Transfers!

Hey everybody!

So Elder Fox is getting transferred on Tuesday, so I'll be getting a new companion. It's always a little stressful for me getting a new comp, but it's always worked out, so I'm sure this time will be no different. My district leader and one of the Sisters is also getting shipped out. Should be interesting!

I got pretty sick this week. Starting Friday morning at about 1:30, I spent most of the night throwing up and dealing with the runs. I don't know what caused me to be sick. I did go to town having root beer floats the day before, so that might have had something to do with it. IDK. We didn't really leave the apartment at all Friday. It stank. But the winds were gusting at like 60 miles an hour, and on a bike that would be pretty rough, so I guess I picked the best time possible to be sick :)

There was a really good talk given in Sacrament meeting on Sunday that I'm pretty sure was prepared just for me. It was about how the Lord works with your imperfections and stuff (At least that is what I got out of it).

We had a really funny experience with trying to give someone a blessing at the hospital this week. So the Sisters asked us to go to the hospital in our area to give a member a blessing that I guess lives in their area. They gave us the name of the lady and the room number. So we get there and to go to the room that the Sisters gave us (623) and there was an older lady there that was pretty hard of hearing. So we ask her if she is the person that we came to see and she says yes. Then she asks us if we are from California which Elder Fox is. We just figured that the Sisters told her that one of the Elders was from there. We then get ready to give her the blessing and ask her what her full name is. She said a totally different name that the one she said she had. We were like, what? So we gave her the blessing with the name that she gave us, and afterward, she said that she felt a lot better, and it made her so happy to see people like us giving our lives to serving the Lord. We leave, and ask the Sisters again what room we were supposed to go to. They then told us 263... For real?! So we gave a blessing to some random old lady that had stage 2 lung cancer. We went back yesterday to see if she was still there, but she wasn't :/ But hey, we tried.

But yeah, I love being a missionary! :)

Anyways, time to go.


February 25, 2014

So I have my new companion! His name is Elder Gunter. He has been out one transfer less than me, played football for Dixie State, and is from Brigham City, so he is really close to where I'm from! I finally got a Utah companion (Elder Reed doesn't count. I wasn't with him for even a full transfer)! He seems like a really cool guy, and I think we'll be able to do some really good work together! I'm pretty excited :) Also, Elder Redd (The one from Arizona) is my new district leader, so that's pretty sweet!

I saw a supercharged F-150 on the way back from transfers, so that was pretty cool ;)

 

Still More Snow

Hey everybody!

This week was pretty good. Some days were better than others, but that is how it goes. One thing that was really awesome was the we got back into contact with Sylvia! She kind of fell of the face of the earth for a couple of weeks, and we thought we got antied or something and that she was trying to avoid us. We went over there the other day with the Branch Mission Leader, and it turned out that there were two deaths in her family, so she has been in Louisiana for most of that time, and she left her phone in Michigan, so that is why she never answered our calls and texts. She is still excited to meet with us and stuff, so I am really grateful for that.

Yesterday, our district had p-day with a district next door, where we had some legit basketball tournaments and stuff (Belle Isle vs Palmer Park in case you were wondering). I figured out that there is a perk of having to bike everywhere. It keeps you in shape! I was able to run and not be weary, and walk and not faint! It was great! Plus we stomped on the other district, so that made it even better ;) I also found out that I have pretty hard knees. So far I have given two different Elders really bad dead legs with my knee while playing basketball. Like bad enough where they can't hardly walk or bike for two days.  I don't mean to do it, I just get a little excited when I play defense...

We get transfer calls on Saturday, so I'll let you know what happens there next week.

Thanks for reading!

Note from Gabbi: Here is a picture from Elder Roderer's farewell, just over a year ago.

More snow and ice! Yay! (Plus some exciting news!)

Hey everybody!

This week went really well. It snowed quite a bit a couple of days, and the back roads are for all intents and purposes, sheets of ice, so biking has been pretty exciting... and a little frustrating. :) I wish I had my GoPro with me so I could record what we bike through, and so you could see what a different kind of place Detroit it :) We'll see...

