September 19, 2011

Hello! It's been another most excellent week here in Dinkytown. The
weather is really starting to cool down now. Elder Checketts and I
both had to whip out our sweaters for the first time of the season.
The chilly air feels super nice though. It's so much better than 95
degrees!

We have had some great success this week in teaching. We ended the
week with 19 lessons when last week we only had 9. It was fantastic.
There are several people that we found as new investigators that have
good potential too. It's really been a miracle. One guy I talked to
on campus last week and he actually came to the appointment we set up
and we taught him the Restoration! We have another lesson with him
this week. There is another guy that was investigating last semester
but went home for the summer and is back now so we got in contact with
him and are teaching him too. Another sweet miracle is there is a
girl who came into the institute last week asking if she could by a
parking pass from us. She didn't even know that the Institute was a
Mormon building but the people told her she has to take an institute
class in order to be able to park here. So she got talking to them
about the church a little and was kinda interested. She came back a
few days later with a friend and they asked if they could take a Book
of Mormon class! Crazy. Luckily, Elder Checketts and I happened to
be in the institute when they came so we gave them a quick intro to
the BoM and sent them into the class. We have another appointment to
teach them this next week more about it. It was crazy and they were
super cool! It would be a hilarious conversion story if they ended up
getting baptized. Or maybe their just pretending to be interested so
that they can have a place to park. We'll see! Ha ha.

Most importantly, we met with ______ twice this last week. He is
doing great. When we first met with him on Tuesday we challenged him
to be baptized on October 8th. He made a funny comment saying, "That
scares me, because it feels right." Ha ha. He is a super awesome kid
and I think that deep down he knows the church is true but just hasn't
recognized it yet. I've seen several very apparent answers in his
life that this is the truth. He just needs time to figure it out. He
is taking everything at his own pace but eventually he's going to
realize what he needs to do. He came to church, he reads, and he
prays so the answer is a guarantee to be there. We also brought him
to the President's fireside yesterday. I've told you what that is
right? Anyway, it was really good for him to hear the testimony of
recent converts and the spirit was strong. It's just been a great
week and we are becoming great friends with him. It helps that he is
only a year younger than us. Ha ha.

Speaking of the president's fireside, guess who spoke at it?
Charles! It was super great! He shared his testimony of this church
and his story to find it and it was just fantastic. I know it's only
been like 2 weeks since I've seen him but it felt like it was forever
and it was so great to see him again! I can't believe how time
flies. It's crazy!

For some reason, President Clements is very concerned about us here in
Dinkytown. Apparently, missionaries in the past have gotten casual
easily and don't keep the highest standard of obedience here. I can
see how they do that too. With everyone your age it's easy to lose
your purpose. But I am determined to not be any problem! It's really
fun here but it's also super hard work.

I loved hearing about the wonderful miracles you guys have been
receiving financially. I can't believe the Yard Sale was that
successful for you! Woo! That is so exciting. It's too bad
everything in this world costs money. I'm excited when Christ comes
and rules over the Earth and everything is fair and we wont need any
money or anything like that. That will be the day.

Also, congrats to Michael for getting past the challenge round! That
is flipping sweet!!!!! Who is your partner in that scene? And I'm
sorry you didn't get it jonny boy but it's okay. You got to be the
star for the whole semester last year. All the girls were drooling
over Mr. Darcy. You might be grateful later because having your own
Shakespeare scene is stressful! Good luck mike!

There are some really cool opportunities here on campus. We are going
to email all the religion professors and see if they would let us do a
presentation in their class. Also with conference coming up we have
flyers for it and we are just going to advertise like crazy! We are
also planning a mormon movie night for next month where we will watch
the Joseph Smith movie. Young students are just curious and so it is
pretty easy to do activities like this and get people to come. I'm
excited to see how things turn out.

We had an exchange this week with the Elders in the Cedar Lake ward.
We have exchanges all the time but I wanted to mention this one
because I was with an Elder who is just a beast. And by beast I mean
he is muscular up the ying yang. He excersices like crazy and so we
got up at 6:00 and went running and then did some arm work outs and ab
work outs. He was basically my personal trainer for the morning and I
thought it was fun but Holy smokes he worked me so hard. And the next
couple days I was so sore! It was horrible. Ha ha.

