Email: AMAZING week!

Hello to my great family,
                                  Well let me just start out by telling you that we had an amazing week! I don't know what it is that all of you were praying for or what you did differently with your prayers but it definitely worked. So I'm sure you remember the family I told you about that the parents decided last Sunday that they wanted to get baptized Thursday. Well let me tell you what took place with them. So Monday we got a text from Tara the wife, know let me tell you why that was big news. Usually whenever she would text us it was to cancel things with us, but this time she was just confirming the baptism but just moving it to 7:30. Phew that was an exciting moment. Anyways Tuesday we were in a bit of contact with them just confirming a few plans with them. Then on Wednesday we were planning on going over to their house for their interview, well like I said whenever Tara texts us it is usually to cancel. Well that is what happened she said that is was their sons birthday party that night so we would have to reschedule for another time. Well we weren't just going to let a text stop us. Knowing that it was their oldest sons birthday we took that as a perfect opportunity to go over there with a gift. We bought him this little remote control car that was pretty cheap. Then we wrapped it up in a proselyting pamphlet and took it to him. We were able to go over a few things and plan the interview for the next day. So now we were coming down to the wire. We usually like to have the baptismal interviews done about 2 or 3 days before the baptism, this time we didn't have that luxury. So here comes Thursday. We had a missionary correlation meeting in the morning with our Ward Mission Leader and went over a few things with him concerning the baptism. We were all freaking out a bit because of how close the interview was to the baptism. So here comes 3 O'clock ( which was the time of the interview). We headed over to there house all ready for the interview. We show up and what do you know things were in our favor that day. We found them all home and ready for us. The interview went great and Will was super excited. The only curve ball that got thrown at us was the wife, Tara. She told us that she wasn't quite ready to get baptized yet. We respected that and didn't push it, knowing that she would definitely feel something at the baptism. Then came the baptism. It was a very small baptism because they had only invited 3 families. They wanted to keep it very small and sacred for their family. If they had opened it up to the whole ward it for sure would have filled up the chapel. Anyways the program went amazingly, the talks that were given were amazing and definitely invited the spirit so strong. Then the baptism took place. I had one of the most overwhelming feelings from the spirit as he was baptized. All baptisms are fantastic but this one was very special because of what it means to this family. The husband has terminal cancer and has been battling it for a long time now. Now because he was baptized, will get confirmed on Sunday, receive the priesthood the same day and then baptize his boys and hopefully his wife as well on the 6th of December. I am just overcome with joy for this family. They have so much love and support from the ward and all those around them and since this took place it will only increase. Oh also the mother/ wife was overheard saying she feels like she should have gotten baptized that night. Didn't I tell you that I knew she would feel something. Now the worse case scenario is that the husband will be able to baptize his whole family practically. What a special experience that will be. So that is what took place with them. It was by far one of the defining moments on my mission so far.
                                  On Friday we drove about an hour south to a place called Chico. We had the opportunity to meet with Elder Stanley G. Ellis of the Seventy. We had a great discussion with him and with President Weston as well. After the main meeting, which included 3 zones, we met as a leadership council. So all of the zone leaders and district leader and trainers as well as a few select others. He talked with us a lot about being a leader and setting the example. Overall that was a great meeting as well.
                                 So as you see it was a great week. There was a lot that kept us busy.  I love you all very much and hope that you all have a wonderful Thanksgiving. Have fun down in St. George!

I love you  Love Elder Payne

1st Pic is of the baptism

 2nd Pic are all Elders who claim me as either a father, grandfather, or great grandfather in the mission.

