9/28/15

What up everyone!

This week has been great! We had a zone conference that my neighbor Brother Ott was at so that was solid!

This week we stunk on lessons. 6. Yikes. But we did have a lot of meetings this week. Thanks to the 40 day fast our ward is doing, we've been getting a lot of meals and now these families have been giving us groceries too!! 5 different families gave us food! It's been such a blessing because I ain't got no money on my card until recently when I got repaid. Not the point. It's crazy to see the blessing flow onto us.

This week the plan is to work like the second coming is in a month. We're going to start hitting all the people that have talked to missionaries in the past and it'll be awesome. I just want to work hard. I don't enjoy sitting around very much lol. But things will get picked up for sure. I'm excited, we have some solid investigators. One lady and her daughter are awesome. They just seem prepared in their lives for the gospel and the daughter who is in 7 th grade is super spiritual. It's awesome to see a child be so close to God/Jesus. Another lady we visited in Wilkinsburg (don't google it mom) also seemed very receptive to the message we shared. Angie we are still giving space. Nick (Debbie's friend) is reading the Book of Mormon and is enjoying it, he doesn't know he's being converted really haha we try to be friends first because that's the only way he'd ever change. Nick is awesome, he is a DJ apparently. And this week we'll finally get to meet with Armetta who is such a sweet and sharp old lady. She loves that we focus on the family so much, so the plan of salvation will be a sweet lesson for her. I'm excited for this week! And in the words of Big Black. DO WORK SON.

-Elder Simmons

Shout out to Uncle Dan with the best letter of the week award. Creative, comical with no plot line. Made my day.

A video from my new upcoming album "Yinzed - Pittsburgh Harmonica Hymnals".

9/21/15

This week has been pretty good! We met with a lot of members this week because the Ward is doing a 40 day fast and they're encouraged to feed us the day they fast. Fine by me! A highlight of the week was the general authority visit, Elder Stanfill of the 70 visited us. He's a really cool guy.

Half of the mission!

Representing Timpanogos High School in Pittsburgh!

I enjoy talking to all the kind people that are here in Pittsburgh. There is always some crazies that are entertaining. Roger, a homeless guy we talk to all the time told us a weird story about a troll and a guy who just likes money..idk but it was interesting. In general people are very kind to us. There's always the few who think they know what we believe and are completely wrong. But what can you do?

Alot of the days I'm super tired. Saturday was the worst/best day. A lady named Lindsay asked us to help move some furniture. She shows up with a full U-haul. Filled with furniture. A table and four chairs, two dressers, an entertainment center, two sofa type chairs, a big old TV, and one giant really heavy couch. This couch was at least 200 lbs. only Gille and I were there to help, oh and did I mention that she lives on the THIRD FLOOR? And this stair case was small and windy. It took us over a half hour to get that thing up there. Half way through I felt the symptoms of passing out so we had to take a break. At one point I was underneath the couch and thought if my muscles give in..I'll probably be crushed and die. But here I am, with only slight back soreness. That was one of the hardest things I've had to do In a half hour span.

Anyways this week was fun, try to share the gospel with someone this week. You can decide to change someone's life by getting out of your comfort zone and speaking up!

Do work son

Elder Simmons

Possible Harmonica Album Cover Photo!

More Sweet Graffiti.

At PNC part for a Pirates baseball game.

Pirates Baseball Game

Brad (AKA Mr. Baseball) was able to go to a Pittsburgh Pirates baseball game with his companion. He made friends with the fans in front of him and borrowed their flag!

Videos from August and September 2015

With the other rain refugees in the bus stop

Running in the rain to Kevin's house.

I was told I'd get a dollar if I kicked a pigeon. I didn't kick any but chased them around instead.

Sneaking a Book of Mormon into a sleeping homeless man's box!

When Linda calls you get rid of that phone!

Caught in the rain under a tree.

Just missed recording loud thunder!

Still listening to thunder as we walk.

Bacon!

9/14/15

This week has been awesome! We worked hard this week, and working hard to me is walking around talking and teaching people. This week is what we got to do. We have like 6 investigators now and we got the investigator back who heard some things that we did like children sacrifice.. Oh no. She's learned too much.

I find it humorous when people tell us what we believe, a car pulled up to us one day and the guy said we were in a cult that was started by aliens. Thanks pal! There's some characters here that's for sure. This week most people we talked to were super nice, we pave had multiple instances a day where cars honk and wave at us and quite a few times people have stopped and told us nice things. This may be normal In Utah but this is Pittsburgh, so it's been really cool to have happen.

We've done a lot of walking and quite a few hospital visits which are enjoyable and nerve racking sometimes. But I've given two blessings and the first guys' blessing helped him s lot and his surgery went really well. The other guy is worse and his wife is sick now. Whoops?

Sweet art all over the place.

