Plano!

So I got to Plano and I love it!

We have been crazy busy this past week and I have an awesome companion! Elder Reid is super solid and way on top of things! I'm back in the city! It's weird. Everything is so big! Especially the houses! I think I serve in one of he most wealthy areas in the Mission! For example, we were tracting in a crazy nice neighborhood with really big houses and we were talking and what not as we walk up to this house. I look up to see if they have a no trespassing sign and I see an Austin Martin sitting in the drive way. The fist thought was I have only seen that car in video games and movies and the second was hey James Bond dives that car. Well, the house had a sign for no trespassers so we didn't knock on their door but it's just crazy how wealthy people are in Plano. But we have been teaching a lot. Every single day. We taught four lessons with members present to our investigators and have found new investigators as well.

 

We are teaching a man named E. and he is a really nice guy the sisters met and referred to us. Then there is F. and V. who are both Hindu who we are teaching. I love them they are great. They gave us cookies after our lesson and it was a great lesson. Also we are teaching a man who is Jewish and a lot of other people who I haven't met yet.

My fist day here I dropped off my bags and went right back out the door to go to work. We tracted for a while and then we taught a lesson with a member from my first area! He was in the YSA and we are teaching an investigator that we found in our area and we are going to get him into the YSA but we get to teach him still. It's awesome. His name is B. (our investigator) and he is starting to believe a little more for himself. 

 

So this past week a new video came out on Mormon.org called "Because of Him"! It is awesome! We have watched it a million times and every time it gives me the chills. We have shared it with members and investigators and people we have met on the street. We showed E. and he then posted it on Facebook to his 500 friends saying "This is what the Mormons believe." It was awesome! We told F. and V. about it and they said oh ya I already saw it. It came up as an add but it's good. It made me happy! It's gotten about 3 million views - something like that.

 

So Elder Reid is awesome! He is such a good teacher. I'm learning a lot from him and I feel like my teaching is starting to improve a lot as well. We teach asking more questions and answering more as well. So pretty much I love Plano and I love the ward even though I just barely started meeting people and  I love that we have a workout room at our apartment! It is so nice to have something to use to work out! 

 

I had an amazing Easter! I even got an Easter package from home on Saturday night and that was a huge surprise to me! Thanks!

 

So the work is good and I'm excited to keep on doing it. Miracles are about to take place in the City of Dallas!

 

I love y'all and want to share one last thing with you. My testimony of Jesus Christ. This Easter we commemorated His resurrection. What a wonderful time of year. I know that He lived, and died and rose again the third day. He did for us what we could not do for ourselves. He provided us with an infinite and eternal atonement. He knows and feels all that we do and have and ever will feel. He gave us the blessing of being able to overcome Death and Sin. All will live again and we all can become like Him. He invites us to have faith in Him and to repent, to live His gospel by enduring in the covenants we make at baptism to the very end. Repentance is the process of becoming and what we experience as we turn to him and change our lives so that they are in harmony with His teachings.  We can Become like Him. Even Perfect in the life after this. I love Him.

Love your missionary,

Elder Drew Bowen

Leaving the Home of Marshall

April 14, 2014

This past Saturday night I got a phone call from President Durrant. He asked me if I would serve as a zone leader for him. I told him I would. Later that night I got a call from his assistants giving me more details. I leave for my new area today at 2:30 pm. I have been called to serve in the Plano 9th ward in Dallas. I don't know my new address so I will get it to y'all as soon as I get it. 

There was a huge miracle that happened this past week. We got a call from our bishop's counselor asking us to fill in for a speaking assignment this Sunday because he had an unexpected opening. We of course said yes and at the time we didn't know I was getting transferred so we said well who ever gets transferred will give the talk. I spoke yesterday and it was an amazing experience for me. I was the last speaker and right before I got up to speak Bro. Y. (our bishop's counselor who called us for the talk) got up and asked me if it would be ok if he could let everyone know that I was leaving. I said of course and he then told the ward that I had been in their ward for a while and that I was getting transferred. He also told the ward how much he had appreciated my service in the ward and how they were all going to miss me. I wanted to cry as he was talking. G. C. was sitting next to me and he is my best friend in the young men's and he looked shocked and sad to hear that I was going to be leaving. I then got up and spoke on the most important thing ever. The Atonement of Jesus Christ. I got to bear my testimony to the ward family that I have become a part of and share with them the things that I felt moved to say. What a blessing it was! I realized that I said y'all more times over the pulpit than I ever have in a talk! It was just natural and that's how they talk here anyways. 

I felt like it was my farewell all over again.  Saying goodbye to the people I love. Investigators, members and my companion. I'm going to miss Marshall! I already do even though I'm emailing at the Marshall library computer right now. I'm going to always remember the people here and love them forever! My investigators are in good hands with Elder Kidd and the friends they have in the ward. C. is going to get baptized in a couple of weeks and I'm excited to hear about it and get pictures. We said good bye to B. this morning and he told me to be safe and stay in touch and that he loved me. I will always remember Marshall! 

