your minds constantly is what you  will become, so if we can keep christ on our minds then slowly we will become like christ! so everyone have a blessed day! :)

Alright so the south is just awesome! we talked to a black woman and her daughter for like an hour in the cereal isle at walmart about christ one day! The people here are just very open to talk about religion and even though they may not listen, at least it shows that Mormons and missionarys are good faithful CHRISTIANS. some people dont think we believe in christ so by changing the general opionon of LDS people from bad to good, we can make a lot of difference! A huge part of that is service, taking every oppurtunity to help your fellow man. We always talk about developing a habbit of helpfulness, i encourage all of you to do the same. Develope a habbit of helping anyone and everyone with anything! all the sudden the world becomes a much better place :)

So now im going to share a story, this story is awesome because it all came from impressions for me! I felt impressed as we were driving towards home last night that we should stop and contact at walmart for a bit so we did. then this whole crazy thing happened!....

So we had a super cool experience last night! I started talking to a Hispanic man in the bathroom (his name is Sido). I gave him a card and then we started walking the other way in Walmart. A few seconds later he came back over to us and asked if we would call his friend who was having a hard time with a recent divorce. He said his friend could really use a message about Jesus Christ. We walked out with him to his car and got the number (who we are planning on calling later today or tomorrow, he lives in Oklahoma though) then started having a great conversation about Christ with Sido. We gave him a book of Mormon and explained it and then right in the middle of testifying to this man a teenage kid walked over. He was an anti, so he hands this man a card and starts spewing all of these random anti Mormon scriptures (in English, sido barely speaks any English) and tells us strait up that we are liars and that the Book of Mormon isn't true. Then the guy we are teaching pulls out a bible scripture that backed us up! we just stood back and were polite, we didn't try and bash or contest or anything and the teenage guy was all taken back and just left. 

So as it turned out, Sido has strong faith in Christ and could understand the references the anti was saying but was offended at how rude he was being to me and elder Jackson who were just trying to serve the lord. we finished having an awesome conversation about Christ and why we don't do things like that that cause contention (it just drives the spirit away!). The spirit was very strong and you could tell that we had made an influence on Sido, he respected us and knew we testified of Christ and the truth. We have his number and hope to set up some future appointments. Super awesome guy!

So that is just a testament to me that the devil will do anything he can to stop you from teaching the truth. However, if we teach by the spirit. Not with contention. We can teach with power and authority so that the devil will be of no influence. im loving my mission so far, and im loving how even our non-Mormon Spanish speaking contact backed us up against an anti with out us doing anything but trying to act as Christ did. Super funny! me and Elder jackson started cracking up about it after because the anti mormon guy really did make a fool of himself haha. super great experience, im just praying we can turn this into a new convert and help change Sidos life for good! 

So yeah, that was crazy! I sent the same expirience to my mission president so thats why its all a different color, but it was just really cool to me because all of that happened because i had a prompting to go to walmart! and if we follow promptings we will always led for good :) Practice listening to the spirit, it will just get easier and easier to hear and follow its instuctions :)

I also really hope that yall had a chance to look at the mormon messages! hopefully you can share those and help bring others to christ, im telling you, member missionarys can change the world, be a part of the mission work in your citys! bring people to christ! you will have more joy doing that then anything else in your life! I hope everyone is doing awesome! Im doing awesome here :)

Love, Elder Steele

In Huntsville Week 8

Hey everyone!

Well Alabama is just awesome! it is a bit like walking around in a hot tub all day though! we always joke about baptizing people in the air cuz its like we are constantly swimming anyway haha. I am just having an amazing time down here, for everybody that reads this letter i have to say missionary work is worth it! they're definitely hard things, your exhausted and hot and sometimes you bike more then should be possibly in a day, but if you work your happier then you can possibly imagine! Just knowing that you are out doing the work of the lord brings comfort to my soul :) the opurtunity to teach and to just give service to people is something i love so much! i strongly encourage everyone who is able. GO ON A MISSION!!!! dont delay, just go out and get to work, it will be hard, but it will bring more joy to you then you can imagine, it is just an amazing thing to be a part of!

