Gregory and Carolyn Marshall

2011-05-03T21:00:00.000-07:00

Dear family
Hey how is everyone’s week going this week? Has it been raining there at all? It’s been raining a lot here. We still haven’t seen any tornadoes on the ground yet though. It’s still raining off and on today. Has anything exciting been going on there? Well everything has been going good here. Elder Petaia and I are working hard together. We had someone at church on Sunday which was great. She was the first Investigator we have had so far come to church here in this area. We were pretty excited about it. We have been doing a lot of finding this week. We found a yesterday that we are pretty excited for. The mom let us come in and talk to her and her son. As we were taking to her, she told us about how her son died a couple years ago, and it still bothered her a lot. We were able to teach her about the plan of salvation. She really liked it. She had a lot of questions about everything. During the lesson, we were putting a lot of emphasis on her need to get baptized to live with her family forever. At the end of the lesson, she told us she wanted to get baptized, so we set a date for the 21st of May. She can’t though because she is going to Mexico for a week. And she can’t do it the week of the 14th because She is going to be in North Carolina. She said she wants to as soon as she gets back though. We are pretty excited for her. I wish I could be there to see her get baptized. It is going to mean a lot to her. We are still teaching Adela. She still hasn’t come to church yet. That seems to be the biggest challenge we have in this area. That and it’s a really small rural area. Everyone here knows who we are and a lot of people have already studied with the missionaries in the past. We have been trying to find new people who haven’t met with missionaries in the past. We will definitely be doing our best to help everyone we can. The Spanish still isn’t the greatest. If anything, I’m still figuring out how hard it is going to be to learn it all the way. Elder Petaia says that it’s getting better, but it doesn’t seem like it to me yet. I can understand most of what I hear now, but talking and expressing myself is a lot harder. Hopefully it will come though. It gets a little frustrating sometimes not being able to talk very well and not being able to help Elder Petaia as much as I wish I could. O well though. Thanks for everything you do for me. I don’t think I need any more clothes or shoes. One of the pairs of shoes, I only wear on Sunday and still look brand new. And my other pair aren’t real bad either. I still have lots of socks still too. Thanks again for everything.

Love Elder Marshall

2011-04-18T15:28:00.000-07:00

Dear family

Hey how is everything going this week? How is your week been going? Anymore snow there? I still can’t believe it snowed there last week. Everything has been going pretty good here. Elder Petaia and I have been doing great together. We are striving to get a lot done here. It did storm pretty good here this last week. I didn’t really get to see too much of it though. I slept through most of it. I guess there were a couple tornadoes that never touched down and everything. I slept through it all. Elder Petaia said he heard the tornado sirens going off for a little while, but I didn’t hear them at all. I remember feeling the apartment rattle a couple times because of the thunder, but I slept through everything else. I wish the storms would come during the day so we could watch them. Its supposed to be raining all week this week, but I don’t think any big thunder storms. It was kind of a slower week than we would have liked. We didn’t have any investigators at church this week. Adela couldn’t come because she had to move a bunch of stuff out of her old house into her new one. She told us she will defiantly be at church this next week though. We are hoping to have a lot of people there this next week. We are both ready to work hard this week. The Spanish is coming ok. Not as good as I hoped it would but I’m learning. Elder Petaia and I are trying to speak Spanish as much as possible. I am starting to be able to help more in lessons. I wish I had had more time learning Spanish. We have been working a recent convert named Fausto. He is a great guy. He would make an amazing missionary, but he is married. He is only a year older than we are. He got baptized in February, but he has a very strong testimony of the gospel. He has invited some of his friends over tonight to meet with us at his house. We are pretty excited for that.
We went fishing this morning. It was a lot of fun. There were 6 of us that went. Elder Leavitt was there too. We had breakfast with a family and then they let us use their pond for a little while. It was fun. Well there isn’t a whole lot else going on here. Dardanelle is a great place. Its nice and small. We are starting to work more in Russellville too. There are a lot more people there. Thanks for everything you do for me.
Love Elder Marshall

2011-04-13T11:44:00.001-07:00

Dear family
Hey how is your week going? So it snowed this last week there? Wow That’s crazy. It has been pretty warm here. I’m in Dardanelle Arkansas. It’s a real small town a couple hours north of Little Rock. It’s nice and quiet. I forgot all my Spanish though. My companion is Elder Petaia. He is from California. He is full Samoan. He speaks really good Spanish though so he is helping me a lot. We get along great together. He goes home at the end of June. I would have gone home with him if I would have been able to extend. Not much has been going on this week here. We have been working hard together. The ward is excited to have missionaries again. They haven’t had missionaries for a while now. It’s a little different. Benton was kind of hard starting out, because neither of us knew anyone. But the missionaries before us had been doing a lot of work so it wasn’t to bad to get started. Here though we are starting brand new. It’s good though. It is defiantly keeping us busy. The Spanish is coming ok. I have forgotten a lot, but I feel like I’m learning a lot faster with Elder Petaia than I ever did with Elder Contreras. Starting today we aren’t speaking any English while we are away from the apartment. Then hopefully in a couple more weeks we are going to speak all Spanish. Hopefully I will be able to pick it up fast. The members here are great. It is almost like being back in the maple street unit. There aren’t very members here. On Sunday, there were only about 30 people there. We are hoping to get that up though. We set a date for baptism for the 30th with a lady we met on Friday. We are pretty excited for her. Elder Petaia made me do it. He is good at getting me to talk during lessons in Spanish. It was great though. Well not a whole lot else going on here. This next week will be a busy one. I am hoping to be able to go back down to Benton to watch Bill and Jenny owens get baptized. Thanks for everything.

Love Elder Marshall

2011-04-04T10:57:00.001-07:00

Dear family

Hey how is your week going? So the fair is going on this week? Is corey and kaitlyn working there this year? Does that mean spring
break is this week too? Its been a pretty hectic week this week. We
have been running everywhere. Tuesday night we went on exchanges. I went with the elders in Spanish North in Little rock. It was a great exchange. I got to see a lady named Carmen Ramierez. Elder Contreras and I were teaching her when we were in that area. She got baptized about three weeks ago. It was great to see her again. We got back from the exchange Wednesday night just in time to go out ith one of the priests from the ward here. We had a great evening with him.
Then Friday we had to go to memphis for a meeting with all the other zone leaders and the mission president so that took all Friday between the meeting and the 3 hour drive each way. Then Saturday and Sunday were conference. I loved this conference. The were a lot of good talks. I think the big thing I got out of it was the need to act. Like when Elder Eyering was talking about having sentimental feelings when disaster or trials happen in other lives. And that we needed to turn those feelings into actions. I liked Elder Uchdorf’s talk in priesthood session too. There were a lot of great talks. A lot of talks that will be usefull t a lot of people. I’m getting transferred. I got the call from president Drewes. He told me that I’m getting moved up to Russleville to be a spanish missionary. I’m excited but pretty nervous too. There haven’t been any missionaries in Russleville spanish in a while now. So me and my new companion will be opening the area. It will be a great transfer. Im excited for the challenge. I was hoping I wasn’t going to get transferred though. There are a lot of great people here I am going to miss. We went and saw Shawn Barber and his family last night. He is still doing great. He and his wife told us they have started to read the Book of Mormon every night and he is loving it. He didn’t think he would. They are a great family. We are going over to see bill and Jenny owens tonight. They are the other family that I’m going to miss a lot. They are getting excited to be baptized. They just need to get married first, but they want to already so its just picking a day.
That’s about all that is going on here. We probably aren’t going to do a whole lot today. Just pack up some stuff. I’m going to be sending a box home this week. Thanks for everything you do.
Love Elder Marshall

2011-03-28T11:10:00.000-07:00

Dear Family

Hey how has your week been going? It sounds like the priest’s Camp helaman was a lot of fun. Why wouldn’t anyone go on the zipline? I remember those trips were always a lot of fun. Everything has been going pretty good here. We have been staying very busy. We are trying to figure out how to best use our time between the two wards. We were in church for about 8 hours yesterday. Both of the wards meet in the same building. We have to be there at 7 30 for meetings before church for Benton, then as soon as we get done with Sunday school in the Benton ward, we go to the Little Rock ward for 3 more hours. Then we have another Correlation meeting after that for the Little rock ward. It was a lot of sitting. Between the 2 wards, we don’t have much down time anymore which is realy good. I like staying busy. Its just that now we don’t have to look for things to do. Now we have to plan out how to fit everything in. This next transfer, we should be having a few baptisms. I’m pretty excited. Transfers are coming up this next week. I’m really hoping Im going to be staying here my last transfer. I really love this area. It is probably my favorite area. Shawn Barber’s baptism went great on Saturday. It meant a lot to him. I think the confirmation meant more to him though. We went and talked to him about the priesthood last night and he was telling us about how he felt something very strong when he received the Holy Ghost. He felt that a lot of weight had been lifted off him. I love talking to recent converts about their experience when they get baptized and confirmed. I think we as lifelong members of the church take the gift of the Holy ghost for granted because we are so used to always having it with us. I love talking to new members because they can feel the difference before and after. Shawn told us he didn’t want to “sound corny or anything” but that he had actually felt some very strong impressions and emotions when he was getting confirmed. It meant a lot for him to tell us that because he isn’t very open with how he is feeling. He told us that he wants to get the priesthood and a calling now because he feels like he needs to contribute something back. He is such an awesome guy. I’m really grateful we were able to help him to get baptized. It was his father in law that baptized him. After the baptism, the mother in law came up and talked to me for a minute and told us that it was a huge step for him. That he had told her that he didn’t think he was ever going to be allowed to go to heaven because of the things that had happened in Iraq. She told me that it had surprised them a lot when he had called her husband and asked him to baptize him. Elder Kelly and I are very grateful we were able to be there to watch it all happen. There is a different feel in their house now from what it used to be. I remember the first time we went to meet them, it was a very serious meeting, and he told us that he had been through a few sets of missionaries, and that he was getting frustrated with us coming over because he didn’t feel like he was getting anything out of it anymore. There was a huge difference between that first meeting and the lesson we had last night after the confirmation. The whole family was there. Everyone was happy, and you could feel the spirit in the room. I know that the Gospel changes people’s lives. I’ve watched it happen. I didn’t really see the blessing of having the gospel in my life when I was back home, because I’ve always had it. But being able to come out here and help other people find the gospel has helped me see all the blessings that are there for us because of the gospel. I’m so grateful that I was able to come here. I can’t imagine what my life would be like now without this great experience. Thanks for the great example you have always set for me.

Love Elder Marshall

2011-03-21T13:59:00.001-07:00

Dear Family

Hey how is your week going this week? Anything exciting going on?
Its been kindof crazy here. Where do I even start… Elder Kelly and I have been working really hard this week. We have been working a lot with the barber family. The dad of the family is getting baptized on Saturday. He has been kindof hesitant saying that he isn’t ready yet.
He spent a lot of time in Iraq and wants to be able to have a new start that baptism would give him, but he has wanted to be completely ready for it. To make things even harder, they have a very busy work and school schedual and we have only been able to meet with them once a week. Last week he said he wasn’t ready at all. Then by the time we left he was sincerely thinking about it. Then we saw him yesterday and he told us he wasn’t ready yet. We read 3rd nephi 11 and started talking about how important it was for him. He told us that he really wanted to be baptized, he just wanted to be completely ready. We went over the baptismal interview and set up an interview time. Then thismorning, his wife, who is a member, called us and told us that she had already set up a couple of talks for the baptism, he had said her dad could baptize him, and she wanted to know who she could talk to about playing the piano. The baptism is going to be at 1 on Saturday.
We were pretty excited to get that phone call. It was great. Our
other baptismal dates for this weekend aren’t looking so good though.
I’m pretty confident they will go through eventually, but probably not this weekend. We have had a crazy weekend though. We got a call from our mission president on Friday telling us that the little rock elders were needing to stay with us for a little while. That something had happened whith where they stay that they couldn’t stay there anymore.
So they were with us Friday night. Then Saturday, we were cleaning the church building and Elder Baron and Elder steed, the Aps, came and picked up the younger missionaries. He was supposed to stay with them for a few days, and the other missionary was supposed to stay with us.
Well we were finnishing up cleaning everything, putting everything away, and we noticed that the missionary wasn’t with us anymore. We figured he was just somewhere else cleaning stuff up. So we started looking for him. We couldn’t find him anywhere. Then we went outside
and our car was gone. He had just left. He didn’t have a phone or
anyone with him, so we had to call our mission president. It turned out to be a chase trying to find the kid again. There aren’t any missionaries in the little rock ward. We found out yesturday that we are covering it now. Our area just went from Benton, Bryant, alexander, and all the areas around them, to that and all of Little Rock too. There are a few sets of missionaries up in North little rock and pinacle mountain, but not in Little Rock. So our area went from big, to Huge. So now we are trying to figure out who all there Progressing investigators are and where they are. Its going to be a busy couple weeks till transfers. Well that’s about all from here.
Everything is going great. We are working hard and loving being able to serve here together. Everything is great. I hope everything is going great there.

Love Elder Marshall

2011-03-21T06:19:00.000-07:00

Dear Family
Hey how has everything been going there? How is everyone liking school? So did corey go on splits with the missionaries? I bet they liked that, Especially if they’re on bike week. Its been a great week here. Elder Kelly and I have been working great together. We have been riding our bikes a ton. Yesturday we didn’t start riding until about 6 in the evening, and by the time we got back to our apartment, we had ridden 17 and a half miles. I took my gps with us because I wanted to know how much we were riding. I’m going to start keeping track more. It has been a great week though. We have 4 people who are hopefully getting baptized. We are real excited for all of them. Lisa is still working towards her date. She has been going through a lot this week. Her husband might be having to go back to Mexico. We are working with a part member family named the Barbers. The dad of the family is the one we have been teaching. He has been putting off getting baptized because he doesn’t know if he is ready yet. He was in Iraq for 3 years and has been going through a lot since because of it. It has been great being able to see the change that is happening in him as we go over and read out of the book of Mormon with him and talk about the plan of Salvation. He says he really wants to get baptized on the 26th. We are hoping that he will. Another person we have been working a lot with this week is a friend of one of the members here in the ward. Her name is Jessica. She has been coming to church for the last couple weeks and has been starting to come to mutual and work on her personal progress. She says that she has been to a few other churches, but none that have felt like this one does. We have been working hard and have been seeing a lot come from it this week. It has been great. I had an interview with the mission president on Friday. The first thing he asked be about was if it would make me nervous to go back to Spanish speaking. It was a pretty big surprise. I didn’t think I would be going back to Spanish speaking. Right now there is a shortage of Spanish speaking missionaries here. We had 2 go home in the last couple months that weren’t supposed to go home yet. So one of the areas got closed. I told him that I would like to go back to Spanish speaking. Hopefully I will get to. A couple weeks ago when we were in our zone leader council, we had been talking about not having as many missionaries as was needed. I had had a really strong feeling that I should ask about extending so we wouldn’t have to close one of those areas. After President told me about maybe going back to Spanish speaking up in Russellville, I told him that I had wanted to ask him about extending. The transfer after I am supposed to go home is only a 5 week transfer. It’s the transfer when the new mission president will get there and President Drewes goes home. So instead of coming home May 17 I would come home in the end of June I think. It feels right to me. President Drewes said that before anything else I should talk to you and ask what you thought of it before he called the stake president and talked to him about it. Hopefully you’ll get this before I have to go. If not that’s ok too. That’s about all that has been going on here. O ya in the interview, I also had to get a new Temple Recommend. Mine is about to expire. Can you believe its been 2 years since I went to the temple. It doesn’t seem like its been that long. Well I hope everything is going great there. I love you.
Love Elder Marshall

2011-03-07T12:05:00.000-08:00

Dear Family

Hey how has everyone’s week been going? Is it pretty nice weather there? Everything has been going good here. I was right. I'm with Elder Kelly in the Benton area. Thats great that Corey found out wich track he will be on. So he doesn't start till next winter? wow thats a long time to wait. I thought he would for sure start earlier than that. I bet he will like it alot though. There was an earthquake here a week ago. We didn’t even feel it though. It was after we went to bed. We are living with a family here though, and they felt it. We heard it was a lot stronger other places than it was here. I wish it would have woken us up. We didn’t even know anything had happened until the next night when we were having dinner with a family. Everything has been going great here though. We are getting a lot of exercise. Our mission’s miles got cut in half for the month of march. So we have been biking everywhere we go now for the last few days. We have about 9 miles a day now that we can drive. So we are going to be doing a lot of bike riding this next week. By the end of the day, we are pretty tired. The family we are living with is the Higgins family. They are both converts to the church. We really like living here. There is a garage between us and the Higgins, but they take care of us pretty well. They have a dog and a huge yard and a shop out back too. It’s a lot different than living in the little house on Maple Street in down town little rock. Everything is a lot more spread out here. We live in a little town called Bryant Arkansas. Our area is pretty big. Its all of Saline county and chunks of Polaski county too. We have been working with Lisa still a lot. She was supposed to be getting baptized this Saturday, but she didn’t come to church again. She told us her family has been getting her to go with them to a Jehovah witness church the last couple weeks. We had a good lesson with her last night. She told us she loves us coming over and teaching her, and she feels the spirit while we are there, and she really enjoyed church, but her family doesn’t like us and they have been working on her trying to get her to go with them. It was a great lesson. We talked to her about the Holy Ghost and how we can find answers to any questions we have through praying and studying the scriptures. We have also been working a lot with a lady named Susie. She was going to get baptized 3 years ago. She was in the water and everything, but she has a huge phobia of water. She never went through with it. Then the missionaries left and we just got back in contact with her. We had a great lesson with her and talked to her about the miracles that God has done all through the bible and talked to her about how if God can do all those huge things, he can help her be baptized. She was still nervous about getting baptized, but she said it was something she wants to work towards. She is getting baptized on the 26th of March. Well that is about all that is going on here. Elder Kelly and I are working hard together. The ward here is great. There are a lot of great members. Thanks for everything you do for me. I hope everyone has a great week.

