Another Baptism in Batesville

Hey guys!  It was another awesome week here in Batesville, Arkansas!  
Tuesday we had some really good lessons which was nice.  We finished 
teaching the lessons to Jack in preparation for his baptism.  That evening 
Brother Traylor took us out to the nicest restaurant in Batesville as a little 
going away party for me.  I ate some of the best chicken I’ve ever had in 
my life.  I'm really going to miss that guy! 

Wednesday we held our Book of Mormon class and went on exchanges 
with the Mountain View Elders.  I spent most of the day in Mountain View 
Wednesday as well as Thursday.  It is a really fun place - it's the folk music 
capital of the world.  As you walk around in the evenings people are always 
sitting around the parks picking on their guitars.  It was fun to walk around 
and listen to all the music.  The Elder I was serving with there returns home 
with me so we had a great time talking about our missions and what we are 
going to do when we get home.  We exchanged back Thursday evening.  
That night we had Jack’s baptismal interview and basketball night.  

Friday was another good day.  We went and visited Jack and got everything 
planned for his baptism Saturday.  We also did our weekly planning.  That 
always seems to drags on forever so I'm kind of glad it was my last one. That 
evening we had a couple lessons which went well.  We also typed up Jack’s 
baptism program and made all of the copies.

Saturday was easily the highlight of the week because it was Jack’s baptism!  
Jack has been such an awesome person to get to know.  He is such a great 
example to me.  He has been meeting on and off with missionaries for the 
past five years.  He has completed all of the missionary lessons three times 
and has read the Book of Mormon almost twice.  I feel so blessed that I am 
serving in Batesville at this time - the time when Jack was prepared to follow 
our Savior Jesus Christ.  He really is an amazing person.  He has been blind
almost his entire life but he doesn't let it stop him.  He plays the guitar really 
well and has taught me some fun stuff that I'm excited to try when I get home.  
His baptism went really great.  His daughter came to support him.  She lives 
in Little Rock and is a non-member.  He was so excited that she came.  He 
now wants to send the missionaries to teach her - ha ha.  President Vaughn, 
our Branch President, baptized Jack.  After the baptism we went over to the 
Wahlquist's home to eat and hang out for a bit. I am going to miss their family.  
After all of that we did our studies for the day and contacted a few people.  

Jack was confirmed in sacrament meeting on Sunday by Brother Traylor.  It 
was really special.  We also had some really great meetings about missionary 
work and ministering.  After church we went to a birthday party for a less active 
member's son for a bit.  Then that evening we had dinner with the Simmon's 
family.  They are a new family in the branch that we met at basketball night.  
They moved here from New Jersey not too long ago. I discovered that Kinkade
served in their ward and they got to know him really well.  They thought it was 
pretty cool that I knew him and had played baseball with him.  It truly is a small, 
wonderful world in the church. 

This morning we went to visit Jack.  He gave me a gift - a ukulele.  He noticed 
that every time we were at his house I would pick up one of his ukuleles up and 
play it so he thought I would enjoy taking one home.  I was really touched by his 
kindness.  I will always remember Jack.  I will always remember so many people 
who have changed my life for the better while serving as a missionary.  I feel so 
blessed to have served here in the Arkansas Little Rock Mission.  It's really hard 
to believe it will all be over in 10 days and will return home and take off the tag.    

Thanks for sending pictures of the boys in their baseball uniforms.  I actually miss 
playing sometimes.  I’m excited to take them over to the park when I get home and 
play some ball!   Well I can’t wait to see y’all!  Love you!

Love Elder Merrill

Elder Merrill with his gifted ukelele

Elder Asay & Elder Merrill with Jack

The Lord was saving the best for last!

Hey guys!  The past couple weeks have been so great.  We have been 
really busy teaching.  I think we have taught a sit down lesson everyday.  
It has been so awesome!  We also had dinner with a member here who 
made us some amazing Mexican tacos. I have been missing Mexican 
food so it was delicious! 