Well, I am looking forward to this upcoming week. We're getting
prep'd for general conference and hoping to see some good progress in
our investigators while still finding new ones. We're seeing good
stuff happen and I'm way excited but the work doesn't stop here!
We're still just truckin along.

Thanks for all of the support and prayers. I got a letter from
Grandma and Grandpa this week and i loved it. It was so awesome.
Thanks for being the best family ever! And I am so glad to hear that
grandma's cancer is gone and she's doing well. Way to be a fighter!

Have a wonderful week.

Love,

Elder Ruesch

September 12, 2011

Hey family! I've been super pumped to write home this week because so
many things have changed! I am safely in the land of Dinkytown. It
is super great. We got here on Wednesday and have been going at full
speed ever since. Elder Checketts is way awesome. He is way excited
about the work. He's been on his mission for 3 months now and this is
also his second area. It's pretty sweet. This is a good area for him
because he's super personable and friendly to the students and so they
are willing to listen to him. I don't know if I told you this last
week but we also got sent into this area with a pair of sisters who we
work closely with. It's kinda fun because the area isn't split in
half or anything we just sorta play "finders keepers" when it comes to
investigators. Any investigator you find, you get to teach. And it
is sweet to have two sets of missionaries that work on the U of M
campus. There are 70,000 students that go to the U of M and so there
are a lot of people to talk to!

When we came to the area, we met up with the sisters and went through
the people that were in the previous Elder's teaching pool and just
split them up. So we are going to teach half of the less actives and
recent converts as well as investigators. The Elders had three
investigators before and we got two of them :) One of them is so solid.

This ward is killer diller awesome. And the U of M campus is so
sweet. It sits right on the Mississippi River. Half of campus is on
one side and half is on the other. So pretty. I love it. Plus, the
members of the ward are really willing to help out in the missionary
work. They give us rides anytime we need it and will come teach with
us anytime too.

There are most excellent advantages to serving in a in singles ward.
For example, we totally get to go to Family Home Evening tonight with
the ward! And yesterday there was a CES Fireside and we went to it
with a few of the less active people we are visiting. It's super
fun! Plus all the students have nonmember roomates and so there is
potential for some sweet biscuit referrals. Awesome! Also, mom you
made the comment that we wont get fed very much in the singles ward
but you'd actually be surprised! We have a dinner every night this
week. The students either cook for us or just take us out to eat. It
is super fun. Gosh I love this area. It's so rad! Sister
missionaries get pampered and we get to benefit from it. It's
awesome. All sister missionaries get a car to use, no matter what
area they are in. So typically, Dinkytown is just biking and walking
but the sisters brought the car with them and so we get to share it
with them. However, we mostly bike anyway. It feels so good to
finally be on my bike a lot!

Since we are working with young people. They are typically WAY more
open to learning about the church and what not because they aren't set
in their ways yet. I love it. So we have a lot of really good
conversations with people while walking around with them. Man, it's
crazy though because it's a whole new kind of ballgame. In Plymouth
the afternoons were dead because everyone was at work and so tracting
was horrible in the afternoon. Well, now campus is crazy busy in the
afternoon and so that is the optimum time to talk to people on campus
and then the evenings can be sketchy, especially weekends. All the
frat party's going on and people drunk on friday night. It's funny
but you gotta be careful. Crazy college kids.

Another cool advantage to serving here is we get to use the computer
that is in the institute building to email. In fact, the dinkytown
missionaries have their own gmail account that they can use to email
students and set up times to meet with them that way and stuff. It's
so sweet. No other area has the advantage of email.

So as you can see, life in Dinkytown in flipping sweet. Since we
whitewashed in it's been crazy trying to meet people and having no
idea what is going on but we figured stuff out pretty quick and are
doing the best that we can. It's a super fun place and I can just
feel a few baptisms around the corner. I'm also looking forward to
Conference coming up here pretty quick. That is going to be most
excellent! I was sad to leave Plymouth but change is good and I am
really loving the work here in Dinkytown. There is so much we need to
do!

I am SOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO pumped to here about my little peanut
NIECE!!!!! WORD!!! I can't wait to be her favorite uncle. It's
going to be a party!

Well, I love you guys and hope you have a wonderful week!

Love,

Elder Ruesch

P.S. Sorry about how random and totally ADD this email is. I keep
getting distracted by people coming to talk to us. Enjoy!

September 5, 2011

Sup Family?

