I love being a missionary

Hey guys, Thank you so much for the emails that you have sent me. It was a joy reading them! It is so nice to hear about the things happening at home. I want to make another big SHOUT OUT to my little siblings, Jake and Maddie McGrath, for getting into Dhahran High School. 

This past week has been the craziest and hardest week of my life! The majority of our lessons kept falling through and it's hard but that's life. We just have to keep on pushing on. :) Elder Kelley and I have been contacting all of our referrals (Yep, we contacted all 63 referrals, including unbaptized/part member list this past week). My feet feels like it's going to fall off any second but it feels good because I know that I worked hard this past week. :D

A lot of people have been super weird this past week too! Elder Kelley and I contacted this one woman who is a less active but has an unbaptized kid named Malachi. She opened the door and yelled at us right away, "We are not interested and don't EVER come back again!". 

We also met this one guy who has two kids: one who is 11 and not baptized and another one who is 5 years old. He also has an unbaptized wife. He wanted us to come back and teach his family. We set up an appointment and it fell through. Two nights ago, we stopped by there about seven o'clock. The kid answered the door and I asked to see his father. He went and got his dad. He came out and was flat out stoned like super faded. When we asked him a question, it took him so long to answer. And the biggest thing that made me so angry about that contact was that he got stoned at 7pm and he has two kids!!! Kids shouldn't have parents who gets faded at 7pm.. Elder Kelley and I are going to go back and try our hardest to get in there and bring Jesus Christ in there. They need Him! haha.

But good things happened this past week too! Elder Kelley and I had some sick door contacts and there is this less active lady with an unbaptized daughter. She opened the door and we started off by introducing ourselves and all of the sudden, she started opening up to us. She told us why she went less active and wants to come back. She told us of all of the hard times in her life. It was crazy awesome! Elder Kelley and I were able to testify of Jesus Christ and how He helps us all in our difficult times and she also said that she wants us to come back. It was awesome, I felt the Spirit! 

So there is this guy named Nate Loftus and he is a stud. He fell away from the church when he was 16 years old and Elder Kelly + his comp baptized his 13 years old son and reactivated the less active parents. Elder Kelley and I have been dropping by to make sure they are still on the right path. Last Saturday, Nate texted us and wanted a blessing of comfort so we went over. It turns out that he was going to give a talk on tithing in sacrament meeting, which he did AWESOME! He was also called to go down to SLC and help a set of sisters teach the discussions. He is to translate the whole thing in Persian Farsi. He served a couple tours in Afghanistan and he knows Arabic really well. He is a stud. Anyways, we were able to give him a blessing of comfort and he asked me to do it. I felt the Spirit so strong when I was doing. I couldn't remember anything I was saying! The words kept flowing out of my mouth and everything was perfect! His sister-in-law also wanted me to give her a blessing of comfort too because she is going through some hard times. Same thing happened. The words just flowed out of my mouth and it was amazing. 

I know that Jesus Christ lives and He is always there for us. I know that this past week has been a trial of our faith because we couldn't teach as much as we usually do and we got rejected so much. haha! But I do KNOW that if I keep having faith that success will come this week, the Lord will help. Faith leads to action and I'm going to work twice as harder and hopefully, my feet doesn't fall apart. haha. 

Have a great week and stay strong! I love you guys and have a great week! (Sorry, this email was so short. Not much happened this past week. :(.) Love, Elder McGrath

A wonderful week in Clinton

Hey guys! It was a great week in the Utah Ogden mission! Every single day, I love my mission more and more! It was a blast! Since tomorrow is transfer day, we got the news today. Elder Kelley and I are staying together in Clinton! We are so happy. We have a lot of people who are super close to being baptized! It is so exciting. Another really awesome thing is that Elder Zarse (my trainer) is coming down to the area next to mine. He will be in my district. How crazy is that!

Last Sunday, James Wales got a recommend to go do baptisms for the dead. The best thing about this is that President Hiers just announced that we can go to any of the temples from Salt Lake up to Logan/Brigham City as long as we go with a recent convert that is doing baptisms for the dead for the first time or getting their endowments for the first time. Elder Kelley and I are thinking about trying to James to go to the Bountiful temple with us. I would LOVE to see the Bountiful temple. It is so beautiful! James is doing super well. He has been going to church every week and he is en route for getting sealed to his wife, Rubelyn, in the temple. It is so AWESOME!

