Hello Everyone,
This past week has been a good week for us here in Donna. We're still working hard and trying to find and teach as best we can. Working to spread the message of the Gospel is often hard, but everything turns out okay because we're entitled to the Lord's help. The last seven days have been days of excitement and disappointment, but nevertheless, the work moves forward. some of the people that we've been teaching have lost motivation or had other reasons to not continue learning about the Gospel. (From now on that motivation/reason will be called 'ganas', which is probably my favorite word in Spanish so far.) some people have been hit by opposition from their families, or a passive demeanor has kept them from acting on what they know to be true. It's disappointing to see, but I'm confident that those people will soon have circumstances that bring them back to the missionaries and allow them to follow through on what they know and receive. Other people that we have been teaching have started making more steps to move themselves closer to Christ. They've found ganas for various reasons and have started coming to Church and progressing in the path of the Lord. I'm grateful for the support that the Lord gives me every day of this work. I could not do it without His uplifting hand. I can testify that the Lord is working here in South Texas. The number of people that have made their first covenant with the Lord from Corpus Christi to the border is staggering. It's not because the missionaries here are better than any others, but because the Lord has a plan and a purpose for the work in this area. I'm not sure exactly what that goal is, but the Lord is working hard in this part of the vineyard. I can only hope that as his servant I can provide some sort of help during this time of my labor.
I hope everyone is having a great Christmas season and that we can all start getting into the real Christmas spirit. The season here is getting more festive and I'm amazed at some of the decorations that are up here. For living in one of the poorer town of the mission, people really don't skimp on Christmas. I'll have to start taking some more pictures of the lights and everything to get some good Texas spirit out to everyone.
I hope everyone can get some ganas to really put themselves in a giving spirit. And, to fulfill my missionary duty, D&C teaches us that "there is no gift greater than the gift of salvation." (D&C 6:13). So, during this Christmas season, we can share the gospel to the best of our ability, and give them the greatest gift that God or man can give. So I hope everyone remembers that the best gift that you can give to anyone during this season is your testimony and the number of the missionaries. Not everyone will accept it, that's true, but those that do will be thanking you now and throughout the eternities.
Christmas season is up and rolling here in Texas and I hope that everyone else can get the Spirit of Christmas with them. Espero que todos tengan una buena semana, llena de la paz del Espiritu Santo.
Les quiero,
Elder Wood
December 13, 2010
Monday, Dec. 6, email from Donna, TX
Dear Family,
This week I will only be writing a short email because of lack of time on this P-day. Some opportunities for service came up that we hadn't planned for, so we're a bit short on time.
These past seven days have been very good, but we have had a bit of trouble helping our investigators to progress. We have a few families we're working with right now, trying to show them the truth of the gospel. Getting them to attend church has been a struggle for us. We're working on showing them how they can receive answers, blessings and support from honoring the Sabbath day, and I'm sure that they will soon begin to obey this law.
My new companion is elder Raynor, from Northern California. He's been out in the mission about a year and a half and is a great missionary. We're already getting along well, and I'm excited for the work that will get done with this new companionship.
I did receive the package that Mom sent today, and Elder Raynor is already jealous of my family. I may have to have a talk with him about the tenth commandment. I'm sure he'll turn out all right. Thanks so much for the package. It definitely helped put a Christmas spirit in the season, instead of every day just being the same when going out to tract and teach.
Everything is going well in Texas, and the Christmas season is really starting to get going. Yesterday we went to McAllen and watched the Christmas broadcast from the First Presidency, which was awesome. The talks were very inspiring and the songs by the choir were amazing. If it's up yet on lds.org, I'd encourage everyone to go and watch it.
I hope everyone is having a great start to the Christmas season and will remember to focus on the things that really matter and not get caught up in the material parts of this time of year. I love you all and hope that everything continues to go well and that the Lord continues to extend his protective hand in the lives of our family.
Love,
Elder Wood
This week I will only be writing a short email because of lack of time on this P-day. Some opportunities for service came up that we hadn't planned for, so we're a bit short on time.
