Monday, August 25, 2014

pictures

Ok so I asked Elder Loertscher why we have not got pictures I am sure you all want to see them as well he does not have what he needs to send them so I need to go by him the connector and then he will send me photos! keep checking back hopefully in like a week. 


FIRST WEEK IN CALI

well i have arrived. Oh btw at the MTC alone i gained 10 lbs. I weighed my self this morning and so far since i have left home i have gained 14 pounds. Thats 14 pounds in 19 days i hope this trend doesn't continue or else when i get home watch out It is crazy. We flew into LA and it was amazing. The Los Angela's Area is so amazing. I wish i could give you all a day by day of this week but it was 10 days since i last got to email so there isnt enough time to put everything down. This was a crazy amazing week. 
Let me tel you a little bit about the area i am in right now. The people are amazing but the area is a little rough. Me and Elder M "WHITE WASHED" the area. Do you want the bad news or the good news first. I guess i will just chose for you. Bad first. The area i am in is known as the "armpit" of California. Haha if you are wondering why its because there are alot of homeless people and we are basically in the hood. There is a couple of streets where the police drive around with there lights on the whole time from 2:00 pm on. Everyone is rude in California and i do not like it. If you wave no one waves back. Its hard to mustard up the courage and go talk to these people. We cover a large area and are in a car. good news.  My companion is elder M and this kid is the coolest kid ever. We connect perfect. He plays soccer, he has a great sense of humor, and he is really spiritual. The lord has really blessed me with amazing people so far to make me a better missionary. He has been out a year "and some change". He has some funny sayings. He is from north Carolina and he has a crazy accent. HE is awesome. We live in a nice apartment. He told me these are the nicest ones in the mission. It is away from all the bad areas obviously we live in a good location. If you want to write me letters ask my mom for the address because i cant give it away in email. Somehow people find out and missionaries have been stalked before. So its going to be confidential information. Only send letters i cant get packages.  Also on anything you send make sure you write ELDER DIMITRI LOERTSCHER make sure you include my first name because believe it or not there is another LOERTSCHER here in california. it is spelled the same way and everything. No we are not related. Im sure that was your next question. A summary of my week. I got thrown right into it. Our area that we are in was left with nothing so we basically had to start from scratch and go find everyone meet people etc etc. We are running around like chickens with their heads cut off. Our area is super big. The average miles you drive in a car each day is like 30-40. Our area is so big we drive anywhere from 80-100. We are the only elders in our area so we are busy alot. Right now we have 4 investigators with baptism dates within the next month. We taught one the first lesson and he was super interested his girlfriend was baptized two months ago and now he is interested. When i get home ask me about his first lesson. When i say the spirit is so strong i have never felt it more in my life. He prayed and he felt it too. We are making good progress and it feels good because hopefully if things continue the way they are going we will baptize him after we teach him all the lessons. We have two baptisms soon. Elder M told me two baptisms in your first transfer is unheard of. I am excited i love the work. I would be lying if i said it was easy. I had a very hard week. My emotions got pulled at by all sides. I cried myself to sleep last night. I am fine while i am working but at night it is rough right now. I will push through and be fine why because "I AM ON THE LORDS ERRAND". The ward is awesome the 1st counselor in the bishopric said that last week the week before i got there they made hamburgers and they got donuts and used the donuts as the bun for the hamburger. Sounds amazing. HE said they do all crazy things with food. Im excited. Tonight there is an activity. Its MUD VOLLEYBALL. They fill up a volleyball court with water. And it gets all muddy and they play volleyball. Its super bad because i cant play but i will make sure i get pictures. Things are going good and i will continue to keep you updated as usual i will leave you with something you will hopefully take to heart and look to make the necessary changes in your life. Dont say you cant change because we aren't perfect. 

