Letter and phone call from Grant

Just thought I'd give a little update on Grant.  He did get a calling card, but couldn't get it to work.  So he borrowed some guys in the airport.  Thank you to that very nice guy!  It made my day to hear from Elder Keller.  He sounds great.  We chatted about our family visit to Victor and I think that made him feel a lot better about leaving.  He's been worried about how things were going, so it was good to have a minute to talk about it.  Grant was the lucky one who went with Troy when they took Victor to Wilderness this summer and he came with us when we picked V up and took him to Vista.  So he's been a part of some of the crazy.  We were just able to chat for a bit about the MTC and heading off to France.  I said, " You don't even sound homesick, you sound so excited." He confirmed that : )  After that first week, he settled in and he is ready to get to work.  I thought I'd be teary-eyed talking to him, but he was my happy, ready for an adventure, Grant.  I couldn't help but smile right along with him.   Love that kid.  His Mission Presidents wife emailed to say that they'll send us pictures tomorrow after they pick him up, so I'll post tomorrow or wednesday, some pictures of Grant/Elder Keller.  And hopefully his new address.

So Saturday we got this letter from Grant and were able to write back and forth for about 30 minutes.  We'll Troy wrote back and forth.  Nothing earth shattering.  More like information about calling cards, that he got the last package, the pants fit, etc.  For future missionary moms: nerf toys are banned at the MTC.  I had a mom tell me she would send nerf guns to her boys so I sent a set and they were confiscated.  Lesson learned.  Everything else in the packages was eaten and appreciated!

So we have some time to do laundry before we leave on the air plane tomorrow! Fun right!?! 

I have sort of been recapping this MTC experience! I would say it was good! Probably could have studied more and eaten fewer doughnuts but hey! Say la vie, this is life. I hope everyone is doing well! 

Everyone at the MTC has been passing out journals and asking us if we would write something and sign it. Well eventually the French elders brought theirs around and I figured "they really don't know who I am and after two years who is going to remember an Elder Keller?" So in each of the 4 French elders "good bye journals" I wrote nursery rhymes, In Mary had a little lamb I added some of my own versus, and signed my name as cursivey and loopy as I could! I heard them reading it out in the hall later that night! Way too funny! They read the cow jumped over the moon and one of the elders said "What is this? There is not a cow that could jump over the moon!?" and we just wouldn't;'t contain ourselves! The French Elders in their French accents are just so FUNNY! 

Yesterday in class was incredibly spiritual! All of the missionaries bore their testimony about Jesus Christ in French and it really hit home! I didn't realize how deep everyone's testimony went!  So in class today Frere Pistourius showed us all of his mission photos! He told us that yesterday was spiritual and today was going to get us excited for the mission! So he told wonderful stories about the people he met and the many miracles he saw just in his first month! 

I got this wonderful quote from Frere Pistorious when he was explaining a French grammar concept!

"French express feelings more in the way that they say things, rather then by the feeling of which they are said in." This was interesting because it explains that the French express the way they feel by the words they use and in the way they conjugate a verb. In English this concept is similar, where you can tell by the tone of voice the meaning be hind a phrase the french change the meaning by the way that they conjugate something. Sorry, that was a very poor way of explaining it.

I can not wait to get to the field! Two days!!!! I love you all and wish you a happy holidays! :D

Elder Keller

For entertainment we give Elder D weird challenges. Usually with ingesting large quantities of citrus. He was challenged to eat two oranges in seven bites WITHOUT peeling off the skin. He made it.

below: Elder S effectively using his pillow tie.

Grant and Elder B at the doctors office

below: is Grant's district and teachers.

Looks like the weeks of salads and soup has paid off.  Whew, I don't have to find him bigger pants!  I was getting worried.

So I am SUPER excited to leave for France! We have travel plans and everything! 11:35 We board the flight from Salt lake to Georgia. (I'll probably call home when we land in Georgia) We spend an hour and a half layover in Atlanta and then fly to Paris. We have a two hour layover in Paris then fly to Lyon!

This being our last week we get another P-day of sorts. We can send out Emails one more time and then do laundry and stuffs. 

