March 5, 2012, email post from Brownsville

Dear Family,

To answer Mom's first question, the weather here is great! Today is in the mid/low seventies with sunshine and a light breeze. I don't think I could ask for much better weather. A couple weeks back it was pretty cold, but the heat is starting to come in again and soon enough I'll be complaining about sweating through my shirts again.

Speaking of sweating, I don't know if I told y'all... but my area is getting divided! The area I'm working now covers the nothern section of the city of Brownsville, as well as Cameron Park. Starting tomorrow another companionship is going to come and live in our apartment and we're going to be working just Cameron Park, and we'll be on bikes! I imagine I'm going to have some great stories to tell over the coming weeks. I'll be just in Cameron Park and on a bike, which always gives you an opportunity to catch the stories better than in a car. My current companion, Elder Ross, will be taking over the other half of the area that doesn't include Cameron Park with a new Elder that will be arriving. I'm sad that I'm not going to be Elder Ross' companion anymore. We got along really well, and we saw a lot of success in these past weeks as well. But, at least we'll still be living in the same apartment, so it's not like I'm never going to see him again. I don't think I've sent home any pictures of Elder Ross and me. Today I forgot my camera cord, so I'll be sure to get those off in the next email.

My new companion will be Elder Marshall, who will be coming in from Los Fresnos, which is a small town just to the north of Brownsville that falls about halfway between Brownsville and Harlingen. I've known him for a little while now, because Los Fresnos is actually part of the Brownsville zone, but this will be my first time really working with him.

Emilio continues to do well, but has had some struggle stopping smoking. He knows he needs to and he wants to, but he's tripped a few times in some of his weak moments. We talked with him and his family yesterday, and talked about how his family could become involved to help him quit smoking. We've also planned out some spiritual messages that we're going to send to him via text every morning, since it seems like early on in the day is when he falls on his smoking habit. But, I have great hopes for him because he's shown so much progress and so much faith. There's no way he can't beat a smoking addiction if he puts his mind to it.

We were able to see a lot of success at church, since we saw the majority of our investigators attend. All of them had good experiences there and enjoyed the three hours of services. After church we went over to one of our investigators to follow up on the experience and she said, "Yeah, I didn't tell you, but if I didn't like any of the parts of it I was just going to go and get in my car and leave, without staying for the whole three hours. But, when I was there I felt really good and I liked it, so I just stayed for the whole thing." She was the wife in a part member family who has a baptismal date for the end of this month. She seems to be doing really well and I'm convinced that very soon we'll see her husband reactivated and performing her baptism.

Anyway, we had a great week, but the rest of the district is struggling a bit. I've been working closely with the Elders trying to figure out things that I can do to help them. I have an exchange planned with them for later this week and I know we'll see some miracles that will help them boost their attitude and their faith.

I hope everything goes well this week. Thank you for your letters and your prayers!

Love,

Elder Wood

February 21, 2012, Email post from Brownsville, TX

Dear Family,

I'm glad to hear that Mom's vision has improved after kind of a scary incident. Being able to see really is something that we take for granted. I can't imagine how much harder life would be if I couldn't see.