First i want to say never give up. Dont give up on our father in heaven. He will never EVER give up on you. He is aware of you and your trials. He will not give you a trial you cant handle. His love is infinite for you.
Next always stand with courage. Stand up for what you believe in. Dont sit back and let people come to you. Did the savior do that? No he went out and found people. Brothers and Sister as members of the church it is our responsibility to go out and share the gospel with all of Gods children. I challenge you this week to have a missionary moment with at least one person. If i can go out and knock a bunch of doors in unsafe areas you can talk to one person about the gospel. Some one you have never talked to. 
Next. DO NOT LIE. DO not justify your lies. Ill keep this simple. Would you lie to GOD? 
Lastly. Who you are when no one is watching determines the type of person you are!

Stay true to yourself. Remember there is always someone watching. There are people here on earth watching you and there is ONE person who will ALWAYS know what you are doing and the desires of your heart. Don't lie to our Heavenly Father

Until next week,
Love ELDER LOERTSCHER

Monday, August 18, 2014

Off to Bakersfield, California

August 18,2014

Travel day today! Elder Loertscher is in Bakersfield California. I am excited for him to start his Journey! He is excited as well his new pday is Mondays! I will post again once he sends me info hopefully pictures as well!

Friday, August 15, 2014

New Week!!!!

Wow what a week hopefully i can get it all in a summary and it still make sense or i will be here writing all day. Lets just jump right into it.
August 9th. 
A sister in our district i wont reveal her name but she got sent home because she had a seizure. It was stress induced so she met with the MTC president and he made the decision for her that she needed to go home. She asked me for a blessing. and then she was off and on her way. It was sad to see her go because she was only at the MTC for four days but i hope all is well with her and her family. I had another cool experience when i gave that blessing. I am so happy i can use the prieshood to help others. Other than that it was a pretty normal day filled with classroom studies and reading sciptures.
August 10th
We went to sacrament meeting with our zone. In our zone there are like twenty-five people. After sacrament meeting the day was filled with meetings for me as District leader. At the end of the day we went to a devotional and then we watched a MTC film by david a bednarz his talk was on christ like charateristics. I was so moved by the spirit. He really helped me find the importance of making the transition of moving outwards rather than inwards and not focusing on myself. I am very selfish and it made me rethink how i live my life. I need to make sure im serving others way before i even think about myself.
August 11th 
We tought Hank today. I thought that went really well. We continued to talk to him about the plan of salvation. We think he understands it really well and that we are making good progress with him. Today was honestly the hardest day yet. I was thinking about my family and brittany all day and it was hard to get them off my mind. Brother Dopp i swear is the most amazing man i have ever met. I am so glad he is my teacher. He taught us a lesson today on prayer that will make me completely rethink how i pray and what i include in my prayer. We need to be less selfish in things we ask our Heavenly Father for. Tonight we started TRC which is where we teach and (investigator) a member who pretends to be an investigator. There are some real investigators in the program and we dont know who they are so the lessons need to be taught well.
August 12th
Today was another awesome day we skipped going to the classroom and just had our studies in our room. Then we went to our service project. our service project was sweeping the sidewalk. (Fun right) Then we went to lunch and gym time. I played basketball with some elders. Then the day kinda went super serious from here. Another sister in our district has a little bit of depression and she might be getting sent home. She had me give her a blessing after instruction by MTC president to do so. I LOVE THE HOLY GHOST and i will never do anything in my life to interupt the constant companionship of the spirit. Today elder rosales and i did something called a book of mormon read. He told me something he was struggling with. We prayed and then we opened to a random page in the book of mormon. It was crazy. We opened up to Helaman ch 4 which talks about sinning. He wasnt having a problem with that but the spirit gave us insight on how we could apply it to his life. I love elder Rosales. He tells me everyday how thankful he is to be a leader in his life and to be here for him to help him. Elder Rosales was baptized one year ago. He is a convert of a year and it out on a mission. I am so inspired by his testimony. It should be him that i am thanking.
August 13th
ITS OFFICIALLY BEEN ONE WEEK 
Its crazy how time flies. I learned today that i need to leave my will up to the lord and not constantly worry whats next in my life. I know that if i chose the right i will be blessed. Especially for serving a mission. I learned today that i need to love the missionaries for what they are doing and not who they are. I was getting really annoyed with some of them but then i had to realize i need to view them and love them how our heavenly father would love them.
August 14th
Today we had in-field orientation. We were all dreading it because it was all day. 8:00 am to 5:00 pm. it was honestly really amazing. I feel like i have learned alot of tips and tricks to be a successfull missionary in California. After dinner we went back to the class room to have a lesson with Brother Dopp. This man continues to blow my mind. He has honestly impacted my life in such a way i could never thank him enough. He took us to see some pictures that were in the hallway of the main building at the MTC. He told us to walk around and look at some pictures we liked and write notes in our journals. He then stopped us all and brought us to the picture where Jesus Christ is washing peters feet. He then explained that story in a way where we would rethink how we spend our time during the sacrament. He told us that peter told jesus "you dont need to wash my feet, i can was wash my own". The savior responded if i dont wash your feet then you have no part with me. (was essentially what he was saying) Bro Dopp then continued to tell us to rethink how we spent our time during sacrament. Are we texting? tweeting? checking intagram? Brothers and sisters focus that time on recognizing the sacrafice your savior made for you. Continue to live your lives in such a way that you are always feeling the spirit.
August 15th
This morning we woke up and went to the temple at 7:00 am. That was amazing i have been praying for confirmation on a question and i got an answer. 

