The Finale - Jacksonville

While standing at the Talladega Speedway, Elder Fogg contemplate how fast time has past with just a few weeks remaining.














Excerpts from emails:

Dear Family

This morning I sent home a 20lb box of books. A nice collection over the course of my mission of Bibles, manuals, and other unique finds. Because of the weight restrictions on luggage now, I felt it necessary to ship them home individually. Feel free to open it up and look at them.

The Lewis family (except for Bro Lewis) are out of town for the next week, so that kind of ruined my goal of getting Haley baptized before I go home. We talked to Bro Lewis about it and he said she wanted to be baptized, so I bet she gets baptized not long after I leave.

This week we taught a guy named Earl who is very educated in the Bible, and he does try and intellectualize every aspect of the gospel, so I'm going to tell him that next time. He needs faith - you don't need to be a scientist to know the Church is true. Last Wednesday we went to the Talladega Super Speedway, it is huge.

Have a good week.

Bye

Standing on Higher Ground

"Life Elevated" Elders Fogg and Coleman stand on higher ground - the highest point in Alabama.








Excerpts from Emails:

Dear Family,

Good morning, I can't think of much to report this week. Last week for P-day we drove to the highest point in Alabama (Mt. Cheaha). It's like 2,400 feet above sea level, big deal huh. It's the highest I've been in 2 years.

I havn't seen Reggie since I talked to him last week. There is this nice old lady we teach all the time, Ms Harris. She has been seeing the misionaries for a while now. She is the one that gave me some local honey and vinigar for my allergies. She is taking us out to dinner on Saturday for my B-day and Elder Coleman's last supper.

The Bishop has been coming out with us everyday for the last few weeks. Last sunday we had 9 less-actives and 2 Investigators at church. I think we owe a lot of it to Bishop. Im looking forward to phone calls on mothers day.

Love yall

--Elder Eric Fogg

Mentoring Missionaries

The District Missionaries of Madison. Elder Fogg and his trainee, Elder Van Leeuwen from Salt Lake City, on the far right.





Email excerpts:

Dear Family

I'm going to have to be short this morning, because for our P-day activity we are going to the Huntsville Space and Rocket Center. Next week is transfers, so this is our last week to do it in case someone gets transferred. One of the member has a pass to get us in for free, so that is nice. This week we taught Sean again. We had a good visit and he has recommitted to come to church and mutual on a regular basis. We also taught Patrick, he is the redneck from Prattville. He was telling us how he got drunk one time and drove his car into the lake with all his friends and they had to escape through the sun roof. Oh and we taught a preacher. Elder Van Leeuwen bore a strong testimony and touched his heart. The preacher said, I'll read the BOM if you read John and Romans. Sounds like a deal to me, I said. I had to upgrade my email to the new myLDSmail just to let you know. See ya next week!

Love and miss you all!

--Elder Eric Fogg

Snow in Alabama

Yes, Alabama does get humidly cold and occasional snow.









Excepts from emails:

Dear Family

It's been cold the last week, down to the teens, which is really cold in Alabama. Snow has been on the ground all week. It's suppose to be back in the 50s this week though. The National Championship game was awesome, Alabama owes it all to #57. He hurt Texas' star quarterback and took him out of the whole game, and then scored a touchdown later.

We had an awesome lesson with Sean Oberlander yesterday. We had 2 Priests on a team up with us. Sean came to church last Sunday and he feels a lot more comfortable now that he has some friends in the church. We are planning for a baptism in February.

We have members feeding us every night for the next 7 weeks. That's the best part about being in 2 Wards. This year our Wards a back to back on Sunday, so we have to work double shift. One of us is in 1st Ward PEC while the other is in 3rd Ward Elders Quorum and so on throughout the day.

Not as many service opportunities in Madison as there were in Jasper, but we recently started helping out at the old folks home. That's the news this week, see ya next time.

--Elder Fogg

Merry Christmas

Elders Fogg and Jorgensen wishing you a very Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year from Madison, Alabama - home of the Crimson Tide.


Excerpts from emails:

Dear Family

How is everybody? It was great talking to you on Christmas. I'm glad everybody is doing great. The work is still moving forward. We have a few new investigators that have some potential. I tried to figure out how to re-send all those pictures I sent, but I didn't have enough time to figure it out. Have a Happy New Year!

Love ya,

Elder Fogg

Dear Family

I received the family Christmas photo. Everyone looks the same except Alicia looks older and dad has more gray hair. Sterling is home for the Holidays. It probably feels like summer in Utah compared to Canada. I will probably be calling in the late morning like 10 or 11 your time on Christmas Day.

We are still teaching Sean. We moved his baptismal date back to the 30th because his grandfather doesn't think he is ready. Sean says he is ready and we think he is ready. There are a lot of apartments here, so most our tracting is in apartments. P-day is still Wednesday the 23rd, so I write you one more time before Christmas. The Huntsville Christmas festival was last week and all the missionaries in the area helped out with security and ushers, so that was pretty exciting. They have a really good choir. I'll send some pics next week. Have a Merry Christmas!!

Love Elder Fogg

North of the South

Dear Family

I am writing to you from Madison, Alabama. Transfers were moved to Tuesday because of Thanksgiving. My new companion is Elder Jorgensen from Albany, Oregon. We live in apartments that are pretty nice. We cover 2 Wards. I can already tell a difference in Northern Alabama compared to the South. Back to civilization. It was sad saying goodbye to the Stangers. We have a lot of members to work with so I'm excited. Wish me luck in this new area. I attached a letter from President Tate to you.

I love you and Happy Thanksgiving.

-Elder Fogg

222 Kyser Blvd. #86
Madison, Alabama 35758

Baptismal Date Set

Elder Fogg standing in a contemplative pose atop a stump in the outbacks of Jasper.















Excerpts from emails:

28 Oct:

We had a wonderful lesson with William and Rhonda Thomas. They are the ones that are a referral of a referral of a media referral. I used some training I learned from Elder Kukuchi and invited them to be baptized. They didn’t give us a definite yes, but the spirit was there and they didn’t say no. So we set an appointment with them tomorrow, so I need all the prayers I can get.

04 Nov:

We went back to teach William and Rhonda again. We taught about faith and I used a mousetrap as a teaching aid. We call this the Mousetrap lesson. I show them the trap and make sure they know what it is and how it works. I ask them to set it off with their shoe or a pen. Then I have them read Ether 12:6. While they are reading, I disable the trap by moving a small lever, but they don’t know and it looks the same. I then pretend to set it and ask them to touch it again. This time I promise them it will not hurt them. I'm testing their faith. Some touch it and find out nothing happens. They exercise there faith by acting on it, and in return they gain knowledge and more faith. Then we read Moroni 7:33-34. If the spirit is right we commit them to baptism. This we did with the Thomas', but again they would not give a definite answer. William wanted some time to think about it and Rhonda had some concerns that we tried to resolve. Overall it went well . They just needs a little more time to pray and find out for themselves. Their 16 year old son has been siting in on the lessons and he loves us. He wants us to come back and he says he learns a lot from us. So that’s pretty cool, we don’t get that much, especially from teenagers. So that’s whats been happening.
Talk to y'all next week.

18 Nov:

Things are going good here in Jasper. We set a baptismal date with William Thomas for December 5th. We hope if we get him baptized first his family will eventually follow along... I forgot to tell you last week. We hit a rabbit with our car on the way home, so we picked it up and brought it home with us and Brother Stanger helped us skin it. We are turning into a bunch of rednecks down here. I come home on the 25th of June. I love y'all and good luck with everything.

Elder Fogg