Update on my life

Hey thanks all that sent me surprise packages for Christmas! I am so thankful that a lot of you haven't forgotten about me out here lol. It is much appreciated!

I had a great Christmas, I went to Waffle House with the Penningtons which was so fun then got to call the fam & open presents. (Already put a hole in a new white shirt I got from my mom for Christmas). Then we went and played Jenga and watched the Christchild at the Penningtons and it was so much fun.

This week has been filled with miracles and good times. On Tuesday we were able to finally teach a guy we found through a member and he didnt care for our message at first, but after 5 weeks of service of helping him breed his Horses (That was horrifying) and feed his livestock and training his horses and goats and cows, we finally got to teach him on Tuesday! And he said he would actually LOVE to read the Book of Mormon. It was so cool. 

The Lord has been good to me out here in Louisiana and Mississippi. I have seen too many miracles and had too many blessings to know that what I'm doing is right. The Gospel changes people. The Gospel is where we can find Joy. Jesus Christs birth is great and all, but it's because of WHAT He did in his lifetime that made his birth something to Celebrate. THE ATONEMENT OF JESUS CHRIST is what brings me Joy. Now honestly ask yourselves what actually brings you Joy? Not just temporary happiness, TRUE JOY. 

I LOVE YALL, STAY CUTE!

LOVE, ELDER WILSON

1) Wafflehouse Christmas morning! 12/25/20

2) Penningtons gave us sick hoodies

3) Elder Roger's and I gave presents to the Penningtons, but we wrapped them in aluminum foil bc we didnt have Wrapping paper (worked very well I highly recommend).

 

Life is Güd in Louisiana still

 Life update from me over here in Louisiana.

Transfer week is this week but I'll be staying in Jonesboro with Elder Roger's. Our whole zone is changing up quite a bit which is sad but also exciting. 

I was on exchanges all week last week which was so fun, I was making tons of memories with my boys over in Vicksburg MS, Greenville MS, Farmerville LA, and Ruston LA. We had a ton of fun and put in tons of work. It was so sick. 

We had Elder Martino from the 70 speak to our mission and he spoke again to our MLC which pumped up or mission quite a bit. We have seen lots of miracles from it too.

Basically all ive been doing is just tons of service. And we did service on exchanges in Vicksburg because that are was struggling with finding so I used the same tactics I use here in Jonesboro and we found 8 people for them to teach in one day. We had 3 different opportunities to serve these people while out and about and it was soooo nice to be in an area that wasnt a small town for once lol.  

This month I've been reading the Gospels a lot more (Matthew, Mark, Luke, John) and I've learned a lot more about the Saviors life and the way He taught and it's been really cool, obviously I've read these stories before but right now I'm taking it in a lot more. 

I love you guys stay cute!

Love Elder Wilson 

All the cows we worked with yesterday.

Aight heres another one ladies and gents

 Okay life is 10/10 right now. Heres why:

RANDOM ANNOUNCEMENTS:

- Our Fridge had been broken for like 4 weeks, as in it didnt make things cold and everything rotted. BUT WE GOT IT FIXED!

- We helped Anna prepare her house for an insurance inspection.

- We taught Jasmine on Friday (she showed up to church and asked to take the lessons last sunday) and she told us shes non-denominational but wants to understand what makes our church different! She had so many questions about our church, so we taught her the restoration and gave her a book of mormon! It was an amazing lesson and shes read basically all of 1 nephi since then and has a huge Journal she takes of all of her questions about the Book of Mormon. 

MLC:

We learned that we will be having Elder Martino of the Seventy coming to our mission and speaking to our mission as well as teaching with missionaries and Interviewing missionaries! So that's going to be so sick! We also launched a new programm where certain missionaries around the mission will "Moderate" Facebook from 10:30pm - 12:00am! And Elder Roger's and I are doing that this week!

SOUTHERN FUNERAL:

We had a Funeral for Granny Betty and because she loved us missionaries so much her son Tim asked us to be the Pallbearers. So we got to carry her coffin, and be apart of the prayer as well. But that funeral was something else, like I never thought I'd here gospel and bluegrass banjo in the same service, but it was amazing, I want my funeral to be that exciting and fun! 