Love Elder Marshall

2011-02-22T09:29:00.001-08:00

Dear Family

Hey how is everything going? How has everyones week been going? We are getting transferred tomorrow. Elder Peinamalie and I both. We got the call yesterday morning. I was kindof surprised that both of us were getting transferred. We call it getting white washed. It doesn’t happen very much. I think I know where I am going though, and who my new companion will be. President Drewes told me that I wouldn’t be getting moved to far, and that I would be getting put into an area with another zone leader. Well Elder Steed used to the other zone leader in the zone, but he is the new AP and his area got white washed too. So I’m pretty sure I’m getting moved to Benton Arkansas, and I think my new companion is going to be Elder Kelly. I trained him when we were in Collierville. I hope I’m right. I guess I’ll find out tomorrow afternoon. Everything has been going good here. We have a baptism on Thursday. I am hoping I will be able to come up for it. Its for Marquise Philips. He is Brother Philips’ Grandson. Brother Philips is one of the active members in the Unit. We had a really small church service this last week. When sacrament meeting started, there were only 15 people there. Including 6 missionaries. It was kindof sad. Usually there is more like 30 people there. We had three investigators there though. And a new member that we found. I don’t think I’ve told you about her yet. We found her a couple weeks ago. She is going to school up at the Baptist collage right now. She says she is the only white girl that goes there. She is pretty funny and we have really enjoyed getting to know her. She was very excited to be able to start coming to church again. She got baptized a few years ago up in morelton. We went to go see her last Tuesday I think, She told us she had cancer. She had gotten a call from her doctor earlier that day and had been told that her 40% chance of survival had just been changed to a 25% chance of survival and that her cancer was now Terminal. We were the first people she talked to about it. She doesn’t have any family here in little Rock. The little unit has become her family. She was immediately accepted and loved by the little unit. She has only been to church once so far since we met her, and we have met with her a couple times with members besides that, but she is already a part of the family here on Maple street. I don’t think I have ever been in a place where the ward or branch is such a close group as it is here. You can feel the love they have for each other. I am going to miss it a lot. I wish I could stay here longer. O well the next place will be great too. Well I hope you are having a great day. Thanks for everything you do for me.

Love Elder Marshall

2011-02-06T19:57:00.001-08:00

Dear Family

Hey how is everything going for you there? I hope everyone is getting over being sick. So you are going up to Idaho this weekend? I bet that will be a fun trip. Its been a pretty crazy week this week. Sorry if I gave you a bit of a scare on Wednesday. That was Elder Steed that called you. He came out with me. We were on our way down for a district meeting in Camden Arkansas, then we were going to go on exchanges with the Hot springs Elders and the Monticello Elders. We had met up with the Hot springs Elders earlier in the morning and were riding to district meeting with them. Well we were almost to Camden, and we got pulled over by a highway patrol. The missionary who was driving was speeding. Well when the officer asked to see his license, he couldn’t find it so the officer asked him to come back to the police car with him so he could put his name into his computer. After a few minutes, the police officer found out that the missionary’s license was suspended. The three of us left were just waiting in the car watching, and after a few minutes, the police officer told the missionary to turn around and put his hands on the car so he could search him. After he got done, he handcuffed the missionary and put him in the back of the police car. We weren’t sure what we were supposed to do after that. The officer called Elder Steed and I out to talk to him and told us that we needed to follow him to the police station. When we got there we got told that for him to get out of jail, we needed to pay the bail which was $590. That’s why I had to get money out of my account. Elder Steed and I split most of it, and the other missionary picked up the rest. He was in jail though for a good hour and a half. While we were in there, a few of the police officers came out and were talking to us and told us we couldn’t have had a more aggressive officer pull us over. None of us knew that he was driving with a suspended license though. He didn’t know either. The officer told him that it was from when he was back home in Arizona, but The missionary said he had paid all his tickets, and he had been pulled over before while he was here in Arkansas and nothing had been said about it. But that’s why we called on Wednesday. It turned out to be a pretty rough day. We were all interviewed by President Drewes and the Missionary got moved to another part of the mission. Then later that night, Elder Steed and I found out another missionary from Idaho Falls had gone home earlier in the morning. It turned out to be a bad day in our zone. Hopefully this next week will be a lot better. Sunday was kind of crazy too. There weren’t very many adults there at church, but there were a lot of kids. Right in the middle of sacrament meeting, they all got rowdy and started goofing off. All the missionaries were being used to pass the sacrament, so we couldn’t help much. The Unit leader got up and took them all out to the car and took them home. When they left, it was like half the congregation was gone. Well that’s about all the excitement from here this week. There should be a letter coming in the mail with a check for $255 and aletter. I hope you have a safe trip to Idaho this week. Have fun.

Love Elder Marshall

2011-01-11T13:52:00.001-08:00

Dear family

Hey how is everything going this week? How is everyone liking being
back in school? sorry this is the third week in a row I have been
late sending out an email. All the libraries were closed yesterday
because of the snow. School is still out. We got about 3 or 4
inches. Little Rock shuts down when it snows here. We got to do some
service because of it though. Sunday night the roads were really
slick. So if the cars stoped going up a hill or at a stop sign, they
couldn’t get started again. So there were a lot of cars getting
stuck. So we helped push them up the little hills and get going after
the stop signs. It was fun. They wouldn’t role backwards down the
hill, just sit there and spin the tires. So a couple of us behind
them pushing made the difference. The baptism went really good on
Sunday. We went to the funeral with Luis on Saturday. Then Sunday
was Stake conference. It was a broadcast from salt lake. President
Monson and Elder Perry were the speakers. Then the baptism was right
after. Lol she didn’t want to go under the water. She was fine
walking down into it, but after I said the prayer and was trying to
get her under the water, she didn’t want to do it. Lol It took a few
tries and a few times saying the prayer. Finally, Elder Nield had to
find a jump suit and come into the water too. It still took a couple
tries and we finally just slid her down under real fast. Lol I think
everyone was having a good time watching except the three of us in the
water. Well I’m getting transferred again. Not to far though. Just
to the other side of maple street. I’m taking Elder Cowan’s place.
So I just move bedrooms. We have another general authority that is
coming to the mission. Elder Gonzales is going to be here on Friday.
He is the area 70 for the south east part of North America. There
are 6 or 7 companionships that are being invited to come and meet with
him. We are one of them. We are pretty excited for that. Then the
next week is when Elder Sybrowskie is coming. Lots of great stuff is
going to be happening. Then on top of it all. Elder Peinamalie (my
new companion) and I are going to be having a baptism on Saturday.
Lots of great stuff. I haven’t started working on anything with the
application stuff for BYUI. I forgot about it all. Ill be seeing
President Drewes at the transfer meeting tomorrow though and I’ll ask
him about it there. Thanks for the reminder. I hope you have a great
week this week. I miss you.

Love Elder Marshall

2010-12-22T05:15:00.000-08:00

Dear family

Hey how is everything going there? How has your week been going? When does everyone get out of school? Is it this week or next? So you are doing a lot of work on the hall? That will be neat to see. Everything has been going good here. It’s been a good week this week. Zone meeting was really good. I was kind of glad when that was over. It went good though. The zone as a whole is kind of struggling right now. We are getting down to the last of the year, and we have a long way to go to reach our goals. So this week Elder Cowan and I are probably going to be doing a lot of exchanges. So it will be another quick week. I think I’ll be down in Benton Arkansas sometime, but I’m not sure. We haven’t really decided anything yet. We have a big Christmas zone conference on Tuesday. That is going to be great. There are two of them this week in the mission. One here in Little Rock and the other in Memphis. So half the mission will be there on Tuesday. So I’ll get to see Elder Levitt. I haven’t seen him yet. He is in North Little Rock. It isn’t in our zone, so I haven’t been able to see him yet. It should be a fun day tomorrow. There were 28 people at church yesterday. I am really loving being here in the group. I think there are two of these little groups in the US right now. What they did is they took a little chunk right in the middle of little rock, and put a set of missionaries there. It’s like we are starting completely from scratch. Everyone in the group is a convert to the church except the missionaries. There is a group leader from the Little Rock ward and his wife that come and help, but they are converts to the church too. There is a really neat feel to this area because everyone is learning together. You can tell that the new members here love each other and rely on each other. Like yesterday, two of the new converts were blessing the sacrament. Well they forgot they were supposed to wait till the sacrament song to start breaking the bread. They started right in the middle of the opening prayer. By the time the prayer was done, they were half way done. I spoke in sacrament meeting yesterday, and sometimes people will Amen or Halleluiah praise the lord. When you say good morning brothers and sisters, they say it right back. It’s a great place. We are working real hard to find new men who are potential for the melkezidec priesthood. They have a goal to become a branch sometime this next year, but to do that they need 6 to 8 Melkezidec priesthood holders. I think there are potential for three right now that come to church every Sunday. It’s a great place to be serving though. I’m really grateful I have the opportunity to serve here. At the first of this next year, we are going to be starting to have priesthood and Relief society every Sunday. So far we have been having it every 2 or 3 weeks at our house. That’s where bible study is too. It gives us a little more incentive to keep our house clean. Thanks for everything you do for me. Thanks for the package you sent and for the letters and the cd. I hope you have a great week.

Love Elder Marshall

2010-12-06T20:54:00.000-08:00

Steven's new address is

Elder Steven Marshall
2504 Maple st.
Little Rock, AR 72204

If you are sending a package Steven has asked that it be sent to the mission home at

905 Kierre Dr.
North Little Rock, AR 72116

He does not want the packages just left on his door step in the City. He is close enough to the mission home that he will get them from the mission office.

Dear Family

Hey how is everything going there? So everyone is getting sick? That’s no fun. Everything has been going great here. I’m back in little rock again. I’m in down town little rock. It’s a pretty neat area. It’s the Maple street group. It isn’t even a branch yet. They just started it about 9 or 10 months ago. They were meeting in our house for a long time. Our house is a dedicated church building. We can have lessons there and everything. We have a bible study class there every Wednesday night for anyone to come to. Now we are renting the seventh day Adventist church just down the road from us. Its a lot smaller congregation than even Pocahontas was. Yesterday there were 26 people at church. Including 6 missionaries and 6 other members from the little rock ward. I had heard about the group when it got started, and have always thought it would be cool to go there, and now I’m here. My companion is Elder Nield. I’m pretty excited to be serving with him. He came out with Elder Arnold. I saw him his first day in the mission field and have been serving around him since. Our area is really small. It’s about 8 square miles. We can walk from one end to the other in about 45 minutes and there are 4 missionaries and the assistants that all work in this area. We had a baptism on Saturday. For a lady named Sandra. Her mom and son are hopefully going to be getting baptized on the 18th of December. It is going to be a lot of fun serving here. We will be getting a lot done. This week has been pretty hectic for me. Transfers were on Wednesday, but I didn’t get to work in the area till Friday night. Wednesday at the transfer meeting, president drewes called me aside and told me that he needed help in one of the Spanish areas here in little rock for a couple days because one of the missionaries was having some health problems. So as soon as I got to little rock, we went and dropped my stuff off at our house, then we had a dinner and after that, I had to meet President and the Spanish elders at the church. I was with them till late Thursday night. It was a good exchange. It wasn’t the area I was serving in when I was here, but the one right next to it. Then Friday morning, the other zone leader and I had a meeting with all the other zone leaders in the mission and president drewes. We didn’t get back from that until in the evening. So Saturday was my first real day in the area. It was great. Especially having a baptism. This week is going to be a great week. We have a zone meeting tomorrow that Elder Cowen and I are in charge of, but after that its going to be good. I hope you liked the pictures. Lol the elder that always has his belly hanging out is Elder Arnold. He was my companion for 6 months. It is a lot of fun. If you saw the video of someone jumping off the roof of a house, that is who I’m with now. Well I hope you have a great week. Thanks for everything.

Love Elder Marshall

2010-11-17T05:59:00.000-08:00

Hey how has everything been going this week? I didn’t know you had church at 1:30 wow that pretty late. I bet no one has the excuse that it’s to early to make it to church though. Your temple trip sounds like it was pretty amazing. I always love going to the temple now. It makes the rest of our week go great. So how is every one liking school? I bet everyone is ready for the Christmas break. It will be here pretty quick. Everything has been going great here. April got baptized on Friday and confirmed on Sunday. It was a great service. She was real excited for it. Her mom and sister came to the baptism too. They thought it was great. We are going to be starting to teach them now too. We had already given them a copy of the book of Mormon and they liked it a lot. It’s been a really busy week for me. Elder Ulrich and I left Memphis on Tuesday night and didn’t come back until Thursday morning. It was great being out of the city for a while. I miss being out in the country. It’s been a year now since I left Pocahontas and went to Collierville. I haven’t really gotten to serve in the country since. Senatobia is bigger than Pocahontas was, but it was still real nice. We went to their district meeting and then we spent all of Wednesday with them. Thursday was a pretty crazy day for us. We left Senatobia by 7, and had to go to South Haven. The set of missionaries there didn’t answer their phone the night before during call-ins, so we had to go make sure they were still ok. We got there and we found out one of the missionaries there wanted to go home. So we talked to him for a little bit (He is doing a lot better now. They had a baptism Saturday.) Then we drove back to Memphis. When we got there, Elder Andreasen told me one of the members needed our help to finish one of the cakes she was making that she had to deliver in a couple hours and couldn’t find any one to help her. She lives down in Mississippi. So we had to take Elder Ulrich and his companion all the way up to Walnut Grove, Then drive back to Memphis and finally get down to the members house to help her. All that before 10:00. The cake she was making was huge. It was over 4 feet tall and took Elder Andreasen and me both to carry it. And it took us two trips. Sister Browder told us it probably weighed about 200 pounds. It was huge. And it was all for a 1 year old’s birthday. That took most of our day. We didn’t finally get back to our area till about 5. Sunday was really great for us. We had 7 investigators at church, and a whole bunch of kids. There were a couple less active families that came that we have been working with too. We just started teaching a new family. That was 5 of the investigators. We are real excited for them. We are going to be inviting them to be baptized on Tuesday. It’s been a great week for us. I’m going on exchanges with Elder Hansen this week. He is one of the Assistants to the President. He is going to be with us for a couple days. That will be fun. Well I hope everything is going great there. Thanks for everything. I hope ya’ll have a great week.

Love Elder Marshall

2010-11-13T11:29:00.000-08:00

Steven's letter Nov 8

Dear Family

Hey how is everyone week going? It sounds like everyone has been real busy. I didn’t know Aaron Dally was getting married. Wow that’s great. I bet about the whole valley was at that one. Everything has been going pretty good here. We just got back from going to the Temple. That was the second time since I was in the mission I have been able to go to the Temple. I don’t know if we will be able to next month. Hopefully we will. We have been staying real busy. We have a baptism coming up this weekend. For a Lady named April Jones. She is real excited to be getting baptized. She talked to us Sunday at church and told us that her Mom’s preacher has been doing a lot to make sure she doesn’t get baptized. He has called her up in front of the Bible study class she went to at the church and told her she was making a horrible decision. And then Saturday night after we met with her he came to her house and had a good talking to her. Both times she told him she had already gotten her answer from God and that she was going to get baptized. She is staying strong to that no matter what anyone tells her. Elder Andreasen and I are pretty excited for her to be getting baptized. We have a busy week this week. Elder Ulrich and I, the other Zone leader are going on exchanges down in Mississippi with a couple sets of missionaries. We are leaving Tuesday and going to be getting back on Wednesday night. Then Friday we have April’s baptism. I’m betting it will be a pretty quick week. I got to go on an exchange with a set of Spanish missionaries this last week. That was a lot of fun. I really like going on exchanges with them. It gives me a chance to practice my Spanish. So I have a question. What is the best way to get rid of roaches? We have Roaches everywhere in our apartment. We keep our apartment really clean, but every time we come in our apartment after it gets dark, when we turn on the lights, there are cockroaches all over in our kitchen and living room. We aren’t sure how to get rid of them. We think the whole apartment complex is probably infested with them. If you have any ideas let us know. Well I hope you have a great week. Thanks for everything. I love you.

