"Pumpkin Love"

Hey-lo! I hope all of you are had a great week especially with Thanksgiving! Hopefully you didn't eat too much. We had some good food at the Kirby's, especially the Pumpkin Love. Anyways...

Last Monday was fun, we ran around and played with a frisbee in the gym for a while. The rest of the night we worked on a report we had to present at Mission Leadership Council (MLC) on Wednesday. We had the Elders from Paintsville stay the night for the mission conference. Elder Willie and Elder Rawle are awesome.

Tuesday was an all day extravaganza with Elder Meurs. He is from Australia and is super nice, as I'm sure all leaders of the church are. He's a really well known engineer in Australia but just recently became a member of the 70 (leaders in the church who travel the world and teach). We talked a lot about finding people to teach, not just by knocking doors but by being creative. It sounds simple, but we had a huge discussion about all sorts of ideas and different ways to find. It was cool to get to see a lot of missionaries I knew as well. Elder Palmer and I got called up in front to do a role play of visiting part-member families and teaching them and working with the leadership in the ward. It was pretty exciting, haha. 

Wednesday was awesome too, Mission Leadership Council is legit. I feel like I learned so much about everything and especially how the mission runs. Elder Meurs and President Salisbury really have so much love for the gospel and the mission. I couldn't even begin to tell you 1/100th of what happened, it was like drinking from a fire-hose, but a good fire-hose. 

Thursday was sweet of course. We went over to the Kirby’s, like I mentioned earlier. Really good food, especially the Pumpkin Love. It was like pumpkin pie and heaven and angels combined into this weird pie-cake thing. 10/10 would recommend. Then we had some appointments, but a lot of people were just busy with the holiday, so it was pretty slow.

The rest of the week was pretty hard actually. A lot of our appointments have just been falling through lately, but it's been good work. We've found some pretty awesome families who were open to us coming back, so we are excited for this next week. All of the students for Marshall University are back as well, so we are going to be doing a booth for Christmas - It's going to be a party! Elder Palmer is awesome too. We're going to do a Christmas card, so prepare yourselves.

Anyways, I hope everyone who reads this email will also take a little time to check out mormon.org right now!!!!! It's all Christmased up and it's awesome. I really enjoy the theme for this year. It's all about how we can individually share the light of our Savior, Jesus Christ to the world. No matter who you are, you can serve those around you. Service really is such a special thing, because as we do it humbly and lovingly, we can feel Christ with us. He is there as we go about doing good. So check out the video and the calendar and I want each of you to do ONE THING a day for the initiative in order to Light the World. It will be awesome!

Stay safe out there and enjoy the cold as much as possible!!

Take Luck 

Elder Goold

Elder Vai and I

Huntington Zone

Mission Leadership Council

"Transfers was fun!"

Well hello everyone! It's hasn't been very long since the last time I emailed, so nothing terribly exciting has happened, but I'll give as many details as I can. 

So Huntington is right on the border of West Virginia and Kentucky. It's the same Zone as Martin, so I'll hopefully get to go and interview some of the investigators from over there. We have Marshall University in our area and so I get to talk with college students once again, but it's not a YSA ward or anything. It's pretty city-ish, but it's infinitely more flat and quite than Morgantown. We also have a full sized Walmart here.   #blessed

Elder Palmer is an awesome missionary. We get along really well. He's from Utah, but he grew up in Arizona. He played football in high school and loves football a lot, which is pretty sweet. He's been out 1 transfer longer than I have and he's a really good missionary. We're pumped for working together and it will be a good next transfer. 

We've got a few cool investigators, but the only one I've gotten to have a lesson with is Kayla.  She's a younger girl in her 20's and she is a really open person. She's eaten up all of the lessons and doctrine so far and has come to church 3 times now! She actually came with her son and boyfriend yesterday! We are really pumped for her and we are going to start teaching her boyfriend soon as well. She's really excited about the Gospel and she loves the belief in eternal families and being with our loved ones together in the presence of God! We are praying for her often and we are looking forward to her getting baptized in the coming months. 

Meanwhile, Natalia was baptized this last Saturday in Morgantown!!!!!

It's been getting colder here, but we're also getting closer to the end of our White CHRISTmas reading of the Book of Mormon. It has yielded some incredible blessings so far and December is going to be an awesome month. This upcoming week will be pretty nuts, we've got a mission tour conference day tomorrow with Elder Meurs (of the 70) and his wife.  The southern half of the mission is meeting with him today in Roanoke and the northern half of the mission meeting with him tomorrow in Charleston. Then Wednesday we have Mission Leadership Council (all the Sister Training Leaders and Zone Leaders meet with the Assistants and President and Sister Salisbury) with Elder Meurs there and then Thursday is Thanksgiving. So the first half of our week will be pretty limited in proselyting, but it will be worth it. The Lord's servants are real and following their guidance can bless us in our individual lives, so I am pumped to hear from Elder Meurs. 

