2 weeks.Feeling Better, and On the Run

Well the penicillin, along with an
of other drugs, seem to be
working, and I am almost back to 100%!
Though the week was busy, the thought
that the Lord was watching after me,
as well as the mission President's wife
who made me go to the doctor,
made everything go smoothly!
This last Tuesday we had a zone leader
council, which is actually my favorite
meeting in the mission. We have
breakfast and lunch together, and than
its just the 8 zone leaders, the mission
president and his wife, and us
2 assistants, and we get to just talk
about the needs of the mission and have
a very intimate teaching. I love it.
We had three topics and just had a
round table discussion about the topics,
along with teachings and a slide show
we prepared. It went very very well!
Right after the zone leader council,
we took the 5 and a half hour road
trip up to Nancy, France (in the North
of France) for our exchange with the
zone leaders.
The exchange went very well and we
even had the chance to go to KFC.
Yes, the fried chicken place.
There are about 4 in the mission area!
Its great. Elder and I fixed the goal
to find a family to teach, and literally
the last door we knocked on that day,
we found a man, his wife, and their
three daughters who said they would
come to church. Talk about miracles!
On Thursday, we drove back, and then
finished up some administrative things
we needed to get done.
Friday, we had another exchange here
in Geneva. I was with Elder , a
great missionary from Paris.
We saw a lot of great people and
learned a lot from each other.
Saturday, Elder Sorensen and I got
to work in our own are for the first
time together in like 2 weeks.
We had lunch with our Brazilian
investigator Ilana, and her Brazilian
friends! It was amazing. Then we saw
a recent convert and
then he helped us teach.
We then saw a member family and
they actually ended
up giving us an hour long lecture
on how to eat well. I think we are
going to try to improve our eating
habits. No more buying coke,
unless on a road trip.
This week will be craziness.
We will be going on 5 exchanges.
Yup, 5. Tuesday in Fribourg
Switzerland, Wednesday here in
Geneva, Thursday in Sion Switzerland,
Friday in Lausanne Switzerland,
and then on Saturday we will be
taking 3 missionaries to the airport
where they will be headed back home.
Interesting thing is that the mission
president will be gone from Tuesday
to Sunday. So we will kind of be in
charge and taking this missionaries
to the airport by ourselves.
It should be an interesting experience!

I hope you have a great week and keep
trying something new everyday.
I promise
I am doing well and my health is good.
Have a great week!
Love always,
Elder Bubba

August 24, 2009
This week was quite the adventure;
5 exchanges. Although it was a
little difficult being all over the
place, it is a such a great chance
to see the Lord's hand work in so
many marvelous ways, not to mention
see the beautiful Swiss countryside.
This last Tuesday I spent the day in
Fribourg, Switzerland. It is a
beautiful city, with a lot of great
things to do. We taught a great
Portuguese family and it was a
great experience.
On Wednesday, I worked here on an
exchange with The zone leaders
from Lyon. It was a crazy day,
and we were all over the place.
We ended up going to Martigny,
Switzerland that same night.
Martigny is such a beautiful
place and is in the Alps.
The exchange went very well and I
think I talked to people for 6
hours straight. It is one of the
only areas in Switzerland that is
primarily catholic (Everyone in
Switzerland is protestant).
Actually, on our way to our exchange
in Lausanne the next day, the mission
president let us go see the
Matterhorn, the mountain the
Disneyland ride is modeled after. It
was quite the adventure! Believe it
or not, my companion forgot his camera,
and mine was out of battery! But
I saw it and that's all that matters.
Check it out on Google
images if you want to see it!



Quick miracle.
On my exchange in Lausanne, we were
waiting to meet up with a
recent convert on a bench and he
was running a little late. A man
comes and sits down and we start
talking with him. We fix a
rendezvous for that same
after and we went and taught him.
We fixed a followup lesson for the
next day and he fixed a baptismal
date and came to church and should
be baptized in about 3 weeks!
Its so amazing to see how quickly
the Spirit can touch people!
This week will be full of zone
conferences, a mission council,
and meeting with
the stake presidencies with the
mission president and Elder
Kopischke of the 70
as he does a mission tour.
It should be a great week and
I again will be traveling all
over for it. I am way excited
and can't wait to hear the words
of this inspired man, and for
the chance to travel around with
him, eat with him, and just get
to know a servant of the Lord!
Thanks for all of your love and
support and for everything you do
for me. I pray that you have a
great week and that everything
keeps going well! Thank you!
Love,
Elder Clayton H. Welch

ps. The pictures are of my visit
to the John Calvin museum.
John Calvin was one of the two
major reformers with Martin Luther
and he did everything from
here in Geneva. I saw the church
he preached in and everything!
This is me next to one of the
museum sign and the other is me
reading the 10 commandments
at the museum in french!