These past seven days have been very good, but we have had a bit of trouble helping our investigators to progress. We have a few families we're working with right now, trying to show them the truth of the gospel. Getting them to attend church has been a struggle for us. We're working on showing them how they can receive answers, blessings and support from honoring the Sabbath day, and I'm sure that they will soon begin to obey this law.
My new companion is elder Raynor, from Northern California. He's been out in the mission about a year and a half and is a great missionary. We're already getting along well, and I'm excited for the work that will get done with this new companionship.
I did receive the package that Mom sent today, and Elder Raynor is already jealous of my family. I may have to have a talk with him about the tenth commandment. I'm sure he'll turn out all right. Thanks so much for the package. It definitely helped put a Christmas spirit in the season, instead of every day just being the same when going out to tract and teach.
Everything is going well in Texas, and the Christmas season is really starting to get going. Yesterday we went to McAllen and watched the Christmas broadcast from the First Presidency, which was awesome. The talks were very inspiring and the songs by the choir were amazing. If it's up yet on lds.org, I'd encourage everyone to go and watch it.
I hope everyone is having a great start to the Christmas season and will remember to focus on the things that really matter and not get caught up in the material parts of this time of year. I love you all and hope that everything continues to go well and that the Lord continues to extend his protective hand in the lives of our family.
Love,
Elder Wood
Monday, Nov. 29th, email from Donna, TX
Hello Family!
I hope everyone had a great Thanksgiving! My first Thanksgiving out in the field was cool, but definitely not the same as a Thanksgiving at home. I did get a chance to make a few of the things from Mom's package which turned out pretty good. Hector wanted me to make sure I gave Mom a big "muchas gracias" for the hymnal that she sent him. He enjoys it very much. We had two meals that day, the first of which was at a member's house in Weslaco. They had quite a few people over and as a result, had prepared quite a feast. They had three different turkeys, one traditional, one smoked, and one fried, all of which managed to get eaten. After the meal in Weslaco, we went over to Hector's house and had a Mexican Thanksgiving dinner, which is very different from an American one. The only thing that was the same was the turkey. The rest as all different; rice, spicy stuffing, beans and chilis being some of the foods I remember. I was sad I didn't have a copy of the Magna Carta to read to continue Dad's tradition. Tragically, it isn't a part of the missionary library. Maybe if I had one in Spanish I could get away with it.
The Christmas season has already started here with most people having all of their lights and reindeer up. We ended up doing a bit of service with our elderly neighbors, helping them put up their Christmas lights and all. In fact, now that I look at it, there's a giant Christmas tree, two wreaths and a garland with bows in the college computer lab I'm sitting in right now. The only place that gets more into Christmas than here might be the BYU campus.
Hector was confirmed during Church yesterday, and had a great experience with it. He asked me to confirm him, which I was happy to do. I was a little bit scared because of the blessing part of it in Spanish. The actual confirmation and the giving of the Holy Ghost isn't too hard for me because it's all rote. Thanks to my many years of memorizing quotes, I can get those down in just a few minutes. But, everything turned out all right and I don't think I made too many mistakes during it. I'm getting pretty comfortable with my Spanish here. The only thing that I'm really scared about now is getting too comfortable and plateauing in the language. I just need to keep focused on my studies and speak as much as possible in Spanish so I can keep learning.
I was able to send a few pictures home in this email which will hopefully make their way to the blog. One is a picture of my district, which will soon be changing, sadly. Two are pictures from Hector's baptism and the last one has a bit of a story. Most people here in the valley are Catholics, and there are very few that don't believe in God at all, so I guess I shouldn't have been surprised. Nonetheless, when I saw that billboard on the side of the highway I was pretty surprised, considering you'd probably never see one like that in Virginia.
I'm glad that our family is receiving many blessings. Mel is being watched over I'm sure as her pregnancy proceeds, and I know that the Lord will provide for both mother and child. I'm also very glad to hear that Christian is okay after his accident. A rolling car is a very dangerous place to be, and I'm amazed and very grateful that he and his friend managed to avoid any injuries and not involve anyone else in the accident. I'm pretty sure our family has some guardian angels flying around with all of the protection we've had.
