Week #94 - These Days There's Dudes Gettin' Facials

Hey Everyone!
This week was awesome! Things are looking up like crazy for us in Petaluma. We have two baptisms this coming Saturday (Brett and Brian) and we set two baptismal dates with Pierce and Coleman for June 4th. They're both really excited about it and the dad is a major support, so needless to say, we are happy campers. We've had some great lessons lately with our other investigators- most of them are really solid aside from a couple small issues that are holding them back. One of them LOVES the reading assignments we give him in the Book of Mormon. He usually asks for at least five chapters or so and always has excellent comments about them the following week. It's always nice to have someone who's that excited about the Book of Mormon- just a nice reminder of how fortunate we are to be able to study it so often.

I was told this week that it's pretty interesting how there are people in other Christian faiths just as unshakable in their beliefs as we are...meaning they believe 100% that THEY have the truth and the correct gospel as well as us. I guess I've thought about that before, but a few things came into my mind about it this time around. Again, I was reminded that "Come Thou Fount" has some of the greatest lyrics of any hymn I've ever heard. It was written by someone who lived before the church was restored but who DID understand who the Savior was. I'm blown away by how perfectly it aligns with our oft-disputed view on "grace/faith and works." If we really do have a legitimate testimony of Christ, we'll feel constrained to be debtors daily to his grace. It has nothing to do with earning a place in heaven with our good deeds (and the Book of Mormon is extremely clear in many places that all the good works we can do will merit to nothing, and that Christ is the author AND the finisher of our faith). When I'm "wandering from the fold of God" even in the smallest way, Jesus seeks me and reminds me what true happiness and joy is.

I guess what I'm getting at is this: Anyone who has a true testimony of Jesus Christ is going to feel they have the truth, because the joy and the perspective He gives you in life is too incredible to deny. I don't know how many times I've been told "Trust me, I've found Jesus, and no one can make me any happier" while talking with people. What I wish people would understand is

1) WE can't make them any happier than Jesus already has, but Jesus can.
2) If they were talking with someone living an insanely worldly lifestyle (good example: Hugh Heffner[sp?]), they would essentially receive the same answer that they gave me: "Look at my life! How could I possible be any happier?" Yet, that Christian knows good and well that the worldly person could be a whole lot happier if they would just pattern their life after Christ rather than the world.

So someone who has found Christ lives a life of happiness, but what if that person also learned that in addition to everything Christ has done for us, He now continues to guide us- not only personally, but also by revealing His wisdom and His warnings through a living prophet (just as He did all through the Bible) with Twelve of His special witnesses (apostles) to help us all remember how to truly be a Christian (if there's one painful thing I've learned on my mission, it's that some of the most pompous, rude, exclusive and un-Christ-like people I've come in contact with are those that scream they're Christians), the priesthood authority of God that seals families together for time and all eternity and enables us to perform sacred and essential ordinances for salvation has been restored, and we now have the written testimonies and experiences of more ancient prophets to learn even MORE of how we can strengthen the relationship we have with Christ? You would think that person would be thrilled, and they should be. Yes, the Bible can teach us who Christ is and how to get to know Him, but God has provided us with so much more than even that, and why- to confuse us? To make it more complex? No! To make us happier because He loves us!! There's so much confusion and contention over His words, and He has provided us with answers! It's not complex at all. The only thing that makes it complex is skepticism and preconceived notions that blind people to what it really is.

Well that about wraps up my time on email, but there are my thoughts on that statement. THE GOSPEL'S TRUE!!!

Much Love,
Elder B

Week #93 - My Mother is Better than Your Mother

Hi Everyone!

It was a pleasure chatting it up with everyone! Thanks for answering the phone- I was hoping you would. I just want to throw out one last Happy Mother's Day to the Mom, and I s'pose also to the other moms in the family (i.e the Cealo, the Vreg, [Erin?]...etc).