SPOON PRANK:

So Halloween night the Pennington girls schemed and toilet papered our house... so Saturday night, Elder Roger's and I got them back by sticking HUNDREDS of plastic spoons in their yard. It was funny, and brother Pennington showed up to church laughing his head off he thought it was the funniest thing ever. And he was so proud of us because he would have never thought that we would get them back for toilet papering us. But I dont take crap from anyone! 

So this week was just great.

Any ways I love yall that's just a little update from me. 

LUV ELDER WILSON:)

PIXS

1) killer sunset, Roger's I needed this

2) after this I chucked him in the pond 

3) this is spooning...

4) everyone that sister Andrew's knew in this mission, so sad to see her go, but shes back in Korea serving there again!!!

5) My old quarantine boys are back! My son Elder Kephart was at MLC with me... he grew up so fast!

New guy and Blessings

 We had Transfers this week and I got a guy named Elder Roger's. The kid is so sick and boy is he ready to WORK in Jonesboro. We have done sooooo much together already, I'm so glad Jonesboro is just becoming such a good area. Like I love this place and work is starting to FLOOD in. Like we are so busy now it's so sick. I didnt think I'd have this many opportunities to teach and serve during COVID but like COVID isnt real here in Jonesboro, nobody cares and nobody gets it out here so it's been nice to live life nearly normal. (We still wear masks dont worry).

SERVICE:

 So we have been doing service for a guy named Roger who is just amazing and he is super Christian and loves God, so we talk about God and Christ with him while we neuter his goats and cut the horns off of his Bulls and trim his horses hooves and we fix fences that were ripped out by tornadoes. And it has honestly been the most fun thing ever. We also got to help Drake weld additions to the metal patio cover we already made with him. That was sick too.

I honestly love Jonesboro, at church yesterday we had a lady come up to us and ask if she could take the missionary lessons, because she is interested in knowing more about the Gospel. Like we have seen sooo many miracles lately and I really think it's just God blessing me and my companion for not giving up and for just working every day as hard as we know how, even though the outcome doesnt look as other areas of the mission. It's been amazing. 

I love you guys so much stay cute lol

Love Elder Wilson

Pics:

1)watching welds

2)Roger's n I

3)Bye sis Nuusa 

4)bye Elder Davis

5)Anna & Braveheart & Elder Wilson

Loving mission life...

 MIRACLES

On Friday Elder Tauraa and I were doing service at one of our favorite members houses, Drake. He is super missionary minded, so after service he made us some burgers and we had a quick lesson with him and his wife. We invited them to use their finding skills to simply ask the only person they live by (the guy across the street), if he would like missionaries to come do some service for him! So Drake decided to do so, but started by praying that night on how he could find a normal and natural way to ask him if he could have 2 missionaries come do service for him. He went to bed that night and woke up to his wife telling him that his neighbor across the street came over that morning to apologize for running over their mailbox the night before! So she said to not worry about it and asked how he was doing and if he needed help. He said "oh I always need help" so she responded with "We have 2 guys coming over to help us this afternoon, would you like to meet them, and maybe have them help you as well?" And the guy loved that idea, but didn't understand we would be doing it for free. He was amazed when we told him it was free. Anyways we go over to his barn, watch him neuter a goat, and left with his name and number! So we will be doing service for him and teaching him and his family this upcoming week!

-also side miracle: Elder Bednar held a devotional last night. And he let us ask questions. And Drake had asked my companion and I a question earlier that day that we weren't for sure on. So we asked elder Bednar, and he answered it! So we called Drake and told him we asked Elder Bednar his question then told him Elder Bednars answer! He was in shock!!

HURRICANE:

the hurrication was fun last week. We had 12 elders that stayed in our apartment for a few days and we brought them around Jonesboro doing service so we got ALOT done. Then we had a Bonfire in our backyard (Mission President approved because we were burning old Paper Area Books that needed to be disposed of).

ZONE CONFERENCE:

We had an amazing zone conference, we invited our members to come as well so we had some of the members share some missionary stories for our presentation and it got our zone and their members PUMPED UP! Some of the missionaries have told us miracles that have happened due to the members stepping in and being so missionary minded because of that zone conference! 

Also we got Toilet Papered lol.... 

That's basically what happened this week. So bye remember who you are! And dont be afraid to change! 

