No Hay Nada

Well a few matters of business on this email. So with the whole corona virus thing going around my release date was moved from June to April, so I will be home at the end of April, 6 weeks. That being said, there is still a lot of restrictions here for is missionaries so days can be long and not all that eventful. So for the next 6 p-days, don't expect anything long email wise or crazy.

We were also told we could do 2 hours of workout here now, but to follow that our apartment gym shutdown :/ even though we are literally the only ones that use it, but that was a sad day.


We had a lesson with Gregory about the word of wisdom and he accepted it super well! So he is still on track for baptism as long as we don't get restricted anymore!

And another update, we are now only allowed to do anything over Facebook, no meeting in person, so life here has gotten very slow and boring. So this will probably be the last group email, if you feel inclined to help my boredom and yours feel free to email, if not, see y'all in 6 weeks!

Elder Pickering 

A Letter from the Barneys

Dear MMM Families,

The work goes forward here in the Minnesota Minneapolis Mission!  We wanted to give you a brief update, since much has transpired in the last few days, and things continue to develop here at a pretty fast clip.

First and foremost, all of our missionaries are well, and going strong, despite the current constraints under which we are operating insofar as our proselyting activities are concerned. 

Currently, our missionaries have been directed not to have any in-person visits with non-missionaries, and to restrict in-person interactions with each other by following the no-touch, social distancing protocols that have been prescribed.  We have encouraged our missionaries not to gather in groups, except for essential reasons, and we will be directing them this week to hold their district councils over video conferencing rather than in person.  We will be using our remote video conferencing technology for our zone conferences scheduled for this week as well.  For the time being, we are permitting our Elders to administer the sacrament to one another and to our Sister missionaries in short Sunday worship services, and then to disperse again.

As far as our outdoor movements are concerned, we have been instructed that our missionaries may go outdoors to do service, to exercise, and to take care of essential functions, such as grocery shopping and doctor visits. 

It is of course possible that our movements may be restricted further as time goes on, but that is where we are at the moment.

As many of you know, a great many of our most stalwart missionaries will be departing for home soon (we are told within the next week or two, but we have no more details at this time) because of health and other issues, and we will be seeing the departure of another large group of missionaries at the end of April, many of the Elders returning because they will have attained 21 months or more.   This past week has honestly been the hardest of our tenure here, having conveyed this news to these returning missionaries and their families.  We know how heartbroken many of you are about this as well.  We must put our trust in the Lord and His plan for each of us, and we know these missionaries will continue to bless the lives of many at home.

With the greatest love and respect,

Pres. and Sister Barney

Well, this is Crazy . . .

Well Wow.  Ryan Face Timed us this morning an the verdict is in.  His release date has been officially moved up.  He will be coming home on April 29.

Wow, just wow.  This is crazy.  There is so much to process.  We are extremely grateful that he gets to have one more transfer before he returns.  Hopefully this will give him time to tie up loose ends, get those people he is teaching settled, have a few of his baptisms come through, and have time to say goodbye and  get closure.  Overall, he is at peace with it.

These times are unprecedented.  Stateside missionaries are making room for foreign missionaries that have to be reassigned due to this virus.  Ryan has served a good and honorable mission.  Now it is time for the next generation of missionaries to have their turn.

I am thankful he is healthy and safe and has access to what he needs.  We will pray that the final weeks will be all that he needs it to be so that he can come back feeling complete and satisfied that having left it all on the table until the very end.

Now I must really clean his room . . . 

Corona Central

In light of all of the crazy things that are happening in the world today with the Corona Virus, we had an interesting conversation with Ryan.  They are doing their best to continue with missionary work in spite of their limitations.  I can't think of a better time to share a message of hope in this world, than right now.  It is challenging but they are still trying their best to work hard and help the people they have been teaching.

And then, today the church came out with a statement saying that any stateside elders that have served for 21 months will be ending their service early and coming home.  We are all in shock and have many mixed feelings.  Ryan has a live conference call with the President this afternoon where hopefully he will receive more information.

As excited as we are to see Ryan, it is difficult to imagine him ending his mission in this way and so we are hoping he gets a little more time.  It is hard not to get discouraged with all that is going on but we need to remember that the Lord is in charge and he knows what is happening.  We just have to trust and rely on Him and know that everything will be okay.

