March 24, 2014 Week 37

Elder Fin answered some questions we sent him last week for this week's letter.

….ALL right so i picked 6 papers to answer questions!!!  i am Excited to see what i Picked out.............

1.  Have I gotten a death threat?---no not yet

2.  Has someone pulled a gun on me?-- yes, an investigator showing us all of his guns and messed around.

3.  Do you miss the mountains?-- yes very much!!!! ^^^^=UTAH _____=OKLAHOMA  you cant do much with flat land except shoot stuff 

4.  Have i forgotten English?  I think so but not because of Spanish haha

5.  Do I play football on p-day?-- we play flicker-ball it is a mix of BASKETBALL--FOOTBALL--ULTIMATE FRISBEE... it is fun it get everyone involved and not to competitive!

6.  Do I hate tacos????--- what type of question is that i love tacos!!  they are the best.

7.  What type of job do you want?--  I don't know i will have to figure that out one of these days.

8.  Do i have a good companion?--Yes he is cool,  he is from the desert part of California, It is Elder Meservy.  We Work together pretty good. And we haven't killed each other yet so that is always a good sign.

9.  how many miles are left on your car for the month?  200-- we get 1000 miles a month and they go fast!  because we drive through Norman at least 3 times a week.  So we will have to bike this month. Which is OK because Purcell is super small!

10.  Am I getting an Okie Accent?--unfortunately i think i am :(  y'all is a very effective word!! i don't notice anything weird about it anymore.  But i bet it will die off pretty fast once i get back!

11.  Was there a scripture you liked this week?  I finished up 3rd and 4th nefi in 4th it reads, "15 And it came to pass that there was no ^acontention in the land, because of the ^blove of God which did dwell in the hearts of the people.

16 And there were no ^aenvyings, nor ^bstrifes, nor ^ctumults, nor whoredoms, nor lyings, nor murders, nor any manner of ^dlasciviousness; and surely there could not be a ^ehappierpeople among all the people who had been created by the hand of God.

17 There were no robbers, nor murderers, neither were there Lamanites, nor any manner of -ites; but they were in ^aone, the children of Christ, and heirs to the kingdom of God.

18 And how blessed were they! For the Lord did bless them in all their doings;

Well this made me really excited to live the law of consecration!  There was no separation,  just disciples of god.  But not everyone could live this way of life.

  

23 And now I, Mormon, would that ye should know that the people had multiplied, insomuch that they were spread upon all the face of the land, and that they had become exceedingly ^arich, because of their prosperity in Christ.

24 And now, in this two hundred and first year there began to be among them those who were lifted up in ^apride, such as the wearing of costly apparel, and all manner of fine pearls, and of the fine things of the world.

25 And from that time forth they did have their goods and their substance no more^acommon among them.

26 And they began to be divided into classes; and they began to build up ^achurches unto themselves to get ^bgain, and began to deny the true church of Christ.

The people were so blessed that they became rich---then prideful--then against the church.  Made me reflect on the encounter Jesus had with the Ruler... 

20 Thou knowest the commandments, Do not commit ^aadultery, Do not ^bkill, Do not steal, Do not bear ^cfalse witness, ^dHonour thy father and thy mother.

 21 And he said, All these have I kept from my youth up.

 22 Now when Jesus heard these things, he said unto him, Yet lackest thou one thing: sell all that thou hast, and distribute unto the ^apoor, and thou shalt have treasure in heaven: and come, follow me.

 23 And when he heard this, he was very sorrowful: for he was very rich.

 24 And when Jesus saw that he was very sorrowful, he said, How hardly shall they that have riches enter into the kingdom of God!

 25 For it is easier for a camel to go through a needle’s eye, than for a rich man to enter into the kingdom of God.

This man had a one way ticket to the kingdom of heaven... but he denied it for money.  From this we can see haw careful we need to be in the way we LOOK upon wealth.  Because it is likened with pride in many aspects--clothes, homes, cars, fame and all of that other worldly crap.... but that is what i studied :)  hope that you all have a gooooood week!