Other than that, nothing else too exciting happened. Transfers was fun, I accompanied Elder Hill to Charleston and I got to see a ton of my old companions (pictured below) and it was a good ole time. The only one I didn't see actually was Elder Vai, who I'll see tomorrow at the mission tour conference, so it will be pretty cool to have seen all of my companions so recently. Other than that, everything is good here! 

Something that I was pondering about this morning was James 1:5. Many of you who read this already know the verse, but I was thinking about how much that verse impacted the young Joseph Smith's heart. And what stuck out to me is just how faithful and bold James was in saying that "if ANY OF YE lack wisdom, let him ask of God" I'm not sure if he even realized it, but that promise is true for all 7 billion people that live on Earth. That's amazing to me that James' promise for having our prayers answered isn't just for a select few, but it is for literally any person who reads and sincerely asks. I know it's true and I want each of you who reads this to sincerely ask God something you want to know!! He will hear you:) 

Alright everyone, have a great week!

Take Luck,

Elder Goold

Natalia's Baptism in Morgantown

Saying goodbye to Elder Baggett

Elder Christensen and I

My trainer Elder Rasmussen going home

Elder Hill and I

Elder Roberts, Elder Christensen, Me and Elder Ballard

Elder Palmer and I in our apartment 

"Well, Goodbye Martin!"

Yep, surprise surprise, I've only been here 3 months and now I am getting transferred!!!! But more on that later…

This last week and a half was honestly really hard. We had Cathy baptized and then we were struck with the affectionately named "Post-baptism curse". Almost everything that we had from last Monday to Friday fell through, which was really rough, but hey, life is not meant to be easy! We did still get to see a few good people.

Tuesday I was actually on exchanges with Elder Palmer in Martin and we took a sweet picture with one of our investigator’s super duper fat pig. It was a good exchange and we had time to go work in a new neighborhood since we had people fall through, it was cool to go somewhere new!  Wednesday we did some service up at Elkhorn Park again and did a ton of raking with the worst rakes known to man-kind, so that was pretty hilarious. Other than that, Wednesday was pretty unexciting. Thursday was just weekly planning and stuff not working out, so I won't bore you with the details.

Friday we had district meeting and that went pretty well. We did a lot of role-playing on teaching the Restoration. It kind of seems repetitive to do that as a missionary, but considering how important the message really is, we can always practice teaching it more and more and more! We have to have the skills for being a missionary in order for the Spirit to work through us best! Then I went on exchanges with Elder Hepworth in Pikeville. It was pretty good there and we did a lot of walking, which I always enjoy.

Saturday we got to see a good number of people, which made up for the week. We got to visit with some less-actives we were hunting for. We hadn't ever met them, but we found a lot and even found some cool people that were interested in the Gospel! We did find a lot of people this week who were interested but they lived in different missions, so we got to make a lot of other missionaries happy by sending them a lot of referrals! Then on the way home, we got a call from the Zone Leaders! Elder Palmer surprised us by letting us know that I was leaving, not Elder Baggett like we thought! Totally unexpected. We thought Elder Baggett would be leaving since he had been in Martin longer, but apparently not. I'm getting transferred to be with Elder Palmer in Huntington, WV where I will serve as Zone Leader. So it's actually not too far away - same zone I’m in now, so I’ll probably get to come back to Martin on exchanges! Plus, at the meeting I'll get to see Elder Roberts, Elder Rasmussen (who is going home tomorrow!!!!) and Elder Ballard (who is also going home tomorrow), so that will be fun!

Sunday was a good day, a lot of people at church not believing me when I told them I was leaving!!  It was pretty sad to leave so early, but hey, new adventures, so it's okay. Later that night we were able to go out with the Bishop again and visit a lot of less-active people who weren't seen in along time, many of them appreciated the visits, so that was fun. We also got to teach a new family, the Hunters! They have been taught before but they didn't have the best family relations going on, so they stopped meeting with missionaries for a while. But now they are open to meeting again, so that's pretty awesome!

I got to visit with Sean and April Sunday night for the last time, but I didn't have a camera so no pictures sadly. It was a good last Sunday here! And the last two days here were awesome, we got to see a lot of people and say goodbye to them!  Lots of good work and last night ended with a fun adventure! We got a random referral for a lady via phone call, which was a new experience. We went by to bring her a bible and also brought her a Book of Mormon (which was something else we practiced a district meeting, so that was nice to have fresh)! It went really well, her and her whole family (like literally, her whole family) live there and are all really nice. We were able to teach about the restoration of the gospel and set up for a chance to go back this weekend!!! That was a good way to end things here! It will be hard to leave this place, but hey change is good. According to a recent fortune cookie I got, "Comfort zones are expanded through doing the uncomfortable" which I would whole-heartedly agree with. We need to do the hard things in life to see the best, most rewarding results! I want each of you to do something this next week that pushes you towards becoming better! Sacrifice something to study the Gospel more, talk to someone you normally wouldn't and anything else you feel like you should do. It will bless you!!!

