Aug. 12 2014

Didn't mean to catch him without his usual smile. But Joel just got back from Cabo with his family. We both know that prayer is able to overcome some of life's greatest challenges!

From Turlock CA, to Parker CO, to Phoenix AZ. — with Paige Morley Baker, Elder Boyd Haskell and Joel 

I love these goons. Pat and Taylor are the coolest. Look out for your families, because the matter a ton!

From Turlock CA, to Parker CO, to Phoenix AZ. — with Elder Boyd Haskell, Paige Morley Baker and Patrick 

I love these goons. Pat and Taylor are the coolest. Look out for your families, because the matter a ton!

From Turlock CA, to Parker CO, to Phoenix AZ. — with Elder Boyd Haskell, Paige Morley Baker and 

I love these goons. Pat and Taylor are the coolest. Look out for your families, because the matter a ton!

From Turlock CA, to Parker CO, to Phoenix AZ. — with Elder Boyd Haskell, Paige Morley Baker and Patrick 

From Turlock CA, to Parker CO, to Phoenix AZ. — with Paige Morley Baker, Elder Boyd Haskell and Nick 

Alfredo Garcia at temple

Temple night. — with Elder Boyd Haskell, Alfredo Garcia and Damien Garcia at Gilbert Arizona Temple.

How can you not want to just love these guys?! Holden told us today that he wants his "mom, dad, sister, brothers, and dog" all to be with him in heaven! He then taught us all about the temple! I love them too much!

From Sherwood OR, to Phoenix AZ. — with Elder Boyd Haskell, Lisa , Golden Boy, Parky, Burke, B and Cal.

Aug.5,2014

Transfers are approaching on the 13th this month. 

 Elder Baker and I are responsible for our district, four of us elders and

four sisters. We do random iPad checks (for obedience purposes, we

don't own the iPads and therefore have to keep them free from personal

stuff, ie selfies, etc.) 

Love,

Boyd

So good to catch up with Joel! It's easy to fall apart with friends so you've got to make sure to keep up those relationships.
Got to talking about prayer. Reminded me of this line from a hymn, "Prayer will change the night to day."

From Turlock CA, to Parker CO, to Phoenix AZ. — with Bailey Mae Baker, Elder Boyd Haskell and Joel Carlson.

Post by Bud Parker.

One of the more motivating videos I have seen in a while. This reminds me a lot of something we call the Warrior Ethos, which is "I will always place the mission first! I will never accept defeat! I will never quit! I will never leave a fallen comrade!" If we tell ourselves the only option is victory and we plan accurately to get ourselves there, we will not, we cannot fail. Also reminds me of motivation I got from my Drill Sergeants during my training with the U.S. Army, and from mentors since then. I love the part where he talks about turning pain into strength. Super powerful. Makes me want to re-up! Hooah!

7.29.14

Today marks the beginning of week four with bedbugs. I think I am just going to let them eat me. I am covered with bites from my ankles to my neck, and I have a single bite on each ear. I was scratching the other day and as soon as I was satisfied with one area, another would begin to itch, and I spent a good five minutes doing that before I just stopped caring. This sucks. But tonight the other elders and I are going to go throw my mattress into the Salt River and burn it, which sounds impossible, but it's not because there's no river in the Salt River. It's bone dry. It shows up blue on maps and stuff, but there's not actually water there. Back in the day I guess there were some prisoners in the federal prison up north of Tempe and they broke out. Their plan was to get to the river, where they would steal a boat and escape to Mexico. Not the worst plan, but when they got to the river and realized 1.) there were no boats because 2.) there's no water, they just gave up and walked all the way back to the prison and turned themselves in. It was also June, so they probably would have died outside. Makes me wonder how all the homeless people survive the summers. It's been about 115 every day and even at the coolest part of the night it's still 95 degrees. This is insane.

But yeah,
Elder Haskell the Younger

Me and my compa teaching skype lessons from out apartment this week.

Who needs slacks?

