What a week! Definietly not a typical one. We have been working super hard to fill our investigator pool. We have been seeing a lot of success from it as well! We are being blessed, and Rotterdam South is starting to see the success it hasn't in over a year! I'm really enjoying it, but it is completely different than my other two cities. I promise, this is the ghetto. Actually, I promise, we live in Baghdad. You wouldn't believe it haha. Finding is very challenging sometimes, but I LOVE it. 80% uninterested Muslims, 18% uninterested other, 1% uninterested Dutch, then the other percent is interested people. I'm not lying haha. It has been fun though :) The weather is good! It rained a few days, but what's new? This is the rain capital of the world. With the warmer weather, also come out the European styles. That's right, good looking people. Me being one of them ;) Nah, but it is very dangerous as well. It is very clear why this country is known to be one of the worst countries modesty wise. That is very sad, but honestly it is not hard to avoid. This past week, we had Koningsdag here. Kings Day. This place blows up for that literally. They go crazy. One of the biggest celebrations in the world and everyone wears orange! I really enjoyed it! Kings Day was on Saturday, and we had to wake up at 2:30 in the morning with the Zone Leaders and R'dam North Elders to set up a booth in the Vrijmarkt and save our spot. We did all of that, all wore orange ties, got to our spot, and realized that we had to reserve a spot 2 months ago, so we had to go to another spot and it turns out that we didn't have to wake up so early after all haha. Still a very fun unforgetable experience. The whole mission was to do this on Saturday for Koningsdag. Free Markets is how they celebrate Kingsday here too. They all line up their booths and sell stuff in the cities. We just contacted, and had a booth with Books, Pamphlets, and other things. If this computer wasn't lame, then I would send pictures of ours, but it isn't working :'( Oh well. We got like 30 potentials for our cities and that was really cool. It was really cool to talk to a ton of people. Elder Frisbee and I were buds in the MTC and were able to spend a lot of time together at the booth. We talked to two pretty girls about the church. One of them is going to Idaho Falls in 3 weeks to start a foreign exchange. She wanted to learn about us because she will be staying with a Mormon family. That was a cool miracle! She left, then came back with her friend again and asked us to go get dinner with them. So yes, we got asked on a date ahah, but no, we didn't go :'( We told everyone what happened. The ZL's, the sisters, and the other missionaries, and they all got mad that we didn't go. They were saying it would've been a great opportunity to share the gospel. That would've been hilarious! At least I know that for next time ;) Kingsday was a great experience. I remember hearing about it back at home, but it was fun being here in reality. Such a cool mission. Soccer here is going crazy too. I collect scarves from the teams in my cities, and now I have an FC Twente, Ajax, and Feyenoord. A family in Rotterdam loves me and bought me a Feyenoord scarf for easter. That was amazing. So cool to see the bonds we can make with people, even only being here for 2 weeks haha.

Well, I finally did what I though I would never do.... I bought a bike. I know I know, I'm crazy, but I had to. It is really nice too. Has a speedometer, great locks, and it is very netjes. It was originally 150 euros, but I told them I would only spend 130 so they did that. They did it cause I'm a Jesus Guy. They were all Muslims as well. It's amazing how Heavenly Father works haha. We bike a ton too. We did 100 kilometers in 2.5 days. That is like 65 miles or so. Not too much, but enough to get a sweat on and not feel guilty for eating 5 panekoeken and 5 stroopwafels right after ;) Nah, but I really enjoy it!

We had a good week finding, and able to teach a little. We had a lesson with a new investigator who said he knows more about us, than we do. I got to my skin and made me pretty upset honestly haha. He kept asking questions and interupting me when I would try to respond. Sometimes we get those here haha. We had other good lessons, and it is amazing what is possible with the spirit as well. I'm so grateful for the spirit in missionary work. It is absolutely impossilbe without the spirit. We also met with Lauwrence. He is the old satanist, but is very interested in the gospel. He took me and Elder Moomey to lunch to a really nice french food resturaunt. He had a lot of hard questions. Deep doctrine that were really hard to answer, especially in Dutch lol. But once again, the spirit was there which made everything clear. Hernandez is our Baptismal date. He will be getting baptized this week on Saturday! He had a really hard week last week. His government funding went out, and now he has no income. Well, at least his tithing issue is fixed haha..... not really, but yeah. It is crazy to see how everytime in our lives when we have a big step to make, it usually won't come without a big trial before hand. God knows what we need to experience, that is for sure. He got his drivers lisence though! That was good. He came to church on Sunday, sat next to me in church, then asked me for a blessing after church. I love giving blessings. Especially in Dutch. Nothing more powerful than using the mission language to perform priesthood ordinances.

