Monday, September 30, 2013

Hey ya'll,

This is Marks mom with a message from Elder Wahlen.

The mission home will no longer be forwarding his mail, so if you have been sending mail to that address you will need to start sending it to where he is actually living.  since that address changes with his transfers, if you are writing him and need his address just text or email me tracywahlen@gmail.com
801-860-6904  even though he doesn't have time to answer all his mail he LOVES getting it and cherishes every letter and email he get's.  Thanks for all your support for the son that I love so much!

Hello from the perfect day here in Atlanta!


Hey y'all,

It's the most beautiful day here in Atlanta... and I know most of you are probably a bit coldish now... but just know that the world, no matter what kind of weather is going on around you... is always beautiful and a true testament of the existence of our Heavenly Father and His son, our Savior, Jesus Christ... they blessed us with this beautiful world to live in... to be together with families.... to learn and to grow... to become more like them... how lucky are we??? Amazing.

Short story this week... We went to teach an investigator last night who we've been meeting with every night for the past couple weeks... he suffers from bi-polar and schizophrenia... and he is AMAZING.

 I love him to death... as we started our lesson, he suddenly blurted out... "I just don't know if God or Jesus Christ is real!!".... we asked him a few questions about how he was feeling, and we talked a little bit about how he can come to know that they are real for himself... but then he turned and looked me in the eyes and asked me "How do you know that Jesus is real?" I took a moment and was about to answer when I thought, how do I know that Christ is real??? 

In that moment, I realized something very important... I had always just assumed and somewhat taken for granted the fact that God is real... that He really is our LOVING Heavenly Father... and that His only begotten son, Jesus Christ.... did indeed live... and died for us... and rose again. That they both really truly exist and live today... and that they both truly do not only love me but love everyone here. I've always "known" that... but I had never truly come to know that for myself by praying and asking for that vital truth to be confirmed to me...
At the time that question was posed to me... I wasn't sure how to answer... but I did my best to... 

but I can now tell you without a shred of doubt in my heart these things... I know and testify with the energy of my soul and every fiber of my being that God is our LOVING Heavenly Father... He loves EVERYONE. I know and testify that Jesus is the Christ... that He died for us and took our sins upon himself because He loves our Heavenly Father and He LOVES us... I know that through the Gospel of Jesus Christ that we can and always will feel of their love... I know that they are ALWAYS there for us.... and I know that as each of you kneel down and sincerely seek out a confirmation of those truths, and any others you stand in need of... I know that they will answer your prayer and you will feel of their eternal love for you. I invite each of you to do so... even if you already know...I invite all of you to kneel and ask God if He and His son are real... and if they really do love you. I promise you that they do. I love you. We will ALWAYS love you. You're amazing. Have a blessed day!

-Elder Wahlen

Friday, September 27, 2013

Hello from the beautiful Atlanta Georgia Mission!!!


Hey y'all,

Sorry again... this one is probably going to be super short. Only 9 minutes to write!!!! But I want to start off by saying that I love you. The world wouldn't be the same without you here. 

So this week has been CrAzY!!!!!! One crazy experience... I was invited in to a prayer and Bible study at a persons house we knocked into... after a 15 minute prayer they invited us to join them in their studies... well, my companion and I (actually we we're on a mini-exchange so it wasn't even my full-time companion!) we decided to share our message about the Restored Gospel before joining in... well, that didn't sit too well with them... but we love them! It was crazy experience to say the least....

So this week... something I want to talk about is repentance. I'll keep it short and simple... but I just want to testify of the power of daily repentance. I feel that often times we take this AMAZING gift for granted... and we often forget that repentance is how we invite the Savior to come into our lives and truly heal us... to come into our lives and truly help us change. It's how we access the Atonement in our lives. Think about that... it's how we can be healed of ALL things. Its how we can overcome ALL things. It's how we can become who the Lord wants us to be... it's how we can have the constant companionship of the Holy Ghost in our lives. I'd invite each of you to pray daily and to repent of your sins so that you can truly be healed each and every day of your life... that you can truly change and grow closer to the Savior each day... and to truly be happy in your life.

 I know this is short and simple... but I promise: daily repentance is SO powerful. It's changed my life... I never truly understood the power the Atonement until recently... and I want you all to feel of the healing and peaceful power of the Atonement in your lives... each and every day as I've been blessed to have. I love you. I know the Savior loves you... and that He can and will heal all things. Have a blessed day!
-
Elder Wahlen

Tuesday, September 24, 2013



Hey y'all,
Sorry again... this one is probably going to be super short. Only 9 minutes to write!!!! But I want to start off by saying that I love you. The world wouldn't be the same without you here. 

So this week has been CrAzY!!!!!! One crazy experience... I was invited in to a prayer and Bible study at a persons house we knocked into... after a 15 minute prayer they invited us to join them in their studies... well, my companion and I (actually we we're on a mini-exchange so it wasn't even my full-time companion!) we decided to share our message about the Restored Gospel before joining in... well, that didn't sit too well with them... but we love them! It was crazy experience to say the least....