Today is the last preparation day before transfers, which will happen tomorrow. I'm staying another six weeks at the least here in Donna, but my companion Elder Navarro, will be leaving for Laredo. My new companion, Elder Reiner will be coming into the area. It'll be my first time taking over an area, which makes me a little bit nervous. Everything will turn out fine, I'm sure. We're a little bit low on investigators right now, but with a bit of effort hopefully that will change.
I hope everyone is doing well at the beginning of this Christmas season and takes some time everyday to remember the Lord Jesus Christ. In this season we commemorate His birth, and we can all take the opportunity to grow a little closer to Him. A short scripture study in the morning, a sincere prayer or just keeping Him in your thoughts are all things we can do to make him a bigger part of our lives. So, during this Christmas season I hope everyone can take a little more time to get away from the lights and presents and do just a little something to remember our Savior and Redeemer. I hope everyone continues to do well and has a great (and safe) week.
Love,
Elder Wood
I hope everyone had a great Thanksgiving! My first Thanksgiving out in the field was cool, but definitely not the same as a Thanksgiving at home. I did get a chance to make a few of the things from Mom's package which turned out pretty good. Hector wanted me to make sure I gave Mom a big "muchas gracias" for the hymnal that she sent him. He enjoys it very much. We had two meals that day, the first of which was at a member's house in Weslaco. They had quite a few people over and as a result, had prepared quite a feast. They had three different turkeys, one traditional, one smoked, and one fried, all of which managed to get eaten. After the meal in Weslaco, we went over to Hector's house and had a Mexican Thanksgiving dinner, which is very different from an American one. The only thing that was the same was the turkey. The rest as all different; rice, spicy stuffing, beans and chilis being some of the foods I remember. I was sad I didn't have a copy of the Magna Carta to read to continue Dad's tradition. Tragically, it isn't a part of the missionary library. Maybe if I had one in Spanish I could get away with it.
The Christmas season has already started here with most people having all of their lights and reindeer up. We ended up doing a bit of service with our elderly neighbors, helping them put up their Christmas lights and all. In fact, now that I look at it, there's a giant Christmas tree, two wreaths and a garland with bows in the college computer lab I'm sitting in right now. The only place that gets more into Christmas than here might be the BYU campus.
Hector was confirmed during Church yesterday, and had a great experience with it. He asked me to confirm him, which I was happy to do. I was a little bit scared because of the blessing part of it in Spanish. The actual confirmation and the giving of the Holy Ghost isn't too hard for me because it's all rote. Thanks to my many years of memorizing quotes, I can get those down in just a few minutes. But, everything turned out all right and I don't think I made too many mistakes during it. I'm getting pretty comfortable with my Spanish here. The only thing that I'm really scared about now is getting too comfortable and plateauing in the language. I just need to keep focused on my studies and speak as much as possible in Spanish so I can keep learning.
I was able to send a few pictures home in this email which will hopefully make their way to the blog. One is a picture of my district, which will soon be changing, sadly. Two are pictures from Hector's baptism and the last one has a bit of a story. Most people here in the valley are Catholics, and there are very few that don't believe in God at all, so I guess I shouldn't have been surprised. Nonetheless, when I saw that billboard on the side of the highway I was pretty surprised, considering you'd probably never see one like that in Virginia.
I'm glad that our family is receiving many blessings. Mel is being watched over I'm sure as her pregnancy proceeds, and I know that the Lord will provide for both mother and child. I'm also very glad to hear that Christian is okay after his accident. A rolling car is a very dangerous place to be, and I'm amazed and very grateful that he and his friend managed to avoid any injuries and not involve anyone else in the accident. I'm pretty sure our family has some guardian angels flying around with all of the protection we've had.
Today is the last preparation day before transfers, which will happen tomorrow. I'm staying another six weeks at the least here in Donna, but my companion Elder Navarro, will be leaving for Laredo. My new companion, Elder Reiner will be coming into the area. It'll be my first time taking over an area, which makes me a little bit nervous. Everything will turn out fine, I'm sure. We're a little bit low on investigators right now, but with a bit of effort hopefully that will change.