Last Tuesday we went to Memphis for Zone Conference.  Elder Perkins 
of the Seventy came to visit.  We had an awesome meeting.  It was quite 
different than many of our other meetings with General Authorities.  He 
taught us some great missionary skills I will be able to use my last two 
weeks here AND after I return home.  He also gave us some really good 
returning home from our mission advice.  He told us that it is a lot easier 
to stay in spiritual condition than to get back into it.  For some reason that 
really hit home for me. It makes me sad when missionaries say that they 
need to take a little break when they return  home.  Serving a mission has 
made me super excited to serve in the church.  

Wednesday was an awesome missionary day!  We finished the lessons 
with Kenny in preparation for his baptism Saturday.  We also had a visit 
with Jack.  That night we taught one of our best Book of Mormon classes 
and I typed up baptismal program. 

Thursday we began exchanges with the Zone leaders and had Kenny’s 
baptismal interview.  I served with Elder Murdock.  He was in Memphis 
when I was there and it was fun to serve with him again.  We had a good 
exchange in Batesville together.  We ended up getting a Bible referral for 
a homeless guy.  We met with him in the local park and had a 45 minute 
lesson that went really well.  We don’t really know what the policy is with 
teaching homeless people and need to find out. 

Friday we exchanged back and Elder Asay and I did our weekly planning.  
We then went to visit Jack again.  Jack called us a couple weeks ago and 
said he wanted to meet with us. He has been through all the discussions 
twice and read the Book of Mormon once.  He didn’t get baptized before 
because he found some anti stuff against the church.  Our first lesson we 
had with him he told us he wanted to get baptized for real this time so we 
set a date for this Saturday.  It has been really amazing to work with him.  
We have taught him all the lessons and are having his baptismal interview 
this week!  We are super excited. 

Saturday was definitely the highlight of our week thanks for Kenny baptism.  
Everything went great.  He has a sister that is a member who lives in Little 
Rock at the moment but she is moving to Batesville in about a week.  We 
called and asked her to speak on baptism.  She did a great job and she was 
so excited to see her brother get baptized!  I baptized him and it was a really 
special experience for me.  He is the first person on my mission that I have 
taught every lesson to and then baptized.  It really was a special day that I 
will always remember.  I still think it is funny that we had our very first lesson 
at Hardees (the Carl’s junior of the south).  From that moment on he just ate 
everything we said up.  He loved every minute of learning the gospel.  It has 
all just been a really awesome experience. 

Sunday we confirmed Kenny.  There was such an amazing spirit.  He was so 
excited to receive the gift of the Holy Ghost.  After church we had our monthly 
potluck that was delicious.  

Batesville has been a pretty special place for me and I will be sad to leave. I 
have had more success here than in any other area of my mission.  I guess 
the Lord was saving the best for last!  I definitely have a strong testimony 
now of enduring to the end.  Sometimes we might not be able to see it, but 
there will always be a blessing waiting for us at the end of the tunnel.  
I love you guys!  I’m excited to see you in a couple weeks! 

Love Elder Merrill 

ELDER MARRINER KADEN MERRILL

Elder Asay and Elder Merrill 

at Zone Conference in Memphis

Zone Conference lunch

Elder Smalley & Elder Merrill

Kenny's Baptism!  

I gave Kenny this tie for his baptism

I feel like you would only see this in the South - ha ha

Zone P-day in Jonesboro today!

Batesville Missionaries go Spelunking!

Due to Elder Merrill's spelunking adventure today we got the following
short message.   

Hey guys - Sorry I don't have time to write a longer letter today.  We had
an amazing outdoor and underground adventure at the Blanchard Springs 
Caverns in Arkansas today for P-day!  They are located in Mountain View 
Arkansas.  It was awesomely beautiful and a ton of fun.  I'm so grateful I 
had the opportunity to experience one of the most interesting Arkansas 
attractions!  I promise to write more next week!  

My 3 Favorite Spanish Missionary Things

Hola everyone!   Another week has somehow gone by.  Only 4 more weeks 
to go - crazy!  Tuesday we had a good day.  We decided to bike and in return 
we did a lot of finding.  We visited one of our ministering families and talked 
to them for a while.  It went really well.  Then that night we went and visited 
another ministering family who lives about 30 minutes away with a member.  
It was a busy good day.  

