10/14/06

What’s up Chief? How are things going? I guess there is a letter over at Mom’s and Dad’s from you as of today (Friday) that I need to go read. Some pics too. Nice going. It’s almost 1:00 AM and I just finished catching up on my TraVo selections. Smallville is going strong. The Unit has been good too. 24 doesn’t start up till January I think, so that’s on hold for now. Which is good. I can barely keep up. I’m in Alma Ch. 13 now. Just got into my favorite part of my favorite person of the book of Mormon. I will send you the Blog update with this letter at the bottom, just before I send it off Sunday night. Work has been BUSY! I spent the first 3 days in manager training. I’m one of 8 people in the company now that will be the “Execution Specialists”. I think that means that I can kill you in several different ways, with extreme efficiency. No, I’m actually a certified manager trainer that can certify them in the 4 disciplines of execution for the Bronze, Silver, and Gold certifications. It’s pretty cool actually. Just a ton of information for me to remember and know in and out so I can train managers for a full 8:30 AM to 5:00 PM day. Much better training with much better info than I did at Snowbird. Here is the Fantasy football overall standings right now. This is before the weekend, so you will know with a pretty good idea where we all stand again come Sunday night…

Team	W	L	T	PCT	GB	Strk	Wks	PF	Back	PA
The Bradiators	4	1	0	0.800	0	W3	2	522.0	0.0	404.5
Baybaz Ballaz	4	1	0	0.800	0	W1	1	470.5	51.5	435.0
Ghetto Fabulous	4	1	0	0.800	0	W3	0	451.0	71.0	451.0
Jake's G-Men	3	2	0	0.600	1	W1	0	451.0	71.0	408.5
Ice Cold	3	2	0	0.600	1	L1	0	442.0	80.0	410.0
Silent Assassins	2	3	0	0.400	2	W1	0	465.5	56.5	468.5
Hip Waders	2	3	0	0.400	2	L3	1	464.0	58.0	453.5
Uonlywish Choppers	2	3	0	0.400	2	L1	0	402.5	119.5	481.0
Money in the bank	1	4	0	0.200	3	L1	1	473.5	48.5	486.0
Buffalo Wings	0	5	0	0.000	4	L5	0	310.0	212.0	454.0
Standings Updated as of: 10/13/06 3:34 AM EST

As you can see, Ghetto Fabuloso is still in the hunt being tied for best record, but 71 pts is quite a bit to be behind this early in the season. And I play Baybaz this week. So one of us won’t be 4-1 anymore. Bradiators plays Silent Assassins, so I’m hoping Challis beats him and I beat Baybaz so I can slip into the solo number one spot. But both are probably unlikely scenarios. We’ll see. As for Halo, I haven’t played hardly at all. I cancelled my Xbox live membership and have let John’s birthday present of a free year just sit on my entertainment center. I’m not motivated enough to renew it right now. All the guys are bummed, but I think they are bummed because they can’t man handle me anymore.

Tomorrow we have Alex’s Birthday party with the whole fam-damily. And I do mean DAMILY. It’s Josh’s family too and we will all be crammed into Stosh’s house again. We’re all big folks and we don’t fit in there well. Not to mention with Brinlee running around. Staci has called on a couple of “Wang” dogs as you like to put it and both have been taken. So she’s bound and determined to get one. She came and babysat Brin the other night while Suzanne was at a work function late at a restaurant with out of towners and I went to the sneak preview of Flags of our Fathers with John. Clint Eastwood’s new movie about the battle of Iwo Jima. I had higher hopes for it. It didn’t suck, but I hoped it would be better. It was at Jordan Commons and Larry Miller apparently thought it would be a good idea to dress his security up in dark suits and ties and give them headsets to communicate. Well, it’s been my experience that security guards can be power hungry fools and usually are POST drop outs or cop flunkies that could never get a badge. So they have to go be rent-a-cops to get that inferiority complex of theirs satisfied somehow. Well, there were a few of these wanna be secret service guys walking around, making threats that if they see anyone with a cell phone, they will throw us out and won’t hear any argument. Then they consorted in the theater, hanging out in their little pack and sized people up as they came in and sat as if to tell one another, yeah, I could take him. I could take him too. John and I staked out the front row after the middle walk way, so we could kick our legs out and relax. It was going to be crowded, so we wanted some room. Well, these self important “enforcers” (Probably fresh out of high school) kept walking in front of us all slow and tough like with their chests puffed out there to look bigger and tougher. It was buggin’ big time to have these dorks meandering in front of the screen for us through the whole movie as they searched and peered for an excuse to toss a poor mom with her cell phone out on her keester. John and I started saying “Down in Front!” and “Hurry up and Get to where you’re going” and “Are you Lost”? I thought we might actually have a confrontation because they would stop and stare at us. I was seriously ready to throw down if this 18-20 year old Puke didn’t get his face and his false sense of authority out of my way! I dared them with my expression and comments to put one hand on me. But alas, nothing came of it, except a lot of irritation.