I hope everyone is doing well at the beginning of this Christmas season and takes some time everyday to remember the Lord Jesus Christ. In this season we commemorate His birth, and we can all take the opportunity to grow a little closer to Him. A short scripture study in the morning, a sincere prayer or just keeping Him in your thoughts are all things we can do to make him a bigger part of our lives. So, during this Christmas season I hope everyone can take a little more time to get away from the lights and presents and do just a little something to remember our Savior and Redeemer. I hope everyone continues to do well and has a great (and safe) week.
Love,
Elder Wood
November 29, 2010
22 November, email from Donna Texas
Dear Family,
This has been a great past week here in Donna, with my first baptism actually happening Sunday for Hector. I have a few pictures from the baptism, but I always have trouble getting pictures off this camera for some reason. I guess I'll try again next week because I'm running out of time for emailing.
The baptismal service went over well with a high attendance from the ward and a good bit of Hector's family in attendance as well. I gave the talk on baptism, a member, Hermano Cabrera gave the talk on the Holy Ghost and Elder Navarro performed the baptism. My talk went over pretty well, even though it was in Spanish. The talk given by Hermano Cabrera's talk went well, but Elder Navarro had a bit of trouble with the baptism. The first time he said the prayer he made a mistake in Spanish, so the second time he was more focused on his words than he was on where he was holding Hector. He managed to give him a big thunk on the head against the wall going into the water. The whole ward in attendance let out a big, "awwwww", but Hector took it with a good heart and has already forgiven Elder Navarro for his negligence. The refreshments afterwards were good, with a cake bought by the Cabrera family. Hermano Carrasco, a baker in our ward, made a large batch of cookies. All went over well, and I believe it was a great experience for Hector and for his family as well.
Cindy Carrizales and the kids are doing well, but we were only able to meet with them a few times this week. We actually met with them on Cesar's birthday, so I went to a bakery and bought him a piece of cake and afterwards we watched the Restoration movie. during the movie, Cesar managed to make another random comment that left me laughing pretty hard. When Joseph Smith started praying in the movie, and the choir starts singing and the light gets really bright, he piped up and said nonchalantly, "God's coming". That kid has given me some pretty funny quotes to think about whenever I teach the first lesson again.
The only other story I have from this week really isn't actually a story of mine, but something that happened down in Brownsville, another area in my mission. In Mexico this past week, one of the leaders of the gangs there was killed by the government. This got the gangs really mad. So this past week the violence in Mexico has been kicking up with more gunfights and other incidents. One of the fights this past week was very close to the U.S. border, near Brownsville, and the gunfire was bad enough that some of the stray bullets were coming over into this side of the border. A college in Brownsville had to close their campus because the bullets in and shattering windows and hitting walls. No one was hurt, I believe, but it's just weird to get a reminder that the war in Mexico is not far away at all. As missionaries we never see the bad things that go on in town since everybody just leaves us alone, which is definitely a blessing. I'm glad to hear that Elder Christensen has some form of protection in California as well!
I'm glad Mom is having a good experience with missionary work in Virginia. I hope that they will continue to be able to come and hear about the Gospel. Hopefully, soon they'll realize that they can find an answer for themselves from God, because as soon as they have that answer, the rest will come quickly and easily.
I hope everyone will continue to do well or improve and also have a great Thanksgiving week! Missionaries here typically have 3 -5 Thanksgiving meals because different families have different times they plan to eat. I'll have to start warming up my stomach for this Thursday. Hopefully, I'll be ready and able to make it through the marathon of meals. Have a good week and start thinking of things you can be grateful to the Lord for on Thanksgiving day!
Love,
Elder Wood
This has been a great past week here in Donna, with my first baptism actually happening Sunday for Hector. I have a few pictures from the baptism, but I always have trouble getting pictures off this camera for some reason. I guess I'll try again next week because I'm running out of time for emailing.