As for mission life, the Lord blessed Petaluma 1st ward this week. Things went really well in just about every aspect of the work. There's a less-active family of eight years who decided to start coming back to church a few weeks ago and we're teaching two of the kids. Both were pretty excited when we told them they could be baptized and they're thrilled to keep learning and taking lessons. They couldn't attend church yesterday, but we still had four of our investigators come. Brett and Brian have rescheduled their baptismal date for May 21 and they're both pretty set on it. They wanted to look at the font after church and see how it all worked. Brian's really starting to realize the importance of all of this and recognizes the changes he needs to make. Brett is a major support in helping him with any issues that he has, so it's been great. The ward has also been extremely welcoming to both of them.

We had a really good lesson with our investigator Mitch (21 years old) yesterday after church. The elders quorum lesson was about prophets in the Gospel Principles manual and he was blown away. He loved it and was REALLY excited to talk with us about it as soon as it was over. He just loved it and kept saying how important and cool it was to have a living prophet. We then taught him all about the plan of salvation which he also really loved- and at the end we committed him to baptism. He told us he knows it's all true and it makes perfect sense, but he's worried about his devout-Catholic parents being upset about it. We had a good talk about it and it basically came down to him deciding to just pray about what he should do. He told us he knows he needs to do it, he just doesn't know how to go about it. Anyway, we're praying for him- I'm sure it will work out soon. He's just working up the courage to do what he needs to even if he has a bit of a rough time with the parents for a while.

Other than that, congrats to the ol' Danny Weidman on the mission call and I'll be responding to his letter shortly, and pants. It was good hearing from everyone and the gospel's true!

Elder B(alagna)

Week #92 - Samuel Clam's Disco

Hey Everyone!


Congrats to Samuel Marshall Weidman for joining the family! I was pretty excited to get the call from Sister Bunker. The pictures were awesome! I'm pretty excited to meet him and Katie!

As for Petaluma news, I don't want to give away TOO much information since I'll be chatting it up with everyone on Sunday. But, here are some highlights:

We were thrilled to get two of our investigators to church yesterday. Brett was in a car accident about five years ago and is a paraplegic, so Brian lives with him and takes care of him. We had to go to their house a little before 7 am and get Brett ready. It was quite the process, but it was a cool experience. It was greatly appreciated by them, and they both enjoyed church a lot. It was a pretty big step for them to come, so we're excited to see how our lesson goes with them tomorrow.

In our ward there's a dad and two sons (ages 10 and 14) who started coming to church last week. They'd been inactive for over 8 years and the mom is an atheist, but she now agrees that the kids need some sort of direction. They're nice boys and enjoy church, the dad is set on getting them actively involved, so there's some major potential there. We get to start teaching them this week.

Anyway- it's been a good week. Life is splendid. The Gospel's true and I'm way excited for Mother's Day!

Elder B

Week #91 - Why Don't We Just Dance?

Hey Everyone!

Things are going well here in Petaluma. We had an excellent zone conference- the spirit was pretty intense during the testimony meeting and President Bunker's instruction at the end. He read us a letter from a missionary that went home a few months ago that I had a lot of respect for. It mentioned a lot of things that he was worried about that I worry about as well, so it was a very comforting thing to hear.

The past few months I've just been thinking a lot about my growth throughout my mission. It's a pretty hard thing to look back and wonder if I really used this time the way that I should have. Even after being out for 22 months I'm learning new things, better ways to go about the work and things I should have focused on when I was brand new. During the testimony meeting at zone conference I thought about where my desires are now, what my perspective on life is now, where my goals are, things I want to accomplish, etc. I finally started to see how far I've come. It hit me pretty hard that the Savior has changed me. I still do dumb things, I make a lot of mistakes and I'm a whole lot farther from perfect than I'd like to be, but I'm at least a much better person (I think) than I was when I left. It's kind of a depressing thing to know that soon I won't be able to devote nearly as much time to other people and help them feel the joy that comes from the gospel. It's a real thing!

