Alliance, Ohio - May 24, 2017

Well last week I promised some pictures, so I had to get at least one to send. We were on exchanges up in Rootstown on Sunday and we were out tracting and doing some finding when we saw something walking through the street. As we got closer to it I realized what it was, and there was just a random turtle walking down the road! Luckily we were walking back to the car and I had my camera with me (which I never have it) so I got a picture just for this moment. Also, there is a random picture of a hat chicken that for all the family, I think we should get them at the farms. They have afros! We'd be the coolest chicken farmers in the country!

 

This last week had a little bit of disappointment associated with it. Monique really needed to come to church on Sunday so she could be baptized on the 3rd of June, and Sunday morning came around and there was no Monique at church. We had called and texted her a bunch of times, but nothing. So, we are going to have to move her date back a couple of weeks because she will be out of town this next week, so kind of sad but it's alright! She is still moving forward and progressing and reading the Book of Mormon. We also were able to pick her brother, David, up as a new investigator as well. We went over one night and Monique wasn't there so we were talking with David and then we asked him if we could share the message of the Restoration with him and he said yes. Every time we've been over it has just been for Monique, but he said that he was going to start coming to church with Monique and so we figured it would be the best time to start teaching him. It was actually a really good lesson and we committed him to be baptized when he came to know that it was true, and he was really interested in reading the Book of Mormon as well.

 

Jean is still doing really well. We met with her last week again and she had made it a couple more chapters in the Book of Mormon and she is still going strong with it. We also taught her the Plan of Salvation and she really liked it. Had a little concern with parts of it (that would come naturally) but it helped that there were scriptures in the bible that support what we were teaching because she LOVES the Bible. So anytime we can use that she just loves it and soaks it up. We are going back tomorrow morning to see her again, so there will be another update about her next week. Also, one of the guys we met last week tracting, his name is Luke, and he is amazing! He has such an open mind, and after meeting with his dad, we completely understand why. His dad wasn't interested in what we had to share because he hates churches, but his son definitely has an open mind. We started reading the Book of Mormon with him, and he absolutely loves us and loves the Book of Mormon. Every time we go over he stops what he is doing to talk with us, calls us his "new friends", and he says he has a new opinion of what Mormons are really like now instead of all the fake stuff online. He's just a cool guy that really wants to continue to learn.

 

We met this guy tracting that is what happens when a Catholic becomes a Jehovah's Witness then talks with a Pentecostal pastor's wife and the decides to create his own religion. It was a mess the things he was talking about. It was truly fascinating talking with him because he actually believes a lot of the same stuff we do, he just takes it to the extreme of the extremes. Crazy people out there.

 

I don't think there was really anything else crazy that happened this week, but I will keep my eye out for more picture opportunities for everyone!

 

Love Elder Woodward

 

 

 

Alliance, Ohio - May 17, 2017

This last week has been a blur! With Mother's Day on Sunday and skyping, I don't even remember what I have told you and what I haven't, so if there are some repeats, it's not my fault.

 

We have this super awesome investigator who's name is Crystal, and she is one of the best people I've taught! She was atheist until about five years ago and then came to know that God is real and since that point in time, she has been one of the best people around! Missionaries knocked on her door soon after she first came to know and they would have Bible studies with her, but after a while they stopped going over to see her until March, when the missionaries here decided to go back and "tract" into her, and she said they could come back. She still wasn't super interested, and there was one day when I first got here that we went over to meet with her on a Saturday night and then went back on Monday to help her do some service in her house and teach her the Plan of Salvation. Since then, whenever we go over, she has been wanting to meet again later every week and we have been able to see her and teach her probably 5 times since I've been here, and it use to be just once a month. We were really focusing on the importance of reading the Book of Mormon to know if it is true, and after one lesson she said to us, "Where do you want me to start reading?" So we told her the beginning and she said she would start. The only thing is that she hasn't started yet for some reason or another, but we downloaded the Gospel Library app on her phone so she could listen to the Book of Mormon as she is doing her mail route because she works for the post office. We are going back tonight to see her again and we are hoping she has read, and if not then we are going to do everything to help her read. We had a little bit of a scare when we were talking about baptism and Priesthood authority. If you have ever seen The District videos where some elders are teaching someone about that same thing and he asks if they are saying his baptism wasn't valid, just about that same thing happened to us. Nightmares of that video from the district were going through our minds and we thought we might lose her as an investigator, but she now understands why she needs to be baptized and why she really needs to read the Book of Mormon. We also have had a member there for our last couple of lessons and they LOVE each other, and Crystal might be coming to church this Sunday. There's a linger longer, so free food gets a lot of people there, but also her kids want to go to church, so it could be a motivator for her to come if they are coming to church every week.