The baptismal service went over well with a high attendance from the ward and a good bit of Hector's family in attendance as well. I gave the talk on baptism, a member, Hermano Cabrera gave the talk on the Holy Ghost and Elder Navarro performed the baptism. My talk went over pretty well, even though it was in Spanish. The talk given by Hermano Cabrera's talk went well, but Elder Navarro had a bit of trouble with the baptism. The first time he said the prayer he made a mistake in Spanish, so the second time he was more focused on his words than he was on where he was holding Hector. He managed to give him a big thunk on the head against the wall going into the water. The whole ward in attendance let out a big, "awwwww", but Hector took it with a good heart and has already forgiven Elder Navarro for his negligence. The refreshments afterwards were good, with a cake bought by the Cabrera family. Hermano Carrasco, a baker in our ward, made a large batch of cookies. All went over well, and I believe it was a great experience for Hector and for his family as well.
Cindy Carrizales and the kids are doing well, but we were only able to meet with them a few times this week. We actually met with them on Cesar's birthday, so I went to a bakery and bought him a piece of cake and afterwards we watched the Restoration movie. during the movie, Cesar managed to make another random comment that left me laughing pretty hard. When Joseph Smith started praying in the movie, and the choir starts singing and the light gets really bright, he piped up and said nonchalantly, "God's coming". That kid has given me some pretty funny quotes to think about whenever I teach the first lesson again.
The only other story I have from this week really isn't actually a story of mine, but something that happened down in Brownsville, another area in my mission. In Mexico this past week, one of the leaders of the gangs there was killed by the government. This got the gangs really mad. So this past week the violence in Mexico has been kicking up with more gunfights and other incidents. One of the fights this past week was very close to the U.S. border, near Brownsville, and the gunfire was bad enough that some of the stray bullets were coming over into this side of the border. A college in Brownsville had to close their campus because the bullets in and shattering windows and hitting walls. No one was hurt, I believe, but it's just weird to get a reminder that the war in Mexico is not far away at all. As missionaries we never see the bad things that go on in town since everybody just leaves us alone, which is definitely a blessing. I'm glad to hear that Elder Christensen has some form of protection in California as well!
I'm glad Mom is having a good experience with missionary work in Virginia. I hope that they will continue to be able to come and hear about the Gospel. Hopefully, soon they'll realize that they can find an answer for themselves from God, because as soon as they have that answer, the rest will come quickly and easily.
I hope everyone will continue to do well or improve and also have a great Thanksgiving week! Missionaries here typically have 3 -5 Thanksgiving meals because different families have different times they plan to eat. I'll have to start warming up my stomach for this Thursday. Hopefully, I'll be ready and able to make it through the marathon of meals. Have a good week and start thinking of things you can be grateful to the Lord for on Thanksgiving day!
Love,
Elder Wood
November 22, 2010
Mon, Nov 15, 2010, email from Donna, TX
Dear Family,
This has been a great week here in Donna, with good progress for our investigators around the board. At the moment, we have Hector, and Cindy and her two kids, Cleopatra and Cesar. Both are making good progress towards baptism. Hector had a bit of a delay with his baptism, since we were unable to meet with him very much this past week. However, we finally were able to sit down with him, discuss his progress, and start planning things for his baptism. My companion, Elder Navarro will be performing the baptism. I'll be giving a talk on baptism. Edgar Cabrera, a member in the ward who has done a great job of fellowshipping Hector will give a talk on the Holy Ghost.
We went over the baptismal interview questions already with Hector. Every thing seems to be taken care of and understood. Everything is going well and barring some random incident, he should be getting baptized this Sunday. Teaching him has been a really interesting experience because he understands a lot and always wants to know exactly why things are the way they are. The big turning point in his conversion, I think, is when he took his Book of Mormon one night, walked around his neighborhood, sat down in a garden and prayed to know if it was true. God answered his prayer and from then on he was able to move forward, building his testimony and understanding.
Cindy and her two kids are progressing as golden investigators, which is awesome. The first time we taught Cindy, we extended a baptismal date to her, which she turned down. We were unable to figure out why. However, after teaching her a bit more and getting to know her better, we found out that three other members of her family, including her parents, are members of the Church. This, I think, really helped her to have a good experience and connection with the Gospel. This last week we again extended the invitation to be baptized. This time, she accepted. We encouraged her to prepare herself for baptism in mid December, and she seems excited for that. She was excited enough about her baptism that she called her parents, who now live in Missouri, and invited them to attend. They are now coming down a bit before Christmas to see their daughter and her children get baptized into the Lord's Church.
