My Dear sweet family,
As I type this I am sitting passenger going through Butte, MT. Elder Heywood and I are spending our P-day driving to Kalispell, MT. For the next couple of weeks we will be going to each zone in our mission with President and Sister Gardner to do training and to introduce Facebook, and blogging to the rest of our mission. Up to this point it has only been District Leaders and Zone Leaders using facebook and blogging. We will be the first mission to get everyone online. President says that if it’s going to be a pilot program we better test it out. Why not have everyone try it. We have no reason not to trust everyone else with this great new ability. I’ll admit though, I am a little nervous about it being available to all of the Elders. I’m not worried about the sisters, they are saints, and will do great with Blogs and Facebook. The Elders are easily swayed. I think they will do well for a while, but then start to slack and use it for the wrong reasons. Elder Heywood and I have talked a lot about our concerns, and have had some ideas we shared with President to help keep The Elders using it correctly. We are going to have the Zone Leaders Monitor the Missionaries in their Zones. They will go to both facebook pages and blogs of missionaries in their zone and make sure they are doing what they are supposed to. Elder Heywood and I have said that the Zone Leaders will have to be “buttheads” so that everyone will use it for what we are supposed to. I think most of the Elders online now have done a great job; there are of course a select few who have already lost the privilege. So there will be a punishment, or a consequence, which will be deleting your blog and facebook. President, Elder Heywood and I came up with 3 pages of guidelines, Tips, hits and rules for Proselyting online. So I guess it will either work or it will crash and burn. J We’ll see what happens.
This last week was good though. We had 2 meetings. One on the East side of our mission and one on the West side. We met with the District and Zone Leaders. We talked a lot about a new theme for 2011. Our theme for 2010 was, “2010 Let the Miracle Begin.” Which has been great, it has been a motivating factor in many Elders and Sisters. Including myself. We also had a goal of Reactivating and Baptizing 1000 souls. We are still counting up how many we have but we are very close, and are still getting some in. We were at 988 this morning before we started driving, and have gotten a few more since we started. So I’m excited to see if the miracle has happened. J
The theme we decided on this year is, “2011 Entrusted by Heaven”. Go to my blog and read what I wrote about it. I think it explains it well enough. www.elderagoff.blogspot.com
We also taught a few good lessons. We don’t get to teach as much as I would like, but I guess I get to teach missionaries now too. Which is fun as well.
Also I thought I should let you all know that Sister Gina Butterfield is getting baptized February 27th! J Elder House and Elder Rogers called last night to let us know. I am very excited for her, but at the same time I’m sad I don’t get to be there to be a part of it. That always seems to happen to me. Why can’t I get a baptism? One that will last and go to the temple? I want it so bad. I want to be a part of the teaching from the beginning to the baptism and be a part of their lives for the rest of their lives. I guess I just need to keep my head up and keep working. Hopefully it will happen before April 28th.
Tiff, Happy Birthday sis. I’m sorry you had to spend it at the doctor’s. I’m sending you a Billings MT t-shirt. I tried to send in on Saturday, but by the time I got to the Post Office it was already closed.
Oh I almost forgot to tell you all about after our meeting on the West side of the mission. The meeting was in Helena. So Elder Heywood and I got to go see some of our favorite people from Helena. In Helena 5th ward we saw the Mangums, Wilcock’s and Jim Maxwell. We spent a long time seeing people. We will be back in Helena on Friday. There are a few people I taught I’d love to go see. So we are teaming up with the Helena 5 and the Helena 1&3 elders. So we can have a little more time in our old areas. It was so good seeing the people we were able to see. I didn’t tell anyone I was coming. Which ended up surprising a few people. I think the Mangums were pretty surprised, and I know Jim was surprised. Haha It was neat seeing their faces. I’ll update you again soon. Love you all. Thanks for your e-mails. J I really love reading them.
I hope you are feeling better and better Tiff. Glad you have such a good DR. J I hope I can be a DR like that someday. Love you all.
Love, Elder Austin Gene Goff
I haven't had a chance to send this until now. Sorry it has taken so long. We have had a long week so far. I am so tired every night when we get somewhere to sleep. Tonight we are in Great Falls, MT and yesterday we were in Missoula, MT. Tomorrow we are going to Helena. The Mangums are going to feed Elder Heywood and I. So it should be a good time. There are a lot of Elders and Sisters excited about having the chance to Facebook and Blog. We have talked a lot about Trust and I hope they all understand how serious this is. I sure do love you all. I'm sorry I haven't had a chance to send this until now. You should expect one on Monday. That should be easy enough. We will have to be in Bozeman on Tuesday to start out another week of training. A lot of driving and a lot of teaching, but it's all going well. Love you all.
Current Area: Billings, Montana
Current Companion: Elder Heywood
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