Can you guess the movie?

 

Korea week 11

First email from Korea.

Well. I am in Korea. Now what? I'll tell you what. Serving the Lord my God with all my heart might mind and strength that i may stand blameless before Him at the last day. This is such an amazing country I love it so much here. The food is wonderful and the people are so interesting. I am glad that I am serving a mission. it will make me a much better man when i return. and i will return. Return with Honor. Sob many thing have happened since being here things that have never happened to my trainer in his entire time in the mission field( 1.2 years) are happening to me and him it is just so surreal. i have so much work to do here and i hope i am up to the task.

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Elder Eads and Carson in Bucheon. 

MTC last week

Well everyone guess what i leave on Monday the 23rd of May. i am sending a picture of my itinerary to show the exact things i will be doing to leave. this has been a really trying time for me. i have struggled in ways both great and small, and learned so much. i just hope that what i have learned here i can take and apply it in the mission field. i want you to know that i love you all for supporting me and being there for me. I will do my best to make you all proud. if you have any questions just ask. and if you need any encouragement just ask. i dont really know what else to say other than i will be sure to not start a war with North Korea while i am gone. fingers crossed.󾓮 lastly i have also done lots of thinking concerning what i am going to do after my mission. Idk. military sound like best option right now but i will think about it. and Korea is still looking like a nice place for after. so ill think about it. I will be praying for you all.

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MTC week 8

hello everyone. 1 and 3/4 weeks left. wow. this has been such a roller coaster and i still have 22 months to go on my mission. it is so insane that i am serving the Lord. he who was the greatest of all of God's children has called me a person of many flaws to continue his work on the Earth and to be his representative among the people of Korea. There is no greater calling i could have accepted at this time in my life. I know that Korea will be very important to my family and i just hope that i will be able to fill my role as a disciple of Christ and to be an example to those around me. I am so glad to have all of you to be there to support me. when i get to Korea i will get my mailing address emailed to all of you. i hope i return home a better man than what i was when i left. if there was any point where i let any of you down i truly am sorry. i will get in touch with you all in a week. oh and i got my new tags. and i get my flight plans on Sunday i think. so... yeah... lotta stuff to do. ttyl. will send pics

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MTC week 7

hello everyone its your favorite Elder. i am almost there. just 2 and 3/4 weeks left and i will be going into the field. so much has happened since i have been here. i really care about you all and i have grown to understand things both spiritually and temporally more deeply. i just wish i had understood these things before i had left. but being here has also allowed for so much growth and i know that if i am obedient that i will be able to be a wise and strong man when i return. i will also have a sense of purpose for the next couple of years of my life and then as i fulfill my purpose during that time i will gain insight on my future purpose. but only if i am obedient to the covenants i have made in the house of the Lord. and this week i have found a verse that strengthened my resolve to be here. its in Romans 1:16. Please read it. it is my solemn testimony to you all that i am not ashamed of this Church and Gospel. if i ever was before i no longer am now. the senior districts left on monday and i miss the so much. below are pictures of me with the Korean Elders and Sisters. we get the new branch members today. im so excited to meet them. its going to be a great mission. i have become great friends with so many people. especially the Koreans. i miss them so much. almost as much as my family. and i will be able to see several of the Sisters when their missions end before mine and they come into my mission area. its where most of them live. so thats going to make my last months fun and powerful. i am so glad to serve the Korean people. and i cannot wait to some home and use korean. and i am actually considering maybe i should live in Korea afterwards. Who knows? only God. I'll leave it to him. God be with you all till we meet again.

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MTC week 6

Hello everyone. Elder Pettijohn here. So this week is just great. We had Dallen H. Oaks come speak to us on Tuesday for our devotional. He spoke mostly concerning missionary work and ways to better effectively conduct missionary work. but to our surprise these were the exact same things that our teachers had been telling us since we had been here. i testified to me that we had the best teachers we could possibly get. I underwent more grief this week. i was teaching an investigator again and we had for 4 weeks and he wasn't understanding what the Holy Ghost was. so i tried to expound onto him what i know and feel through the Holy Ghost but i did not know the words. it filled me with so much grief that i could not tell this man, this living soul in the way i desired that we know how to save him and bring him unto Christ. but i couldn't. i sobbed from this grief and understood through it that maybe i should strive harder in my learning and studies to become more wise and learned in the language and ways of the Lord. i hope and pray that each of you are safe and blessed where you are. God has a plan for each of you. even though you may not see or understand it now, it is there, and He is there to help you if you only come to him with a broken heart and a contrite spirit and real intent having faith in Christ that your prayer will be answered the Lord shall shew unto you what he wilt that thou to have. Thank you. All.

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MTC week 5

Hello everyone.

 So i have started my fifth week here at the MTC i only have 100 weeks left in my mission so i just have to keep busy and the Lord knows He's keeping me busy. i went to the temple today and had an amazing experience. The actor who is Hyrum Smith in Joseph Smith: Prophet of the Restoration does temple work every week at the temple in Provo and i was able to speak with him. i could feel the Spirit emanating from him so strongly that i was speechless for several minutes. i have gone through alot of great experiences since being here at the MTC i have been so happy and so sad at the same time that my heart feels like it has swelled three sizes. i have so much love for all of you and i just wanted to let you know that. so in other news i have gotten very well aquianted with the new district. it has been a fun week with them. we are right now working on a song to sing for the districts that will be leaving.we take things about the people leaving and incorporate them into the song by changing out words. it was a really wonderful experience when we did it for our other districts 2 weeks ago. i have quite a few pictures and i will try to continue to send them as fast as i can. i really dont know what else to talk about so i will leave with that and i will send pictures soon. oh i almost forgot I saw Elder Ames from Washington. hes going to Mongolia. its good to meet some one  from Washington. I miss that place. well i have two years to think about what im going to do with my life wish me luck. Bye. TTYL

