Thursday, October 5, 2017

SEPTEMBER 25, 2017

Hey y'all

Where do I even start. This week was such an amazing week filled with miracles and blessings.

On Monday night we went to a part members/less active family's home for FHE and had a lesson on the Book of Mormon and doing everything in our power to find out for ourselves if it is true. Marcus is married to a non-member and unfortunately been struggling with his faith, and his brother James is 22 and has been less active as well. Both haven't come to church for over a year now and so we have been really trying to help them. It was cool too, because James invited his friend Milan to the lesson and rumor has it she made it to church yesterday in Houston! We introduced Milan to the B.O.M briefly and then started sharing Alma 22 about giving everything to the Lord. The spirit was so strong especially as James started bearing his testimony. (again, he hasn't been active for at least a year) Everyone committed, but sadly Brikea (Marcus' wife) just doesn't seem ready yet. Regardless, we truly felt the spirit touched everyone there and everyone committed to finding out the truth.  On Saturday we picked up James in the morning and went out teaching with him! We ended up finding this really cool guy named Mark and taught him the restoration and James invited him out to church!!! Wait, what? we were shocked, because we have been inviting James to come to church with us for a couple months now, and here he is inviting an investigator to come with him! Long story short, James went over Sunday morning to pick up Mark but unfortunately Mark had to head off to work, but James AND Marcus both came to church together!!!!! :D It was soo good to see them there, and the Stake President even reached out to them and expressed his love to see them there. That was a miracle for sure. 

Yesterday morning we went with an inactive member Robin (she is the daughter of the Porter's/the elderly couple we bring the sacrament) to her church and it was a full on Southern Baptist church, like as good as it gets! It was quite the experience let me tell ya. Also, the interesting thing is that Robin stopped going to the LDS church when she was like 20 because of a few things possibly including marrying a baptist husband and social barriers based on race/ethnicity that were prevalent back in the day. Anyways, we think it meant a lot to her, because we had part of that same experience yesterday at the baptist church, but absolutely had a great time!! Let's just say I have never heard more sincere prayers being completely yelled and screamed out loud haha. I will share a few highlights: They had a full size band with the big ol drum set, electric guitar, electric keyboard, massive background choir singing praises, the whole works. Just about anything you can think of haha :) It was pretty funny and hard to keep a straight face at times hearing, "Yes, lord! HMMM. That's it. Yes Lord that's it!! Give it to me Jesus. Come on now! Literally after every phrase the pastor said :D And yes, the pastors all over Louisiana use the same style: Beginning with their nose in da book, starting low and slow, and then moving higher, and then catching on fire/yelling by the end of the sermon haha. The pastor was getting blue in the face by the end of that haha bless his heart. Also, it isn't a good sermon without mentioning Washington D.C/politics and how our leaders overlook the scripture, "As I have loved you, love one another." As well as bitter feelings from North Baton Rouge to South Baton Rouge. Not sure what is going on there haha, but bless everyone's hearts! The QUOTE OF THE MORNING had to have been the pastor yelling, "Open up your pocket books... AND Share the Loove!!" and then of course quoting a bible scripture. I hope I don't sound like I am belittling them at all though. I absolutely loved it for the experience and the people were seriously some of the nicest people I have met. They were super kind and friendly. Like they even had us stand as they introduced us and shared what church we were from :) Just great people. We even got stopped like 5 times on our way out from people. That whole congregation is getting dunked sooner than later, just wait haha! We then made it back for our ward and it was a stark difference. I sure enjoyed the service, but I don't know how they feel the spirit with all the yelling and rock band-ing going on. I was grateful for the refreshing spirit dunk at sacrament meeting :D 
Later in the afternoon we brought the sacrament over to the Porters and Robin sat in for the entire lesson this time! She usually leaves the room so that was awesome. I think we are starting to break down those walls. Also, after a few minutes Robin answers her phone and it was Bria. She told her "Yeah, the Elders are still here." Let's goo!  Robin's daughter Bria came back from work and was excited to meet with us again. Everyone shared their miracles/tender mercies from the week and then we talked with Bria about the YSA activities over on LSU. She seemed super interested in going, like she was just waiting for an invitation. One of her co workers is a member and goes to all the LSU YSA activities too so she is going to invite Bria for tonight. 


At church Liz came and is doing really well! Unfortunately her boyfriend Bret is going out of town the whole month of October, so we are planning for her baptism in the beginning of November. She said she is grateful for the extra time to just keep learning though, so I guess that is good. We tried sitting by Sheryl at church, but it looks like she has made other friends and everyone wants to sit by her :) We then asked her about general conference and she continued telling us all of the members that have invited her over to their house for the sessions. That sure made us smile! No one invites us over to watch general conference, but they sure invite Sheryl :) Jk, we are in good hands!

We attended the Baton Rouge and New Orleans zone conferences and that was yet another opportunity to strengthen my testimony of being representatives of Jesus Christ out here sharing the fullness of his gospel. The greatest miracle I will have experienced on my mission is the opportunity to draw closer to my savior and feeling of his love. He helps me every single day and I know this is his work. I couldn't do it without Him. I then went on exchanges down in New Orleans with one of the Spanish zone leaders and that was neat. It is interesting how things I once studied and learned just flooded right back from the spirit, and I was somehow able to understand a lot of the Spanish lessons/ members. Anyways, things are going super well, and we are really working hard. There are so many things I would love to share, but no time and y'all are probably tired of reading at this point haha.  Well, I hope everyone enjoys General Conference this week. I am really excited about it! 

Love, 
Elder Wilson