I also met brother and sister Wolfe in the Gilbert temple. Apparently

they live in Maricopa,  Supercool.

Elder Morley Peebles Baker I love this kid. Once a Hilmar kid, always one. Got to talk about praying to God like we would to our Dad. "Spoke to God like he was talkin to a friend And I said, Son, now whered you learn to pray like that? He said, Ive been watching you, dad aint that cool?... See More — with Bob Baker, Elder Boyd Haskell and Manuel Michael Bettencourt. LikeLike · · Share · July 24 near Phoenix, AZ
 
Comment from Sis. Sorrell....Four of the most awesome gentlemen that I know. I sure love these guys. So honored to have had the opportunity to attend the temple with them, my hubby, my son Avery and be there for Brother Salisbury's day. — with Elder Morley Peebles Baker, Elder Boyd Haskell, Elder Kirk Rohrbacher and Elder Rustin Babcock at Gilbert Arizona Temple.

 
Love ya Morley's! From Sherwood OR to Phoenix AZ — with Elder Boyd Haskell, Lisa Draper Morley and Burke Morley.

7.22.14

I've endured a week of bedbugs with no solution that worked only to discover twenty minutes ago that we have a bedbug spray in our cleaning supplies. So dumb.
I really suck at soccer. One zone leader is from Argentina, and the other from Guatemala, and they're ridiculously good. They make the Mexicans look like white people. We get trounced.
My companion and I are the new iPad tech support missionaries, and we just rolled out a new software for the restrictive profiles that keep our iPads from being regular iPads, and so we've bother been on the phone for about four hours a day this last week, every day, trying to help two hundred and twenty three missionaries who don't know what they're doing (or think they DO know what they're doing and don't) update their iPads. It's been a trip.
We went to a Mexican wedding for a couple named Arnoldo and Rita. They're all Spanish, and we taught them for a few weeks, Rita is a member and Arnoldo got married to her and then baptized. It was super cool! We have another set of elders in the Spanish ward with us along win five sister missionaries. I'll add the pictures.
That's about it. It's about 115-119 degrees every day now...we're on bikes mostly. It's freaking hot. My Spanish is better. I prayed for the first time in Spanish early last week. Probably one of the most spiritual experiences of my mission. We teach every investigator how to pray, and it's easy right? Yeah now do it in a language you thought you knew but really don't. Talk about feeling inadequate. It was wonderful because I got to feel like my investigators do when we as them to pray. I got to switch places with them for a few moments, and I felt God's love, not the strongest I've ever felt it, but I'll never forget that moment...

That's the wrap. Still in Maryvale.


Arnoldo and Rita were married this last weekend! Arnoldo is going to be baptized in a week! Such a happy day. — with Elder Francisco Macalupú, Elder Jordan Norton, Elder Boyd Haskell, Hermana Claudia Guadalupe Acosta, Hermana Katie Bryant and Sister-Andraya Funke.
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Benjamin Moreno muchas felicidades Elderes y hermanas, por sus logros!!
See Translation

Brian Alexander

Paige Morley Baker

Bob Baker

Biviy Sarahy

Elder Francisco Macalupú

Sister-Andraya Funke

Hermana Katie Bryant

Hermana Claudia Guadalupe Acosta

Elder Jordan Norton

7/19/14

Post by Elder Boyd Haskell.

July 15th

Post by Elder Boyd Haskell.

Post by Elder Boyd Haskell.

July 13, 2014

Pride. It always comes down to pride. People only accept help. I, for one, am a pretty proud person. I don't like accepting help because it makes me feel inferior, which is dumb, but yeah. That's how people go less active. Maybe they get more offended because they already know they're spiritually insufficient and they don't like the reminder. We have a recent convert, Jamie, who is struggling still with the word of wisdom. mostly coffee, occasionally alcohol. She made the argument of "well, whats one cup of coffee. that won't keep me out of the celestial kingdom." To which I rebutted, "Jamie, the real question is are YOU going to let ONE CUP of coffee keep you out of the celestial kingdom?" Then we talked about Olympic sprinting, and how almost every runner trains to a certain degree of fitness, and then it comes down to less than half a second between first place and fourth place. If we liken that to the three kingdoms of glory, how does the gold medalist differ from the silver medalist? He must have done SOMETHING better than the silver medalist, right? Well, even if the gold medalist and the silver medalist are only a tenth of a second apart, one still gets gold and one still gets silver.