Elder B and I have now taught Z three lessons! (Dad, he said he would try to email you last night or later today!) Z has lots of interesting questions about being a missionary. Like, why all the missionaries are here. What we do here. He was shocked to learn that B and I had never learned French before getting to the MTC. He doesn't know much about any religion really so we get to explain lots of the bible and other basic "christian concepts" like Baptism, Sacrament, and even who Jesus was! I think my favorite experience with Z was probably having him pray for the first time! It kinda went like this "God, hi this is Z, thanks for school and my family, and these missionaries, ill talk to you later. Amen, I mean Jesus Christ Amen". We explained why we close our eyes during prayers but he continues to watch us during prayers! It's kinda silly but I love him all the more for it!

Our last meeting with Z was even better! Earlier that day we learned about soft and hard invites during zone conference. A soft invite is a commitment that isn't so straight forward like "if you come to know these things are true will you..." So we used that with Z! We were having a conversation about praying and feeling the holy ghost when we asked him if after he read the Book of Mormon he prayed. He told us about how he felt more comfortable praying alone and he said that after his prayer he felt kind of comforted and that he felt peaceful! Six months of Mission Prep prepared me for that exact moment! I bore testimony to him about how, even though he might not know it yet, that what he felt was the spirit comforting him and that as he continues to pray he will be able to feel like that more often and recognize those feelings! He sat back in his chair and cocked his head and said "okay...." after a little silence Elder B read a scripture that talked about how the spirit works! It was amazing! I hope he could feel what Elder B and I felt at that exact moment! Later that lesson we used the "soft invite" to ask Z that "if he came to know these things if he would be baptized!" Again he sat back in his chair and said "yeah, I think that would be nice. I really like what you guys believe! It seems like a nice way to live!" My smile was just huge! I felt SOOOOOO happy that he wanted that! Elder B bore his testimony on revelation by the spirit and I used the classic "I know what my companion said is true" line and bore testimony of the same thing. That was an awesome lesson! It just felt great to help Z learn about the gospel and even better that he accepted it!

Sunday was EXCELLENT! Our MTC mission president, President Merril, was a lawyer his whole life! About ten years ago he was asked to teach institute at BYU and let me tell you, He is the COOOLEST~! Last Sunday he gave us a portion of his institute lesson on the godhead. Mind blown, God isn't who I thought he was, the church is true, and my concept of the godhead is totally different! I have two and a half pages of Awesome notes! He speaks hebrew and so he reads the Bible completely differently! I won't try and cram everything I learned into this email but ill put in some things that were WAYY cool were 

1: In Hebrew Elo means god and IM is how to make something plural. so Elohim, in hebrew, means Gods. And evidence in the hebrew bible suggests that God's real name is closer to Ahman. like ahman and diamoand(sorry spell check didn't help with that one)? but we won't for sure know that for a while. 

2: In MSH 15 in the first five or so verses it talks about dual aspects of Jesus. Man, and god; Flesh, and spirit; Son and Father. Then President Merrill asked us "what would Jesus be the father of" and no one really had a good answer. After a minute or so of more bad answers he pointed out that Jesus is the Father of our world, and our Spiritual lives! When we are baptized we "take upon us the name of christ" which I thought I understood but President Merrill explained that Baptism is like a form of adoption and that we literally get adopted into Christ's spiritual family. Therefore making him our Father.

3: Often the scriptures sound like god is speaking and then we have a jump and then Christ is speaking. President Merril explained that Christ is a "Divine Investigator of Authority" which states Christ can say something and it has just as much power as if God himself said it. That is why the scriptures sometimes sound like Jesus or God is talking and then they switch.

So elder B got an ear infection around Thursday. Infact, Elder B has been more silly than usual but you know what I have not been even the littlest bit annoyed or angry or felt any negative feelings for him. I have felt only love for Elder B. When he said that we needed to walk a half mile to get him medicine I was almost happy to go! Something changed this week. I love Elder B with all of his quirks and silly pieces. And it feels wonderful! I don't know what changed but something did! And it feels great! :)

Elder Keller

As of this week Troy hasn't received an email from Z, but we are hopeful.  So exciting to see these young men have missionary experiences before they are in France trying to share the gospel in another language.  What great preparation.  Love to see their perspectives change and the growth in their testimonies.  