Busy Busy Sick but Still Busy

You both asked some questions,
so as usual, I will make my attempts
at answering them:
So how did all the transfer activity
go this past week?
Very Well
As smooth as you had hoped and planned?
Yes, except for a little craziness with
trying to get the missionaries going
home to the temple ( I wasn't there,
just the mission president and his wife)
That must bring some reality to
you to see four former
companions returning home.
It was pretty crazy, but a little
anti-climatic.
So what was the reason to go from
7 to 3 zones?
We actually went to 4. I might
have mistyped that last week.
There are 3 major reasons:
There are 4 stakes in the mission
and we wanted one zone for each
stake, so we can work more closely
with the stake presidents. Also,
we have a lot of new missionaries
we needed those zone leaders in
senior companion positions.
Also, based on the leadership
in the mission, or current lack
thereof, we felt that by putting
the strongest leaders would better
stimulate the younger missionaries.
Will that make it easier to do zone
conferences and reduce some of the
administrative stuff or just not
enough leadership with the shrinking
number of missionaries. We will
actually probably travel just as
much, haha.
Based on what we’ve heard it
sounded like your mission was
having great success.
Why did the number of
missionaries go down.
We are having a lot of success,
but they are reducing
missionaries in europe in general
by about 70%. For example,
in there Paris
mission there are 150 missionaries,
but by the end of the year, they
will be at 90; we will be at about 85.
Pops, I think you should turn in the
durango for that tax rebate, and get
a car that gets a lot better gas
mileage. Get a mini cooper or
something, haha. They are all
over here.

So I hope that responds to the
questions you have and lets you
know a little better what is
going on in my life.
With 16 missionaries going home
this week, 4 of which being my
former companions, receiving 8
new missionaries in the mission,
and receiving a new companion,
making me the "senior" assistant
with a mission President who has
been here for a month, made this
week a little busy. Not to
mention having gotten strep (sp?).
Actually, I dont know if that is
what it is, but myself and
my companion have it and will be
going to the doctor; don't worry!

As for my week, it was primarilly
occupied with the picking up the new
missionaries from the airport,
doing their legality, teaching them
about the mission, taking them
contacting, and eating with them.
The new missionaries are great!
I love seeing the great Elders
and Sisters the Lord has prepared
and sent to this mission.
Taking the returning missionaries
to the airport is always weird.
Everytime I feel like I am just
taking a trip. With as much
traveling we do here, it
wouldn't be that big of a change!
Other than that, we have been
primarily focused on getting
the mission ready
for the transfer.
This transfer will be crazy.
We will be having a mission tour
with Elder Kopischke of the 70
for four days, and we will be
traveling with him, having 3
zone conferences. We will also
be going on 11 exchanges this
transfer, trying to stimulate
some of the struggling areas
in the mission, which will be
very tiring.
As for this week, we have a zone
leader council tomorrow, then we
will be driving the 5 and a half
hours to Nancy for an exchange
with the zone leaders there on
Wednesday, then driving back
Thursday to have another exchange
on Friday. It should be a great
week though, and I am looking
forward to see the Lord pour out
blessings this week as I work
hard on trying to better serve the
Lord.

I love the quote you shared mom:
“Sometimes God calms the storm…
sometimes he lets
the storms rage and calms the child.”
I personally need to better learn to
remember that.
Have a great week and always
remember you are loved!
Keep trying new things for me!
Love always,
Elder Clayton Henderson Welch

Happy Fete de Geneve!

My week was great, with a majority of
the time spent working on this upcoming
transfer. To give you a better idea
of what this consists of, I will try
to go through the days.
On Tuesday we started on the general
ideas of what we wanted to do with the
mission, and tried started at the top,
and work down. We started by attempted
to identify my next companion, and then
zone leaders, then trainers, then
district leaders, then senior companions,
and then the rest. Though this system
seems simple, with all the factors that
go into it, it takes time.
We spent about 4 hours working on it on
Tuesday, 4 hours on Thursday, and a
couple of hours on Friday. Its
interesting, the hardest part of it all
was finding my new companion.
We actually went in with a missionary in
mind, and built the transfer around that,
but, to help reassure ourselves, we decide
to fast about it. It is amazing.
The night of our fast, right after my
personal prayer, I turned to my companion
and said, "I have an idea, but I'll tell you
tomorrow." First thing in the morning my
companion wakes up and said, "Elder,
j'ai une idéa, mais, je vais vous dire
pendent nos étude." (the exact same
thing in french) We actually took our
breakfast to go work on it, and as I told
him my "idea," he told me that his was
exactly the same; something we hadn't
even talked about! We went in, told the
mission president, and prayed about
what we had done. We received the
confirming witness that it all came
from God and that this is exactly what
needs to happen in the mission.
It was an amazing experience!
I am so glad to have been apart of it.
Some things that changed are that we
went from 7 zones to only 4 zones. We
actually closed three companionships.
We will be losing 14 missionaries this
transfer and only will receive 9.
With this new transfer, I have received
a new companion. His name is Elder
Sorensen. He is actually from North Ogden,
Utah and went to Weber High, the
same school I would have gone too!
We know tons of the same people; its crazy!
We will serve together actually until
December, unless something changes. I
will stay here as an assistant a little
longer than normal. I am very excited
for this chance I have to serve with Elder
Sorensen!
Other than the transfer, we had a big
BBQ here at the mission home to celebrate
the National Holiday of Switzerland/
Le Fete de Geneve! We talked about the
history of Switzerland and had a lot of
good food together. The four wards from
Geneva came along with 12 investigators.
It was a great time!
This week will be spent with the change
of transfers. Tomorrow we will pick up
the new missionaries from the airport
and spend the whole day with them.
Wednesday we spend more time with them
and train the new missionaries as well as
the trainers and see them off.
Then Thursday we take the missionaries
ending to the airport where I will lose
4 former companions, including my current
companion, Elder Boisserie. I will then
be the senior assistant in the mission.
Thursday and Friday will be spent
getting everything ready for the transfer!

That's funny that you mentioned passing
the sacrament because I actually passed
the sacrament for BOTH sacrament meetings
I attended! Its summer in Europe;
everyone is gone on vacation.
There aren't very many young active
members of the church here in
Europe unfortunately.

It will be a busy week!