This week I want to relate one of the greatest mirales that I have seen on my mission. We were walking around on Saturday on our exchanges with the zone leaders trying to find someone to teach, when we felt impressed to knock on a door in a street in Cameron Park. A man named Emilio opened the door and invited us right in. He had just gotten back from rehab 3 days earlier. When we knocked on his door, he was sitting there wondering if he should become part of a church. As we began talking to him, he expressed to us that his desire was to do God's will and to help other people, because he didn't want them to have to go what he went through. We taught him a lesson about the doctrine of Christ, and when we invited him to accept he replied, "Yes! I am willing, I am ready and I accept." We started talking to him about how he would need to read, pray and meet with us to prepare for baptism to which he replied, "Oh yeah, I'll do anything. You tell me to jump and I'll say, 'how high?'" We started talking to him about church and we asked him if he would rather attend church in Spanish or in English and he said, "Well, I speak both. I can go to both if you want..." Ahhhh! I don't think I had ever met anybody in my whole mission that was that prepared. And it gets better. At the end of the lesson we left him with a Book of Mormon and invited him to read. When we went by to check on him in the morning on Sunday to see if he was still going to come to church he started talking to us about what he had read. From the afternoon on Saturday to Sunday morning he had read up to 1 Nephi 19! He had been highlighting it and making notes as he read too, and he was telling us all about Nephi's vision and how he used to be one of the people lost in the 'mists of darkness'. He came to church on Sunday, loved it, and then we had a lesson with him afterwards about the restoration and prayer. When we invited him to pray to know that the church is true he said, "Oh, I already think I know the answer, but I guess I can just go and confirm it anyways." I'm super excited for him and I know that really soon he'll be ready to be baptized. Miracle!

We also met another family of five a few days ago that seems to be progressing really well. The husband is a member, but hasn't gone for a long time, but has some really strong desires to come back. The mom and two of the children are of baptismal age and are excited to take the step. My guess is that I'm going to have some great stories to tell about them in the coming weeks.

We've actually got to get going cause we have a lesson with Emilio set up and he's already confirmed the appointment, so I've gotta go! But thank you so much for your support and your prayers, I feel them every day. And don't think the prayers aren't going the other way as well. Take care, work hard!

Love,

Elder Wood

Oh, and yes Mom, I got the chocolates.. they were delicious =)

As far as the registration for fall term, I'll think about it this week and tell you next week what I've got in mind. When do the signups for classes start?

February 13, 2012, Brownsville, TX

Dear family,

Well, I'm out of time to write for the day, so I'll give you a really quick sum-up and then send you a copy of the email I sent to President Trayner for the week. (It's in English don't worry.)

My companion, Elder Marble, will be moving to Harlingen tomorrow, and my new companion has already arrived. I'll be training a missionary, Elder Ross, from Spanish Fork, Utah, who is waiting for his visa to Mexico to arrive. He's assigned to serve in the Mexico, Mexico City West mission, but will be serving with me until his visa arrives. He's been with us since Friday night, which is when President Trayner dropped him off at our house. We received about 6 hours of notice before we had our new companion, which was a pretty funny experience. We thought he was going to arrive on Tuesday, but on Friday night we got a text from President Trayner which said, "We'll be at your apartment at 8:15 with your new companion." Pretty big surprise, but it was pretty fun along the way.

Interesting fact we found out, Elder Ross has the same birthday as me, but he was born in 1992. Weird, right?

Anyway, it was a fun week and I'm excited to train again. But, sadly as I said, I'm out of time, so here's the email I sent to President Trayner.

Dear President,

I would just like to report to you how amazing and miraculous this week was. I felt my testimony was greatly fortified as I was able to see miracles wrought in the lives of our investigators. The numbers for the week didn't turn out that well, but the things that I saw happen during the week were really significant to me.

This week we saw our investigators receive answers to their prayers as they offered sincere, heartfelt supplications to the Lord about concerns or problems that they had going on in their lives. One couple we are teaching was struggling with the rent. They didn't have the money to pay it as a payout they were waiting on was delayed. Desperate and depressed, the wife of the family sat down on the couch and offered a prayer to the Lord asking for help. After the prayer, she called her father, who normally never has money, and asked if he had $200 dollars that he could loan her until their payout got there. Her father replied, "Of course!" Relieved and amazed, she hung up the phone, only to receive a call from her husband at work who said that his sister had just called him and given them $300 that she had but didn't need until later on in the month!

Later that week, we stopped by the same family, and Maria, the sister of Nancy (the wife in the previous story) was there at the house. She had been meeting with the missionaries is striving towards baptism. We spoke with her at the door to learn that her husband had been looking for a job, without any luck, and that he didn't have much interest in the message of the missionaries. After speaking with her, we said a humble prayer on the doorstep, asking for the Lord to help her husband find a job and open his heart to the missionaries. When we passed by two hours later to try and find Nancy home, Maria was still there, and her husband had just hung up on a call with a job offer for him!

