Turkeys, Fire Ants, and Banana Spiders--Oh My!

Hello again y’all! I guess another week has gone by because here I am writing again! I hope y’all's week went well and that everything is peachy.

This week was Thanksgiving as I’m sure most of you know ;p So I hope everything went well for that! It was kind of weird not being with family for Thanksgiving this year but I had an awesome time this week regardless :)

For my week, not much happened on Monday, Tuesday, or Wednesday. Tuesday afternoon we went to Lake Charles to meet with the Beaumont Zone Leaders because they wanted us to help them make a google sheets document like the one we made for here in the Jennings branch. So we went down and saw them for a bit.

Thursday was probably one of the most fun days on my mission so far. So earlier this month we had scheduled to have Thanksgiving with the D* family but then a few days before they erased their name on the list... so the T* family picked us up like the awesome people they are. They told us they had been thinking about us the day before and were going to invite us even before they knew we didn't have a place! So we headed to their house at about 10:30 and pretty much spent all day there. Before lunch/dinner we played games outside with the kids. They live on a country farm so we had lots of fun. We played soccer, volleyball without a net, dodge ball with what E* calls peaches (oranges that have fallen on the ground from their tree) Then we had our feast. It was so good! We had a traditional Thanksgiving meal. Turkey, ham, mashed potatoes, yams, rolls, jell-o, etc. It was super yummy. (Their turkey wasn't as good as Grandpa's turkey though) ;) Before we started eating E* asked me to sit by her so I did and she told me about where she got her necklace from. Then I gave her one of those green shield CTR rings and explained to her what it meant. Haha-- she loved it! She went and showed it off to everyone in her family and then when we were going around all saying what we were thankful for the very last thing she said was the ring. After dinner we played a Thanksgiving matching game that E* wanted to play and had pie for dessert. Then T* went and got his girlfriend,  who is one of our investigators, and brought her over. The kids and us went outside and went exploring for a little bit. We found a fire ant hill which I was then dared to stick my hand in for 10 seconds... and you know me, I’m no lightweight ;) haha

"Haha I figured I gotta do it at least once while I'm
down here. And it actually wasn't that bad at all.
Like the bites are almost completely gone already."

In Louisiana on the outskirts of all the property there is just this massive jungle type forest that is super thick and seems like it goes forever! So we went exploring in that for a while! We found a big thing of super old junk that was pretty cool. We also came across a giant banana spider. It was probably the biggest spider I’ve ever seen that wasn't a tarantula... go look up pictures of banana spiders. They are something else. Anyways, this is super long so I'll finish up the day. J* and his grandpa took me and Elder Jones fishing in the bayou. We didn’t catch anything but it was still super fun. We had to be in our apartments by 7 though so once we got back from fishing we said bye to everyone and then headed home. It was a super fun day and if I ever visit Louisiana again, I'll have to make sure I see the T* family  :)

The Bayou

Fishing

Also, Thursday was my 3 month mark! Crazy how fast it’s gone!

Friday was kinda uneventful. We just had district meeting and such.

Saturday we had priesthood Saturday. So we biked around Welsh. We found this guy at the park and talked to him for 30 minutes about the gospel. We read from the Book of Mormon to him and answered all his questions and it was going super well! But then all of a sudden, at the very end he said he wasn't interested... That night we went and visited our investigators J*and J*. J* had to go chase his sheep things and so we talked to J* and her friend L*and J*’s mom who is technically a member. Jessica had read from the Book of Mormon and she understood it and liked what she read! They promised us they would come to church the next day and it seemed to go really well! But come Sunday, they didn’t show up again. This is the third time they've done this. So technically we are supposed to drop them since they aren't keeping commitments but J* read from the Book of Mormon... And she's really the only investigator I’ve had keep a commitment on my whole mission. So I think we will keep working with them.

I hope with this holiday season you all are reminded of what is truly important. I encourage you all to do the Light the World project the church has put out. As members of this church you all are called as missionaries to spread Christ's' light. Show others around you that you love them. Even small gestures of kindness can completely change someone's day. Be that light in their lives.

I love and miss you all. I hope your week goes well and I'm so thankful for all the support you all give me. I love it here and I love this gospel. I've never felt more pure joy than when I live and share the gospel. And I know that same joy is available to all of you.

Love,
Elder Wood

A fox tail hanging from some guy's roof

The Amazing Race

Hey y’all! I hope this week has gone good for all of you! Now I'm fixing to put the most important part of this email first, then I'll get to my week later. (Just like we should live our lives, with what's most important first) 😉 Anyways, if you are going to read any part of my letter this week, have it be this next part.