And so the craziness begins. We had our transfer calls this morning.
Sadly, I'm no longer going to be serving in the promised land of
Plymouth. I have recieved a new assignment to serve in the Dinkytown
ward. AHHHH! I'm pretty nervous but super excited. I don't know if
you remember but the first day I got to Minnesota, they took all the
new missionaries to Dinkytown and let us loose to go talk to people
even though we had no idea of what to say. It was a mortifying
experience. Ha ha. And now I'm going back there permanently!
Dinkytown is an area of the University of Minnesota campus. There is
a lot of hussle and bussle of young students going to class. The ward
that I will be serving in is a singles ward, which will be a definite
adventure. All of the people that I will be working with are going to
be right around my age. It's wiggy wack. Basically, I'm going to an
area completely opposite of Plymouth. We are going to do a lot of
talking to people on the street, instead of tracting.

Anyhoo, my next companions name is Elder Checketts. We will be
whitewashing the area (if you remember the terms it means we're both
going in there brand new) and so that adds a new twist. School is
starting on Tuesday here and so the area is pretty busy when school
gets rolling. There will also be a team of sisters that will be
working in Dinkytown with us. And my guess is that it is going to be
a bike area! Woo woo! I love the bike. So there you have it! After
5 transfers in the land of Plymouth, I'm finally being scooted away.
I'm really bummed that we didn't see a baptism this transfer when I
thought for sure we were supposed to. I just really hope we didn't
miss something or do something wrong. But I am very excited for
Plymouth because Elder Gottfredson is staying here and the missionary
that will replace me is a super solid missionary. His name is Elder
Caldwell and they are going to dominate. I know that they are going
to see some great stuff happen.

Fall has officially begun. The weather has been constantly AMAZING.
It's generally around 70-75 degrees with a nice breeze. Except last
wednesday was the weirdest day. It randomly shot to 90 degrees and
really humid. But then the next day was awesome again. Mother nature
in Minnesota has a little bit of a bipolar problem. I think fall has
to be the best season of Minnesota though. It's glorious. I need to
enjoy it now because pretty soon it will be a little colder than just
kinda chilly!

As for this week, we had some good and we had some bad. Last Sunday
we picked up two new investigators (I think I told you) and they are
super great. We met with them again on Thursday and had an
interesting but good lesson.

Something that has been really awesome about this last transfer is
that I have gotten to develop a really great friendship with ______
who got baptized last June. She is just on fire. I love it. What a
blessing to watch these people grow in the gospel!

With Labor day we had a hard time getting appointments with less
active people and ended up spending almost the whole weekend
tracting. But it was okay. I have a lot of fun when we tract. We
make it a party.

Well, it is time to embark on a new adventure. I am really nervous!
But PUMPED too. We'll see how it goes. Thanks for all of the support
and love!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY BRIAN!!! I hope that it's a happy one. You scored big
on those awesome presents. Nice! Thanks for being born.
Have a wonderful Labor day and I look forward to emailing next week
after I have spent a couple days in the new area. Word!

Love you so much!

Elder Ruesch

P.S. It's only natural that the best teller at the story telling
festival was from Minnesota. Minnesota is just a superior place! :)

August 29 2011

It's been another week already! This is ridiculous.

We had a pretty good week. It surely was an adventure. President
Clements actually came to our distric meeting. That was fun. We have
a small district - only us and one other team. So we only have 4
missionaries in our district meetings each week. It was really cool
to have president Clements come to ours. I don't know why he chose to
do it because he is so busy. But it was really fun! He is such an
awesome person. He has a lot of weight on his shoulders right now but
he is so inspired and is really moving this mission to do great
things. The other fun part about that day was after the meeting,
President wanted to come to an appointment with each of our
companionships. So he went with the other Elders first and was then
going to come to an appointment with us to a less active family. But
it turned out that he got stuck in rush hour traffic and was too far
away to come back. Ha ha. It was kinda funny. But it worked out well
because our appointment ended up falling through and he would have had
to just tract with us anyway.

As for investigators, we really don't have much. We are working on
it! Yesterday was awesome though. We were knocking doors in an
apartment complex and this young, awesome couple let us in. The
husband is very interested in Theology and he has read tons of stuff
about our church. Normally, that would be a pretty bad thing but he
was cool because he try's to find literature that is not bias for or
against the church. He just wants the facts. And so he isn't really
into all the Anti Mormon literature, although I'm sure he's read
some. But they were so nice to us and we talked about the restoration
and how we can know through the Holy Ghost. It was great and we're
going back this week. We have high hopes for them!