Anyway, two months is a while, so I've still got time. Suffice it to say though, I felt a whole lot more comfortable with everything during conference. As far as things in the area go, we were able to have some really good lessons this week. Two brothers that we're teaching set baptismal dates for May 8th. We had a great lesson with one of our investigators. He's a great guy and loves the the Bible and the Book of Mormon. He wouldn't commit to a solid date yet, but he fully understands that he needs to if he finds this is all true (he pretty much already knows it is though). We really focused on teaching how we feel the spirit and how we recognize it- and I think it made a pretty big impact. He's one who struggles with faith in general, but he said he's really starting to develop a faith in Christ after meeting and studying with us. Alma 32 and Alma 30 were big hits with him.

Stuff's going really well in the area. We'll be teaching a friend of a member on Wednesday who apparently is really excited about the gospel and has been to church a few times already- so we're pretty thrilled. Life is good and the gospel's true!

Much Love,

Elder B

Week #90 - Happy 21st Birthday Alex!

Hey Everyone!
Thanks for all the birthday wishes and packages and other stuff! The movie list was classic and I read it to a lot of missionaries who also got a kick out of it, the cookies were delicious, the razor does a beautiful job on my face, and I went ahead and got the Droid already to make the Mother's Day phone call easier.
Things are great in Petaluma. I'm really happy to be working here- there's a ton of potential and the ward members are great. I was also really excited to hear that the work in Sonoma had some huge things happen the day after I left the area; an entire less-active part-member family that we'd been working with came to church for the first time in years yesterday after their son and daughter both set baptismal dates for May 1st last Wednesday. Brian (the son) is 15 years old and it sounds like he's taking the lead in his family to get things on the right track. He really recognizes that the gospel is the only thing that will bring things to where they need to be in the family. I'm so excited for them! This is a HUGE step for the family. Plus, our other investigators FINALLY followed through on coming to church for the first time, which is pretty amazing as well.

But...as for things in MY area, life's great here. We taught some good lessons to a few of our investigators. One of them had a baptismal date for April 24th, but the first thing he told us when we met him was that it was too soon. He's very set on working out some personal struggles that he has before he gets baptized.

Aside from that, my new companion's name is Elder M. He's a really good guy and he's also way into music, so that's a major plus. He sings really well so we've had some fun with that already. In response to the Chief's question about me getting taller, I'm currently 6'3'' and still growing, or at least it looks like that's the case from that picture. I didn't even realize how short those two were until I saw it. Hehehe.

Anyway, stuff's good here and this week we have zone conference. I'm pretty excited because I was asked to teach a workshop dealy on goal setting and making use of our weekly/daily goals. It's a subject I had mentioned to other missionaries that I wish I would have learned better sooner, and apparently rumor spread...so now I have to teach it to everyone. This is a pretty common topic that I feel no one ever really takes much from (including myself) when it's taught, so I've come up with some awesome things to tie it into. If everything works out as planned, this will be legendary. I'll let you know how it goes.

Stuff's good, I'm 21, and thanks again for everything! The Gospel's True!
Elder B

Committed to Preaching the Gospel to All Who Will Listen

Week #89 - I'm Still a Guy

Hi Everyone!

Well I can't say I wasn't shocked at the transfer news, but I'm pretty excited! I love training- and I suppose it would have been easy to get too comfortable had I ended my mission here in Sonoma. Anyway, I'm looking forward to the change!

Here's the new address once again:
Elder Alexander William Balagna
1124 Baywood Drive #119
Petaluma, CA 94954

Things went pretty well this week. We had a good lessons with Lauren all about Joseph Smith and then she committed to go on the Stake Temple trip. Unfortunately, she's still very set on June 26th for her baptism, but I guess she'll do it either way- so we can't be too disappointed.

We picked up a new investigator last week named Morgan. We had quite the discussion with him- it started off pretty heated on his part and he was convinced we were false prophets and deceivers- he's also read his fair share of anti. We started talking and ended up sitting down with him for quite a while- and it got better and better. He agreed to start meeting with us and by the end we were laughing and hand-shaking, so I think there's some potential there. The more he comes to realize the logic in this church and begins reading out of the Book of Mormon, I think he's going to be blown away. At the very least, he's a truth seeker, so although he may think we're false prophets and deceivers now, I think his harsh opinions will change soon.

I don't have too much more time to update, but I hope everyone enjoys my birthday week! Happy birthday to me!

The Gospel's True!

Elder B