Love Elder Wilson

Pics:

1) all the Elders that stayed at our place

2) our house after getting TPed.

3) our bonfire

Typical week dont read.

 EXCHANGES:

- We were unsuccessful in pranking the APES. But this whole week we were doing exchanges, so I was in Ruston, LA for one exchange and Farmerville, LA... With a fellow Lone Peak Knight, Elder Daniel Taylor. So that was sick. And shout out to my boy, Elder Jacobson, hes a shy little dairy farmer from a small town called Bule Idaho, he is aactially VERY shy but while we were trekking through the college campus of Louisiana Tech, every girl that tried to flirt with him he would just look straight ahead and not even acknowledge it. So when I asked why we weren't talking to them (to teach them the Gospel of course) he said it was because he was "scared".... but I know it's truly because he doesnt want to even get SLIGHTLY distracted from the evil of this world. SO MUCH RESPECT! 

DEER:

- We got a call from one of our members (Brother Nunn) and he needed help with a deer he just shot, so we helped him pull it off the ATV and hang it and skin it and gut it. While Brother Nunn was gutting it he accidentally cut the stomach or intestine or something and so it just shot out stomach acid and half digested corn and that got all over our shoes and it REAKED. the stench lingered with us all night so we were gagging every now and then. It was BAD. BUT it was a sick service opportunity, so I'm not mad.

THE TRUCK:

- We finally got our truck back! So we driving around in the tacoma which makes some of our service projects so much nicer. 

HURRICANE LIKE 5 OR 6?? IDK

- Hurricane Zeta is hitting us probably wednesday, so everyone is evacuating up to us. I am starting to understand why people dont like living here.

SPIRICHUL:

- So this week I had a few more opportunities than usual to teach, and boy did I miss it. Sitting down and genuinely helping someone understand a truth that can change their life forever is just an experience we almost take for granted on our missions. So I want all of yall, whoever is reading this, to share what you KNOW to those around you. You Utah folks may feel like everyone around you wont benefit from what you have to offer. But I know you have at least one friend you can reach out to right now. So do so. 

Love yall, I miss some of your cute faces. 

Stay cute.

Love, Elder Wilson. 

1) Halloween Zone Pday Fit 

2) exchanges w/ Elder Taylor

3) we did this guys wood floors lolz

4) broken house, Elder Jacobson

5) We built a Car Port

6) Zone Pday. 

 Jonesboro is treating me Nicccccceeee, we have been doing tons of service for everyone down here and we have gotten to know so many people, and tonight the APs are coming up to do exchanges with us and I'm so excited cuz they are my HOMIES. and we are going to be messing with them we have a few things planned.... so next email you'll hear about those.

MEETING 

We had an amazing Stake High Council Meeting and our stake president went HAM on member-missionary work and it was literally AMAZING. He wanted to know how to get the whole high council more involved in our missionary work and helping us and so then the stake would be better at helping us and it was sick!!! Love that man we got so excited and got a lot of things running because of that meeting!

MOVING:

One of our recent converts, Anna, has been helping us big time with service opportunities. Because we live in a "Village" (we live in a place called Hodge, Louisiana which has like 400 people that live there, and its classified as a village for some re and jonesboro is the biggest city in our area with 4000 people, she helps us meet people because shes been here for so long and knows everybody. So we helped her friend Phyllis move and we got to meet a few of her family members and her neighbors so we have friends in the neighborhood who love us!

Anyways I love yall

Love Elder Wilson 

1) my house 

2)cute hailey playing with gators miss her

Hurricane Delta

We had ANOTHER HURRICANE. Except for instead of missionaries coming to us, my companion and I had to get evacuated. We got sent to Hattiesburg Mississippi which is a 4ish hour drive east of us, in order to get out of the path of Hurricane Delta. 

In hattiesburg we slept at a stake center there with 45 other missionaries! It was so sick! My whole zone and another whole zone was there and it was so much fun! Both nights we had devotionals, so my companion and I led one devotional on training the first night, then the second night the other ZLs over the Jackson zone led that devotional. It was AWESOME. 

I'm now home and excited for hopefully staying here in Jonesboro all week! Except we do have ANOTHER hurricane coming we think but dont know for sure yet. 