Love Elder Marshall

2010-11-13T11:22:00.000-08:00

Steven's letter Nov 1

Dear Family

Hey how is your week going? Is it starting to get cold there already? Its been getting a lot colder here. Have you been doing anything exciting lately? Can you believe its November already? It feels like October just started and its already over. Everything has been going great here. Elder Andreasen and I have been working really hard together. Erica didn’t get baptized. She has gotten real hard to get a hold of. We will keep trying though. We have been working a lot with a lady named April. She has a strong testimony of the prophet Joseph Smith and the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day saints. She told us the first time she walked into the building she knew she was supposed to be going to church there. She has felt the spirit a couple of times since telling her that she needs to get baptized. We are pretty excited for her. She just needs to keep coming to church. She is going to get baptized on the 12^th. There is another guy named Octavius that we just started talking to this last week. He is going to collage right now at University of Phoenix. He is real smart. He has prayed about Joseph Smith and knows he is a prophet too. He just needs to come to church. That seems to be the problem that a lot of people have. Coming to church. Lol a lot of people around here get a “Sunday sickness.” He is hopefully going to get baptized on the 19^th. We have really enjoyed talking to him. He and Elder Andreasen get a long really well. We are also trying to work more and more with the members here in the ward. We are trying to get them to be more involved in the missionary work going on here. So far there hasn’t been a whole lot of involvement from them. Elder Graham, Arnold, Andreasen and I are hoping to change that a little. Well I hope everyone is having fun there. Good luck in school. I love you all.

Love Elder Marshall

Steven's letter Oct 25

2010-10-31T18:15:00.001-07:00

Dear Family

Hey how is everyone doing this week? Has it still been raining there a lot? It rained here last night. It was real nice. It’s supposed to be raining tomorrow too. It’s been a really good week here. My new Companion is Elder Andreasen. He is from Brigham City Utah. Everything has been going pretty good. We had a great weekend and we have a great week planned this week. We are both pretty excited for this transfer. We have been working a lot with Erica this week. We aren’t sure if she is going to be able to get baptized this weekend. We are hoping she will be able to, but she isn’t sure if its something she should do yet. And as much as we tell her that it is important, she is gonna have to find out for herself. She has been to a lot of different churches before looking for “The one true church,” but every time she thought she had found it, she got disappointed. So she is nervous about committing herself again. She came to church yesterday. She really liked that. It was the Primary program. She was really impressed with how much the kids knew and how they acted. She was going to leave after sacrament meeting, but a few of the members surrounded her and got her to come to Sunday school. She ended up staying all three hours. Her son didn’t want to stay at all either, but by the end he said he really liked it and he wants to come to the Wednesday night activity. We have been doing a lot of finding this week. We are trying to find new people to teach. We found a Cambodian family. I was on an exchange with the Spanish elders, and we stopped to talk to them. They got all excited and told us they were Mormon. They moved to Memphis 10 years ago from Florida where they were baptized. When the moved here, they didn’t know there was a church here, so they haven’t been back since. They said they had seen missionaries ride by a few times, but none had ever come and talked to them. We were pretty glad we did. They don’t speak much English, but it’s a great family. Well I hope you are having a great week this week. Have fun.

Love Elder Marshall

Steven's letter Oct 18

2010-10-31T18:13:00.000-07:00

Dear Family



Hey how has your week been? How was the trip to Logan? I bet it was pretty nice weather up there. How has everyone been liking school? Is everyone getting ready for Halloween? The ward here is doing a big trunk or treat and a chili cook off. Are they doing that again there this year? We are going to be trying to get a lot of our investigators to come. Elder Graham is getting transferred. He got called this morning. He is leaving on Wednesday. It doesn稚 feel like it has been that long since we first got together. I知 not sure who my new companion will be. I guess I値l find out on Wednesday. I hope he is ready to work hard. We just got done with a lesson at the church this morning. We were talking to a lady named Daffney and her husband. She had come to church a couple times, but this was the first time we had actually been able to have a lesson with her. We had a less active member that agreed to come with us too. Brother McCormick. He really enjoyed it. He has been afraid to come back to church because it had been so long since he has been, but he said that was the ice breaker and that he would be there on Sunday. We are pretty excited. His daughter just got baptized a couple months ago so it will be good to have them all there as a family. Its been a good week here. We are still working a lot with Erica. She has had a lot of questions come up about getting baptized. She is going to miss Elder Graham a lot. She had a really great connection with him. They have had a lot of similar experiences. Well I hope you have a great week this week. Have fun.



Love Elder Marshall



quote of the week: "A testimony is not thrust upon you; a testimony grows. We become taller in testimony like we grow taller in physical stature; we hardly know it happens because it comes by growth." - Boyed K. Packer

Steven's letter Oct 12

2010-10-31T18:11:00.000-07:00

Dear Family

Hey how is everything going this week? It sounds like a lot has been happening. We have been having a great week here. I’m glad all the meetings are over for a while. I won’t have another one until the first part of November and that one will be here in Memphis so we won’t have to drive clear to Little Rock again till December unless I get moved over at the transfer. That’s coming up this week. We will be finding out on Monday if one of us are getting moved. I think we have a pretty good chance at staying together another transfer though. Elder Graham has only been here for one transfer longer than I have. We are working really great together. He is a great missionary. He really wants to work hard. We have been working with a new family lately. We saw them earlier today. It is a great family. We read a little from 3^rd Nephi 11 with Zane today. Star, his girlfriend had read the chapter 3 or 4 times since Saturday since we last saw them. They asked us to come over again tomorrow and talk to them again. We are going to teach them the Plan of salvation and Commit them to get baptized. O I heard someone speak in tongs a couple days ago. I had heard a lot about people doing that, but I had never heard anyone do it though. It was right in the middle of our closing prayer with Erica. She was praying and she kept on getting louder and louder until she was about yelling, then she started speaking in tongs. That was a new one. I guess she felt the spirit real strong. And that’s what happens when she feels the spirit. Elder Graham and I weren’t sure what we were supposed to do. Ok so another story from this week. So Elder Arnold and his new companion decided they wanted to catch a squirrel a couple days ago. He wanted to find out what they tasted like. The neighbor always feeds all the squirrels every day, so we have a lot of fat squirrels around the apartment. So they decided to take a fishing pole and put a piece of bread with peanut butter on the hook and leave it as bait. Then when the squirrel bites, just reel it in. The things missionaries do when they get bored. Well instead of catching a squirrel, the neighbor’s dog came over and started licking the peanut butter. Then it ate the piece of bread… hook and all. They caught a dog with a fishing pole. The neighbor wasn’t to happy. Lol Some people’s kids. Well I hope everyone has a great week this week. Have fun going to Logan this week.

Love Elder Marshall

2010-10-04T10:55:00.000-07:00

Dear family

Hey how are you doing this week? How is grandma doing? That’s good that everything is doing better now. So the barn is coming down? Wow it’s going to look a lot different when I get back. It’s good to hear that it is finally cooling down there. It has gotten pretty cool here too. When we left our apartment this morning, you could see your breath. It is a pretty big change from a week and a half ago. It’s still cool outside now. I think its supposed to warm back up though. Everything has been going pretty good here. . The exchange with Spanish went pretty good. I wasn’t able to add a whole lot, but I could understand most of what was being said. I thought it was pretty good for not speaking Spanish very much for the last 7 months. I can’t believe it’s been that long. It’s been a good week this week. Not a whole lot of excitement. I went to little rock on Friday. It is a 2 and a half hours drive. So five hours driving, and then a 4 hour meeting in between. I was ready to be done sitting by the end of it. It was good though. We left Memphis at about 7 in the morning and we didn’t get back to east Memphis until after 6. Elder Arnold and I have 2 more meetings this week, but they are both here in Memphis and shouldn’t take so long as the last one. We have been working a lot with a lady named Erica. She is a really nice lady. She is getting baptized on the 29^th. We haven’t been able to meet with her very much this last week because she is going to school up at the University of Memphis, but she has been reading a lot out of the book of Mormon. She really likes it. We are going to drive up there a couple times this week to read with her on campus. We also have a trip to Mississippi planned for Saturday. There are a bunch of people down there that we are hoping to see. We are pretty excited to go down there and get out of the city for a few hours. Well I hope you are having a great day. I love you. Have a great week.

Love Elder Marshall

2010-09-20T11:58:00.000-07:00

Dear Family

Hey how is everyone doing this week? How is school going with everyone? It sounds like the trip to Boise was a lot of fun. It’s weird to think that David is home now. I’ve heard that it’s hard going home and going back to regular life. Well everything has been going great here. Elder Graham and I are working hard together. We went down into Mississippi a couple days ago. That was really nice. It had been a long time since I had been out in the country. It’s been about 10 months now I think since I left Pocahontas. It was real peaceful. It felt good to be out away from all the noise and traffic in Memphis for a little while. This area covers a lot of area out in Mississippi. I like it a lot. Most of the active members in the ward live out in Mississippi too. We haven’t had the baptism for Ray yet. He is getting baptized on the 24^th. We are all pretty excited for him. He is loving having the missionaries come over and talk to him and his wife. I wish I could still go over and see him. I’m glad I’ll get to watch him get baptized though. Most of the people here in East Memphis are a lot like the people in Orange Mound. The only difference is that most of them have jobs or are going to school. So it’s a little harder to catch people home here. They are still great people though. Its still pretty hot here too. Has it cooled down there yet? We got told all this week is supposed to be real hot. It will be nice when it cools down. Well I hope you have a great week this week. I love you.

Love Elder Marshall

Quote of the week: “And I was led by the Spirit, not knowing beforehand the things which I should do. Nevertheless I went forth” -1 Ne 4:6-7

2010-09-13T15:02:00.000-07:00

Dear Family

Hey how are you doing? How is everyone liking school? It sounds like Rebecca really likes school. That’s great that she does. That’s great that Kaitlyn likes playing Tennis so much. I bet she will do great at it. The motorcycle trip sounds like it was a lot of fun too. Bet it was a great ride. It sounds like there is a lot going on there. So David goes home tomorrow doesn’t he? I think that’s what he told me. Wow that’s crazy. It doesn’t seem like it has been long enough. I’m glad President messer got up and said that about everyone needing to go on a mission. I’m so glad I came. I would always regret not coming if I hadn’t come. I think all the young men would regret not going after it was to late to go. It will be something that they will always remember and bless the rest of their lives. Well everything is going great here. I’m in East Memphis now. Melisa Browder is a member of the ward here. She has us over for dinner sometimes. We were over there last Friday or Saturday and she started talking about face book and told us she would look our parents up. The missionaries have been working with her for the last year or so helping her start coming back to church. She is really nice. Its pretty nice being in the same ward. I know all the members still. Its kind of weird not being with Elder Arnold though. Elder Graham is a great missionary. We are getting along pretty well. This area is a little bit different than orange mound was. It’s a good area though. O by the way. I got a call from President Drewes today. He got a letter from the first presidency and Ray got the approval to get baptized. We are pretty excited for him. Elder Arnold and his companion will be going over tomorrow to set up his baptism. I’m really glad I will still be around to see him get baptized. I saw him at church on Sunday and he was talking about how he was excited about how he finally found Christ’s church. His family owns a few different churches. He wants us to go over and start talking to his mom now. He has been talking to her about the church and how much he likes it. I think it is here in this area. That would be really neat to be able to start teaching her too.

I got asked to be a zone leader. I’m pretty nervous about it. I call into Elder Hansen every night though. He helps me out a lot. I’m still not sure what all I’m supposed to be doing. I guess I better learn fast. Well I hope you have a great week. I love you all and miss you.

Love Elder Marshall

O and yes I did get the package with the 4^th of july t shirt. I thought I told her thankyou. Maybe I didn’t though. I’ll tell her again.

2010-08-31T05:43:00.001-07:00

Dear Family

Hey how has everything been going? Thanks for the package you sent. That was great to get that. Thanks for the pictures. They are great to look at. Everything in the package was great. Thanks so much. We have been listening to the talks. Well everything has been going great here this week. Elder arnold and i have had a pretty good week. We have been working alot with Tyree. He is getting baptized on sunday. He is pretty excited. He is inviting a lot of his friends to come watch him. It is going to be great. We have also been talking a lot to a guy named Ray. He is hopefully getting baptized on Sunday too. He has to get interviewed by the mission president before he gets baptized. so hopefully everything goes good with that. He is a really great guy. His wife is a member. They have a goal to go to the temple together and get married in the temple. She has taught him a lot about the church. When we first met him, he already had a testimony of Joseph Smith. He said it made since that God would call prophets today, just like he called prophets thousands of years ago. He really enjoys reading the Book of Mormon too. He is always trying to learn. I think he will really like the Doctrine and Covenants too. He is really smart. probably one of the smartest people i have talked to in a long time. We are excited for him to get baptized. Transfers are coming up this week. One of us are probably getting moved. We have both been here for the last 6 months now. I'm thinking its going to be me that is going to get moved. I think Elder Arnold is going to train a new missionary. It will be good for him. We will find out a week from today what is going to happen. We are taking Elder smith to the temple on Monday too. He is going home. He flies home on Tuesday. It will be sad to see him go. the three of us have been around each other for the last 6 months. Well i hope you have a great week.

Love Elder Marshall

Quote of the week: “We are given the gift of the Holy Ghost after our baptism, but often we leave this gift on the shelf, forgetting that He will help us in the most important judgments of our lives. The Lord gave us this gift, knowing we would face difficult decisions in life. Listening to this voice is vital in developing good judgment. A relationship of listening often requires a quiet environment in which we can take time to ponder and hear the still, small voice. This peaceful environment is both external and internal.”

-Gregory A. Schwitzer

2010-08-24T23:03:00.001-07:00

We had a really fun Summer this year. Here are a few pictures. While we were at Lagoon Corey was able to go to the National Scout Jamboree in Virginia so he is not in the Lagoon pictures.

2010-08-24T22:50:00.000-07:00

We got to see a Moose in Island Park

We were able to go to John and Susan's cabin for a few days.

2010-08-24T22:37:00.000-07:00

We were able to take the girls to Lagoon this summer. We all had fun but Kaitlyn is excited for Steven to come home so he can go on some of those "exciting" rides that the rest of us don't do anymore.

2010-08-24T22:09:00.000-07:00

These pictures are probably out of order a bit but it will kind of give you an idea of what we got to see on our Alaskan cruise.

We are walking back to the boat after visiting Victoria.
I got these next pictures mixed up. When we went to dinner the night of the 17th our waiter brought us a little dessert and sang us a love song for our anniversary. It had a candle in it and we got to blow it out. We thought that was nice of them.

Every night (actually every meal) we had fruit. It was the best fruit especially the pineapple.

We got our cabin door decorated for our anniversary.

2010-08-24T21:45:00.000-07:00

This is one of 6 pools on the ship.

Dinner time. It seems like we were always eating.

The second day on the boat I was not feeling very well...

These are just some fun things that they made there on the ship.

2010-08-24T20:34:00.000-07:00

This is Gregory and I in front of Mendenhall Glacier. This is just outside of Juneau Alaska.

This is a big chuck of ice in the water. The ship had to go by a whole bunch of these to get to the Glacier.

We were able to go to a State Park that was full of totem Poles. This was in Ketchikan Alaska

This picture was taken in Ketchickan. We are just getting ready to get back on the ship.

This is a picture of part of the inside of the ship. Very nice!!

2010-08-23T20:08:00.001-07:00

Dear family

Hey how has your week been going? How has getting ready to go back to school been going? Is it still pretty hot there? It hasn’t been to hot here. Its supposed to be getting cooler this week too. That will be nice. So when does school start? Is it this week or next week? It started a couple of weeks ago here. Everything has been going good here for us. We have been staying real busy. I was with Elder Smith again this week. We had meetings again. We had the last one on Friday. They were really good. The missionary department is putting a lot of emphasis on teaching skills. So we were doing a lot with that. Pete went to the temple on Friday. He got baptized back in April. The ward did a trip for all the new converts and the youth in the ward. We weren’t able to go, but we heard it was really good. Pete said he had a great time. We have just sarted working with a new family. The Martin family. The wife has been coming to church for a couple weeks now. She is the granddaughter of a member in the ward. The husband came for the first time this week. We went and saw them yesterday. She is a member already. She has been to the temple to do baptisms and everything. Its just been a while since she had come. The husband though isn’t a member. When we went over yesterday, he started telling us how he wants to go to the temple with his wife and get married there. That kindof surprised us. Most people we talk to don’t know much about the temple at all. Before we left, He told us he wanted to get baptized too. He wanted to set a day that he could get baptized before we left. It was great. We are hoping to see him get baptized before one of us gets transferred. That’s coming up in about two weeks. I think the 4^th is the last day of the transfer. Well I hope you have a great week.

Love Elder Marshall

Quote of the week: “Patience is not passive resignation, nor is it failing to act because of our fears. Patience means active waiting and enduring. It means staying with something and doing all that we can—working, hoping, and exercising faith; bearing hardship with fortitude, even when the desires of our hearts are delayed. Patience is not simply enduring; it is enduring well!”

