One last chance 6-15-15

Dear family and friends,

                      Thank you all for the wonderful emails! I have had a fantastic week...also a very busy week! It seems like the Lord is really helping me to stay busy! We are seeing a lot of great successes. We have officially put the Hinton Boys on date for the 4th of July weekend! Or possibly July 3rd (we are going to work out the extra details later). Those two boys are so prepared to be baptized. One is about 12 and the other is about 10. They know so much more than I did at their age! They are super ready to be baptized. It's now just a matter of making it happen! We are also helping out our investigator Jason! He is doing so much better now. We have truly seen a lot of progression with him over the past couple weeks. He is making a lot of great changes in his life, and we are helping him see those changes. Elder Mitchell and I can both tell he is enjoying this Gospel. It seems like Service is really taking a toll on us. I would say the Lord has been filling those "blank" hours of the day with awesome service opportunities! This upcoming week we have a pretty packed schedule as well. Tuesday is the only free day we have in the area. Wednesday we will weekly plan, and probably end up helping people move. Thursday we will be out in Britton, SD to help a member move. Friday we will be up in Jamestown for District Meeting all day. And Saturday we will be out in Eureka doing work. So this week is going to fly by! It is amazing how fast the mission has gone. Yesterday I was pondering about my time in the MTC and that feels like Yesterday. But when I really think about it that was a LONG time ago! I am happily working to the finish! I am excited to see you all next week! That is still weird for me to say. It doesn't feel real to me. But I look forward to being back in Salt Lake, and see all the family again! I love you all and have a great week!

Love, Elder Barber 

Finishing fast 6-8-15

Dear family and friends,

                  What a great week it has been. We are diligently working up here in Aberdeen! It seems to me like each week is a blur, and they all mesh together very well. This morning I actually woke up and the comforting thought came to me saying "Get up, it's P-Day!" and in that moment I thought to myself "Are you serious? Again?" Right now it just feels like P-Day happens, then a crazy fast blur of a week, and then P-Day again! We are starting to weed out a lot of investigators. It seems like we have just dropped a lot of investigators this week. Some of them were trying to convert us to there religion. You could say it didn't work out the way they were hoping. I think one of the biggest successes this past week is working with the Karen Members. I have absolutely grown to love them this transfer. Last transfer it was kind of hard because I didn't know how to communicate with them. But since the tragedy they have had we have all become very close knit with them. To me it is almost like being with my own family when I am gathered with them. The Father of the Family's name is Eh Poe. I absolutely love Eh Poe. A part of me wishes I could just take Eh Poe and his whole family with me when I come home. Every time I am around Eh Poe you can just feel the goodness he has. His kindness and his love for his family just radiates off of him. I will definitely miss the Karen families I am privileged to serve with. We also were able to get the Hinton boys on date for the 4th of July weekend. I wont be here at the time, but I am so excited for them! This past week I had my last Zone Training Meeting. That was very weird for me to think about. It was also very hard to take the trainings seriously being so close to the end. But Elder Mitchell and I are trying to apply as much as we can from them. This upcoming week I will also be going on my last exchange of the mission. I will be with Elder Carter (who is currently serving in Valley City, ND) down here in Aberdeen. It is weird to be finishing a mission. It is weird to think it is all coming to an end, but I am so excited for the future and everything it holds. I love you all and have a great week!

Love, Elder Barber     

Welcome June. 6-1-15

Dear family and friends,

                      Thank you for all of your letters and support! I really do appreciate it! I have heard word about Elder L. Tom Perry. I didn't find out until Sunday. Elder Mitchell and I were up at the Sacrament table and we were having Ward Conference. When they did the sustaining of Church Officers President Olson said "as we all know L. Tom Perry passed away yesterday." Elder Mitchell and I looked at each other like "we didn't hear this yet." I guess this confirms that missionaries are 100% out of the loop on everything (including news in the church.) I am thankful for Elder Perry and his great example. I loved his strong and very bold testimony of the Savior Jesus Christ. I will never forget the multiple occasions of meeting Elder Perry. He is the only apostle I have ever met and it seemed like I ran into him everywhere. I still remember the time he held the door for me at the GAP at the Park City Outlets. I will never forget Elder L. Tom Perry. Well June has officially arrived! I am sad to see the mission ending so soon. I love Aberdeen! I am thankful to be ending my mission in this area. It is definitely helping me fulfill the vision I always had for my mission. I absolutely love the members here, and I love the work load. I have never taught this much in my mission! I also have never had this much fun with all the people I teach. We are currently teaching a lady named Cheryl. I think she has some kind of mental disability, but she is accountable enough to live on her own. Elder Mitchell and I have truly grown to love Cheryl. Ever since we began teaching her she has called me "Urban." I really don't know where she got that name from! She always says to me "Alright Urban you got the prayer, fire away!" And just to mess with Elder Mitchell I told Cheryl that his name is "Perry" and that name has stuck ever since. So now she calls us Urban and Perry. We love our visits with Cheryl she's funny. Also we had a Karen Investigator pass away. His name is Noe Noe (I may have mentioned this in the last letter.) But we got to attend his funeral this past week. I had the opportunity to say the opening prayer of the funeral. That was a hard funeral to go to for us. I wasn't amazingly close with Noe Noe but it was still hard to watch his young wife Say Htoo Paw (who is now a single mother) say her final goodbye to him. It was one of those wet eye moments for sure. But we are still visiting them and testifying strongly of the Plan of Salvation. And right now Say Htoo Paw is planning on having his work done so they can be sealed in the Bismarck Temple. I also am trying to learn a Karen tracting approach. It seems to work! Except all of the Karen people we tract into think I speak Karen. I don't know if they realize I am reading it off of my planner. So at least I can communicate to them who we are and then I ask them in Karen "can we come inside and teach you?" And usually they try to talk to me in Karen but it usually ends with them shaking their head yes or no. Well we will keep working hard out here in Aberdeen! I love you all and have a great week! 

Elder Barber

One more month. 5-26-15

Dear Family and Friends,

                   It has been an awesome week! I can't believe today is my 23 month mark out of 24. That absolutely blows my mind. I never thought I would be able to say that, but the day is here. We had such a sweet Zone Conference! It is always a trip to get to Fargo from Aberdeen. It is a total three hour drive one way. It was such a beautiful drive up on Wednesday. There was a sweet lake that I really enjoyed driving next to. It's called Buffalo Lake, SD. For some reason it was totally beautiful the day we were driving through. But on the way back it was cloudy so it wasn't as beautiful on the way back. But we had an awesome Zone Conference. The spirit was VERY STRONG. Like after the meeting I could feel the spirit burning in my heart for the rest of the day. It was crazy. I got to give my "final testimony" to my fellow missionaries. I don't know why but I was so nervous to get up and bear my testimony. I kept thinking to myself "this is the last testimony I get to bear to my fellow missionaries." But I prayed that I would be able to loose my nerves, and bear a strong testimony. And when I got up I was totally fine and I felt like it went over wonderfully. I got to go on exchanges with Elder Eckley in Fargo for a couple of days. It was awesome to be serving in the Zone Leader position again! It totally brought me back for a couple of days. It was good to spend time with Elder Eckley. He goes home one transfer after I do. So it was good to talk to someone who is in the same boat as I. But we had a great teaching week this past week! So far we have hit 22 lessons each week! The Lord is truly blessing us! This week will fly by. And we have another trip to Fargo on Friday June 5th for my last Zone Training Meeting. It is crazy how fast it will be from right now to then. But I love the work pace in this area. It truly is helping me finish my mission the way I have always wanted to. Well I love you all, and I hope you have a great week!

Elder Barber