John is still seeing his girlfriend every night. He’s trying to take things slow-ish. More updates on that weekly I’m sure. They doubled with Nate and his wife tonight where they ate at Dodo’s, played games and ate ice cream. Sounds like an upscale version of our night with them, but I guess an upgrade on friends to see if she liked them any better. I see how it is. Well, it’s time I went to bed. It’s 1:30 and I have a big day ahead tomorrow. I’ll respond to your last letter and get back to you after the party tomorrow. Out for now.

OK, it’s Saturday at 1:44 PM. I’ve been pretty productive cleaning and organizing my stuff. I’m donating a ton of swag to the DI soon. I always like having you around to pick and choose what you wanted first before I gave it to DI. Oh well, you will reap the bounteous booty again when you get home. Let me go into your last letter here…

So have you started the New Testament? Still reading the Book of Mormon though? Where are you in the book of Mormon. I bet you lap me even though I’m in Alma 20 and you are going to be reading a little less of the B of M than you used to be with the NT going. We’ll see how it turns out. That may motivate me to read more each day than I have been. Have you been confronted much with Bashers? Baptist bashers to be specific? Any other religions that want to contend with you? Those NCCM vitamins were weird Yo. I told mom and dad I’ve never seen anything like that. We didn’t have mission specific vitamins. We just had some standard bottles we got at the MTC. Those are crazy that they are packaged with your mission stuff all over it. Cool looking though. Any J-Dub problems? I could send you my New World Transgression. It is the most complete shredding of that bible and the J-dub beliefs I have seen. It puts Dad’s Green Dragon to shame. I spent some quality time on that. A little too much actually, but I learned my bible doing it, so it was semi productive. Have you looked through that? I’m way proud of it because of how much work that went into it and how obvious that work shows. I could shred J-dubs and Catholics, but I never really bashed with any other religions other than the unique Hebrew Israelites and Nation of Islam who both just wanted to kill us for being white anyway. Yeah, Shelli is living by herself. I hope she can afford rent and everything that comes along with it. I’m not so sure she realized how much real life costs. She’s going to pick up more work though, with Tim and somewhere else maybe. So that might keep her social life in check and keep her responsible out of necessity. The apartment is by the Century theater off of State and 33^rd south about.

Yeah, Ammon is super cool. As I mentioned I just got to the middle of the Ammon stuff, so let me break down what I like so much and then you can expound what you like so much about Capt. Moroni.

In Alma 17, The sons of Mosiah who had desired to go serve a mission among hostile Lamanites who all delighted in murdering Nephites at any chance they had, but in verse 9, they fasted and prayed much that the Lord would grant unto them a portion of his Spirit to go with them and abide with them, that they might be an instrument in the hands of God to bring, if it were possible their brethren the Lamanites, to the knowledge of the truth, to the knowledge of the baseness of the traditions of their fathers which were not correct. They were brassy enough to go among the enemy and tell them that their traditions were incorrect and if they did not accept the teachings of the promised Messiah, they would not have the blessings of salvation. In verse 10, the Lord visits them with the Spirit and said unto them be comforted and they were comforted. What a blessing of confidence, knowing that the Lord would be with you in such abundance and protect you. What boldness you would be able to show forth. Then I love verse 11: And the Lord said unto them also: Go forth among the Lamanites, thy brethren, and establish my word; yet ye shall be ^apatient in long-suffering and afflictions, that ye may show forth good ^bexamples unto them in me, and I will make an instrument of thee in my hands unto the salvation of many souls.