The cool thing is we get to choose if we are going to win or not, everyday when we wake up at 0630 to excessive, as we study and go and teach. As we are obedient to the commandments of God on a one-day-at-a-time basis, it becomes easy. On paper, but thats where enduring to the end comes in...


Looking forward to the 21st. we have a baptism. Also, my companion is getting emergency transferred. So I get a new companion in about an hour. Woo.

Elder Haskell the Younger

Post by Elder Boyd Haskell.

Post by Elder Boyd Haskell.

Post by Elder Boyd Haskell.

July 4

Post by Elder Boyd Haskell.

Post by Elder Boyd Haskell.

Post by Elder Boyd Haskell.

June 29th

still alive. doing work. learning spanish and chinese. thanks for the package, but i am sending the card game back to you, we are not allowed to play games anymore, so...kind of lame, but obedience and all.. oh yeah we had a baptism on the 21st. such an awesome dude. #likeaboss

Post by Elder Boyd Haskell.

June 12

There is nothing more important in this life (after serving a mission) than being a father. There are some great quotes in the Gospel Library App under the Family section. the book is called 'A Parent's Guide' Super cool. Makes me want to be a dad. "in proper courtship the partners must recognize that their first responsibilities are to encourage each other in righteous behavior and to sustain and support each other in righteous desires and ambitions. the young man will do anything to protect the young lady's purity. Each partner will UNSELFISHLY seek the best for the other while they learn to know each other well." So basically being a father requires a good husband, and being a good husband starts way before you get married. heavenly father's purpose is to "bring to pass the immortality and eternal life" of all his children. There is so much potential there! In our attempts to fulfill these roles properly, we thankfully have perfect role models! Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ. They ultimate goal of a man or boy is to become an effective husband and father, and the ultimate goal of a woman or girl is to become an effective wife and mother. notice that i said 'man or boy' and 'woman and girl'; again this all starts before the fact. PREPARATION IS EVERYTHING. Now just ask some questions and answer them. :) How do Heavenly Father and Christ fulfill these roles? What examples do we see in their relationship? How do they act in relation to us? You can contrast this with Satan's attitude, whose purpose is to destroy the human family. Moses 4:1, 2 Nephi 2:18, Moses 4:29-33. GET RID OF THE "WHATS IN IT FOR ME" ATTITUDE. Guess what fellas? Its not about you! Life is about sacrifice! We give things up so we can be better sons and daughters of God! You want to put off having kids and travel the world, partying on the beach with your homies? Sure you can do that but you're hindering your eternal progression. You are literally delaying opportunities for spirits to gain mortal bodies. Again, life isn't about us! Its about love for other people. Children and others are our spirit brothers and sisters. This is important. The lord asked Cain, "Where is thy brother?" Cain said, "Am I my brother's keeper?" Our answer must be a resounding yes! As parents, we become responsible for some of our younger brothers and sisters, and we are their keepers. The Lord has entrusted us with His children for a very limited amount of time to teach them true principles and govern in righteousness over them, until they are able to govern themselves. Teach children the eternal roles of men and women, and to glory in their respective sexes. There are abundant blessings and tremendous responsibilities given to both genders and both are critical in raising future children. 1 Corinthians 1:11. As parents, men and women are given the responsibility of teaching your children to fulfill faithfully the roles of eternal mothers and fathers that the Lord has promised to those who are faithful. Always remember that your children are your brothers and sisters, given into your care. Teach by example and precept, what a righteous parent is, teach the value of their eternal roles as men and women, and teach them to use their procreative powers within the bounds the Lord has set. We can choose on a daily basis to follow God, or to follow Satan. Being a parent can bring true joy. Granted, I don't know any of this from experience, but the Holy Ghost has manifested to me that this is true. I never wanted kids until probably last week when I started reading this. For real.

