Chet Wants Chocolate..........

     So the other night Chet ran out of his chocolate syrup. I know the world came to an end. So I asked him if he looked on pintrest for the recipe. He looked at me weird and sad. James saved him by calling and needing a ride. I take this opportunity to get on and find one. When they get back I show him what I found. I thought he was going to cry right there. So the next day he watched me make him some yummy dark chocolate syrup. He pulled out his ice cream to try it out. He was so silent while eating it. Then there was a big smile. Yes, I can make chocolate syrup. Sorry Hershey, I will be making my own, but I will still need your cocoa. As long as Chet is happy then I am happy!!   :]

Dear family,

Well this past week was good. It slowed down quite a bit though. My whole mission i think has really been pushing me to do the hard things, and this past week was definitely a trial of my faith, which is a topic we have been focusing on for a long while as a mission. Pretty much every appointment we had last week canceled, and so most days we found ourselves asking, "Well, what now?" But one thing i have learned, that to make it to the breaking point and not break, you have to keep the faith and knowledge that God lives, and he will lead you. Don't pray away the trial, but ask for strength to make it through it. Don't ask for a different road or a different load, but ask for guidance and help to carry the load. The Savior's grace is with us and helps us every step of the way. We will always hit our trial - the trial of our faith - but if we push through it, THEN we receive the witness or miracle. So i found myself asking for a lot of help and guidance this last week. We didn't find any new investigators, but with some help and because we did the hard things and pressed on in faith, we got 2 new people to church, plus 2 other pretty much new investigators to church that we will be teaching this week. Plus! I'm happy. Ha ha. I love the peaceful feeling knowing that you worked hard and did your best. I love how much help we have from our Heavenly Father through this life if we just press on!

Holly came to church for the first time in years and really enjoyed it. She was taught years ago by sister missionaries and almost was baptized but never commit. But right now she is on date for December 3rd! She is great. Gospel Principles class was so awesome, we prayed about what needed to be taught and we decided on The Gift of the Holy Ghost, which was perfect for her! The class went over because we were having such a great conversation. Man it was awesome. Also Brother Boyd (we call him brother boyd because he's pretty much a member) came to church for the first time and really enjoyed it! He already knows so much about the church and is reading in 3 Nephi now! I'm pretty sure Holly thought he was a member ha ha. It was awesome! Oh and Elder Johnson gave a talk to which was so good. It was a really great Sunday.

WE PET A RACCOON! Yep. He was nice. The names Rascal.

But anyway, this week was definitely a learning experience! It really was a good week though. This week will be a good one too, we have a couple great lessons lined up already! I'm excited to see what's in store! I love this gospel so much and i am so grateful to have it in my life and a part of my family. I am so grateful to be on a mission and I'm grateful for how much it has shaped me. The mission is hard, but it is incredible. Heavenly Father lives and loves us, Jesus is the Christ who suffered and died for us to make it possible to live with Him and His Father again. Families are forever.

Amen!

Have a great week! I love you all! Share the gospel!

-Elder Chrys Robinson

Hello again.......

     It's me again. I really don't have a lot to share this week. Just driving James crazy trying to get him caught up on homework for his missed days. He has been talking German to me and I have no idea what he is saying. But if it helps with his communication log I will listen and try to guess what the phrase is. I am always wrong and we laugh. My guess last night was "Lucky's sweater is by the blanket hamper." His question was "How was your day today?" I so don't know what he's saying! Tonight we are going to a free concert at Riverwoods so he can get his concert report done for orchestra. It will be a nice night out and hopefully with some good music. We are taking one of his friends also. I hope Chet and I survive!! Then a great thing will happen tomorrow.........no alarm Saturday!!!! I can hardly wait!!!! Have a great weekend everyone!!!


Dear Family,

HAPPY BIRTHDAY GRANDMA CHERYL!!!!!!! I LOVE YOU!!!!! Man i need to write them. 

Haven't gotten the package yet, it's in Hebron Kentucky right now with the elders over there, but i will be seeing them tomorrow. Thank you!! The pictures ha ha lucky looks so cute! I love how much she hates that thing ha ha.

I'm still in Batesville! WOO!!

This past week was definitely a good one. It's been hard lately with pretty much no appointments, but we've been trying to stay busy finding people. On Tuesday we tracted out a sweet family! We set up a return appointment for Friday and they were all ready to sit and hear what we have to share with them. Asheesh (that's not how you spell it but i can't figure out any other way to) is Hindu and he's from India. He is way sweet! He grew up in a Catholic church so he knows about Jesus Christ a little bit. He's not a practicing Hindu, but still considers himself one. April is his wife and she is super cool too. She knows quite a bit about the church from her member friends, but has never met with the missionaries until now. They are both ready and willing to learn and very open to reading the Book of Mormon. It was cool though, we prayed and decided to teach the Plan of Salvation for their first lesson, and everything was going so good, but near the end Asheesh stopped us and asked, "what is the Holy Ghost?" Man did i feel dumb. Ha ha. I guess we carried on thinking he knew. But it was pretty cool to teach him these eternal basic truths about Heavenly Father, Jesus Christ and the Holy Ghost. It's just awesome being a missionary.