One major part of missionary work for us is working with the less
active members. Recently we've started visiting with an older guy who
is a member and we're trying to help him come back to church. We also
found another fella who was baptized at 8 and pretty much never went
back to church. And now we're starting to work with him. So we get
to see some cool things happen. And when you see someone come back to
church after years and years, it's just amazing. It may not show up
on any baptisimal count or anything but it sure counts as something
very special to me.

I don't know if I've ever mentioned this in the past but a long time
ago when I was finishing up with Elder Farnsworth, we picked a name of
a person on the ward list that we didn't know and decided to stop by
her house. Well it turns out this girl had moved here pretty recently
and had not been active for quite some time. She had been diagnosed
with Lymes disease the year previous and that provided a huge stuggle
for her. Anyway, we started visiting her weekly and she started
coming back to church and just a couple weeks ago she went to the
temple and did her first endowment session in quite some time. It was
so neat. It's just another cool success I have gotten to see since
I've been here. The church is true!

This week we moved homes for the LAST time. All of our past homes
were very temporary but this one is finally the permanent residence
for the missionaries in the Plymouth ward. At least for a couple
years. Thank goodness. In fact, when I first got here we lived in a
home for 2 weeks until the ward could find a better place for us to
go. And now we are back in that same house. I love it. It is funny
to live there because transfers are in a week and a half. If I am
transfered I will have spent me first two weeks in Plymouth at this
house and my last two weeks in Plymouth at this house. I love it.
The best part is living here is giving me flashbacks to the first few
days of my mission. Wow. I love it. Can you believe that I left 7
months ago? Freaky.

Things are moving forward and the weather is so flipping awesome. It
has been very mild for the past month, except for a few rain storms.
But it's fantastic. Can't think of a better place to spend my summer!

Well, when I email you next week I'll know if I'm being transfered and
where I am going. What happened to this transfer? It went so fast!
I thought for sure we were going to see a baptism this transfer but I
guess the Lord had something else in store. I just pray that I did
what I was supposed to do here. But we still got another week to go!
Another week of miracles! Word.

I love you guys and love hearing from you! Have a wonderful week!

Love,

Elder Ruesch

August 22, 2011

Hello family! I guess I wont have too much to update since it was
only wednesday when I emailed last. But things have been good. Last
week had quite the struggle with appointments. Once again, it was one
of those weeks where everything just kept on not working out and
appointments fell through over and over again. Oh well. Life goes
on. I would say that that is probably the most frustrating part of
missioary work in minnesota, appointments falling through. That and
when people turn away from the gospel even when it's staring them
right in the face and they can see it. Those are the two hardest
things. But hey, they are the ones missing out, right?

To be honest, I don't know the specific reason why President kept me
in Plymouth. We still don't have a baptism coming up soon and we
haven't seen any crazy miracles. I do believe _____________ will be
baptized but her date isn't for another month. I'm hoping we didn't
do something wrong. But we are working hard and I'm just going to
trust the Lord that he knows why I'm still here. However, I have seen
___________ progress a lot in the last few weeks. It's been a slow
process but things are moving along. I first met her in March and it
has been all this time that I've been working with her. So maybe the
reason I am still here is to help her. I don't know. She's getting
really close to being ready for baptism.

We've been helping ___________ move this week too and it has been
quite the adventure. She is going from a 4 bedroom home to a 1
bedroom apartment. It was funny because she tried to pay us 100
dollars for helping her. She insisted on giving it too us so we took
it just to not offend her but there was no way I was accepting 100
bucks. So we snuck it back into her purse when she wasn't looking.
It was awesome.

That's pretty much it for the week. We're going to keep on seeing
some good stuff happen! I wish I didn't have to learn patience though
because it takes SO LONG for people to progress. Ug. Why doesn't
everyone just get baptized? Goodness.
Anyway, I love you guys! Hope that the start of school goes well and
everything else too. The weather here is freaking awesome. It
couldn't be better. Is it good over there? I still miss the mountains.

Have a great week!
Love,
Elder Ruesch

August 15, 2011

Hello! This is so strange writting my email on a wednesday. At least I do get to email sometime this week. We went to the temple this morning as a zone. It was awesome. I loved it. It is very very refreshing to have the chance to go to the temple. The spirit is always so strong that it is cleansing.