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MTC week 4

Hello everyone. Week four is here. I have been going through a lot of emotion these past couple of weeks. its been crazy sad because our senior districts have left and we get our new district members today. An elder from New Zealand, a Sister from Texas and a Sister from Utah. and then five missionaries from Korea. its really crazy. i feel like i need to work on my relationship with my companion alot more and be more understanding. Our teaching is not progressing. it is so hard. I need to keep my head fixated onto the end result and that is to invite others to come unto Christ to bring to pass the immortality and eternal life of man. I miss you all and i am glad to know you. I would ask that you keep me and my companion in your prayers to help us. I have one last thing. an experience of mine. I was in the residence on Sunday and i had been feeling distraught and not really feeling like i belonged in the MTC and one of my fellow senior elders gave me a blessing that actually became direct revelation given through the Holy Ghost. i sobbed from my joy of being able to know through the spirit that i was to stay and be a missionary and that my Heavenly Father loves me. I love you guys and thank you.

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MTC...week 2 or 3?

I think he missed a week or we didn't get the second week.

Hey everyone,

 Your favorite missionary is still here and very surprised at all that has been happening to me. I am now able to testify my feelings into Korean which is very good and i also learned a few other things. like how to use to spirit to testify of my feelings and not my knowledge of words. it was really humbling to have no ability to tell my first investigator what i feel and know about this gospel. then there was General Conference... Ive never seen Elder Holland cry...ever...and i really felt that he loved me and that all the leaders of the church loved me. and that my father in heaven loved me, that he loved me so much he sent his son to take all our sins and suffer agony and turmoil that we couldnt imagine even in our darkest dreams. i now have a renewed testimony in this gospel that it is the restored church of Christ. it also made me realize that even though i am a missionary i have so much spiritual growth to undergo. i hope i will be able to make you all proud. thank you for supporting me. i am doing well other than that. the food is good and the people are great but i am having trouble with my companion. its my fault mostly but im working on it. i have been incredibly busy and hardly had time to sit down and just think but i know its for the best. If any of you have questions please let me know. if you know anyone who would like to email me let me know as well. I miss you all, and i love you all from the bottom of my heart. thank you for being there. until next week. 

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Missionary Training Center week 1

 Week 1 email...

Hey everyone. so i made it through my first week and it has really been quite the experience. i didn't cry until the day before yesterday even though i expected myself to do so way sooner. i have been learning the language every day and i never would have gotten to the level i have gotten to in a week than i would have at any other language class. this really is one of the hardest things i will ever undertake and i hope i will be able to endure to the end. my companion is a very kind and spiritually minded Filipino Elder who is actually from Manila in the Philippine Islands. the remainder of my district is very spiritual and actually quite fast at acquiring an understanding for the language. Korean is actually simple in concept but to carry it out is an entirely different thing all together. imagine how Yoda speaks like his sentence structure how its subject object verb while regular english is subject verb object. imagine it in a different language entirely and add word markers for the place a word is in a sentence and depending on if a word ends in a consonant or a vowel it car change the subject or object marker that ends a sentence. yeah its pretty confusing. we are also teaching return missionaries who pose as investigators who speak only korean and understand no english whatsoever. i was practically dead weight in these lessons becuase korean is very difficult for me to memorize and after my 3rd meeting with him i cried so hard because i couldnt let him know with all my limited knowledge of Korean how i feel about the gospel of Jesus Christ. when i would teach people who understood english, i being wise with words would use my knowledge and vocabulary to say the things i thought they wanted to hear...I never used the Holy Ghost to guide my words to tell them what they needed to hear. and in here i am learning to do just that. to put the power of the holy ghost behind my words. even now as i type this i feel a burning in my bosom that what i am doing and learning is necessary in order for me to progress in this life to be a better son, brother, grandson, cousin and future spouse to that one lucky gal...who i will hopefully find someday... anywho so in other news M. Russell Ballard came on Easter Sunday to speak to us. and it was quite moving. i have 7 1/2 more weeks here at the MTC and im sure they will be chock full of good times. what else... oh the food here is good im sure i gained 10 lbs since being here i really need to eat healthier. i can exercise pretty much every day and i know from that that i am also very out of shape from all the working and job aplications i filled out after getting out of Youth Challenge. i need to get back in shape. if you know anyone who would like to email me or would like me to email them let me know. but only if i know who they are alreay cause if i dont then its just weird. anyways i you guys are awesome for letting me email you. Thank you and Laters.

Elder Pettijohn

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Carson's mission call

Just after Christmas Carson submitted his mission papers. 

 

On January 21st, Callie's birthday, Carson received his mission call in the mail. See how long that hair grew. It was a good 3 weeks.  

 

We waited till the next day to open it. It was hard to have it sitting in my house for a whole day without knowing where he would be called. Carson had told us several times he felt it would be Korea. 

Then we raced to finish his shots, purchase some need items, get his passport, and apply for his visa. We did it. He made it to Utah on Friday, March 8th. He spent the weekend with Grammy and Papa finishing up his shopping, attending the Provo City Center open house, and visiting more family and friends. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

3 years and 3 months later...

I was reading through my past posts and realized what treasures they are.  I need to continue.  And so it begins again...

We are in Hawaii, Carson has graduated, Callie a senior in the fall, George a sophomore, Ginger an 8th grader, Lucy a 6th grader, and Liza a 2nd grader.  Carson is serving a mission in Korea, Seoul South Mission.