Email: Meetings and Lineage

Hello to all of my wonderful family,
                                I sure hope that my email finds you all doing well and that everything is going great! Boy it sounds like you guys had quite the week this past week. I swear every time I get an email from you guys that you all have been of on some new crazy adventure. haha I'll bet having everybody back at the house kept you all very busy. It is weird that, that was the norm not to long ago, now it is a huge event whenever everybody shows up. I loved the pics of the baby blessing, little Sara looked extremely cute in it.I cant believe how much she has been growing. It is the same with each one of the little kids. Drake is getting so big I cant even believe it. Savannah! Holy smokes she is changing so much as well. I cant believe how quickly she is growing. Make sure and keep sending me all of those great pics of them, thanks.
                               So we had an extremely busy week this past week. Most of the time I felt like I was a chicken running around with my head cut off. What happened was on Monday we found out that we had a big meeting on Sunday that we had to have a bunch of info for. We thought it was supposed to be like 2 weeks later but that didn't end up happening. So we had to get a paper out to all of the companionship's and then get it back, then we had to type it all up, compile all of the numbers and such, print it all out and get it all together. And so you see the glory of being a zone leader. You get all the perks of a regular missionary plus a whole ton of reports. On top of that we went down to Chico for a leadership meeting on Friday. It was actually a really great meeting! We met with all of the trainers, District leaders, and zone leaders in the Northern part of the mission. We met with President Weston and his Assistants. We talked about quite a few things with them. We talked a lot about how we can increase the amount of investigators that we have coming to church. We also talked a lot about utilizing the members more and using them as a great resource for help. Then lastly we talked about the doctrine of Repentance and how key that is. It was a great meeting where I learned a lot about those subjects. It was really strange though because at that meeting I did not recognize like half of the Elder or Sisters there. Usually I know quite a few of the people but there are so many new missionaries in the mission that it is hard to keep up.
                             So just a little update on our investigators. Both of the families that we are involved with right now are doing pretty well. First the Lockwood's, they are doing great. Unfortunately they had to cancel both of our appointments this past week. They did, however, come to church which was awesome. We are going to be meeting with them on Thursday at a dinner with some of our members. We are going to be setting a baptismal date with them for the 19th of October, so please be praying for them. Next Dean and Tracey's family are doing well. We were able to meet with them a few times to check up on things. We are going to be doing a big push with Dean to quit smoking. We are going to be fasting with him soon so we will see how that goes. So there is your little update haha. Things are great here I am still loving it. I was on exchanges last week with the APs and also saw President Weston. They both said they are very happy with what is going on up here. It has been a while since the Redding zone has been this good. I am grateful that the fruits of my labors are paying off and being noticed. We have been working very hard to make this the best zone in the mission and a place where everyone wants to serve. Hopefully it is getting there.
                            Well I love you all so much. I am sending a picture of me and a few people. It is what is called my posterity picture. It has the Elder I trained (Holbrook), Then both of his "Sons" and then one of their "sons". So all of them came from my lineage. The only one missing is Elder Hyde so hopefully I can get one with him sometime. I love you all and hope you have a wonderful week.

Love Elder Payne

Email: Member Present Lessons

Hello my dear family,
                              How is everything going back at home? It sounds like things are going great back there with everything, except for of course grandma breaking her wrist. That was really unfortunate that, that happened Make sure and give her my best and let her know that I am praying for her.
                              So wow let me tell you a little about my week. Things have been amazing out here. This is definitely one of the happiest times of my life. I am just absolutely so blessed to be where I am right now with all that is going on around me. So to start off the whole Facebook thing is crazy! It is really nice in some ways but sort of weird in others. We are currently working through all of the kinks and things but it seems to be working out ok. i an awesome experience with it on Tuesday. I was on and i saw that one of our investigators was online. she is one that it has been very hard to get a hold of for a very long time. So what I did was start chatting with her and asked how her day was going. She was struggling really bad because of some things with her mother. i was able to share a little bit with her. Then i noticed that our Elders quorum president from out at the branch was on. i connected with them both and boom there you go, an online member present lesson. It was absolutely amazing being able to help her just by sitting at a computer. That girl is actually getting baptized this coming Saturday, we are super excited because it has been a long time coming. That experience right there showed me just how effective this tool can be.
                               Well lets see what else took place this past week. On Friday we headed about an hour and a half away from Redding to a place called Gridley. We had our monthly zone leader meeting. it was a really great meeting with everyone. We discussed a lot about the way things are going in our zones. Like some of my past emails have said Redding is just exploding right now. This past month in August we averaged 36.2 member present lessons, this is huge because back in like May and June we only averaged about 19, so that is a huge jump. This past week we had 41, it is just so awesome to see the work moving forward the way that it is and to see the way that the members are rallying around us missionaries to help is such a blessing. We also talked about our upcoming training meetings, which will take place this Thursday. It was a great meeting where i really feel like i learned a lot.
                               So the reason that i am emailing so late is because we decided to utilize our surroundings and go do something fun outside. We went and did this hike called the Castle Crags hike. It is about 3 miles to the top, it was a ton of fun and great to switch things up and do things a little differently. It was a little tiring and reminded me of how out of shape i am but it was definitely worth it. Also on our way back we saw this huge fire going on. It is a couple miles outside of Redding and moving fast! But luckily not in our direction. it is headed towards two small towns call Igo and Ono which are both in our ward boundaries so hopefully they can knock it down before it gets there.
                           Well that is about it for the week. Dont worry i am still doing great and loving it here. I love you all and hope all is going well. i love you all and hope you have a great week