About two weeks ago we were driving home and I thought to myself when we got to a certain area, "Hey, we've never tracted this before." So we went tracting there last week on two seperate days. We were knocking doors in the afternoon and there was a girl sitting on her porch reading her bible. She was probably in her early 20's. We started talking to her and she told us about how she just recently started to go to church again. We had a great chat with her and taught her the restoration. It was the right place at the right time and she told us she would love to come to our church. It was disappointing when she didn't come on sunday but we're trying to get back in contact with her. I fear that her family gave her anti-mormon stuff and pushed her away from the church. It's not cool. However, the seed is at least planted. I know that we were sent to that street for a reason.

Recently we've also gotten several referrals from mormon.org. It's awesome! Unfortunately, they usually are fake and people will refer their friends as a joke. But we went to contact a referral that we got for a guy in an apartment complex. He wasn't actually interested in learning like usual but we decided to knock doors in the complex. We ended up finding a person who said we could come back. pretty great. But that's not the good part. There is a member that lives in the same building and so we thought we'd stop by real quick and say hi while we were there. We knocked two different doors that we thought were the members apartment and neither of them were the right room but we talked to the people that answered anyway and both of them said we could come back. Ha ha. It was awesome. That doesnt usually happen. Way cool!

Zone conference was on monday and that was super great. My first one with president clements. It was very good. I really like zone conference. But you know what's scary? President wants to go out teaching with all the missionaries he possibly can and so he is going to come to an appointment with us next week and I'm really nervous! Ug. Oh well. His spirit will surely convert anyone. I'm sure it will be a great experience.

The weather has been AMAZING recently. The temperature has really been cooling down and it feels like fall time already. I love it. It feels a lot better. We did have a crazy storm yesterday though. That was cool. And today is beautiful again. It's great!

It sounds like the train ride home was ridiculous. That's pretty funnny. I'm glad to hear you are at least home safe!

MJ, you have retreat for chamber this week? That is fantastic! Let me know how it goes. Those were the good ol days.

I can't believe school is already starting again! They don't start here until after labor day. So everyone is getting in there last bit of partying. There is also this huge sail boat racing world championship going on over in the giant lake next to us. I'm excited to see it. It sounds really cool. Everyone here has some sort of a boat. It's hilarious and really awesome.

Well I love you guys and hope life is going good. Good luck in school!!

Love,

Elder Ruesch

August 8, 2011

Yo! Before I forget I need to tell you that next week our P-day is
going to be on Wednesday. So don't expect an email on Monday. We
have zone conference on monday and so p-day got switched. I am SO
EXCITED though because on that p-day we are going to be going to the
temple as a zone. Awesome? Yes!!!! I am so pumped. Temple = Win.

This week has been pretty good. We are getting a little more busy.
Things have picked up since last month, thank goodness. Hopefully,
stuff starts to get even more busy. Busy is good. I don't know what
it is about Hindu people from India and Plymouth but there are quite a
few of them living here. It's really cool. Who would of thought that
serving in Minnesota I would learn to love the people from India? But
I do. They are seriously the nicest people in the world. And really
hard workers. I bring this up because there is a member who is moving
out of the ward and she sold her bed frame to this young hindu couple
and so she invited us to come over when they were getting the frame to
meet the couple and help out. It turns out the bed frame was actually
a beastly water bed frame and we spent like two hours taking it apart,
moving it, and setting it up again. But it was an awesome experience
because this hindu couple really appreciated it. We didn't get the
chance to pick them up as investigators but they said they would like
to come to our church sometime. We became pretty good friends with
them and hopefully good stuff happens in the future. Pretty cool.

This sunday was looking so good. I was excited because it looked like
the first sunday that ______ was actually going to make it to church.
Things were working out great and then she never showed. Ug!
Depressing. Apparently, she had some crazy stuff happen at home that
kept her up all night and she just wasn't able to make it today.
Everytime it looks like she is going to move forward and really start
progressing, some blasted event stops her in her tracks. But we wont
give up! She is an awesome lady with a great heart and would make a
fantastic member of the church. We're just going to keep praying for
her that things start to work out more. I do believe that someday she
will be baptized. I just hope that I get to see it!

