June 6th, 2016

Dear Family and Friends,

This week I was able to go on an exchange with Elder Hougland. Their
area was low on miles and this was the last day of the month, so we
had to bike quite a bit. I have never had to bike on my mission so
far, and frankly that day was probably more biking than I ever want to
do again. Elder Gardner and Elder Hougland were too afraid to tell me
that I would be biking on exchanges so I found out right after we
exchanged. Since they didn't warn me, I didn't have my bike so I had
to use Elder Gardner's bike which is too small. By the end of the day,
my right foot was shaking involuntarily because I think I pushed
myself too hard. At least Elder Hougland was patient with me and so we
were able to go a little slower for the last couple miles back to the
apartment.

On Exchanges, we were able to teach Brother Bower. He was on a panel
of recent converts during one of our zone conferences and the
missionaries got to ask about their conversion experiences. He is
preparing to give a talk in Sacrament Meeting in a couple weeks on
enduring to the end. It was interesting to get to know Brother Bower
more than when he was in zone conference.

In District Meeting, I learned that I need to know the truths of the
gospel well, not only in my mind, but in my heart also, so that I can
teach it simply. This way of teaching will not only be simpler for the
investigator's mind to process, but it will also help them to get the
principles to be understood spiritually, in their heart.

At a dinner with the Vonn Neiderhausern family, we were able to help
them develop a family mission plan. This plan is meant to be how that
family plans on contributing to the ward mission plan. They were
really excited about making a plan and even wanted to print it out and
hang it on their fridge to constantly remind them of their goals. They
are a great family and are always willing to help out with the
missionary efforts in any way that they can.

Friday, President Daines invited us and everyone that helped with
moving the mission home furniture over for lunch. Their daughter,
Emily, just got married to Bronson Young, a former assistant in this
mission, and they needed help finishing all the leftovers. There was
so much food, and it was all amazing. President Daines said this is
also future payment for helping move some more furniture when they
replace the basement carpet again.

Saturday, we had a lesson with Grant. Normally, he has been really
busy and hard to contact, but he had some time during an open house he
was doing that he could meet with us. The lesson went really well.
Elder Low and I focused on applying what we had learned at Zone
Training Meeting about teaching using scriptures and asking questions
to aid in self-guided discovery. We asked Grant to ponder as we read a
verse in the Book of Mormon and then we were completely silent after
he finished reading the verse. After a lengthy pause, he opened up to
how he felt about baptism and I know he wouldn't have shared that
information if we didn't ask him to ponder then give time for the
spirit to work on him.

We found out Sunday that Brother Fisher, our ward mission leader, is
moving. He will likely be leaving by the end of June. Also, Brother
Hunter, one of the ward missionaries, was released Sunday. Now there
are only two ward missionaries, which is down from four that we had
when I first got to Powell. On the bright side, I can see that the
ward is starting to rally together and see the need for more member
missionary work with all of the people that are leaving. There have
been more talks and lessons in church about how to reach out to be a
friend to everyone and inviting them to learn about the gospel.

Brother Hunter brought twelve interns from BYU and UGA to church with
him yesterday. Four of them were non-members and we were able to get
the contact info of one of them to refer to the missionaries in
Georgia. Having that many people visiting was interesting. Our gospel
principles class barely fit in the room we meet in. Overall, the
non-members said they had a really good experience at church. Alex
said he felt like the church was really personal, but not in an
intruding way.

--
Elder Aaron King
Ohio Columbus Mission