Love ya'll

ELDER FINLINSON 

March 17, 2014 Week 36

Pues

This week went by very fast!!!  I guess some crazy news is that we had transfers and I am staying here in Purcell--which isn't a surprise..

BUT no one in the whole Norman Zone is getting transferred haha I guess we are really good. I don't know.  

But we did get news that we are going to get a new car in June!!  The car we have right now isn't even bad but they switch them out once they hit 50,000 miles.  

But I am happy that I am not getting transferred!  I really like this area even though it isn't Spanish speaking.  But in this area the time goes super fast it is crazy.  

I am happy to hear that everyone is doing good!  The weather this past week was crazy we had the usual 70 and then 30!!!  And the wind is crazy!!!!  

I guess this is when weather in OKLAHOMA gets crazy!!

But this past week was awesome!! We went to the temple!!  

I finaly got to see the new video and lets just say that it was a game changer compared to the last one!!  

I tried to explain the difference to my comp who never saw the old one and it was hard!!  

I know that it is old news for all of you since it was more then 6 months ago it came out but I though that is was cool. haha.  But it was awesome to finally be able to go through the temple IN ENGLISH!!!  I figured the last time I went through--and understood-- was with Aunt Tebs at the Salt Lake Temple!! 

The spirit that comes through the temple was long missed! Even though the temple was very small the spirit was very strong!-- 

Also because of that I was able to drive through my last area and it was weird!!  

I saw the streets that I rode my bike on every day... speaking Spanish... those were the days.

I think that by the time I am done with this area I will be half way!!  We had a good week last week though we were finally able to go to Lexington(the town that is right next to Purcell but it is divided by a river and the bridge has cracks in it right now so it is shut down... so we have to drive 45 minutes to get to it!! and then 45 minutes back!  But we were able to get a member to do it for us.  We spent most of our time talking to this old less active man who lives in the middle on nowhere in a trailer... HOLY OKIE TALKER!!!!!!! HE talked for 2 hours!!  He is one of those guys that lives all by himself, is obsessed with his property, says he will shoot you if you trespasses, hates the government and has to many stories.... But yeah he talked for a good amount of time.  I am starting to think that Grandpa Quilter had some, Okie blood in him! But that was cool.  We then were able to have 2 recent convert lessons right after--patience is key!

We had a very interesting lesson last night.  It was with this guy who had been meeting with the missionary's for a long time--4 years.  He has claimed that he has read the book of Mormon twice.  Well we asked him if He knows if the book of Mormon is true? he started going on about the way the book of Mormon makes him doubt its truthfulness... he said it sounds like 1800's philosophical literature....? well that was a new response to reading the book of Mormon haha.  so we read Moroni 

10---4 And when ye shall receive these things, I would exhort you that ye would ^aask God, the Eternal Father, in the name of Christ, if these things are not ^btrue;   so we asked him have you prayed... he said yes and that he felt that it wasn't true.  So what do you say to something like that??- Well first off we can see how meaningful his prayers are just by his first response to our question.  When we first asked him, he said that the reason he didn't think that it was true was because of the way it was written, Not because he received a answer from God that it was wrong..?  Would an answer from an ALL KNOWING source trump ALL?  Well this experience helped me realize one of the biggest reasons for withdrawal from the church.  PEOPLE HAVE NOT YET RECEIVED A SURE WITNESS FROM THE HOLY GHOST! BECAUSE THEY HAVE NEVER ASKED THE WAY MORONI DIRECTS  and if ye shall ask with a ^csincere heart, with ^dreal intent, having ^efaith in Christ, he will ^fmanifest the ^gtruth of it unto you, by the power of the Holy Ghost.