So im gunna share just a little expirience here, Its about how sometimes you have hard days, but often times those hard days just set you up to help someone who needs you :) 

on Saturday we had to go to the clinic because Elder Jackson had this massive boil and sister Jones (the nurse) thought we should go check it out, he ended up having to get it cut open and we might have to go back again if it doesnt start to go away with anti biotics! Then we were riding bikes to an appointment and Elder Jackson's tire went flat and so we resorted back to walking, Every single on of our appointments seamed to fall through, but then something awesome happened. We were walking along the street to go tract in some apartments and we met an older lady, she had been taught some of the lessons and really wanted to get back in contact with the missionary's. She had fallen out of contact after she had become very sick. We got her some water and got her info and now the sisters i believe are going over to teach her! It just is a testament to me that sometimes your going to have struggles and go through hard things, but i can see that everything that happens is to prepare you or put you in the right spot at the right time to find the elect!

I want to testify that the lord has a plan! he puts us where we need to be to really help people! Sometimes we go through hard things, but all those hard things we can use to help others, all we have to do is to turn out to help others rather then turn in to help ourselves. Thats what being christlike really is, is turning out to others when we ourselves need help :)

Please go watch the video called "true christianity"  Its found at http://www.mormonchannel.org/ Once youve watched it, watch a few others and choose your favorite. Go share that video with someone, someone who might need it or someone who is a friend, a non member, a less active, anyone that you feel inspired to share the video with! The most important part of missionary work is member missionarys! go out and do the lords work and youll be suprised the blessings you get :) after all, if 15 million members are missionarys, the 85 thousand ish of us full timers will all the sudden have a lot more people to teach. the work will really be hastened :) So thats my challenge, try and be a true christain like in the video, and share that christian message with the world, "bring the world its truth!"

Thats all for now, but i love you all! your all awesome and i love to get letters and emails about how your doing! i would like feedback on how taking that challenge went too! everyone have an awesome week!

-Elder Steele

PS I have taught a ton of lessons now! its funny cuz as a spanish elder its really easy to teach a first lesson. people will invite you in and listen to you, however... they wont be there for your return appointment and they wont ever answer the door for you again ha. but its ok! we are hunters of men, jeremiah 16:16, we are trying to find the elect of god! not just some that will fall away right after baptism, we are finding the cream of the crop! 

It actually isnt scary at all to knock doors, people are generally nice, and i almost only knock spanish doors (you get like a detective vision for hispanics ha) so they are almost always nice and friendly :) even though they wont accept our message it is nice to not always get doors slammed in your face, that only happens when we knock white peoples doors though haah. What i havent done yet is been fed! i want somebody to feed me! haha ah well.

My bike did get here though! and i had to build it myself! ( i took it over the next day to get checked by someone who knows what theyre doing haah, ;) but i love it! its so easy to ride, best bike in the mish by far!!!

The car that me and my comp have is a 2011 toyota camry that is the ugliest gold color i have ever seen haha. its like the oldest car in the mish so it will proboly be sold after this transfer! but we are blessed to have a car! :)

As far as Ipads i dont know when i will get one! but i do know that i will by the end of the year! and im stoked to get to keep it! it will be such an amazing tool to! the mormon messages carry the spirit so strong!!! gah, im so stoked for it! it will really help progress the work! theres rumors we might get them next transfer but idk! we will find out!

alright so last thing, this is random fact time. Down here we say "have a blessed day" for have a good day, and if someone tells you "you been touched" it basically means youre strait retarded haha. they use things that should be nice as like bad things haha, for example "bless your heart" It basically means they pitty you in a bad way haha. 

Week 7

Hey everyone!

