Elder Fisher and Elder Bentley

Dear Family,

This week has been a pretty good week! Elder Archibald and I did a lot
of finding. We found a couple of people, but all of our appointments
feel through this week with investigators. We are hoping that this
week our appointments will be more solid so that we can start
getting some solid investigators.

On Tuesday we had Elder Perkins come and talk to us for our zone
conference. As he talked about Preach my Gospel, the spirit really
 chastised everyone into focusing their studies on PMG. Along with
this he emphasized the importance of being Strictly obedient. As we
are obedient we will be blessed more, wether it be with more knowledge
and remembrance in our studies or with more opportunities to find
investigators. It was also a nice tour because we were supposed to all
be there by 8, but we showed up earlier and I was able to just play
prelude piano hymns. Playing the piano is a real big stress reliever
on my mission. Not that I'm super stressed, it is just nice to sit
down and play hymns for a couple of hours. Elder Perkins interviewed
some of the missionaries and it took longer than they expected. And
that is when I was able to play piano.

Then on Wednesday we has a specialized training for all of the new
missionaries, mostly the meeting was going around from station to
station learning how to get refunded for metro, cleaning the
apartments, driving basics in the mission, and how to work with
referrals. There was an emphasis on companion unity in this meeting as
well, Elder Archibald and I are pretty unified though so we didn't
really have to worry much about that. The older elders in our
apartment are having a hard time because they are training and the
trainee isn't really a social person, and so its hard on Elder Hill,
but at night time he winds down pretty well with Elder Archibald and
me.

We have had a lot of time this week to go tracting, we usually do a
Liahona where we pray that we will be guided as a companionship to
know which street to go to. We then each pick 3 streets on our
tracting map, and almost always we pick streets that are the same or
super close to each other. Wednesday night we went tracting and found
this old Asian guy named Mandy, he said he was really busy and to call
ahead and set an appointment with him this week so we will do that.
Just a few houses up we found this lady sitting on a bench and she was
having a hard day. We gave her a card and tried to talk with her and
comfort her, she didn't want to really talk so we went on, but we felt
like we needed to go back and chat with her, we ended up talking about
The Plan of Salvation, and she told us to come later and so we are
going to go check up on her this week.

Elder Hill is a great guy, we usually get home before them at night
time so we really like to prank them, Thursday we strung up their room
with a bunch of strings, and tied his animals up to the ceiling. He
thinks it's hilarious and so he tries to get us back by covering our
beds in pamphlets and cups, but he will get us back eventually.

President Cooke is a great guy. He told us that we can pick what music
we want to listen to. He also lets missionaries leave their apartments
early to go to the gym, we think that Sister Cooke had a big influence
on both of those. We are really good however in our apartment
listening to spirit inviting music thorough the week and Sunday, and
on our pday we listen to piano guys, John Schmidt, Jack Johnson, and
just the relaxing music of Disney soundtracks and other soundtracks.
They don't really have a lot of musical music though, but I'll get
them to listen to it. He also encourages us to go into DC on our
pdays, so we don't have to stay in our areas on pday, we just have to
be home by 6. Today we are going to thrift stores and tie shopping.

I hope all is going well at the Bentley residence, and I hope that you
all have a great coming week!

Love Elder Bentley

First Week in DC

Dear Mom,

 

We are staying in a city named Laurel just north of DC. The metro went well. Since it is the summer, alot of people in the city are gone so they just wanted us to try and talk with people on the metro and if the chance arrives to just talk with them about the gospel. President Cook is a great guy! He kind of reminds me of Papa Whittle in a little way just by the way that he looks and acts. 

My new companion and trainer is Elder Archibald. He is from Pleasant Grove and he reminds me of Brady so it has been really easy to get along with him. He is sending you pictures of the week because I forgot my camera today and so he sent them from his iPad. That is good that Interns were able to get to our house safely and that they are doing well. Most of the nights here we have eaten with members and so I have been able to get to know some of them. There is this family in the ward named the Siads, they speak french and fed us Sunday. They have a little kid that just was wanting to play with us so we threw a ball around with him for a short time.

The area here is really good, we still have a lot of work to do, but we slowly take a chunk at a time so that we can get it done. Tracting was quite the experience for the first time. The first time that I had to knock on a door and talk all by my self was very tauntilizing, but now it is really easy to tell them who we are and why we are at their door. 

The first night in my area I went on splits with Brother Jensen and we went and visited a member who is not able to get to church because she has a hard time getting around. But it was cool that the first night I was able to go and teach someone. There is this member in the ward named James, he is such a cool guy, and we are 95% sure that he is one of the 3 Nephites. He says that he served a mission in 82-84 but he does not look like he is that old so there was only one conclusion...he is one of the three. He has not told us whether or not he is one, but he does not deny it when we say he is one. It is nice that we can joke around with the members here.