Love Elder Payne

Email: The Future is Now!

Hello to my wonderful Family,
                                  Well I have some very big news to share with all of you. You may have noticed some activity on my account on a certain social networking site over the past few days. No, you don't need to worry I have not just gone super disobedient and started breaking all of the rules. My mission is now one of 12 missions in the World that are piloting, you guessed it, Facebook! We found out on Friday that we are going to be using Facebook as a proselyting tool. It is crazy, I never in a million years would have thought that I would be adding people on Facebook and sharing videos and stuff on there while on my mission. The past few days have been very strange trying to figure out how we are going to be doing this. We found out that it is just going to be starting with the Zone Leaders and some select Sisters and then eventually filter out to the rest of the mission. One of the things we have to do is make our Facebook pages much more professional. That involves going through and hiding all of the pictures that are not in line with our calling, as you can imagine that means there are quite a few that I have to go through and hide. We also have to clean up all of the posts that we have been tagged in or have posted ourselves. So if you have seen that I have untagged myself there is a reason for that.
                      I am very sure that this new tool that has just opened up to us will definitely help to further the work. This is most assuredly the generation that can use these resources for what they were meant to be used for. Like I said on Friday I learned a little of how we can use Facebook to teach lessons and do things like that. This is going to be a huge learning experience for me and I am excited to see where it will lead the work.
                  So other than the announcement about Facebook the rest of the week has been pretty dull. haha  So on Wednesday I was on exchanges up in a little place called Weaverville. It is this little tiny city of only about 3,000. I got to meet some really neat people and have a lot of really great lessons. One of which was with this Less Active family. They are older and just kind of one day stopped coming to church. We talked a lot about the Book of Mormon and how we need to continually be reading it. There are so many teachings in there and so many things that can help us that we really can be blessed by it. The woman at one point said," I have already read it why do I need to read it again?" At the point I was able to bear my testimony of the divinity of the Book of Mormon and how it has blessed my life by continually reading it. I sure hope something that I said will help them. Anyways then on Friday we had our Zone conference. That is where I found out about Facebook. Then Elder McMurray and I got to give a training on the Doctrine of Love. It was a really neat experience teaching about love and how important it is to have it in our zones, districts, and companionship's. We read from Matthew 22:36-40 that talked about the first great commandment. Then we read a little from Jeffrey R. Hollands talk "The First Great Commandment". It went really well, we got to talk for about 25-30 minutes.
                                  In our zone we had 4 baptisms this past week. It was amazing to see the miracles that are taking place out here. Well I believe that is all I have for the week. Like I said it was a crazy one but it was great. I love you all and I am so grateful for the amazing family that I have. I hope you all have a wonderful week.