Week 4 - mission letter pics

The Zone

French speaking missionaries heading to Montreal & one to DC.

Grant and Alec up and Grant and Jeff below.

Grant and Eric up and Grant and Davis below.  The MTC seems more like a social hang out for Grant than a place of learning : ).  Both Jeff and Davis are off to their missions now, hope they arrived safely!

The bench where Elder Keller and Elder B met Z.  I think it's cute that he took a picture and sent it to us.  Hope they were able to meet with him today and share the gospel.  So awesome.

I am SOOO EXCITED! So we found our first investigator and gave him a book of Mormon! But I am getting a head of myself; a little background. The church pays BYU students that are not Mormon to hang out at the MTC on park benches and if missionaries want they can go sit down and talk to them! To make them easily identifiable they give them a gold missionary tag with their first name on it. They are real investigators and Elder Brill and I made contact with our first one Saturday!

His name is Z! He is from Florida and is going to BYU because it is much cheaper than the other collages. He is Atheist but his father was Catholic so he has a basic understanding of the Bible.

So Elder B and I were walking to class when I pointed him out, he was sitting on a park bench, and said "Hey do you want to go and talk to the gold tag?" Elder B looked at me like the crazy person that I am and sighed. I jogged over to him and said "Hi my name is Elder Grant and this is my colleague Elder B."

 He looked up from his phone a bit startled and greeted us. We talked for a little bit and learned he was going to BYU. Then we asked what he was studying at school. He said "English" and without thinking I said "are you going to be a lawyer?"

 He looked confused when he said "actually, yes! Most people don't think that how did you know?"

 Instead of answering his question I asked him if he was considering NYU as his law school and then he looked really confused!

 He started grinning and looked between Elder B and me and asked "Did you read my mind? How did you know that?"

I explained that my dad went to NYU! And, once again without thinking, said "Would you want my dads phone number? you could talk to him about lawyers stuffs and good law schools?" he shrugged and agreed. So I wrote down the home phone number and gave it to him! We set up another time to meet and talked a little more before we left! 

Walking away I had the BEST feeling ever! I have never felt anything like it before! My body felt good all over! It was like an adrenaline rush but with a lot more positive emotion! The best solution I think I have is that I was overwhelmed with the spirit. It was warm and sunny outside and I had my suit jacket on but my whole body was shaking! I had an Incredible amount of energy, it was like nothing I had ever experienced! Then I realized, when I was talking to Z about law school and stuff, I didn't really think about what I was going to say! In fact, I cut him off once or twice! And a scripture came to mind, D&C 84:85 

Z made my week! He doesn't know it but all that I think about is when we get to talk to him and what we are going to teach him! Tomorrow is our next lesson! I am very excited!

Other then that, French has been coming along! Monday our district went out and practiced teaching with our teachers. The objective was for you and your companion to meet someone on the street and give them a tour of an LDS church. They explained that missionaries do this in some zones in France as it is a really easy way to get people to learn about the church. So Elder B and I went out and "met" our teacher on the street and asked her if she wanted to take a tour of the "church." We ended up using the spanish speaking building! It was great! We wandered around and looked into all the spanish classes, some with students and teachers in them, and named them things like the chapel, or the relief society room, and explained, in French, to our teacher that they were different room of an LDS church. We got to the conference room and we called it the sacrament room. When we got in there I explained that this room is sacred because we take the sacrament. I explained how the sacrament worked and what it represents. I bore my testimony on what the sacrament meant to me and why I found it special. It was nice, the room was quiet and I almost thought I could feel the spirit. Then I looked over at Elder B and he was just staring. At the teacher. And then he giggled. He put his brochure in front of his face and gave a light laugh. Then he turned away from the teacher and smiled at me and mouthed "I don't know what to do" in English. I apologized to my teacher in French for my colleagues' behavior and told him to bare his testimony. He just looked at me like I was crazy. I said "you start with say vrey and then what you know to be true." He gave me the blankest look. Then smiled. And giggled. Then he looked at the teacher and giggled harder. I apologized to her and told her that our tour was over.

