Someone's Having a Baby....Missionary!

First and foremost, the results from transfers.....I'm getting transferred! And the reason for my title is that Elder Ball is getting a brand new missionary! Straight from the MTC! So now Elder Ball is going to be a "father" and train his "son" starting on Tuesday. It's pretty exciting.

Now on to the rest of the week!

So one thing that I didn't mention last week that I meant to was that we were going to have a special speaker come to the mission this last week. Elder Teh of the Seventy visited and we had a Multi-Zone Conference this last Tuesday with him. And it was really good! There really wasn't a specific theme to the whole meeting (which is pretty understandable since it was a 7 hour meeting) but there was a lot of really good stuff shared there. On a side note, one really cool part of the meeting was that Elder Teh didn't have a single page of notes even though he was the one who spoke for the majority of the time (can anyone say...really good at following the Spirit?). But some of the best parts that he talked about were he talked about faith at the beginning of the meeting (and so did the couple other people who spoke then, so that was cool), in the middle he talked about how saying we "Almost Always" do something can be very good, but also can be very bad, especially when we relate it to inviting others to do things that will help them reach salvation, and lastly he also talked about how when we are part of any organization there is a current we have a tendency to slip into over time where we aren't making a complete effort, but we are doing "good enough" to get by. And he counseled us to make sure we don't slip into the current, or if we slip in make sure that we get out. (Below is a drawing I just made that he used to illustrate this current. The top is where we start off, where we are making every effort we can to help further the work where we are, and then in the middle is "the current" where we still make effort, but we let some things fall to the side, and we just kind of coast through and go through the motions, and then the bottom is...well...you don't want to be at the bottom.

Other than that we had another really cool thing happen this week. Elder Ball and I were going around visiting less active members that we didn't know in this one apartment complex in our area. And we knock on one of their doors and the member we are looking for lets us in as soon as we knocked on his door, his name is Damian, and when we got in we met his wife Crystal and their two kids. The thing is, we weren't expecting a wife and kids because on the ward list he was the only name. But his wife is a member, and we think his kids are too. But they were very friendly to us, and had us give their son, the younger one (probably about 8, and his sister is 10) a blessing because he broke his leg, it healed, and then he ended up breaking it again, damaging his growth plate so he might need surgery. And then before we left Damian said that they would come to church on Sunday, and if they didn't to come back by until they did come to church! They did end up coming last Sunday, and Damian plans on getting work off on Sundays so they can keep coming! It was so awesome!

Lastly, we had a baptism in the ward this last weekend! Except due to a miscommunication the person baptized was actually taught by some other missionaries in another ward! They street contacted a 15 year old named Malik, and found out he lived off of a certain street, but this could have either meant our area or theirs, so they thought it meant theirs. And they taught Malik at the church, so they never found out where he lived. Well, one night a member had them and Malik over for dinner, and then when they dropped off Malik the two Elders realized he actually lived in our ward! So, since at this point the baptism was the next day, they called us and had us try to get some of our members to the baptism (which we were able to do). And then at the baptism more trouble happened. Because he isn't 18, the Elders had to get permission from his parent's to baptize him, and so they got his dad's signature. But it turns out that that isn't his biological dad (even though he was living with him since he was 4 months old) and doesn't actually have legal guardian rights, and it is his aunt that does. So about 10 minutes before the baptism starts is when they find this out, and the aunt tells Malik that she isn't going to give permission! Malik and her start talking, and it gets to the point where she tells him that if he can say what baptism means then she'll give permission. He does, and she finally gives him permission! It was a pretty exciting thing to be a part of! But pretty stressful as well! In the end though, Malik was able to get baptized and the service itself was awesome!

Well, in closing, my spiritual thought comes from the Gospel Principles class we had yesterday. We were talking about faith and blessings, and how sometimes we think of blessings being in a big rain cloud above us, but no matter how hard we try, God never lets the rain pour down, because of some imaginary expectation that we don't measure up to. But in reality, God is continually pouring blessings down, and we actually have an umbrella blocking the blessings from reaching us. This "umbrella" can be fears, doubts, disbelief, sins, pride, etc. And even though God wants to bless us we through our own choices stop the blessings from being ours. Below are a couple little doodles I drew in my study journal to help me remember this, so I hope you enjoy!

Well, that's about all there is from me this week. Next week you'll be hearing from me in a new area!

Love,

Elder Wixom