So Tuesday of this week was zone conference in Vidor. President Hewlett and Sister Hewlett came down and taught us all and then President did interviews during and after the meeting. President had a list of questions he wanted us all to prepare answers for so we would know what to expect during the interview. After those questions were discussed he said something to me that I have no doubt in my mind was inspired. It was one of those things that you feel was exactly what you needed. He told me about a race. He told me to imagine my mission as this big amazing race. At the end of the race was the finish line. Now that finish line isn't when I finish my mission, but rather when I baptize a convert. And everything before then was the preparation and the actual running of the race. Now, you prep a little different for each kind of race. Some are longer than others so you need to train a little more and work a little harder, but ultimately they are all still races. Now too many people get caught up in finishing the race. Too many people think that the only important part of a race is winning. But if you focus only on finishing a race and you hate the extensive training and the difficulty of pushing through the race then you will be extremely let down when another racer finishes before you. Or when the race is too hard and you give up. These kind of people or missionaries have such tunnel vision that when the end of the tunnel gets blocked they are left in only darkness. In order to avoid that almost guaranteed darkness and feeling of failure, we need to learn to love the middle parts. Learn to appreciate and love the training and the running. Take your time to see the beauty in the course. Take time to learn to truly love those around you and who you are working with. Become excited to teach those you are talking with about the eternal truths you know. See the light of Christ work in their own lives. Help teach them how to run their own races. Then at the end, even if you don’t win, it will be okay. And you will still thank the Lord for the wonderful race you were able to run.

Now this doesn't only apply to missionary work, but can relate to anything in life. If you are looking for a new job but are only focused on after you get one, then it will be much harder to find a job that you will really enjoy. But something important to remember is that if we even want a chance at finishing then we have to run.

"Know ye not that they which run in a race run all, but one receiveth the prize? So run, that ye may obtain." -1 Corinthians 9:24

We will not be able to obtain if we don’t even start the race. But if we keep pushing forward with a steadfastness in Christ, we will obtain. It may not be in the time we would like, but we will eventually win that race.

Anyways, so my week 😊

Monday was a super slow p-day. We are low on miles so we just stayed in Welsh and hung around our apartment all day 😜

Tuesday was the zone conference thing. That was super good and it's always a blast to see all the other missionaries. (Especially since as the Jennings Elders, we don't ever really see any other missionaries.) After we left we got about 45 minutes away from Vidor and then we got a call from other Elders saying that they had found my tablet... which I wasn't even aware I had left ... so we turned around and drove back. (Good thing miles are exempt for zone conference)

Wednesday was kinda slow. We didn't have any success except for we went and met a Book of Mormon request and it was T*’s girlfriend that had already been to Mutual and Young Women's in Excellence a few times! The only problem is her family is what I call Cajun Catholic... which means that you are born a Catholic, and you die a Catholic. And if you ever switch, then you get disowned... it's a very real thing and it's super sad. She told us she wants to switch and be baptized... But she is only 17. So without the consent of her father, there is nothing we can do. So we are gonna keep trying to get in to have a lesson with her family and see what we can do to help them.

Thursday was super super slow. We went and tried to visit less active and find part member families... and we didn't get a single answer or success....

Friday we had our Branch Thanksgiving party! That was fun. People didn't show up until 45 minutes late but then we had a decent turnout. We had good food and then after we had eaten we set up an alley with tarp and a wooden board at the end and had a "Turkey Bowl". Haha we went bowling with turkeys instead of bowling balls 😂 it was great. We did kids vs big kids (adults). I got a spare my first try!

Saturday we did exchanges. I went to Lake Charles with Elder Harmon. It went really good actually! That morning we did priesthood Saturdays and biked around looking for potential priesthood holders. We were riding and some little black kids came up and said "y’all from New Orleans?!?" "Y’all on TV?!" We explained that we were missionaries and that our job was to help others come unto Jesus. They nodded for a while and then out came more questions. "Y'all teach people how to dress up nice at your church?" "That's a nice bike, I got that exact same bike!" Haha One of them said, "My dad's a pastor". Another said after that, "My dad's in jail"... Oh man, after we talked to them for a while we asked them if their dads (the ones that were still around) would like hearing a message about Jesus Christ. They said yes and then took us to their house. We then had a very very good lesson with a man named R*. He seemed super prepared. He had changed his life around and wanted to be there for his family and his kids. He knew God's presence was in his life and he truly wanted to become closer to him. We taught him about the restored priesthood and how that can bless his family and he said that he really wants to come to know that it has been brought back so he can use it to bless and help his family. He also promised to start reading the Book of Mormon and Bible again. It was super super cool to feel the words I was saying be validated by the spirit and see them make sense in his eyes--to have the spirit work though me and help him make his life better. That's what missionary work is all about.