Every week we have a planned service activity and we go to a food
shelf near by and pack bags of food for the people who can't afford
food. It is an awesome activity and over the past 6 months I have had
the chance to get pretty close with a lot of the volunteers. They are
super nice people. Just the best of the best. Anyway, there is this
one guy who I like a lot and we finally asked him if we could come
over and share our message with him and his family. And he said yes!
I'm excited. So hopefully this week we get that chance because I
really feel good about him and want him to be baptized. He's a great
guy. We'll see what happens!

I really like having the chance to stay in an area for a long time.
It is super cool because you get to see so much happen in people's
lives. It can be sad though too. Minnetonka is the area next door to
us and I was around when they had a person get baptized and the
stuggles to get her to that point and then she is struggling in the
church and I'm seeing her go inactive. It is sad to watch. It is the
worst thing in the world to watch a person who knows the truth and has
felt and seen it in their life and still turn their back. It blows me
away. But when I think about it, we all do that in our own ways. It
gives me a perspective of how Heavenly Father feels. What a crazy life.

Well, I can't wait to find or be found by the people who are ready to
be baptized. Something awesome is going to happen this week. I can
feel it.

Thanks for the pictures of Denver! It looked like a ton of fun. I
would love to do a trip like that. Trains are fun. It's weird what
the mission can do to you though because right now I have a hard time
sitting down for 5 minutes. I have to always be doing something
effective. So to think about a several hour train ride would be kinda
hard. Ha ha. Good thing I still got another 18 months.

Oh yeah, weird news. This transfer cycle is actually only going to be
5 weeks for some reason. It is crazy! They cut my time by a whole
week! I'm gonna die. I think it is becuase the new missionaries are
coming a week early. I don't know. Salt Lake made that decision.
The time flies by at rocket speed. Seriously. I can't handle how
fast time is going by. Each day is like a second long. It really is
freaking me out because I have so much to do! Ah!

Thanks for being the best family in the world!
Love you guys!

Elder Ruesch

August 1, 2011

Hello!! It's been a good week here in the land of Plymouth. Several
good things happened.

First off, transfers are this wednesday. We got our calls this
morning if we were being transfered. Crazy news! President called
and told me that I am going to stay in Plymouth for another transfer
with Elder Gottfredson. He said he had a hard time deciding that
since I've been here in plymouth for so long. But he said that there
is someone we need to baptize here in the next little while.
Awesome! When President says something like that, you know you've got
to get to work because there is something right around the corner.
President Howell essentially said the same thing to Elder Farnsworth
as we were leaving the mission home for my first day. And look what
happened. The ____________'s were baptized a month later. Just
crazy. So I am really excited. We are working hard but the work has
been kinda slow and I am hoping that we can get it moving again. It's
about time Plymouth had another baptism :)

We had a couple cool experiences this week. We were tracting in the
afternoon (a very ineffective time because no one is home) and a girl
came to the door. We talked to her for a while and ended up teaching
quite a bit of the Restoration and the Book of Mormon. That was
cool. She said that she feels sorta empty right now when it comes to
religion and she just doesn't know where to go. In fact, the night
before she was reading in her bible trying to find the path for her.
And then we show up on her door the next day. Coincidence? I think
not! So I'm excited. If she starts to progress we'll have to send
her to the singles ward, which stinks. But whatever, we do what we can.

Another cool experience. Tracting again! Yesterday we knocked on
this guys door and he let us in to chat for a while. A super nice
guy. He has a hard time with religion. The way I like to put it is
he sees the Apostacy that has happened in religion and it has turned
him away (but he doesn't realize it's the apostacy). Anyway, we gave
him a BoM too and I really felt the spirit in our visit. He didn't
want to set up a return appointment but he said he would read and if
he becomes interested he would call us. It kinda stinks but he was
very sincere and so my hope is that he really does read. He is in the
Lord's hands now. At least the seed is planted.

The young men of our ward went to the temple to do baptisms for the
dead again. The thing that is funny about the temple here is that
they don't have enough workers to staff the whole baptistry. And so
if you go as a ward you have to bring several endowed males that can
run the show. Well, our poor young mens president had a few adults
cancel on him the night before and so he asked us to help. Going to
the temple is not something we are supposed to do often - our work is
for the living - but we got permission to help out and it was really
fun. We had a good time! And it is fun to develop better
relationships with the youth in the ward. This ward has some
fantastic youth.