Labrandeon: I was selling a bible and a book of mormon on facebook market place as a "finding" tool and I had a few responses! Yesterday this kid slid up and asked for a bible so we brought one over and introduced the Book Of Mormon to him and he loved it, and started reading both of them right after we left, and marked up his favorite scriptures. 

Dont have a ton of time but that's what's been happening here! I love yall so much and stay cute! 

Love Elder Wilson!

Purty sunset

Our room for hurrication

Digging up and burning a tree root next to this fire that was scorching us next to the sun which was scorching us I was scorched

JONESBORO BANISHMENT

 Life in jonesboro is not nearly as bad as I was expecting. When I found out I was coming here I set low expectations. Jonesboro is said to be like one of the "Worst" areas in the mission due to its lack of humans and everyone being so far spread out and due to the fact that our Branch President isnt even considered an active member and the fact that theres only 8 other people that attend church. But I love it here. My companion is sooooo funny, so we bounce jokes off of eachother so well, and hes also a GRINDER, and oh it's so nice to be comps with a Grinder. We have lots of fun, but when it comes to preparing and planning for zone stuff and for teaching lessons and finding, we get into it and I love it so much. 

We have only spent 3 days in Jonesboro because we stayed in Denham a little longer due to me having to finish up some responsibilities. We stayed for the Go-Home missionaries testimonies wednesday night at the mission home, then Thursday morning we took them to the airport. It was sad to see a bunch of great missionaries go home and step onto the next chapter of their lives, but at that time I was 10x more jealous cuz I was heading to Jonesboro later that day. But i still had fun and said bye to 2 of my companions at the airport so that was fun.

Something fun we got to do on Friday, we went over to a Recent Converts house and we helped her on her farm. She has a ton of horses, goats, pigs,  and donkeys like everywhere. But her favorite animal is this beautiful craft horse that she has put a lot of money into. But it has a really bad foot disease and so its foot cannot get wet. So we go and scoop poop. Yup, never thought I'd be doing that on my mission. But we scoop up poop in the horses stall because the poop is wet. So we did that and a few other things on her farm to help her out. And then we were able to teach her some lessons as well! She doesnt have a great grasp on the gospel quite yet. But she believes it to be true and wants to do whatever she needs to in order to progress even more so right now we are working on getting her to the temple! So that will be cool!  

Life is good here and I'm really feeling my Mission Presidents punishment right now for making the fake transfer board! But jokes on him I actually love it here! Hahah just kidding! It's been really nice to only have to worry about your area and nothing else. My stress levels have SHOT down. It's been great!

We all watched conference and we all heard our Prophet speak yesterday, and I want to share a little about that. Gathering Isreal is something I hope to never stop doing. I have been called to the work not only for 2 years but my entire life. And you each have been called to this same work when you made covenants with God at Baptism and in the Temple. I know its difficult at times to share the Gospel as a regular member of the church, maybe a little awkward, or especially in Utah you might say to yourself "They are already probably a member," but I would like to encourage all of you to pray for opportunities to share your testimony to someone, anyone, of what you know. I know that if you pray sincerely and have the desire in your heart, God will provide a listening ear and an open heart to hear your testimony. Bear witness of what you know to be true, even to those that already may feel they know it too.  

I love you each. 

Love Elder Wilson

Pics

1) Big Red, one of the horses he was aggressive 

2) bye Elder Niepraschk and his legacy 

3) SISTER MCKAY I love her she is the sweetest lady in the whole wide world. She has such a strong testimony and she does so much for us in my mission I love her so much and I'm grateful to have served with her! 

4) some fellow Lone Peakers at T-Point. 

Best life & Transfers

 Update on my life:

I'm getting transferred finally! I'm so excited to be serving the people of Jonesboro, Louisiana. It's a small town in Northwest Louisiana. 