On Wednesday, we get to go to the temple! Super excited. Already will be my 2nd time our of 4 on the mission. That is insane!!!!! I'm very excited, especially because Yocom arranged it to make sure he would be able to sleep over at my apartment the night before, so tomorrow night. We are gonna have a party. I love him to death! So fun to have him here. Elder van de Merwe will also be there and he is a good buddy from school. They do the temple on two different days in this mission, so I got lucky to go with all my friends this time around. Even from the MTC friends will be there. Everyone except Elder Alston haha, but rumor has it that he will be here next transfer as Zone Leader, which puts him in my ward and living 5 minutes away from me. Super steeze. Just a little rumor though :) I cannot explain in words how excited I am to go to the temple. After the temple, we are going as a mission to the Keukenhof. Big flower garden that is world famous. Tulips, tulips, tulips. It will be so fun to be with buds there as well.

I am honestly loving my mission. This is the best place in the world. THE best mission in the world. Nowhere else I'd rather be, and I can honestly say that. I love it. I have become converted to the gospel as well. I know why I"m here, and I'm doing my best to be as the Sons of Mosiah in Mosiah 28:3. I'm learning to focus on other people and to forget myself. By doing this, I can put my worries aside, and focus on others' worries. I'm grateful for you all and all the support I have received. Thanks for everything! I hope you all have a great week. Tot volgende week!

Love,

Elder Elkins

Happy Easter

Hey Guys! I hope you all had a wonderful Easter! Easter here in the Netherlands is a lot like Christmas in the fact that they have an Eerste Paasdag, and also an Tweede Paasdag. They have the first on Sunday, then have another excuse of work off on Monday for the second. Typical Dutch eh? ;) Grapje, but it was a pretty good week! I honestly cannot remember half of what happened, but I will try to do my best and tell you some of the cool things that happened. I have been studying a lot lately about the Atonement and also how it applies to our investigators. We have had really cool experiences with Hernandez, our investigator. Last week, we just went shopping for PDay in Rotterdam North. That is such a beautiful city and it looks like a big city in the States. I didn't buy anything, none of us did. It was pretty lame, but some guy tried to sell me the new Galaxy 5, but that just stung ;) At night, we went to Oma Croese. She likes us to call her "Oma" (Grandma) because she loves taking care of us. She is such a sweet lady and lets us ride her Scooter and use her Staircase seat roller coaster. So steeze. She makes the most Dutch food ever, which is usually the same. Sausage, potatoes, Au jue?, Milk, and veggies. For Desert, warmed milk with butter and sugar daarin. Honestly pretty lekker! Tuesday I was on exchanges with Elder Moomey. I love him so much! He went to BYU before the mission. Honestly, I'm going to BYU when I get home. All the mission bro's, except for Yocom, are going there. I don't have the grades, but I will transfer there so we can have our own Dutch branch haha. But going on, we taught Lauwrence. I cannot remember if I told you about him, but he used to be in a satanic cult. He regrets it totally, and wants to change. He is super cool, and love video games like a mad man, almost more than Parker, my bro. ;) He opened up to us, told us some crazy stories that honestly I didn't want to here, and asked really, really good questions. I love when investigators ask really good questions. It is amazing how the Spirit is active in lessons as well. Moomey has been out one more transfer than me, and we speak about the same Dutch, but in this lesson, we almost spoke perfectly. The Gift of Tongues is real. It is funny, because when the Spirit isn't in a lesson, or a contact, then Dutch is 100 times harder and is sucks. It is so important to have the Spirit with you. Especially in a lesson like this, where it is a really sensitive subject and we need to answer his questions correctly. He asked if me and Moomey can be together again for our next lesson, so we scheduled another