Yesterday was fun. To finish off the night we had a BBQ with _______
and his son. He is the Man! I love him to death and I am so grateful
that I have been able to be a part of his conversion. We have become
really close friends. It's awesome! He cooked us some steaks and
corn on the cob. Delicious!

Unfortunately, ______________ dropped us this week. He is still
interested and I could see him progressing in the gospel sometime in
the future but right now he just didn't want to take the time to meet
with us while he is working out his divorce and everything. It will
be finalized pretty soon though, I hope. If only people realized how
important this was. Then they'd have time for us. No matter what,
they would have time. This is salvation we're talking about!

It sounds like you guys had a really fun week camping and then in St.
George. Ridiculous! You guys aren't supposed to have fun while I am
gone. Just sit around and don't do anything till I get home and then
we can party it up and do some fun things. Ha ha. Just kidding. I'm
glad to hear you are using your summer time wisely. Keep up the good
work! And way to go MJ for making it to the top of Timp. Nice work!
Thanks for the pictures mom. I love seeing them. Sorry I haven't
sent you guys pictures in a while. I need to do that...

Well, I am really looking forward to this next transfer. I love the
Plymouth ward and I love the area here. I can't wait to see what
exciting things happen. We're just going to be working our tails off
and we're going to see some miracles. We've got great expectations
for the future!

Love you guys so much!

Elder Ruesch

July 25, 2011

Hi family! Sorry that this is coming so late. This morning we went
on a bike ride with our Catholic friends. It took about 4 hours but
it was awesome! It was on a trail that used to be an abandoned
railroad track and they turned it into a paved bike trail. Super
awesome because that means it's totally flat! Word. We went about 42
miles and had lunch at the best hamburger joint in Minnesota called
Culvers. Good times! Unfortunately I will have to be more brief today.

We've had a pretty good week. Things are moving along. We were
finally able to have another lesson with _______. It's been 4 weeks
since we've had an appointment go through with her and this one
finally did. It was great! We took her on a tour of the Church. She
has never been to our church and so that is something we like to do so
that they are more familiar with the way the church is set up and how
the service goes. We talked with her and she wants to be baptized on
September 23rd still. Far away but closer than we think.

We had a cool opportunity this week. There is a guy in our ward who's
father was the producer of a new Joseph Smith movie. This movie was
not church produced but still super good. Apparently, some of the
bretheren in Salt Lake saw it and said it is the most accurate
depiction of Joseph Smith's story that they have seen. I think it is
called Joseph Smith and the Golden Plates or something like that.
Anyway, there was an activity where the guy in our ward was showing it
and we got to go watch it. It was really interesting! It was more
like a movie with all the drama and love story and everything but I
thought that it was really good. We tried to get some investigators
to come but none of them did and I am kinda glad because it is a movie
that would be good for members with a better knowlege of the church to
watch. Apparently this is the first of three movies. This movie only
covered the time period from when Joseph gets the plates to when the
BoM is printed. Cool stuff. If you ever hear about it and get the
chance to see it, do.

We are moving into a new house again this week. Ha ha. We are just
getting juggled around. It is kinda funny. We were supposed to move
this week but didn't have the chance, so we will this wednesday.

There is a road that I found called Morgan road. Awesome! So I
couldn't resist but to tract that street. It was most excellent. The
people there were SUPER rich and we obviously didn't have much success
but we did have a great conversation with one lady. And I took a
picture next to the street sign.

This has been a fun week because we had a competition in the zone
about who could get the most referrals and potential investigators.
It was interesting to watch but we had a really good time and it
helped push us to find more referrals. Referrals are very sparse in
the Plymouth ward but we are doing everything to find people to teach
in as many different ways as possible. It is hard but fun.

Another cool thing that is happening in the mission is this week the
AP's set a goal for the mission to invite 1000 people to be baptized.
Do you know how crazy that is?! And on top of that our zone set a
goal to have 1/3 of those invites. Crazy!!! Which means that this
week Elder Gottfredson and I need to invite 33 people to be baptized.
Ha ha. Isn't that nuts? I am so excited! It's going to be super
intense. We are going to have to adapt our teaching and the way we
talk to people on the street so that we can invite everyone to be
baptized. It is going to be really hard but I know the Lord will
provide a way.

