James and Melissa's Wedding

Hey my family!

Well, our week probably wasn't as busy as yours back home, but it was a really good one. I got to go on an exchange up to Palm Harbor at the beginning of last week, and that was pretty fun. Since I was only there for 6 weeks I'm pretty not many of the members there remember who I am, but it was a lot of fun to follow up with the people that I did know. I got to see Cheryl Comini, and she is so awesome. It feels a little bit like being at home when I've stopped by her house. She has a calling now and is a primary teacher for the 5-6 yr olds.

We had a lesson with James on Wednesday night at the church and it went really well. I'd never done it with an investigator before, but we went through some of the Josph Smith History, and it went really well. I love going through that account of everything that happened, and reading Joseph's own words. James really felt the spirit, and I think when we meet with him again tonight we'll set his baptismal date for June 19. We actually got to go to James and Melissa's wedding on Saturday as well! It was a lot of fun to be at, and I'm really glad that we waited until after they got married to have his baptism. I really feel like that was another reason why his date needed to get pushed back. They had the wedding at the church, and the Bishop married them. It was really great to see, and I've never seen James so happy. This is definitely going to help him stay on the path.

Also this week we had the awesome experience of having Elder Stever Allen (the managing director of missionary affairs for the church), come and train us at a leadership confernece. Wow. It was really motivational. He didn't sugarcoat anything that he told us, and I know that it made us all want to improve. They are making a lot of changes in our mission to make everything we do line up with what it talks about in Preach My Gospel. Elder Allen talked a lot about working with urgency. He said right now we're moving along by shuffling our feet, and we need to be quicking moving ahead. "Walk twice as fast and you'll double your baptisms". That's something we're all going to be focusing on is making sure that we're moving ahead and working with diligence. I felt really fortunate for the mission president that we have though. Elder Allen told us that we honestly have the very best mission president in the world, and that if he could pick someone to have his grandchildren serve under it would be President Summerhays. He's such an incredible man, and I have really love working with him.

At church yesterday we had the most investigators that we've ever had. Tony, Paige, Polly, Misty, and James were there! I've talked about all of them (I think) periodically throughout my emails, but it was a great Sunday. We weren't able to meet up with Tony this past week, but we will this week and hopefully we'll be setting a date with him as well. I know that he's ready for that step as well. He has been reading and praying, and he told us that he feels like he's on the right path.

Well I love you all so much! Thanks for all you do, and I hope you have a great week.

Elder Kade Bartschi

President’s Letter

Dear Sisters and Elders,

I feel so grateful and happy this morning for the privilege of having Elder Stephen B. Allen in our mission. Elder Allen is the managing director of the missionary department and spent 4 days with Sister Summerhays and me. On Friday, he spent several hours teaching our leaders in the Florida Tampa Mission. They are eager to share it with the rest of you. His presence was a remarkable “tender mercy” for the Florida Tampa Mission. Our direction is right, but our passion and focus must be accelerated. I felt with my whole heart and soul that our Florida Tampa Sisters and Elders are ready to meet the challenge. I knew that you would rise to the level of expectation that the Prophet has established. I knew that we would embrace the hard but beautiful things we are now asked to do. I knew that we all were ready to offer our full obedience, our focused eye of faith, and our exceeding diligence and tireless labor to this critical need to the growth of the church worldwide. I knew that most of us already knew that this was the time of harvest in the Florida Tampa Mission and we would thrust in our sickle with all our might. I knew that you were the best. I told him that you could and would do all that was required.

Elder Allen emphatically stated:

“Those missions that are seeing growth and increased harvest, fully embrace a CULTURE, MINDSET AND PASSION for FINDING NEW INVESTIGATORS.”

I am confident our mission believes it is time to harvest. I know we must:

Fully embrace a CULTURE, MINDSET AND PASSION for FINDING that will double, triple and eventually quadruple our new investigator pool each week.

I love this work, and it is work! I pray that He will grant you the blessing of seeing the fruit of your labors. I love you and I believe in you.

President Summerhays