Elder Mackey's May 30, 2011 E-mail

Dear Family,

So things have been going pretty smooth I guess. We have one
investigator progressing and thats pretty cool. It has been raining
here like crazy! I have never seen so much rain! Its starting to get
green. There are a lot of colors here. Happy Birthday Jimmy and Happy
Birthday Mother. My studies have been going pretty well. Our finding
have been pretty low so I have been studying in PMG how to find
people. I have been having the feeling that we just need to serve. I
was reading about Ammon and Aaron and the very first thing they do in
contacting in they ask to serve. So I have been applying that in our
finding and it has been going really well. Then I have been studying
the Doctrine of Christ because when we have the the Doctrine of Christ
in our hearts then we will have power to teach. Also I have been
really focused on my pondering. I really need to be humble and one of
the members here we have been talking to who is like the super
missionary family. She has given me some really good advice. That
seems like it was pretty intense prank Mandy. What was their reaction
when they saw it? Well I have to go. I love you all! Thank you for
your prayers!

--
Love,
Elder David Mackey

Elder Mackey's May 23, 2011 e-mail

Dear Family and Friends and whoever reads this chronicle of Elder Mackey,
It was so awesome this week! We had a tornado touch down like 3 miles
away. It has been pretty stormy this past week or two. Its awesome! I
love that I get to experience a tornado sometime in my life. I want it
to touch down where I can I see it but I probably dont. So when it
rains we still ride our bikes everywhere so I get soaked and I ripped
my pants in the place thats embarrassing. We had our last Zone
Conference with President Howell this last Wednesday. I will miss him
and his wife. They have been awesome leaders. It was a great
conference on how to follow the Spirit and have Him there in our
teaching and finding. I play the piano pretty much all the time out
her and I do practice the organ which is not hard because it pretty
much like the piano. I am grateful dad that you made Sunday dinnerbecause I made it for yesterday dinner for our investigators. 15
pounds of chicken, 5 pounds of carrots, 10 pounds of potatoes. We put
it in a crock pot thingy we borrowed from the church and it was sooo
good! We had it at a members home and they were worried that we didnt
bring enough (they didnt know how much we had) but it was plenty. The
only bad thing is all our investigators bailed out on us. It made me
so frustrated! AHHH but oh well, what can I do. I try my best to get
them to church but they never come and I do everything but ugh.....its
just frustrating! So anyways we went around our members home looking
for anyone that would like to have dinner and we found two people. We
taught this lesson we do with a tea bag about faith in Jesus Christbut the Spirit guided this lesson and tailored it to be more on how we
can be taught by the Spirit. It was real neat to experience that.
Thank you very much for the all the letters that many of you have sent
me and for the love and prayers for me! I am truly grateful!

--
Love,
Elder David Mackey

Elder Mackey's May 16, 2011 E-mail

Dear Family,

Thank you very much Mandy for the e-mail. It is very interesting that
you put that in there about obedience because my new companion is not
very obedient. Man the mission is so fun!! I just love it when my
companion and I get in a conflict with each other and then the Spirit
leaves but right when we go to work nothing matters except the people
we are serving and all negative feelings we had with each other leave.
I knew I was going to love this companionship! For real. I have been
learning so much about how to better relate to all sorts of people. We
had an awesome week!! We averaged talking to 39.1 people a day with
13.5 of those being good conversations. Oh also one of our
investigators who we have been trying to get to church actually came
yesterday!!!! I was so surprised! Her boyfriend wasnt able to make it
because someone was trying to break in to their apartment so he stayed
there to hold down the fort. Now these investigators are jobless so
they resort to drinking and smoking. The last two appointment we had
with them Edward was way drunk and we kept saying to Patricia that
they cant get the Spirit unless they leave these addiction (but in a
nicer way) At church yesterday she told us that she was sick of
getting drunk and said that she was tired of Edward getting hammered
as well and just wanted a change! :D How the Spirit works in
mysterious ways. I tried something new that mom would tell me to just
smile no matter what. Soo I have just been smiling so big everywhere I
go: tracting, church, apartment, giving direction to my companion. The
response of those has changed so much! They are more interested, they
are nicer, I council with love! Thank you very much for your advice
Mom!

Thank you very much Katie for your package and the pictures. Socks is
a Mackey present. That bubble gum is so good haha I just eat until the
sour goes away and then throw it away. It was good to see the kids and
Grandma and Grandpa Lee. Thank you very much Luke and Zane for the
letter and picture. :D I am doing great and loving the mission! Zane
the joke about the green grape and the red grape is so funny! The red
grape asked the the green grape, "Man, are you ok? You seem like you
are going to barf." He said this because the green grape looks like he
is sick. hahahaha so funny. Hey Dad I will be needing some money for
meds next week. Thank you all for your prayers!!!!!!