appointment and exchange for this Wendesday. Lauwrence is taking us out to lunch to ask us "very important questions". Oh boy, this will be good :) Wednesday was very fun. We went to a lesson at 1, but he wasnt home so I called him and changed the appointment. We were looking forward to it! We met him on the street and he told us he was super curious. We rescheduled for the next day, but he wasn't their the next day either! But after this, we went and did service for familie winters. They are my favorite by far in this ward! So super duper amazing. They are remodeling their amazing dutch home, and needed help to destroy stuff. Who better to call than the Elders eh? We had a lot of fun, and Bro. Winters is a ton of fun! Good day, but we didn't get home until late. Thursday Two lessons fell apart, so we did a ton of finding and found a bunch of great potentials. We were walking down the street, and I got the biggest impression to talk to this next guy. I stopped him, and he knew who we were. He has lived here in the Netherlands since 8 years ago, so speaks good Dutch, but is from Portugal. His name is Lonus. He met with the Elders when he was in Portugal but could'nt find us here! Now he found us and was super pumped. We got his number. I called him 3 times yesterday om af te spreken, but he didn't answer. I left a voicemail. Today, he called me and asked for an appointment. Thursday, at 7:30. Super pumped! That is how effective the Spirit is in missionary work! I've decided to keep a Miracle Journal throughout my mission. That will be soo cool for when I go home. Later, we had a dinner appointment with Familie Van Kalken. She is a member, but he is not. Usually the Elders don't eat their often cause he feels uncomfortable, but he loves Childs and I. He set our next appointment and wants us to come every week! How cool is that? Friday was another good day. We had a lesson in the morning with two little girls. Serenity is 8 and Usha is 11. They are the daughters of an inactive member. They called us in the morning to cancel our appointment cause is was good weather and they wanted to play, so I made an ultimatum. They had to come to church, then we could cancel our appointment and meet this week. They agreed, and came to church yesterday! So amazing! We also met with another investigator, gave her a blessing and that was super spiritual, then we met with Hernandez at night. We listened to a talk from General Conference, talked about his Baptism next week, which he is super pumped for, then he had a question about Tithing and told us he is willing to pay it! Super amazing. I loved it! This guys is a brother! We are meeting with him again Wednesday to discuss his baptismal program. Saturday, we went to neverland like an hour away to look up a referall who wasn't interested, but a completely gorgeous city, then weekly planned and then ate with the Zone leaders. Good day! Sunday was amazing. First Easter here. Honestly probably one of the best Church Services of my life! The spirit was super strong. We had 4 investigators at church, and I loved it. Sat next to Hernandez. Br. and Sr. Reinders spoke. They are the old temple presidents. They spoke, of course, about the Atonement and Resurrection of Jesus Christ. Gosh super spiritual. Also, a famous gospel singer sung two songs in our sacrament meeting. That was amazing as well! After Church, we had to eat, then go straight to the Easter Concer with the whole stake and people in the country. There were probably 400 people there. It was very good. We sang as missionaries too. I love seeing other Elders there too who I've gotten pretty close with. After, we rode home with the ZL's and cops were everywhere. We were wondering why, then drove past the Feyenoord stadium, and remembered it was the championship of soccer here. Ajax vs. PEC Zwolle. Ajax was number one, and Zwolle was number 8 in the country and made it to the Championship. They beat Ajax 5-1! Super crazy. Rotterdam was partying cause they hate Ajax hahaha. Super funny. We had a great day. Today, we cleaned a lot, then i went on a long drive with Corsini to pick up my new bike. That will be fun to finally be on a bike! I don't have much more time, but I do want to leave something spiritual.