 

We met with Monique on Monday night and she is amazing! She came to church on Sunday and loves it every time she comes, and her baptismal date is good to go for June 3rd. We really wanted to get a feel for her testimony so we decided to go over the baptismal interview questions with her when we met, along with teaching follow the prophet and tithing. She is soooooo good to go. Still working on the Word of Wisdom and smoking, but she is doing so well with it. Just going over the baptismal interview questions with her, it wasn't just for us, but also for her to see that she is ready and that she has a testimony of this gospel. It wasn't until she was taught about ordinances for the dead that she really started to shoot forward in progression because she really wants to do the work for her great-grandfather and her other ancestors. We obviously knew that that is something that she wants to do for her family, so we also set a date to go to the Columbus temple with her to do all of that, and we set if for June 17th, two weeks after she is baptized. She is so cool and we love going over there to meet with her. It was also great way to end a rougher day of tracting for 3 hours and having nobody be interested. But it was a great end of the day!

 

We met with Jean again on Monday and she had started to read from the Book of Mormon and didn't make it as far as she wanted to, but had made it to 1 Nephi 11 which is pretty good if you ask me. We are going back again tomorrow to hopefully teach her the Plan of Salvation, but she is doing really well. We also met with Deena Middleton who we met last week (tree worship lady) and she had started to read the Book of Mormon but was confused by the testimonies at the beginning of it, but we talked more about it and got her to commit to keep reading. She's going out of town for a couple weeks so it might take a while before you get an update on her.

 

If anyone tells you that tracting doesn't work and nothing comes from it, they lie! Every new investigator that we find comes from tracting and more tracting and more tracting! Monique was found through tracting and she is going to be getting baptized soon, and everyone else that we have found is because of tracting. We found another couple of people this last week and one guy yesterday who was super cool! Had bad experiences with pastors of other churches but let us teach him and said he would read the Book of Mormon. He was just a cool guy.

 

There was also no hiding that I could play the piano in this ward because there was a baptism for an 8 year old boy that we were asked to be at to play the piano, and then the Bishop was there so he knew right off the bat. And then on Sunday the lady in the ward that is the organist was a little bit late so I was up there playing prelude music so the entire ward knew at that point. No more keeping secrets here! Not like my other two areas.

 

I'm all outta stuff to write, so I'll be back next week, maybe with some pictures!

Love Elder Woodward

Alliance, Ohio - May 10, 2017

This last week has been flying by for us here in Alliance! Yesterday was honestly the busiest day I have ever had on my mission and the most successful day ever! I'll get to it later though. So my new address is

 

1026 Mill Circle #76

Alliance, OH  44601

(I think this is the zip code, but you can double check with Google)

Now no one has an excuse to not write me letters... ;)

 

There weren't any crashed cars on the day before transfers last week, so there's always improvement! Got everything all packed up and made the long drive from the mission office down to Alliance. The only sad thing about the day is that as I was putting my suitcases in the car, somehow my magnetic name tag fell off and I lost it, but I ordered a new one today so all is well. And I think I was supposed to be driving from the mission office down to my new area, but it was the exact same car I crashed, just silver instead of red, so I opted out of it and let another missionary drive so I didn't crash it. I am the assigned driver now though because Elder Amparan doesn't have a Tiwi card to log in to the church's driving system, and no, we have not got in a car wreck. Not planning on it with our little Corolla, but it is a much welcome change to the Specialized Hardrock I've been on. But going from Lakewood to Alliance is something different! It was like going from Tiffin to Lakewood, just the other way around this time. It is so much different than Lakewood was, and it reminds me a lot of my first area in Tiffin, just instead of corn fields there are A TON of trees and it is more hill-y out here. The further east in the mission you go, the more up and down it gets, but nothing like real mountains from Utah. But this area is so good and I love it here! We have so much work to do and there are so many people here to work with, which is crazy because it's a small town!

 

The beginning of my time here was a little bit rough because we had a lot of cancelled appointments or people flaming us even though they were inside and looked through the window at us, but it was good because it meant we had some time to do some finding and knock on doors. And it decided to randomly get cold as well. I thought the sweaters were packed away for good, but it was down in the 40's and raining all day so we had to crack them out again. And then after a long day of knocking on doors, at dinner with a family, they gave us a referral for their neighbors that they are going to keep working on.