12 And it came to pass that the hearts of the sons of Mosiah, and also those who were with them, took courage to go forth unto the Lamanites to declare unto them the word of God.

As a missionary, I hope you are praying for patience with your afflictions, for the hard hearted to be prepared before you, and that you are being a good example at all times as a representative of Christ himself so that you can be made an instrument in the hand of the Lord “unto the salvation of many souls”. What a cool scripture. Man! I love this stuff.

Then verses 14 and 15: 14 And assuredly it was great, for they had undertaken to preach the word of God to a ^awild and a hardened and a ferocious people; a people who delighted in murdering the Nephites, and robbing and plundering them; and their hearts were set upon riches, or upon gold and silver, and precious stones; yet they sought to obtain these things by murdering and plundering, that they might not labor for them with their own hands.

15 Thus they were a very indolent people, many of whom did worship idols, and the ^acurse of God had fallen upon them because of the ^btraditions of their fathers; notwithstanding the promises of the Lord were extended unto them on the conditions of repentance.

What better way to describe the people of NYC as I relate back and now the people that you have been sent among in North and South Carolina. Honestly, it is so easy to liken this to your work now, right? Maybe not quite as much with the murdering, but everything else. Their hearts are set upon being lazy, not working for their well being, their hearts are turned to riches and to get it with as easy a way as possible. Idol worship, etc. But to remember that the promises of the Lord are still extended to them on the condition of repentance is what every effective missionary has in the back of their head as they go among that wickedness.

Verse 18 tells us that Ammon was chief among the sons of Mosiah as he administered unto them. He is more or less the district leader if you will. He goes to the land of Ishmael and is immediately captured and taken before the king where he does the ultimate BRT (builds a relationship of trust) Do you guys still talk about that in the MTC? Builds so much trust in fact that he wins this kings affection to where after he looses his bands, he tells him to stay as long as he wants and even offers one of his daughters to wife. What a stud Ammon must have been. Are you kidding me??

Ammon had so much humility that he offered to be a servant, a perfect opportunity to show the king and his people this example that the Lord wanted him to do, of working for his means. How much more did the King love him now that he offered to be a servant even after declining a gift of marrying into royalty basically?

Let’s go to verse 29: (this is after the mob of goons scattered the kings sheep and the servants wept for fear of being slain): Now they wept because of the fear of being slain. Now when Ammon saw this his heart was swollen within him with joy; for, said he, I will show forth my power unto these my fellow-servants, or the power which is in me, in restoring these flocks unto the king, that I may win the hearts of these my fellow-servants, that I may lead them to believe in my words. Where he says to himself, I will show forth my power unto my fellow servants, how powerful is that? That is my other hope for you as a missionary that when you find an opportunity which may not even seem like a missionary opportunity at the time like this, but when you are guided by the spirit to recognize a perfect missionary opp. That you take it and “show forth your power” that no one else in the world would have except a missionary of the true church. Know that the Lord will give you power to perform the seemingly impossible if you have the faith that Ammon had.

I love verse 33 after Ammon tells the servants to come with him that they may re-gather the flocks and to have good cheer: And those men again stood to scatter their flocks; but Ammon said unto his brethren: Encircle the flocks round about that they flee not; and I go and contend with these men who do scatter our flocks. Not “hey, you guys got my back?” Not, alright, let’s all rush on 3, ready break. It’s, I will go and open up a can of Whoop A on these foos, stand back and watch the power of the Lord in action! We all know what happens next. He strategically places stones on the foreheads of “a certain number of them” from a distance before the large group gets in close to him. He takes out what we find out later to be 6 of these jokers and as they get in close enough to have a physical scrap, the reaming thugs are even more mad and foaming at the mouth to kill him because he just took out their buddies. Then of course anyone who raises a club to him loses not only the club, but whatever appendage was gripping it. And kills only the leader by the sword bringing the total number slain to 7 and a bunch of one armed bandits to run back to their homes to train themselves how to be left handed. (and at the end of verse 39 we learn that this number of one armed bandits were not a few) That’s quite a group he just single handedly (pun intended) took care of. Then in chapter 18, as the grateful group of servants are standing forth and testifying of the things they had just witnessed the king is astonished and asks where Ammon is, for he must be a God to do what he had done. The servants tell him, oh, he’s out in your stables feeding your horses since that’s what you asked us all to do next. He was the only one who was faithful enough to go and continue his chores as a servant when he could have been in there boasting up what would have been the equivalent of being the Superbowl MVP for the 4^th year in a row.

