Blur of a busy week - baptisms & growing testimonies

Hey!!!!!!!!!! 

first off I am so excited to talk with you all on Sunday!!!!!!!!!!!! that is awesome! Only 2 more calls home after this! wow time flies! So I didn't get transfered this time around! Me and Epperson are staying together for 6 mor weeks atleast which is good! we are getting along pretty darn well lately and the work is exploding! Elder Bennett did get transfered though... He's on his way to Kimberly Idaho to be a Zone leader in the Twin Falls mission! I'm proud of that little guy! It'll be wierd serveing in Lagrande without him.. haha we've been together since January and its crazy just how much we went through together! He's one of my best friends for sure! haha I stayed up talking with him while he was packing untill like 4 in the morning lol! It was fun! we had a good heart to heart and played some pranks on the other 2 sleepy heads and it made for a good night lol! haha I'm pretty dang tired today though lol!  

Miranda and Mic have been emailing me and that's been soo awesome!!!!!! I've been missing you guys this past week or so.. I also got a letter from Kera and Josh!! Thank you so much! I'll write back soon! Sounds like things are going well and people are getting healthier! I was so stoked to hear about Miranda's IV treatment stuff!!!! that is so sick!!! lol anyways keep me up on whats going on and I guess I'll get to talk to you all about it on Sunday!!!! 

This week is a blur! haha we were pretty dang busy!! we got to hit the best of both world and taught 26 lessons as well a bunch of service hours! A busy week makes for a good week! Ok week highlight!!!! Suzanne is getting Baptized on May 25th!!!!!! We had an incredible lesson with her Thursday night! we watched the Restoration video and then talked about the resoration of Christ's Gospel ment for her! Holy dang that was a powerful experience! she has a big inferiority complex and she just can't find the good in her self.. Its heart breaking but it felt so good to bear testimony that again and again how she truly can be forgiven of past mistakes and how much Heavenly Father truely loves her. I have gained a huge testimony of how much Heavenly Father knows the needs of each of his Children individually just from the promptings we receive during a lessons and the feelings we have for the person. I think that its a gift of the Spirit that heavenly father allows us through the Holy Ghost to not only say what he wants to say to these people but also feel a portion of how he feels for them. We talked about the cleansing attributes of Baptism and repentance and she kinof broke down. The most powerful feeling or part of the lesson was by far the closing prayer. She is super shy and selfconciouse about what others think so even when she has tried to say prayers out loud with us she just shuts down and can't think.. So we invited her to say a silent kneeling prayer at the close of the lesson and that was incredible. It felt like Heaven was really in that room and the spirit just filled everything! I read in a talk by President Packer that we are suppose to keep special spiritual experiences to ourselves and only share them when prompted to but I do feel that yall need to know just how incredible seeing the Gospel's light work on someone is! Soo I'll share with yall in here a few things and I'll save some for back home stories! ahaha 

anyways we also had another really good Lesson with James! we went over to Sister Wheeler's house( who is this freakin awesome woman who got baptized when she was 19 and the served a mission 2 years later!!) He talked to her about how her parents felt when she joined the church and how they feel now about it! I t was really neat to hear him ask some of his questions and Sister Wheeler helped resolve a bunch of his concerns!! He read all of 1st Nephi Last week!!!!!!! he is just soaking it in and is on fire! We asked if he knew it was true and he said that he's probably just fooling himself at this point but since he hasn't been a "spiritual" person for so long he's still allowing some doubts to enter his mind about some stuff.. He'll be baptized soon if he lets his faith grow and dosn't try to smother it.. We are working with him though! he descrices it as his little faith seeds like a mini mini tree but he can feel it growing! Its cool to see a guy who didn't even believe that he had father in Heaven who loves him!!!!! 

So thats the highlights!! we are also working hard with Brian, Doug and a bunch more! Really quick Colton re-accepted an invitation to be baptized and we are setting a date with him this Friday!!! we is a 16 yr olf kid in Union!!  

I love you all so much!!!! have an awesome week!!!! I'll see ya on Sunday!!!!!!!!!

6 months out!! and Happy Birthday Dad!

My Family!

Hey Everyone!! Holy cow this was a hectic week! Yet awesome! 

Well I'm not sure if yall know this but I hit my 6 month mark this week! Pretty crazy right?? time flies but I've heard as long as you can keep your focus it will only speed up from hear! Soo first off, Miranda, Micalea, and Kera(so sisters) you should send me emails so I have your individual email addresses! I obviously suck to the highest at getting you individual letters so I would love to beable to shoot you at least a quick email each week! Miranda!!! I'm so sorry to hear about your collar bone... Get feeling better ok?? I know how tough injuries can be.. I am flippin proud of you though! I can't believe that you had your senior night already! your awesome and I know that you are going to be freakin awesome in college!! Just try not to beat yourself up and stay positive! Your definitely an all-star in my book!!!(sooner then you think everyone else as well !!