I am sitting here on my first p-day in the mission feild! alabama is just one awesome place to be! (best mission on earth i have to say.) I was extremely impressed because as we landed in goergia, every one was probobly the nicest people ever! even the hard core security guys were nice and friendly and one even handed out candy after you went through custums, it was awesome! that southern hospitality is real! as we came to birmingham i realized how green everything is! you litterally cant see more then a mile because there is just trees everywhere! it is such a beautiful place! 

I am now serving in huntsville with elder jackson. He is my trainer for at least 6 weeks and is an amazing missionary! he has been out here for like a year and is all but fluent in spanish. He is really good because we get along and share food. we have already started a habit of sharing and serving one another and I feel extremely blessed to be getting along so well with my first companion! The only really hard part is that we are both new to the area and had no area book! basically we are starting from scratch out here, so we have been contacting a lot and tracting and weve found a few nice familys! we are hoping and praying that we will be able to teach these few familys and help bring true joy to their lives! 

We have a car but also ride bikes because we can only drive our cars a certain amount haha. There is a lot of spanish people so we mostly will be driving down close ish to where they live and then biking trying to talk to every one we can! thus far its been some hard work out in the feild but we are ery excited to be here in huntsville doing work! I dont have much more to say at the moment because ive only been here a few days but make sure to ask any questions and i will try to answer them!  Alabama is the best mission on earth! my address right now is 

huntsville alabama, 670 apartment 8, julia st NW, 35816

feel free to send my letters and such and i will respond as i can!

Also please thank everyone at the reunion for there letters! it was super nice and it was great to be able to hear from them! i miss all my family and love you all so much!

Oh and a few random things, i went on exchanges like day 2 in the feild. i went with our ZLs. because of that my very first lesson i taught on my spanish speaking mission was in english!!! haha. Then later that same day me and elder jackson ended up in a mild bible bash in spanish! this is going to be a weird mission i can tell but itll be awesome! the 2 hispanic guys were from a church called "la luz del mundo" and they beleive some weird stuff. they didnt really try and bash us, mostly they just were curious as to why our church was different then theres. Hopefully they got a good feeling from us because we were kind and not contentious at all! but we definitelly try to avoid bashing as much as posible.

I want everyone to know how much i love and am excited for this work, i love this gospel and i love the people here in alabama. I will be extremely excited to share some awesome storys in the future but one quick thing i want to share is my mission scripture. helaman 5:12. please go read. It shows me that if you build your foundation on christ, if you trust in the lord and lean not unto thine own understanding, when you have trials they will be of no avail. Be steadfast i christ (2nephi 31:20). I know that if you do these things you will find joy and peace. I know this is the true church and that through folling the example of christ and keeping the comandments we can be eternally happy :) its amazing being part of the lords work.

Love you all!

Elder Steele

This picture is from the Mexico CCM.....notice the statue in the background.  Kieran's companion is Elder Bartlett to Kieran's left, not striking the silly pose. 

Pictures from CCM

First Pictures, Kieran is in Alabama!!

Hey guys!!!  8/7/2014

I am here in alabama safe, my first area is huntsville spanish speaking, my companion is elder jackson, he seams like an awesome trainer! the adress is...

670 julia st NW appartment 8, Huntsville Alabama, 35816

Also make sure my bike is on the way please, its not here yet but hopefully soon!

Love you guys a ton, im mailing a package today aswell so youll get to see pictures and all kinds of fun stuff soon! ill email you guys on P-day but thats all i have time for today! Love you!

Hey mom!  8/5/2014

 i dont have much time, we are just supposed to send a quick email today but i will be able to send another quick one on wednesday! (see forwarded email) i found out though that since my mission president is half owner of marriots, we will get to stay in them various times over our missions! im way excited!!!

 District in CCM

 with mission pres.

 Kieran and Elder Jackson serving in Hunstville.

Mission Home address printed on back of Sacrament Meeting program