Ammon comes in unto the king to tell him his chariots are ready and the whole room falls into reverence. In fact, the king is so full of marveling that he can’t speak to Ammon for the space of an hour in their time. But Ammon perceives his thoughts and reassures the king that he is but a man and the kings servant. What humility! In fact, the king tells Ammon if he will tell him how he did these things, and how he discerned his thoughts, he will give him anything he wants. Ammon exercising all humility and selflessness tells him just to listen to all that he has to say and takes advantage of his captive audience to recount the teachings as recorded by the prophets from the time that Lehi left Jerusalem and then some. Ammon builds on common beliefs and helps the king and his people understand the nature of God by building on the Great Spirit. He teaches them on their level so that they can understand all that Ammon is trying to teach by the power of the spirit. The rest is history. You know how it turns out with the king being so filled with the spirit that he falls to the earth as if dead. The whole comment by the queen that she is afraid he is dead because some tell her that the king stinketh, but Ammon knows that he is just caught up in the spirit. When the king awakes from this state of vision he was in, he recounts his vision of seeing the savior and other magnificent things did he tell the queen that she too was so filled with the spirit that they both pass out and it leads to all the servants and even Ammon fainting from the power of the spirit in the room. How intense must that have been? I love when we get to the point where one of the sheep robbing goons brothers sees Ammon and they are talking about how Ammon must either be a curse from God for allowing him into their kingdom or that he is a “Monster sent by the Nephites to torment them”. What a cool thing to be thought of as. Then the brother of the goon wants to kill Ammon because he is upset about his brother, so he raises his sword to let it fall on Ammon and kill him while he is in this vulnerable position being passed out and immediately drops dead after raising his sword, proving to all that Ammon could not be harmed while being a faithful missionary. I won’t go on, since this is getting long. But we see that Ammon could have killed the king of all the Lamanites and is offered half of the Lamanite kingdom to spare the kings life, but all he asks is that his brethren are released from prison. And uses that as another teaching opportunity. Ammon is about as tough and cool as they get in the book of Mormon. So dang tough, yet as humble as they get and as powerful a teacher and filled with the spirit as they get. He is blessed with invincibility basically, no one can harm him. He has a population of people named after him for the shear number he converts for crying out loud. Anyway, I know you have always liked the strategically minded especially the type like what’s his name in that book you had me read. That kid. I can’t remember his name. I totally dig Captain Moroni too. He is probably my second favorite in the B of M. But I’d like to hear your take and site some scriptures and what it means to you and what you admire most. I’ll put in what some peeps have said on your blog so far too at the end of this letter.

You know, you don’t need to reply via e-mail to me if you want to write me. Take your time, print off my e-mail and write me whenever you have chances to write. Or if e-mail works best, you can keep that up too. Whatever. I forward all appropriate material to mom and dad, Staci and Shelli so they can read it too. Not to let your letters to me become generic family letters, but we like to read what you are writing to everyone, so I share easier than others by forwarding, rather than bringing a letter to family functions. So if there is ever anything you don’t want shared with any or all of the family, just put it in a caption and I’ll exclude it before forwarding the letter. K, I need to go get ready for Alex’s birthday and start doing some chores. Catch you later tonight or tomorrow.

We just got home from Sunday visits. I didn’t make it over to Ma’s and Pa’s house to read your letter or see the two pics, but I will in the next day or two. Mom is going to take Shelli shopping to get her some stuff for her apartment tomorrow, so I might not go tomorrow, but I might still try. Not sure. But let me paste in what people have written about their favorite peeps in the B of M.