 

I didn't actually get to meet most of the ward because on Sunday there was a regional broadcast and a lot of the ward is closer to the Youngstown chapel, so since it wasn't Sacrament meeting they could go where they wanted so a lot just went to Youngstown. It's a 10 minute drive for them to go there instead the 45 minute drive to Alliance. What I have heard about the ward is that there are a lot of older members, and there used to be a lot of younger doctors doing their residency but they are all finishing and moving out and nobody new is coming in. So the ward is decreasing in active members.  The members that I have met so far are all AMAZING though. Some super crazy and energetic people, but really enthused by the Gospel and missionary work. The ward has two sets of missionaries, us and a set of sisters and we cover the south-western part of the ward. One of those sisters is brand new, and they were also at the Youngstown building on Sunday so I didn't meet them until Monday at district meeting, which was also interviews with President Brown. Always a good time when that happens.

 

My new companion is Elder Amparan from the second best land to Smithfield of Syracuse Utah. He just finished training but is a killer missionary and loves to work hard. It has been one of the most fun weeks of my mission since last Wednesday being here with him, and there is SO MUCH happening here in our area now. If I got started about all of our investigators, we would be here all day typing away which is a welcome change from the days of knocking on doors in Lakewood. Don't get me wrong, we still knock on doors, but there are a ton of other people that we are teaching as well. We have five investigators with a baptismal date, Silas and Juanita Dawson, Monique, Quanisha, and Rachel Butcher in case you wanted to know their names, and we have about ten other investigators that are all awesome!

 

Yesterday we had a perfect day that every missionary hopes every day is like. We had some appointments that we weren't too sure if they would work out and if the people would be home, but we didn't get flamed a single time! Every single appointment that we had worked out, and all of them kept the commitment that we had left with them the last time. We even had time to go tracting for an hour and managed to find two more solid new investigators. It was the craziest day and the best time tracting. In that hour, we probably were only able to knock on 15 doors, but two of them let us teach them, Dena Middleton and Kaitlin Ford, and they were both super super excited to learn. As we were finishing the Restoration with Dena, she said that she used to look into the Latter Day Saint church and was ready to join it, but then someone told her that Joseph Smith went to the Sacred Grove and prayed to a tree and thought it was Jesus Christ, so she thought we all worship trees and that we don't have churches which turned her away from the church. It was the first time I've heard anything like that, and we just all started laughing when she was talking about it. We cleared all of that up and taught her what really happened and how Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ came to Joseph Smith and how we do have churches that we go to, and she committed to read the Book of Mormon and was really excited about it. The craziest thing of it all was that she was babysitting at that house and had only been there for about 20 minutes when we knocked on the door, and the night before she had been praying for direction and guidance and help, and then we knocked on her door. And she still lives in our area so we don't have to turn her over to anyone else to teach.

 

A couple of houses down, we found Kaitlin, and it was the last door we were going to knock on because we had an appointment in 10 minutes. She said that we could share the message of the Restoration with her and after everything we taught she just kept saying, "That is so cool!" and after the First Vision she said, "No way. Did that really happen?" and we said, "Yes. Yes it did." She was so excited about everything and when we talked about the Book of Mormon she was crazy excited to read it and when we found her, it just happened to be her one day off work when we knocked on her door, and then she gave us a referral which is HUGE for this area! We ended up being a little bit late to our next appointment but it was alright!

 

We've taught all the investigators on date since I've been here, and Monique is one of my favorites. She is so sincere about everything and has noticed the difference the Book of Mormon has made in her life and the difference the missionaries have made in her life teaching the Gospel to her. We just dropped in last night unannounced and she was so happy to see us! We taught her really quickly about keeping the Sabbath Day holy and committed her to come to church these next two weeks to prepare for her baptism on June 3rd, and she was all for it! She really has a desire to be baptized and when she realized the importance of the Sacrament and the Atonement of Jesus Christ, it really helped her to make that commitment to come, and she wants to change. Every time we are there, she always thanks us for changing her life, and it just makes me feel good when they can see the change that the Gospel brings to their life.

 

We have found a couple other investigators these last couple days, one whose name is Jean. She is an older lady who LOVES to talk, but she has some of the most sincere desire to learn more and to read the Book of Mormon. The first time we knocked on her door, she took a Book of Mormon and Restoration pamphlet and said that she would start reading before we went back on Sunday, and she did! She read through the entire pamphlet and the introduction and testimonies in the Book of Mormon and was ready when we came back. We committed her to be baptized when we met with her yesterday, and she said when she knows it is true, she will be baptized. It took her a couple seconds to think about it and say yes, but it's all because of her true desire to know. It takes a lot of patience going over there to meet with her, but she really wants to continue to learn, so we are still teaching her.

