General Authorities In The Mission!

Dear Family,

This week was so amazing! I was sick most of this week, but that is not the cool part of it, Elder Ronald A. Rasband came to our mission for a special training! Not just him, but also Bishop Wadell of the Presiding Bishopric, and Elder Clayton, President of the Quorum of the Seventy. Also, Elder Call, the Seventy of our area, was there, too.

It was on a Saturday Morning. The whole mission piled into the Federal Way Stake Center, filling almost the whole chapel. We all stood up in reverence when they walked in. At the beginning we all had the opportunity to shake their hands. Elder Rasband made a comment that he had never been in a meeting with missionaries with so many key holders present. It was a powerful meeting. The program was changed a few times, on the spot, allowing for some people to bear their testimonies.

The Spirit was so strong there. They spoke of our divine call as missionaries and what it takes to assign a missionary to a mission, a zone, an area. There is a lot of prayer and fasting involved, and it is all done by revelation from God. Every single missionary is in exactly the right place in exactly the right time to bring about Heavenly Father's will. It is powerful. It is the true church of God.

Elder Ronald A. Rasband spoke of how Christ served one by one, to each person. Similarly, he shook all of our hands one by one. And we are so serve the people in our mission one by one, person by person, lesson by lesson. God works in small and simple ways, one by one.

He talked about the difference between going on a mission and serving a mission. To serve a mission is to go all in, giving your all. Going on a mission is just to go and fulfill your duty. Elder Rasband said, "The more you know Him, our Savior, the more you love Him. The more you love Him, the more you will want to serve Him." His challenge to us was to be obedient missionaries for the right reasons. We need to study the life of Christ to learn and love Him.

I know that Elder Ronald A. Rasband is an Apostle of the Lord. There is no doubt in my mind that he was inspired with what to say. I know that this church is true. It is lead by the Savior, and He has called common men and made them into leaders to guide us back to Him. Always follow the Prophet. Heavenly Father will bless you as you do. I love you all and I hope you have a great week!

Love,
Elder Bretton Steiner.

This is my new companion, Elder Jones!

Elder Rasband agreed to have a picture with our entire mission! It was so amazing! Good luck finding me!

Transfers Have Come Again... Always Too Fast!

Dear Family,

This week has been very rainy, but awesome! On Wednesday, our Zone Leaders did a great job doing the Zone Training. They invited the Spirit by testifying often of Jesus Christ and they taught a little bit about what the difference is between fun and joy.

What is fun? Fun is something that we get when we do something that we like and it is always temporary. What is joy? Joy is happiness that comes from the Gospel of Jesus Christ and can last. The Zone Leaders taught us that it is important that we focus on finding joy in the work, not just looking for fun. So many blessings are promised to those who lose themselves in the work. It is literally the best way to go.

Now that I have delayed a little bit: Transfers! I am staying in the Lakota Creek Ward, but Elder Scheidell is getting transferred to the Gem Heights Ward in the Puyallup South Stake. My new companion is going to be Elder Jones. I think he is a newer missionary because I haven't met him, yet. I am currently e-mailing with Elder Scheidell and the transfer will actually take affect later today. I am going to miss Elder Scheidell, but I am excited to meet Elder Jones. It is going to be a great transfer!

I am still the district leader. I guess I will have to make my district meetings more formal. With an all Elders district last transfer, it sometimes got to be a lot of fun. :) It is interesting the way that Federal Way Zone works. Everyone in the Zone has a car except for the District Leaders. They are all on bike. I hope that we can get a car in the near future, because our area is starting to become dangerous. (Killer Clowns on the lose, multiple shootings a few weeks ago) I am only scared to be outside some of the time. :) For the most part, though, I feel pretty safe. As long as I am obedient, I won't have to worry about getting harmed! It is so awesome to have such a promise on my side. :)

On another topic, a member of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles will be visiting this mission on Saturday! We think it is going to be Elder Rasband, but we don't know. We have been told that their schedules can change just a couple of days before, so we might just get a 70 instead. Cross your fingers!

I am excited for this week! I hope you enjoyed this letter! So much is going on! It is going to be awesome! I love you all!

Love,
Elder Bretton Steiner.

P.S.