I enjoy talking to happy people. That's always fun, it's a lot like retail. You have to have the mindset that this is my space and theses people need/are going to hear from me. So send your kids to retail is the lesson from this story. I enjoy being able to teach people. It's always the most touching when someone tells me that I'm answering their prayers. One day, as we were walking by all the colleges with all the hundreds of students, Gille was on the phone and I walked straight over to this old black guy and we had a great conversation about Jesus and he was impressed that I was so young compared to all the bad youth of my age. And he said I was a blessing just because I talked to him that day. As he was hopping on the bus I gave him a BOM and our number. We've had a lot of great talks with people, and even tho so far they haven't really came out to be anything I like being able to plant a good seed with these awesome people. I like being out and about so we can talk to people. Pittsburgh has the worst member to nonmember ratio out there. We've got so much work to do here so I like being out in it. Makes sense right?

Probably my favorite day this week was Tuesday. Elder Masina and I were on exchanges together and we decided to go to an area and talk to members, less actives, it didn't matter. As we were walking a car parked in front of us and a guy came out and handed Masina an umbrella, he said you're going to need this later. We were like what the.. Are you a member? No I'm a catholic but you're going to need this. It was brand new still in the plastic. Not ten minutes later It started dumping on us. It was insane rain. We were stranded under a tree, Masina said were going to start knocking doors till someone let us in. So we started running house to house and no one was home. Then we saw a lady running her groceries in her house. She let us in and we helped with the bags. We quickly realized we couldn't stay there because there was no other male present besides her shakey dog. As we were getting to leave she opened up to us about her life and Masina related to her and it was touching. We'll be visiting her again this week. As we left the rain stopped. So we kept on walking to a members house to drop by. As we got to the front door it started up again. So we ran up the steps and rang the bell. The assumed member let us in quickly and it started pouring like crazy. Turns out the member had moved and we said well, who you are you!? It was funny. Nick was a super nice guy he's a catholic and his wife Presbyterian, but she wasn't home. Anyways we had an awesome discussion on our religions, his hang up on our gospel is the priesthood leaving the earth. He's done his research on popes and fathers and saints. But there's a lot of things we agreed on. We taught him the restoration. He said it would be great for us to come over again. We have to structure what we teach as a discussion, not a lesson in the future because he doesn't want lessons but good talking. Next time I want to talk about the plan of salvation with him. That would be good.

As we left the rain once again stopped, and as the bus was coming it started picking up a little bit again. It was super cool to see the power of God directing us through the weather. That night we had dinner at Debbie's house. She's a talker. She's awesome but her house is well...bad #buginfested but we're teaching her neighbor named Nick (two Nicks in one day). He opened up and told us about his crazy life. He has a wife and three kids and two of them died in a fire. Then his wife left him. It was super emotional and I was about to cry. But we were all bearing testimony and the spirit was "kickin" as Debbie put it. He's going to listen to the Book of Mormon which is awesome. We're converting him without him even realizing it. Muahahaha. That was a good day even with cockroaches crawling on me (enjoy that image mom) I've really enjoyed this week. And tomorrow is the Pirates baseball game! Woohoo! It's at 1:30 ET so 11 am Utah. Hopefully we get On TV, that would make my day also to catch a foul ball. I might fast for it to happen. lol. Remember kids, God made you special. And he loves you very much!

Elder Simmons

Before and after we bought lights for our apartment.

There are crazy steps in this city.

The new Book of Mormon reading I'm doing. It's been awesome to be able to mark things. I highly suggest it.

When you buy PopTarts without the frosting.

Donut shop. I got Oreo cheesecake, birthday cake and maple with bacon.

9/7/15

Another week down, it's been a interesting week. Things have slowed down considerably. We lost our two awesome investigators Angie and Mittie. That has been rough bc they were so ready except their problems with smoking. Dangers. We did get to go to the temple on Friday. That was awesome, it was a 4 hour drive there, to the Columbus temple. but we made it for the 11 am session. We went because a newly active member sister Page, was to get sealed forever to her husband, who died. No only did she get to be sealed to her husband, but she had her parents sealed to each other, her grandparents sealed to each other, her children sealed to her-both of which died before the age of 1- and lastly sealed her to her parents. It was a really special time for everyone there. She didn't know all of it was going to happen so she was filled with the spirit.

It was a great trip. Except for the drive back. Oh boy. With our bishop driving we almost died like 5 times while trying to sleep in the full van, with no air conditioning. At one point had to slam on the brakes and three cars behind us went in to the grass to our left while we went into the other lane. It was crazy.

On Saturday we got to baptize Rob! That was really cool to be there for, the spirit was super strong. On Sunday I confirmed him during sacrament meeting. That was intimidating but it was a super awesome experience to be able to give him the Holy Ghost. So it's been a crazy week, it had some up and downs but over all it's been a solid week.

On Sunday we got to go to one of the many huge hospitals, we met with a man who came from Altoona to get his lungs looked at. He said we were a huge blessing in his life, it reminded me that I'm not here for me I'm here to serve other people. It was a cool experience also here's my iCloud where I'll be sending pictures each week.

https://www.icloud.com/sharedalbum/#B0VJtdOXm0EAcVn

Enjoy,

Elder Simmons