So this week... something I want to talk about is repentance. I'll keep it short and simple... but I just want to testify of the power of daily repentance. I feel that often times we take this AMAZING gift for granted... and we often forget that repentance is how we invite the Savior to come into our lives and truly heal us... to come into our lives and truly help us change. It's how we access the Atonement in our lives. Think about that... it's how we can be healed of ALL things. Its how we can overcome ALL things. It's how we can become who the Lord wants us to be... it's how we can have the constant companionship of the Holy Ghost in our lives. I'd invite each of you to pray daily and to repent of your sins so that you can truly be healed each and every day of your life... that you can truly change and grow closer to the Savior each day... and to truly be happy in your life. I know this is short and simple... but I promise: daily repentance is SO powerful. It's changed my life... I never truly understood the power the Atonement until recently... and I want you all to feel of the healing and peaceful power of the Atonement in your lives... each and every day as I've been blessed to have. 

I love you. I know the Savior loves you... and that He can and will heal all things. Have a blessed day!

-Elder Wahlen

Wednesday, September 18, 2013




Who is that handsome missionary?
A zone meeting (Mark is in the middle)

Elder Wahlen and his present companion Elder Mccormbric


Elder Wahlen teaching at a zone conference Sept. 10th

Monday, September 16, 2013

This is Tracy again,

I wanted to share part of the email that Elder Wahlen, aka son that i love,sent to me today.

My husband and i were curious if he had had any more baptisms. This was his reply:

"I've been apart of multiple baptisms since the Bordleys... and 1 that i've seen all the way through from start to finish...but in the end, it's not me doing the teaching, baptizing, etc. its the Lord and Holy Ghost so i don't like to talk about it too much... i don't deserve the credit!"  He also told us that everyones prayers, letters and emails help him more than we will ever know.




 I FOUND SOME OLD PICTURES ON MARKS MISSION FACEBOOK.  I THINK THE LAST ONE MAY BE NEWER

Hello one and all from Atlanta



Hello y'all,
Everyone doing good? How's your day been? How about your week? The weather here has been amazing... but you know what's more amazing than that? You are. Did you know that you're a child of God? One that has a Heavenly Father???? How incredible is that!!! You're amazing!!! Never forget that.

So.... I thought about sharing some experiences this week... 

but I feel that I should share (briefly) something that I learned this week in my studies. It's about prayer. Did you know that prayer is considered work? This is really interesting... cause if you remember, we'll be judged by our desires and our works... so in some part, we'll be judged by our prayers. Also, faith without works is dead... so that means that we MUST pray to keep our faith strong. But you know something else that's cool about prayers??? It's an act of aligning our will with our Heavenly Fathers... in other words, as we pray and ask for things that not only we want, but that our Heavenly Father wants... He will give it to us. As we align our lives with the gospel... and as we're obedient... and as we learn what our Heavenly Father wants for us (which is all of the good and happy things in life) we can then pray with absolute surety and ask for the amazing gifts that He has in store for us that He's just waiting to give us... but only on condition that we ask for them. 

In short... we MUST pray to receive our Heavenly Fathers most precious gifts and blessings... He wants to give them to you! He wants you to be happy! If we simply live the gospel... and we ask in faith... we shall recieve. I invite each of you to not only pray every night this week but to really search out and ponder what gifts is God waiting to give you on condition that you ask for them... what does He want that you want as well???? Search, ponder and pray about that... and I promise you that you shall find and recieve.

I love you.... God loves you and Christ loves you. Have a blessed week! Pray lots!

-Elder Wahlen



Monday, September 9, 2013




Awesome picture taken off the atlantageorgiajohnharding Facebook site
Hi everyone,

This is Tracy, Elder Wahlen's mom.  Elder Wahlen wants me to thank all of you that are supporting him through prayers, letters, emails and packages.

He loves and reads everything he gets.  If you don't hear back from him, it is not that he wouldn't love to write to everyone.  In fact it stresses him that he can't, because he is so busy in his leadership role and doing the lords work.

I love and appreciate all of you that are supporting my son.