I had to give a talk in Church on sunday. To be honest, we don't
think that I will survive the next transfer. I could very well be
transfered to a new area next week and so they asked me to speak. My
topic was fasting and it was just 5 minutes but it was a good
opportunity. I love the Plymouth ward! I don't want to leave. But
duty calls I guess. Who knows, maybe I will stay another transfer.
The lord works in Mysterious ways.

Can you believe that as of tomorrow I will officially have been on my
mission for 6 months? It blows be away! Time flies when you are
preaching the good word. 1/4 of my mission gone in a millisecond. I
can't believe it but it is also really exciting too! I feel
accomplished :)

That is cool to hear that you got an email from President and Sister
Clements. What awesome people! I just love their guts. I'm glad I
get to experience two mission presidents. There is room in my heart
for both of them. Ha ha. They really are such a wonderful family.

The beginning of this week was dang hot but by the end of the week it
had cooled down a bit and the last couple days have been beautiful.
Minnesota is the bomb!

It was weird not celebrating pioneer day and so I am glad that you
sent me that package. Thank you very much!! It's got the perfect
stuff in it. I also got a package from Ashley and it was awesome!
She gave me another tie to add variety to my life. Thanks so much
fam! You are the best.

I love and miss you guys! Thanks for all of your love and support.
Sorry my letter is shorter today.

Much love,

Elder Ruesch

July 18, 2011

I was thinking yesterday about the homecoming for President and Sister
Howell I couldn't wait to hear from you guys what it was like. Sounds
like it was fantastic! Ah! I wish I could have been there!!! That
is so awesome that you met President and Sister Howell as well as
their kids who live in Plymouth. They rock. And Elder Farnsworth! I
wasn't expecting you to meet him. He lives in Arizona so I didn't
think he would come up. But now that I think of it, of course he
would. Who would miss it? It was super cool to hear that you met
him. That is too weird that he is home. Crazy kid. Well, what an
awesome experience.

Life is going pretty good. Still slow unfortunately. We've been
having a really hard time getting to meet with our investigator.
Winter is so much easier because no one leaves their house. But the
summer is rough. Every single appointment we had set up with an
investigator this week fell through. Not cool! It got to the point
where it was funny. Even our appointment with _________ on Saturday
night fell through and by the time that happened we just couldn't stop
laughing because it's been kind of ridiculous how much that happened.
Elder Gottfredson and I must smell bad or something. Who knows.

Not too many eventful things have happened though. Just the same ol'
missionary work. These last couple days were CRAZY humid. And
apparently this week it is supposed to get super hot. I might die.
They are talking about 100 degrees. Kill me now. I kind of like
humidity, but not when the temperature is 100 degrees. If you get an
email from me next week you will know that I survived. I'll just make
sure to carry a lot of water.

President Clements interview each of us in the zone on Thursday. That
was fun. He is a super cool guy. I already love him. He and his
wife are the sweetest people in the world. We're going to see lots of
great things happen in the mission!

We have had a few people come back onto the radar. As for
____________, his appointment fell through also but we did get to
talk with him and he said that he is kind of interested in our
religion. That is progress! He almost came to church. And he also
has been sharing the pamphlets and book of mormon we gave him with his
daughter. Apparently she likes it. I'm hoping we'll be able to teach
her too!

Like I said, nothing crazy exciting happened this week. The work is
moving forward and we're trying to find ways to get this area back on
fire. I saw so much success at the beginning of my mission that it is
hard to see things so slow. But I guess this is how regular
missionary work is. We can't always be super blessed right? I guess
so. Sadly. Ha ha.

Well I hope you have a happy birthday Ashley!! Thanks for being born!

It sounds like you guys are having a fun summer. Keep having fun!

We are working really hard and doing our very best. There is someone
that is ready just around the corner. I can feel it! Time to
baptize! We had a miraculous month of June in this mission and we
aren't letting our expectations down. This mission is amazing and I
am so grateful to be serving here. Minnesota is the best place in the
whole world. I never want to leave! If it only had mountains then it
would be perfect :)

Miss you guys! Thanks for being the best.
Much love,
Elder Ruesch

P.S. Oh yeah! One cool thing I forgot to mention last week. There
is a less active couple that Elder Farnsworth and I helped get back
into activity and they are doing great now. The husband got the
Aaronic Priesthood last sunday and he asked me to ordain him. It was
such a wonderful blessing! I was so grateful to be a part of it. A
super neat experience. The church is true.