It was kind of cool to have had my first baptism and last baptism in the same font!

Mary Louise asked Phillip what he would like to eat when he gets home. His response is below. My mother asked the same thing when I returned from Korea many years ago. My response was a big bowl of rice with some side dishes of KimChee and bean sprouts. I didn’t get it, so I think that is what we should serve Phillip when he gets home! -Doug Letter from Phillip on August 13, 2012 Familia Mia, Wow, the days truly are counted. By the way, today was a great email day, thanks for the letters and updates. OK, we have come to the part of the email that actually has an eternal significance. Chantal is now a member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints! Thanks to the example of a good friend of hers. I´ll send you pictures of the baptism and a picture with her friend. It was certainly not the smoothest baptism I´ve had. Baptismal clothes didn´t fit, we had to go looking for her for the interview and so on. But in the end she´s a very intelligent girl that was happy to be baptized. It was kind of cool to have had my first baptism and last baptism in the same font! It really brought back some good memories of the people that have really touched my life out here in the Dominican Republic. Our relationship with God, Family and friends are what really matter. I know that Chantal drew herself closer to God and can truly change her life if she allows Him to help. We keep finding cool new people out here in Sabana Yegua. We contacted a very nice Haitian couple that have a lot of interest. A cool kid that is friends with all the young people of the ward. I read all the war chapters this week of Alma. I can´t say I gathered any fascinating life changing insights, but I will say this, Moroni and Teancum are both heroes of mine. Two of the coolest men in scripture! Not to mention the stripling warriors and their mothers. Mom, thanks for being a mom comparable to the Ammonite Woman! I wasn´t going to mention food in my emails at the risk of sounding trunky, but since you mentioned it, I´ll tell you. Mom, I want a room temperature cherry pie waiting for me when I get home. I want to go to a Waffle House the day I get back. And in the first week, I want some baked chicken with mashed potatoes and gravy. I hope I´m not asking too much. Love you all, Elder Phillip LeCheminant

"It's a magical world, Hobbes, ol' buddy...Let's go exploring!"

Letter from Phillip on July 16, 2012 My Dearest Family, Wow, I have officially entered into my last and final transfer! I am now a part of the oldest group of missionaries in the mission. Are you ready for some transfer news........drum roll.......I am staying in Sabana Yegua. I´m happy that I´m staying here for my last six weeks. I´ve grown to love the people that I am working and serving with. The verdict, Elder W. is leaving. Elder P. is replacing him. I don´t know much about Elder P., just that he grew up in both Mexico and the United States. One of those fluent English Spanish speakers. So, the English class every Saturday is still a go. I´ll be sad to see Elder W. leave. I wasn´t sure what to expect that first week, but we were two chill guys that worked hard. I think we helped each other out in our respective strengths and weaknesses. Atlanta is sounding like my kind of city. I´m excited to see what it´s like. I´m glad that you guys are all moved in, and that life is now normalizing. For the most part, our investigators are doing well. It´s always tough when you try and try to help people progress, but something always gets in the way. There is this great family. Miguel and Rafaela. High functioning family, Miguel works for the department of education, yet something always gets in the way of them going to Church. A young girl has been going to Church with her best friend. I think in terms of people that will most likely get to baptism, this girl Chantal is the best bet for this next transfer. She has a lot of enthusiasm and has great support. A lot of the people that we have found that have gone to Church are doing well, but they still lack that extra touch of conversion. I hope that they can get it. This last week, we had the end of transfer Azua lunch with the senior couple, Elder & Sister Browns. So much fun! The missionaries of Azua, along with the assistants, got together at the Browns apartment to eat hoagie sandwiches. I thought of Mark Johnson [Phillip’s friend who recently got back from Spain] last night. We saw a group of about 20 white people. I thought they were from the U.S., so I started speaking English but it turned out they were Spaniards from Barcelona! They are here on a 2 month service mission from the Catholic Church. Even though we both speak Spanish, I realized how different Mark’s mission experience must have been from mine while talking to the Spaniards. Their accent was so different. But, they all had an air of European sophistication which I am definitely not used to here. I told my comp that I have few goals for this next transfer. Finish marking my Spanish Book of Mormon, 2 baptisms, and become tight with all the new Spaniards visiting Sabana Yegua! Gretchen, I need you to do me a favor. There is a quote I want to write in my planner. It is what Calvin says in the last ever Calvin and Hobbes strip. [Gretchen responded to him and sent the following: "It's a magical world, Hobbes, ol' buddy...Let's go exploring!"] Con mucho cariño, Elder Phillip LeCheminant