It is always exciting and reassuring when someone invites their parents to their baptism. It lets you know that they're ready for it if they invite someone else to come. On a random note, her kid, Cesar, is maybe one of the funniest kids I've met. he's nine years old and always manages to do something funny during our lessons. For example, during our lesson about the Restoration, we explained that Joseph Smith went into a grove of trees to pray and know which church was true. When he prayed, God and Jesus Christ appeared to him and told him that he was going to restore the Lord's Church to the earth. After we explained this, Cesar interrupted one of us and blurted out, "Geez, what kind of tree do you have to pray under to get a vision like that?" At that point my companion and I started laughing and his mom explained that it wasn't where you prayed, but how you prayed, with faith and real intent.
So, all has been well here in Donna. We're having a bit of trouble finding new people to teach. This makes things a big difficult because soon we will have Hector moving out of our teaching pool. But I'm confident that the Lord will lead us to someone who is prepared to hear and follow the message of His restored Gospel.
I'm glad to hear that everything is going well at home with callings, sharing food and the like. Mom's story about Jenny Oaks Baker was interesting because she actually gave a short series of talks and played a number of songs for us at a devotional in the MTC. I'm not sure I ever wrote home about that, but I have heard her play. I'm glad you had the opportunity to hear her too. She's an amazing violinist. She's almost as good as Marsali, but I should be careful to say that without too much Arlington Ward pride.
I would suggest to Uncle Marty and Aunt Liz to show Toy Story 3 to their missionaries at Thanksgiving. How to Train Your Dragon was a great movie, but Toy Story is such a classic. I'd hate to have any missionaries miss out on that for any longer than they have to. I'm not sure what we're going to do for Thanksgiving here, probably just eat with a member family or something. Donna is struggling in the way of member families who feed the missionaries dinner. We have one lunch appointment once a week in Donna, and then we have one other dinner and lunch appointment during the week, but it's actually over in Weslaco's area. As far as a Thanksgiving package goes, I'll be excited for whatever Mom can send me. In answer to her question, yes, we do have an oven in our apartment. I'll send a picture of me with my cowboy boots and other stuff next week.
I hope everything continues going well for the family and I hope that Mel improves and everything goes all right! I can't wait to hear more from you all next week!
Love,
Elder Wood
This has been a great week here in Donna, with good progress for our investigators around the board. At the moment, we have Hector, and Cindy and her two kids, Cleopatra and Cesar. Both are making good progress towards baptism. Hector had a bit of a delay with his baptism, since we were unable to meet with him very much this past week. However, we finally were able to sit down with him, discuss his progress, and start planning things for his baptism. My companion, Elder Navarro will be performing the baptism. I'll be giving a talk on baptism. Edgar Cabrera, a member in the ward who has done a great job of fellowshipping Hector will give a talk on the Holy Ghost.
We went over the baptismal interview questions already with Hector. Every thing seems to be taken care of and understood. Everything is going well and barring some random incident, he should be getting baptized this Sunday. Teaching him has been a really interesting experience because he understands a lot and always wants to know exactly why things are the way they are. The big turning point in his conversion, I think, is when he took his Book of Mormon one night, walked around his neighborhood, sat down in a garden and prayed to know if it was true. God answered his prayer and from then on he was able to move forward, building his testimony and understanding.
Cindy and her two kids are progressing as golden investigators, which is awesome. The first time we taught Cindy, we extended a baptismal date to her, which she turned down. We were unable to figure out why. However, after teaching her a bit more and getting to know her better, we found out that three other members of her family, including her parents, are members of the Church. This, I think, really helped her to have a good experience and connection with the Gospel. This last week we again extended the invitation to be baptized. This time, she accepted. We encouraged her to prepare herself for baptism in mid December, and she seems excited for that. She was excited enough about her baptism that she called her parents, who now live in Missouri, and invited them to attend. They are now coming down a bit before Christmas to see their daughter and her children get baptized into the Lord's Church.
