Luke is serving in the Argentina Buenos Aires West Mission.

Tuesday, April 30, 2013

Pictures from the Mission Blog

Luke would have to explain these pictures.  These were taken off the Mission blog. 





Elder Morgan and Elder Thevenin


Elder Thevenin will be training Elder Morgan.
They will be serving in the Farmington Zone.



Monday, April 29, 2013

Luke's Letter dated 04/29/2013

Hey everyone!

This week has been really fun! A lot of up's and downs, and a few miracles! I've been having a lot of fun! working really hard, and looking ahead to what is in store for me, both here and in Argentina.  I've wondered a lot why the lord needed me here in Salt Lake before I went to Argentina. And I believe that there are a lot of reasons. But through a lot of study, pondering, and prayer i've figured out at least one of the reasons. I'm here to prepare me to go to Argentina. I know that there's a ton of work to do in Argentina, so I need to be prepared to hit the ground running. I also know that there's people I need to meet here, and things I need to do here. I'm focusing on making sure not one moment of my mission is wasted.  

This week we had one really solid guy ready for baptism on saturday. We were planning on doing the interview on friday night so he would be ready for saturday. We called and texted him, but he didn't answer. We were really disappointed that he wasn't going to be able to take this step in his life this weekend. On Saturday we got a hold of him, and he explained that his dad didn't want him to get baptized yet, he wasn't against it, but just didn't want him to do it at this point in his life. So this guy is going to work with his dad to get all this done. While we were down and a little discouraged, we had a miracle happen. The lord sometimes waits till the last moment to give to you what you need, kind of like a trial of your faith. There's this family who wants to get baptized, but can't because they're not married yet. But they can't get married because they are in the process of getting citizenship papers. We found out this weekend that the last step in the process of getting their citizenship is getting married. So they're going to get married and baptized in the coming weeks. This was a true answer to our prayers! Just goes to show you that the lord has a plan for every one of his children.

I walked past a car show this week and I saw this Yellow Camaro. I get looking closer and this Camaro has black stripes. I look again, and it has black rims, a big tail, dark windows, and what looks like an autobot logo a little behind the front tires. I'm sitting here thinking to myself no way. there's no way that Dad and Susan are here. I go up closer to the car, and sure enough. 2013 Camaro T3 2SS. But I looked at the name of the owner in the car, and it was some guy from Hill Air Force Base. It was still cool to see buzz's twin though!

I hope everything is going good back at home. You're all in my thoughts and prayers! Thank you for everything you all do for me!

Love you!
Elder Luke Morgan

Monday, April 22, 2013

Letter from Luke dated 04-22-13

Hey!
So this week has gone by so fast! On tuesday we had a referral competition which was really fun, and we got a bunch of referrals. Even a few Golden ones. On thursday we went to Temple Square with a family. It was a really awesome experience! We watched the "God's Plan For Families" Presentation. Not gonna lie, I cried a little at the end. But this family really enjoyed the experience, and they are really coming to love the church! On friday night we went on splits with the Assistants to the President. My companion and I were down in the Young Single Adult area in Salt Lake. We didn't know that we were going to temple square, so we didn't bring our suits. So we both felt like super out of place just wearing the white shirts! But it was still good! Then we went to a YSA comedy night. The comedians were awesome! One of them had his bishop there, which was absolutely hilarious! We have a couple people who should be getting Baptized next week! I'm really excited for them! 
One thing I learned this week is that if I just make my mind shut up, and really focus on listening to the person we're teaching, the words to say can be given to me. It says many times in the scriptures that the words will be given to you in the very moment. I have a testimony of that! It's so cool to see the spirit work on people through me, and through other missionaries.
Sorry for the short letter. The computers weren't working. So I didn't have too much time today!
I Love You All!!
Elder Luke Morgan

Monday, April 15, 2013

Luke's Letter Dated 04-15-2013

Hey everyone!