Ryan's journal entries from the week:

Tuesday ended up being a fair amount of service, we get to do some service at a salvation army. We got some Tuesdays for taco Tuesdays and that's always fun, serve up some tacos, talk to some interesting fellows and make the best of it. Tracting today we found a lot of not very nice people and a ton of Karen people, so it was quite the variety of experiences. Also we had a lesson with Juliana who came to church this last week and taught her some English and just helped her keep progressing! She iss super happy all the time and ready to keep coming!

Today we had a handful of lessons that went really well! We had one again with Jonathan the husband of a member and we talked about the plan of salvation and he really liked it and said that it all made sense to him! Also we met with Suzie and her kids in the evening and one of her daughters had just these absolutely golden questions about Jesus Christ and the atonement, it was cool, we could just feel the spirit in the simple message as they all learned and grew together.

Today we had interviews with our mission president which was good, he had lots of good thoughts as usual. He talked about how the Coronavirus will be effecting us as missionaries, said he could see all sorts of changes and churches being canceled, and then later that day just that happened. And we got notice in the evening that we are being asked to not do any tracting or street contacting and only going out If we have a predetermined set appointment. So the next little while is going to feel really weird as a missionary.

Today was pretty slow with not being able to leave unless we have an appointment. Thankfully we had a lot set up for today, and we had a lesson with Graciela who is just awesome as usual. They invited us to come celebrate her birthday with them tomorrow so we get another time to leave! Blessings. And we talked about baptism and she has good desires to get her and her family baptized, so we are excited to help them do that!

Another day that wasn't super eventful here. Our morning lessons fell through which is too bad. We dont have the phone numbers of some of the people, so now we have no way to get in contact to have lessons for the next while. We had a member let us come over to do a little lesson with their family, everyone is pretty weary right now with the Coronavirus and everything. One thing that was fun was we went over to Gracielas to celebrate part of her birthday, we went, had some food, met a lot of her friends and family and were able to break some of the stereotypes of missionaries and our church, so it was fun, a good chance to leave the house, and a great opportunity.

Well we are making the most of the days out here. We started the morning with a combined lesson with Gregory and Juliana since they live so close to each other and Juliana even made breakfast for us! So that was awesome! I think in total we shared the Jacob video 3 times today when doing Come Follow Me with different people, so that was a good time. We are super blessed to have this inspired program to help us have the gospel in our homes in a time of need like right now, we had our time to try and figure it out and get adjusted and now we are really seeing why it was put into place! Modern day prophets and apostles really are inspired and direct the Lords church in today's world! 

And Yet Another Letter . .

To: The parents and friends of our Minnesota Minneapolis Mission (MMM) missionaries.  

From: Elder Brower (MMM medical advisor)  

March 13, 2020  

Just a quick note to let you know that we remain actively involved with the missionary department in 

following and adjusting our efforts to the current corona virus pandemic.  

The following is a copy of President Barney’s instructions to our missionaries as of 3/12/2020.

“As you know, the Church is taking further dramatic steps to limit the transmission of COVID-19. We are awaiting further instructions from the Missionary Department as to how all of this impacts full-time missionaries, but for the time being, until we receive further notice, please note the following:  

1 No live missionary meetings, zone conferences, district councils, etc. Can be done over wifi if feasible, but if missionaries go to church buildings to get wifi, they should not meet together but in separate rooms as companionships. We will consider doing zone conferences remotely. More to come on this.  

2 Mission President Fireside is cancelled. Please spread the word.  

3 Missionaries should cease door to door contacting at this time. Pre-arranged appointments in homes are ok so long as missionaries are not having any symptoms or illness. When covering these 

appointments, please follow strictly the no-touch greeting rules we sent out earlier.  

4 Baptisms that have been scheduled should be strictly private, involving only the candidate, the specific 

missionaries CURRENTLY teaching the candidate, and priesthood leaders. The Bishop has the final call 

on this, including whether confirmation can be done at water’s edge.  

5 Missionaries to avoid public gatherings of any kind. 6 Logistics on transfers will be forthcoming.  

Thank you, dear friends. Please keep in mind the importance of using common sense, and let us all strive 

to bring peace and calm and bring the Spirit to all as best we can.  

Love,  

Pres. and Sis. Barney”  

There's People on Mars?

Pday, the only really interesting thing today was that we had to put together these 2 week kits for any kind of disaster and just all the crazy stuff going on, so we spent the longest time in a store for a long time.