I got to see Elder Fisher and Elder Paul, they were at the transfer meeting. It was a blessing being able to see them because it just calmed my heart to see them. I will send a picture next week hopefully if I can find a place to send pictures. 

There are two other elders living in our apartment as well, one of them is a trainer and he is having a hard time training his companion because he doesn't really try to keep conversations going and he just wants to talk about himself. Luckily we are there with them in the apartment so we can talk with him when he is having a hard time. We are hoping this week to find some new investigators so that we can start to fill up our schedules with appointments, which means we will be tracting a lot this week. 

There is a lot of good work going on here in Laurel, and we are here to try and help it go along. Our area is just half of the ward, the east side of Laurel. 

 

This week has been full of ups and downs, it is really hard watching people say that they don't want to hear our message because I know that it would make them so much happier! But mostly in the field right now we are going from meeting to meeting with some appointments at the night time. We go out tracting when we don't have anything else to do, and that is quite the thing because you knock on every door but alot of them either are not home or just don't want to answer the door because its the missionaries. Most of the gospel messages that we have shared have really been with members of the ward that feed us dinner, so free food is always nice!

Tracting is really fun at the same time though because Elder Archibald and I just talk and joke around as we are walking to and from the car after we finish areas. We play a lot of would you rather games to try to keep our minds positive as the doors are slammed in our faces! Our first night tracting we had no luck until we were walking back to the car. A catholic guy stopped in his car and was telling us how great we were because we were out sharing about Christ. He asked what it was about us that was different, so we shared a pamphlet about the Plan of Salvation with him, hopefully he looks through it and calls us with questions.

Love Elder Bentley. 

Last Day in the MTC

Dear Family, 

Because it is the last day in the MTC, they are letting us email home a day early because we will be shipping out early in the Morning! This has been such a great experience here in the MTC, I have been able to learn and grow so very much and it is amazing what we can learn in just 12 Days. Our second class time teacher was gone all week and it was kind of nice because she said "cool" and "yeah" way to many times every day.

We were able to wrap up things with our TRC investigator and end on a good note. We were all sad because he had had some problems praying when he was younger, and he said that he felt like he never got an answer to his prayers. Elder Lee and I were stumped because we did not know how much we could teach him because he refused to say his prayers because of this. We invited him to pray and he said that he didn't think that he would be answered so he didn't pray at all about it. I was led to find this talk on the ways prayers are answered by Elder Scott. It talked about the many different ways prayers were answered. It was from 1989, and If you have the chance to read it on lds.org, I challenged everyone to read it because it applies to everyone.

The investigator went boating and camping that night and woke up early and read it the next morning down at the lake and then he finally prayed! It was such a great thing to hear when he told us that! He said that after reading the talk it felt like there was a barrier in his mind that went away from his childhood! Elder Lee and I were filled with joy as we heard this! We were sad because this was in our last lesson with him but it was great to hear him progress!

This Sunday we had two devotionals, one was because we were departing and the other was just the Sunday devo. After the first one I wasn't excited for the second one, but then I heard that the Nashville Tribute Band was the devotional! It was so amazing being able to hear them live, It kind of made me a little home sick because I remember listening to their songs with Brady in his car. But it is all good now because I am all good now. I sang to like every song that they sang and it was just a fun and powerful devotional about Joseph Smith and the trials they went through so we could have the Book of Mormon.

Thank you so very much for the packages this week! The box full of fruit snacks and gushers was nice because they are fun to snack on! But i think my favorite thing to eat is apple sauce, I used the apple sauce box and the tape to make a scripture holder for my quad set. 

Elder Lee is such a great guy, we have the same humor and so whenever a joke is told be both just laugh our heads off. His accent is still killing me because I just love listening to it. He is the district leader, sometimes it get annoying taking him everywhere and dropping him off for a meeting. On Wednesday, he was able to go on a tour of temple square because he is international. He said that the live session was different but that he liked it.

Being here in the MTC has really made my patience grow. There are just some things that bother me, but I am just trying to not look inward and to look outward towards others.

The gym time here has been full of spikeball, so when I get back, everyone should be ready because I am practically a professional at it now. I was able to find Elder Ross while I had my camera on me today so I got a picture with him. It brought tears to my eyes realizing that that was goodbye for the next two years. That was a tender mercy to me because we love the work. 

I will call home in the morning when I am at the SLC airport!

Love Elder Bentley

First P-Day at the MTC

Elder Lee & Elder Bentley

 

Hello Family! 