I think alot of the time we forget this......... ahh well i wish i had more time i had alot more to say but o well 

I HOPE THAT YOU ALL HAVE A GOOD WEEK

ELDER FINLINSON

(Elder Fin welcomes your questions, he said it makes it easier for him to write, you can send him questions at ethan.finlinson@myldsmail.net

I asked him what he was eating, he said he bought 10lbs of potatoes for 2 dollars and he has been making a mix of cubed potatoes, eggs, ham and cheese, puts it all in the pan and it is done in 20 minutes…he was excited to find 48 oz of sausauge for $4 today at walmart so he will add that to his mix…)

He sent one photo, this is the desk the missionaries have been using since at least 1995, you can see Ethan added his own works of art….besides his name, he added the First Vision and the U symbol….interesting there is not a BYU symbol….hmmmmm  I imagine this desk will get more colorful if Ethan is in Purcell for the next several months…. Thanks for your Love and Support of Elder Fin!

March 10, 2014 Week 35

Well don't have any photos.... i just haven't been taking alot of pictures over here in Purcell.  

There just isn't alot to take a picture of so I am sorry that it isn't as visual.  

It sounds like everyone is doing good!  Looks like the skiing is decent still.  The weather here is crazy Saturday was below freezing and today it is 80!!! 

What is up with that ??  

I don't know we had a good week this week.  

We were able to get Brittany our investigator to church and she seemed to fit right on in!  

She is planning to get baptized on the 29th of march!! so that should go well and we had church this week so that is always nice!!

But we had a ton of meetings this week so nothing too exciting happened.  

We went out with our mission leader last Friday and it was a ton of fun.  We visited a less active-- the one who lost her son last month, and we gave her a blessing. 

She said that it has been hard because none of her home-teachers ever show up…

After that we visited with an investigating family and we caught them smoking it was funny.  They got really embarrassed, because they know that is wrong.  

But we then had a lesson and at the beginning Brother Fishburn asked why are you still drinking and smoking....really loud i was like o crap.  

But it ended up being a good question to ask and it made them really think  about why they were doing the things that they were doing, so that was good.. 

But during that lesson we talked about a ton of things and there were some close calls to some deep doctrine stuff but lucky the spirit was there!!

But yeah that is about ...1% of what happened this week but everything is in my journal so after my mission you can learn everything.

Love you all hasta luego!!

March 3, 2014 Week 34

Welllllll another week...another month gone!!  this week nothing too crazy happened.  

Well i guess we are still alive haha there was one point that that was questionable last week.  

Some members gave a us a ride to Lexington--about a 45 minute drive- but is still our area.  We then had a nice dinner with one of our recent converts.  But on the way home it was about 8:45 and we were just flying down some farm road and well lets just say that the driver isn't the youngest and well 8 o'clock was his bed time... he didn't really care for stop signs... o well we lived!

But we had some good weather this week---for half of it.  We had weather in the 70s and then to below zero with snow and thunderstorms!!! only in Oklahoma... it is funny when we talk to people why they live in Oklahoma a good majority of them say I don't know.  This place has earthquakes tornado's, hailstorms, lightning-blizzard and extreme heat summer... but the people here are the best!  So that is ok I can live with that, since all we do is talk to people,  but as far as living here.... yeah i dont know about that one haha.  

We found an interesting investigator this week his name is Chris and he is from Sandy, Utah !!  But the way that we found his is pretty good... We were tracting and we heard this house playing some hard rock and roll so we knocked on the door..  someone yelled, "its the mormons!!!!!" and then we knocked again and Chris answered.  We asked him if he was rocking out in there and it took 3 times saying it before he was able to hear what we were saying... but when his hearing finally adjusted we were able to talk to  him and then we were able to pray.. it was supper cool we told him that we will have to hear his band some time, then he said that they were all together and we could listen to them.... ok... so we went into the house and it smelt like....... yeah  and we went into a room and they had lights and a whole bunch of band stuff.  Well they played a song called valley of the souls...they were...loud and screaming, after the song we said well done and got out of their as fast as we could!!  

anyways we OF COURSE didn't have church this week!  so we had a nice 3 hour study i read alot about LAW and found this talk from Spencer W. Kimball on obedience 

“To obey! To hearken! What a difficult requirement! Often we hear: ‘Nobody can tell me what clothes to wear, what I shall eat or drink. No one can outline my Sabbaths, appropriate my earnings, nor in any way limit my personal freedoms! I do as I please! I give no blind obedience!’