Quick funny doin lately in the offices:

I had my mom buy me a 5lbs bag of SUGAR-FREE gummy bears and left them in a bowl in the office for all my missionary friends to eat.... and boy did they EAT THOSE UP. idk if yall know what sugar free gummy bears do, but read Amazons reviews and you'll get an idea of what happened to all the missionaries that serve with me in the office. Funniest thing of my life. They surprisingly taste amazing so I had slight effects, but only limited myself to a few. My poor fellow missionaries were suckin those gummy bears down 10 at a time for hours. #NOREGRETS

NEXT FUNNY DOIN:

So my comp and I get transfer news for the whole mission like 3 days before everyone else, like even the APs because we have to make sure apartments and car situations work. So everyone knows that this is how transfers go down in the mission. We also knew we were heading out this transfer so we did something really dumb. We mixed up the big current transferboard in the office and made up a whole transfer situation. We had "called" new APs, new ZLs and new STLs and even brought the missionaries that were coming in this transfer and made up their trainers as well... and then we leaked it to 2 missionaries.... and the next morning everyone in the mission was blowing up. The actual APs called us and they were sooooo mad, and I'm sure for a second they thought it was real hahahha but president thought it was funny so we got off good. 

But I'm honestly so excited to stop doing house stuff all day everyday. It's like having a full time job but working overtime every single day until 10:30 at night. I'm so ready to be done and teaching lessons again.

Don't get me wrong, I had a blast. Learning anything and everything about leases and buying apartments, washers, dryers, and mattresses. While also learning how to run 82 apartments and 100 cars at the same time. While ALSO getting to drive around the mission multiple times and see all of the missionaries.

I got to serve with some of my greatest examples. I got to make some of my bestest friends. And I made a whole lot of memories. 

But BOY AM I EXCITED TO TEACH THE GOSPEL 24/7. I am so excited to dedicate all I have, from 6:30am-10:30pm to inviting others to come unto Christ. 

I love yall and I will keep ya updated on missionary life in Jonesboro 

Love, Elder Wilson!

1-5) Some good office memories

(It usually doesnt let me send any more pictures than this sorry)

This weeks weekly, plus hurricane again lol Yahoo / Inbox

 Even more happened lol

So we had zone conferences so Elder Fualalo and I got to go to all of the zone conferences and Elder Fualalo knows how to cut hair nice so he brought his hair clippers to cut up some hair after zone conferences. Well long story short, after each zone conferences, with a lot of persuasion we were able to get like 40 other missionaries to buzz their heads at all the zone conferences. So now our mission looks like a prison camp, full of consecrated missionaries who dont need their hair! It attracts too many sisters attention! We dont need that right now! We stay away from such temptation from the adversary! 

So yeah whole mission be looking cute right now not gonna lie.

Also we got ANOTHER HURRICANE COMING IN LOL kinda not funny ahhaha 

President Amos called me saturday night and was like "hey we got a hurricane coming, we need 3 zones evacuated make it happen". So me and my squad hopped on the computer and were making travel plans for all the missionaries, and made it happen so the next day we made calls and got missionaries into what we THOUGHT was safe.... then the hurricane RE-ROUTED. so we had to move a bunch of missionaries AGAIN. So right now we have 4 zones evacuated and I've got the same 8 missionaries living with me that I had in the last hurricane evacuation which is SO FUN 

But yeah a cool little miracle happened this week. There are 2 sisters in my district who were kinda sad because they had gotten 0 member referrals the whole time they had been in their area, so during our stewardship call we said a lil prayer and asked for a member referral, and then I told them they can't sit around and just wait for that referral like they gotta go get it, the Lord will only assist. So they went out and got 3 meal appointments with members and the members invited us as well. So basically we shared great lessons had great food but these members had no referrals to give... so the sisters were sad but then on saturday this member that they haven't seen in dayyyyyz calls and tells them "hey I was talking to my friend about the church and like she really wants to meet yall and get baptized eventually, will yall help me out?" And we got sooo stoked hahahah.

So like I know that was a tiny miracle, but we each see miracles like that every day so I felt like it was the perfect picture of how the Lord works in our life, He let's us push ourselves and do all we can, then he steps in and will answer our prayers, maybe not in the way that we were thinking but he does it. So idk just super cool. Remember this when you're praying, and needing something, The Lord will provide, just look outside the box... or in other words, do your best to HearHim. Just my thought!