I got my travel info. 
I have to report the MTC travel offices at 2:30 am monday morning
I fly to the L.A airport and will get there around 6:30 and have a two and a half hour lay over then we fly to bakersfield. We will get there around 9:45 we will then go to the mission presidents home and then from there its all real.
Thank you so much to those of you who wrote dear elders thats what honestly kept me going this week. When president platt talked about me being blessed with health and giving blessing to help others. Ive given 5 blessings in almost a week and half. Im thankful for the spirit and all the opportunities that i have.

Friday, August 8, 2014

I love the mission already

I Love the mission already

Oh my goodness. I do not know where to start. I love you all so much. I guess to tell you about a crazy two days. 

Wednesday August 6th (THE DAY) 
The day had finally come. I was excited,nervous,crazy emotional etc etc. I had a hard time leaving my family and Brittany. Once i said goodbye and passed security i met up with the other elders. There were three elders on that flight that are going to my mission. I got to know them pretty well. Once we got on the plane i sat next to an Elder going to mexico. His name was Elder Carpenter and he reminded me of my good friend Elder (mitchel) Cordy. When he spoke all i could think of was mitchel and how much i missed him. Elder carpenter and I spoke the whole plane ride and he helped ease my nerves. Once we got to the airport in Salt Lake we went to go find the shuttles to take us to the MTC. On our way there we saw many elders coming home from there missions. The homecomings were crazy. There was probably 50+ family members there for an elder. At that time all i could think about was coming home. Fast forward to arriving at the MTC. We got split up into districts of people who were going to california some in the same missions others not. We got a teacher Brother Dopp. When i grow up i want to be exactly like elder dopp. He teaches with the spirit so well. This man is so humble and you can feel his spirit. One thing he said really calmed me down. He said why are you wanting to serve a mission. Before i could answer he said any reason you are serving is the right reason as long as you stay for the right reason. After class the MTC president greeted us all with a message then we ate dinner and unpacked. WE went to this thing called People and Your Purpose part 1. This was so cool because a group of about 30 of us elders and sisters taught one investigator.After this we met our zone leaders. Elder Andrus one of our zone leaders is my new favorite person. He asked me how i was feeling i said i was okay. I asked him who all he left behind at home. He said his family and a girlfriend. He said they have been dating for two and a half years. He said it was the hardest goodbye ever. ( i could compare ) I showed him the tie brittany got me and we instantly connected. We talked about girls for about 20 minutes. He said that she sent him a care package and it was the sweetest thing ever he showed me. It felt weird being around the girls at the MTC. It felt wrong to even just talk to them because we are Elders haha. That about concluded the day. 