I loved the part when the guy is courting the girl

Letter from Phillip on June 18, 2012 Well, let me tell you all a bit about the week. The big news was the zone conference. It was good to see everybody again. Elder B. is doing a great job as an assistant. I liked the conference so much because of all the senior missionary couples who spoke. The senior couples in our mission are the best. All so loving. The MTC doctor, Dr. Shaver, spoke about the importance of cleanliness. The McDermids are the mental health professionals here. The wife spoke and reminded me so much of Mom. I dropped your name dad but they didn`t know you. My favorite senior couple in the mission are the Fords from Bountiful Utah. They`re in charge of the finances. I still have the touch. I can get Sister Ford to laugh every time I talk to her. President spoke about a talk given by a General Authority called the “4th missionary.” It talked about different kinds of missionaries and how the only missionaries truly changed by their mission are the “4th missionary.” It wasn`t so much focused on obedience as it was focused on giving the Lord your heart. The “3rd missionary” is obedient and serves and has a lot of success. But he does it for the honors of men and works to finish his mission holding back his heart. The “4th missionary” serves in order to progress spiritually. The “4th missionary” is a missionary of consecration. He has qualities of Christ. The mission is difficult for both. Both may think it`s difficult to knock on doors and take cold water bucket showers. But the 3rd does it out of resentment and hate while the 4th does it because it`s intelligent and will lead to progression and joy. The big news of the week. Bolivar`s wife, Esther, went to Church for the first time yesterday! [Phillip had the chance to teach and baptize Bolivar when he was in this same area the first part of his mission!] We had a good lesson on Friday and she committed to Church and went to Church with her family! We`ll see what happens. We`ll keep praying for her. We found 2 great families contacting this week. Super cool families with a mom and dad that have interest. I`ll let you know next week if they start progressing. I`ve been reading in the book of Isaiah lately. I think that Dad and I will have some good Isaiah chats after the study that I`m having. I keep reading and marking in the Book of Mormon. I`ve watched the movie legacy countless times in Spanish, but Elder W. had it in English so I watched it last night. Haha great film! I loved the part when the guy is courting the girl and he says, amidst the tribulation, persecution and problems of life, God allows us joy as well, just after kissing her. Love, Elder LeCheminant

It was good to be able to talk to you all about my life, your life, investigators

We had a great (and lengthy) visit with Phillip on Mother’s day yesterday. He is healthy, feels very good about his companion and roommates, has a baptism planned for this coming weekend, and is focused for the last 3 months of his mission. Here is his email today: Letter from Phillip on May 14, 2012 Querida familia mia, Wow, that was so great to talk to all you guys yesterday. What a great day. It was good to be able to talk to you all about my life, your life, investigators, Atlanta, Georgia, etc. But anyways, I`m trying to find some good things to tell you that we didn`t talk about yesterday. Today for P-Day, we called up the missionaries in Bayona. There are 4 good missionaries there and we made some homemade pizza! Haha, not great, but decent. We also decided to explore some big hardware store that was in our area. As you might tell, there really aren`t too many options of things to do out here. This is a good story. At the internet center just now, I saw a girl I knew in my first area. Her brother was in the branch presidency there and is now on his mission. He had sent her some photos and he`s looking good. Serving in Bolivia. This week there was a mission fireside. Our ward mission leader planned it, and we didn`t know about it until this week, but it turned out well. We had a pioneer activity and watched the John Tanner video and some Mormon messages about pioneers. Two weeks ago was Stake Conference, and yesterday was ward conference. The Stake President is a great guy. He spoke on overcoming sin. We should avoid having favorite sins. He also taught the class in Priesthood meeting. I think that he`s the director of the Institute Program in Santo Domingo. Say hi to Grammy, Granddaddy Bob, and Grandma Teedie and wish them a most happy Mother`s Day from me. Love you all, Phil

Six Mission Photos from the D.R.

