Hey yall!! So excited to write to you today... today is a beautiful day here in Peachtree City and I'm so blessed to be here!!! Today is the day we find out if we're getting transferred or not... so I'll try and keep you updated as I write this. I may or may not get a call to get moving on Wednesday so we'll see!
This last week was great!!! Elder Schlesinger was feeling much better this week and we almost made it through the whole week without him feeling sick at all which was a huge blessing! We made it till Saturday before we had to let him get rested up but we've been having a great and blessed time!
I wanna start off by relating a couple of experiences I had to start the week... we went to a former investigators house one afternoon that we had scheduled an appointment with over the phone... we went up to the door, knocked and eventually it was answered. He invited us inside so we came in... but as soon as we walked in I felt like something was wrong. I just gross in there... just dirty and not good. I tried to push it out of my mind and tried to focus on how the Lord will see this man and his situation but something just wasn't sitting right with me no matter how much I tried to focus on good things... Elder Schlesinger started things off by leaving him with a blessing through prayer... the entire time I tried to feel the spirit but I just couldn't... it was like something was blocking it. Afterwards I just felt like leaving... I didn't know why but I wanted out of there!!! We ended up going over and sitting on the couch with this man and as we sat there (Elder Schlesinger was teaching/talking to him) I looked across the table by the couch... there was a bunch of DVD's laid out across it. All of them were titled with something like "Know the End of Times". It was a 10 or so DVD set about the end of the world and apparently what we needed to know about it. The pictures on the front of each of them were pretty terrible... pictures of war, the false prophet, famine, etc. As I looked over them, I just kept getting this feeling like there was something wrong... especially with those DVD's sitting there. It was almost like there was a dark presence lingering over them... Again, I tried to push it out of my mind and focus on this man cause Elder Schlesinger was trying to teach him... but I just couldn't. The man started talking about his beliefs pretty quickly after that... and man... without going into detail... lets just say that he has some very twisted views of things (bless his heart). I literally was sitting there in shock as he told us the things he believed... and then he started to try and convince us that we should believe them too. As he did this... his friend walked in and asked us "Are you with the church of Heathens? I'm a member... and it's all around us" ... needless to say, we were ready to go after that point. We thanked the man for his time and invited him to read the Book of Mormon (he had a copy) and then we got outta there!!! We got into the car and we both just felt gross. We drove to our next appointment without saying much... once we got there, we talked about how we were feeling... so we decided to say a prayer. That didn't help. Eventually we decided that something wasn't right so Elder Schlesinger raised his arm to the square... instantly after that we felt better. It was so weird. It was like taking a pair of sunglasses off. Just felt so much lighter and brighter and happier.
Later that same night we went to visit a member who is a single, recently widowed mother of 6 kids. Her husband died of a medical condition and now she's left with all the kids... we went there and when she opened the door... man, it was just instant spirit. She talked to us about her husband and about missionary work... and the whole time the spirit was just so strong! They both served missions and they loved having the missionaries come over... eventually we left her and her kids with a blessing through prayer... and during it, we could feel of her husbands presence. After I closed the blessing, she said "He's here, I can feel him here. It was like a warm breeze across my face"... and it was so true!!! It was so powerful... Elder Schlesinger ended up giving his own personal copy of the Book of Mormon to the little girl... it was just so powerful and the joy, happiness, and just great feelings of the spirit were so strong...
So why am I telling yall these stories??? I can't describe it, but the VAST difference between the two experiences just amazes me. The adversary is real... he's out there doing terrible things... but the Lord is real to, and he's out there inviting us to be happy and joyful and to have peace in our lives. I'll never forget that day... literally feeling the presence of both sides of good and evil... just know that the side of good is WAY better than the side of evil. Never let yourself be tricked by the adversary .. do everything you can to avoid him and his snares. Do the small and simple things to fortify and protect yourself (just as captain Moroni fortified and protected the Nephites from the Lamanites) Read the Book of Mormon daily. Have daily prayer. Serve your fellow man. Go to church. Attend the temple as much as possible (if you can). I promise you that as you do those things, the Lord will bless you and protect you from the adversary... but always look for more ways to continue to fortify and prepare yourselves. The adversary is only growing stronger... we need to be doing the same thing. Always look for ways to draw closer to the Lord each and every day of your life. It's not just something that would be good to do... it's something we MUST do. The outcome of this fight is too important... this is eternal salvation and eternal life that we're fighting for. There is NOTHING more important than that...