Easter. The Resurrection of Jesus Christ. This means a lot to me. I studied it a lot this past week. It is absolutely amazing what is possible "Because of Him". I will give you this link to a very inspirational message released by the Church this past week. I'm sure most of you have seen it, but if you haven't, please watch it. I am eternally grateful for my Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. He is with us all, every step of the way through our lives, and as we continue in the next world. Easter is such an amazing holiday. No wonder the Dutch celebrate it twice. What I love, is they also have a day called "Goede Vrijdag". Good Friday. The day Christ was hung on the cross. Easter means so much more to me now that I have had a lot of time to think about it and strengthen my relationship with Christ. The Savior not only died for us, but he also rose from the dead. He overcame the world. "Because of Him", We can do anything. "Because of Him", We can live together, forever. "Because of Him", There is no end. I love you all, so very much. Have a great week. I pray for you all, and hope that you all are doing well. Please watch this video! and geniet ervan. http://easter.mormon.org/

"He is not here: for He is risen" 

Veel Lief,

Elder Elkins

Hey Everyone! I hope you all had a great, warm spring week.... Well, at least it has been SUPER warm here! Literally hot, and i´m a little nervous for the summer when it´s hot, and humid, maar komt goed eh? I got transferd to Rotterdam South and it is very ghetto but amazing. Walk around and there are thugs everywhere from Surinam, Curicaou, Morocco, and every other place in the world. It is so funny. They are so fun to talk to as well, because they just talk to you like bro´s because they are higher than kites 24/7. It has been a great experience. I will not be going through days today because I don´t have my planner from last week with me and I honestly cannot remember what we did, but I will do my best to tell everything that I remember happened. It was hard to say goodbye to the missionaries and members in Amsterdam. Especially the investigators actually. I´m not worried though, Keith and Danny were prepared to be baptized so they will do that, I know it. There is a huge rivalry between Ajax (Amsterdam Soccer Team), and Feijenoord (Rotterdam Soccer Team), so everyone was begging me not to switch sides and they all bought me a bunch of Ajax gear haha. So funny. Honestly a bigger rivalry than BYU and Utah. It is so funny. I think I will be safe in the ghetto, as long as I don´t wear Ajax haha. So I will not do that. My new companion is Elder Childs. He is exactly like Kevin James, and looks like him too. He is so funny, honestly. He reminds me of Elder Ashy Reinhold and that has brought back so many memories of the good ol high school days! Miss ya man! Before I left, Tim and Vincent took me out to dinner on Tuesday night. They are two amazing friends in Amsterdam and return missionaries and great examples to me. Tim is going to Harvard next month so he will be coming to the states. Wednesday was transfers and that is always stressful to pack and unpack, but fun to see all the missionaries. Elder Childs and I had a good first few days together. We saw some cool miracles and met some inactive members on the street while contacting. Nobody has been able to get in touch with these people forever too! That was cool. We have an investigator named Hernandez. 33 years old from Surinam with a baptismal date for May 3rd. He is hilarious! Surinamers are just bros like Jamaicans. Surinam is a counrty right about Brazil, where they speak dutch. Surinams Dutch is hilarious and I´m trying to mimick it and learn it like they say it. I´ll get it down. We went to teach Hernandez and just get to know him, for me at least. He has been taught everything and loves the gospel and just wants to change his life. He is a typical Southy in Rotterdam. Gangsta! He just wants to change. He failed his Drivers Test so that was hard on him and hurt his trust in Heavenly Father because he prayed really hard for help. Elder Childs is new, speaks good dutch for how young he is here, but of course not enough to converse, so I taught 95 percent of the lesson, but it was soooo cool! I was able to give him scriptures that he hasn´t read before and help him feel more comfort. I shared Ether 12:6, then John 16:33. He was in tears and I just bore testimony along with Elder Childs that everything would be alright. It was very powerful! It has been a challenge being in a new city though. It is hard to go to a new city and finish a training for a missionary and not know the city, the members, or the investigators. Heavenly Father will help me though. We had a good week, and the next will be even better. I need to buy a bike here for sure, but it will probable get stolen. Gelukkig, Elder Corsini, one of my Zone Leaders who also serves in this city, has a brand new bike that he is going to sell me for very cheap. I love him to death! Along with Elder Praag. Praag is someone that would´ve been one of my bro´s back at home playing FIFA with us honestly. We do everything with the ZLs cause they live like 5 minutes away from us. We do mensen 4 dinner appointments every night and just see each other all the time. That is fun, and good to know that they are always right there. 

General Conference was amazing. I hope you all were able to watch it and be able to take new things out of it. Every member is still a missionary. ;) I loved it and was touched by Bednars and Richard G. Scott´s talks. I love them to death! Hollands talk... i think it was... about defending our faith was also amazing, and his testimony at the end was killer. I love our church and am so grateful for the leaders we have in it. I love you all so much and I hope you have a great week. I will talk to you all next week! Till then.

Elder Elkins

Well Hello Everyone! Another week is history, but this was a good one, that's for sure! Also, another year is history. Now I'm a 19 year old missionary. That sounds about right ;) This was a super busy week and I will try to fill you in with everything. It is literally impossible to do that, but I will try! I've been hearing a lot about March Madness, and how it has been pretty good. Also, about soccer. Congrats Chelsea. And Matt Morrell, I don't know if you will read this, but welcome to the Nederland Crew man! We need you over here! Who knows, maybe Yocom or I will get to train ya eh? :) That would be awesome! I'll start off my week now!

Monday - Great PDay. We went to the Artis Zoo and I saw a lot of animals. Very cool. Then at night, we went to a members house cause he had two friends who want to learn about us. That was amazign and they both want to be baptized! We watched a bunch of films and talked about the BoM. The member ran the show, and that is exactly how it needs to be!!!! :) I loved it. 

Tuesday - No District meeting cause we had Zone Training Friday. We went to do look ups, then went to Danny's to teach him. Danny is progressing like crazy and has a testimony that shocks me. He was Atheist in December, but now testifies that Jesus is the Christ and that God is His father. AMAZING. We invited Danny to come to Family De Nijs for dinner and he came. That was so fun! The Spiritual Message that we shared was about Gratitude. That was amazing and the spirit was super strong. Danny felt it for sure. I shared a scripture from D and C about it and we went in a circle giving Gratefulmonies. Super cool. We had a super good day today!