Tuesday, so we had MLC today which was alright, our zone has been killing it lately which is awesome. It's cool to help the others see the fruits to their efforts. We then had a lesson with a husband of a member who is honestly desiring to learn more and receive his own answer! He is so awesome, plus he is pretty buff so he always gives us some advice in Elder Soderberg and I's quest to huge. We also had an inactive member call us to give a blessing and met like 15 people that we never had met in his family before, so that's always fun, we will see what comes from that. Also had a lesson with this lady that just seems so happy with all that we teach her, it's super cool to see others take hold of the joy of the gospel.

Wednesday was a bit of a long haul. We started off with our cat service, the cats all seemed to just be going crazy today and were fighting left and right, so it was quite the adventure. We then also had a few lessons with different people through the day. We had a lesson in the evening with our man Gregory and worked on addressing some concerns he had after watching the Restoration video. He had the classic exodus scripture where no man can see God and live, so we gave him some study materials and talked about it a bit and hopefully he will receive his answer! He is a very humble and teachable guy which is awesome.

Friday was solid with the people we got to teach. First off, Friday is our taco bell tradition, so I got to see Elder Moyle like usual which is just a stellar time. We had a lesson with this family who are trying to both figure out religion and really want their kids to know about God and His love for them, they only had about 15 minutes but we made do and we hope to see them at church. And then in the evening we got to work with another family we found last week. They are both so humble and earnest in their wanting to know of the truth from God and not be caught up in the deceits of the devil. So we had a super cool talk about Moroni's promise and they actually set up consistent lessons with us, so it's cool to work with these people and just have them honestly desire for more

Saturday, a few good times today, the weather has really been picking up lately which is good! We met a guy named Mario today which is kind of just the typical contact where we got to share our beliefs and help him learn more about us, we will see him next week! We also met this other typical contact when you are in the cities here. This lady claimed to be hiding from the police, said that Joseph Smith saw aliens, that there was a secret knock to get into temples, and that humans have been on Mars since the 50s, so if any of you learned something new from today, you can thank her.

Sunday. We determined as a companionship that Sundays are like game days. You work all week and can find new people and invite and teach, and the hope to see people at church. Gregory couldn't make it due to some work issues with a boiler, but Juliana who got the job the other week was able to make it! She got to know some of the people and had a good time. We also had quite the awkward time, so some members picked us up to have dinner with them, but then instead of taking us to their house, pull up to a restaurant... so that was a classic. And we had a lesson with Gregory and set him on date for baptism later this month!

Interesting Things Happening . . .

To the Parents and families of our Minnesota Minneapolis Missionaries

From Elder Brower (Mission Medical Advisor)

We wanted to make you aware of our ongoing plans and efforts to educate and protect your missionaries.  The  Church Missionary Department is closely monitoring the impact and evolution

of the Covid-19 (Corona virus) throughout the world and is maintaining frequent contact with Mission Presidents, mission medical advisors, and other involved health care professionals.  The

Church’s Newsroom has created a webpage where they are posting updates on how COVID-19 isimpacting members and missionaries worldwide (https://newsroom.churchofjesuschrist.org/

article/coronavirus-updates). We encourage you to regularly review that webpage.

During our most recent Zone Conferences, three weeks ago, a Power Point Presentation was made to all of our missionaries discussing what the Corona virus is, how to limit or prevent its

spread, and what kind of symptoms could be expected including treatment and danger signs. Shaking hands was banned and replaced with a warm, caring elbow bump.

In addition, this past week, at President Barney’s suggestion, it was decided to create a twoweek emergency food storage box for each companionship/apartment in the event of aquarantine or other natural disaster.  Each companionship was given a detailed list of fooditems, extra water supplies, and a storage box to purchase, the cost of which is being covered

by mission funds.  

We are also emphasizing personal and living space hygiene and expect to increase the number of apartment inspections in the weeks ahead.  You may hear grumbles about our new expectations -

we will be disappointed if you don’t.  

Every missionary will continue to have 24/7 access to the Mission Medical Advisor, Elder (Dr)Brower if they have questions or concerns.  You may also contact me at 208 351 6405 should

you have specific issues you would like to discuss.  We are very serious about our callings and responsibilities and will work closely with the Missionary Department and  our Priesthood authorities as the situation evolves.  