Love, Tracy


Hey y'all,
Not gonna be too big of an email today and I do apologize for that... busy busy!
Just wanted to share a quick experience I had while on an exchange with a new missionary... we were out tracting in a neighborhood... and we had been out for a good 45 minutes or so... they didn't have any set appointments so it was just a solid day of tracting... and we weren't having too much luck. It was hot. Humid. Sticky... and we had no water and the car was gone with the other missionaries in the area until they were done with their lessons... so we were stuck. So we kept going... working hard and keeping a good attitude... then we decided to pray and ask for help in finding someone. Long story short (only 4 minutes left on the computer! Sorry!)... we were led to a man who had just pulled into his driveway and gotten out of his car. On first approach, the man shot us down quick "No, I'm not interested. I'm really not interested. Have a good day." But then we asked him if we could just pray with him and that we represented the Savior... that opened him up a bit and we took the small window of opportunity to bear our testimonies to him and just let him know that we loved him and that God and Christ love him. Again... long story short, we ended up having a good hour long conversation with him... ended up teaching him about the Book of Mormon, The Restoration, The Gospel of Jesus Christ, etc. etc... and we ended up committing him to be baptized at the end of it! All of this coming from testimonies and love.
Never be afraid to share your testimony and the love of the Savior!
I love you all (20 secs left!)
Have a blessed week!
-Elder Wahlen


Friday, September 6, 2013

Thursday, September 5, 2013



Hey y'all,
Everyone doing good today? Good :) Keep smiling!!!! You never know whose heart that amazing smile might help today :) Remember this also... the greatest testimony is who you are! So be happy! Smile! Love and serve everyone! And know that God loves you, that the Savior loves you and I love you (my companion does too!)
I don't have much time and my keyboard is messed up so it takes FOREVER to type anything... but here's a short story.

We're teaching this lady... she's been working double shifts at her job to try and care for her family of A LOT of kids... first time we sat down with her, all we did was tell her about the Book of Mormon and share our testimonies... we invited her to read, pray, be baptized (if she came to know it was true) and come to church. She agreed somewhat half hearted...and informed us that she worked on Sundays and couldn't come to church. Long story short... we kept coming back over a couple week span and asked her how her reading and praying had been going. She kept saying "Haven't be able to yet", etc., etc.... but we didn't give up.... we went over there just a few days ago and we come to find out that she started reading and praying. We could see it in her before she even told us... she was so much happier and just had a glow about her... turns out that she got mad one day and turned to the Book of Mormon for whatever reason... again, long story short... that decision led her to quit her job so she could be with her family more and come to church, start and continue reading the Book of Mormon and praying every day and commiting herself to be baptized. She told us last night that the Book of Mormon has changed her life... that its bringing her back from a place that she never thought she could come back from...

So point of this VERY condensed and short story (again, I'm sorry I don't have the time to elaborate)... the point is that I can testify to each of you that the Book of Mormon is true. It will help you... it will help you in any and every situation you find yourself in. You will recieve blessings from reading it. God will speak to you through its pages. I invite each of you to read the Book of Mormon each day of your life... and to do so prayerfully. You will be blessed... and you won't just change for the better each day... but you will change for the better for the eternities.

Last note... as we're healed, we help heal others (through the Atonement)... but we can heal ourselves by loving and serving others... by helping others be healed. As we help others be healed through Christ, we too are healed. He lifts up His hands to heal us... but we are His hands. He will lift you up as you lift others.
I love each of you so much... have a blessed week!
-Elder Wahlen


Hello again from ATL!!!


Hey y'all,
Everyone doing good today? Good :) Keep smiling!!!! You never know whose heart that amazing smile might help today :) Remember this also... the greatest testimony is who you are! So be happy! Smile! Love and serve everyone! And know that God loves you, that the Savior loves you and I love you (my companion does too!)
I don't have much time and my keyboard is messed up so it takes FOREVER to type anything... but here's a short story.

We're teaching this lady... she's been working double shifts at her job to try and care for her family of A LOT of kids... first time we sat down with her, all we did was tell her about the Book of Mormon and share our testimonies... we invited her to read, pray, be baptized (if she came to know it was true) and come to church. She agreed somewhat half hearted...and informed us that she worked on Sundays and couldn't come to church. Long story short... we kept coming back over a couple week span and asked her how her reading and praying had been going. She kept saying "Haven't be able to yet", etc., etc.... but we didn't give up.... we went over there just a few days ago and we come to find out that she started reading and praying. We could see it in her before she even told us... she was so much happier and just had a glow about her... turns out that she got mad one day and turned to the Book of Mormon for whatever reason... again, long story short... that decision led her to quit her job so she could be with her family more and come to church, start and continue reading the Book of Mormon and praying every day and commiting herself to be baptized. She told us last night that the Book of Mormon has changed her life... that its bringing her back from a place that she never thought she could come back from...

So point of this VERY condensed and short story (again, I'm sorry I don't have the time to elaborate)... the point is that I can testify to each of you that the Book of Mormon is true. It will help you... it will help you in any and every situation you find yourself in. You will recieve blessings from reading it. God will speak to you through its pages. I invite each of you to read the Book of Mormon each day of your life... and to do so prayerfully. You will be blessed... and you won't just change for the better each day... but you will change for the better for the eternities.

Last note... as we're healed, we help heal others (through the Atonement)... but we can heal ourselves by loving and serving others... by helping others be healed. As we help others be healed through Christ, we too are healed. He lifts up His hands to heal us... but we are His hands. He will lift you up as you lift others.
I love each of you so much... have a blessed week!

-Elder Wahlen