Weirdest Elder B experience yet. This is the second time that he hasn't said anything in an all French lesson. I worry for him and for his French. 

I would count this week as a Good week! Two different experiences but everything else was great! :)

Love you all!

Elder Keller

Week 3 in the MTC

Grant with Davis (I took this from Davis's blog : ) Good friend from our NJ days, these cute boys were play group buddies.  Except when Grant would bite Davis, then we had to go home early.

Grant's zone and district groups.

Ran into Jeff! Good friend and cross country buddy.

He said this is Elder Darius, he is happy to see him.  I'm not sure I know who he is so I'll have to ask.

Grant sporting his new hair cut.  He said she cut it all with a razor.  One way to get rid of the curl : )

And our letter from Grant:

So this week felt less stressful than the previous two. I spent a good portion of this week memorizing vocab and conjugations! We also learned past tense! and the biggest French rule ever! Basically the French change the pronunciation and conjugation of words just to make it sound pretty. For instance, whenever a vowel follows an S you turn the S into a Z sound and slur the two words together to make a big word! There is also no rule for Masculine and Feminine. If it sounds prettier to make the word masculine, it becomes masculine! 

I got my haircut today! Brill and I walked into the barber shop and checked our names off of the scheduled list. The barber came out and called my name. I walked into the hair cutting room and sat down in a classic big red hair salon chair. The barber came over and put on the usual neck towel and hair catching coat, she then proceeded to pull out a big nasty looking razor that still had hairs from the last kid. She didn't even ask how I wanted my hair she just went to town! I told her I usually like to have hair in the front to comb over and she looked at me through the mirror and said to me "you haven't ever been here before have you?" and then proceeded to cut my hair again! I was really confused! Elder Brill's barber asked him what he wanted and cut his hair how he specified! I guess I got the lucky barber! Anyways, my barber used a razor to cut my entire head! It reminded me when dad got his haircut in Belize! The barber just used razors to cut his hair and blend it all together! After shaving the rest of my head she flipped the razor over and just sort of scraped my bangs off. I think the best part of getting my hair cut was when she turned the vacuum on! She had a big old vacuum hose that she used to suck off all the excess hair on my head! It felt weird but I definitely feel like your average Elder now!

Yesterday Elder Smith and I decided to go only salad and soup for the rest of the week! I am very excited for this! Ps: I may have gained a few pounds! But its not my fault! they let you have UNLIMITED CHOCOLATE COOKIES! now who can resist that!?

So Sundays are fun days for missionaries! In fact, we have more to do on Sundays than any other day of the week! Last Sunday I got to prepare a discussion on faith and blessings! I pulled a scripture from Mark where this man falls to Jesus's feet and tells him that he wants his Servant healed. He looks up at Jesus and says Lord I have faith that you can heal him but can you "help my unbelief?" and the Savior says go, your servant is healed. I asked a question along the lines of "even when our faith is insufficient will the lord help our unbelief?" and that got people talking! Some Elders had some interesting concepts of faith. I didn't know but during my discussion the mission president for the french speakers was listening. He then asked me to talk in sacrament for the next block. I didn't mind speaking other then it had to be in FRENCH!!! I had to give a 5 minuet talk in French. OI Vay. Fortunately, we had been asked to prepare a 5 minuet talk the week before and I had about half of mine done!

During my talk, about half way through, I had a scripture I wanted to reference. Unfortunately, I could not find the scripture and in my best French said "moving on" and my district leader just looked at me and sort of chuckled. I carried on and rattled my talk of in about 2 minuets. I then bore my testimony for three minuets on how grateful I was for the Savior. After my talk I sat down next to my district leader and he commended me for conjugating the verb "to love". I was so excited! I conjugated a verb and didn't even have to think about it! Or I mispronounced the verb. I think it was probably a 60/40 split.