I love yall stay cute and I promise I'll be safe lol

Love Elder Wilson

1)buzzed boys after Zone Conferences

2)Elder Ihrke did it and I was so happy

3)He wasn't as happy lol

This was last weeks weekly that never sent

 To start my week off I was just driving my big ole' 12 seater van with some elders in the back (idk if I told you but yeah I drive a 12 seater van and its sick!) And I just leaned back to Elder wheeler and said "dude, president Varner hated buzz cuts, but President Amos HAS A BUZZ CUT.... should we buzz our heads?" And he said "Yeah." So that night we buzzed our heads lol. Pics are below.

We had Hurricane cleanup in DeRidder, LA which is just north of Lake Charles. It was so sad to see so many houses just destroyed but it was so cool to just watch so many people come together and just serve and we saw so many miracles.

Lots happens on a day to day basis and I forget everything but yeah I'll send ya pics and vids of this week! 

Love yall! 

Love Elder Wilson

Post-Laura & Da BOIZ

 So the Hurricane hit HARD and it affected quite a bit of our mission. We had evacuated the whole south 1/4 of our mission, but the first hurricane (Marco) dodged us completely. Then the second (Laura) hit way more west than we expected and harder than we expected so it shot up the whole west side of our mission and luckily we evacuated the missionaries on that side last minute so everyone was completely safe. Just a lot of missionaries without power or water, so we evacuated them to areas where they do have power and water. We have a few of our missionary apartments that got a little bit of water in them and had shingles taken off. One apartment had a tree go through the window too. 

All in all this hurricane did a lot of damage, but I'm so glad that we have an Inspired Mission President who is also very intelligent, who did all in his power to keep the missionaries safe, it was so awesome to watch as he fully relied on the Lord to keep us safe and did so successfully. 

And because of that I had so much fun with all 8 of us Elders staying in my apartment and we had so much fun and had the deepest talks as we just sat in the apartment... (we were on lock down because President Amos didnt want anyone outside.) 

Well I love yall Mom and Dad have fun in Lake Powell without me again

-love Elder Wilson

Pics of our good times.

1) we all were picking up new cars for the mission

2) Mike The Tiger 

3)LSU BABY

4)The boiz infront of the temple

2 Hurricanes & Sad good byes...

 So update on the snake story real quick, we caught another Water Moccasin that was much bigger than the one we caught last week... so we decided to kill it and eat it lol. The thing was a scary beast but it tasted pretty good with lots of seasoning.

Transfers were this week, I'm staying here but I get a new companion and he is going to help me with housing, so I'm not a lone ranger anymore and I'm so glad. It's my boy Elder Fualalo! Big Toko and I will be conquering this assignment for sure the next 6 weeks. Me and him were homies before we became comps and now we just are the bestest of friends. 

We got to do the same old "Pick up new missionaries" gig which was fun and it so sick talking to these new missionaries about online MTC and PUMPING them UP for the mission.

Highlight of the week: President Amos didnt want to drop off all of the Go-Home missionaries at 4 am then again at 6 am then again at 8 am... so he asked Me and Elder Niepraschk to do it and we were STOKED. So after transfers happened we headed over to the mission home and ate with them and had a testimony meeting with the 12 missionaries going home, and it was SAD. Then the sisters went upstairs to sleep and the Elders stayed downstairs and talked... until it was really late so then we just decided to sleep on the floor at like 2am. Then at 4am I woke up and we were out the door with the first 1/3rd of the returning home missionaries. But then the second wave of missionaries we took, I drove the big van and I was taking Elder Olsen, Sister Reich, and Sister O'Brien home... and they have all been with me in the office since covid started, so we are all so close and they all went home this transfer. They have effected me a lot, and definitely helped me be the best possible missionary I can be, while we also had INSANE amounts of fun. So I was super sad saying goodbye to them. May or may not have shed a tear or two. 

Also yeah 2 hurricanes are hitting us this week. So president called me saturday and told me to move all the missionaries from the coast areas and all of new orleans, so we took a little over 50 missionaries and put them in apartments more north, so right now we have 8 Elders living in our apartment and its SOOOO SWEET. Of course I hooked myself up with some sick elders. So we having a good time while we prepare to die in at least one of the hurricanes that are going to hit us. 

Anyways I love yall stay sweet out there and remember who you are. Wuv u

Wuv - ELDER WILSON

1) & 2) 350 LBS BIG TOKO & I

3)Sayin bye to lots of good memories with these gr8 missionaries.