This has been a fantastic week here at the MTC. I have grown so much spiritually. Its been a really long week however, it seems like there has been a lot of personal study time here since we do not have to learn a new language. It's been really hard for me sometimes to concentrate. I get really distracted just from the little things. I have found out that if I take just a few minutes to take a break every half hour or so I am able to concentrate more. We were able to listen to a talk here on Sunday that was given to missionaries here on Christmas Day a few years ago by Elder Bednar. It is about the character of Christ and how we need to turn ourselves to the Lord. And by doing this we turn away from the natural man. To turn to Christ we do this by love, compassion, and service.

Elder Lee and I have had just a couple of "investigators" here at the MTC. Our first investigator was named Poasi, It is a teacher who is just acting and all but we were able to teach him yesterday about the Plan of Salvation. The spirit was in the room and we were able to get him to say our closing prayer which was pretty great. The next one we had named Stephen was a TRC investigator who has a Jewish background and so we were really trying to plan what we could talk with him about and so we met with him ready to teach the Restoration, but he just missed the feelings of the spirit and said that he just felt that it was like a bunch of facts. That really crushed our spirits, but as we were at the temple today I just have this feeling that we will rock our next lesson with him Tomorrow.

Since its p-day we have had lots of free time but the field is closed and we cannot go there so we have been just talking in our district. The food here has been pretty good but it definitely takes the body a few days to get used to the food here so its been a long weekend. I saw Elder Ross and Elder Baker today but we have not been really able to get any pictures because it's just been at times of the day where we cannot take pictures or just that we have no time to take them. They both seem like they are really doing great.  

Mom, I will be able to call you on Tuesday morning while we are at the Airport. Our flight leaves to DC at 9:54 am and its a direct flight so there are no worries about connecting flights or anything. I got a calling card so when we get there I can call. We leave the MTC at 4:35 in the morning so that will be hard to get up to on time, but we will hopefully can catch some sleep on the plane.

Attached is a picture of Elder Lee and me. The computers here are really weird sending pictures so I will try and get more pictures to you.

The second day here we were sitting in our class and a guy named Brother Liston came in and said that I really looked familiar. Ends us that he got off a mission in Taiwan where Blaine served 3 Years ago so i just had to be able to get a picture with them. As I was talking with our branch president, President Hodges, I told him that I knew Brother Liston and he said that coincidences don't just happen. 

My district here is great and I am starting to love each one of them. We all have different hobbies and likes, but it is really great to get to know them. Its truly been an amazing experience here and I cannot wait to get out to DC.

President Hodges in our interview also talked about gaining a stronger testimony of the Book of Mormon. He told me as we read it daily, we can pray to Heavenly Father to know that it is true, this does not mean however to just read the first chapter or verse and ask to know if it's true and be done. This means that we need to read it daily and sincerely ask to know if it is true. He also talked to me about how as we do so, we can become converted to the Gospel.

Something that I have noticed is that when missionaries get home from the mission field, people tell them that they can tell their testimonies have really grown. That is true, but the reason they can tell that is because as we gain stronger testimonies we hopefully  start to live them. If we have a testimony and don't use it, it will not help you in your life. The more that we live our testimony, the more that we become converted. It is very important that we become converted because it is then that the Holy Spirit will want to dwell with us!

Love,

Elder Bentley

 

My District

 

 

First letter from the MTC

Dear Family, 

My P day is on Tuesday but they are letting us send a quick email home to let everyone know that we are okay.

 I just got the package you sent and both me and my companion are loving the treats.

 My companion is Elder Lee, he is from Adelaide Australia, he has this way awesome accent, I make him say stuff just so I can hear it.

I saw Elder Ross on the first day just out between the buildings in the MTC, then again at Dinner the first night. He looks like he is very happy and enjoying it here!

I saw him again at dinner the next night, he told me that Elder Baker was looking for me. Ended up that Elder Baker walks right past our table and I finally saw him and it was amazing.

Its been a great few days here at the MTC and I have met many new people! I will tell you more about it on Tuesday!

Love,

Elder Bentley

MTC

Bridger was anxious to leave to the MTC. He was up and ready early on August 5th. He was able to go walk to school with Gabe before he left. Gabe wasn't able to come over after Bridger was set apart on Tuesday night.
We enjoyed a late breakfast at IHOP and then we headed to the MTC. We walked around by the temple and said our goodbyes before we headed to the MTC.
It never gets easier to say goodbye to a missionary. It is such a bitter sweet time. There is nowhere I would rather have them, but it is very hard to have them gone for 2 years!

Setting Apart as a missionary.

Bridger was set apart as a missionary on Tuesday, August 4th, 2015. He was able to have his dad and 4 of his 5 brothers stand in the circle. (Brian was in Ohio for residency). He also had Milas Howe and Jeff Olsen in the circle. President Barry Harris set him apart.