My week as I said be fore was craycray lol! Having to cover both areas in Lagrande is a challenge but awesome! We got to go to Elgine Oregon which is about 40min out of Lagrande and teach some super cool hill billy people up there lol! hahaha they called Lagrande the city and Lagrande has maybe 10,000 people in it and yeah... is pretty small but these people were so funny about it! They have a 100 year old opera house in Elgine that the community runs so we got to do some awesome service for awhile helping build sets and dropping backgrounds!! Learned a ton about theater and stuff lol! Those big canvas drops weigh a flip ton! haha The other elders have a guy who is getting baptized up there named Jeff 2 Horse lol! he legally changed his name after having a vision about him riding 2 horses at the same time... haha its apart of his native american heritage.  

We taught Jon Jian 2 times this past week!! He is seriously awesome! we tought him the restoration and Joesph Smith and he on his own time researched all about early church history! He calls it "our" churches history! He told us how touched he was that they sacrificed so much to bring us the truth! Sooo yeah he's getting baptized on March 2nd!!!!! I am so happy for him! He is seriously a spiritual giant and I know that he is going to have a big part in bringing the gospel to the people of China! We met with Mallory twice this week as well and after allot of praying we decided on the 2nd of march for her baptism as well!! She told her family and they said they would support her and still love her even if she is a member of a cult lol! She really is awesome and way strong! She has an awesome knowledge of the scriptures and a real desire to learn the truth! She texts us gospel questions all the time throughout the week! She is awesome! 

We had a bunch of cool experiences with less active members this week as well and It is so amazing to see someone who knows they need to make a change and then go out and do it! It is even better when they tell you how much happier they are because of it! It just feels rewarding! haha so that was my week in a nut shell! Lots of driving around and a ton of miracles! 

I love you all and hope your doing well! I am doing awesome! Love Elder Macfarlane!!

P.S hey so cool experience, Saturday I got super sick with a head cold flu thing that has been going around.. Everyone told me that it took them 4 days to get it out of there system and that I had the worst ahead of me.. I received a blessing Saturday night and by the morning I was feeling alot better! Today almost all my symptoms are completely gone and I'm just a tiny bit tired from it! I'm being looked after for sure and I know it because I have work I need to do and I need to be healthy to do it! Love you all! I'm looking forward to an awesome week! hope you all are to!

P.S.S DAD! Happy birthday!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Hope all yall Mac's do something awesome to celebrate!

Transfer to La Grande Oregon!

Happy New year Mi Familia!

haha i'm glad things sound like they are going well! I'm sure school started back up today so that will be fun  haha

so its transfers today and I got moved form Nampa to La Grande Oregon! its about 3 hours out of Boise and the absolute farthest area in the mission. Its a smallish town of about 12 thousand.. mainly college students at Eastern Oregon. My comp is Elder Bloomfield who seems pretty cool! he's been out about 16 months or so. We are actually in Onterio right now and will drive up to La Grande in a little.. Its a 2 hour drive and I'm the driver. lol its snowing like crazy right now! haha it felt so weird driving this morning after being on a bike for the past 4 months lol! haha pray I learn to drive in the snow quick!

La Grande is sort of up in the mountains in the middle of Oregon so it it crazy cold! Haveing a car will be nice though! It was pretty heard to leave Nampa. Luckily I got to say goodbye to many of my people on Saturday and Sunday.. Its tough, It does feel good though to know that I've worked hard down there and that the work is picking up! We had a baptism this coming Saturday for a 18yr old girl named Randy and its stinks I'm missing it but its ok! Its not important who's there just that it gets done. I have a bunch of good memories of my first area but I am excited to get to know the people of La grande! I'm going to be in a apartment with 3 other missionaries so that should be pretty fun! I'm sure I'll have some interesting stories for next week. La Grande was the highest baptizing stake in the mission last year so I'm ready to get to work and keep it up!

any ways that's all for me! Lets Go DUCKS!!! haha I love and miss yall a ton! Good luck with your surgery Dad! I hope all is well and you'll be out running again soon!

p.s I also have a bunch of pictures from my first area that I'll be sending home soonish!

P.s.s send letters and packages to the mission office USPS and they'll forward them to me! Thank you!!!

Going to the MTC

Goodbye Family! (airport in Virginia)

Josh, Kera, Micaela, Aaron, Miranda, Joe, Beth, Steele

Lunch before the drop off with uncle and cousins

Ready to Serve

Read this book!  :)

MTC dropoff

There he goes!