-Elder Dieter F. Uchtdorf

2010-07-26T13:45:00.000-07:00

Steven's letter written July 26

Hey how is everyone doing this week? Are you having fun in Idaho? Isit pretty nice weather there? There is a missionary here in the wardthat is from Pocatello. He is going home at the end of the transfer.He says it has been pretty nice weather there lately. His name isElder Brandon Smith. I don’t know if Grandma Smith knows him or not.Its been fun serving around him. Well Elder Arnold and I are stayingtogether at least another 6 weeks here in Orange Mound. We thoughtfor sure that one of us was going to leave. At the end of thistransfer we will have been together for 6 months. So Steven Jensen isback from his mission? Wow I didn’t know he was coming back thatsoon. I bet his homecoming was pretty good. Everything has beengoing pretty good here. We had a few less actives at church that wehave been working with. It was great to see them there. We have beenworking a lot with one less active family. The Malone family. Mostof the kids are baptized, but none of the adults are baptized. Thereis a bunch of little kids there. We have been trying to get them tocome to church for a while now, but they don’t have any way to gethere. And they live about as far away from the church as they couldso it makes it hard to get members to go out to pick them up. That’sone of our goals for this transfer is to help them get back to comingevery week. One of the kids wants to get baptized too. Her name isNa Na. The first time we went out to see them she came up to us andtold us she was 8 and that she wanted to get baptized. Oddessey isdoing good. She wont be getting baptized on the 6th though. We arehoping she can get baptized by the 13 or the 21 though. Her aunt’sfamily just got baptized. They have an awesome family. Elder Arnoldand I are looking forward to a great transfer together. We willdefiantly be working hard. Thanks for everything you do.Love Elder Marshall
Quote of the week: “You can know the things you need to know. Praythat you will learn to receive that inspiration and remain worthy toreceive it. Keep that channel—your mind—clean and free from theclutter of the world.” -Boyd K. Packer

I have been a little behind sorry......This is Steven's letter written July 19

Hey how are you doing this week? It sounds like you had a great weekin Alaska. What all did you do while you were gone? I bet it wasreally neat. Did you go anywhere around where David is? That wasgreat that you got to see Corey before he left. I was wondering whenhis trip was going to be. Was he pretty excited to be going on that?Is there a lot of people going on that trip? Everything is going goodhere. Elder Arnold and I had a great week this last week. Sorry Ididn’t write yesterday. We are having P-day on Tuesday this week.We’re going to the zoo today. Its free for anyone that lives inMemphis every Tuesday. So for our last week together, our district isgoing to the zoo. I’m pretty excited to go. Its been a while sinceI’ve been to a zoo. This is the last week of the transfer. ElderArnold and I are thinking that one of us are getting moved next week.We’ll know on Monday morning. If we get moved, we’ll leave onWednesday. Its been a fun 4 and a half months together. Elder Arnoldhits his 6 month mark today. So he is going to be burning a tietonight. It doesn’t seem like that long ago when I burned a tie. Wehave been really busy this last week. We have found a lot of newpeople we are starting to work with. I think I already told youabout Oddessey Clark. Well she is getting baptized on the 6th withher mom. We are pretty excited for her. There is another lady wehave been working with for a while now who has a baptism date for the6th to. We stopped teaching her for a while and just started teachingher again last week. She said she is ready to start making changes.She is the only white person I have taught since I got here. We hadquite a few people at church on Sunday too. It was good to seeeveryone there. So your going to be in Idaho the next couple weeks? What all are yougoing to be doing there? Well I hope you have a great week this week. Thanks for everything you do for me. I love you.Love Elder Marshall
Quote of the week: “To gain a testimony, you must nourish it step bystep. Your testimony will increase as you make decisions to keep thecommandments. As you lift and strengthen others, you will see yourtestimony continue to develop. ” -Mary N. Cook

2010-07-07T07:19:00.000-07:00

Dear Family

Hey how has your week been?  Your going on a cruise this week huh?
How is everyone enjoying their summer?  I was sorry to hear about warm
springs.  Wow. Do they know how it started?  That’s to bad.  Do you
know if they are going to rebuild it?  I hope they do.  It sounds like
you had a good Fourth of July.  The Wollenburgs sound like they are a
fun family.   Every thing has been going good here this week.  We had
a pretty good Fourth of July. There were a lot of fireworks going on
around where we live.  We had a pretty good time.  There are a couple
videos and some pictures I think you will like.  We had Zone
conference.  That was really good.  There was a lot about how we need
to be doing more with the Recent Converts and the less actives here in
Memphis.  There are a lot of them here, so we will be kept really
busy.  Elder Arnold and I are staying pretty busy.  We don’t think we
are going to be staying together another transfer though.  He hits his
6 month mark this month.  It’s weird to think that I’ve been with him
most of his mission.  He had only been out 6 weeks when he came here
to Orange mound.  The time has been flying by.  It seems like its
getting faster.   We have been working with a less active sister named
Sister Johnson a lot the last couple weeks.  We talked to her
yesterday.  She has opened up to us a lot in the last couple of weeks.
We are hoping to start teaching her daughter and her Grandson.  The
daughter isn’t really interested right now, but we are hoping that
will change soon.  We are also working with a recent convert family.
The mom’s name is Patricia.  They have been going through a lot
lately.  I never knew there were so many people struggling before.
She just got evicted out of her apartment.  She is a single mom and
has no job.  She got a little house that she thought she could afford
if she could find a job.  She hasn’t been able to find one though.
The area where she lives doesn’t have much business around it and
there are a lot of people looking for work around there.  She doesn’t
have a car either so she can’t look to far away from where she lives.
She is such an awesome person though.  She was baptized in February
with her 4 daughters.  They are a great family.  The ward really loves
her and her family.  Well I hope you’re having a great week this week.
I love you.  Have fun.

Love Elder Marshall

2010-07-02T06:55:00.000-07:00

Dear Family
>>
>> Hey how has your week been going?  It sounds like the Manti pageant
>> was a lot of fun.  And the shopping afterwards too.  Is Rebecca still
>> liking the swimming lessons?  I kindof wish we could get in the water
>> sometimes here.  The swimming pools look really good here on really
>> hot days.  So you got to sit in the chapel for stake conference?  Wow
>> I don’t think we have ever done that before.  That must have been
>> pretty neat.  Especially with a member of the seventy there.  Well
>> everything has been going good here. Elder Arnold and I have been
>> doing good.  We have been working a lot with some of the Less active
>> and recent converts in the ward this week.  We got a sister to come
>> that hasn’t been to church in the last year.  We were pretty excited
>> to see her there.  We didn’t have any investigators there this Sunday.
>>  Her name is Sister Johnson.  She was baptized when Elder Baron was
>> here in this area.  He came out with me.  He’s from Pahrump.  I talked
>> to the missionaries in Pocahontas this morning.  I was asking about
>> some of the people that we were teaching when I was there.  Do you
>> remember Kelly Newcomb?  He got baptized right when I left.  Well I
>> guess he is running for mayor up in Ashflat Arkansas.   Its been a
>> while since I talked to him.  They said he was still doing great and
>> that he was teaching Sunday school now.  I think its really neat
>> hearing about the people that I got to meet there.  Carla Baily should
>> be getting ready to go through the temple pretty soon.  Im hoping when
>> she does,  Elder Hansen and I  will be able to go through with her.
>> It would be the first time I have been able to go to the temple in
>> over a year now.  Well I hope everything is going great for you there.
>>  I hope you are having a great week.  Tell Rebecca Happy Birthday for
>> me.  I miss you.
>>
>> Love Elder Marshall
>>
>> Quote of the week:  “Always do your best, and the lord will do the rest.”
>>                      - My branch President in the MTC
>>

2010-06-24T08:13:00.000-07:00

This picture is a little late but I thought it was a good one. It was taken in Dec

2010-06-24T08:05:00.000-07:00

Dear Family

Hey how is everyone doing?  So you are going to the Manti pageant?
That would be a lot of fun.  I remember going there once with the
ward, but its been a long time.  I remember it was really neat though.
I bet everyone would love going to that.   So how has your week been
going?  When is Corey going on his big trip?  Is that coming up pretty
quick?  Everything has been going good here.  Elder Arnold and I have
been working pretty hard this week.  The week flew by too.  If all the
weeks go by as fast as this week did this transfer, its going to be a
real fast transfer.  We have been trying to find a lot of new people
to teach.  We find plenty of people to teach first lessons to, we just
have problems ever finding them again.   There was a missionary
farewell on Sunday.  It brought back some memories.  He is going to
Germany though.  He goes into the MTC on Wednesday.  I went back and
read in my journal that first day in the MTC.  I had forgotten a lot
of what went on that first week there in the MTC.  Reading the journal
helped me remember a lot though.  The first two or three days were
pretty hard but after that it wasn’t too bad.
 Elder Arnold is from Washington state.  From a little town called
Ellensburg.  He has been out 5 months yesterday.  He had only been out
one transfer when he came here to orange mound.  It doesn’t seem like
it was that long ago, but it has been three months now.   I have two
flags, the confederate flag and a Arkansas flag.  I’ve been having my
companions sign the confederate flag.  I didn’t at the first of the
mission, but I just started.  Elder Perza signed it before he went
home.  Now I just need to get Elder Contreras and Elder Kelly to sign
it.  Everyone else has.   Well I hope you have a great week this week.
Thanks for the letters this week in the mail.  It was great to hear
from everyone.  Thanks again for everything.

Love Elder Marshall

Quote of the week:     “In the end, the central purpose of all
scripture is to fill our souls with faith in God the Father and in His
Son, Jesus Christ—faith that They exist; faith in the Father’s plan
for our immortality and eternal life; faith in the Atonement and
Resurrection of Jesus Christ, which animates this plan of happiness;
faith to make the gospel of Jesus Christ our way of life; and faith to
come to know ‘the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom [He has] sent’
(John 17:3).”            -D. Todd Christofferson

2010-06-24T08:00:00.000-07:00

2010-06-24T07:52:00.000-07:00

What happened to our Steven that should be dressed in a suit and tie?!?!?

2010-06-07T21:45:00.000-07:00

Dear Family,
>> Hey how is everyone doing this week?  Is everyone liking being out of
>> school?  It sounds like it is good and hot there.  It isn’t getting
>> that hot here yet.  It hasn’t been over 95 or 96 yet.  It feels pretty
>> hot though.  A lot of the houses and apartments we go into are old and
>> run down and don’t have air conditioning.  My companion is having a
>> pretty hard time of it.  Lol He is always sweating.  Our air
>> conditioning went out a couple weeks ago.  I didn’t think it was too
>> bad.  It was only out one night.  I slept fine, but I guess he didn’t.
>>  He said he was up most of the night.  There was a sweat outline of a
>> body on his sheets when he got out of the bed.  He keeps telling
>> everyone that it was -15 when he left Washington and it was perfect
>> there.  It not real hot, its just real humid.  Even when I’m not hot
>> I’m still sweating.   We are having a great time serving together.
>> Transfers are coming up next week.  We should be getting a call next
>> Sunday night.  I’m kindof hoping I get moved this one.  I’m ready to
>> get moved back out of the city.  I miss being out in the country.
>> What ever happens will be good though.  I’m hoping I get switched back
>> to Spanish this transfer.  There are two Spanish elders going home
>> this week and none coming back out.  I guess we’ll see what happens.
>> Its been a good week here this week.  Elder Arnold and I have been
>> staying busy.  We are having trouble getting the people we set baptism
>> dates with, keep their dates and get baptized on that day.   Right now
>> we are trying to figure out how we can help them keep their
>> commitments better, or what we can do better to help them.  We have
>> been working a lot with Tina and Jerry.  We found Jerry while he was
>> watching a guy get arrested.  They have a great family.  They have
>> been coming to church for the last couple weeks in a row now.  We have
>> been trying to get them married for a while now.  Well on Sunday we
>> finally got them to go set up an appointment with the bishop.  They
>> are going to meet with him on Tuesday to talk about when they can get
>> married.  I really hope the get married and baptized pretty soon.
>> They are my favorite family that we have been working with.  They come
>> play basket ball with us every Wednesday night.  They bring their 4
>> kids too.  O so Elder Yoshihiko Kikuchi showed up at sacrament meeting
>> yesterday.  That was pretty neat.  He spoke for about 10 minutes.  It
>> was really great to hear from him.  We came and shook all the
>> missionaries hands.  Our investigators that were there really felt the
>> spirit while he was talking.  Even the ones that hadn’t been to church
>> before were really impressed by him and the things he talked about.
>> It was awesome.  Well I hope everything is going great there this
>> week.  Have a great time out of school.  I love you
>> Love Elder Marshall
>>
>> Quote of the week:  “Elders, keep working hard.”
>>                                             - Elder Kikuchi to Elder
>> Arnold and I.  it was pretty cool meeting him.
>>
>>

2010-06-05T22:08:00.000-07:00

Dear Family

Hey how has your week been going? So only two more days till school is
out?  Wow its coming up pretty fast.  Is anything fun going to be
happening after that? Its been a pretty good week here.  Memorial day
was a lot of fun.  We were over at a members house during the day.
That was  a lot of fun.  We got to do a lot over there.  We went
fishing, played basket ball,  had a barbeque,  lol and we got to shoot
elder Arnold in the stomach with air soft guns.  That was a lot of
fun.  It was his idea too.  He has some nice red welts now.  We were
invited to a few dinners.  It was a fun P day.  Ya I didn’t used to
like playing basket ball.  I do now though.  I’m getting better.  I
wasn’t very good, but that’s what a lot of missionaries like to do for
Mondays and then we do it Wednesday night and invite all of our
investigators to come play at the church.  And we play with people on
the streets and in the parks. We find a lot of people to teach when we
play with them.  Lol we have to go easy on people on the streets
though because the don’t like getting beat by a couple of white kids.
Elder Arnold is pretty good at basketball.  We don’t get to play
soccer very often though.
 Well Temeka still isn’t doing very good this week she found out that
her Liver is enlarged and she has a lot of extra fluid in her stomach
where she got shot.  Ya Satan works hard against all of the new
converts.  I don’t think there has been one person that I’ve seen
baptized that had an easy time before or after they got baptized.   We
are teaching Temeka’s daughter right now.  Her name is Shameka.  She
is getting baptized on the 19th.  She got her jaw broken a few years
ago in a fight. They put metal plates in her jaw. Well she has been
tasting rust in her mouth when she eats and drinks.  She says it
tastes like she is sucking on a penny.  Well she went in and got it
checked and the doctor told her whoever did her surgery put iron
plates.  They are rusting and she has to have them taken out and new
ones put in.  I think she said that was going to be happening in the
next week.  Ya Satan defiantly doesn’t want any of these people
baptized.  They will though.
Well I hope you have a great week.  Thanks for everything.

Love Elder Marshall

Quote of the week:   “Now is the time for each of us to work toward
our personal conversion, toward becoming what our Heavenly Father
desires us to become.”
                     -  Dallin H. Oaks

2010-05-24T20:58:00.000-07:00

Dear family
Hey how is everyone doing this week? Is everyone getting excited to
be getting out of school pretty soon? Everyone is out here.
Graduation was today. That’s awesome that the family just got
baptized. There name is the Garcias? Is it a Hispanic family?
That’s great to have a new family in the ward. It hasn’t been
raining very much till today. We still haven’t been anywhere close to
seeing a tornado. Today its raining though. We were over by the
church playing soccer in a field with a bunch of missionaries. It
started raining about half way through. We decided to keep playing
though. It was a lot of fun. We were all soaked by the end of the
game. There were a lot of mud spots too so that was a lot of fun.
Last Monday night we got a pretty crazy phone call. Temeka has been
trying to move to another house, but she hasn’t been able to get a
truck to help her move. We had set everything up for the ward to go
help her move on Thursday. She and her family have been living in the
new house though. They just had her beds there. Well the land lord
for the other house got told that it had been abandoned so he decided
he was going to go and take all of her stuff out so he could rent it
out. He tore everything out of the house. Beds, fridge, clothes,
pictures, social security cards, everything… He threw everything out
in the street. It was in the evening time too. We got a call from her
at about 7:30. People had already started digging through it taking
what they wanted. Nicer things like her fridge were already gone.
She was pretty upset because they didn’t have much to start out with.
We couldn’t go over until Tuesday morning and we helped her get
everything that was left. She has been through a whole lot lately.
She is doing a lot better now though. Besides that everything is
going great here. Elder Arnold and I are doing great together. Well I hope everything is going great for you. I hope everyone is having fun in their last
couple weeks of school. I love you

Love Elder Marshall

2010-05-17T18:49:00.000-07:00

This quilt is my Mom's. It is called "Blooms" She finished it this last week. We started them at the Cedar City quilt retreat.(I am still working on mine)Both pictures are the same quilt the coloring is just different because of the flash.

2010-05-17T18:45:00.000-07:00

This quilt is one that I got started with my sisters on a weekend trip to Salt Lake a couple of years ago. Yes this one is actually quilted.

2010-05-17T18:37:00.000-07:00

This quilt is called the Hunters Star. The Black, White, and Red one is mine. The Blue and White is Mom's(she does not blog so I get to show of her quilts too)I hope to get this one quilted this summer also. (I have a lot to do this summer)

2010-05-17T18:08:00.000-07:00

I thought I would show off some quilts that I have been working on. These are just quilt tops I plan on quilting them this summer. The 2 top quilts I worked on with my Relief Society sisters. "Oh my stars" and "Stars and Stripes" are quilts that I learned how to do at the Cedar City quilt retreat.

Steven's letter May 17

2010-05-17T10:33:00.000-07:00

Dear Family
 Hey how has your week been going this week?  Did you get the
pictures i sent? It sounds like the trip to Idaho was pretty fun.   So
the family got baptized?  Thats awsome.  How many people are in their
family?  Elder Arnold and i have been doing pretty good this week.  We
have been doing a little bit of service, but it wasn't because of the
storms.  We helped a recent convert move.  We have been working a lot
with Temeka's family.  We have been talking to them a lot about how we
want them to all go to the temple and be sealed together as a family.
four of the family are already baptized.  We have been working with
three others trying to get them ready to be baptized.  We are working
with another youger family too.  Tina and Jerry.  They have 4 little
kids too.  All under 5 years old.  They are a really great family.
They are a great family  we found them when we went up and started
talking to Jerry.  He was watching a guy get arrested so we went over
and started talking to him and invited him to come play basket ball.
He ended up coming and bringing his whole family.  They have come to
basketball everyweek since.  They have only come to church once
though.  Tina works all but 2 sundays a week and Jerry doesn't like
bringing 4 little kids to church by himself.  They want to get
baptized on the 4th of june.  Elder Arnold and i love going over and
talking to them.  The members of the ward really love the family too.
Well i hope you are haveing a great week.
Love Elder Marshall
Quote of the week:     “We should learn to be patient with ourselves.
Recognizing our strengths and our weaknesses, we should strive to use
good judgment in all of our choices and decisions, make good use of
every opportunity, and do our best in every task we undertake. We
should not be unduly discouraged nor in despair at any time when we
are doing the best we can. Rather, we should be satisfied with our
progress even though it may come slowly at times.”       Joseph B.
Wirthlin

2010-05-11T19:45:00.000-07:00

Kaitlyn is so happy to get her picture taken!!