So we had something super crazy happen this week. A set of Sisters sent us a referral and we went and contacted him. His name is Langston. He is an awesome guy. He is 19 years old but has a kid so he is not YSA age. He wanted us to come back every single day so we can teach him. We taught him the first three lessons and committed him to baptism on March 29. But something SO crazy happened. We went to Ward Council and it was the ward that Langston is in. We brought his name up and the bishop asked us where he lived. We showed him where Langston lives on our iPad and the first thing he said, "That's not in our ward... That is not even in our stake.."!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! It turns out that the fence next to Langston's house is the stake boundary! So we had to give him away to a different set of missionaries. It was so disappointing. But this whole experience was a trial of our faith. We kept having faith that we were going to get new investigators this past week. That same night, we were at this dinner appointment and at the spiritual thought, we asked for referrals and guess what?!?!?! Two of the kids that are present isn't BAPTIZED!! One is 12 yrs old and I think the other one is 9 yrs old. That event made all of the tracting we did all worth it. It was an incredible night! I love being a missionary! 

We had a crazy event happened this week! This lady named Heather called us and wanted us to come over and teach her nonmember kid. Before we went over, we talked to the WML in her ward and he told us that Heather is not baptized because of her fear of water. We went over and it was this FIVE YEARS OLD boy that wants to have missionary discussions. He had so many questions and one of them was, "Why did God kick out Satan?". The parents couldn't answer them all so they had us come over and answer questions. It was super hard trying to explain the Plan of Salvation to a five years old kid. I learned a lot though and I am super grateful for that opportunity. If I can teach that lesson to a five years old, then that means, I'm doing something right. :) But we did commit the parents to taking the lessons (the husband is a less active and Heather is nonmember). It is going to be so AWESOME!

Thank you all for reading this and have a wonderful week! Stay strong because the gospel is true, I know it!Man, I love the gospel so much! It brings so much peace and happiness to those that have it. Here is a CHALLENGE for y'all (we ate dinner with a family from Alabama and they said y'all so much and it got Elder Kelley and I saying it too. When other people found that we were from Cali and AZ respectively, they gave us weird looks. They thought we were from TX or the South. hahaha): Will YOU find one person for the missionaries to start teaching? That challenge may sound scary but I promise YOU that when you open your mouths, the Lord will help you. When we get out of our comfort zone, we grow and that is one of the purposes of life. To grow and have experiences. What an amazing plan!

I love you all and have a great week! (Sorry, this email is so short, we are short on time. we have so much to do! :D ) Love, Elder McGrath

Another fantastic week

Hey guys, Thank you so much for the emails that you have sent me. It was a joy reading them! It is so nice to hear about the things happening at home. I want to make another big SHOUT OUT to my most awesome Dad on his birthday! Happy birthday!!!!!!!

This week in the Clinton West stake has been a wonderful week. I honestly love working here with Elder Kelley. We both have been getting better as missionaries because we are constantly teaching each other on how to be a great missionary. It is so exciting because we learn something new every single day.

Morgan J. McEwen (11 years old boy that we have been teaching) got baptized by his uncle last Saturday and it was a superb baptismal service. Elder Kelley and I aced the missionary presentation and we had a lot of people come up to us and tell us that we did an excellent job. It felt good that people were doing that. :D

James Wales got the priesthood last Sunday and it was so awesome. We visited him the night before and he was super excited for the opportunity to receive it! James also told me that he wanted to play basketball with me and we set up an appointment later today to play some basketball. I am so excited!

Bryndee Lutz (a 13 years old girl that we are teaching. She has an anti-mormon mother but she is nice enough to let Bryndee make her own choices!) is doing so awesome. We got to go over there a couple times this past week and just read the Book of Mormon and during the reading session, a fire inside of her ignited and she kept saying how happy she was. When we gave her a short reading assignment, she was disappointed because she wanted to read a lot more. She told her that she can do that! :D It was awesome seeing her change and the whole experience itself actually increased my testimony on the truthfulness of the Book of Mormon! What a miracle! I LOVE being a missionary!

About four days ago, I got to do an exchange with Elder Patiño and I got to go to his area is which is the Hooper stake. He has been out thirteen months and it was a great exchange. He has taught me so many things! I actually have a funny story to share that happened during the dinner appointment:

We went in there and the father was wearing a BYU shirt. I complimented him on the shirt and he asked me which college is my favorite and I said that BYU is my favorite college. Elder Patiño said U of U! The father did not like him after he said that! hahaha. When dinner began, he asked Elder Patiño if he would like to eat a ghost pepper. (A little background before I continue, Elder Patiño is a very competitive person and doesn't like to lose.) Elder Patiño agreed to it, thinking he can do it. The father went and grabbed an entire ghost pepper and gave it to him. Elder Patiño took and threw the WHOLE thing in his mouth and chewed on it and eventually swallowed it. At that point, everyone including me was FREAKING OUT! Luckily, he didn't die... He drank 2 gallons of milk to stop the burning and he was super sick after that. It was a funny story. I even took a picture of him drinking some of the milk. It was hilarious afterwards! Notice how calm he was.. He was trying not freak out the family more. What a great elder he is!