Love Elder Payne

Email: 2 Baptisms! And a McDonalds Stand-Off

Hello Family,
                  Holy Smokes where do I begin? This has been such an amazing week. We have seen a ton of miracles a ton of craziness and a ton of change. So I guess we will just start at the beginning. So Tuesday we began our day by doing a lot of running around, because we are the zone leaders we had to go and babysit a lot of missionaries because a lot were leaving. So we had to go out about 10 minutes North of where we live to pick up an Elder. Well come to find out that didn't happen he just ended up doing some other thing to get his new comp. Anyways back to the story, so we are heading back home to do some things and I was like man i would really like some McDonald's breakfast right now, and Elder McMurray was like ya me too. So we head to McDonald's. Well we pull into the parking lot and what do we find? Oh nothing much just a parking lot full of cop cars with their guns drawn and pointed at this car that was between us and them. So basically we were looking down the barrels of about 3 glocks, and of course the first words out of my mouth were, " oh man now we cant use the drive through!" ha ha ya no joke i am brilliant. So we wheel around and get out of there as quick as we can. We decided to park a ways away from the action and observe. Of course I snapped a few photos and I wont explain to much because i am pretty sure they speak for themselves. So after they get the guy in cuffs and start searching the car we go into the other side of McDonald's. It was awesome because while we were in there i got talking to a guy. He was super excited to learn that we were church people, so of course we picked him up as a new investigator.
                       So enough with that action, on Thursday we had our zone meeting. That is the one that Elder McMurray and I teach. We had a great time teaching it. We talked mainly about strengthening the faith of the missionaries and strengthening the faith of the members. It was great because we had out Ward Mission leader come in and talk about what missonary work is like from the members point of view. i thought it went very well and we all learned a lot. At the end we challenged everybody to go through and read Ether 12, because that is the whole theme of that chapter is faith. So of course that is my challenge to all of you. Go read Ether 12 and tell me what you think. Better yet tell Lindsay and she can put your responses on the blog.
                     Now we continue, Later that day we had the baptismal interview for Tracey and her son Demitris. They both did awesome and are so ready to be baptized. Continuing on through the week, we had a great lesson with Shane Toro. We went over the Restoration with him. It was so amazing when we were going over the lesson. We were talking about some things and I was explaining the Apostasy when i stopped and wanted to ask a few more questions to make sure he understood but he was just sitting on the edge of his seat and when i stopped he just blurted out, " Well then what happened?" It was so cool because I have never had an investigator that was that excited to hear the message of the Restoration. When we recited Joseph Smiths vision he was just about in tears. He told us that he got chills when it was being recited. What an amazing person. We explained that those feeling were form the Holy Ghost and they were confirmation that the message is true. We invited him to be baptized on the 31st of this month and he said he would pray about it!
                        Alright shall we continue with the miracles? i believe we shall! So Saturday we had one of the most amazing baptisms of my mission. Tracey and her son Demitris got baptized and what was even more amazing was that i got to baptize Demitris! What was also pretty neat was that because Tracey had brain surgery and isn't very strong I got to be in the water with them Tracey while Elder McMurray baptized her. It was such a neat experience. Then Sunday I got to confirm Demitris as well. It was amazing seeing someone as prepared as them both completing all of those ordinances. Later that night we visited them and I personally witnessed scripture being fulfilled.
2 Nephi 32:2-3  "Do ye not remember that I said unto you that after ye had received the Holy Ghost ye could speak with the tongue of angels? And now, how could ye speak with the tongue of angels save it were by the Holy Ghost?
 3 Angels speak by the power of the Holy Ghost; wherefore, they speak the words of Christ. Wherefore, I said unto you, feast upon the words of Christ; for behold, the words of Christ will tell you all things what ye should do."
                    So she usually has trouble speaking but she said a prayer that was absolutely amazing. I will stop there because this is a long post. Well I love you all and hope all is going well. Good luck to Lindsay this week because she definitely needs it. I love you all.

 Love Elder Payne

Email: Happy Monday!

