The End of My Journey in Murrieta

To start off. I made an error in my email last week. I said the visiting authority for stake conference was Elder "Bassnet" but his name is actually Elder "Basset." So, sorry for the confusion...if I caused any.

Anyways...as you can guess from the title......(pause for dramatic effect)......I'm getting transferred. Going to be going to the mission office tomorrow, and then I'll find out where I am being sent. So I'll say more about where I'm going next week.

The more startling thing is that it is not just me leaving, but Elder Bird is being transferred out as well! According to the Assistants to the President we are both getting transferred due to a logistics issue because of this next influx of missionaries. So, even though it came as a big shock that both Elder Bird and I will be departing from good old Murrieta, it is a bit comforting to know that we are both leaving because of how much the work is progressing on a world-wide scale.

After that bit of exciting news, the rest of my email is going to be dull by comparison probably. But I still thought it was a good week, so I'm going to share about it anyways.

One awesome thing is that even though I'll be leaving Murrieta here in a bit, I was able to see the first project of the big City Service Project all the way through. Since the announcement of this monumental project about two months ago, us missionaries in Murrieta have been working in a park called Firefighter's Park. When we got there we were put right to work giving the park a "face-lift" as it was described. We sanded, scraped, painted, re-mulched, and worked really hard making this park look good for the past couple months, and this last week...we finished it! It has been really fun to be working so closely with the city, and it was also just great to be able to provide service that otherwise would not have gotten done. But I'm really glad that I was able to see this phase of the overall project all the way through.

The rest of this week has been spent trying to track down some of the area's potential investigators. So in other words...lots and lots of bike riding. Though it was well worth it. We were able to contact quite a few of these people, and set up appointments with a few of them...though...I won't be seeing those appointments through...but at least the new missionaries coming in will have something to do right from the get-go!

Now, before I end, my traditional spiritual thought. This last Sunday (so post finding out that Elder Bird and I were getting transferred) our Bishop said something was really cool. He said something like, "You can count the seeds in an apple, but you can't count the apples in a seed." In other words, I may be able to see the work that I have put into this area, but I will never be able to know what will come from it in the long run, or how many people I have affected without even realizing it. This reminds me a bit of the parable of the sower that Christ tells in Matthew 13, where a man is sowing seeds, and some of the seeds fall by the way side and were eaten by birds; some fell among stones, grew quickly, but died in the sun because they did not have roots; some fell among thorns and were choked, and some fell on good ground and brought forth much fruit. The reason I think of this is I (and all missionaries for that matter) are like the sower, but we don't always know where our seeds land, and we also don't really know which ones will grow and bring forth much fruit. Even though I will be leaving Murrieta shortly, maybe there will be someone I have affected in my time here that will one day come into the Church due to what I said, possible without me knowing it or them even remembering me. All I can do is work my hardest and hope that some seeds will grow from my labors.

Well, that is all I have for this week. I'll talk to you all again from wherever it is I am at!

Love,

Elder Wixom