Corey was able to go to prom with Jessany Mortenson. Prom was in Las Vegas at the Treasure Island. They had a great time.

Rebecca convinced me that it was silly sock day at school. After school she told me that it really wasn't silly sock day it was a different day. She said that it was fun to wear them anyway.

2010-05-11T19:41:00.000-07:00

Dear family

Hey how is everyone doing?  I hope everyone is doing good.  It was
great to hear from everyone yesturday.  Did you ever get the video to
work that i sent you?  We went over to a recent converts house and she
made a video for elder Arnold and i on her phone.   we are going to be
helping her move later this week.  So did you have fun over at the
shop last night?  It sounded like just about everyone was there.  Its
been raining again today.  I think its supposed to rain tomorrow to.
It rains so much here.  a bunch of the elders here in memphis got
together and played basketball at the church.  It was a lot of fun.
I'm getting better.  I was pretty horrible when i started playing.
Most of the missionaries around here haven't played much either though
so we just go to have fun.  Later today a member is taking us out to
have pizza out in south haven.  Well i hope everyone is having a great
day.  I hope you have a great week.  Sorry i missed you Corey.  I'll
make sure i get a letter in the mail this week.  I love you.
Love Elder Marshall

2010-05-06T06:03:00.000-07:00


Hey how is it going this week?  It sounds like its been pretty cold
there.    It has been raining like crazy this weekend here.  I
don't think i've seen so much rain.  Friday morning
we got woke up at about 4 by tornado sirens.  It was no fun.  There
never was any tornadoes though.  There were in arkansas though.  In my last
area in Little Rock, they had a couple.  The sirens were
going most of Saturday too.  By saturday night, Elder Arnold and i
were pretty tired of hearing them.  We slept all night long saturday.
We got told on sunday that that was when the worst of the storm was.
It didn't bother either of us though.
         Well neither of us are getting transfered.  Elder Arnold
and i are pretty excited to be staying together again.  O we went and
saw Tameka this week.  (thats shameka's mom)  She has been seeing
missionaries for a while now.  She has is completely ready to get
baptized except she smokes.  She has told all the missionaries she
wants to quite and get baptized, but she never has.  Well On friday we
went and had an awsome lesson with her.  Elder Arnold and i were
pretty bold with her.  She has had 4 baptism dates so far and she has
missed everyone because she can't quit smoking.  We called her out on
it and told her she needs to be baptized on the 8th.  The spirit was
so strong.  She has always told the missionaries " I'll try.  I won't
lie to you I'll try to quit, but i don't know if i can."  This time we
wouldn't leave it at that. She finally promised us and God that she
would quit smoking so she could be baptized.  We have been seeing her
everymorning since to read scriptures with her and help her quit.  It
has been amazing to see how much she has changed since then.  She is
so much happier now.  Before, she would go through mood swings and she
always had headaches.  She is getting baptized on Friday.  We are
pretty excited for her.  Well I hope you have a great week.
Love Elder Marshall
Quote of the week:
“Faith is not a theological platitude. It is a fact of life. Faith can
become the very wellspring of purposeful living. There is no more
compelling motivation to worthwhile endeavor than the knowledge that
we are children of God, the Creator of the universe, our all-wise
Heavenly Father! God expects us to do something with our lives, and he
will give us help when help is sought.”            - Gordon B.
Hinckley

2010-04-22T20:51:00.000-07:00

Well everything is going good here.  Elder Arnold and i
have been working hard together.  We have been teaching a lot of
lessons together.  We are having a baptism this friday.  His name is
brandon.  He is about 21.  Elder Arnold and i are pretty excited for
that.  His mom and his neace have already been baptized. We were
hoping that his sister would be able to get baptized, but she couldn't
come to church so she is going to have to wait another week. There are
a lot of people here that want to change their lives.  A lot of them
live in very humble circumstances and dont have very much money. . .
or anything else.  A lot of the people that we talk to have had rough
lives and want to change their lives and become better people.  I have
been really surprised at how religious everyone here is.  ELder Arnold
and i are getting a lot of practice at just going up and talking to
random people on the streets.  There are always people out walking
around. all day long.  Especially when the sun starts going down.  We
meet a lot of interesting people.  Most of them will stop what they
are doing to listen to what we have to say too.
        So I had a funny experience this last week at church.  My
companion sometimes has a hard time staying awake in church.  Well he
was sitting next to one of our investigators during sacrament meeting
and he started falling asleep and was nodding off. lol Well the
investigator saw his head bobbing and bumped him and asked " hey are
you sleeping?"  Elder arnold said," No, I'm having revelation." He
said it with a strait face and the investigator thought he was serious
so he just said, " O sorry,  Keep having them revelations" and didn't
say anything else to him. Lol  It was pretty funny.  Well i hope you
are having a great week.  I miss you.
Love Elder Marshall

Quote of the week:  "We cannot become who we need to be by remaining
who we are"                         -Elder Ballard

2010-04-12T12:58:00.000-07:00

Dear family,

Hey how is everyone doing this week?  Is everyone happy to be
 back in school? Is it pretty nice weather there?  Its been
really nice here.  Perfect weather.    Sorry again for not
getting you all a letter on time last week.   We were
 pretty busy all week last week. we have been working with a
lot of people trying to get them ready for baptism in
the next few weeks.  Its been a pretty crazy week.
We have 10 people with baptism dates,  for the 24th and
for the 1st of next month. Elder arnold have been working
 really hard this last week.  He is a lot of fun to be around.
 One of the families we are working with are
the Gilcrests.  They are a really neat family. 
The Grandma and one of the daughters is already baptized.
We have been working with the mom,the dad, a daughter,
and one of the uncles alot this week.  THey are
all getting baptized on the 24th.  Its coming up fast. 
They are an awsome family.  They were being taught before
I got here.  They love it when we come over and read
scriptures with them.  They call it bible study and
everyone comes in and sits on the bed in the livingroom
to read with us.  We are also working with a lady named
Veronica. SHe is from texas.  She was taking lessons
a while ago, but then got lost by the missionaries. 
She stopped us on the side of the road and asked us to
 come see her.  She has a baptism date for the
24th too.  THere is a lot going on in this area right now.
We will definatly be busy for the next few weeks. 
Its been amazing so far in this area i have really been
enjoying it here. We work really hard.
Well i hope everything is going good there. 
I hope everyone is having fun.  I miss you all.
 Have a good week.
Love Elder Marshall
quote of the week:
“Everybody in this life has their challenges and
 difficulties. That is part of our mortal test.
The reason for some of these trials cannot be
readily understood except on the basis of faith
and hope because there is often a larger purpose which
we do not always understand. Peace
comes through hope.”

2010-04-11T19:43:00.000-07:00

Dear family
Hey how is everything going.  Sorry i didn't email on monday.  All of
the Libraries were closed.  How has your week been going?  It sounds
like spring break was a lot of fun.  I bet going bowling and miniture
golfing was fun.  Thanks for the package you sent.  I got it
yesturday.  THanks for the spanish scriptures.  I'll be using them for
sure.  I have been able to talk to quite a few people in spanish this
week.  WHenever we see any hispanic people on the streets,  i always
go up and talk to them.  Its really good practice for me.  I never did
it when i was in Little Rock.  I like doing it now though.  I'm
getting a lot of practice at just going up to people and talking to
them.  I have been reading the book of mormon in spanish everymorning
for about 30 minutes before study time starts.  Hopefully i'll keep
learning more.  Its been kindof a crazy week here.  ELder Whiting got
moved. He is in Little Rock now.  He left Sunday.  Elder Arnold is my
new companion.  He has been out just 6 weeks in the mission.  he's
from a little town in washington.  well i hope everything is going
good there.  THanks again for the package.  and for the letters and
candy. I miss you
Love Elder marshall

Steven's letter March 29

2010-04-02T08:12:00.000-07:00

Dear Family
Hey how is everything going?  This week is Spring Break?  how is
everyone liking that.  Is it pretty nice there right now?  Everything
is great here.  My new area is in Memphis.  I really like it.  Its
alot different than anywhere else i have served.  Its all city area.
My companion is from Nampa Idaho.  I really like serving with him.  We
are working really good together.  This week I have mostly just been
trying to learn the area.  Trying to remember a bunch of new names and
remember where everything is here.  Its a pretty small area compared
to any of the others i have served in,  but there is a lot more in it.
There are people everywhere here.  We can just walk around and talk
to people all day if we want to.  Everyone is out walking on the
street or sitting on the front porch.  Its also kindof different
because there are a lot of other missionaries here.  We just got done
playing volleyball and basket ball at the church.  There were about 20
other missionaries there. it was a lot of fun.  I guess they do that
every monday. There are 2 sets here in this ward.  Most of the members
live in the other Elders area though.  We are working on getting more
members in our area.  The last couple days have been pretty good.
Yesterday we had a pretty neat experience.  We were walking down the
street and a truck pulled over.  The lady driving it asked us if we
were the mormons.  We told her yes and she asked if we could have
someone come over and see her.  I guess she used to be taking the
lessons from the missionaries, but she wasn't ready to make changes.
She asked us to come over and start teaching her again.  We are going
over on tuesday to talk to her and her son.  I guess the same thing
happend a week ago too.  Her name is Cindy.  We went over and tought
her two days ago.  It was really neat.  She wants to get baptized.
Elder Whiting and i are pretty excited for her.  Well I hope everyone
is doing good.  I hope everyone is having fun this week.
Love Elder Marshall
Quote of the week:
“Perhaps there has never been a time when we had greater need to pray
and to teach our family members to pray. Prayer is a defense against
temptation. It is through earnest and heartfelt prayer that we can
receive the needed blessings and the support required to make our way
in this sometimes difficult and challenging journey we call
mortality.”           -Thomas S. Monson

2010-03-23T05:56:00.000-07:00

Dear family

Hey how is everything going there this week? Is everyone ready for spring break? When is that? It's this week here. All the kids are pretty happy to be out of school. It will make it a lot easier to catch people home. Well I'm getting transferred again. I'm not sure where I'm going yet. I think back English speaking, but I'm not sure and i won't know until i get there. Its been a really good week for elder Contreras and I. We have been working really hard together this week. We were able to do a lot of teaching this week. I think He and his new companion are going to have a lot of baptisms this next transfer. We have quite a few people that are getting really close. I wish I could stay and see everything happen. Its going to be an amazing transfer for them. There are a lot of people that have made so many changes in their lives. That's one of the reasons I love serving in the Spanish community is because the people are so humble. Just two days ago, Elder Contreras and I met a guy. We went to the house to talk to someone else, but they weren't there. So we ended up talking to him. At first he told us he wasn't interested in what we had to share with him, but we gave him a picture of Christ coming out of the tomb with our phone number on the back. He just started telling us everything that has been happening in his life. He is an alcoholic. He knows he needs to change and asked us if we could help him. He wants to start coming to church with us. He isn't really active in any church, but knows he needs to be. We have been working with another family for awhile. Elder Contreras knew them before i got here. They are such a nice family. The wife wants to get baptized. She wants her daughter to be baptized as soon as she turns 8 in May. That will be right at the end of the next transfer. I wish i could be there to see that family get baptized. There are a lot of people that i am going to miss from this area. But I look forward to getting to the next place too. I'm excited to find out where i am going to be serving. O something else i realized last night. The end of next transfer will be May 2nd I think. 11 days later i will have been out 1 year. I can't believe its been that long. The time flies by so fast. Does it go by that fast there too? I feel like I just barely got here in Little Rock and I'm already leaving. I keep hearing the second year goes by a lot faster than the first too. Well I hope everything has been going good there. It sounds like the concert would have been fun to watch. LolI bet kaitlyn had fun. Thanks for everything. I love you

Love Elder Marshall



Quote of the week:

What we are is God's gift to us. What we become is our gift to God.
 -Eleanor Powell

2010-03-17T06:12:00.000-07:00

Dear Family

How is everyone doing? Still no word on the computer? Wow I thought it would have been done by now. Everything is going good here. Its been a pretty good week. We have been working hard together. I cant believe the transfer is almost over. It has gone by so fast. I wish I could have learned more Spanish, but its pretty hard to learn a language in 6 weeks. I think I’m going to be getting moved this transfer. There are a lot of rumors going around about what is going to happen. But no one knows for sure. I guess we will find out in a week. So if you are going to send anything this week, you can just send it to the mission office in north little rock. We have been working a lot with a family from mexico. Carmen and Jose-Luis. We have been trying to help them get baptized. I think they are really close to getting baptized. They need to get married first though. Carmen wants to get baptized, married, and go to the temple. She has a testimony of Joseph Smith, the book of Mormon, and Thomas S. Monson. Jose doesn’t want to get married though. I think they will get married and baptized in this next transfer though. They are such a nice family. They feed us quite a bit. Their oldest daughter is 7 almost 8 and she wants to get baptized when she turns 8. Its kind of funny talking to the Spanish community here. No one can pronounce Marshall. Everyone says Mar chal. Like its two words. Especially the family we are teaching from El Salvador. We were over there earlier today helping them paint their apartment. O I got your letters this week. Thankyou. It was good to hear from everyone. Thanks. I hope everyone has a great week this week. Have fun.

Love Elder Marshall

"Because of the sacrifice of Jesus Christ, we need not fear, for we will live forever, never to taste of death again. Because of His infinite Atonement, we can be cleansed of sin and stand pure and holy before the judgment bar. The Savior is the Author of our Salvation." -Dieter F. Uchtdorf

Steven's letter Feb 22

2010-02-22T09:57:00.000-08:00

Dear family
Hey how has your week been going? Anything exciting going on? Everything has been pretty normal here. Its warmed up lately. I am still trying to learn Spanish. Elder Contreras is helping me a lot. He speaks English so we are doing pretty good together. So far I haven’t been able to do much helping in the lessons. I can’t understand much. This week I am going to start trying to add more into the lessons though. We don’t have a ward or a branch here. There is just a little group. We are trying to help it become a branch though. The stake president came last week and told us that hopefully soon it will be able to become a branch. The Memphis area has a branch, but most areas here are just little groups. They haven’t grown enough to become branches. I had to give a talk in church yesterday. The group leader called me and asked if I liked challenges. Then he asked me to give a talk in church. I think that was probably the hardest talk I have ever given. It was defiantly the hardest one for me to say yes to. I don’t think I did that great. I’m glad its over with now. I have been worrying about it all week. I found out that we play soccer and teach English classes every Tuesday night. Those are a lot of fun. We invite all of our investigators to it, and a lot of other people that we meet. A lot of the branch comes to it too. It’s a great activity. I never thought I would be playing soccer here on the mission. It’s a lot of fun. It’s a good way to fellowship the investigators and to find new people to teach. The members in the group sometimes bring friends and introduce them to us. Its great. O This week we got fed pig feet again. We got invited over for dinner on Thursday and the family had taken pig feet, dipped them in eggs and fried them.(like you would to French toast) Then they boiled them in tomato juice. That one was hard to eat. I never thought I would be eating anything like that on the mission either. Elder Contreras wouldn’t eat it though. I guess he doesn’t like any kind of pork. So he just wouldn’t eat anything. I don’t think the family was to happy with him. They just said “the American will eat it but you wont?” Well every thing else is going great. I’ll be doing a lot of Spanish study this week. Hopefully I’ll be able to start doing better with that. Well I hope you have a great week.
Love Elder Marshall
O and I haven’t been able to go to the temple at all in Memphis. I haven’t been able to go since I was in provo. About 8 months now. I won’t be able to unless I get moved back over into Memphis.
Quote of the week:
"We are commanded to 'pray always' (2 Nephi 32:9; D&C 10:5; 90:24)—'vocally as well as in [our] heart[s]; . . . before the world as well as in secret, in public as well as in private' (D&C 19:28). I testify that prayer becomes more meaningful as we counsel with the Lord in all of our doings, as we express heartfelt gratitude, and as we pray for others with real intent and a sincere heart. I witness Heavenly Father lives and that He hears and answers every earnest prayer." - David A. Bednar

Steven's letter Feb 16

2010-02-16T15:35:00.000-08:00

Dear family
Hey how is everyone’s week going?  Its going pretty good here.  I got transferred.  Im in Little Rock now.  And I got switched to Spanish speaking.  There are 4 spanish elders in Little Rock, 16 in the mission.  It’s a lot different than classroom Spanish was.  My companion has only been out 6 weeks.  His name is Elder Contreras.  He came out with Elder Kelly.  He is from mexico though so he is a native Spanish speaker.  Its been a pretty crazy week for me.  I cant understand a whole lot of what is being said.  I’ve asked a few of the other missionaries how long it took them to get to where they could understand everything that is going on in the lessons.  They said about a month.  I hope it doesn’t take me that long.  I can understand more when other missionaries are talking than I can when the investigators are talking.  The missionaries talk slower.  I’m excited to be learning Spanish though.  It will be a huge blessing even after the mission.  We are working with a few families that are very close to being baptized.  There are a couple families who want to be baptized, but the parents aren’t married.  They know they need to get married though and they want to be baptized.  I think they will be baptized really soon.  I am Loving serving in the Hispanic communities though.  The people are very humble and easy to talk to.  Hopefully pretty soon I will be able to help Elder Contreras teach.  So far I have mostly been sitting and listening, saying prayers, and reading scriptures.  Well thanks again for the package.  I’m not sure what my address is, and neither is my companion.   I’ll have to find that out.  You can send anything to the mission office though and then they will forward it on to me.  Its 
905 Kierre Dr.
North Little Rock, AR 72116
I hope you have a great week
Love Elder Marshall

O so missionary story.  So like I already said, I don’t understand a lot of what is being said during the lessons.  Well its been really neat because even though I don’t understand, I can still feel the spirit really strong while we are talking to people.  Like two days ago.  We were talking to a guy named Jose Hernandez (there are a lot of Jose s  :)   I could tell they were talking about the gospel of Jesus Christ, about how we need to have faith in Jesus Christ, Repent, be baptized, receive the gift of the holy Ghost, and endure to the end.  I kept on feeling like we needed to ask him to be baptized.  Well at the end of the lesson Elder Contreras asked him to be baptized.   He said yes.  No hesitating or anything.  It was Awesome.  He is getting baptized on the 27th.  We are both pretty excited.