Last night, Elder Kelley wanted to visit some former investigators he taught and one of them is Mazen. He is originally from Jordan and he has two brothers who is working in Yanbu and Jeddah, Saudi Arabia!!! We talked a lot about what was it like over there and he kept asking questions about how we coped over there. It was a neat experience. He is a great guy and I am super glad that I met him! :D Here is a picture of him and I:

His house and his accent reminded me of the Middle East. :D It was a super cool experience to have.

There is this lady who wants to get baptized but she is from Vietnam and didn't speak a lick of English. We were trying to find a Vietnamese translator who would help us teach this woman. One night, during dinner appointment, my companion asked the father where he served on his mission and he replied with Australia, VIETNAMESE SPEAKING! And guess what, he still remembers some of it but I'm sure he will be able to pick it back up in no time!  What a miracle!

I love love being a missionary and the people I meet on my mission. I seriously love being a missionary, especially in the Utah Ogden mission. I wouldn't take back the past seven months for anything else. I am so excited for the next seventeen months and the miracles I will get to witness! It is truly a huge honor to serve the Lord. What a great week in the Utah Ogden mission!

I love you and keep on pushing on! Stay strong and the Lord will bless you. Watch this video! It is one of the most shown videos the missionary share in dinner appointments. The message is so powerful: with the gospel, we can get through trials with a bright attitude! :)

Have a great week!! Love, Elder Sam McGrath

Clinton is the best place in the world

Hey guys, thank you so much for the emails that you have sent me. It was a joy reading them! It is so nice to hear about the things happening at home. I want to make another big SHOUT OUT to my most awesome brother, Jake McGrath, for dominating in the basketball tournament at DHS.

This week in the Clinton West stake has been a wonderful week. The weather here is getting better and better until today. It was POURING today and I love it. The weather all week has been sunny and in the high 50s. It was nice not having to wear a suit but a short sleeve shirt with a tie. It's awesome! :D We have been doing a lot of finding and teaching this week and we have definitely seen so many miracles happen. The Lord always watches out for His servants! :)

An example of that is when I was doing exchanges with Elder Coronado. He is one of the Zone Leaders (the DL and his comp does exchanges with the Zone Leaders.). He has been out for 13 months and he is a superb missionary who loves to work. After contacting referrals and tracting apartment complexes all day, we decide to head home (it was about 8:45pm at this time), all of the sudden, Elder Coronado started crossing the street. Confused, I started to call out his name and asking what in the world he is doing. He just kept going. As his temporary companion, I had to go with him. I quickly found out why. He saw this lady out in the front porch stmoking and he wanted to go talk to him. Her name is Courtney and we have been talking to her for a half hour. It was an awesome conversation. She talked about how she is a convert and she went less active but she said that she wants us to come over and teach her 12 years old daughter and wants us to baptize her. What a miracle!

James Wales is doing amazing. Elder Kelley and I was able to teach him about temples and priesthood. He said that he wants to get the Aaronic priesthood and do baptisms for the dead. He is such a great guy. He is also a big fan of the NBA too! He was wearing a Stephen Curry jersey at the lesson. Stephen Curry is one of my favorite NBA players. :D Because of that, we were able to connect really well! :D

Morgan (the 11 years old boy) is going to be baptized this Saturday and he is super excited. We had a lesson with him last night and we went over the baptismal interview questions with him. He aced them all and it was so awesome! He is a stud. I am so excited for him to get baptized!

Elder Kelley and I also got to go to mutual with one of the wards in our stake. It was basically a Q&A. One of the quorum advisors asked us to bring some food. A cheap missionary food. We brought tortillas, peanut butter, and jelly. It's like a pbj sandwich but with tortillas. It is so good and cheap too! The Q&A was awesome. They had a kid who is 18 years old and is getting his call sometimes this week! I'm excited to see where he is going. I guessed the Arizona Mesa mission. I always guess that.. haha!

I also got to an another exchange with one of the elders in the district. His name is Elder Mckee and he is an awesome missionary. He goes home in April and going to be in the Navy SEALs. He is super fit and excited for the SEALs. We were able to do some work in his area (Clinton North stake)!

I love being a missionary. It is seriously a joy to serve with the Lord. "If God be for us, who can be against us?" Romans 8:31. That scripture is one of my favorite missionary scripture. It is so true! :)

I know that the gospel is true and that if we obey Heavenly Father's commandments, we can find peace and happiness in this life and after we die (Mosiah 2:41). What a great promise! I know that Heavenly Father will ALWAYS fulfill his promise as long as you do your part! :)

Have a wonderful week and I love you all!! Love, Elder McGrath

Kelley and me at a dinner appointment