N's email 10/19/2015

area: Jennings Branch (Welsh, Louisiana)

zone: Orange

companion: Elder Hobbs

We finally got the Wrights, a part LDS family, to come to church. I was so excited when they pulled up! They are a great family.

I love this area so much!

I want to share my ponderizing scripture for this week: 2 Nephi 2:8 "Wherefore, how great the importance to make these things known unto the inhabitants of the Earth, that they may know that there is no flesh that can dwell in the presence of God, save it be through the merits, and mercy, and grace of the Holy Messiah, Who layeth down His life according to the flesh, and taketh it again by the power of the Spirit, that He may bring to pass the resurrection of the dead, being the first that should rise." Think about that.

I love making these things known to the inhabitants of Jennings, Welsh, Lake Arthur, Iota, Iowa, Kinder, Elton, Bell City, Hayes, Lacassine, Roanoke, Fenton, and many micro towns. I love this Gospel. I know it's true.

I love all of you. But I love Jesus Christ more. And this is where He wants me. So this is where I want to be.

These are from an email he sent answering some of my questions:

The man who wanted to quit smoking ended up not wanting to meet with us anymore. Whenever we tried to go back and see him his friend who owned the house would chase us off.

We actually didn't get to pull that lady's weeds, she wouldn't let us. And when we went back for the return appointment nobody answered the door. We met her Priest on Friday. He's a super nice man. We got to testify about the First Vision and we gave him a mormon.org card, he said he'd look it up. And since he has 1000 families in his congregation he knows about plenty of service opportunities so we made sure he had our phone number so we can go help.

The deaf man in our branch, Nae, is awesome. He loves the Gospel and is always eager to introduce us to his deaf friends.

Appointments with our Russian neighbor never seem to work out.

The Miller family, the couple who drove us to Baton Rouge, are great. She was baptized in March and within a few weeks she's going to be called to a counselor in the Relief Society. She has autism and just says what she thinks very monotone and calmly and it seems to get people to act. It's awesome!

The 143 people were all strangers who we never met before. Most of them said, "We're Catholic." and no matter how persuasive we tried to be to get them to just listen to our message they wouldn't listen. But yes, they were all new people.

My birthday package came the morning of my birthday. Thank you again!

No, we didn't have a baby alligator in our apartment. I'm not exactly sure what or when you're talking about. If I would have seen one in the wild I probably would have mailed it home though.