Those were the exciting parts of my week! 

a la porcahine (until we meet again) 

Love, Grant Keller

Letter from Grant - no pictures this week

Wednesday Elder Brill was still getting over his sickness so we stayed in the housing halls. While he was sleeping I hammered out the second lesson and started the third lesson that we were going to teach to Solonge. (Solonge is an actor who role plays mission discussions with the French missionaries. She herself went on a mission to France and tries to play the role of one of the many French investigators that she taught.)  It was time consuming for the simple reason that I had to translate most of the questions and statements that I wanted to make. She received the second lesson very well! and the third lesson was AWESOME! Halfway through she asked a few questions and the words I needed just came to me. It was very broken french but it got the point across. After I answered her question Elder Brill, in broken french, bore his testimony and it went something like "even though I am very sick, I love the gospel. We both know these things to be true" and after another question we asked her to be baptized and she agreed! After she agreed we spent 10 minutes trying to set a date for her to be baptized haha oh man neither me or Brill knew the days of the week or months in French so we had to point to them on the calendar! We found out later that she denied being baptized by two other missionary companionships today and as backwards as this sounds, I am glad she did. Just because that means she won't say yes to everyone. It made me and Elder Brill happy! :) 

Elder Brill finally de-stressed Thursday and we really got to know each other. He has had a hard life moving and never being able to keep friends. It makes me glad that I can be his friend for four more weeks! 

We had our first zone conference this week! That was scary exciting! We all shared stories about the stupidest things we have ever done! I told about when Matt, Ben, Josh, Hunter, and I went bouldering up in the Uintas and how Matt almost fell of the cliff face. VERY scary! After we got to know our Zone better we had a discussion led by our district leader. It was nice. I am excited to have a real Zone conference when I get out to the field.

 Sundays in the MTC are incredibly busy! We all got to have a personal conversation with the mission president or his counselors and they all talked to us about mission life and things of that nature. The end of the day is the Best! We got to watch a video of Elder Bednar speaking to the missionaries! He talked on how to find Christlike attributes and challenged all of us to find a question, take a fresh book of mormon (one of the paper back kind) and read the whole book of Mormon and mark anything that pertains to our question and then when we finish write a half page to a page on what we learned. He said that if we did this for every serious gospel topic that by the end of our lives we would have a library of answered questions. 

Yesterday I felt like I had a breakthrough in the language. We got to have a follow up with Solonge and we brought a member along with us. We explained the Sacrament and why we keep the Sabbath day holy and then the member we brought along bore her testimony! It was great! It got even better when I bore a second testimony in French without needing to look for a word! After that experience I have felt more comfortable with the language. 

Also, some French missionaries from Paris came and are learning the Creol language. Whenever we have free time we go over and talk to them and practice our French! Its funny though because all they want to practice their English on us! 

I am loving the MTC. Spending all of this time just focused on the lord feels really good! I love you all. 

Elder Keller

Finally a letter from Grant - guess Tuesdays are his p day.

  I guess Elder Keller's p day is Tuesday.  We finally received a letter from him.  I wasn't sure if I should edit the info about his companion, so read it knowing that he does like him and Elder B is probably writing home saying I got stuck with some crazy kid who wants to run 5 miles every day and doesn't keep a tidy room : ).   Also, I think it will be good for Grant to learn to be a little more compassionate and organized.  They learn better from peers than parents, right?

   If you don't want these letters or need them sent to a different address please reply just to me, not the whole group.  Thanks so much.  It was so good to hear from him and feel free to drop him a note.

grant.keller@myldsmail.net  (his weekly email) or dearelder.com  he is in unit 105, France Lyon Mission, departure date of Nov 10th.

Love,

Carlin

  So hugging mom and dad for the last time got me crying a little, but I'm doing great.

 After I got all of my materials and sat down in class Wednesday our french teacher came in and just started speaking French. He was crazy. So far he has said three English words and I have had class with him for almost 8 hours a day.

