Life at Haigler Creek Hideaway

Fall is finally here, we think, and we are preparing for the winter by stacking up the wood, canning and freezing veggies from the garden and planting the garlic. It has been a wonderfully busy summer and we are enjoying the cool evenings and glad to see the garden slowing down. It has been very productive and we are a little tired of squash and green beans. We just harvested the potatoes and they are really good this year. The tomatoes are mostly still green but we'll just pick the whole plant and store it in the garage and hope they ripen a little at a time so we can enjoy them throughout the winter. If not, we'll have great salsa.
The missionary work is going well. We are still teaching our investigator, Paul Anderson, who has set a date for baptism on Dec. 12. We are fellowshipping several couples in the branch who are less active and have nonmember spouses. Getting involved in several activities in the town (ie the Gila County Fair and the Pleasant Valley Singers) has enabled us to make new nonmember friends. Helping to build a greenhouse for the school is the latest project that has kept Grampa busy.
We have a new grandbaby boy born in Shanghai, China on 10-10-10! His name is Jackson Platte Lyman and he is the son of Bekki and Tyler Lyman. President Ellsworth, our mission president has given us permission to visit them and the new baby next month, so we will spend Thanksgiving in Suzhou, China.
Hope you all have a Happy Halloween!!

Young Missionary Experience

June 13, 2010
We still have not received the corrected mission call. If it doesn’t come by Fri., Pres. Brenay said to call Pres. Whipple (the stake president). However, we have been called as branch missionaries and as such we were given a referral that we made an appointment for today at 2:00. After church we were about to drive away from the parking lot, when Brother Williams of our branch came up and said we should go with him to talk with this lady who was across the road and down a ways. She was yelling, "shame on you for going to that bad church." We did. Bother Williams was already talking with her when we arrived. The lady was a lesbian (she advertised it with her shirt) who was obviously full of anger and hate for the world. She was telling us how terrible we were for going to a church that discriminated against her. We tried talking for awhile but we could feel such a bad spirit that we didn't even want to talk with her. Dale asked her several questions to see if she was open to finding new truth, however she just wanted everything to be proved. She just wanted to argue and accuse and judge everyone. There was such a terrible spirit there. We finally excused ourselves saying we had an appointment to go to, which we did. We left and started out for our appointment with this referral that was given to us last week. It took about 45 mins to get there but when we arrived, there was such a difference! This man has been prepared by the Lord and has humbled himself. He agreed with everything we told him about prophets, the need for them, Joseph Smith, etc. It is true that he has had a very hard life and made some serious mistakes, but he has been humbled by them and has submitted himself to the Lord and is earnestly seeking truth and the true church. He is very grateful for God in his life and acknowledges Him in all things. The full time elders came also, although they were an hour late and we had already taught him about the Gospel, the Book of Mormon and the need for a restoration before they arrived. He took the challenge to read and pray about the Book of Mormon and he offered a very nice prayer at the end. He is anxious to come to church as he agrees with everything we taught him. Wow, what a different in attitude! It was like night and day. There could not have been two more opposite extremes than was exhibited in the example of these two people. They had both been through difficult experiences in their lives but each had come out with such opposite thinking and attitudes. It was an amazing experience to feel the spirit of the Lord so strongly and working so effectively in this man's life and to see such a proud woman who had so much anger and hatred and had allowed Satan to rule her life. We are grateful to have had both experiences to see the difference and to confirm to us that there is a God and there is a Satan and they are in direct opposition with one another. It could not be clearer than that.

Everything good comes from the Lord and everything bad is from Satan (Moroni 7: 15-16). We hope we will always choose the good but know that being mortal with weaknesses, we will sometimes fall short and perhaps choose unwisely. We do know, however, that as the years go by we are becoming better and stronger as we choose well and follow the Lord's plan and commandments. That's all we can do, but those small steps bring us closer to Him. A testimony is fragile and so it is necessary to nourish it with the good word of God daily and pray for the guidance of the Holy Ghost in our lives each day.

It’s been a great Sabbath day.