On Sunday we got a new bishop! Bishop Watkins, after 7 years, has been called to the High Council. He will do great. Man I love that family though, it was a big tearful Sunday that's for sure. They are seriously my family away from home. On Saturday we were able to go do service for his neighbors and rake all their leaves, which actually turned into them dropping goodies off at bishop's to thank him, and they ended up having a gospel conversation for like an hour and a half. And Sister Watkins offered to have them over when we were there and they should be setting something up this week! Man, just doing service is my favorite anyway, but to see the things that come out of it sometimes are just awesome. Things are definitely moving!

Right now the rest of our investigators are kind of in limbo, so we're having a good take action week this week. Which started last night with a less active family that we are going over the Addiction Recovery Program with. It's funny, everyone we've taught here kind of progresses at the same rate and at the same time. When one person is being taught the plan of salvation, so is everybody else. It kind of just works out like that. So right now it's get it done! Make it happen! Just do it! Action week. We'll be having some sweet lessons this week to get people to baptism. It's going to be a good one :)

Well, I'm out of time. And i gotta say, if there is anything I've learned out here, it's that there is not a point that you reach to where you are in the safe zone away from Satan's influence. You ALWAYS have to protect and defend your faith. It is an every day-every second thing. With correct decisions, you can increase in faith, and with incorrect decisions you can decrease in faith. It is a gift of God that is given when righteousness is present, and man am i thankful for it. I am just so grateful for how much Heavenly Father loves his children and leads and guides us. The work is rolling forward, and through our faith many people will know the truth. This is the work of the Lord, and it will roll forth with or with out us! I love being a missionary. I know i say that a lot but it is so amazing. It scares me to think of how short it is. But it makes me so happy to see so many people preparing to serve and getting out there! Let's do it!

I love you all! Have a great week! Share the gospel with someone!

-Elder Chrys Robinson

James is dripping..........Ewwwww!!!

     Well we had a great Conference weekend. Like always we spent it with the Spencer's making salsa. Then we ate a lot of good food while listening to wonderful uplifting words. I won Conference bingo twice while taking notes! It was a good time all around. Then James' allergies kicked in again and he got a cold on top of it. But just to make sure he had it all he burst his ear drum. So he is dripping from his nose and ear. Then he has this wonderful cough. Lysol is my friend right now. The heating pad broke the 3rd day into his ear yuckiness. It was old and had a good life, but it could have waited till he didn't need it, sigh. I am finding tissues and cotton balls around. I'm sorry, but I will not touch them!! That's just not right!!! So James is a pain, I mean James is still in pain at times. I wish there was a wonder drug that would heal it all in one day at this point. But then he acts silly in his feel ok moments and he makes me smile. So I guess we will get through this again. This too shall pass. Then maybe I will get some sleep.........sure...........    :]


Dear Family,

I got the package from the Robinson's! A camera?! That's awesome!! Thank you so much!! I love all the goodies too. Also, between Harris and I....Little buddy and I had a good time watching conference together..and eating M&Ms. Ha ha. He sat next to me in the church. :)

I love the pictures! Shawn is like 10X bigger than when I left. Wow he has grown! But it's so good to see the Spencer's. I love that family. Congrats Susie! She'll do great! So for how long are they going to be tearin up the church? What are Sundays like? Classes outside? Ha. Those Elder's ties are sweet! I had one in Xenia for a little while that Elder Riggs and I would wear as a "tie-bib" at dinner appointments sometimes. ha ha. Mostly just to make the kids laugh.

It was a pretty good week this past week. Definitely wasn't at as fast of a pace as the others, but it was still really good. General conference was amazing! All our investigators bailed out on coming to the church to watch it with us and the members, but 2 still watched it at home. Our Monday chapel tour went so good! James is so ready for baptism. We went through the church talking about doctrine and baptism most of the time then finished with a quick lesson of the restoration in front of the baptismal font. That went really well too! He had good questions about the priesthood and everything that we were able to clear up. He said himself that he is ready for baptism, but he wants to wait for his wife. She still has concerns. It's kind of a milk before meat type of deal, except she went meat before milk, so we're just trying to clear those up and get her reading the Book of Mormon. They are so awesome though and I'm really excited for them!

CV and Emily's lesson went very well. Their fellowshipper is Kari, so we gave her an assignment to teach part of the lesson which was way good. It's always good to hear other's teach in their own way and their point of view, it's good for the investigators too. Emily was on date for the 13th but we all decided to push it back. Her and CV are working on quitting smoking. That's hard stuff! So this week we will be teaching the Word of Wisdom. I'm excited to see the Atonement work with them with this, it's a big step for them. They are such great people, I love teaching them. They are so fun! They should be making some yummy turtle gumbo for us this week :D Woo!