Sunday was pretty normal. After church we went and visited Sister E*. She is the grandma of the G* family. She apparently had fallen pretty badly so we went to see how she was doing. She was in a lot of pain but she seemed alright. We also got to see the kitten we saved that she has been taking care of. She is doing much better. She was all healed up but didn't recognize us anymore. Sister E* talked to us for a while and told us about how she grew up in California and was a rodeo queen and had the fastest time for barrel racing at a few major competitions. I would have never guessed! Haha it was funny though, because Elder Jones didn't know what barrel racing was and the fact that he didn't know what barrel racing was, was almost incomprehensible for Sister E*... 😜 she was just so shocked that someone didn't know what it was. Then he told her he had never seen a rodeo before... I think at that exact moment she lost all faith in our generation... haha she was relieved I knew what it was though. 😂

Anyways, that was my week. It really went by super fast again... it's crazy how fast things go now a days. I miss and love y’all! Thank you so much for your support and love! I hope y'all have a great week!

Love,
Elder Wood

Week of Kittens

Hey y’all! I hope you are all doing well and loving life! It starting to cool down a little here in Louisiana so that’s been good! And by cool down I mean it’s in the 60's. Which would probably be warm for you guys back home... ;p

So, for this week...

Monday our zone leader Elder Andersen came down to stay with Elder Jones and me for exchanges. That night they both got in this big discussion of how Adam's physical body was actually created. Because it says Jesus was the only begotten son of God and it says Adam was created from the dust of this earth. But there are quotes from apostles saying we would be foolish if we thought any man was created by any other way than all men have been created. And that being because God is unchanging. Anyways it was funny to watch them go back and forth all night trying to figure this out :p

The picture I colored with  E*

Tuesday was good. We went around with Elder Andersen to visit some people. We went down to Morse to drop off a check to a less active. Then on the way back we stopped at the T* family! That was fun as always. E* and I finished coloring and then she showed me these walkie-talkies she had. But they didn’t have batteries so we just had to pretend they worked and talk through them ;) We were on a tight schedule so we couldn’t stay long and she wanted me to stay and play a game with her but we had to go. Before we left though, she raced with me around her yard to show me how fast she was. It was a close race but she was always a little faster than me ;p After that we went and visited this less active who I hadn't met before. And let me tell you... She was absolutely crazy! haha She lives in an old gas station. Not even kidding... They have about everything you could think of and not in a good way. They let us in and the first thing they had us do is try and find a dead rat they had been smelling for 2 weeks... haha Oh man, I'll sure have some stories to tell when I get back! Then we went by the G*'s again and their little girl M* just loves me. She is kinda crazy though and is very high energy ;p As we were leaving we closed the door and I heard M* say that she didn't get to give me a high five so I quickly opened the door back up and gave her one. Haha that made her happy I think

Wednesday was the day of the kitten. While we were out trying to find less actives, we saw a dog down the street that had a kitten in its jaws and it was throwing it around and stuff trying to kill it... Now if you read my letter a few weeks ago I saw a kitten get killed by a dog earlier and now that there wasn't a guy with a gun next to it I wasn't about to let it happen twice... We ran over and got the dog away from it. As soon as I crouched down towards the tiny thing it crawled between my feet to hide from the dog. It had a pretty bad cut on its neck and it was super scared. I picked her up and we took her to the church where I washed its cut out and wrapped it up to keep it warm. Then people started coming for mutual and by this time the kitten was calming down and getting used to me. J*  named it Crystal and we decided that A* would take it home to take care of it. Also for mutual, since we are a branch, we don’t have a chapel... so our building can be used for church and for activities. So we had a giant Nerf war with all of the youth. Haha-- it was a good time. And we had four non-members at mutual!!!

Thursday we stopped by J* and J*. They showed us their baby kittens and sheep. We then tried to commit them to come to church. At the time they seemed pretty solid and like they wanted to, but they didn't show up... we will have to go see them this week and see what’s going on with that.

Friday we went and saw R*. It’s been awhile so it was good to see him. We focused on the importance of the Book of Mormon. Hopefully he will actually start to read because then he can find out for himself that it is true. And if the Book of Mormon is true then Joseph Smith was a prophet. Which means we have prophets today. Which means this is the one and only true church. I'm really hoping he sees a change in his life and decides to accept this gospel. Any prayers would be much appreciated.

Saturday was our first day of doing this new thing called "Priesthood Saturdays" which means we biked! It was so nice to go and get out compared to the usual inside our car because our area is so big. We found a guy named K* who might go somewhere. I guess we will see. All of the rest of our appointments that day fell through... that was a bummer.

Sunday none of our investigators showed up for church... but I got to pass the sacrament and teach the youth class. We also had a good branch council meeting after so that was good. We went after church with President M* and saw Brother W* at the Veteran’s home. He isn't doing too well... That night we went to President Y*’s house for dinner in Sulphur since it was the second Sunday. His wife always cooks such good Cajun food... oh man. We had jambalaya and some shrimp parfait stuff. It was so good.

