Towson, MD - May 31, 2016

There is traffic here in Maryland for sure. It's really teaching me to drive to be honest. I think I'll be a Nascar driver after the mission. We had to go to zone conference and then zone training this week and so we had to drive to Baltimore twice and the traffic was crazy.

I'm excited there's a lot of potential baptisms because of the nonmembers coming to church that are dating a member or married to them or just friends that are coming. I'm excited. We had some awesome lessons. Members came out with us for this week, too.

So, I'll find out about transfers next week. So, President said I could meet with the grandparents and have lunch on a preparation day sometime. This week was awesome. We had a ward Memorial Day picnic and the ward really helps me and Elder Tausaga.

This week we've done a ton of service. We had the coolest experience. This member in our area is in the Air Force and he volunteers repairing old engines. So we went to this museum in the basement with him where they built planes that fought in WWII. We got to get up close to some planes that fought in Vietnam. Then the cool part is I'm now an honorary mechanic. I helped take apart an engine from a plane that fought in the 1950's. It was so cool.

Then we were at Ross yesterday because we both love clothes and this member comes up to us and asks us if we have dinner plans. We didn't and so he asked where we wanted to go and Elder Tausaga said Habachi Grill. Dinner was good. The members are very kind to us.

Love you all.

Elder Ressler

Towson, MD - May 23, 2016

It's a beautiful day today. It's been raining all week. I am loving the Jones Falls ward! The people here are so cool and the ward members are really supportive. We are teaching this guy who's a rapper. He came to church yesterday and is really excited to be baptized. It was cool he told me Joseph Smith went through quite the journey. I was like what do you mean and he told me a step by step summary of like the introduction and how Joseph Smith got the plates it was awesome. Then he talked about Michael Jordan's faith with basketball and how he would shoot with his eyes closed he's the man. Then we had another investigator come. It's been a really good week. I bought a Ukulele and my companion is teaching me the "good stuff". I also bought the coolest sweatshirt I forgot to take a picture but it's awesome one of a kind ;) Me and my companion eat a lot of rice. He mixes his with tuna and mayonnaise which actually tastes really good. So next month that's all I'm buying because it's really cheap.   

I love the ukulele I actually got a really awesome deal on it. Elder Tausaga's teaching me to play. It's really easy. I can already play 3 songs on it, like hallelujah from Shrek. We're going to write a song on the Book of Mormon and play it for people. This last Sunday was the best ever. We had 4 investigators come to church. The family who have been coming for a while. We're actually going to go see them next week. They really like us which is awesome. We are emailing president to have us stay together as companions. One investigator is progressing pretty well. We just finished tithing we're just deciding a date when he can. He's come to church 3 times now. Another investigator came and he took the light rail and then we picked him up. We introduced him to member who is a rapper as well and it was really good. He's coming out to teach him Friday. He really liked the first two hours of church, but he totally fell asleep the last 20 minutes of priesthood. Three hours is a lot for people who usually only go to church one hour twice a year. Towson is busy it's a college town, but a lot of the 20 year olds are prepared.

Love you,

Elder Ressler

Towson, MD - May 16, 2016

Today was an awesome day. I gave a talk about overcoming adversity. I felt a little intimidated at first because the ward is so big and I still don't know everyone, but when I actually gave the talk I felt great. We didn't have any investigators at church, but last week we had like 3 and next week we'll have 4 or 5. We had an awesome miracle with this new investigator. We had a text that we had an appointment with him in an hour. We called him and it checked out. He lives like 15 miles away and so we started the long drive. He wants to be baptized. He's so awesome. He is like a rapper and he really wants to come to church. We had an awesome chastity lesson with our main investigator and it went really well. He's still waiting for his answer on baptism, but he'll get there. I love the bishop he's from England. They feed us good. They all take their callings seriously. My ward mission leader is like a return missionary with a young family and he's the bomb. This week our whole mission got cut miles and so we had to bike a couple days to save for our long drives. I'm in Towson it's a college town and I cover the county so it's really nice here.

Love,

Elder Ressler

Towson, MD - May 2, 2016

The ward loves us. I'm now serving in the Jones Falls ward just outside of Baltimore. It's also really cool because we have like four companionships that all live really close by, like Spanish Baltimore YSA and the other missionaries that are in our ward. I have a car now, no more biking in the rain for me! I live in Towson which is a college town and it's super nice. Our area is a lot bigger than my last area, even the ward is like two times as big. The members here REALLY love helping with missionary work.

Elder Tausaga is awesome. He's really bold with people and really relaxed. He plays the ukulele really good and he's going to teach me . So his mission is his first time in America. He's from Samoa and he learned English in the MTC, but only was there for 2 weeks. His English is good now though. He said it was weird wearing shoes not flip flops when he got here and he used to go spear fishing in Samoa and wear a lava lava. He's on a professional volleyball team. You know we're tearing up the gym here. Elder Tausaga is a really hard working missionary which I love.

We're having a lot of success already. It's a pretty nice apartment, but not as big as my last one. The members love doing missionary work. We already put a guy on date for baptism my 2nd day.

The area's really pretty. My first day driving was scary, but I am doing well. I'm so close to Grandma and Grandpa. I'll have to have lunch with them. It's allowed. I haven't seen any not nice areas, because I have the top part which is like Towson and a little below, then up to the Pennsylvania border.

Love,

Elder Ressler