Well hello to you all
                    It was so good to here from you all and be able to hear a little about what has been going on back home. It sounds like everyone has been extremely busy with parties and trips and other crazy things so I am sure many of you are exhausted. I guess it is getting to be that part of the summer when you need to start fitting in all of those extra vacations, just make sure you don't wear yourselves out too much. Thank you all so very much for all of the pictures that you sent me, it is always good to see all of your faces. Per request of Staci i need to answer a question for her. I would love for you to print off pics and send them to me because it would be a lot easier for me to get good prints of them, thank you. I am glad that the fireworks went over so well, that is great. Ya, you better expect next years show to be the biggest ever.
                       so let me tell you a bit of how my week went. Compared to most weeks this has been a relatively slow week. ha ha only because we didn't have a million and one things to get done just a million. This coming week is going to be insane! i don't quite know how to put this but it is by far going to be the busiest week of my mission. We have 2 baptismal services to schedule this week, then we also have a meeting on Friday that is for the mission leadership (Zone Leaders) that goes pretty much all day, and we also have a huge stake meeting on Sunday that we have to prepare for. On top of those few things we have to meet with all of our investigators and do many other things. So if you wouldn't mind praying for me, especially that we will be able to accomplish it all that would be wonderful! We are continuing to a lot of miracles happen though so of course I am not complaining and being busy is definitely a huge blessing. things around here are just exploding and I love it. We are getting close to the end of the transfer and i am pretty sure Elder McMurray is leaving. It will be sad to see him go but I know that i have learned a lot from him. I don't know if you heard about the Elder that died in Guatemala in  a car wreck, but that was actually one of Elder McMurrays close friends back home. So please also keep him in your prayers.
                             I am sure you are wondering why i am emailing to late as well. Well that is because for P-day today we did something a little out of the ordinary. We decide to go do an awesome hike. There are so many beautiful hikes and mountains around here that it is crazy. We hiked up to this place called Whiskeytown falls. It was only like a 2 mile hike but it was amazing. i will include some pictures at the end.
                         I want to send a HUGE shout out to the girl that is a play this evening. Yes i am talking about the magnificent and talented Hannah Rose Payne! I want to wish you good luck, and you know like they say "break a leg" but not really at least not like Drake almost did but in the way that means you are going to awesome in the play. :) I hope everything goes well and know that i will be praying for you.
                       Well everyone i love you all so much and once again i will close my email with a "I love you" and a " Cant wait to hear from yall" Hope all goes well this week.

Love Elder Payne

Email: Crazy, Busy Week!

Hello to my wonderful family,
                    So did I mention last week that this was going to be a busy week, why yes I believe I did. Well that definitely came to pass. Holy smokes let me tell you this past week has been insane! It has been so stressful and yet at the same time there have been so many amazing things that have happened.
                    Let us start at the beginning of the week. How about Tuesday? So Tuesday we had interviews with President Weston. They went really well. He didn't have to much to say to me in fact it only took like five minutes. I think a big part of it was that I told him in my last interview before this that I just want to be one of those missionaries that he doesn't have to worry about. That he knows that I am always doing what I am supposed to do and being diligent. We talked a little about me being a zone leader and how I was liking that. We talked about the work a little bit, so ya it went well. So after that the miracles really started to happen. We had a lesson with Nike one of our investigators in the singles branch and we committed her to quit smoking and then right after that we committed her to be baptized. She accepted both so we are currently working with her on that. Well then later that evening we had a lesson with Dean and Tracey, and before I go on I am just going to tell you that they could really use your prayers. Anyways so we have been working with them for a long time now. Especially with Dean because he is trying to quit smoking and it has been really hard for him and that is the only thing holding them back from being baptized. Well we committed him right then and there to quit smoking and for both of them to be baptized. I then asked him for his cigarettes, it was extremely hard for him but he gave them to us. So for all three people we are working towards the 3rd of August for baptism. After that we went on exchanges the Assistants to the President. Well let me tell you that was an interesting day. I was with one of the assistants who is known as one of those missionaries that likes to brown noes President. Anyways it was a pretty good day. Apart from him partially offending one of the members of our ward.
                         Well the rest of the week was pretty great but stressful none the less. On Friday we had to do a ton of reports so yes mom there are a few things different about being zone leader. I feel like I am adjusting pretty well to all of the new work load though. So then came the craziest day yet, Saturday. So in the morning we had to drive about an hour and a half South to a baptism in a place called Chico. Someone that Elder McMurray taught about a year ago was getting baptized and he asked McMurray to come baptize him. So that was an amazing thing getting to see someone that went through so much get baptized. Then later on , on Saturday we had another baptism, this one was for Mitch who was an investigator in our ward. It went so well, he was just absolutely glowing. I love seeing someone who is so prepared get to enter into the waters of baptism. That is something that I have really seen out here so far. That there really are people that are so ready to be baptized. I love being able to feel the spirit in those lessons. I know for a fact that the lord is mindful of his children, he knows what we need and he loves us all so much. I also know that repentance is such a real thing. Repentance is available for everyone, no matter what we have done as long as we come with that truly repentant heart the Lord will forgive us.
                        So Sunday Mitch received the Holy Ghost. One of the members of the Ward was able to give him that. He told us that he just felt so much of a difference now. Well like I said there was a ton of stress this week but it was so worth it. It is a great feeling at the end of the day when you are able to lay your head down on the pillow and know you put in a hard days work. Well I love you all so much. Good luck to all of you especially Hannah and Katelyn. I know that you have a ton of stuff going on and just know that I am praying for you all. I love you and hope you all have a great week.