We had a Specialized Training this week. It was really interesting and different, because it was just President and Sister Gerber and our district. We weren't assigned to study anything in preparation for the meeting, and the reason for that was President didn't have a set instruction that he was giving. He just went around to all of the districts in the mission and asked us what we needed help with, and taught by that. It was legit, and President Gerber is stinking brilliant.

We found a really promising investigator this week! We were walking to a recent convert's house because of a snow storm, so there was a bunch of snow and ice on the roads. But while we were walking, we saw a lady shoveling her porch, so we asked if we could help. She gratefully said yes, and because she only had one shovel, one of us shoveled the snow while the other would talk to her. She expressed a sincere interest in the Book of Mormon, and we are excited to start teaching her!

So for the exciting news..... Justin (an awesome investigator of mine back in Warren) in getting baptized this week!!! WOO!!! I am super stoked about it, but unfortunately, I won't be able to go to his baptism. President Gerber said that we can only go to a baptism of one of our former investigator if it has only been a transfer since we have been in that area.. So that stinks. It's okay though. I'm just happy that he is getting baptized!

Thanks for reading :)

~Elder Roderer

Here's a picture of how much snow is over here. When you're on a bike, it's a lot. (This is just some random dude's house by the way. We are sitting on the porch of a less-active member)

Snowy Detroit/1 Year Down

Hey everybody!

 

Something pretty cool that happened this week is that I was in Michigan to witness the snowiest January that Detroit has ever had. I think it was even the snowiest month period that Michigan has ever had. 39.1 inches of snow during the month of January, and I was on my bike for that whole time. Awe yeah :)

 

I went on my one year temple trip this Thursday! It was pretty legit. Almost the entire transfer that came out with me was there, and we got to hang out at the mission home after to eat lunch and be taught by President Gerber. The topic was The challenge to become. It was pretty great :)

 

So a cool experience that happened this week. Elder Fox and I had a little time to burn one day before dinner, so we decided to tract an apartment complex that is near by our apartment. Nobody wanted to talk to us, and it seemed pretty fruitless, but yesterday we got a referral from a card that we left on one of the doors that we knocked on, asking for a Book of Mormon and a Finding Faith in Christ DVD! You never know what you efforts will yield, even if at first it seems like nothing.

 

Today, the Branch President took us to Costco to do our shopping. It was really nice of him. I spent almost half of my monthly allowance there, so I hope the food I bought lasts a while :) It was super weird though, because I had a little bit of culture shock going back inside a Costco. The whole idea of buying bulk just blew me away after being here for a year. It was a little like being back home for an hour. We even saw a member of the Branch there, just like what would happen in Utah!

 

A former investigator named Al called us a little while ago, wanting to meet with the missionaries again, and we were able to have our first real lesson with him on Sunday. It was an awesome lesson! I felt the presence of the Spirit really strongly (maybe it helped that I was fasting), and he accepted a date for baptism as well! It was pretty awesome! I've found out that doing missionary work just makes you happy. That's all there is to it.

January 27, 2014

Hey everybody!

 

So in just three days, I will have been on my mission for one entire year! It's pretty crazy to think that I am half way through my mission. Pretty mixed feelings about the whole thing. On Thursday, I get to go on my one year temple trip, so I am pretty stoked about that.

 

This week was a bit of a struggle. Feelings of un-motivation were pretty prevalent. It being colder than cold, and it snowing a bunch didn't help much with that either. Also we tried hard to get one of our more progressing investigators into the home of a member to be taught, but every time we had something set up, the day of, or even while we were on our way to her house, she would cancel. It was pretty stinking annoying. 

But on the bright side, we did have 10 less-actives come to church on Sunday, so that was pretty awesome! We also had like three dinners with members this week! In this area, that's pretty awesome! :)

 

So yeah, I'll have a better report to give next week.

 

Thanks for reading :)

 

Elder Roderer

 

Here is some pretty legit 5 story tall street art. :)