5th Transfer

I did go to the most
beautiful city in Switzerland this week,
Montruex, to help some woman with some
stuff for the mission president. It is
was actually home to people like F.
Scott Fitzgerald, Hemingway, and many
others including Freddy Mercury of
Queene. Here is a picture of me right
next to a statue of Freddy Mercury, and
also of the Alps looking over Lake Geneva.






As for your questions/comments this week:

So how did your transfers planning go
this week? It went way well! It just
flys by, but it is very spiritually tiring.
I love seeing the Lord's hand
direct this work.

Are you staying in Geneva for your
5th transfer? Yes, I will be here for one
more. 7 months in Geneva!

Did you talk about your plans with your
mission president and have you decided
when you plan to come home?
February 11, 2010.

Do they celebrate anything like Halloween
in Switzerland? Not really, though,
the English ward is having a party.

So this week we decided to break some of
the "traditions of our fathers" and the
mission president decided to keep me here
for a 5th transfer. It hasn't
happened for a long time, so I hope I do
a good job. Apparently there is
something the Lord still wants me to learn
here that I haven't learned quick
enough. I am pretty sure this will be my
last transfer here though, and then I
will have a transfer and a half to end
my mission in the field.

Working on transfer week was great.
It is always way tiring, but its just so
much fun. It is very spiritually
exhausting though. The week just flew by!
It is also fun meeting with the president
all day, and learning so much from all
that he knows. He is a great example.
I have been growing way close to him and
am grateful to be here at the mission home.
Other than that, we had some great
rendez-vous with our great investigators.
We are still teaching I, the Brazilian,
and she told as at church that she is
positive that she will be baptized the
28th of November! I am way excited for
her. She is seeing opposition, but her
desire and faith will keep her going.
C, the referral from our DMP
(ward mission leader) is also doing great.
He is quitting smoking this week and,
thanks to a quit smoking plan for
investigators, he is now at 5 days
no smoking! We also met with D, our
Mongolian ami, who is always way fun
to teach. She speaks Mongolian and Chinese
and a very little English, and her
member sister, speaks Mongolian and French,
so we teach and French and hope that
she is understanding. Its great to see how
the spirit teaches.
This upcoming week should also be great,
filled with picking up missionaries
from the airport, teaching the new
missionaries, and helping the missionaries
get around. I am excited to be here for
one more and look forward to learn as
much as I can from the mission president!

Have a great week and keep on smiling!
Love always,
Elder Clayton Henderson Welch

Caught up

Je t'aime!
I had a great week here in Geneva.
It was nice to be able to relax
a little.
Being in Geneva this week was great!
It was a great chance to work in our
own area, and to get caught up on
things here at the mission home.
As far as I know, we are all caught up,
something I haven't been able to do in
my 6 months here in Geneva.
This week I went on two exchanges,
both of them taking place here in Geneva.
They went very well, and I always like
being able to get a couple of hours to go
out and talk to people in the road.
Speaking of being outside, the weather has
become quite cold over the last week,
but I love it! I really like being able
to wear a coat and scarf.
I hope it snows here soon.
We had a baptism here on Saturday which
went very well! Her name is Kelly M and
she is 9 years old. She is from a
family that has been inactive over the
last 5+ years. We have been working
really hard with them and
they are doing so well!
They have been coming to church for
the last 4 months, and they haven't
missed a Sunday in 3! Another great
thing is that Kelly has two older brothers,
S who is 18, and E who is 17. S was
ordained a priest last Tuesday,
and E a Teacher, and S was able to
perform the baptism! It was great!
It was such a great opportunity seeing
the family united like that.
Another great thing that happened this
week is with the recently called Ward
Mission Leader in one of our wards.
He is a little timid about his
capabilities, but the thing he did
this week was something I have never
seen any member do on my whole mission.
He invited a friend of his to have a
family home evening 2 weeks ago,
where he came and they talked about families.
He then invited him to church where he,
came and was introduced to us. We
taught him twice this week, he came to
the baptism on Saturday, and again to
church yesterday. He told us that he
thinks he will be the next one baptized!
IT was a great testimony builder to me
that members truly can have the biggest
effort in this work!
This week will be primarily spent
working on the Transfer Board with the
mission president. I don't know what
will happen yet, but I think I might be
staying for a 5th transfer here.
The weeks working on the transfer board are
always the fastest so this week should fly!
Have a great week.
Love always,
Elder Clayton Henderson Welch

Bonjour!

Bonjour!

After quite a few hectic weeks,
this past week was a great chance
to relax and get caught up on a
lot of things going on here.
It is a little chilly here in the
morning, but it is nothing strange
for a usual fall day. The leaves are
all changing colors though which is
great to see.

As for the questions and comments:
"Did you park in a no parking zone or
why did your van get towed?" Apparently,
the parking lot had signs saying that
it was free parking until 5:30 am on
certain days of the week, but, even when
I went back to check, I didn't seem it!
All I saw was parking was payed parking
after 9 am. But, you can't really argue
with the French government.

"Was [the week] a bit more restful for you?"
yes it was! It was great.

"It is also apple season and have found
Honey Crisp and have been eating one of
those every day."
Thats way good that you are eating an apple
a day pops. I am too! They taste way good
though. I always eat pink ladys. Do they
have those there?