The Lord's tender mercies truly are all over all the earth, aren't they? This week I have found myself more and more grateful to Him, and for the things that, in His mercy, he has seen fit to give to me. I often feel like the people being spoken to in Mosiah 2:22-24. He has blessed me with so much, for which I will forever be a debtor, owing a sum so great that I could never repay, and yet all He asks is that I keep His commandments. Truly the Lord is merciful to all of us, even when we are unprofitable servants.

The district has been in the same kind of spot for the past few weeks now. We saw a rise in new investigators this week, but a significant drop in church and member presents. The focus this week will be getting our people to obey the commandment of the Sabbath Day so that they can show their gratitude and devotion to the Lord and His commandments. We've been struggling to have a balanced effort, as it seems some weeks we do well in some things, but everything else seems to take a dive. We will be striving this week to get our investigators to church while not losing the progress we have made in other respects.

Sometimes I feel weird being the district leader here, because I often feel inadequate to be training the other missionaries how to have success when I myself am struggling to find it. However, I trust in the fact that I'm here for a reason, and often try to remind myself of the words of Nephi at the end of his writings when he says, "And ye shall know that the Lord has commanded me to write them, in spite of my weakness." I have many weaknesses, but I trust that the Lord has called me here for a reason, and that if I do my best, it will make a difference. I wonder how Moroni or Mormon felt, working so hard and yet not being able to see the results of their labors; only trusting in the promise of the Lord that their writings would be of worth to future generations and their posterity. Their cause seemed so hopeless, and it must have appeared like their records wouldn't make much difference, after hiding them away not to be found. We know that the Lord fulfilled his promises and know one of the greatest treasures that I have is what Moroni buried in a lonely hill.

I'm grateful for the chance to be here with Elder Ross. I will miss Elder Marble, but I know he's moving on to greater things that the Lord has in store for him. I will admit I feel jealous of Elders like them who are just coming wide-eyed into the beginning of one of the key experiences of their lives, while the time seems to grow ever shorter on mine. I'm committed to doing my best and using all the time I have, I just hope I can make the difference the Lord wants me to.

I hope that I can be a better trainer this time around. I definitely have things that I want to improve from the last time that I was given this responsability. When I found out that Elder Ross was coming I had studied on what I wanted to do right this time, and how I could give my companion a start off on the right foot. I pray the Lord will help me follow through with the goals that I have set.

I'm excited for a new week. There are still so many things that I want to apply from this last week of trainings. We'll be trying to improve and apply as much as we can from the revelation that we have received.

con carino,

Elder Wood

Love you family!

Elder Wood

February 6, 2012, emailed pictures from Brownsville, TX

February 6, 2012, email from Brownsville, TX

First off, pictures, and then I'll see if I have the time to write down the story that goes with them.

I also have a few movies, but we'll see if it lets me send those somehow. (ed. Nope that didn't work.)

Well, I just have a little bit of time to write down this one story from the week.

So on Sunday one of the investigators, Flor Mancillas, from the other Elder's area was supposed to get baptized. She showed up late to church because her ride showed up late, and so she was feeling kind of insecure about it all. She didn't feel like she was worthy because she didn't get to church on time and had had a really bad week. So, she wasn't feeling that good about everything. I found her in the hallway on Sunday. I was talking to her and that's when this all came out. I started talking to her a bit and asked her about what in her week went bad. We started talking and she mentioned a few things. But the biggest thing that went wrong in the week was when a sick opossum (tecuache) crawled underneath her trailer and died. It had been rotting for a couple days and the smelled had forced her out of her house.

So, I talked to another missionary and we determined to go and remove it for her, but to help cheer her up, we were going to do it before her baptism.