It is always exciting and reassuring when someone invites their parents to their baptism. It lets you know that they're ready for it if they invite someone else to come. On a random note, her kid, Cesar, is maybe one of the funniest kids I've met. he's nine years old and always manages to do something funny during our lessons. For example, during our lesson about the Restoration, we explained that Joseph Smith went into a grove of trees to pray and know which church was true. When he prayed, God and Jesus Christ appeared to him and told him that he was going to restore the Lord's Church to the earth. After we explained this, Cesar interrupted one of us and blurted out, "Geez, what kind of tree do you have to pray under to get a vision like that?" At that point my companion and I started laughing and his mom explained that it wasn't where you prayed, but how you prayed, with faith and real intent.
So, all has been well here in Donna. We're having a bit of trouble finding new people to teach. This makes things a big difficult because soon we will have Hector moving out of our teaching pool. But I'm confident that the Lord will lead us to someone who is prepared to hear and follow the message of His restored Gospel.
I'm glad to hear that everything is going well at home with callings, sharing food and the like. Mom's story about Jenny Oaks Baker was interesting because she actually gave a short series of talks and played a number of songs for us at a devotional in the MTC. I'm not sure I ever wrote home about that, but I have heard her play. I'm glad you had the opportunity to hear her too. She's an amazing violinist. She's almost as good as Marsali, but I should be careful to say that without too much Arlington Ward pride.
I would suggest to Uncle Marty and Aunt Liz to show Toy Story 3 to their missionaries at Thanksgiving. How to Train Your Dragon was a great movie, but Toy Story is such a classic. I'd hate to have any missionaries miss out on that for any longer than they have to. I'm not sure what we're going to do for Thanksgiving here, probably just eat with a member family or something. Donna is struggling in the way of member families who feed the missionaries dinner. We have one lunch appointment once a week in Donna, and then we have one other dinner and lunch appointment during the week, but it's actually over in Weslaco's area. As far as a Thanksgiving package goes, I'll be excited for whatever Mom can send me. In answer to her question, yes, we do have an oven in our apartment. I'll send a picture of me with my cowboy boots and other stuff next week.
I hope everything continues going well for the family and I hope that Mel improves and everything goes all right! I can't wait to hear more from you all next week!
Love,
Elder Wood
November 9, 2010
Nov. 8, 2010, email from Donna TX
Dear Family,
The weather here in Texas has been surprisingly cold, at least considering what it is normally like here. Most of the Mexican people around here are walking around in sweaters and coats, even though it's still pretty hot. When you've been here for a while, sometimes it seems very cold just because you are used to it being super hot. I do just fine walking around in a short sleeved white shirt. Most people always ask me if I'm cold. I'm guessing I haven't been here quite long enough to have that condition yet.
I was glad to hear that Dad was able to give out a Book of Mormon this past week. Member involvement and work are essential to the whole of missionary work. The help of a member always makes the conversion process better and more comfortable, especially for an investigator. So keep up the good work all of you and do what you can to further the work. I'm glad to hear that Tyler is doing well and has already found a job to go into after he finishes school. I hope Mel improves and that everything will turn out all right for her and for the baby. They will definitely be in my prayers.
As far as stories go for this week, I've only got one really good one. Cindy is one of our investigators. I think I talked about her last time. She is a younger, divorced mother with two kids--Cleopatra, 11, and Cesar, 8. Both of her parents are LDS and converted just a few years ago. During the last week we had the lesson with her on prayer. We taught her how she could ask for help from God in anything, as long as it is something right. At work she got slammed with a large presentation that she had only one day to prepare before she needed to present it. Even worse, it was on a subject that she knew little about and would have to present to a large number of the employees at her work. While preparing the presentation a lot of problems came up, and she came home that night very stressed, worried and even thinking about quitting. So, remembering our lesson, that night she prayed for help with the presentation and that everything would go over well. Sure enough, the presentation ran smoothly and when she arrived to the question part at the end (which she was very scared about) the only questions that were asked were already in the FAQ portion of the presentation. So all in all, everything went over great, and now she has a strong testimony of the power of prayer. This is definitely something she will need when she wants to know about the truth of our message.
