Elder Joseph Barlow - Nevada Reno Mission

Ayo whats up everyone!! This was another crazy week. We didn't have very many lessons this week because everyone was busy or out of town which was bummy. Went on two exchanges and those were definitely the highlight of the week. Elder Bailey and I are super similar and it was one of the best and funniest days of my mission. Then Elder Carpenter is a soccer player and you guys have no idea how happy I am to have someone else here who plays and loves soccer as much as I do. It's been way too long and we got to juggle and just talk soccer it was so sick. We played some ball with these kids at an apartment complex we met a couple weeks ago. We play with them every time we see them and they said they go to the court at 3:00 every day hoping we come by haha. So we show up a couple times a week to ball with them for a bit and it's cool to see how excited they get when they see us. Also we got to teach primary and help out with singing time haha it's the best I wish we could te...

Time is flying by here, the week went by so fast. We had a really good lesson with Deb this week, she asked so many questions and she's studying the Book of Mormon a lot actually which is crazy! We had a lesson with Will and his wife Jenny this week and it was so cool because she opened up and started asking so many questions. And then they're whole family came to church again!  The rest of the week we did some nice service chopping wood and then we cleaned out a nasty trailer full of rotted and moldy grass from last summer. It was black and green and smelled brutal. We played ball with some Elders and their investigator which was so sick. I hit two game winning threes, I felt like Steph chef good lookin curry out there lol. Oh and we watched a drug deal happen at a park while we were doing a companion study haha Nevada at it's finest right there.  Anyways hope you guys are all doing good and have a good week!! Love Elder Barlow

  It was a lovely week and I'm just gonna do some bullet points of some highlights or funny things! ~This amazing lady named Deb told us she wants to join the church so we started the discussions with her and she loves it!! ~Our door approach we tried, "Hey, we've been trying to reach you concerning your cars extended warranty... nah just kidding we're the missionaries haha" got some good laughs out of people with it  ~Met a guy who's name was Jesus and he likes to jump in the park when the moon is high in the sky lol ~Our friend Will that we've been teaching brought his wife and kids to church on Sunday! It was the coolest thing and made me so happy! Definitely the highlight of the week ~Quilted with Sister Mahoney again Quick thought, even if we have just a desire to believe and trust in God and  Christ then that's enough. There's this amazing recent convert named Dawn and she's going through some challenging health struggles and even though ...

The weather has been wild this week. Last Monday night when we were driving back from Reno there were like 95 mph winds in Washoe and there were some crazy wrecks so they had blocked off all roads and entrances into Washoe. Sooo basically we couldn't go home so we spent the night with some other Elders and turns out the floor is pretty brutal to sleep on but what do ya do. We got to play with a members 23 puppies that they bred. Pretty therapeutic honestly.  We did exchanges this week so I was with Elder Evans and it was probably one of the most productive and satisfying days I've had as a missionary. Our buddy Daniel was asking about the word of wisdom and he agrees with all of it but he's got some hard habits to break. We challenged him to get down from 15 cigarettes a day to under 10. Pray for my man Daniel   Reading in Moses about Enoch was really cool. He talks to the Lord about how he doesn't feel qualified to be a prophet and he says I "am but a lad, and all...

Pretty solid week, we started off with a lot of snow shoveling. We do service for a state park here and they had 2-3 feet of snow and that was brutal to shovel through. The rest of the week it seemed like literally every appointment we had fell through so we spent so much time out knocking and either getting rejected or no one answering. It ain't much but it's honest work. A family I helped teach back in sparks got baptized yesterday too so I got to go back for it and it was amazing! The highlight of the week for sure was helping our ward member repair his fence so his Bison wouldn't get out again lol. It had torn the metal fence apart and got out onto the main road. And I'm telling you this thing is huge, like absolutely massive. Almost gave it hug. Hope yall had a good week, here's a quote I read this week!! "Patience is not indifference. Actually, it means caring very much but being willing, nevertheless, to submit to the Lord and to what the scriptures call...

Well the beginning of the week we didn't have much because people were out of town or appointments fell through so that was a tough but the second half of the week was packed. We had a mission Christmas party on Thursday and that was a ton of fun to see everyone. We spent Christmas Eve with a few different member families and we had yak for dinner. Never heard of anyone raising or eating yaks until I got here lol. Christmas day we played ball with other missionaries and made gingerbread houses which was way fun. We spent the rest of the night with a couple different families. All the snow melted but then on Christmas day and the day after it dumped snow and the wind has been crazyyy. We canceled church and we spent the day shoveling driveways and taking the Sacrament to people who wanted it which was really cool. We only got the car stuck once and I blame my companion on that one haha. Psalms 46:10 "Be still, and know that I am God: I will be exalted among the heathen, I w...

Ayo Merry Christmas everybody! This week was pretty cool, we got a nice snow storm early this week so that was cool. We shoveled a lot of snow for our neighbors and people who needed it and then shoveled snow for the regional park around the camp sites. Theres part of our area that's like 40 min away and up a crazy steep canyon and we had dinner up there with some less active members the night of the blizzard. We were debating if we should go because the roads were terrible and they told us not to drive up... so we decided to drive up anyway haha. Looking back we definitely shouldn't have gone and we only slid out a couple times but we made it safely back. Its a really pretty drive and I've decided that besides Tahoe I'm definitely in the prettiest area of Nevada. Which isn't that impressive considering most of the state is sage brush. We had some super sick lessons this week. We taught Will again and we brought up baptism and I was kind of expecting like a hesitant...