The Lord did protect us this week. We didn't have the full weather report, but we knew that it was supposed to be bad because everyone we talked to on the weekend told us to go inside and take the day off. Well, we didn't. I think that the Lord turned to storm away because we were out proselyting. We expected to get 50-60 mph winds, but we didn't get much more than about 25-30. Enough to make a couple wet trees fall. I actually have read my setting apart blessing recently (Actually almost 3 weeks ago) and I think it is pretty cool the things that I have been promised in that blessing. Hopefully, I am being obedient enough. :) I can see some places that I can improve on, as can we all.

This is the Hoof family. Brother Hoof is the new ward mission leader in this ward! It is going to be so great!

The Federal Way Zone! Truely awesome!

Some missionaries didn't get the memo that this is supposed to be a funny picture...

Ugly Tie Day!

Dear Family,

This week has been a good week. I got to go on a short split with one of the Assistants to the President who also happens to be my trainer. Elder Nelson and I have always been great friends and having this opportunity to go proselyting together again has been amazing! We both have come a long way in the last year! It is amazing the change!

Elder Scheidell and I have had a slower week this week, but it was still great! We have doing a lot of tracting and street contacting. We are starting to improve our skills and work together in teaching. We get a lot of practice. :) I have seen a few door mats that are pretty funny. I only took a picture of one of them, though.

We knocked on the door anyway. There was another one that said "Beware of Dog" and it looked like a dog had taken a bite out of it. It was funny!

We knocked on the door anyway. There was another one that said "Beware of Dog" and it looked like a dog had taken a bite out of it. It was funny!

I am doing great here in Lakota Creek Ward. The members are awesome here and they really love to help us out. We are supposed to get a new ward mission leader soon because Brother and Sister Kauer and moving out. They say that they will be back in a year. The work is slowly moving forward and Elder Scheidell and I are working hard to bring souls unto Christ.

I love you all!

Love,

Elder Bretton Steiner.

P.S.

We somehow agreed that for our last District Meeting this transfer, we would all bring our most ugly tie to district meeting. I think I won the contest. :) There was one tie that I thought was actually pretty good...

Ugly Tie day at District Meeting! It was awesome!

This is my District: (From Left to Right: Elder Steiner, Elder Scheidell, Elder Lewis, Elder Northrup, Elder Hunter, Elder Mitton)

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The Commandments of God

Dear Family,

General Conference was awesome! It is hard for me to choose a favorite talk, but I really liked the one by Kazuhiko Yamashita about being ambitious for Christ. I think if we are all ambitious for Christ that we will be able to do great things for the Lord.

One week ago, on Monday, Elder Scheidell and I got to teach Brother I the Word of Wisdom. We set up for Brother W to come with us, he was baptized about 10 years ago and has an amazing testimony of the Word of Wisdom. We all met at the church after P-Day. Brother I showed up with a coffee in his hand.

I thought it would be best to start off with saying outright what the Word of Wisdom is. We went over the things listed in the pamphlet that we should refrain from (Then we added marijuana to that list, because it is legal here in Washington) and then focused largely on the blessings that come from living it. We read the story of Daniel and his brethren in the Bible (Daniel 1). They decided to eat grains and water when the other kids ate meat and wine. In the end, Daniel and his brethren were more wise than the other children. Brother I loved the story and he proudly proclaimed, "I am going to share that with my kids!"

Brother W gave a powerful testimony of how the Word of Wisdom affected his life when he joined the church. It was probably the best Word of Wisdom lesson I have ever had! Brother I committed to live the Word of Wisdom so that he can get baptized!

After the lesson, I remembered that he walked in with a cup of coffee. When we first taught him about what the Word of Wisdom is, he put his coffee on the ground and didn't even touch it until the lesson was over and we were all leaving. He did not finish that coffee. Brother I knows the Book of Mormon is true and he is now making sacrifices and changes in his life that is bringing him closer to Christ. I am excited for his upcoming baptism!

I know that Heavenly Father has given us commandments to bless us. To some people, the commandments may seem like a barrier keeping you from enjoying life, but the complete opposite is true. Keeping the commandments of God brings you joy that you can find no where else. He loves us and He intends for us to be happy. I know that this is true.

"And moreover, I would desire that ye should consider on the blessed and happy state of those that keep the commandments of God. For behold, they are blessed in all things, both temporal and spiritual; and if they hold out faithful to the end they are received into heaven, that thereby they may dwell with God in a state of never-ending happiness. O remember, remember that these things are true; for the Lord God hath spoken it." Mosiah 2:41

I hope you all have a great week! I love you!

Love,
Elder Bretton Steiner.