2010-02-08T13:37:00.001-08:00

Dear Family
Hey its been a great week here. It snowed about 4 or 5 inches last night.  We woke up to a lot of white. Thanks so much for the package. Im getting transfered. i got the call today. I can't write much right now. I might be able to come back later hopefully. We are taking a missionary to the temple pretty soon. He is going home. O when the president called he told me to bring any spanish liturature that i have. So i think i'm getting switched to spanish speaking. Ill know for sure on Wednesday though. If i do get swithced could you take some money out of my accout and get me a set of spanish scriptures?  hopefully ill let you know if i need them on Wednesday. Elder Kelly is getting moved too. Well I better go. I hope I'll be able to get on a little later and email more. If not Ill talk to you later.
Love Elder Marshall

2010-02-08T13:35:00.001-08:00

Dear Family

Hey how has everyone been doing there this week. Did it rain again? I forgot the farm show was coming up. I bet that is going to be a lot of fun. Everything has been going great here. Elder Kelly and I are both pretty bummed to be getting moved. I thought for sure one of us would be staying here. O well. Life goes on right. It’s still storming outside. We woke up to snow. It’s raining/hailing right now. The news says there is supposed to be another Ice storm tomorrow. I had never seen those before. I guess what happens is its to humid for snow, so when it rains, as soon as the rain hits something it freezes. So the tree branches and leaves had about an inch of ice on top of them. When the tree limbs get to heavy, they break. There are still a lot of broken branches. We got to help a few people move branches out to the road We have been asking people about it and it sounds like this almost never happens here.
I have really come to love reading the scriptures. I wish i would have taken more time to study them while I was there at home or in Rexburg. There is so much to learn. So many things that we can apply to our own lives. Morning study is one of my favorite times of day now.
Love Elder Marshall
Quote of the week: This was one of my favorite scriptures before i came out It has helped me a lot of times when i didn't think i could do something by my self

"Thou whom I have taken from the ends of the earth, and called thee from the chief men thereof, and said unto thee, Thou art my servant; I have chosen thee, and not cast thee away.
Fear thou not; for I am with thee: be not dismayed; for I am thy God: I will strengthen thee; yea, I will help thee; yea, I will uphold thee with the right hand of my righteousness."

Steven's letter Jan 19

2010-01-19T10:25:00.000-08:00

Dear Family
How has the week been? Its been a great week here. What did everyone do on the day off yesterday? Sorry I couldn’t email yesterday. All the libraries were closed. Its been a pretty good week. Its warmed up a lot since last week. Its been pretty nice all week. I think its supposed to be raining this next week. Elder Kelly and I are doing great together. I am loving being his companion. He is a great missionary. . I got a call from one of the AP’s yesterday morning. He gave me kindof a Spanish test over the phone. This is the second one I’ve had since I’ve been out. He told me President Drewes is looking for a couple new Spanish elders. I guess I’ll find out in a couple weeks whether I’m getting moved to Spanish speaking. I hope I am. Then last night Elder Kelly and I were walking home, and we stopped and talked to a guy on the sidewalk. He wouldn’t really say much when we introduced our selves, then he told us he didn’t speak English. So I tried to give him a pass along card and explain what it was in Spanish. I didn’t do so great. So my question is: is it like an omen? Like you better get ready cause here it comes? I duno
We went back and saw Mikey on Tuesday. It was great. He knows so much about the bible. We were talking to him about Faith Vs. Works. Because Baptists believe that its by faith that we are saved. There is nothing we of ourselves can do to be saved. He was quoting all kinds of scriptures and different things to us. Almost like he was trying to convert us to his way of thinking. It was really amazing what happened. After he was done talking, Elder Kelly and I and a former stake president that went with us started talking about how works are very important. It was really neat. The spirit was so strong as we were talking with him. At the end of the lesson, we could tell that he was really thinking about the things that had been said. It was amazing. Elder Kelly said it really helped his testimony to grow. We are hoping to go and see him again this week.
So I tried some new southern food this week. Neck bone from a pig. It looked grose, but it was pretty good with a little hot sauce. Then I tried Cow maw. That’s the bottom part of a cows stomack. It wasn’t as good as the neck bone. Really rubbery. Then… Elder Townsend and I tried Pig feet. That was grose. They just threw the whole pig foot in the oven and cooked the whole thing. We ate it right off the bone. I guess its one of those things I’m glad I can say I’ve tried it, but I probably don’t want to try it again. Well I hope you have a great week.
Love Elder Marshall
Quote of the week:
"What may appear initially to be a daunting task will be much easier to manage over time as you consistently strive to recognize and follow feelings prompted by the Spirit. Your confidence in the direction you receive from the Holy Ghost will also become stronger. I witness that as you gain experience and success in being guided by the Spirit, your confidence in the impressions you feel can become more certain than your dependence on what you see or hear."
- Richard G. Scott

Steven's letter Jan 11

2010-01-11T11:16:00.000-08:00

Dear Family
Hey how has the week been? Is everyone enjoying being back in school? It sounds like Stake Conference was really good. That’s interesting that they talked about complacency. That is something that our mission president has talked to us a lot about in the last couple of months. The goal for baptisms for the year was 409. We beat the goal, but president Drewes thinks we can do better. The goal for this year is 712 baptisms. Its going to be a tuff goal to get to, but we will be able to do it. It will defiantly stretch us.
Its been a good week here. It got real cold though. It snowed and everything. Just enough to turn the ground white, but they shut the schools down for a couple of days because of it. Some of the businesses were closed too. This week was our walk week. We were able to talk to a lot of people. We were able to start talking to a guy who was unloading groceries out of his car. We started talking to him about families and how they could be sealed together in the temple for time and all eternity. He asked us to come back and teach him and his family next Sunday. Elder Kelly and I are both pretty excited to go talk to them. We also went back to talk to the Baptist minister. He and his wife are such nice people. They both know a lot about the bible. A lot more than Elder Kelly and I do. We ate dinner with them last Tuesday. They are very nice people. She has had a lot of good friends that are LDS. We are going back tomorrow to talk to them again. I think we are going to watch the restoration DVD with them that we give out to people.
Elder Kelly and I are doing great together. I love serving with him. This week is the half way mark for the transfer. It feels like we just started the transfer. Time has really started to fly by. Well I hope you have a great week. I miss you all.
Love Elder Marshall
Quote of the week:
“And I was led by the spirit, not knowing beforehand the things which I should do.
Nevertheless I went forth…”
1Ne. 4:6-7

Steven's letter Jan 3

2010-01-04T10:22:00.001-08:00

Dear Family
How was the new year? Did everyone make it to midnight? It was just a regular day here. We went to bed at 10:30 and were up at 6:30, just like every other day. The holdays were a lot of fun. It was hard to get ahold of people though. I think I told you, but I got a lava lava for Christmas. Those Hawaiian skirts. Ya one of the sisters in my district is Hawaiian. We had a white elephant gift exchange and that’s what I got from her. Its pretty neat. I bet there aren’t many missionaries that go to Arkansas that can say they got a lava lava on their missions. Elder morris had to get a picture of me wearing it because he thought it was funny.
Elder Kelly and I are doing great together. He is a great missionary, and being with him is defiantly breaking me out of my comfort zone. I’ve had a lot of fun with him. Hes from Salt Lake City, and he is about 2 inches taller than me. I’m starting to feel a little short, there are two missionaries here in Collierville that are taller than me now. Elder Cox is in the first ward. He is about the same height as Elder Kelly. We have a tall district. This week we have been doing a lot of finding. Elder Kelly and I are both getting good practice at tracting. Yesterday, we tracted into a family that let us come in and seemed really interested when we started talking to them. They asked for a book of Mormon and said they would read and pray about it. We are going to try to go back a little later in the week. We have also started teaching a Baptist minister. Most of them don’t really like talking to us, But this one does. His name is mikey. He and his wife are really nice. They told us we should come over for dinner some time. Both are very nice. They went out to Utah a couple weeks ago and ordered a free video when they went on a tour of the tabernacle. We have a lot of fun talking to him. I’m not sure if he is really interested in making changes, or if we have just sparked some curiosity. That’s something that still amazes me is how nice and friendly most people are here. Every once in a while we meet someone that doesn’t like us, but most of the time everyone is very friendly. Almost everyone has a church they go to. Sometimes it makes it hard because a lot of people are set in their ways. Their parents were Baptists, so they are Baptists. Very good people though.
Chruch is starting at 11 now. That’s going to be really nice. This will be the first time on my mission I will be able to study before church starts. I have always been at 9 or 9:30. It will be easier to try to get investigators to church now too. They don’t have to wake up as early. We had a couple of less active families that we have been working with come to church this week. It was great to see them all there. They’ve made the goal to start coming back to church again. Both families have been inactive for 10 or 15 years. They both live down in Mississippi.
Well I hope you have a great week this week. I hope everyone has fun going back to school. I love you all.
Love Elder Marshall
Lol and nope I haven’t eaten it all yet. There is still a lot left. Elder Kelly are working on it though.
Quote of the week:
“As we go about our daily lives, we discover countless opportunities to follow the example of the Savior. When our hearts are in tune with His teachings, we discover the unmistakable nearness of His divine help. It is almost as though we are on the Lord’s errand; and we then discover that, when we are on the Lord’s errand, we are entitled to the Lord’s help.” - Thomas S. Monson

Steven's letter Dec 28

2009-12-28T12:43:00.001-08:00

Dear Family
Hey how was everyone’s christmas? It was great talking to yall this last week. It was good to hear everyone’s voices. Christmas was great here. We went around and saw 4 or 5 families in the ward and then went caroling. We had a Christmas eve party with the Darby family. They had a few of their neighbors over and we got to talk to them a little. One of the families was a Hindu family from India. They were really nice people. They have a little girl about 5 years old. They had never celebrated Christmas before, they really enjoyed the party. The Darbies kids had a nativity play. It was a lot of fun. They invited us over for Christmas breakfast too. They are a really nice family. Then we went over to the Jessop’s. That’s where we called home from. They have a really young family. Both of them went on missions. After that we went to the McBride’s for an early Christmas Dinner. All of their family lives in the Memphis area, so they had a full house. I think Brother Harris said they had about 40 people there. They invited a recent convert over to eat to. His name is Brian. He is from Simbobway. He is going to University of Memphis for school. He lives in the other ward. He is a really neat guy. His Wife is moving here this next week, and she wants to be baptized. The elders that cover that ward are really excited. After that we went around and saw a few more families and went caroling.
So I don’t know if you remember Kelly. Elder Perza and I were working with him a lot trying to get him and his girlfriend to get married. He got married the day I left Pocahontas and baptized that same Saturday. Any way. I got a call from him Christmas night. Last Sunday, he got the aronic priesthood. And he is now a Sunday school teacher for 13-15 year olds. So awesome! It was great talking to him. I miss being able to see him. He is such a great guy. There are a lot of people I miss being able to see in that area. I’m sure its going to be the same way when I leave here.
Elder Morris is getting transfered. We are pretty bummed about that. I guess it would have happened sooner or later though. He is getting moved on Wednessday so half of this week we are going to be going around so he can say good bye to everyone. He has to pack everything up today. We are going over to the harris’ tonight. They are having us over for dinner and then we are going to show them how to have Family home evening. Things have been going a little slow this week. Its been hard to catch people home over the hollidays. Elder Morris and I have really been trying to find people are ready to hear and accept the gospel. I’m a little nervous about him leaving. I don’t feel like I know the area or the people very well yet, but I know that God will help me. I have come to rely on that help with a lot of things since I’ve come out to Arkansas. Well I hope everything is going good there. I hope you have a great week. I miss you all.
Love Elder Marshall
Quote of the week
“Whenever we are inclined to feel burdened down with the blows of life, let us remember that others have passed the same way, have endured, and then have overcome.”
-Thomas S. Monson

steven's letter Dec14

2009-12-14T13:01:00.000-08:00

Dear Family
How is everything going there? Is everyone getting excited for Christmas? It’s coming up pretty fast. It feels like December has just started and its already half way over. Has it started to get cold there? Its kindof different here. It can be real cold one day and be we will be wearing our big coats, and two days later it is t-shirt weather again. It’s pretty nice today. It’s been a pretty good week. We go one on one off with the car. This week was our walking week. So we got a lot of walking done. Brother Harris is getting baptized on Saturday. He is real excited for that. He was telling everyone at church about it. He’s a great guy. I don’t remember if I’ve told you, before but a week ago when we went and saw him, he told us he believed that Joseph smith was a prophet, and that the book of Mormon was true, but he didn’t believe that God would want him to give up the tobacco and the coffee. He has been chewing tobacco since he was five years old. He told us he would pray about it though, and if he got an answer to his prayer, he would quit. Elder Morris and I were praying for him too. Two days later, he had a doctor’s appointment. He has problems with depression. The doctor told him he needed to quit chewing tobacco, and drinking coffee. That was pretty neat to hear. Kind of like out of the mouth of two witnesses. His wife has been less active for a few years now, but wants to start coming to church too. They have the goal of going to the temple to be sealed together in a year. It’s a great goal for them to have that will help them both as they become active in the church. The members of the ward here are really excited for the baptism. It’s the first baptism they will have since the ward was formed 2 years ago. We are hoping that there will be a big turnout at the baptism and that it will get the members excited about doing missionary work. Well I hope everyone is having a great week. I love you.
Love Elder Marshall
Quote of the week
“They do not love that do not show their love”
-William Shakespeare

Steven's letter Dec7

2009-12-07T09:57:00.000-08:00

Dear Family
Hey is everyone getting excited for christmas? How long before school lets out for christmas break? I got the package. thankyou. Its been a really good week here. Im still trying to find my way arround collierville. Elder Morris and i are working really hard together. We have been working with a lot of the members here in the ward. We are trying to get them to do more missionary work. Missionary work is a lot better when it is the members that are finding people for us to teach. So we are trying to help them see that. We have been working a lot with Brother Harris. He is the 79 year old. we are hoping that he is going to get baptized before christmas. We talked about how he can get married in the temple to his wife. Thats something that he really wants. He has to give up his chewing tabacco though. That might be a little hard for him to do, but i know he can do it if he wants to. He has been chewing tabacco since he was 5 years old. He has to stop drinking coffee to, but i don't think that will be as hard for him. I think its really interesting how big of a thing the word of wisdom is. almost every person that i've seen get baptized has had some kind of a word of wisdom problem. Even a 13 year old girl. And most of the time, it was a challange for them to give it up. It just shows how a testimony of the gospel can help us and those around us come closer to God. They knew that Joseph Smith was a prophet and that the Word of Wisdom had come from God, so they knew that it was something they needed to follow. well I hope everyone is haveing a great day. I love yall. Hope you have a good week.
Love Elder Marshall

Quote of the week
"The spirit of giving gifts has been present in the mind of each Christian as he or she commemorates the Christmas season. Our Heavenly Father gave to us His Son, Jesus Christ. That precious Son gave to us His life, the Atonement, and victory over the grave.