Wednesday - We went to Joyce. She is went to Ghana on Sunday, so we went and said bye and told her everything that she needs to do to help her family! That will be amazing. He friend is making us african clothes which will be so tight. After this, we met with Keith and went to Ale's house. He had like 7 other Italian friends there, all who only speak enough English to order a sandwich. It was sooo funnny. And literally the best food I have ever eaten. It was a 4 course meal. Spaghetti, then Lasagna, then Pizza, then the chocolate puff dessert. Incredible. We got home like at 10:30 haha. It was the funniest thing in the world cause we could not communicate, but it was still so fun! They all call Keith "Balotelli" cause he looks like the Italian soccer player. 

Thursday - Gerphal for Brunch. He made us French Toast which was nice. He is a character, that's all haha. Then we went to teach Ibrahim. This was the last time I was going to see him cause I'm getting transfered, so I just shared a strong testimony and encouraged him. He will now be baptized on May 11th, along with Danny. That will be amazing and I'm going to get permission to go to it! We then did weekly planning cause Friday and Saturday we were too busy.

Friday - MY BIRTHDAY :) Super good day. Woke up, made sure to get a good work out in, then went straight to Zone Training in Amsterdam. Nothing like being around a lot of good friends on your Birthday :) That was great. They sang to me at lunch and Elder Bishop, Zone Leader, made sure to embarras me haha. It was great and I learned a ton from the training. Then we went home, changed into soccerable clothes, then went to Vapiano, an amazing restaurant with Keith, and the Amsterdam Elders. That was great! Then we went straight to the Church to play Soccer with the young men. We had 3 investigators there. Keith, who is incredible as you all know, then two italians who are also good. It was so funny. I suck at soccer but man it was a great Birthday! Then I came home and opened my gifts and letters from family and friends. Thank you all so much. It meant so much to me. I love you all! Keith also got me a gift. He bought me hair gel hahahah. That was so funny. I love it.

Saturday - We had an activity at Dappermarkt with the members. We stood outside with a booth at the market and just talked to everyone. We were able to get information from 25+ people. That was so fun and the members were great. Missionary work is picking up, that's for sure! We are seeing unreal success here in Zaandam too. It's so great to see! Then we went to Keith's to teach them. Little did I know, they wanted to suprise me with a Birthday party! They invited a lot of people, aka friends and family of them. They made traditional African food like chicken, rice, and fufu. So funny. Of course, we eat all the bones. They even made Chicken Necks. That was hilarious. We had a ton of fun. They bought me gifts and I love them all so much. I sent pictures home so I hope you see them. :) Great day!

Sunday - Last time in the Amsterdam Ward for now... :( We taught the lesson for the Gospel Principles and that was great. It was on the Priesthood. I love sharing my testimony about that. Spirit was super strong. We had two investigators at church. It was sad saying bye to everyone, but they made me promise that I would be back with my parents in Summer 2015. That will be here before we know it too haha. Crazy. We then went to Anna and Luma for dinner to say goodbye. That was sad, but again, parents will meet them. They are Portuguese, well at least Anna is. They want to meet my parents. They don't care about me ;) Great day yesterday.

Today has been good. Was super busy cause we found out last night that I'm going to be serving in Rotterdam South starting Wednesday. I will be with Elder Childs, I believe. He is going to be in his second transfer so I will finish training him and break him. That will be fun! I hear that my city is the Ghetto, but I'll join my best friend Elder Reinhold in the Ghetto baptizing. ;) I'm super pumped. Transfers are inspired. I know that. This mission is inspired. Sorry for everyone who doesn't get to serve here ;) Jk, everywhere is they same...... ;) They say that to put others at ease :) :) Now i'm getting too prideful, but yeah you know what they say.... If you're not Dutch, then you're not much. 

For the Spiritual Message, but as a mission we have been reading the BoM in 90 days. 88 days ago, we started and the AP's sent out a calendar to get it done. We also focus every week on Christlike Attributes in the BoM. Guys, the Book of Mormon is true. I see it effect lives everyday. I'm grateful that I have a good knowledge of it. It is the word of God, and it is the proof that Joseph Smith is a true Prophet, who restored the church that Jesus Christ established on the earth. I challeng you all to read it. Finish it by the end of the year. It will change your life, even if you have already read it before. I love you all. I will continue to pray for you all to have missionary moments. Nothing strenghtens your testimony more than missionary work, and that goes for the members as well. Invite the missionarys over for dinner, and ask them if you can pray for their investigators. That is a very simple form of missionary work. Or even let them come over and let them practice lessons with you as the investigator. I love that! Have a great week everyone. I love you to death. I'm ready to leave Amsterdam, and take on Rotterdam :) I like these big cities :) Till next week!

Elder Elkins