Wednesday we had interviews with President Hansen.  He sat me down and 
the first thing he said was "the next time we do this you will be headed home." 
That was kind of a scary thought.  After our interviews I instructed our district 
meeting.  We discussed how to become preach my gospel missionary.  It went 
really well.  President Hansen actually stayed and participated in our meeting.  
That was a little intimidating but he said I did great job.  After the meeting we 
began exchanges with the Mountain View Elders.  I served with Elder Jackson 
here in Batesville.  He is from Arizona and we got along great and we were able 
to teach a few lessons together. 

Thursday we did service for Habitat for Humanity which is always fun.  We have 
established a good relationship with the people who work in the store.  After our 
service we drove up to Melbourne which is about 45 minutes away to exchange 
back.  The rest of that day Elder Asay and I drove around the outskirts of our area 
contacting less active members.  It was really fun to be out in the countryside and 
drive down dirt roads in our little car.  We drove around for about three hours. We 
returned just in time for basketball night.  We found an awesome family last week 
and invited them to come play basketball and they came!  Hopefully we can start 
teaching them soon because they are basically a Mormon family already.  They 
are seriously one of the nicest families I’ve met on my mission. 

Friday we had our usual weekly planning and spent the rest of the day contacting 
people.  Saturday we served at the Methodist breakfast again and then returned 
home to continue our studies.  That afternoon we went to lunch with Brother Trayler.  
He is probably my favorite old man ever - I could talk to him forever.  He has done 
just about everything you can think of.  He has really taught me a few things about 
life. He really enjoys coming out and visiting people with us.  He took us to a nice 
Italian restaurant and bought us each a 14 ounce steak.  It was delicious!  

Sunday was a wonderful fast and testimony meeting.  I think every member got 
up and bore their testimony.  Then Elder Asay and I taught priesthood and lead 
a discussion on missionary work.  After church we went to Cave City for dinner 
with the sisters and had an awesome family home evening with the family there.  
We are teaching the father of a family who is not a member.  Our hope and prayer 
is that he will become a member soon. 

As I look back on the last 2 years of my mission my 3 favorite things about 
being a Spanish missionary in the South are: 
     1. Learning about all the different cultures here -
     2. Eating all the different amazing food -
     3. Learning that God loves all of his children equally.  

It is amazing to be able to have a conversation in an entirely different language 
and understand that the meaning is the same.  I have really come to love all of 
the people I have met and served here in the Arkansas Little Rock Mission.  I 
have been truly touched by their willingness to follow Jesus Christ.  I feel that I 
have served two different missions since I have served in both Spanish and in
English areas - the contrast is crazy.  The South is definitely a unique place and 
I have been forever blessed to serve there people here.  I will really miss it a lot.  
Thank you for everything.  Have a great week. 

Love Elder Merrill

While out finding one day we went to check this address 

and instead of finding people we found this empty lot - lol 

Elder Merrill and Elder Asay

Enjoy this little video -

Thought you would like seeing what Arkansas looks like.

Fun with the Wahlquist Family making homemade tortillas!  

Elder Merrill and Elder Asay suited up for the job

Look at Elder Merrill go!  

A hot buttered tortilla you rolled yourself....nothing better!

We loved having Elder Merrill and his new companion Elder Asay 

in our home.  I made them work for their supper again! We had 

chicken tacos, but I made them roll the flour tortillas themselves. 

Any reason to get the Elders in an apron, right? LOL!

They got pretty good towards the end and took the recipe for tortilla 

dough home with them. My great granny Maria Nina Perea Valdez would 

be proud. She housed missionaries for 15 years in an apartment on her property. 

She took the lessons and joined the church as well. But she feed them and taught 

them all how to cook for themselves before they left her. Tortillas and beans 

all day long! Many of them even brought their wives back to have her teach 

them how to cook "real" Mexican. Carrying on the tradition generations later!

-Sister Michelle Wahlquist