"What will you and I give for Christmas this year? Let us in our lives give to our Lord and Savior the gift of gratitude by living His teachings and following in His footsteps. It was said of Him that He 'went about doing good.' As we do likewise, the Christmas spirit will be ours."
Thomos S. Monson

2009-11-30T09:59:00.001-08:00

family letter

O quote of the week
"There is danger in the word someday, when what it means is not this day.  The thought "some day i will" can be a thief of the opprotunities of time and the blessings of eternity.  If you choose to serve the lord this day, i make you 2 promises, hard as things seem today, they will be better in the next day if you choose to serve the lord this day.  By choosing to serve Him this day, you will feel his love and grow to love him more."   - President Eyring

Have a good week
Love Elder Marshall

Steven's letter Nov 30

2009-11-30T09:22:00.000-08:00

Dear Family
How was thanksgiving? I hope it was a lot of fun. Did you watch a movie over at the shop? Is it still nice and warm there? Its been a pretty good week here. Elder Morris and I have been staying pretty busy. We have a lot of fun together. He has been out almost 11 months now. He’s from Logan Utah. I’ve learned a lot from him. We spend a lot more time walking than I’m used to. In pocahontas, we had a car the whole time. Now we have a car every other week. I think I like walking more. We get to talk to more people while we are walking. The ward here is a really nice ward. There are a lot of nice people here. We have a baptism coming up on the 12th. We found him last wednesday. Its an older guy. He is 79 years old. He is probably one of the most humble people I’ve met while I’ve been out. We talked to him about the restoration of the gospel and watched the Joseph Smith movie with him. He told us he felt the spirit stronger then than he had in a long time. That’s when we challenged him to be baptized. He came to church for the first time on Sunday and loved it. We talked to him about being baptized again and he told us he didn’t feel like he was ready yet, but said he would keep praying about being baptized on the 12th. He believes that Joseph Smith was a prophet and that the book of mormon is the word of God. He is a really great guy. Elder Morris and I are excited to be working with him. Thanksgiving was a lot of fun We went around and talked to a lot of members. I think we saw 16 families. We had dinner with the Rees family. They had a bunch of family out from Utah. It was a lot of fun. We are going to go buy a little christmas tree today. Well I hope everything is going good there and everyone is having a lot of fun. Have a good week.
Love Elder Marshall

Steven's letter Nov 23

2009-11-23T10:11:00.000-08:00

Dear Family
I think that’s a new record getting pulled over three times in one trip. And I thought I got pulled over a lot. Its been a pretty good week here. Elder Morris Is a really good missionary. He has been teaching me a lot about how to be a better missionary. Its been kindof hard coming from a little branch to a big ward. There are a lot more names to remember. There are a lot of nice people here in the ward. We had a fireside at the ward mission leader’s house last night. That was a lot of fun. We have a new investigater because of it. It was for the youth to bring their friends to. There was only one non member there, but she really liked it and I think we are going to try to see her again on Wednesday. She told us that she wanted a copy of the book of mormon so she could give it a chance and find out for herself if it was true or not. Elder Morris and I are pretty excited to get to teach her. We get fed a lot more here than we did in Pocahontas. That’s going to be nice. We have only had to cook dinner twice since we got here. I miss the little town life style though. Everything is really big here. The people here in Collierville are a lot more wealthy than the people in pocahontas were. A lot of the buisness people that work in Memphis commute there from German town and collierville. We go down into mississippi too. The people there are more country people. I had a lot of fun going out there. It was a lot more like what I was used to. One house even had the cocroaches running all over the walls in the living room.(and the floors… and even one on the kitchen table. No joke) That grosed out the member that went with us. Thanksgiving is going to be a lot of fun. They have a turky bowl here. There are two wards here, so we get to go play football with them in the morning. We are going to be going out like a regular day besides that though. We do have 2 dinner appointments already though. So Elder morris and I are planning on being pretty full by the end of the day. Well I hope everything is going good there. Hope every one is having fun in school and corey is having fun working at linns. Have a good thanksgiving.
Love Elder Marshall

2009-11-19T07:34:00.001-08:00

Dear Family
Hey just letting you know im in Collierville.  Its right down next to Memphis Tenessee.  It looks like its a pretty wealthy area.  I don't think i've ever seen houses as big as the ones here.  I thought they were appartment buildings.  My new companion is Elder Morris.  I'm looking forward to serving with him.  He says the people here are really wealthy so I think its going to be different than Pocahontas and Ash Flat were.  He was serving with Elder Baron before me.  Elder Baron was in the MTC with me.  I got to see him and Elder Steed today at the transfer meeting.  It was good to see them I haven't seen Elder Baron since we got to arkansas.  Well i better go.  Hope everything is going good there.  Talk to you on Monday.
Love Elder Marshall

Here is my mailing address:
396 ramport lane
Collierville, TN 38017

Steven's letter Nov 9

2009-11-09T13:07:00.000-08:00

Dear Family

How is everything going back home? Everything is going really well here. Elder Perza and I are staying really busy. We work really good together. We have been spending a lot of time in ash flat. We have a guy here that is going to get baptized in the next two weeks. We don’t have an exact date yet though because he and his girlfriend have to get married first. They know they need to do it though and said they would be talking to the branch president in the next couple days about getting married. Elder perza and I are pretty excited for them. We have been spending a lot of time with him in the last week. We met him about 2 weeks ago. What first interested him about the church was when he found out Glen beck was a Mormon. When he heard that he thought there must be something to it. He really likes Glen Beck. We got a pretty bad call Saturday night. Tina called us at about 7. She is the lady who has the two little kids whose husband just died about 4 months ago now. Her house was on fire. She lost everything. She and her kids weren’t hurt though. They weren’t home when it started. They were driving in their driveway and they noticed there was a glow under one end of their trailer. I guess it burned pretty fast. She lives in Ash Flat so it took us an hour to get there from Pocahontas. It was done burning by the time we got there. She has gone through a whole lot in the last few months. The branch has helped her out a whole lot though. She really appreciates it too. She is staying with her sister in law right now. We are going to go over in a couple hours to see how she is doing. Transfers are next week. I’m probably going to be moved next Wednesday. Elder Perza talked to President Drewes Saturday night. He told him that was probably what was going to happen. I’ve gotten pretty attached to the people around here though. Especially Tina and Tanara. I’ve loved working with them and seeing them be baptized. I’m going to miss this area a whole lot. I guess I’ll let you know for sure whether I get moved or not next Monday. Well I hope everyone is having fun. I miss you.

Love Elder Marshall

Steven's letter Nov 2

2009-11-03T09:12:00.000-08:00

Dear family
How is everyone doing. Are you starting to feel better? Hey sorry I didn’t email earlier today. We had a couple service projects that we did today so we weren’t able to come email till now. We helped Carla (she got baptized a couple months ago) paint her front porch. We got introduced to her husband. We have been trying to go over to see him for a while now, but this was the first time we were able to. This week has gone pretty fast for us. We have been staying pretty busy. Tanara was confirmed yesterday. That was a great experience for her. I feel really blessed to have been able to know her and watch her make changes in her life. We started working with a new investigator this week. His name is Kelly. He is about 40. He has already told us that he wants to join the church. He knows a lot about the church. He got interested in the church because Glen Beck is a member of the church. He is a pretty funny guy. We are having fun working with him.
It finally stopped raining. Its been nice to see the sun the last couple of days. The rivers are still pretty high though. I think the water level is starting to go down though for most of the rivers. We had to help one of the members move everything in his house up on tables because his cabin is right next to the river. We talked to him today and he said that no water was in his house, just up to the steps that go to his front door. I’m not sure if its supposed to be raining more or not. Well hope everything is going good there. Hope everyone is having fun in school.
Love Elder Marshall

O I only see my mission president every 6 weeks. I’m not sure if that’s just because we live so far away from everyone else or if that’s how much all the missionaries see him. We don’t see any other missionaries except for district meeting(Tuesday s) and zone meeting which is the same day as the interview.

2009-11-01T19:34:00.000-08:00

These pictures were taken last year at our Trunk or Treat

2009-11-01T19:19:00.000-08:00

Rebecca was really trying to do a nice job.

This is the pumkin that Kaitlyn carved. She really got into carving this year.

This is Corey's pumkin. He did a good job too.

2009-11-01T19:14:00.000-08:00

Rebecca got up Thursday crying because it was costume day and she had no costume. I completely forgot about her party at school. I had been so caught up in the homecomming ordeal. Rondalene to the rescue. She was able to find a costume that Rebecca was happy with. Thank you Rondalene!!

2009-11-01T19:10:00.000-08:00

I took a class on making this table runner. This is just one end. The other end has the same witch facing the other direction. Isn't it cute!!

2009-11-01T18:09:00.000-08:00

This is Heather's sister, Rebecca, and Kaitlyn.

Corey was so excited to be riding in the parade. Probably just as excited as I was.

2009-11-01T18:05:00.000-08:00

2009-11-01T17:56:00.000-08:00

2009-11-01T17:53:00.000-08:00

All the students tied these ribbons on this float. The part that has the heart on it was made by the construction class. They will be displaying it at all the school funtions. Assemblies, game, and even graduation. Right before the homecomming game started they brought this float onto the field and they had 30 sec of silence.

Steven's letter Oct 26

2009-10-26T20:27:00.000-07:00

Dear family
Hey how is everyone doing this week? So how is Corey likin the new job? It’s been an awesome week here. It started out real slow though. Elder Perza was sick for a couple days. So we couldn’t go out and work Wednesday and Thursday. It was a slow couple days with not much to do. We did a lot of studying. It was good to start working again on Friday. Tanara did it. She quit smoking and drinking coffee. She got baptized yesterday after church. It was so awesome. Tanara has had to change so much to get to where she is. We have been talking to her a lot this week. She has been having really bad headaches because she is used to having a pot of coffee every morning, and she has been really struggling with not smoking any cigarettes. There were a few nights when we called her that she was having problems not giving in, but she was able to quit. Last night when we talked to her, she said it was the first time this week she hasn’t had any headaches or cravings for cigarettes. She is going to be an awesome member of the branch up there. We have been working with another guy up by Eveningshade. Elder Perza drove on a dirt road for about an hour to get to his house. He lives way out in the middle of no where. I thought I could understand people with strong southern accents, but I have to really concentrate to understand him. He is a really good guy. Elder perza and I are looking forward to getting to know him. He doesn’t know much about Christ or what a prophet is or anything about the bible, but he knows he wants to get baptized. He has a date for the 7th of November. We were pretty excited to find him. His name is Eugene. Well hope everyone is having fun. Love yall
Love Elder Marshall

Steven's letter Oct 19

2009-10-19T13:59:00.000-07:00

Dear Family
How was your week? How is Grandma Winsor doing? How is Corey liking the new job at lins? This week has been pretty good here. It has been raining a lot here. It has been real nice the last few days though. This weekend has been awesome. We havebeen up in ash flat a lot. We are probably going to start spending more time up there. I think we are going to have to stay at the senior couple’s apartment acouple nights this week. We’re still trying to figure that out. Elder Perza doesn’t think we should sleep in the church. We have been meeting a lot with Tanara lately. She is the single mom that used to be into drugs and gangs out inWashington. She has made a lot of changes in her life. She has been in jail 32times, but has been off drugs and out of gangs for the last 3 years now. We have been working with her to help her quit smoking. Well last night we set a date with her to get baptized next Sunday. It was a really neat experience. We told her she couldn’t get baptized until she quit smoking and drinking coffee though. It took her a little while to make the commitment, but she finally gave us all of her cigarettes, her ash trays, all of her coffee, and both of her coffee machines. It was an awesome night last night. She says if she doesn’t have any coffee orcigarettes in the morning, she gets really bad headaches and it makes her sick so itwas a pretty big commitment for her. We called her this morning though to see how she was doing and she was pretty happy. We are going to be talking to her a lot in the next few days checking up on her. I love doing missionary work. Well hope everyone is having fun there. Thanks for the pictures. Have a good week.
Love Elder Marshall

Steven's letter Oct 12

2009-10-12T12:16:00.000-07:00

Dear Family
How is everyone doing there? Everything has gone pretty good this week. Elder Hansen and I just went around so he could say goodbye to members of the branch here in Pocahontas on Monday and Tuesday. Then Wednesday we drove to Memphis to the big transfer meeting. 41 of the 51 companionships got split up so it was a pretty big meeting. I haven’t seen so many missionaries since I was at the MTC. Elder Hansen is in Conway now. My new companion is Elder Perza. He’s from Idaho too. He is a pretty cool guy. There is a whole lot I can learn from him. He said he was Weiser Idaho. I think its west of Boise. He is a good missionary. Hopefully Ill get to stay with him for a while. We have been working pretty well together. Jacky has a baptism date for the 24th. She is the one that came and asked us if she could be a Mormon after the first session of General conference. We have been seeing a lady up in Cherokee Village. We helped her move a couple Saturdays ago. She has been trying to quit smoking. She even told us she knows that God doesn’t want her smoking. She has gone from smoking 2 packs down to only a few every day. She says she really wants to quit. We are hoping to set a baptism date with her and that maybe that will help her want to quit even more. We only get to see her once a week though because she lives so far away. So that makes it hard. We have been able to see quite a few people. It has been raining a lot. I think it’s supposed to be raining all this week to. Well I hope everyone is doing good. Are a lot of sick people from school sick? I love you all and miss you. Have a good week.
Love Elder Marshall

Steven's letter October 5

2009-10-05T11:07:00.000-07:00

Dear Family
Hey how is everyone doing this week? Is it starting to get cold there? I heard it snowed in Idaho this week. Elder Hansen is mad that he can’t go snow boarding. Its been getting cold here already. Its been a pretty good week here. We had two baptisms this week. One on Friday night here in Pocahontas, and one on Sunday between sessions of Conference. They were both really neat baptisms. Elder Hansen and I have been working really well together. We are getting split up though. He got a call from the mission president on Saturday morning. He is getting transferred and is going to be a new Zone leader. So Wednesday I'm getting a new companion. This transfer was huge. Every companionship in our zone got split up. There are 9 new missionaries coming out and 9 going home. It’s going to be a busy week. I think the next couple days we are just going to be going around so Elder Hansen can say good bye to all the members. No fun. Do you remember the lady that Elder Hasalam and I gave a tour of the church to last week? Well she came to all 4 sessions of conference. She really liked all of them. After the 1st one, she came up to Elder Hansen and i and asked us if it was ok if she became a Mormon. That kind of cot us by surprise. she is getting baptized on the 24th of October. She is a pretty cool lady. She is 79 years old. She used to be the treasurer for the Lutheran church here in Pocahontas. The first time we met her she was trying to give another one of our investigators anti-Mormon literature. We asked her if we could come talk to her. She has changed her mind about the church since then. Well thats about all that has been going on here. Hope everyone is having fun in school. I miss you all
Love Elder Marshall

Steven's letter Sept 21

2009-09-21T12:55:00.000-07:00

Dear Family
How is everything going back home?  Is everyone liking being back in school? So we have a new bishop?  I bet he does a good job as a bishop. It’s been another really good week.  We have been staying really busy especially going back and forth from Pocahontas to Ash Flat.  The 16 year old girl's mom still hasn't changed her mind about letting her get baptized.  We are still able to go see her though so we are grateful for that.  That has happened once before, only the other time the parents wouldn't let us talk to her or let her come to church.  So at least she can still go to church and go to mutual.  Elder Hansen and I have been spending more and more time up in ash flat.  We are going every week, usually twice a week.  We are teaching another person who used to be into drugs and gangs out in Washington.  She has changed her life a lot and has been going to church with us the last couple weeks now.  She is trying to quit smoking this week.  She says she has been trying to stop for a while now.  She has even tried hypnotism and fake cigarettes.  We gave her a copy of the churches 15 step program.  We won't see her until next Saturday though to see how she is doing with it.  Tina has started to introduce us to some of her friends and family.  We met her cousin and one of her friends on Sunday.  I think we are going to start trying to teach them this next week.   Well I hope everyone is having fun.  Hope to hear from you soon.  I love you.
Love Elder Marshall

O I heard that skyline beat hill crest.  Go grizzlies.

2009-09-20T19:25:00.000-07:00

These three girls loved to dance together!!

2009-09-20T19:22:00.001-07:00

2009-09-20T19:15:00.000-07:00

Travis and Pam were able to see Steven in Pocahontas. Steven thought that he was meeting a Bishop from Kansas for lunch and instead Travis and Pam was there. Steven was quite excited and surprised.