We left church early, grabbing some plastic cleaning gloves before we left. Elder Pack and I ran over to their apartment. He changed out of his suit into some work clothes and we set off to get the tecuache. After getting underneath the cold, mudsoaked trailer, Elder Pack realized that the opossum wasn't just underneath the trailer. It had crawled through a hole in the plastic tarp that covered the bottom of the trailer after it had been raised up on cinderblocks. After feeling around the plastic he found a pretty solid heavy lump. He began to kick it with his legs and push it with his arms towards the hole in the plastic where it had worked its way in. After kicking it for a while the tail flopped out. He grabbed it and pulled the rest of it out. We put it in a trash bag and threw it in a dumpster. Overall this took about 30 minutes and the whole time the stench was HORRIBLE. All of the neighbors around her could smell it as well. It was just gross. When the tecuache flopped out of the hole all the maggots and everything came with it too, I'm surprised Elder Pack didn't barf.

Afterwards we ran back to his house. He took a shower and got ready to go back to church. Flor was excited to hear the news and she had a great baptism. Anyway, overall it was a pretty funny/gross experience that I would never want to repeat.

The week was good. Our investigator family came to church again. Frank, aka Pancho, is hilarious. He's the dad of the family and never stops making jokes. When I told him about the opposum story he said, "oh yeah, we have like 15 of those at my house. We've already named all of them. That one's Curly, that one's Carlos...."

We struggled with getting new investigators during the week, but we've been working with our members and giving them commitments to give out copies of the Book of Mormon, etc. So I think we'll see some success from that in these coming weeks. Also we should have some more success this week since we'll have more time to go finding on our own.

The week was really warm, hot even, up until Saturday. It was 80 degrees or so for a long time, sun and all. Then Saturday came in and we had a huuuuge rainstorm come in from the Gulf. It threw down a lot of rain for a good two hours with lightning and all. I'm not gonna lie, it reminded me of Virginia. I wish our apartment had a porch so we could go out and watch it, like the house in VA. We were lucky though, we had planned lunch right when the storm hit. Since the storm hit the temperature plummeted and I'm back to my sweater and rain jacket again, with my scrubs underneath my slacks.

Anyway, everything is going well and we're having a good time.

I was glad to hear that Levi's sealing was a great service. I really do love the temple, it's a wonderful place. I hope everyone has a great week!

Love,

Elder Wood

Jan. 31, email note from Brownsville, TX

(Ed. note) Roland's half hour of email time for this week was spent emailing back and forth with me trying to arrange housing for himself and six missionary/former roommate friends for Fall semester at BYU. At the end of our back and forth email exchange about housing he sent this note:

I'm out of time. Sorry for not being about to write a real letter, but just know that this week was a miracle week and we had a new family of 7, 4 of baptismal age come to church. I love you mom and I hope you had a great birthday. I brag about you to all the other missionaries. Love you! I'll write a real letter next week when I'm not dealing with crazy things.

Love,

Elder Roland Wood

Jan. 23, 2012, email note from Brownsville, TX

If you want to know what scripture Roland refers to in this quick note he sent, scroll down to see the scripture I sent to him.

-----Original Message-----
From: Roland Wood <roland.wood@myldsmail.net>
To: Nathan44@aol.com <nathan44@aol.com>
Sent: Mon, Jan 23, 2012 7:42 am
Subject: Re: ARL1> Scripture of the Week

Funny story. I read that scripture to someone the night before they hopped the checkpoints. Promised her that if she kept the commandments and would be active in the church in Houston the Lord would guide her through the checkpoints. She ended up getting caught at the checkpoints, but rather than sending her back to Mexico, they decided to pardon her and start arrangements for her to receive papers. It really is by the Lord that we are led huh?

On Mon, Jan 23, 2012 at 7:52 AM, Nathan44@aol.com <nathan44@aol.com> wrote:

And I will also be your light in the wilderness; and I will prepare the way before you, if it so be that ye shall keep my commandments; wherefore, inasmuch as ye shall keep my commandments ye shall be led towards the promised land; and ye shall know that it is by me that ye are led.

1 Nephi 17:13