So this week has been pretty sweet! Last Tuesday we went down to the Joseph Smith Memorial Building to meet with the Argentine consulate. The consul from Argentina spent about half an hour talking about the country, culture, customs, and answering questions. I learned a lot about Argentina, which was really good!  Then he called us up one by one, looked over our paperwork with our fingerprints and everything, had us sign the application, then he signed it. A little uneventful, but not too bad! He said that it should be about 6 more weeks before we get our visas. There's about 20 of us here in this mission waiting to go to Argentina, so we're all really excited about all this!

The rest of the week went pretty good! We have split our area up between four of us, but only one my companion and I have the car. So the other two elders have the area close to our house, which is where the concentration of the hispanic community is up here, And we have all of farmington, fruit heights, and most of kaysville. As you could imagine, there's not too many hispanic people all through these areas, so we're working hard trying to find people!

Elder Thevenin and I taught the Elders  quorum in a ward in Kaysville. With the talks given in General Conference a lot of people have been getting excited about Missionary work. So we just taught them about how members can help with the work. Working here in Utah is an interesting experience. There's 200 missionaries in this mission, and 300,000 members. Which makes the work of finding really fall upon the members. I really look forward to using my experiences in how the members can help the work when I get to Argentina.  

As far as investigators, we have a couple families that we're working with. Two of them have marriage that they need to get taken care of before they can be baptized. One is working on citizenship papers, and the other needs to get their divorces finalized before they can be married. We're working with a few other people, getting them ready for baptism. I'm loving all this! I get to play a part in the lord changing people's lives! 

I got to go to the Salt Lake Temple today!!! This was my first time going through a session there. What an awesome experience!! I really love going to the temple! It always makes me feel so peaceful and good!

I love you all!! Thank you for everything you all do for me!

--Elder Luke Morgan

Tuesday, April 9, 2013

Letter From Luke 04/08/13

Hey everyone!

So this week has been really really good. It's been spring break up here, so a lot of families have been out of town. But we still found people to teach and help! 
One of the days this week My companion, who is a zone leader, had to conduct a baptismal interview. So I went on transfers with another elder for a night. It was pretty cool to be able to go out and teach someone who i had never met before. The family we taught was so receptive, and loved to learn about the gospel.  We've got two families who we are teaching, both of them are super solid. One of them is going to get married here pretty soon, then will get baptized. The other, we originally were teaching the 18 year old boy, Moises. But after coming by a few times, his parents started wanting to listen to us. They're all on date to be baptized later this month. It's really cool to see how the lord has prepared people to receive this gospel. With some people, we really only have to ask them to be baptized, and they accept.  
With General Conference being this weekend, we really wanted to find tickets so our investigators could go. This was fairly difficult. We called everyone we could think of. Finally we came up with a few tickets to give to a family. As conference came closer, we got calls from stake presidents, saying that they had tickets for us. Friday night we were planning how to use our tickets, and we were able to bring our investigators to every session except the two Sunday sessions. We were so excited! For the priesthood session, we wanted to invite one of our investigators, Moises. When we talked to him about it, he said that he wasn't going to be able to come with us because he had to go make a baseball video for his application to some colleges.  We were super bummed out. We really wanted him to be able to go.  Our appointment to watch the Saturday Afternoon session fell through, so we went to the bishop's house and watched there. About halfway through the session, Bishop Resek came downstairs and asked us if we had anybody that could use tickets for the sunday afternoon session. My companion and I looked at each other, rather shocked. Then we told the Bishop that we really needed tickets for a few investigators. He said he would see what he could do. So the next morning we went back to his house for breakfast, he couldn't be there because he was translating for some of the speakers in Conference. But one of his sons handed us some tickets. we had 8 tickets in total, half for the balcony, And half for plaza, right in front of the pulpit. So we called Moises, and told him that we were able to get tickets, he was so excited to come with us! We ended up being able to take him, a member, and another family. Our seats were about 15 rows back, pretty much right in front of the pulpit. It was so cool! Seeing the Prophet and the Apostles speak that close was absolutely amazing!