This week was great, being the first week
in a while where I spent the majority
of it here in Geneva. We got a lot of
things done here though, which was great,
and it was great to get out and teach
those whom our Heavenly Father has
prepared.
On Thursday night, we did travel to Lyon
again for our exchange there we had
with the Zone Leaders; no, I did not get
towed this time. It was a great
exchange though!
Friday morning during our exchange,
the Zone Leader, Elder H, felt inspired
to change some of our schedule for the
day. It was raining very hard all
morning, and we had planned to pass
some investigators. We weren't really
talking to people on the road, because
of the rain, but as a man was approaching,
I felt like I needed to talk to him.
I contacted the man, and we had a great
contact. I asked if there was some time
that afternoon if we could pass by him.
He said that he was busy, and that he was
about to go to Paris for the next week.
I then asked if we could go to his home
right then and talk. He was like, "baa, ok."
So we went there and talked. Right away,
he said, "I need to tell you something.
This morning I prayed for the first time
in a while and I asked God to give me some
direction in this life. When you stopped
me, I honestly prejudged you, but as you
asked the second time if we could talk, I
realize that I had just rejected the
response God gave me, and that you are the
answer to my prayer." It was crazy!
We had a great rendez-vous and he said he
would like to be baptized. It was an
amazing testimony builder of how the Lord
truly has prepared people here to teach.
Other good news, our investigator, from Brazil,
who has been struggling with the idea of
baptism, came up to us at church yesterday
full of smiles. She said, I was walking
down the road on Friday, and I all of a
sudden received my response, I need to be
baptized November 28th! She said that
there was no doubt in her mind, and it
was as though someone was there telling
her she needed to do it!

This week should be another great
low key week! We have a baptism this
Saturday with our investigator K M.
We also have 2 exchanges, that will
take place here in Geneva.

Have a great week and remember that I love you!
Love,
Elder Clayton Welch

ps. The picture is the man I taught who
was baptized in Lyon.)
He baptized someone on Saturday and
will be going on a mission in April!

I Love General Conference!

Every week I am trying to eat
healthier and healthier. I
haven't bought any carbonated
beverages for weeks now, and I
think I bought more vegetables
and fruits than ever this week.
Its great. I can definetely
feel the difference in my body
from trying to better respect it.
I have been doing a lot of
reflecting on Section 89 of Doctrine
and Covenants and I am grateful
that I am better living to that.

You both had mentioned,
"I think all of the sessions were
great and the theme was definitely
about love and trying to show that
to those we come in contact with
whether it is family, friends or
those we associate with."
I think you are exactly right.
I had those same feelings.
I had actually just been studying
in Romans 7 and 9 the day before,
and it confirmed to me how important
the love from God is in our
lives, and how much we need to
love others. Mom, you also
mention, Pres. Eyring's talk and
when he mentioned his grandmothers
saying..."Families are
Forever, Please No empty chairs ."
I really liked that too.
I thought of you when I heard that.

As for your questions:
Do they drive really fast like
they do in other parts of Europe
like Germany?
in Switzerland nobody goes over the
speed limit, literally. There are
cameras everywhere, and people are
really good about respecting rules here.
Do you get exhausted? not to bad,
I have a great companion and we always
end up talking the whole time or
rock out to a hymn.
Do you get to text at all?
no, thank goodness. I hate phones.
We have 2, an international phone and
a Swiss phone, and I usually hold on
to the Swiss phone because I turn it
off when we are on France. I wish I
didn't have to have a phone when I
get back, but, we all do.
Are you speaking mostly French? yeah.
We teach only in french except for
that one investigator. That's because
there are English speaking missionaries
here in Geneva.
"Remember when you were young you
would tell me you would be willing
to be a missionary for 3 years if you
could do service and not knock on doors?"
Haha, yeah. Either way, being a
missionary is great!
General Conference was definetely the
highlight of my week! Watching it from
Saturday at 6, up until last night
at midnight, listening to the prophets'
words helped me with literally every
question I was having. I went into conference
with 2 major questions, both of which
were answered. Its amazing how that works.
Living here at the mission home we have a
few perks. We were able to watch the
Sunday afternoon session on the TV on
the mission president's side of the
mission home. It is always shown here
from 10 pm til midnight, and since the
mission president didn't want anyone
traveling after midnight, let us watch it
on the other side! It was great being
able to watch a session of conference in
PJs and with a bunch of treats, though,
honestly, nothing beats being at the
church and feeling the spirit. But
it was nice to relax for a second.
I loved the talk given by Jeffrey R.
Holland on the Book of Mormon, and Joseph
Smith as a prophet. I would encourage
everyone to read it after this Thursday
after its online. His testimony was
so genuine and so sincere, I couldn't help
but to have the desire to cry out to the w
orld my own testimony of this restored
gospel.
I also loved the talk by Elder Tad
Callister on the apostasy and the
restoration of the church.
It was definetely for missionaries.
This week, we also had the chance
to go to three zone conferences,
all over the mission. With that being
said, it was a very tiring week
spiritually, along
with a lot of driving.
Long story short, I parked the large
mission van (we were shuttling people
for zone conference because there
was a large subway/bus strike) in
Lyon on Monday night where we were
sleeping for the zone conference
the next day. When we went
out to get it it had to be towed.
We spent all morning getting it and walking
across the city jumping through hula hoops.
All I can say is that I am grateful
that I was able to sit through a
spiritual meeting after being so
flustered all morning!

This week will be more low key.
We will be working a lot here in Geneva,
finally focusing on our investigators.
We will also be going to Lyon on Friday
for an exchange.
Thanks again
for all of your love and support!
I pray that you have a great week!


Love Always,
Elder Clayton Henderson Welch