That is my great story from the week. The only other thing I could relate is something I did during P-day, today. Elder Cook (a missionary in Weslaco) and I made a trip into McAllen today in order to buy a set of cowboy boots. I did end up buying a set, and now I'm one piece further into my true Texas uniform. All I'm missing now is a hat and a set of longhorns to send home. I'll have to buy those if I ever get to Laredo.
Anyways, I hope everything is going well for everyone this week. I hope you will all have more chances to share the Gospel. I know if you'll keep your eyes open and look for them, the Lord will put someone in your path to give you an opportunity to share a part of this good news.
I'm grateful for how involved and committed the Ward in Arlington is in things like Home Teaching. It's always great for new or struggling members when they have really determined home and visiting teachers. The work it does to keep people close to the church and fortify new converts is priceless. It helps to build unity in the ward and is one of the greatest ways that we can obey the scripture, "When thou art converted, strengthen thy brethren". (Luke 22:32) I hope everyone is being sure to do what they can to fulfill and magnify their callings as home and visiting teachers.
Love,
Elder Wood
The weather here in Texas has been surprisingly cold, at least considering what it is normally like here. Most of the Mexican people around here are walking around in sweaters and coats, even though it's still pretty hot. When you've been here for a while, sometimes it seems very cold just because you are used to it being super hot. I do just fine walking around in a short sleeved white shirt. Most people always ask me if I'm cold. I'm guessing I haven't been here quite long enough to have that condition yet.
I was glad to hear that Dad was able to give out a Book of Mormon this past week. Member involvement and work are essential to the whole of missionary work. The help of a member always makes the conversion process better and more comfortable, especially for an investigator. So keep up the good work all of you and do what you can to further the work. I'm glad to hear that Tyler is doing well and has already found a job to go into after he finishes school. I hope Mel improves and that everything will turn out all right for her and for the baby. They will definitely be in my prayers.
As far as stories go for this week, I've only got one really good one. Cindy is one of our investigators. I think I talked about her last time. She is a younger, divorced mother with two kids--Cleopatra, 11, and Cesar, 8. Both of her parents are LDS and converted just a few years ago. During the last week we had the lesson with her on prayer. We taught her how she could ask for help from God in anything, as long as it is something right. At work she got slammed with a large presentation that she had only one day to prepare before she needed to present it. Even worse, it was on a subject that she knew little about and would have to present to a large number of the employees at her work. While preparing the presentation a lot of problems came up, and she came home that night very stressed, worried and even thinking about quitting. So, remembering our lesson, that night she prayed for help with the presentation and that everything would go over well. Sure enough, the presentation ran smoothly and when she arrived to the question part at the end (which she was very scared about) the only questions that were asked were already in the FAQ portion of the presentation. So all in all, everything went over great, and now she has a strong testimony of the power of prayer. This is definitely something she will need when she wants to know about the truth of our message.
That is my great story from the week. The only other thing I could relate is something I did during P-day, today. Elder Cook (a missionary in Weslaco) and I made a trip into McAllen today in order to buy a set of cowboy boots. I did end up buying a set, and now I'm one piece further into my true Texas uniform. All I'm missing now is a hat and a set of longhorns to send home. I'll have to buy those if I ever get to Laredo.
Anyways, I hope everything is going well for everyone this week. I hope you will all have more chances to share the Gospel. I know if you'll keep your eyes open and look for them, the Lord will put someone in your path to give you an opportunity to share a part of this good news.
I'm grateful for how involved and committed the Ward in Arlington is in things like Home Teaching. It's always great for new or struggling members when they have really determined home and visiting teachers. The work it does to keep people close to the church and fortify new converts is priceless. It helps to build unity in the ward and is one of the greatest ways that we can obey the scripture, "When thou art converted, strengthen thy brethren". (Luke 22:32) I hope everyone is being sure to do what they can to fulfill and magnify their callings as home and visiting teachers.
Love,
Elder Wood
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