“Blind obedience! How little they understand! …

“When men speak of all faith and all obedience as blind, are they not covering their own weaknesses? Are they not seeking an alibi to justify their own failure to hearken?

“A man obeys strictly the income tax law and pays fully and before due date his property taxes but justifies himself in disregarding the law of the Sabbath or the payment of tithes on time, if at all. In the one case he may suffer only deprivation of freedom or resources or lose his home or personal property, but in the other he opens doors to the loss of a soul. The spiritual as truly brings penalties as the temporal, the principal difference is the swiftness of punishment, the Lord being so long-suffering.

“One would hardly call the first blind obedience, yet he sometimes regards the spiritual commands as such.

“Is it blind obedience when the student pays his tuition, reads his text assignments, attends classes, and thus qualifies for his eventual degrees? Perhaps he himself might set different and easier standards for graduation, but he obeys every requirement of the catalog whether or not he understands its total implication.

“Is it blind obedience when one regards the sign ‘High Voltage—Keep Away’ or is it the obedience of faith in the judgment of experts who know the hazard?

“Is it blind obedience when the air traveler fastens his seat belt as that sign flashes or is it confidence in the experience and wisdom of those who know more of hazards and dangers?

“Is it blind obedience when the little child gleefully jumps from the table into the strong arms of its smiling father, or is this implicit trust in a loving parent who feels sure of his catch and who loves the child better than life itself?

“Is it blind obedience when an afflicted one takes vile-tasting medicine prescribed by his physician or yields his own precious body to the scalpel of the surgeon or is this the obedience of faith in one in whom confidence may safely be imposed? …

“Is it then blind obedience when we, with our limited vision, elementary knowledge, selfish desires, ulterior motives, and carnal urges, accept and follow the guidance and obey the commands of our loving Father who begot us, created a world for us, loves us, and has planned a constructive program for us, wholly without ulterior motive, whose greatest joy and glory is to ‘bring to pass the immortality and eternal life’ of all his children?”

I really loved this, God gives us commandments and laws to help us and in the end to exalt us!  But how do we usually look at those commands??  Well in john 8:31-32...if we are obedient then we are disciples, then we will receive truth then we will be made free.  Sound like a good deal to me.  

As missionaries we are given a BOOK of extra commandments that we need to follow!  with consequences if we don't follow...so why be a missionary??!! Because there is a book a blessings that comes too!  and it is fun talking to random people about what you believe!! but yeah that is what happend in the BIG PURCELL OK

ELDER FINLINSON

February 27, 2014 Week 33

Well almost 1/6 of the way done with the year!!!  Crazy.  People have started saying that I am close to halfway done!!  I still have 5 more months!!!  But who knows??  It feels like yesterday was Christmas and a week ago was Halloween!!!  

Life here in Purcell has improved... a lot.  Mostly because of the weather!!  It has been awesome here in the 70's... but from we heard it doesn't last that long... we have the tornado's coming in and then after that we have summer............  with some 100 days over 100.  I am not looking forward to that but at least we will be in a car...I guess if i stay in this area.  

