November 26, 2007

Hello hello hello! I'm starting to feel like I got transfered to Greenland! It's freezing here!

Everything is going great out here as usual. I had a great Thanksgiving. In the morning all the missionaries met together and we had a giant turkeybowl, and then Elder Thompson and I ate a nice big dinner with a new convert family.

Pedro Mayorga got baptized on Saturday which was amazing. A really good, short, powerful baptismal service. It's taken us a lot of hard work to get him into the water, but his testimony really is strong so I"m excited to see him in the church.

I've learned a valuable lesson as I've been able to attend so many baptismal services out here. Sometimes we confuse emotion with the spirit. This is easy to understand considering that many of our spiritual experiences are very emotional as well as we learn new, profound truths and experience landmark changes in our lives.
But for me, as I attend these baptisms, I often have the opportunity to feel the Spirit enter the room in a way that is largely detached from emotion. The ceremony of the baptism is simple, and very short. At times it is almost awkwardly brief. For me, baptismal ceremonies do not evoke much of an emotional reaction. And yet I always feel the spirit powerfully, testifying that baptism is a necessary part of God's plan, and that through Jesus Christ we truly are given an oportunity to be born again.

This past week I also learned a great lesson on pressing forward with faith. We biked up to visit a new investigator named Vanessa at about 8 o'clock at night, but she, unfortunately, wasn't home. We had two other families that we could visit but they lived on opposite sides of the area and so we were only going to have the chance to visit one of them before the night ended. I said a silent prayer to know which family we should visit but felt like I didn't recieve an answer for either family. I prayed again and pondered the names of the two families again, and again, did not recieve an answer.
I then thought it out, and decided that the Carrillo family needed our help more than the Garcia family, and so I decided we would head down to the Carrillo family, still not having recieved a real confirmation from the Spirit as to whom we should teach. We started off and had barely biked three blocks when we passed Vanessa, the lady who had not been home, walking back towards her home with some groceries that she had just bought. It was then that I recieved a confirmation from the Holy Ghost as to whom we were supposed to teach, and that night we taught and set a baptismal date with Vanessa.

Anyways I'm not sure I've mentioned it yet but it blizzarded here in El Paso and dropped probably six inches of snow with biting winds on Saturday. I wasn't prepared for it at all and didn't have the proper clothes or anything, and we were on bike! I thought that that kind of thing wasn't supposed to happen in El Paso!

I know I left some winter clothes at home, so Mom, if maybe you could send me a scarf or two, maybe one or two of the sweaters that I left, and a pair of gloves, I would really really appreciate it.

I'm really really going to try to send a snail mail letter home tomorrow with some pictures. Unfortunately I forgot to bring my camera on snowday so maybe I can snag some pictures off of my companion. We shall see.

Thank you Dad for sending all of your letters. I really do love them! And Mom, I really liked your talk.

I'm praying for all of you all the time, especially you, Dad. Mary, Kate, Brig, Steve, Chris, and Caitlin I love hearing from you and especially getting pictures of my wonderful niece and nephews!

Anyways, that's about all I've got to say to the general public. Hopefully I'll have a bit more to say if I get a chance to send off some hand written letters! I love you all you're all amazing! I have so much to be greatful for, with such a wonderful family and such great friends, and an opportunity to be a member of this great church, and to know fo this beautiful gospel.

I love you all, keep writing!

Love,

Elder Wilson