We went on exchanges this past week with the Zone Leaders, so I got to go to Kentucky again! Whooee! It was so fun. I was with Elder Fulmer, one of the elders I came out with. So that was SO fun! We made cookies and passed them out to people, taught an awesome investigator named Brian who is so solid in his testimony of the gospel, and talked with a crazy guy on the side of the road about the haunted bar of Big Macky's. It was definitely interesting! Meanwhile in Batesville, Elder Johnson and Elder Bowen were tearin it up! They got Holly on date for baptism which is so sweet! They extended for November 3rd but she wanted to do it on December 3rd because it was a special day to her. So that was so good! She is awesome, and has a way solid testimony of the gospel after being taught by missionaries over the years.

General Conference really hit home for me. Gosh i loved it. I love having prophets and apostles. We are so blessed! Pretty much every talk i felt was for me. I love when that happens, It was a big testimony builder that's for sure! I've been reading the New testament for a couple weeks and man, I love having the Book of Mormon with it. It helps so much! The Bible is amazing, but if i only had that and not the Book of Mormon, then I think i would really be lost. The Book of Mormon clarifies everything so much! It is so perfect and with the Bible it shows us who we need to be and what we need to do. I am so grateful for it! I know that Jesus Christ lives and loves every one of us. Heavenly Father is our loving Father, and he is always watching over us and caring for us. Even if sometimes we don't realize it. Dispute not because ye see not! You receive no witness until after the trial of your faith!

I've gotta go! I love you all so much! Thank you for everything you do for me! Have a great week!

Elder Chrys Robinson

I'm a Mormon!

The Letter "P"...........

     This week is brought to you by the letter "P". I am wearing it proudly upon my shirt because I have procrastinated in writing the blog. I am now tired and have a very long Saturday a head of me. So yes I am wearing my letter "P" and I am going to let the Elder entertain you this week!! But before I go, I hope those of you who are going to listen or watch, may you enjoy your conference weekend!!!      :]


Dear Family,



First~Yeah 18 months! Sure you didn't forget ;) ha ha it's ok if you did. I tried to. I have yet to find a place i can burn some pants but i will soon!
Second~I'm sure I've spoke with Elder Alger, but i can't remember any of the Elders names any more. There's too many! The older you get the less missionaries you know.
Third~Where's Waldo thing at the Riverwoods? Whahh that sounds fun. So your taking the missionaries then ya? Sweet!
And Zac is home! He looks....the same. Ha ha. But awesome! That's so good. Thanks for sharing parts of his talk with me.
Jacob and Caleb on missions?!? I can't believe it. That is so awesome. How many missionaries are from our ward now? like a billion?


Well this past week was pretty awesome. the work is rolling forward at such a fast pace it's hard to keep up! CV and Emily are doing great! They both came to church yesterday and loved it. CV is so funny, he kept asking when he gets the "kool-aid" ha ha. Emily is still on date for October 13th but right now we are looking at maybe pushing it back a little bit, we will be having dinner with them on Tuesday and we are going to discuss it. They are so awesome though, it's so fun teaching them. They're definitely some of my most favorite people ever!

Last night was pretty cool. We were planning on going up to Brookville with a member after lunch at the bishop's but ended up not because they didn't have enough gas to get there and we didn't have enough miles to drive there and back, so we ended up calling some investigators down in Osgood to see if we could drop by. We eventually got there and when we did, the wife called their preacher and asked if we all could come over which he of course said yes. Who can resist grilling a couple of Mormon missionaries? We got there and almost instantly they brought out all they could about the Mormon church they had found on the Internet. Oh man did i start praying! The preacher's wife really tried hard to bash us as much as she could. The preacher was actually pretty cool, he was just trying to determine if we were Christian because he had heard otherwise. It was funny because all the stuff they got off the internet was actually right, and we just kinda sat there bearing testimony of everything she said and after we did she didn't have much to say on the subject. I've had some Bible bashes before, but none like this one. This one all we did was bare testimony and it literally stumped everything they tried to throw against us. It was pretty cool. Preacher John decided in the end that we were a couple of good guys who were part of a great religion, and that we were Christian. Pretty cool i thought!

Ok so, the Boyds. They are so SWEET! Holy cow they are awesome. So yeah it all started with him flippin through the channels and coming across BYUtv and loving what he watched then he ordered a Book of Mormon and he as of last week was already reading in Alma 60. WOW. He knows it is true and really wants to go to the temple. It was amazing! Such a testimony builder! The wife hasn't read it yet but is very willing to learn and discover for herself, and they are both SO nice! We gave them an extra Book of Mormon and he was like,"Hey i'm going to give this to one of my friends!" He's already a missionary!! Tonight we will be having a chapel tour with them and a member and we will be inviting them to baptism for this month. Oh man we are so stoked! And it turns out that he knows a ton of the members in this ward already so everybody else is just as excited!! We are so blessed here. I LOVE BEING A MISSIONARY.


Well the time is up and i must get going. This is the work of the Lord. I know that. I know that this is the true and living church. I know that the Book of Mormon is true and because of that I know that Joseph Smith is a Prophet of God. Heavenly Father loves us all so much, and he shows it every day. I love him and I am so grateful to be out here serving. Thank you so much for everything you do! I love you all so much! Oh, and tell the Bagley's that the Flarp is awesome!! Ha ha! Also the home maid gatoraide rocks! Thank you!

Have a great and safe week!

-Elder Chrys Robinson

Represent!