We had an interesting conversation with one of the youth in the ward.  We were at a dinner and she talked about how she was the only Mormon in her high school, and how she gets a lot of anti Mormon crap thrown at her!  All of the stuff that she said we have heard, but we are missionaries!!  I guess every year one of the baptist church's in Purcell holds a sleep over thing for all of the high school students and I guess everyone goes there and there is just a ton of anti Mormon doctrine that they talk about!!... yeah pretty week right… I wonder why they don't talk about the catholic church with over 1 billion members, or any other domination...??  I wish that they would invite us over…  I have to say I enjoy answering questions!  and some of the questions that they ask are hilarious...one topic is the trinity that is the frosting on everything!  Not many sects believe in 3 separate beings... we had one guy tell us that we don't believe in John chapter 1... we explained and he said that we were just looking at it far out.... well we told him to turn 20 chapters and read verse 17 "Jesus saith unto her, ^aTouch me not; for I am not yet^bascended to my ^cFather: but go to my brethren, and say unto them, I ascend unto my ^dFather, and your Father; and to my God, and your God. "  He then said that that one makes him question... we then testified about the book of mormon, but he wouldn't accept one because he said that he didn't want to be influenced by it-- this is a guy that reads the dead sea scrolls...  well we ended up 'accidentally' leaving a book of Mormon on his sofa, haha he is probably going to burn it that is what they do with a lot of them... that is ok he can look back at that one in heaven haha.

We had a cool lesson with a guy last night, we were able to get him to give us his lighter, to go to church and to be baptized...  it was the boldest I have ever been on my lesson, we went straight up to him.  It was a super powerful lesson.  The mission life is awesome nothing is better!!! 

But yeah that is a small about of what really happened this week.  I guess you can hear it all once I get home from my mission.  every week my emails are like movie trailers.... the movie will come out in june 2015 haha but until then!! 

ADIOS

ELDER FINLINSON

(Though Ethan is serving in an English speaking area he continues to work on his Spanish by translating conference talks and conversations in his head, he loves the language and is grateful for the gift.  His companion is Elder Meservy, he is English speaking, from California and entered the mission field in November.  They are in a car, a cheve Malibu, and also riding bikes when needed.  Ethan is grateful for the car.  Thanks for all your love and support for Elder Fin!)

February 17, 2014 Weeks 31 and 32

This week was awesome.  

I love the people here they are so nice, and the members are awesome!  

Our ward mission leader, Brother Fishburn is 82 and he is so cool, he has lived in Purcell his whole life.... never left only for the war!  But we called him on Wednesday and he went out with us for 7 hours!!! and he fed us twice!!  He was the mayor in the town a couple of years ago and everyone knows him.  He was also a bishop and all of the members said that he was the best.  Lets just say that I flat out love this man, he reminds me a lot of Grandpa Quilter and Finlinson--- I don't know like a mix of them...  but he has a way for just showing that he cares for the people and also jokes around with them… he kinda took me back when he asked me to say a prayer at dinner.  I said it and then he said  "prayer is an offering not a thing".... ok so he made me switch how I prayed haha.  

It is very weird praying and reading in English.  I didn't think that it would be but it definitely shocked me.  I feel like I am dyslexic sometimes.  But that is all right, it is coming back.  The weather here finally got better--for a time.... it is in the 50s and 60s up and down but it is very windy.  We talked to a guy today and said that it is supposed to get up to 40 miles an hour in some parts of OK.  It was good that he told us that because we were about to go golfing today but we will probably put a rain check on that one!  One of our members owns a small little golf course.  

We had the opportunity to go to a funeral this week.  It was for one of our less actives son who passed away to stomach cancer.  I don't know I think it kinda represented the funeral for Grandpa because during the whole time I was just thinking of him. But it was sad to see some of the people there... truly some of the people thought that they were never going to see him again.  Many people there couldn't believe that a loving god could allow a 37 year old man to die.  It is comforting to know of God's great plan.  Mortal life--begins with birth and ends with death... the time in-between is determined by God and his will for his children.  It is weird to think that God knows when we are going to leave this earth.  He also knows when we are going to sin and make wrong choices...mind blowing to think of the knowledge of God... so what do we need to do!!!  

8 ¶For my ^athoughts are not ^byour thoughts, neither are your^cways my ^dways, saith the Lord.9 For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ^aways^bhigher than your ways, and my ^cthoughts than your thoughts.