Travis Alexander said...

My favorite person in the Book of Mormon is Ammon. Could anyone else be so TOUGH that they could open a can of Whoop butt on a gang of bad guys who come to scatter and steal the kings flock and yet be so humble as to voluntarily submit to servitude. Especially when thought of as a God and offered half of an entire kingdom and to wish only for an opportunity to teach the King the Gospel of Christ. That kind of Humility combined with his ability and stature inspires me. He was such an amazing missionary that he basically converted a kingdom and even had a large population who called themselves the people of Ammon because of their admiration of him. What a stud! Would you want to mess with this guy? Click me (this link takes you to the stallion picture of Ammon and his sword in the midst of the sheep as interpreted by Arnold Frieberg.)

9:36 AM

Dave Alexander said...
Enos wished to gain his own testimony and manifestation of the truthfulness of the gospel. He was taught by his father yet didn't feel worthy enough. He prayed mightly unto the lord and received his manifestation.

11:35 AM

Aunt Margaret said...

My favorite Book of Mormon person is Moroni. He is the epitome of integrity, doing the right thing when no one else knows or cares. But he knew the right choices to make and he knew God knew. I cannot comprehend how lonely his life must have been or how sad, but he was valiant and true to the end of his life.

6:41 PM

Matthew Ashton said...

You have to admire Jacob. I love how he taught the people so clearly. Matt

8:02 PM

Staci said...

I really like Nephi. He held his faith so strong despite the murmurings of his brothers. He went through a lot of trials in his life as he trekked here to the Americas and was still strong in the testimony of Jesus Christ. Josh's favorite person is Captian Moroni. He loves him because he was a great leader and he has some of the mos powerful words in the B of M, especially his promises for those who read the book, and the many blessings would come.

3:57 PM

I’m kind of disappointed in some other peeps who didn’t get this done by now. I posted it a few days ago, so it will still get more responses, but still, I prodded a few specific people to get this done and they didn’t. Sorry for not having more responses. But you will see more when you get home and read this.

I played a little halo with Austin tonight for the first time in over a month. Man, I am getting rusty. Games would be about 25-12 or 25-15, so I was still hanging and he has been playing every day still. He told me he has been really into it again lately for some reason. He taught me a new trick that is even better than the battle rifle double shot. It’s the BXR where you hit B then X then R fast and you kill the person instantly if you are aiming at their head. So upclose combat, if you are close enough to hit them, you BXR them and they are dead before they know what hit them. I only got it twice in one game because it’s so hard to do on a moving target.

Anyway, I need to go to bed. It’s 10:30 and I have to get up early. I won my game, so I have a guaranteed 2^nd place and it depends on what Challis can pull off tomorrow on Brad to see if I take first. It will be close in that game. But I’m gaining on Brad’s points too, so I won’t be too far behind Brad even if he retains his first place seat. I whooped on Baybaz though by 30 points (I have 110.5 pts right now and I still have Lance Briggs to play tomorrow. He is a LB for the Chicago Bears who is scoring better than Urlacher this year. I’m liking him a lot). So I’ll have even more points to gain on Brad tomorrow night. OK, you know the drill as I’m signing off. I only keep telling you to work you butt to the bone because I remember how much I wish I had more time and wish that I would have worked just a little harder when I was at the end of my mission. Not that it’s a big regret because I tried to do everything I could to not have a single regret on my mission, but as long as you work till you are dead tired every day you are out there, you will have served the perfect mission and have absolute Zero regrets and you will reap the blessings of crossing the mission finish line with a sort of “well done, thou good and faithful servant”. That is the confirmation you want from any boss when you have done a good job on any project, but this is the one job in your life time, a temporary job at that, where you are working for the perfect boss. This job pays more than you could possibly ask for, it is more than generous. You may always feel like you make way too much along the way, but make sure that you don’t ever disappoint your boss. 2 years is just a short temp. job. Make the most of it.

Love you Mike. I hope that everything is going well, that you are healthy, strong, energetic, happy, yearning to work hard at all times, and that you find the success that you are working for. I would do anything I could for you, just name it. We pray for you and miss you daily.

Love,

Trav