Happy Thanksgiving! -- November 23, 2015

Hello Everyone,

It has been a successful week! I cannot believe that Thanksgiving is already here. . It will be a fun one! We have plans to go eat with some members and go see a lot of people that will be alone on that holiday.

This Thanksgiving I am so most grateful for such a great family. I have the best family in the world! We know it is true that we feel God’s love the strongest in the realm of our family unit. How grateful I am for the Gospel that blesses families!

This week was fun; we had a really funny experience. We got a new phone number, so Elder Kropushek and I have been calling the people in our old phone that we didn't know. We called this Spanish lady and she answered and said she speaks no English! So we paused for a minute, hurried and grabbed a Spanish Restoration pamphlet and tried reading it in Spanish. . .needless to say, we failed miserably. . . haha But it was really funny and a good try! :)

We saw one of the promises from Elder Kopischke be fulfilled! This week we spent an hour knocking on some doors in a neighborhood not too far away from our church that we were not familiar with. The first door we knocked on a man answered and without any hesitation we just started to teach and to testify, (instead of asking if we could share a message). After a few minutes of this, we became aware that the man we were attempting to teach has been a Preacher at a large Baptist church in Roanoke for seventeen years! He asked us to come inside his house so he could hear our message out. We taught and kept testifying and guided him with questions we felt inspired to ask. We watched this Preacher go from being not interested in the Book of Mormon to committing Himself to read it. There is so much power in Testifying and teaching, I will never ask someone if I could share a message with themagain!   

We started teaching a man named Ben Martin. Brother Martin referred himself on Mormon.org to have a Bible delivered to him. We went to contact him with one of our members and we couldn't get a hold of him by phone, so we decided to go stop by his house that was also close to our church building. He answered his door and was super happy to see us. We gave him a Bible and after teaching off the bat about what missionaries do, he asked how he could get a copy of the Book of Mormon. Of course we gave him one and we taught him about it. Our member friend did great at testifying what the Book of Mormon has done for him then we set up a return appointment two days later. When we came back he was very prepared to receive us and is doing great. He couldn't make it to church with us Sunday, but he wants to attend with us in the coming weeks. Heavenly Father truly prepares his children. Like it says in Preach my Gospel, you will find those that are prepared or they will be lead to you but we must have faith! 

Great things are happening here! I keep learning more and more every day. I love that about the gospel that we always learn and progress. I pray everyone has a Happy Thanksgiving and that it is a good one. Hit the slopes for me!

Keep the Faith,

-Elder Kaleb Bingham

P.S. I attached a link--We made the news from that food drive a while back on the church newsroom and also on the local news, pretty sweet stuff!

http://www.roanoke.com/community/sosalem/church-of-jesus-christ-of-latter-day-saints-makes-donation/article_4e2a55e1-eec2-5ee8-94d1-466c7c4e826d.html

Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints makes donation to Feeding America Southwest Virginia

Mayor Randy Foley of Salem, state Sen. Ralph Smith and other dignitaries were in attendance at the Feeding America Southwest Virginia location in Salem, where the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints donated over 30,000 pounds of food.

Each year, the church donates to food banks across the country as part of their Day to Serve project.
 
"A donation of this size equals $28,000, and will provide over 25,000 meals" in our region, said Jenny Doud, VP of external affairs for Feeding America Southwest Virginia.


"This donation is particularly timely," said Pamela Irvine, president and CEO of Feeding America Southwest Virginia. "We are nearing crisis-shortages of food to help feed the region's food insecure who are unable to adequately feed their families. Far too many of our neighbors, including children, are still having to go to bed hungry.

"We so appreciate the efforts of so many volunteers that are collecting food and making donations to help us in our mission of alleviating hunger. We are especially grateful for this large scale donation at this time from the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints."