Progress

Hey y'all!

I've had an awesome week here! I know that I've been really good at telling y'all about all the new people we teach, and rarely update you. So here's the quick scoop: KC is quitting coffee and is very excited for her baptism on the 29th of September. Tammy came to church for the second time and is excited for her baptism on the 13th of October, but she's having a little harder time giving up coffee. Magnolia came to church, but still wants to wait until her husband can come up from Mexico and be there for her baptism, which won't be until February. Lori has been texting us and is excited to start taking the lessons, but has been way busy, so we haven't taught her yet. Jarod is fighting hard to quit smoking, but has come to church now 5 weeks consecutively. So, there you have it! 

Here's another miracle we saw this week:  We stopped by a part-member family last Wednesday. The family includes a very active husband and a wife that is not a member and has been going to church with him for the past year and a half. The area book notes on them said that the ward council had asked the missionaries to leave the family alone because she felt like she was being pushed into baptism when she didn't feel ready. So we talked to the bishop and he said that we should totally go over and share a spiritual thought, but maybe not try to push too hard for her to take the lessons, so we did. As we were getting to know the family, and before sharing the spiritual thought that we had prepared on faith, she said, "I think the next step for me is to get baptized, I know the church is true, I don't know what is holding me back." We talked about how establishing a habit of reading the Book of Mormon and praying would help her feel ready to make that step. She admitted that she hadn't read the Book of Mormon hardly at all. We challenged her to do so and to prayerfully consider being baptized before the end of the month. She said she would. It was sweet.

Love y'all!
Elder Stephen Watts

First Monday Trade Days

The First Monday Trade Days in Canton, Texas is the biggest flea market in the state. It is held every weekend before the first Monday of the month. It has been held every month without fail since the 1800's. Elder Twitchell and I had the idea of setting up a booth and trying to give away free Book of Mormons and DVD's. We were blessed to be given a spot for free since we were non-profit. We arranged for different Elders and Sisters throughout the zone to take turns running the booth. To make it as exciting and inviting as possible, we made carnival games where kids could win candy and materials as prizes. 

It was really fun, but we weren't able to attract very many shoppers. The booth was open from 9-5 Thursday-Saturday and we maybe gave out 15 Books of Mormon and 20 DVD's (knocking doors does about just as well) so we weren't too thrilled. But we understand that we weren't there for any of the shoppers. We were there for Lori, the jewelry vendor next door.

We met Lori Wednesday night. It was 9:15 and we had just finished setting a few things up to prepare for the next day. She was setting up her booth as well. We might not have talked to her, as we were in a hurry to get home to be home on time, but we felt we might aught to, so we did. We got talking and found out Lori has incredible faith in God. She's had 4 open heart surgeries, 6 seizures, over 200 strokes, been run over by a car, shot in the chest, struck by lightning twice, and even woke up in a body bag one time. She said that she's come to know God through those struggles. We asked her if she believed that a living God would have a living church, and she said yes, but that she had no idea where she might find such a church. We talked to her about the Book of Mormon and how by reading and praying, she could at least come to know whether The Restored Church was truly Christ's church or not. She practically yanked that Book out of my hand before I could even offer it. She mentioned that she was looking for something that could help support the Bible, as the Bible has been translated and published in so many different versions. When she found out that the Book of Mormon had only been translated once, and that there existed only one version of it, she was ecstatic.

Through the course of the three days, Lori talked to every missionary that came out to station the booth. She brought her kids, who played every game we had dozens of times, and took home and watched every DVD we had to offer. She defended us when people were rude. She read the first few chapters of the Book of Mormon. She asked all sorts of questions about the church, which we enjoyed answering. We are excited to meet up with her this week!

Love y'all!

Elder Stephen Watts

PS. Thanks to all those who wished me happy birthday! I will be drinking that ice water on the rocks later tonight ;)

Coming to Church

It has been a really neat week. We met someone last Sunday who came to church with one of the members. His name is Jarod. He happened to be working for said member. We got his number and asked about coming by for a lesson. He said that would be OK, but he was really busy, and lives far away, so we weren't able to visit him. Yesterday, he showed up to church again. We asked him if he would still be interested in having us bring a Book of Mormon by his house and teach him about it. He said, "If I wasn't interested, I wouldn't have come back!" Also at church was Kacey (two times for her now) who has recently discovered general conference and has been sending us her thoughts on just about every talk from last conference. She is so awesome! And the Thompson's also were able to be there, I think I talked about them 2 times ago, but only the husband is a member in that family, and the wife and daughter want to be baptized. It's been incredible how many people God has allowed us to meet recently.