TRUST IN THE LORD and follow his example and follow his commandments.  this scripture is a testimony to me that we need modern prophets--to tell us what God wants us to do!!  

After the funeral we had BBQ--first time on the mission!! at a place called THE RAck Shack it was awesome!!

HOPE YOU GET THIS LETTER THIS WEEK>>>>HAVE A GOOD ONE!

ELDER FINLINSON

Last weeks letter, Ethan forgot to push send…all week we were missing his letter….  Hard week for mail, he never received the Valentines package we sent him.  Wondered if the Pony Express didn't deliver in Purcell, but then realized we had his address minus his apartment number.  For those interested, Ethan's address is:

Elder Ethan Finlinson

1938 North 9th Avenue

Apartment A-3

Purcell, OK  73080

February 10, 2014, Week 31

Well this week was crazy.......I got a car--- a companion that speaks English--- teaching in English-- went from a city to a town-- a ward.. no Catholics...  a lot of change. 

 

On Tuesday we went around and said goodbye to everyone, it was kinda weird they were people that I was seeing every week 2 or three times for 6 months… 

The new area is called the South Noble Area and we are the Noble District and the Norman Zone!  So my new area consists of 2 small towns south of Noble--- Lexington and Purcell.  I think that both of them have about 6000 people.  But it is very small!!  everyone who has ever visited Filmore, Utah--- I think they are smaller.... and everyone I think is baptist!! so that is a big change from only teaching Catholics!  

But the big drama that is going around right now in the town is that the bridge that connects Purcell and Lexington is down because it is 90 years old and it was about to collapse!  It is is causing a lot of problems for people, because they have to travel to Norman and then Noble to get to Lexington.  It is also a problem for us because we have investigators in Lexington it is just that we only have 1000 miles a month.... yep car probs!!…

It is super Nice to be able to tract!!! i know that is probably a weird thing to hear. But now i don't have to worry about finding Hispanics!!!  We can just knock on every single door!   A good number of the population is over 50 years old I would say... alot of them haven't left Purcell there whole life---only when they fought in the wars they left haha.  

The adjustment to the food has been interesting... last night we were at a members house and we had potato soup and it was good,  then they pulled out some crazy Caramel brownies and I about puked!  I don't know what happened to me but I can't handle super sugary stuff---  I can handle super greasy though!!  Because of the bridge being out we only have one member feeding us this week:( the bridge is supposed to be ready in May to cross... but who knows! )

This area has a lot of good members and a ton of potential!!  We have a good group of people to see so there is always work to do so it makes things a little bit easier!!!  I guess one cool experience that we had was we gave 2 lessons outside in 20 degree weather!! so that was fun!!!  got to love the 3rd male rule for missionaries!!  thats ok nothing stops us!  but in one of the lessons the lady said that she has been baptized before but said that because it wasn't by proper authority she would be baptized again!!!  it was super cool.... ice milargos

but yeah that is what is happening here in the Purcell.  Hope that you all have a good week and go shred that powder!! 

ELDER FINLINSON

February 3, 2014, Week 30

Hi Friends and Family, Elder Fin is getting transferred to the Heart of Oklahoma, Purcell, Oklahoma.  He was super busy yesterday so he sent his journal recordings of the week rather than writing out a letter.  Sounds like he had a great week.  Below are the photos he sent.
Elder Fin's District and Zone Leaders   Snow in OK!  The Spanish Branch cancelled church again:) 
The Fiesta, a lot of fun, Fiesta starts at 5pm, missionaries arrive at 4:50, everyone else shows up around 6pm and eating begins at 6:30pm.   

Gilberto's Baptism.  Gilberto had to wait to receive Holy Ghost because church was cancelled. 
Elder Finlinson and Elder Guzman Elder Finlinson and Elder Powley went on exchanges! (Elder Powley is the zone leader, he is in our stake, he goes home in three months.)