October 1, 2008
Dear Family,
Here I am reporting from Jacksonville, Arkansas. So much has happened in such a short amount of time. I have decided that I am not a big fan of whitewashing areas. It was nice to have the same companion but when we got to the area, we had no idea what was going on. We have like 5 or 6 investigators and it is crazy to try and keep up with all of them. I think that the president is truly inspired with his choices when he transfers but it is very different then the norm.

The first couple of days was just to meet the investigators and find out where the church is and what not. We have been trying to get to know the members and I think that that is going well. This area is the opposite of my last area. We have really good investigators but we don't have such a good ward. The ward doesn't have very many members and there are like a million Less-actives in the area. We are trying to visit with all of the less-actives and trying to find out what there deal is. One got mad at us for visiting there house and said that they would call the police if we visit there house again. Ugh, why did LA's have to be rude? Who knows but don't worry, we get that kind of stuff all the time.

So we have several investigators and I will try and talk about each one of them.

1. Kimi - She is a big black woman and she is committed to baptism on the 28th of October. She has a problem with the word of wisdom but I think that she will get over that problem.

2. John - He was a referral from one of the members, Sister Hampton. He really seems like a "golden" investigator but he has to start to read and pray to get him over the top. Lessons have been going really well.

3. Jimmy and Judy - They live in a trailer park and they are not married. (We just found this out....) They are a big couple so we really don't think that it will be a problem. They said they haven't got married because of the money issue but i think if we can get the bishop to marry them then it should be a problem. He is committed to baptism on the 28th as well.

4. Gabby - She is a 9 year old girl and daughter of a less-active member. She is really smart but her parents don't want her to be baptized until she is ready. We have taught her pretty much everything so we need to explain to the parents that we have taught her everything we know and that she is ready for baptism.

5. Maurice- He is 11 years old and black. We read from the Book of Mormon with him twice a week. He is really smart when it comes to the Book of Mormon. We are asking him to pray about being baptized but I feel like he wants to wait until he has finished reading the Book of Mormon. I hope it doesn't come to that because he is only on Jacob 5. Ugh!

6. Destiny and Ebony - One is 8 the other is 11. They are hard to keep there interest but i think that they will get baptized. Only a matter of time.

7. Whitney- We have dropped her because anytime we gave her a challenge or committment, she never did it. So we told her that we as missionaries can do only so much so we told her to give us a call when she is ready.

So that is most of them. Yesterday, we had like 7 appointments so we were busy all day. It was awesome and crazy!

We also had family home evening with the Edwards. They are an awesome couple and they open there family home evening to everyone including investigators so that is really cool.

I am excited for conference this weekend. I feel like they haven't talked to us for a while. It is kind of cool to tell investigators that the prophet of the world is speaking this weekend so that sparks peoples interest. I am excited for this and we will see how it goes.

I love missionary work and I love to see the change that it brings into peoples lives. I am very grateful for the prayers and thoughts that you guys give me. I hope Ryan is doing well. I will put him in my prayers as well. My family, be safe, I love all of you and thanks again for all that you do for me.

Love,

Elder Parker