  Love,
Elder David Mackey

Elder Mackey's May 9, 2011 E-Mail

Family!
It was soo Awesome to see you all on skype! Yup I am balding but thats
ok. ;) Oh guess what that Juan kid randomly called us and told us that
he was in Nevada for right now and that his phone was dead because he
forgot to bring his charger. So he baught one and said that he is
still interested. (I guess it was his girlfriend we were trying to get
to) Also, Linda called us back after I called her like 6 times hehe
and she said she will be getting out of the hospital probably tomorrow
and that she is still doing awesome in progressing!!! I am happy! So
Transfer calls were today and I will be staying her in New Brighton.
My companion Elder Holmes will be leaving to Alexandria and my new
companion is Elder Ralph. President Howel put me as the senior
companion. Elder Ralph is in my district and I am going to make this
transfer the best! That I have had so far. I know I will be learning a
lot of patience. :D Love you all!!!

Love,
Elder David Mackey

Elder Mackey's E-mail dated May 2, 2011 - Plus pics from the start of the Mission

At the Map in the MTC

Elder Mackey and Elder Warner

The District:  Elders Warwood, Stitt, Vienuku, Spencer,

Bingham and Mackey - MTC

President and Sister Howell

Elder Mackey and Elder Steele

Wearing his new Glasses

Dear Family,

Well Juan (the kid on Peters Pl)  wont answer our calls and we went
over there and his girlfriend answered the intercom thingy and she
acted like she wasnt there and then we got in and we knocked on his
door but his girlfriend wouldnt answer the door. She is a Jehovah
Witness and is starting to go back or something. Oh well...on
Saturday the 23 of April (I dont know why I didnt put them in there)
we got two new investigators who are way awesome!! They are 21, black
and have a set of new born twins and a 16 month old little boy that is
so cute! The Dad (Dez) wrestles in college and the Mom (Alisha) is
going through Nursing school. The second time we taught them we
pointed out the Spirit and they loved it and we extended them the
baptismal commitment and they accepted 6/4/11. They didnt make it to
church though. They said that their boy was sick. Hopefully they are
not going to forget the feelings they had.

We received a referral from the Zone Leaders and they received it from
some Elders up in St. Cloud. The Elders in St. Cloud have an
investigator who is getting baptized this Saturday and this referral
is his mother. She is moving apartments and needed some help. She
called us and she set up a day and time. Well last Saturday she called
and she was bawling and sounded really depressed. She was canceling
that day for us to move because she was sick. We asked her to at least
meet with us at a members home who is in the same apartment complex.
She said ok. We met with her and she was very very emotional. She has
been going through a ton of trials and she was diagnosed with two
diseases that will kill her sometime (this is what she said) We taught
her about Gods love and the Atonement and how it can help her. We then
gave her a blessing and it was awesome! She said that she could feel
all her fear and stress leave and peace come into her heart. She
planned to come to church the next day but she didnt come and we were
calling her but she wouldnt answer. We were worried for her because we
thought she might have injured herself or something. But we were
persistent in calling and she finally called back and apologized
because she slept in. We met with her around 2:30 and we taught her
the 1st half of the Plan of Salvation. Went real good and we invited
her to come to dinner with us to another members home. A half an hour
before she called crying trying to cancel and we tried everything to
keep her appointment but she wouldnt give in. But we called her back
and offered to give a blessing and that we will be there and she
accepted. It was an awesome time! We watched finding Faith in Christ
and it was a great movie! I think her only problem is that she needs
to stay out of her apartment where she can sit and think about things
and become anxious and stressful and start to have bad thoughts. We
are keeping a eye on her 24/7 what she should do for all our
investigators but she really needs it. Oh she accepted baptism
6/11/11. Her name is Terry Cox. The ward her is really good at doing
missionary work and member missionary work and fellow shipping.

My week was pretty bland. Had exchanges and that was ok. Was kinda
lame. Oh Mandy what mission did you serve in? There is a member who is
from Santiago, Chili and is a convert. There is also a member who is
28-29 who went to San Jose, California English Speaking. His name is
Andrew Fielding. Would you know him Joe? Oh and do you think someone
could get me a GPS? The streets/ roads/ highways freeways are just
randomly put anywhere and there is no orginization. I get lost a lot
and I dont know where north is.

Hey there was a crazy big storm down south east in the United States
and its pretty cool but is our family ok? Like Morg and Katie and The
McClelans (however you spell)


--
Love,
Elder David Mackey