 After that I got to meet my collegue missionair (companion)! His name is Elder B, he is a triplet! He has forgotten his key card 4 times and lost his room key twice (he doesn't know where it is right now). Overall I like him. He has a testimony and understands the scriptures.  He is deathly allergic to ALL nuts, he can not have any melons, there are three fruits he can eat, he is allergic to grass, trees, most plants, and any animal even if it doesn't shed. The only pet he has ever had was a bat and his sister killed it with a rock only a week after he got it. His dad is in the army/airforce and so he has lived in 14 different states and 2 countries. He runs our room like an army camp. He marks off when we do our chores and how well we do them, he also takes 10 minuets each day to transfer the mission schedule over to his note pad. He really is a loving person, but It does bother me a little that he hates running!  This weekend he got a virus in his lungs and so we missed a session of conference while we were at the hospital. 

    Conference was the most fantastic experience! We got to watch the conference sessions in the gym where the MTC had two MASSIVE projectors set up to display it on the wall. I have no idea who gave the best talk they were

 all fantastic!!

    The other companionship in our room are elders Sm and Sw. Sm is from Texas and is a very cool missionary! He has an awesome testimony that fills the room with the spirit even through his thick Texan accent! Sw is kinda shy. I didn't realize how much slang I have picked up from Josh, Hunter, Matt, Ben, Jeff, and Jacob. I said HAAAAMARABI! and I just got blank stares. Elder Sm however has listened to a lot of music that I have and we make weird music jokes. Often he just quotes rap songs from Drake or Weezy. I really do like my Missionary Colleagues. Besides their quirks they are good people and just want to serve! And they aren't as crazy as some of the other missionaries in our zone. :) For instance the Australians! whenever we are outside they yell  "AUZIE AUZIE AUZIE" and other Australians on campus will answer their call. The British guys sang how much wood could a wood chuck chuck in the shower today and quoted monty python and to hear it in a British accent is pretty hilarious!
    French is coming along nicely! I am learning slowly and day three we had to give a thirty minute lesson in French. My incredibly broken french some how got us by; I have however memorized the Joseph Smith first vision and the missionary motto along with some powerful sentences. Our investigator asked us a question about the priesthood and how the prophet receives revelation so we get to explain that to her tomorrow! Our district is nice. Two of the missionaries have taken 3-4 years of French and one sister lived in France for a year. The rest of us had never heard French spoken before :) I Love being in the MTC and just enjoy working. Life is simple and yet super High Stress. We really don't have a lot of free time to think and do other things! And when we are given study time we are expected to study French. Its funny though because our zone leader interrupts us and flirts with the sisters in our district and it is REALLY annoying! He even sang them a song acapella the other day. Great Stuff. I really do enjoy being here! I love the letters that I have received from home and the package! They brighten my day and take some of the stress off :) Until next Tuesday!

Love,  

    Elder Keller.

I don't know why half of the letter is centered in the middle, it won't let me change it.  So here it is.

MTC

 Had to throw this picture in from last week when Grant went fishing with Troy and his brothers.  Grant loved spending time with his Grandpa and uncles.  And as he shared in his sacrament talk he had the opportunity to share the first discussion with one of the guides that was helping them.  What a great experiences before heading out into the mission field.  Thanks Grandpa K for giving him the opportunity to teach.  Loved it.

 The morning before leaving the kids all said their good-byes and gave him hugs.  He then changed and went on a last run with his friend Jacob who was also going into the MTC in the afternoon.  He showered and changed back into the suit and we headed down to Provo.  We stopped for some euros and lunch.  Took a few pictures out side the MTC and then dropped him off on the curb.  I couldn't believe the amount of cars and people that wrapped around the building to drop missionaries off.  We have been so excited for Grant and his decision to serve a mission, but it was still very tender to watch him walk away.  It takes a little piece of your heart, even though we know what a great missionary he will be.

So we decided to drive up the canyon after we dropped him off and we headed up through Aspen Grove and it began to snow on us.  Crazy, snow on Oct 1.  It was beautiful falling among all of the yellow aspens.  So I had to take some pictures it was so lovely.  Grant would appreciate a couple of these shots even if I took them with my auto focus instead of manual : )  Good Luck Grant on your next two years.  Stay close to the Savior and you will do much good.  Love you dearly.