Included in the pictures is us fixing a roof and trimming trees for a member, and us tracting a porch that was well equipped.

Love,
Elder Stephen Watts

Recent convert, Angel, would not let us take a normal picture of her

Kacey

Kacey was introduced to the gospel by a member because she was the first grade teacher of the member's daughter. I'm not exactly sure how the conversation was brought up, but the member invited her to read the Book of Mormon and gave her a copy. The member then gave us her phone number.

So for about three weeks we would call Kacey and text her and answer her questions and keep her excited about the Gospel and the Book of Mormon. And, for three weeks she would tell us that she would love to meet up and take the lessons, but that her husband wasn't ready yet. She mentioned that her husband was reading the Book of Mormon and studying online and stuff, but wasn't convinced yet. 

Yesterday, Kacey came to church and introduced herself to us as Kacey _____. We were shocked and Elder Twitchell asked, "You mean, the real life Kacey, the girl we've been texting for the past few weeks?" She said yep. She said that she was done waiting for her husband and was ready to take the lessons. After asking a few followup questions we discovered that she had been doing her research, and had even chatted with missionaries on mormon.org. She mentioned that she joined a Facebook group called Mormon women whose husbands don't go to church. We're not sure what we're going to teach her because she already knows everything there is to know about our faith. She's ready to join. It's incredible.

Many of the other people we've been teaching are progressing rapidly as well. We are very excited for many of the future converts we are teaching. 

Hurrah for Israel!
Elder Stephen Watts

Teaching Families

Hey All!

So, these past two weeks we've been going crazy finding part-member families. Part-member families are tricky because most of them have seen missionaries a lot in the past, so you have to figure out a way to teach them that's different. But, we have had a lot of success nonetheless. One family that we found was a member, Bradley Thompson who went through a divorce a year ago, and was remarried 2 months ago to a non-member. Before we even taught them a lesson, he had talked to her about going to the temple and having an eternal family. Teaching them was a blast. They asked all the right questions and promised to come to church.

It's sometimes more rewarding teaching families (part-member families included) because we get to see the family rally around their faith, and become more united as they choose to follow through with commitments. The gospel of Jesus Christ exists to bless families. I wish I had more neat stories to tell this week.

Love,
Elder Stephen Watts

New Companion

It's been a great week! I love my new companion, Elder Twitchell. I keep trying to speak to him in Spanish and he never understands, but apart from that, it's been great.

We've changed the focus of our work toward part-member families, partly because I knocked thousands of doors with Elder Bushman (maybe even half of the area) and partly because that's the revelation we received. One of the part-member families we found was a Nevadan, born in Vegas, but lived in Tonopah and Reno. He was an active member in Nevada, but a divorce and some ward drama led him to inactivity (and a move to Texas). He hasn't been to church in Texas yet, but told us that he still has a testimony, and would like to go back. He has a wife and 4 kids (3 are of age to be baptized). We taught them about the restoration and invited them to be baptized. They agreed to consider it, then they invited us back for another discussion and dinner. We were pretty excited.

Kenneth is doing well, and came to church for the third straight week. The 101st door family (the Hernandez) are progressing, but slowly. Many more of the people we are teaching are making some sweet progress as well.

Love,
Elder Stephen Watts

Elder Twitchell and Elder Watts

Elders from the two Tyler districts

Self reliance

Hey all!

Anyone remember Kenneth? He has muscular dystrophy, and is bound to a motorized wheelchair. He lives in an apartment by himself, but is about the nicest and smartest man I've met. Anyway, he came to church for the first time 2 weeks ago, just 2 days after we found him wheeling around in a parking lot. Yesterday, he came for the second time, and stayed all three hours (he left after sacrament his first time). Anyway, it just so happened that in Priesthood, someone from the stake was boldly chastising the ward for being the only ward in the stake without a self-reliance program to help people get educations, find jobs, and provide for families. We were a little worried about what Kenneth thought of it, but instead of being discouraged, he offered to help out. He said, "I know I'm not a member of your church yet, but I would love to help people with this self-reliance program." And so we've been in contact with the bishop, and pretty soon our investigator is going to have a calling as ward self-reliance specialist. So if any of you feel like things aren't working out the way they're supposed to in your ward, I encourage you to have a Kenneth attitude, and see what you can do to help out, even if no one asks you to or expects you to.

Tomorrow is transfers, and Elder Bushman is off to his home in Logan, Utah. My new companion is Elder Twitchell. He's a veteran, and has been zone leader for a long time. I'm pretty excited to begin anew out here in East Texas. 

I love you all!
Elder Watts