To my little brothers Christopher and Jared and anyone else who is getting ready to serve a mission. When you serve a mission one day in the future act in faith and work hard! Put your Trust in the Lord and do everything you possibly can to bring about His work. Love the areas you serve in and Love the People you serve. Love from the bottom of your heart and people will see the love of Christ in your eyes! Love an area and it will love you! Try to leave every area better than you found it! When you leave make it feel like you are leaving home all over again because home is where you heart lies. Give them your heart! 

I love y'all so much and I miss y'all! But this work is the work of the Lord and it is the most amazing thing I have ever done in my life. Is it hard? Yes. Absolutely. But we do hard things and it is in the difficulty that we bring forth the most good. It is in the difficulty of seeking for truth that one gains a testimony. It is in the difficulty of living the gospel that one becomes converted and it was in the difficulty that Jesus Christ went through for us that we can Become! 

I love y'all!

 

Love your missionary,

Elder Drew Bowen   

Oh How Joyful Referrals Are!

April 7, 2014

It's incredible to think that another week has passed by! Last week feels like it was forever ago and yet just like it was yesterday! I can't believe that General Conference has already come and passed. I barely had time to get excited about it before it was already over! But I loved conference! As always. It's hard not to when you get to hear from the Lord's prophet and His apostles! So many people don't realize just how nice the structure of Christ's Church is. No other church claims to be organized under priesthood authority with a prophet and Apostles. Only one. The true and living church of Jesus Christ. The world today has a weird look on the Savior's church. So many people think that well it doesn't matter what church you go to as long as it serves God (or claims to at least) and that you like it. Many don't think there is only one true church but that all churches are in some way combined simply because they serve God. All Christian churches are combined in one way. They all profess Jesus Christ to be the Savior of the world. But Christ only established one church and it had structure to it. That structure and authority is only found in The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints. This is His church restored through Him appearing to Joseph Smith and sending His servants with Priesthood Keys to bring the fullness of His Gospel once again to the earth.

Did any of y'all notice that you sustained my mission president in his soon to be new calling as a counselor in the General Sunday School presidency? He gets to serve with Elder Tad R. Callister in a few months! It's just another evidence that I have one of the best mission presidents ever!

We watched part of General Conference with a part member family. It was great! The entire family watched almost all of conference for Saturday. It was great. I love the spirit that comes from conference and how each talk is meant for us. It was amazing to see this year as in years past. It applied to the T. family who we watched the Saturday sessions with as well. You always learn something new when you listen and are sincere. We even took the T.'s son to the priesthood session with us. That brought back good memories of going with Daddy and Christopher and Jared. Those were always great memories. 

This past week Elder Kidd and I went on an exchange with the Henderson Elders Hendry and Smith. I worked with Elder Smith in Marshall and it was a great experience. We worked in a neighborhood and met a very kind lady who was in her 80's and visited with her. She was more open to our message than I thought she would be. We also met a man who had lived in Utah who asked for a copy of the Book of Mormon so he could read it. He was a very nice man even though he reminded me of how long I have been out on my mission. When he heard I had been out for 15 months he said, "Oh wow you'll be home in no time!" He was really nice though and visited with us for a little while.

At the end of this week I learned a really important lesson. We had an appointment fall through on Friday and so we knocked in the trailer park we were at. We met a very nice lady who said she was attending a church here in town and that she wasn't interested in our message at this time. Elder Kidd asked if we could leave her with a card in case she changed her mind and she said ok but I wont really use it. Well Sunday afternoon we got a referral for a lady named Karen who lived in the same trailer park. You can imagine how surprised we were that her address was that of the lady who said she was not interested. What a miracle! The spirit has such an influencing power upon the Lord's children! 

 

Just this morning we received another referral from church headquarters for some one on a street that I knocked with Elder Johnson months ago. Elder Johnson and I got in a good habit of leaving a pass along card on the door if no one answered and it sure did pay off. Someone looked at the card and then used it. The Lord uses our efforts and then turns them into something. This is the fifth referral that I have received in Marshall that came directly from leaving a card on a door or giving it to someone after talking to them. The Lord helps us in His work every single day in small and simple ways. We just have to be patient to see how He will use our efforts to bring about His purposes! That's why we are only tools in His hands but what a blessing it is to be able to take part in His work in whatever way He sees fit. 

Doing our part brings a fullness of joy even in the hard times and makes every seeming failure worth every effort. We don't have to do everything we just have to do what the Lord would have us do in moving His work forward. We just have to do our best at our part in His work and He makes up the rest! 

I love y'all so much! Always remember that! I think of y'all often and how much I love y'all! I'm excited to be able to talk to y'all again on mother's day and to see y'alls faces once again. I hope that y'all apply the things that you learned in conference and that you do what you felt was specifically directed to you! I love y'all tons!

 

Love your missionary,

Elder Drew Bowen

 

First Baptist Church in Marshall

Elder Bowen with B.

Elder Bowen and Elder Kidd being funny in their hats.

The lake they had to drive through to get to an appointment!