2009-09-20T19:12:00.000-07:00

Steven's letter Sept 14(Sorry it is a bit late getting on)

2009-09-18T15:04:00.000-07:00

Dear Family
This week has been a good busy week here in Arkansas.  We left Pocahontas on Tuesday and didn’t get back until Thursday night.  We had to go to Jonesboro on Tuesday night.  Elder Hansen had to do interviews there on Wednesday.  Then we had to be in Memphis on Thursday for zone conference.  That was a lot of fun.  That’s one of the best parts of the transfer I think.  We have a baptism coming up next Saturday.  Elder Hansen and I are still going up to ash flat.  We were supposed to have a baptism this Saturday, but the girls mom wouldn’t let her be baptized.  She is only 16 so she has to have her permission.  Elder Hansen and I are going to try to see the mom sometime this week.  We have a couple other people who are starting to get closer to being baptized to.  Tina has a cousin that just moved in with her and we are starting to teach her.  Between the two areas, we are being kept pretty busy. 
Thanks for the package you sent.  I really liked the shirt and the CDs.  Thank you.  Tell Rebecca thank you for the Balls too.
It was good to see Uncle Travis and Aunt Pam.  That was a pretty big surprise.  We were expecting  it to be a bishop from Kansas.  That was a pretty big surprise seeing them walk through the door.  It was fun getting to talk to them  and eat lunch with them.
I didn’t know they were taking the old church building down already.  Are they going to build another building there?  Are you still having to go out to Moapa for church?  Well I hope everything is going good there in Logandale.  I miss you all.  Hope you have a good week.
Love Elder Marshall

Steven's letter Aug 31

2009-08-31T11:19:00.000-07:00

Dear Family
So there are a lot of fires going out west? I didn't even know that. We don't know anything thats going on unless the members tell us what the news says. So no new bishop yet? i thought there would have been one called by now. Youll have to let me know when someone gets made the bishop. This week has been a lot of fun here in pocahontas. We have been able to do a lot of service this week. We helped a couple of the older sisters in the branch paint their chairs. Then we got reminded that we had some things that we needed to get ready for the fair. So we made a big sign with the 17 points of the true church, we made a display thing that shows how our church is set up the same way that Christs church was set up. We also got asked to help one of the members put a roof on a building at the fair grounds and then paint it. We have had a pretty busy week. This next week is going to be really busy to. The fair starts on tuesday and goes through saturday. We are going to be there at the booth a lot. It doesn't sound like it is a really big fair, but they have a lot of neat stuff at it. There is a rodeo, a little carnival, and they have redneck games. Im not sure what is going to be in the redneck games, but Elder Hansen and I are definatly going to those. Its going to be a lot of fun. We have been inviting alot of our investigators to come and see it, and a couple of the people who have just been baptized are wanting to work in the booth. Tina and Travis are doing pretty good. We saw them on sunday. Tina's Sister is moving out for a few weeks though so we arn't going to be able to keep teaching her for a while. So we are only going out to Ash Flat once a week now. How is everyone liking being back in school? does rebecca like Kindergarden? Well i found this story i thought yall would probably like. It made me laugh.
The first Epistle of the Elders
to the Letter Writers:

Chapter One
1. In the beginning was the mailbox and the mailbox was void of letters.
2. And the missionaries said, Let the mailbox be filled and the box was not filled.
3. And the missionaries beheld the continuing void and were not pleased.
4. And lo, it was the first day of the week and there was no mail delivered, but this was good.
5. But on the second day mail was delivered, yet the mailbox remained empty.
6. Yea, even from the second day unto the seventh was the mail delivered.
7. Even so the box retained its' void.
8. And yea, great mists of darkness spread forth from the void and enshrouded the Missionaries. Yea and did bring much sadness to their otherwise cheery days.
9. Even the long hours of fruitless tracting, being chased by the fowls of the air, and being pursued by the beast of the field were not as disheartening as the lack of sacred objects known as letters.
10. Yet they persisted.

Chapter Two
1. And, lo, on the second day of the second week the mists still encircled the sacred mailbox.
2. And on the third day, from within the depths of the void was a single postcard.
3. And this postcard put forth a single ray of light which did pierce the darkness and did overcome the mists.
4. And the Missionaries were well pleased and there was much rejoicing.
5. But, alas, their joy was not to last. For the mailbeast had made a mistake and the postcard was for someone else.
6. But if their joy was so exceedingly great over someone else's mail, how great would be their joy at partaking of their own mail.

Chapter Three
1. But some will say, a letter, a letter. We have already written a letter. We have no need to write anymore letters.
2. Know ye not that there are more days than one. And more events than one in a day. Why think ye that these events need not to be reported.
3. Yea, and ye need not worry that your letter will go unanswered.
4. But you should say, I will go and write the letter that a missionary requests. For I know he giveth no request except he be prepared to respond.
5. And we give unto you the Parable of the self addressed envelopes.
6. When the missionary departed into the far off land he gave a certain number of self-addressed stamped envelopes to his friends.
7. Unto one he gave 5, unto another he gave 2, and unto the third he gave 1.
8. And while he was gone he that was given the 5 envelopes wrote 5 letters, then in his zeal wrote 5 letters more.
9. The same with him that had 2 envelopes; he wrote 2 letters and then 2 letters more.
10. He that was given the self-addressed envelope became slothful and careless. And he lost the envelope, even that which he was given.
11. When the missionary came home he went unto his friends. And he that had written 10 letters was warmly greeted.
12. The same with him that had written 4.
13. But he that had written none at all was given nothing more than a Fishy-Whimp like handshake.

Chapter Four
1. And it has been said; Blessed are the letter writers for they shall receive mail in return.
2. Blessed are they that keep in touch with a missionary for they shall know all that happens to him.
3. Ye and your letters are the light of a missionaries' day.
4. A city that is set on a hill cannot be hid.
5. Neither do men write letters and put them in a desk but in an envelope that it giveth light unto all that are around the missionary.
6. Let your letters so be read by missionaries that they may see your good works and show an increased love to you.
7. And we give unto you the Parable of the Prodigal Letter Writer.
8. A missionary had two friends while he was laboring in the field.
9. One was faithful and wrote every week to the missionary.
10. Meanwhile, the other friend spent his stamp money on riotous living and wrote no letters.
11. But after 231/2 months he felt deep sorrow and did write a letter unto the missionary.
12. Who when he received it did go and kill the fatted Macaroni and Cheese box and did feast and was merry.
13. For it was meet that he should make merry for the letter writer which was lost was now found.

Chapter Five
1. And the missionary said unto his friend, Lovest thou me?
2. And the friend said, of course I love thee.
3. He saith a second time, friend, Lovest thou me? and the friend said, Thou knowest that I love thee. He then said, Feed my mailbox.
4. He then spake a third time saying, Lovest thou me? and the friend said, Thou knowest all things, thou knowest I love thee.
5. Then the missionary said, Stuffest my mailbox.
6. And the vision is become unto all as the words of a letter which is sealed in the envelope that the men deliver to one who is not serving a mission saying, read this, I pray thee; and he saith I cannot for it is not mine.
7. And the letter is delivered to him that is serving a mission saying, read this I pray thee; and he saith, why sure.
8. Therefore you should proceed to do a marvelous work among a missionary, even a marvelous work and a wonder by writing a letter.

I hope everyone has a good week and has fun in school. Let me know how everything is going. I love you and miss you
Love Elder Marshall

Steven's letter Aug 24

2009-08-25T19:51:00.000-07:00

Dear Family
This week has been great here in Arkansas. Its been a little hectic though. Elder Hansen and I are together for at least 6 more weeks here in Pocahontas. The 2 baptisms on Saturday went really well. Ill send some pictures so you know who I’m talking about. We slept in the church building up in ash flat on Friday night because the baptism was at 10 in the morning. It’s a long drive to get all the way up there so we just drove up Friday afternoon and slept on the floor in the gym. We brought the cushions of our couch and the couch in the church for our beds. There is a fair coming up on the 1st through the 5th here that we are supposed to be planning. We need to start planning. Elder Hansen and I are pretty excited about being in that. We have a booth in the main building. We have a whole lot of pass along cards and pamphlets to hand out to people. The members here in the branch are excited to be working in the booth with us to. There is a rodeo and a lot of good food that is supposed to be there too so its going to be a fun week. We are still driving out to ash flat twice a week. There are a couple more people out there that we think might be getting baptized in the next 3 or 4 weeks. We don’t have any scheduled yet though. There are a couple people here in Pocahontas that I think are pretty close to wanting to be baptized. And one out in corning too. Well that’s about all that’s happening here. We still haven’t seen any tornadoes yet. The weather has been really nice. Well have fun going back to school. Lol I hope you find the snake.
Love Elder Marshall

Steven's letter Aug 17

2009-08-18T06:13:00.000-07:00

Dear Family
This week has been pretty good here in Pocahontas. We had a baptism for Duke pinn on Saturday. It was a really neat baptism. Duke even got up and bore his testimony after he got baptized. He said he had never felt the spirit as strong as he was feeling it then. He is a really neat guy. He is going to make an awesome member. We have two more baptisms next week for Tina and her son Travis. Tina’s husband died about a month ago now. She is really excited to get baptized and eventually go through the temple and be sealed to her husband. There are a lot of really nice people here. Elder Hansen and I keep meeting more every day.
Transfers are coming up next week. Elder Hansen doesn’t think either of us is going to get moved. We will find out on Sunday if either of us is going to get moved though. We will be together at least till next Tuesday though.
I met sister May’s cousin on Sunday. We got a new senior couple. They said they used to be serving in Nauvoo. I asked them if they knew sister May and it was her cousin. They are the Normans from Cash Valley. Elder Norman was in the Tabernacle choir for 18 years. They are living out by Ash Flat.

We were in Memphis on Tuesday for zone meeting. That’s about a two hour drive each way. Elder Hansen and I have been spending a lot of time in the car lately. We have to go to ash flat twice a week which is about an hour each way, Jonesboro once a week, another hour each way. Then this week we had to go to Memphis. Lol that was a pretty good story about the snake getting into the house. You’ll have to let me know how that turns out. Well that’s about all that’s going on here. Have a good last week without school.
Love Elder Marshall

Steven's letter Aug 10

2009-08-12T06:57:00.000-07:00

Dear family
The reunion sounded like it was a lot of fun. Its been a really good week here. We have had to drive out to ash flat twice a week for a while now. There is a baptism there this Saturday and two next Saturday. Elder Hansen and I are really excited for all three of them. We have been staying really busy. Transfers are a week from Sunday. I was in Blytheville most of this week on splits with the missionaries there. It was fun to see another part of Arkansas. I like Pocahontas a lot better, but it was fun to go somewhere else. I was supposed to be going to Memphis this week with the zone leaders, but they have to go to Blytheville instead. Elder Hansen and I still have to go on Tuesday to Memphis for zone meeting though. This week I learned all about how to go catfish hoggin’ . They do it a lot here. It sounds like a lot of fun, but I don’t think we can do it as missionaries. You find a whole where the catfish sleep. Then you just stick your hand down into it real slow until they bite onto you hand, then you pull it out of the water. I guess they have a big competition here. lol I learned the best way to skin a squirrel this week too. And I got told all about bow fishing. We spent a lot of time this week with one of the families that lives out away from town this weekend. It was a lot of fun. They live out on a farm out in the hills. I’m glad I’ve been writing stuff in a journal because there has been a lot of funny stuff that has happened out away from Pocahontas. On Friday night Elder Hansen and I went out to see the family that has all the dogs. I think they have about 30 now. They needed help herding their pigs from one pen to another. That was a lot of fun. The pigs didn’t want to get moved. Elder Hansen has chiggers all over now. Its been a fun week. well thats about it from here. I hope everything is going good there. Have a good week. Let me know how grandpa is doing
Love Elder Marshall

2009-07-23T06:45:00.000-07:00

Gregory and Corey decided it would be fun to try and ride the 4 wheelers from Logandale to Beaver Utah. Gregory has done it before but it has been a while. Corey has never tried it. It should take them about 10 hours. I am going to Beaver( in the van and on the freeway) to pick them up.

2009-07-21T10:14:00.000-07:00

2009-07-21T10:12:00.000-07:00

2009-07-21T10:09:00.000-07:00

2009-07-21T09:40:00.000-07:00

It sounds like there are a lot of changes going on there. This week end went pretty good here. Joie's parents were at the baptism, but not at the confirmation. Elder Hansen and i want to ask them if they want to be taught. Her dad just had a pretty bad stroke on saturday, but it sounded like he was doing better by sunday. We are going out there tonight to see how they are all doing. The baptism went really well. We have another one this saturday for Carla. We just met her 3 weeks ago. on the 4th of july. She is going to be an awsome member. She has already started introducing us to a lot of her friends. She lives in an appartment right down the street from us. a few weeks ago we were going to see a family in walnut Ridge. They werent there so we decided to walk around and try to talk to their neigbors. thats the day i got sprayed by the little kid. Well we went back to see if we could teach the mom. I guess she knows one of the sisters in the branch and already has a copy of the Book of Mormon. We taught her last night and she told us she would like us to come back. She said we could stop by the hotel she works at and talk with her while she is on breaks to. Elder Hansen and i are pretty excited to start teaching her. So you are going to Nauvoo on this Saturday? thats going to be a lot of fun. Ya i remember Sister May. She was my 5th grade teacher wasn't she? she was in Nauvoo on a mission last summer to. We saw her while we were there. So Amelia came over? Is she still going to babysit while you are gone? when you see her again, tell her i said hi. well thats about it from here. Have fun in Nauvoo.
Love Elder Marshall

2009-07-21T09:15:00.000-07:00

Just a little update on what we have been doing....not a whole lot. Sometimes I feel like we are still in a bit of a fog. I didn't realize there was so much to do after a funeral. Bank accounts, pay checks, insurance issues, head stones, cleaning out bedroom..... Maybe it just seems like a lot because I don't want to do it. Gregory and I are getting ready to leave on Saturday for Nauvoo. It should be a fun trip. It has been nice to focus on something fun. The kids will stay home. We have someone staying with them. The girls are fine with it but Corey thinks he is to old for someone to have to come "babysit" him.

2009-07-14T05:20:00.000-07:00

Dear family
Its been a busy week here in pocahontas. We started teaching Carla last Saturday. Her baptism is going to be on the 25th. She is pretty excited to be baptized and is already trying to find other people for us to teach. Joie's baptism is on this saturday. She is prety excited to. She is trying to read the Book of Mormon before she gets baptized. She is only 13 years old. We have been trying to get her to let her brother Kevin baptize her, but she thinks he would drown her. Kevin got baptized 3 weeks before i got here. He has been bringing his girlfriend to church the last few weeks and he wants us to start teaching her to. hopefully we will be able to sometime this week. We haven't been able to talk to her yet. We are going to start going all the way out to ash flatt starting on Tuesday. Elder hansen says its about a 120 mile round trip so its going to burn through our miles. Their branch has a couple people who have been coming to church for the last 3 or 4 weeks. Elder Hansen and I are hoping to set a date with them either this week or next. I guess we will see what happens. We are pretty excited about how things are going here. I got a call from one of the spanish elders on tuesday. He wanted me to talk with him in spanish. I didn't do very well, but at the end he said that President Drewes is looking for more missionaries to go spanish speaking. Ive been pretty woried the rest of the week because transfers are this week, but if i was going to be transfered i think i would have gotten called by now. I'm hoping i can stay here at least one or two more transfers. So Grandpa is in Washington? That sounds like a lot of fun. I miss going flying with him. We are all done moving and cleaning. We had our first big storm here two nights ago. There was a lot of lightning. There was never a pause in the thunder. Just a conastant rumble. You could have walked around outside with out a light pretty easy because of all of the lightning. The wind was blowing pretty hard to. There were a few trees blown over and lots of libs on the ground. Joie's power was out for about 12 hours. It was really humid all day yesturday. O Elder hansen said that Nauvoo is only about a 4 or 5 hour drive from here. i dont know how he knows though. O I found out that music isn't as strict as it says in the book that came with the letter. President Drewes said that we can listen to any music that doesn't drive away the spirit. one of the CD's that is approved is Spirit by Alex Boye. I was wondering if you could maybe get me a copy of it. I'm pretty sure you can buy it on deseret book. o and i was wondering if you had found out anything about a gps. Well thats about it from here. I hope everything is going good in logandale. I miss you all.
love Elder Marshall
O one of our investigators is having trouble accepting Joseph Smith. She believes everything we have taught her about the restoration, and the gospel, and she accepts him as long as we call him brother joseph or just joseph. But she doesn't like his last name. Elder Hansen and i aren't sure how to convince her that he had a last name. If anyone has any ideas let me know.

Steven's Letter July 6

2009-07-06T13:07:00.001-07:00

Dear family
This week was a pretty busy week.  We had to move into the Elder and sister Winegar's appartment.  We are appartment B now instead of A. There isn't any one in the old appartment yet so we can still check both mailboxes, but could you let everyone know that the address is changed?  They aren't going to replace the winegars.  We are the only missionaries in our area.  The nearest elders are about an hour drive away in Jonesborro.  Thats where Elder Fjerstad is.  We had all the missionaries over last week to help the winegars move out.  We had to clean their appartment after they left, Then move all their furniture out and ours in.  Then we had to clean our appartment really well so other people can move in.  Then load all the Winegars stuff on to a trailer to go back to Little Rock. It took all day tuesday, and part of Wednesday.  We are down to just one baptism schedualed on the 18th.  The two that were suppost to be this saturday are running from the law right now.  So they arent going to be baptized this week.  We had three investigators at church on sunday.  One of them wants to be baptized so we are going to be setting up a date with her some time pretty soon. She was talking to missionaries before she moved here from Texarkansas, but she lost track of the missionaries for a while.  It hasn't rained here since i got here.  Elder Hansen said that it was raining a lot before i got here,  but the grass is starting to turn brown now because it hasn't rained in three weeks.  So i haven't seen any lightning or tornadoes yet, but hopefully pretty soon.  He says the clouds turn green when there is a chance of a tornadoe.  Ill try to get some pictures.   :)   Thank you for the light, the knife, and the Priesthood line of authority.  I just got the box today.  There was a lot of stuff in the box. Did you take the pictures off the card and put it on the computer? transfers are next week. They happen every six weeks.  Elder Hansen thinks i am going to be switched to spanish speaking pretty soon, but he doesn't think it will be this transfer.  I guess ill find out by Sunday if i am going to be transfered.  Hopefully i wont though. I like it here.  The people have been really nice.  The food is really good to. I haven't tried any wierd food, but Elder Hansen has.  He has eaten possom,  pig intestines, and some kind of squirl soup that had fur in it.  I've just tried deep fried brocoli.  O i ment to ask you what all of the envolopes were for that were in the box with the blanket and pillow.  I still have them, but i'm not sure what they are for.
So did you go to Lagoon?  Grandpa said something about that in his letter.   Well i better go.  I hope everything is going good in Logandale. Have fun on the Lawn mower.
Love Elder Marshall