The Ecstasy of Gold 4/21/2022

 It's been a great week full of highlights. So much so it's taken a hot second to write out this email.

 

Early in the week, we got the opportunity to attend a ward activity in the park. We ended up just playing football and frisbee with all the youth.

 

Wednesday we had a great zone conference. Lots of different missionaries led a lot of different trainings on how to find new people around us using various methods. It was a blast talking to other missionaries, especially since we were joined by those in my last zone.

 

We helped out our friend Trevor with raking his lawn on Thursday, and in return, he bought us a bunch of groceries, much more than we thought he would so we're pretty stocked up at the moment.

 

Saturday morning, we got our friend Hannah to meet the Sister missionaries 8n the YSA and got her excited for some of their FHE and group activities, so hopefully, she starts making good connections in the church.

 

Saturday evening we had a special opportunity to attend a late-night fireside with Brad Wilcox. He gave us a wonderful talk about our divine purpose here on the Earth and what we can do as missionaries. We even got the chance to talk with him and take pictures so we didn't end up getting home until midnight. 

 

Sunday we had stake conference and it capped off an awesome productive and spiritual week. As Sis. Richards was speaking, she made an example out of her missionaries and had us stand up, so we thought we were off the hook for the rest of the meeting. Turns out, Elder Johnson of the area seventy missed having a choir, so he had all the missionaries go up to the front to sing called to serve. That afternoon we also had an awesome Easter lunch with a few member families as well.

 

It was a pretty eventful week and the only thing I regret is not getting more photos.

 

-Elder Thompson

 

Facebook Post from Debby Richards 4/22/2022

 Over the last two weeks, we’ve had the chance to gather for Multi-Zone Conferences. We focused these conferences on building missionary skills. We had 8+ trainings led by our missionaries. We also loved the training given by Samye Martino Peterson on health, nutrition, and budgeting. She definitely inspired us!!! We are always working to develop the whole self. (More group pictures are coming! I’ve included just a few that I have on my phone. I always wish I’d taken more. Look for another post today or tomorrow with group pictures).

You may have also heard that we had a special fireside with Brad Wilcox. This was an incredible opportunity. He was coming to speak at the conclusion of the Houston South Stake Youth Conference. At the conclusion of their fireside, about 180 youth and about half of our mission sang the EFY medley together. It was so powerful. I videoed it (included) and you know I had tears. The Spirit was so powerful!! It was amazing to feel the strength of the mission added to the strength in our local youth!

We then had an unusually late fireside for the mission. One-third of the mission listened on zoom. The missionaries within a 30-minute drive were able to come in person. Brother Wilcox spoke to the missionaries about our "birthright" as children of God and members of the house of Israel. We laughed, we listened, we pondered and learned. He went through all 12 tribes and talked about how we receive blessings for our tribes and how we help gather Israel in the way that we are destined to. He said that any question of "why do I have to do this or why do I have to do that" can be answered by remembering who we are: Children of God. Heirs to the throne. Members of the House of Israel. We are so grateful to understand more deeply of our divine heritage Ask your missionary about what they learned from this incredible time together. “Don’t let the world change you when you are meant to change the world!”

Bicycle Race 4/13/2022

 We had a fantastic week tryna sort out our area now that we're on bikes, it gives us very little room for error and downtime.

 

We've had some success with biking to formers and talking to people on the street but nothing too promising. It is nice being outside for the short period of time that is spring in TX. 

 

Bro. Garza actually found someone for us to teach. His name is Peter and he loves diving into the really deep questions and doctrine. He likes challenging what we say but not to contend, only to understand.

 

Nothing too much more exciting has happened around here, hopefully, the excitement picks up around here soon.

 

-Elder Thompson

Lithium 4/5/2022

 It's been a great week and there have been some crazy changes around here. 

 

Elder DeCarlo has left and now I'm comps with Elder Amrine, who hasn't been out that long and is actually from Fair Oaks, which isn't too far from home. We have a lot of changes within our district as well and we're excited to see how everything plays out. Sadly, we got our car taken away for no other reason than we got unlucky. With so many missionaries going home and to original assignments, we had to get rid of some vehicles.

 

On Friday, the departing missionaries got to go to the temple, so Elder Brown and I were on exchanges since his comp is going home as well. We helped a friend of the sister missionaries in Jones Creek with some service at his church. It's a church and group that focuses on food distribution, and after we helped clean up the yard and sort some trash, he offered us practically a missionary years worth of food. We declined and said that we'd rather have all the food they were saving be used for other people who really needed it.

 

General Conference was awesome, we had the opportunity to spend time with Sis. Curtis, the Vances, Bishop Mangum's family, and the Schaerrers. We got way too much food and had a fun spiritual experience spending time with these families and hearing the words of the prophets. I don't think I've taken as many notes in my whole life for anything than I have this conference.

 

It was a fantastic week and I'm ready to start this new transfer with a lot of new details in the work.

 

P.S. My previous comp Elder Worland and I happened to be matching at transfers aside from our goofy ties

March Zone Conference Pictures from Facebook 3/2022

 

Breaking the Habit 3/29/2022

 Our friend Clifford who is on date for baptism finally broke his old habit of missing church and not responding to us by showing up on Sunday! We also saw our friend Remi, who is also on date, attend church with her family for the first time as well! It's been a fantastic week of miracles.

 

District council was phenomenal because we all ended up giving each other good advice for our areas, and have seen success applying those ideas whether it be getting in contact with people, helping them with their commitments, or even strengthing their desire to be baptized. 

 

Friday we had an interesting opportunity for service. It was a miracle that with only us missionaries to help out we got everything into the Uhaul. At one point we may or may not have debated throwing the couch over the balcony from the second floor onto the ground below, we were at a breaking point and done with moving stuff down the steep flight of stairs. It was difficult and frustrating to say the least but so worth it and we were grateful to help the very appreciative couple.

 

For PDay, we all went to the Vietnamese Buddhist temple in our area, then got some haircuts at the church before ending Elder DeCarlo's last PDay with some district soccer.

 

It was a pretty great week and I look forward to many more awesome ones ahead.

We Didn't Start the Fire 3/22/2022

 This past week went well and there were definitely some highlights. 

 

District council was a bit different this week. We had the opportunity to learn more about the family tree app and see how we were all related, then we learned how to teach others about family history and family search. This upcoming week we are supposed to help some investigators do their own family history which should be fun.

 

I had the opportunity to go on exchanges with Elder Tuckett in his area on Wednesday which was a good time. We taught an inactive member family in their ward and got them to open up to us by talking a lot about board games, video games, and movies so hopefully, the Elders will keep meeting with them and get them back to church.

 

Remi has started taking the lessons from us and both ones we had with a member present went so well. They've been by far the most spiritual lessons I've had on the mission and afterwards both times she has said she could feel the Spirit testify of the powerful things we were teaching.

 

We also had interviews with President Richards this week which is always nice. It lets us share where we are at as missionaries and he gives us great advice on how we can improve and do better.

 

We had our first zone pday which was a blast. We all got together along with the APs and President and Sister Richards to play volleyball at the stake center. It was awesome to play volleyball again with a large group and get to know the other missionaries a whole lot better. Hopefully, we get to do more zone activities in the future.

 

That's all for now, I'm glad I get to be out here as a missionary serving the Lord and spreading the joy that comes with the restored gospel.

 

-Elder Thompson