So I was able to watch the thing on tv between the sunday sessions. I saw myself like a whole bunch in the choir, Also my mission president was on there! That was pretty cool!

I'm so grateful for the opportunity I have to serve in this mission, and with these people. I know that God has a purpose for me being here in Salt Lake rather than Argentina. I'm so grateful for the chance I have to serve the Lord, and spread this gospel. Thank you for all that you all have done for me to get me to this point. You have all impacted my life in so many ways.

I love you all!
Elder Luke Morgan















Monday, April 1, 2013

Mission Blog

Luke's mission has a blog.

mamawinnsplace.blogspot.com

Luke's Letter Dated 04-01-13

Hola!

So this has been my first week in the field now! I'm assigned to the Farmington zone. My area covers south Layton, down to Lagoon. We cover 14 stakes, our ward has about 200 people in it or so. All spanish speaking. We only teach Spanish speakers, but most of them speak some english too, So I understand the conversations as well.  We live in a little townhome in Kaysville. There's 6 of us living there now. But barely enough room for 4. So me and the other visa waiter have to keep all of our stuff in the unfinished basement, and sleep  in the living room. I sleep on the couch, and he sleeps on an air mattress. It's not the greatest, but it works! So being in Utah, all the members love missionaries! So we get fed every night, and sometimes twice a day. Last night we had the biggest dinner ever with one of our stake presidents. It was awesome! Mostly we eat out with spanish families, and i'm LOVING the food! Which isn't good, considering I already gained 10 pounds in the MTC. My goal is to not come back too fat! 

We had a talent show on friday night with our ward. There was a lot of cool stuff there, Jaun Direction (one direction) some clowns (one elder is terrified of clowns) and we did the Haka (I think i spelled that right) like the tongan war dance. It was pretty cool! We had a guy from new zeland there with us, so he really rocked it. Our ward mission leader Eric Russec had his band there. It was really fun!  

We have about 6 or 7 investigators. Some are super solid, but some just flake out on us. Like yesterday, we had this family who said they would for sure come to church. But we get about halfway through sacrament meeting (which started at 11) and see that they're not there. So we leave and go to their house, and he's out weed-eating his lawn. We get talking to him and he said he was too tired to come to church. We thought it was a really lame excuse. Oh well. Some other investigators are looking pretty solid for baptism pretty soon here. Hopefully we'll have at least a couple this transfer. Our mission is the highest baptizing in the world. The goal for this year is 3500. Our mission president recieved revelation on this goal while reading Alma 4:5. Pretty high, but I know these guys can do it!

So I'll be here for at least one transfer (6 weeks) because my mission president made a deal with the missionary department that he could have us for that long just so it doesn't screw up our transfer schedule. I'm really loving being here, even though I'm only like an hour and a half from home! It's still awesome to be here! It doesn't even feel like i'm in Utah still. It's kinda weird. But yeah it's pretty nice here! We play soccer with the ward and some investigators every saturday, we play basketball every morning, and on mondays we go to the sports-plex here in kaysville. I guess it's like a huge gym with a trampoline park, soccer fields, basketball courts, all kinds of stuff. I'm pretty stoked for that!  

We will probably get to go to general conference this next week, we're really excited and so are the families that we will get to take! It should be a really good experience.  Every now and then we get to take investigators down to temple square, just to let them get out of their environment, and into one that they can feel the spirit. I haven't been able to do this yet, but i'm pretty excited for it!

So... I think that rather that sending letters, emails will be better. They're gonna be faster, and especially in Argentina email will be tons faster. I still like getting letters in the mail though! But yeah! I just wanna hear from you all!
Spread my email address around. Like facebook and stuff. That'd rock.

I love you all, I pray for you every day, and i look forward to hearing from you!

Love,  Elder Luke Morgan

New Zealand missionary explaining the haka



Our car, at our ward mission leaders house, his 18 year old sister likes to screw with the missionaries


A shopping list that someone helped us with.