Love Elder Payne

Email: So Much Great News!

Hello to you all,
                     Well from moms email it sure sounds like you are all having a pretty busy summer. That sounds pretty normal for the Payne household. Katey congrats on making All-American that is awesome. I am so proud of you. Hannah I am so happy for you as well. It sounds like you are staying extremely busy as well. How is the play practices going? Are you working hard? I sure hope so because the harder that you work the more it will be worth it.
                      So I am not going to tell you about transfers yet because I want to keep you on the edge of your seat. Let me tell you a bit about this past week. This week we were on exchanges quite a bit. That is one of my responsibilities as District Leader is to go on exchanges with everyone in my district. Well just with scheduling two of those exchanges happened on the same week. It made it feel like I basically wasn't in my area at all this week. ha ha Elder Hyde did a great job of taking over the area. He is really filling in very well. On Wednesday we had Kris Conrad's baptismal interview. That went very well. He was a little surprised when he showed up to the church and there were 6 Elders there. Everything was going well, or so we thought, until the Elder who was interviewing him asked me to come in for a moment. He told us that he felt that we should postpone the baptism for a little bit because he didn't get a clear answer on whether or not President Monson was a Prophet. Kris was like hang on a second I didn't say that I said that all the Prophets are Prophets and that the Priesthood authority was handed down. It was really neat seeing him really stand up for his beliefs like that. Anyways the interviewer was like alright sounds great we will proceed then. So then came the baptism on Saturday. Kris came and picked us up on Saturday at about 11:20 because the baptism was scheduled for 12:00. When we showed up it was great because we had to hand him off to other elders they had to take care of setting everything up. Kris was so amazed at the support that he got . There were quite a few people that showed up for the baptism, people from both our ward and from there ward. The baptism went very smoothly. I was so grateful that i was able to step down into the water with someone as prepared and amazing as him. When he came up out of the water he was just absolutely glowing he just couldn't contain himself. The sister of the other ward were very nice and prepared a great lunch after the baptism. On Sunday Elder Hyde confirmed Kris and he did a great job. He gave him a great blessing as well. I know for sure that Kris is going to go very far. I am so grateful that I have had this opportunity to teach him. I know that there are going to be a lot of other people I teach, but I know that Kris is definitely one that I was sent here to teach.
                        I did get to watch the Broadcast at our church building. I didn't realize that Derek was on it I am going to have to try and find it again so that I can try and see him. So as far as facebook and stuff like that, we have not received and info on that yet. I am sure that we are going to be hearing more about that soon. I will keep you updated.
                              Alright so here is the big news. I am being transferred, I am actually going to be a zone leader now. I am also going to the very furthest North zone in the mission, Redding. I get to go be companions with Elder McMurray, who is one of my very good friends out here. I am so pumped for a variety of reasons, great area, great, comp, and many others. So that is all for now I love you all and you are all in my prayers. Thank you for all of the prayers on my behalf as well. I love you all.

Love Elder Payne