 

It has just been amazing going from Lakewood with not a lot of people to teach and coming here where tracting brings people for us to teach and there are already people progressing! I love Alliance right now and I love Elder Amparan and the members of the ward that I have met! This might be the longest letter I have ever sent, but there was so much good that happened this last week! Praying that it continues throughout the week!

 

Love,

Elder Woodward

Lakewood, Ohio - May 2, 2017

Well hello there!

 

So I'm gonna start off with the transfer news. My time in Lakewood is coming to an end and I am continuing my journey eastward to Alliance with a new companion, Elder Amparan. Elder Weekes is going to be staying here and taking over the area with Elder Stohs. I do know that he just finished being trained so he's been out for about 3 months now, and he was trained by my MTC companion, Elder Walker. So things are going to be good and life is moving on here.

 

So going back a couple of weeks to fill you all in, we had zone conference a week ago, and like I said last week, it was different. They spent a lot of time talking about and giving us ideas to use the colleges in our areas, but the only problem is that we don't have a single college or university in our area. So that whole time I was listening and paying attention, but it just didn't really apply to me at the current time, so we couldn't really apply the things we learned. Other than that zone conference was good and then topped it off with getting a car and then going on exchanges with our zone leaders. It was the first time that I've been on exchanges with the zone leaders since being here and it was one of the best days we've had in a long time! They have some sketchy areas which I was in, but it was all good. There were some people that we were talking to as we were biking around that said, "You feel safe riding around on your bikes in this area?" So we just said yup and kept going after we talked to them. But we had a lot of people to teach and we did some service at a Baptist church food pantry helping people take food out to their car. That was a neat experience doing that. We were biking around a lot and Elder Hunt is amazing at talking with everyone! There was nobody that passed that he didn't just go up to and talk, and we ended up getting them a bunch of new investigators. I could go on forever about how great the day was. 

 

So the car that we got last week, it was just for a week. And we didn't know that until after we had cleaned the entire thing top to bottom and put our stuff in it and finally enjoyed having it. It had to go into the shop, so yesterday during district meeting, the vehicle coordinator took it in to have the battery checked because it kept dying on us. The only problem is that we weren't told that we weren't getting it back until it was at the shop with all of our stuff in it AND our bikes on the back of it. So now we don't have a car and we currently don't have bikes to do anything with, and we don't have bus passes because it's a new month and we didn't buy them because we thought we would have the car for a little bit longer. But my new area is going to have a car, I just don't know when I will get my bike back to use. I'm not complaining though!

 

Last Wednesday, we had a really cool experience. There was a recent convert that we hadn't seen in a long time or that hasn't come to church in a long time, so we decided that we were just going to go stop by and say hi and set up an appointment for another time to come back. The living situation is a little complicated, but she lives with a member who has like 7 grandkids that she watches all the time. When we got there, one of the little boys who is only 10 starting pulling chairs around the table and gathered all of the other kids because he wanted us to teach them all a gospel lesson. Him and all the other kids were all sitting there and we had no idea what was really going on, but he wanted to read from the Book of Mormon with us. There were 4 little kids there that we were reading with and they all wanted a turn to read and they all wanted to volunteer to say the prayer so we ended up having two opening prayers and two closing prayers so they could all say one. It was super neat because they are still young but have that enthusiasm to read from the Book of Mormon and have the missionaries over, and now we are going back every Sunday to read with them. The grandma, Sister Thomas, had been having a hard couple of days and said it was an answer to her prayers for us to go over and be with the kids. They are a super family and they kids are all studs. 

 

Friday we were at the temple which is always amazing. It's a smaller temple, but it's all the same work! Doesn't matter how big or how small a temple is, it's all the same. It was a long drive down and long drive back, but it was totally worth it! 

 

We haven't had any run ins with Gary the Goose lately, sadly. Yesterday we were doing more service at our Bishop's house and had some extra elders there that we were on exchanges with. We didn't plan to be there since it was my birthday, but the Bishop's wife was making waffles which are my favorite food so we had a double dinner of a huge pizza at 4:30 and then waffles at more dessert at 6:30. It worked out perfectly for everyone involved, especially since they had the goods from the bakery. It was too much food in too little time though. I ate so much food that I literally threw up. It's never happened before, but now it has. And the sad part was that even after I threw up, I still felt like I was full, that's how much food was in me. But I only gained .4 pounds. Don't really know how, but I was stuffed. 

 

There's some pictures, as promised, of the district at the temple last week. You can enjoy them! Maybe more pictures will be sent later in more emails. Also, hopefully this is long enough to make up for last week. I think it is.

 

Love, Elder Woodward