Hope you all have a great upcoming week this next week and stay safe! I'll need your prayers for this change, I'm still in shock haha:) Love you all!

Take Luck

Elder Goold

Elder Palmer with a fat pig

Thomas and I

Joe Bentley and I

Chris Bentley, Jacob Bentley and I

The Spurlocks and I

Sister Camp and I

Fudd and I 

Cathy, Debra, Andrew and I 

Ray Sloan and I

"November is here, off to a good start!"

Hey-there everyone!  Elder Baggett and I went to a science center at Big Sandy community college earlier today, which was sweet. I got to hold a bearded dragon and learn science. I miss school, haha. Anyways, this last week was totally awesome!

Last week we played basketball to end our p-day and then we went and did some community service in Maytown. There was a little community center we went to and we helped with Halloween games and organization and such, so that was fun.

Tuesday was sort of a let down compared to most other Tuesdays. On Tuesdays we go to Allen and Dwale which are the busiest places we go for a small as they are, but this week we had a lot of appointments fall through sadly. Regardless we did get to see a lot of people and we talked to one person in Dwale completely by "accident". People in our mission are pretty bad when it comes to addresses so we usually get real general directions to places when we get referrals. So we went to talk to this one referral we had and found another lady who was super interested in learning more!! She loves to read and has never read the Book of Mormon and willingly accepted it!  That was pretty awesome and we are going to see her tomorrow!

Wednesday was also kind of a slow day, we had a lot of people out in McDowell not answer but we did get one of the coolest text messages ever! We were teaching Thomas about the 10 commandments and the prophet and then Elder Baggett got a text message. Afterwards we looked at it and it was from Sean and April, April specifically!  We had committed them on Sunday to pray specifically and ask if the Book of Mormon is true. April said she had done everything we committed and that she was excited to tell us what happened! If that doesn't just kill a missionary and makes the hours drag on forever, I don't know what does. So yeah, we were excited.

Thursday we had the usual planning session for the week and then we headed back to Allen and Dwale to see a lot of the people we missed on Tuesday. We got to see Fudd, who is the father to a member here and his wife is less active. He is an awesome man and he came to church last week, not sure if I mentioned that, but Elder Baggett and I were speculating it was for their granddaughter’s talk. He's been taught before but we had a good lesson this week with him about learning as we read from the scriptures not just reading them. More on him later…Then we went back to the good ol' Job Corp and saw our newest investigator from there, Quinton Davis. We are really excited for him because he is awesome and actually read the Book of Mormon and took lots of notes! Now we need to just get him a ride to church! Then we went and saw...Sean & April! Well, not exactly. Sean was the only one home, April had to help out her niece. But Sean told us the news... Sunday night, after praying, April apparently had a dream about dying or something along those lines and she heard a voice, which she said was Christ’s and some other details. But the crazy part is what it meant! She looked up the dream on the internet as soon as she got up and the dream was interpreted to mean that "you have just received new-found religious beliefs into your life"!!!!!! Yeah, we flipped out and now she fully believes in the Book of Mormon! It's awesome sauce.

Friday was a good day. We had Zone Meeting in Huntington and I got to see Elder Kidd again (He was a zone leader my last 2 transfers in Morgantown) because he's the new assistant to the Mission President! He told me that there is supposed to be another baptism in Morgantown soon, so I emailed Elder Roberts and found out that Natalia is set for baptism on Nov. 19^th!!  That is so awesome, she really was prepared and I'm sad I won't see it, but it's so great to hear!!!!!

Then I got to go on exchanges with the Elders in Hazard again. I was with Elder Hill in Hazard and the highlight (and the main reason for the trip) was to interview a sister for baptism!! She was the first person I have gotten to interview and it was awesome. She'll be getting baptized this next weekend!

Saturday we drove back to Martin, just in time for the baptism of Cathy! It was an awesome service and she invited a ton of people to come!!! She had 4 family members come and one of her friends as well! It was super awesome. Cathy was baptized by Brother Bentley.  She's a great lady and we look forward to her continuing in the gospel! Picture below:)

Sunday! Sunday was good. 10/10 would recommend. We had an awesome testimony meeting. Cathy was confirmed a member of the Church!! Then we had Fudd and his wife at church again! That was super exciting to see. During the meeting Brother P., Fudd’s son, got up and bore powerful testimony of the church and straight up said how he prays for his dad to gain a testimony and wants him to be baptized into the true church so he can have his family together forever! It was so awesome, the Spirit was so strong.

This past week I committed our district to act on every spiritual prompting that they received throughout the week and dang, it was awesome. The Spirit truly is an amazing gift and it WILL guide you as long as you are humble and willing to follow its guidance. It is such a blessing to be able to know God's will and see how much it blesses us. I challenge each of you to the same thing, try and follow the Spirit in all things! Love y'all and have a great week!

Take Luck,

Elder Goold