Post by Elder Boyd Haskell.

June 7

Pride. It always comes down to pride. People only accept help. I, for one, am a pretty proud person. I don't like accepting help because it makes me feel inferior, which is dumb, but yeah. That's how people go less active. Maybe they get more offended because they already know they're spiritually insufficient and they don't like the reminder. We have a recent convert, Jamie, who is struggling still with the word of wisdom. mostly coffee, occasionally alcohol. She made the argument of "well, whats one cup of coffee. that won't keep me out of the celestial kingdom." To which I rebutted, "Jamie, the real question is are YOU going to let ONE CUP of coffee keep you out of the celestial kingdom?" Then we talked about Olympic sprinting, and how almost every runner trains to a certain degree of fitness, and then it comes down to less than half a second between first place and fourth place. If we liken that to the three kingdoms of glory, how does the gold medalist differ from the silver medalist? He must have done SOMETHING better than the silver medalist, right? Well, even if the gold medalist and the silver medalist are only a tenth of a second apart, one still gets gold and one still gets silver. The cool thing is we get to choose if we are going to win or not, everyday when we wake up at 0630 to excessive, as we study and go and teach. As we are obedient to the commandments of God on a one-day-at-a-time basis, it becomes easy. On paper, but thats where enduring to the end comes in... Looking forward to the 21st. we have a baptism. Also, my companion is getting emergency transferred because someone somewhere else in the mission screwed up and he gets to babysit, and I get the other problem-child. Yay babysitting. So I get a new companion in about an hour. Woo. Elder Haskell the Younger

Post by Elder Boyd Haskell.

Post by Elder Boyd Haskell.

Post by Elder Boyd Haskell.

Post by Elder Boyd Haskell.

May 29th 2014

In the Army we have our own set of recitations to do in the morning, and they are powerful pieces of text, just like our missionary ones. They remind us of who we are, and they keep the importance of our positions in the front of our minds. I have been thinking of this over the last week, and I wrote 'The Creed of the LDS Missionary', based off of the Soldier's Creed. They share similar traits. I think you would appreciate them both.

The Soldier's Creed:
I am an American Soldier. I am a warrior and a member of a team. I serve the people of the United States and live the Army Values. I will always place the mission first. I will never accept defeat. I will never quit. I will never leave a fallen comrade. I am disciplined, physically and mentally tough, trained and proficient in my warrior tasks and drills. I always maintain my arms, my equipment and my self. I am an expert and I am proffessional. I stand ready to deploy, engage, and destroy the enemies of the United States of America, in close combat. I am a guardian of freedom and the American way of life. I am an American soldier.

This creed is ingrained into every basic training graduate. Every soldier knows this and strives to live this creed. It is part of the doctrine of the Army.

The Missionary's Creed:
I am an LDS Missionary. I serve the people of the Arizona Tempe Mission and live the Doctrine of Christ. I am a son/daughter of Helaman, a warrior of truth and righteousness. I will always place the mission first. I will never accept defeat. I will never quit. I will never leave a comrade fallen. I am disciplined, a disciple of Jesus Christ, trained and proficient in my doctrine and dedication to this work. I always maintain the spirituality of my investigators, my companion, and my self. I stand ready to be a witness of Christ in all things and in all places, to be a rock and a standard for the values of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Our world is at war. "We wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places". I am a warrior. I will not waver, nor will I falter under the persecutions of men. I am a guardian of the human family and the restored gospel. I am an LDS Missionary.

Just thought I'd share,
Elder Haskell

Post by Elder Boyd Haskell.

February 27th, 2014

Transferred to the McClintock YSA ward! Ready to do work with Elder Bryce Latimer!! Also, if you're in the ward, we spend a lot of time at the institute building, so if you see two missionaries that look lost it's probably us.