Thursday August 7th. (the greatest day yet)

Man what a day. I feel closer to my savior already. If i was to evaluate myself spiritually before my mission i would give myself a 70%. After today and the experiences i am at 100%. After my mission i will probably be at like 100,000% and so on and so forth because we can always continue to grow. So when i got set apart the stake president told me that i would be blessed with health and with that health i would need to use my priesthood authority and heal others. We will get to that amazing experience in a little bit. We woke up at 6:30 got dressed up in our church clothes and went to breakfast. The food at the MTC is alright. After breakfast we went to the classroom. Bro Dopp continues to teach amazingly. We started to roleplay a lot, and focused on how to teach investigators. Next we went to Plan Study Prepare and teach pt 2. Thisi was cool. The brother who taught the lesson shared with us a story at the end of the class. He said that he had taught a man when he was on his mission. The man was interested in the church but didn't want to continue to hear any lessons because his dad was a preacher at another church. The teaching continued no more. Fast forward to his mission 18 months down the road. This man got transferred back to his original location and a sister came up to him and asked if he knew this man. ( the man he taught before). She said that his father had died. The elder smiled because he knew that this man's father was the reason this man didn't want to hear about the church. The missionaries met with this man and they talked to him about Joseph Smith and how he prayed. The next day the elders  were driving around and they felt impressed to visit this mans house. They knocked on the door said hi how things were going and then they had to leave. Weird huh. They went over there just to say hi. They had this impression for three days in a row. On the fourth day they returned to his home and asked how things were going and went to go teach another lesson. The man before they started said i have prayed just like joseph smith about which church to join. He said he prayed that there would be a way the lord would show him which was the true representatives of jesus christ. Every Time after he finished the prayer about a minute later you guys showed up at my door step just to come say hi. I knew then that you were the true representatives of the lord. After this class we went back to our classrooms and when we got there a sister in our district wasn't feeling good they day before she had complained about her cold and not feeling well. She came up to me and said "Elder Loertscher i am not feeling well today and i have a doctors appointment later could you please give me a blessing". At this point in time i had never given a blessing so i had butterflies in my stomach so bad but of course i accepted. My companion Elder Rosales anointed and i gave the blessing. I throughout the day at this point was on a spiritual high. I gave the blessing and then i came to the point where i literally could not speak anymore i was at a loss of words and i didn't know why. I sat there for about 20-30 seconds but felt forever and  then the words your sickness will be short the lord wants you to return all your focus back unto your mission and get ready for california. Of course i said other things in the beginning of the blessing but the whole thing was from the spirit. I knew nothing about sister jackson and i gave her a blessing. I know now by personal experience how truly powerful the priesthood is. She came up to me today. (friday) and told me thankyou for the blessing she was feeling 100 times better and that everything i said in the blessing was what she needed to hear. I needed to hear that because i didnt know how it went since it was my first blessing bu ti knew it had to have gone great because i had the spirit on my side. Later that night we met with the branch presidency and got callings. After getting to know us somewhat on a personal level they eventually gave us callings. I got the calling to be the district leader. So i am in charge of several people who are going to bakersfield california. I have several responsibilities for our stay at the MTC.
 
Today Friday August 8th

We were given a little information about an (fake investigator fyi. it was our teacher) investigator and we had to go in and teach them a lesson. We are asked to invite people to baptism even on the first visit. Elder rosales and i went into the lesson and didnt know where to start we were guided by the spirit throughout the lesson and invited him to be baptized. He said yes we talked about meeting with him tomorrow and going to see where this goes. Today as distric leader i get the mail. I went into the mail room and got our districts mail. Seeing people having used Dearelder.com was amazing it is such a cool thing. Thank you to those who wrote to me i loved reading everything. I am sorry if you respond and i dont respond until next P-DAY which is next friday. Our day was cut in half since it was our first pday. 
I love you all thank you for your support i know these will be the best two years FOR my life. 

To end i would like to invite all of you to go watch the Mormon message because of him. Go to youtube and type in beacause of him. The first couple of seconds should have a bulb. As you are watching this remember what our savior did for us and what we can do because of him. 

I am going to change the spelling of my last name to ( LURCHER ) because people are having a hard time pronouncing LOERTSCHER. 

SEE PEOPLE NOT AS THEY ARE BUT AS THEY CAN BECOME

LOVE, 
Elder Loertscher

if you have questions about dear elder.com ask my mom i would love to hear from each of you everyday.