Anyways, that was my week. I really hope all of you guys’ weeks went well! I miss and love you all! If you have any questions that you need answered Read Moroni Chapter 10. That will show you how to receive answers for yourself :)

Love, Elder Wood

Cute flowers that grow wild in the grass here

A Good Week in the Bayou

 Hey y'all! It's been a good week here in the Bayou! I hope all is going well back home!

So, to start out this week, we drove to Vidor on Monday to do exchanges while all the District Leaders and Zone Leaders went to a meeting in Kingwood about getting Facebook and changing the mission. Now, I’ve been to Vidor a few times before. Mostly to do service or direct traffic when all the Mormon Helping Hands were staying in the high schools. Now if any of you haven't heard of Vidor and its historical significance, I would suggest looking it up. Because unfortunately, in a lot of aspects, nothing has changed. But, that just means there is a lot of work to do there! Elder McBride and Elder Larsen and I all stayed there for the day while our DL companions all went to the meeting. So it was just us "greenies" for the day!

The next day was Halloween! We were still in Vidor for most of the day doing work there. That morning we went to go help at Christian Care, which is a place where people donate food and clothes to and then they distribute it out to the needy. We didn’t really know what was going on but we kept busy so it was good I guess :p

Wednesday we headed out to Crowley with Brother W* for the day. We tried to visit a lot of less actives and members on our records. We found out that most of them had moved away or weren't interested. But while we were there it was raining the entire time. I love the humid rain! It feels like everything has been through a power washer! But, down in Crowley, it only rained for a few hours and the rain water was up to the houses already! So I can't imagine what it would be like if another hurricane came through. After that, Brother W* took us to Cajun Tales. It was so good! They had the best seafood Gumbo! And then I had all this Cajun food and I didn't know what half of it was but it was all super good!





Later this week on Friday I got Facebook! This is something new the mission is doing and it’s to help us hasten and be more effective with our work! I’m super excited because there are a lot of people down here who don’t have working phones or emails, but everyone has Wi-Fi! Haha So it'll be good to be able to contact everyone! The rules are that we can group message anyone in our area and post things that are "Member Appropriate". So with Facebook, we aren't only missionaries, but we are ourselves too. So that helps all the people we come in contact with realize we are regular people :p But all you back home can like and comment on my posts and everything, I just can’t message you or anything like that obviously. That is still saved for Mondays :) But, it would be super cool if you guys would post a thought or your testimonies on the posts I share or anything like that so we can continue to share and spread this great gospel! Anyways, also on Friday, I got in my first car wreck... It was just a backing accident and only scraped the car a little. But still... Our vehicle coordinator Elder Avery is very adamant about his cars...

That night we went to go visit a member and she wasn't home, but her husband and daughter were! They were very nice and let us right in. We talked for about half an hour and taught them about the Book of Mormon. The wife is very less active but the husband and daughter seemed very interested. The daughter had already read from the Book of Mormon before and they said they were going to come to church this Sunday! Plus her best friend in school is a member as well! What are the chances that her friend is the only other member her age in the whole school? They seemed super prepared and hopefully with more work, they can get baptized!

Sunday was a conference thing, I’m not sure what the real name of it is, but it was for a few of the states. I think Utah was one of them. That was good. They talked a little about the clean-up that was going on down here and they even mentioned us missionaries who have been working on it! After church we heard that Brother T* was in the hospital in Crowley so we went to go visit him and give him a blessing. After that, we went to the Young Women in Excellence our branch was having. That was the first Young Women’s thing I’ve ever been to and it was very, Young Womens-ey... ;p It was cool though! It’s great that our branch is starting to do all these things to help strengthen each other! Also, the T* family were there so as soon as we walked in, Emma ran up to us and wanted us to go get nerf guns or something. Haha. She is such a character! We went and sat in the back and she came over to our table and asked if she could sit by me instead of her family. She pulled up a chair and then sat with us. And then she handed me and Jones little pass-along cards that she had from her little stash in her front pocket. Haha. Then after the meeting she had me sit by her again so we could color together. She told me she wants me to come over to her house when we aren’t doing missionary work so we can finish our picture ;p Her brother has a friend that he’s been bringing to mutual and to the Young Women in Excellence thing. It would be super cool if we started working with her and then he could baptize her!

Anyways, that’s all for the week pretty much. It’s been good for the most part. I’m starting to love the people here more and more! And the food is so good! And the weather is perfect! It’s just an overall quality time. :)

I love and miss you all! I hope you have had a wonderful week! Also, congrats to my little brother on all of his band stuff this week! I’m so proud of him and all the hard work they have put in! Keep me updated on everything, I’d love to hear from all of you! Thank you so much for the prayers and support!

Love, Elder Wood (Jonah Wood on Facebook) ;)

What the Jehovah's Witness bible says about Jonah