So... now other normal things :) One of our investigators gave me a crystal like rock and told me that its been blessed to help me... so I'm suppose to carry it around in my left pocket and pull it out and rub it when I'm feeling stressed. He also told me to think of all the things I'm grateful for as I do it... so I do! And it helps! Even just something small like that can help... I know it's helped me tons!!
So... Teancum is like the coolest dude ever, right? If you don't know who he is... just go read through the last half of Alma... he's a stud. Sorry if that's random, but he's one of my new favorite people in the Book of Mormon.
We had an awesome cleanup project with one of our investigators (he's actually the first one I ever taught). He is somewhat of a hoarder... and he has a hurt back so he can't get around to clean things up very easily. We organized the young men to come over one night to help clean up his house a bit... not even move stuff out, but just to vacuum the floors, dust, etc. And WOW!!! Even just doing those small things made such a HUGE difference. It really helped him to feel of the spirit too... he was really touched. Can't even begin to describe to yall how much stronger the spirit was in there after doing that... we had a killer lesson to end things off too. Doing service for your fellow man is SO awesome... it invites the spirit into your life and into the lives of those whom you're serving... I'd invite all of you to find someone that you can serve this week. You don't have to do anything big... but just even doing something small will bring the spirit and blessings into your life.
We had mission council this week which I was lucky enough to get to go to since Elder Schlesinger is the District Leader.... and WOW!!!! Changed my life... seriously. The things I learned in there... so awesome. I wish I could just copy my notes from it and send it out to yall. I'll just drop a few things from it real quick (go read Ether 12 too)... see everything through the eye of faith first! Miracles happen AFTER you have faith... really aim high and have faith that you can get there. the Lord bless you with miracles if you just have faith in him and his plan for you... but you don't limit him!!! Have that endless faith so he can give you endless blessings. Always try to help people have good, spiritual experiences. Experiences are what people build their beliefs on... and beliefs fuel actions... and actions give results. If you give someone good experiences, it will change their beliefs and subsequently it will change their actions and results. That's what we need to do as disciples of Christ! Always look to give good, spiritual experiences to people when they're around us so that they can have good, spiritual results in their lives.
Some things about the mission real quick... we've all been challenged to bring a soul into the waters of baptism by April 7th. That's one for each of us, two per companionship. It's an exciting goal and I know that we can achieve it through faith! President Harding also felt inspired to tell us to try singing "I am a child of God" during lessons... so we've tried it a couple times! Only with members, but Elder Schlesinger and I have gotten up and sang it all by ourselves... and man, it does really invite the spirit! If you're ever feeling down, just start singing that out loud and it will help :)
Other random notes... I talked Elder Schlesinger into coming with me over to the church in the mornings so I can shoot hoops haha. We're going to try and go over at least 3x a week... it helped me A LOT this last week so I'm pretty excited about that. It's been a HUGE blessing in my life and I can't thank him enough for being willing to come with me to do that...
I just want yall to know that you're not just stripling warriors... you're all Helaman's and Captain Moroni's!!! You're all leaders unto the word and unto the Lord's people... keep your testimonies burning bright and do everything you can to share the gospel. As you look and pray for missionary opportunities, the Lord will help and bless you in finding them. Don't be afraid to share the gospel!!! The Lord will bless you with what you need to know... and always live your life in a way that will be an example to others. Leading by example is the best way of doing missionary work.
There is soooo much more I wanna write about but I'm outta time... I love you all so much!! Thank you for all the letters, I'm still reading them all! Especially the ones from all you cousins!! I love your pictures and hearing about whats going on!! And yes, I'm having lots of fun!! It made me smile to hear that Brock is playing Minecraft a lot... I played with John a lot before I left haha. He'll have to show you what we built sometime!!
I love you all so very much... continue to draw closer to the Lord and he'll continue to watch over you and bless you in all the ways that you stand in need of. Love him with all your heart and always do everything for his glory.
-Elder Wahlen
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