December 22, 2014
Dear Family:
Hey it is Christmas!! Since I will be talking to you soon I
will probably keep this one short. We had an awesome week! Even though I was
sick. Elder Peterson kept me going. I had to lean on him a little this week. He
is a good pusher. I can't even get my shoes on before he is out the door and
half the way to the car! We have a long drive way. He always has the best
attitude too. Everyday he says (with almost annoying enthusiasm at least when I
am sick) Hurry up! Let's go preach the gospel Elder!! Aren't you excited?!? It
reminds me of Dad early in the morning with that green toy tractor that says
"Let's Get To Work!" So I am grateful he was able to help me last
week. I am better now so we should be good. I was still out working but this
week I will have a better attitude because I am not sick!
Monday we finally got to go to that Fender Guitar Shop/Museum.
It was super cool I got to play some guitars that were in the mid $3-4,000.
They only had electrics though! This week we found another shop and I got to play
two nice Epiphones. Tyler came to FHE and had a good time. By the end of
this week he had gotten a lot more comfortable with us. We sat down for a
second away from the activity and talked about the Book of Mormon. I need to
come up with a saying for how he keeps me on my toes. He says things sometimes
that just blow me away because I have never had somebody say or do something
when they are investigating the church. Maybe I should just stick with about
falling out of my chair because that is how this all started. He just has the
most pure desire that I have ever seen. One example from Monday was from
Thursday when we gave him a Book of Mormon to that time he had read most of 1st
Nephi in 3 or 4 days.
Tuesday not a whole lot of exciting things happened. I
honestly don't even really remember it. We got in for a few minutes with
Aolani.
Wednesday we had another lesson with Tyler. All our YSA team-ups
fell through about 3 o'clock so we asked the Wheat's if we could teach him at
their house. That was a really good experience for Tyler. We ended up having a
ton of YSA fellowship there we weren't even planning on! Kelsey and Bri who are
both recent converts and are both awesome basically live at the Wheat's so they
jumped in on the lesson. They helped out Tyler a lot with their testimonies. We
also had Mike there who is a returning member and on fire. Plus Sister Wheat
who is a power house missionary. It was basically the best lesson. The way the
lesson ran we ended up spending a lot of time explaining the Holy Ghost and how
it works. I don't think I could have picked a better group to teach it to him.
They are all great and I don't even have to prod them, they all just throw in
what they have to say. After Sister Wheat wanted to feed us all ice cream. I
was sitting by Tyler and decided to help him put the Gospel Library on his
phone so he could do more studying there with all that is available. He already
had downloaded a copy of the Book of Mormon. That surprised me but not that
much because it was Tyler and he is a go getter. It was when I was telling him
about how he can check out General Conference Talks and I told him what
conference was and he said. "Oh ya! Like those talks by Thomas S. Monson!
I was listening to those. I think Jeffery R. Holland is my favorite." I
think he thought I was crazy because I just sat there and stared at him. In my
head I was saying OK I give up where is the camera you have to be punking me
you are a member and the church is like making a video or something. I didn't
know what to say. I don't even know what I did say. He then started teaching us
and told us all we need to watch the Mormon Channel cuz there is some good
stuff on there. He told us about one with Holland called "Wrong Roads"
he then told us the whole story almost word for word. Then he taught us the
take away message or the principle. It was awesome.
Thursday we went and helped Sister Cameron's neighbor with
some service he wanted to do for somebody else who is actually a member as
well. We asked if we could help him. He really likes the missionaries but isn't
interested. He knows tons of members. He will get baptized sometime, he just
doesn't have the desire right now. We had some good lessons.
Friday we taught Tyler. This was the Word of Wisdom, and Law
of Chastity. Once again he is already living them so no problems there. That
enabled us to spend more time on just testifying and promising blessings
because we didn't have to resolve concerns.
Saturday was long! We got to teach Aolani, but pretty much
everybody else was not home. We went to President Zimmerman's house for a
Christmas devotional kind of thing with all the missionaries. It is an annual
thing the Zimmermans do. I was there for it last year as well.
Church was awesome. Both of them. We had a meeting at 7 with
the stake presidency and linger longer until 6 so I was at church for 11 hours.
the only break we got in the middle was travel from the stake meeting to the
other building. Tyler really liked church. In Priesthood we were looking at the
teachings of the prophet book and I saw a picture of Moroni coming to Joseph
Smith in his room so I started to tell him the story. After I got through the
first part he told me the rest of the story about how Moroni kept coming back
and sharing the same thing and then Joseph working with his dad and then
falling over the fence. Also how he returned to the Hll Cumorah each year for 4
years. I think the reason it surprises me so much is because the only thing
investigators normally know is what I teach them. I haven't taught him most of
the things he knows. He just searches it out. I am learning a lot from Tyler.
He texted us Sunday night at said "Well boys I am to Second Nephi!"
Pray for him. I don't think I have prayed more for an investigator. I just
don't want anything to change. Just to keep how they are going. Well got to go!
Love ya!
Elder Wood
