Chicago Chronicles Jan. 26th

Dear Family and Friends, Hello! This week went by rather quickly for us. We have one or two new potential investigators from tracting, but not much else in the way of increasing our teaching pool. I want to make finding and planning to be our focuses this week to better prepare Elder Leslie, should he have to take over the area. He's doing great, by the way! I love our companionship. Maybe it's just because we trained together, but I feel pretty close to him. Unity has been a strength for us. I wouldn't say we've reached our full potential of being the most hardworking missionaries ever, but I fully intend to repent and recommit ourselves to do much better. One cool thing that happened this week was Corrine, who contacted us last-minute and requested to meet with us. She has investigated the church off-and-on for over ten years (TEN YEARS!!) and recently felt very unsettled in her life. She asked us to pray for her to know what to do. She basically told us that apart from a few doctrinal disagreements, she would most likely join the church if her husband wasn't so against it. We promised her that God really does answer prayers, and if she sets out to do something she thinks He wants her to do, He'll provide a way. Today we're playing shuffleboard and Kübb (a Swedish block-knocking game) at the McLaws' house. :) I wish I had more to report back on, but that's pretty much all I've got. Has anyone learned anything from their personal of family studies that they'd like to share? Love, - Elder Jared Richardson

Letter January 19th

This week blew by pretty quickly! We picked up a new investigator who requested a Book of Mormon via mail. He's an older gentleman who had many frankly weird perceptions of the church, but he came to the other Ward yesterday (by accident) and seemed to enjoy it! We'll see where that goes. Apart from that, we don't have much to work with. The majority of our time is spent stopping by less active members in our ward directory and tracting here and there. Not much shoveling since it's been warming up recently. The people I'm most concerned with are our young recent converts in the ward, particularly Chief and Don Busch, and Jacob Bos (who converted a year ago). None of them have had much of a desire to come to church, and I really want them to feel loved in this Ward. If everyone could keep them in your prayers that would be fantastic. I hope all is well in the Homefront. I want to do the best I can out here, as I may only have two weeks left in this area. I love you! Thanks for the letters and encouragement! - Elder Jared Richardson

Chicago Chronicles 1/12/2014 - ONE YEAR DOWN, ONE TO GO!!‏

From now on I'm not going to count down the months. :) Also, in an effort to try and keep a working attitude, if anyone asks me how long I've been out I'll simply reply, "Over a year." It was a good, cold, long week. We shoveled for a lot of people (yay!), had two meetings, and tried helping loading people's groceries one night in an effort to find new people (but weren't too terribly successful). The wind is insane out here, but we're layering up. While we still have a very small teaching pool, the Lord gives us small tender mercies now and then. One was finally getting in and having dinner with a semi-less active family that I've wanted to visit with since I first got here. Another was having several members call us asking for help on a day that we had very little planned. I'm so grateful for moments like that. :) Another thing I'm very grateful for is the time we're given to study the scriptures. I feel I'm learning so much more than I have in church or seminary. Maybe it's because we learn and teach doctrine 24/7 as missionaries. I love you guys! I hope you're all doing well. I hope this next year will be stellar! - Elder Jared Richardson