Your missionaries are the reason we are here!  We love them as we do our own children.  We need and appreciate your prayers - for them and for us.

Thank you!

Elder Brower

Aaron's Baptism!!

Once again, Elder Pickering's email consists of him sharing daily recaps of the previous week.  The format may be different be I am loving hearing the details of his days.  I can tell that he is busy and working hard and seeing the blessings that come from it.

And as a side note from a mom, Ryan is down to 100 days left.  We can hardly believe it!

P-day
Just a normal p-day here for us, did basketball which is kind of a staple for us here. Every week we get together since this area has a ton of missionaries all close together and we play some ball, its always a good time. And then we attempted a few lessons, had some doorstep lessons with different people. And then on Mondays we always have dinner/ FHE with the Torres family which is great. We showed them the "Wheelz" video which is a classic, Elder Soderberg and I pretty much watch it daily.

Tuesday
Today was a long day here. We found this library that we were going to do language study in, and we walk in and there is this massive dog that apparently just lives in the library, so we got to have this dog do study with us. Also national pancake day at IHOP so you already know that we hit that up. We did some tracting and ran into this Hispanic JW, those are always quite the time, they'll just waste your time away talking. We also were able to have a lesson with Gregory tonight and had a member with us and watched the movie of the Restoration, he liked it, he is grasping the idea bit by bit, and then our member shared his simple testimony of how he grew to know the truth and that was super awesome. Also cool experience, a lady we are teaching wanted a new job, so we promised that if she read the Book of Mormon she would get a job this week, and then yesterday we heard she got a job!

Wednesday
Today we were out on that grind like usual and had some good times. We did this service in the morning at the food shelf and were able to help a bunch of people out which is always good. This afternoon we went back to an apartment we were at yesterday at just continued to get it all figured out and meet more people. Its easy to spend just days in some of these larger apartments and still know so few of the people, but today we were able to meet a ton of people and then set up return appointments for tomorrow. Also we had a lesson with this husband of a member and he is super cool. He has met with missionaries quite a bit in the past, but it seems they told him some interesting things that have made it hard for him to progress, but we will see what we can do for him!

Thursday 
Good times as always. We have district councils on Thursday which is good, our district isn't super huge, so it was chill. We gave a training, it's always a good time. We then went back to the big ol apartment building today and did some more work for about an hour got in a door and had a good time. We also did some other apartment buildings and met this African lady that had missionaries stop by a while ago and she was super cool! Been here for about a year and had question about the Book of Mormon, but just has a hard time understanding it in English. We also had a lesson with our lady that got a job that we promised her and she just wanted to pray and read the Book of Mormon and give thanks to God, she was super happy and excited about it all!

Friday 
Friday is the usual accounting and weekly planning stretch. We got to meet with a less active here named Barrascout who is just a legend, he is always a good time to meet with. And then the other really notable thing was that we got a call the other day from just this Hispanic we didn't know and they wanted us to visit. So today we had it set up and it turns out it is two returned missionaries who are up here from Peru. They are here for a little while for work and just have been missing being able to go to church, so we got to talk with them for a while, give them blessings and will find them a ride to church! And they are going to help us get a family we are teaching to church!

Saturday
Today I had the blessing of seeing Aaron get baptized!! It was super great! Also his twin brother showed up and pretty much confused all of the members on who was getting baptized, but it was super cool. I got to give a quick talk on baptism and then Aaron also gave his testimony and shouted me out and it was such a good sincere testimony, it was cool to hear some of the insider scoops of his side of it all. So he will be confirmed tomorrow and just moving on in the world! We also went to lunch after and I attempted this insanely massive burger in 30 minutes.. I lost.. :( but tonight we met this family that says they have been searching for the truth and the real church! So we are excited and will hopefully see them tomorrow at the church!

Sunday was good! Our church was at 1 this week so we went and stopped by people before to try and get some homies to come. We had so many confirm and say they would be there, but at the end of the day only our man Gregory came, but that's okay, he is awesome. Also our Sunday school lesson was given in Portuñol Spanish and Portuguese combined since the lady is from Brazil and that is quite the time. You can understand it all, but it sure uses some different parts of your brain. And not only that but Gregory knows some Portuguese so he was spitting it right back!

Also, in the pictures,  we are not playing playstation, just setting up a video for a message with a member haha. 

Aaron's baptism day!