What follows are 6 mission photos in no particular order. 1) Deciding who makes the better candy bar, the LSU Tigers or the Alabama Crimson Tide; 2) Enjoying some local Christmas decorations; 3) A Christmas pig; 4) A mission conference at Christmas; 5) Thanksgiving dinner; and 6) P-Day in the D.R. Country side.

We had 9 investigators in Church yesterday!

Ok, Familia:

I can’t believe Gretchen entered the MTC 3 years ago yesterday! Time really does fly sometimes.

We had a good week. We had zone conference. I really liked it a lot. Hermana Rodriguez talked about health and obedience. And Presidente talked about repentance. However, I’m realizing right now that I´m blanking out and I can´t remember too many details or insights about what he spoke about. But it´s not about what I learned, but what I felt. We also did some role plays and practice. Elder H. and I had a lot of participation. We talked about the successes and goals of the last transfer and the transfer to come. It went well. Another piece of good news, I´ll be able to talk to Francisco and Santa on Tuesday night. Presidente wants us to call the families we baptize about once a month. So, hopefully I´ll be able to talk to them and Horbito and Dianella from Sabana Yegua.

Our other investigators are all doing well. There was a night last week where a couple people weren´t in their house so we decided to pass by to see Luz, because we hadn´t seen her in a while. We set another appointment and got her to Church. I was very happy about that. We had 9 investigators in Church yesterday! All we need to do now is help them progress up until baptism. The members here have given some great support. It makes a big difference when the members sit by the investigators and help them feel comfortable.

We´ve been getting lucky here with food. A lot of members have been feeding us well. The Old Bishop´s family fed us on Saturday afternoon and another great family fed us on Sunday. A great way to break a Fast!

General Conference is this Saturday. We´re going to have it in our chapel. If investigators come, we can go on Saturday. So don´t worry, we´ll be trying to find some people for Saturday. Also on Friday, we have interviews with Presidente. I´ll let you know how those go next week.

English class is growing more and more each week.

This morning we played basketball. I wanted to get a haircut before we went, but somehow on the way there, 500 pesos fell out of my pocket. Which is a shame, because I was going to barely make it through the end of the week with what I had. So, just letting you know.

Love, Phil

I`ve been studying more and thinking more about the greatness of the grace of God.

Letter from Phillip on March 5, 2012

Hola Familia,

Here is a picture of our baptism from last week. I forgot and left my tie at home, but Elder H. loaned me his tie for the baptism.

Let me tell you a bit about this week. We didn´t have a super eventful week, but we did have some good lessons, put some baptismal dates and found some new people to teach.

English class. We started out 3 weeks ago, but it`s already a hit baby. We had about 20 people come to the English class on Saturday. We divided the class up into 2. An advanced class and a beginner class. Elder B. and I took the advanced class and it was great. We did it all in English. We were wondering how everybody found out about it. I think we`ll end up finding some people to teach out of all of it.

We did a service project this week as well. We cleaned a kid`s house in our ward. His name is Angelo. He`s a funny kid who loves to theorize about deep doctrine. He`s preparing for his mission, and always helps us out, so we decided to return the favor.

We have the coolest former bishop ever. He just got released, but he has so much excitement to help others. Everyone looks up to his family as the model family in the ward. Our current bishop is great too. We just have to drop by his house more often.

We got an awesome referral this past week. Her name is Paola and lives with a recent convert. She`s 18, and had a lot of questions about the Book of Mormon. She read the testimonies at the front of the book and was ticked off that there were no woman witnesses. She thought it was somewhat sexist. But she went to Church yesterday and liked it. We have an appointment with her soon.

Also, we are teaching the rest of Maora`s family. They are all going to Church and a couple of them have accepted to be baptized.

I`ve been reading a lot in the book of Romans. The apostle Paul is still one of the best missionaries ever. If only we could all be as smooth as him. Ever since that Grace talk you sent me by Brad Wilcox, I`ve been studying more and thinking more about the greatness of the grace of God.

Have a great week!

Elder LeCheminant