Monday, September 17, 2012

God's Hand In The Work Is Amazing To See

MONDAY - We had an awesome preparation day today. I got 2 letters, one from Shawn and one from Josh! SO HAPPY! THANKS GUYS! We had a good turn out at the church today for ball. Had a less active and these twins that saw our fliers and wanted to come play and were pretty good. We played some good ball and then we headed back home to get ready to go out. We did some tracting and then we went to our lesson with Charles with Andy. We visited a few others after as well, the Hodgins and the Princes. Funny story when we were tracting we knocked into a girl who came out with a beer in her hand and we asked if she believed in Jesus Christ and she said yes and then turned around and shut the door saying "But I'm going to go drink my beer now, bye!" Hahaha, people. 8:00 hit and we had no idea what to do, school nights kind of stink when you don't have appointments.

TUESDAY - HAPPY HALF BIRTHDAY TO MYSELF! :) 20 and a half years of age holy cow! Also it was 11 years ago that the tragedy in New York happened. Best wishes go out to all the families that lost loved ones in that sad event. We decided to have a minute of silence during companionship study. Today was tough! One of those days you feel like a train full force hit you head first! We had a good district meeting today though, very good training by Elder Richardson. After we all went to Panda Express! LOVE IT! We didn't even know there was one here till just a few days ago, so it was really good to have for the first time in a long time. When we got back we grabbed the GPS and were on our way. We headed down to Kilgore and started knocking some apartments and then visited some members, not having any luck whatsoever, so we tried some other ones and had a guy let us right in and start playing the guitar for us and talked our ears off for a good amount of time. We were so tired but carried on and then headed back home to grab a bite to eat and try and stay on our feet. We dropped off a few ward mission plans to a few families and then headed to the stake presidents report with President Wagley. He is so awesome! Members are so great out here but its just super hard to find people that are interested in the Gospel. Most of them are just so set in their ways they wont even budge. But anyway the meeting was super good! We then went back down to Kilgore to teach a couple English. Its really fun to teach them English, also we got a compliment from them about our Spanish. They said they thought we were Hispanic by how we talked on the phone :) WHOOP WHOOP SOY HISPANO! 
 
WEDNESDAY - HAPPY BIRTHDAY AMBER! BIG 17! my only advice is.... stay away from them boys! hahaha, I hope you had a good one! Today was good! 9 hours of work. No dinner. One appointment. We mixed it up a bit by doing different things all day. We started by visiting some of the members to give out more ward mission plans then we went to the Monterrey to contact a bunch of Hispanics to tell them about English classes. We went tracting and got in with a girl named Alfreda and taught the Restoration and invited her to be baptized and she accepted. Man it feels good to be back on track and teach! We had a total of about 56 contacts today which is a record for me! We grabbed a quick bite to eat at Sonic and then went to the church to meet Hno Plascencia hahahaha, he is SO awesome! Love that guy. We headed over to Marlenes for a lesson and of course she had a DVD player with no remote so we couldn't do what we wanted to do. We ended up testifying to her and I told her flat out that she will not live with God after this life if she does not leave her other church and be baptized by the Authority of God. It was very powerful. We ran home that night and got food dropped off for us by the Rivas family and then headed to bed. Exhausted!
 
THURSDAY - Planning is the best day of all the week... NOT. We got through it and went out to work. Had some very awesome experiences. We had a lesson with Brent with Andy and taught the Plan of Salvation. I love the Plan of Salvation. Its my favorite to teach that is for sure. We then went on splits. I went with Andy to a lesson with Charles where we taught a quick lesson on the Word of Wisdom and he agreed to live it. Super bien. We then went to visit a less active we had tried to visit so many times in the past and didn't have any luck. This is where the Spirit came in. We were heading there and we missed the turn and then when we got back to it we went down the wrong road. But when we arrived she was just pulling up and we caught her and had a great conversation with her. Who would of the thought the Spirit would lead you in the "wrong" direction hahaha. If we hadnt of missed the turn and gone down the wrong road we would probably not have caught her. I love this work. We then went back to find out Elder Chappell and Brother Sellers both had a similar experience. They tried a less active who didnt answer and there was another LA that lived right across from them in the complex. They tried both and nothing. So they sat there for a while thinking "what the heck do we do" They started to pull out when they saw a man walking towards the stairwell that led to the less actives apartment and so they went back and sure enough it was him. They got in and had a good conversation with im and then as they left 35 minutes later the LA across from them were just leaving so they caught them as well. Miracle. Wonderful Thursday it was. Gods hand in the work is amazing to see. 
 
FRIDAY - We got up at 5:45 to head over to the church because we got invited to a scripture chase for seminary. It was really fun! But took a toll on our energy level thats for sure. We headed down to Kilgore for the day and met 2 girls with amputated arms within one hour. Crazy little stat. We had 25 contacts and met some good people but no real luck. We headed back to Longview for the Spanish party at the church. We were so excited to eat but it started while we were setting up our English class and we walked in and there was NOTHING left. No food. We were disappointed because it was a Hispanic party... there supposed to make TONS of food.... It was sad and it didnt help that nobody came to English class... again. We helped clean up and then headed home. 
 
SATURDAY - Crazy day. We got up and headed up to Idabel for a few interviews. 2 hour drive... yuck. We did the interviews and drove back down almost dead by the time we got back. We grabbed a pizza and ate a bit before heading out to Kilgore again. We tracted a bit and went and visited Josh but he was playing games so we went to dinner and came back at 6. He told us his favorite game is Halo so he goes to the preview on his xbox!!! Crazy kid!!! Looks pretty good! But it will be there when I get back. We read a bit with him too and then left to visit Alfreda. She moved to Dallas. So much for that! We then went to the Alexanders and shared a scripture with them. Really hope they are there tomorrow. We headed over to la casa de la familia Florez to go over the work in the Spanish branch. It was really good. Ate a ton of pineapple to start our fast.
 
SUNDAY - WOW what a day today was! Marlene didn't come but Candelario did come so that was good. Sacrament talks were super good and we got the lesson thrown on us for second hour. Subject: Second coming.... not a good one to teach while you have investigators in the class. We headed to English ward after and had a surprise from a less active that we thought would never ever come back to church! She told her story in class about how her grandmother had passed away and that because she was not a Temple Recommend holder she could not put the veil over her and it tore her apart because she was the only other member in her family. So she is back. She also brought her 11 year old (non member) Grandaughter. They are just so wonderful and I was happy all day because of that. We had the opportunity after church to give them both Priesthood blessings. So powerful and I'm so grateful for the Priesthood. Its so real! It was such a powerful experience. Love this church, so grateful for Jesus Christ and all the blessings and knowledge I have gained here on my mission. We finished with our meeting and ended our fast with spaghetti at the Rossows hahaha, brother Rossow is so funny. Love the ward and the branch. We did some more contacting and had a total of 143 contacts for the week. Went and did numbers and came back tired and ready for a reboost. Loving it out here. So crazy how fast its gone. Thanks for reading and have a great week! The church is true, I know it! 
:)
love,
Elder Aaron Jackson #25

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