Feb 17th

It's been kind of a crazy week.  I haven't had a whole lot of down time, which is gopod, I suppose, but I am tired.  I'me made a list of improtant things that happened during the week so I have something to remember to write about.
Story #1
We're baptizing a kid on Friday.  He's super cool and thinks like he's in his mid-20's.  When he's only 13.  Anyways,m his step-dad started listening to our discussions and started participating a little.  We're thinking hey cool!  His dad wants to hear about the gospel.  THEN we learned that he was and ANTI!!! WhAAAT!!!  Yep.  Those guys who stand outside the temple with signs and bullhorns?  This guy.. CRAP! Then, revelation! We took him to the temple open house with (his son) and it was super fantastic!  They both had a super spiritual experience and they both committed to baptism.  We'll see how that goes!  I'll likely get transferred this month. We'll see.  I've been in the same area for 12 weeks now, so maybe I'll get shipped to Yuma or Maricopa.  Then our zoned leaders have been in the same area for eight months... so... yeah.  We'll see.

Story #2
We were visiting a sister who is an avid stamp collector.  We helped her move eight or ten huge crates of stamps that were covered in this black dusty stuff!  I thought it was mouse poop or something, but then I  noticed the egg sacs.. They were black widow eggs!  and the insides of the crates were covered with HUGE black widows!  I HATE SPIDERS!!! To make matters worse, [there were a lot of ]feral cats, and they're zooming and hissing and fighting, (and mating) all over the place!....And there is an lot of juice in a black widow.  We gooshed bunches of them.  That's all for this week!

--Elder Haskell

Feb 14th

.... The weather in Chandler/Mesa/Gilbert--75° and sunny... its a really rough winter.  I almost threw out my back because I was shoveling SUNSHINE!!!
 I saw show choir pics on Fbook and I realized I haven't been to Stars On Stage in  a looong time... Did Millage show up?
 ...The Importance of Being Earnest is a FANTASTIC play!  We analyized [it alot] in AP LIT, probably my favorite work we went over.  I'm bummed I won't be able to see it, but send me pictures.

We ran into some anti-guy the other day.. He was (maybe) 16, but he was getting into his Jeep he clipped off a Nazi Salute and yelled [at us].  We stopped of course...A stupor of thought hit him like a freight train.  It was awesome... I've not seen that before...

We've had all our lessons for yesterday and the day before fall through and have had 2 investigators fall off date for baptism.  So it's been a rough couple of days. But all in all we're doing good.  We've radically changed the way we do missionary work.. We're training the Stake President and the bishops from our wards tomorrow.  Its a complete overhaul of the missionary/bishop/members relationship.  I'll know more how to describe it tomorrow. But from what the sone leaders tell us, its sweet!

Elder Haskell

Feb. 7th--Got the opportunity to go through the Gilbert Temple open house yesterday; it was amazing! What a beautiful (and truly massive) building dedicated to the Lord! Can't wait until the dedication.

Transfers this week!

I moved this last transfer. My address is now 950 West Obispo, Mesa AZ 85202

12.30.14

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There's this thing here in Mesa that they do for Christmas called the Christmas Lights at the Mesa Temple! Its like 350,000 Christmas lights and there were concerts by college choirs and stuff every night from 1 Dec to 25 Dec. It was sooooo SOOOO cool! We get to go there once with an investigator, so we capitalized on it and went out to ice cream afterwards at a place called SubZero. Apparently they're a Utah-based ice cream chain that uses liquid nitrogen to make the ice cream right in front of you. They put all the ice cream and flavors and syrups and toppings into this aluminum bowl as liquid and mix it all up and then hold it in liquid nitrogen and it freezes (of course) and its super duper good. Also, its a gluttonous amount of ice cream that practically requires repentance. Its really good. I asked if I could just take one of their nitrogen tanks, but they said no :(

Need help with your car?  Just ask those two guys in suits walking or riding around town.  They can help!

Post by Elder Boyd Haskell.