Tuesday, October 22, 2013

"I also crashed my bike for the first time..."

Hey Family,
Thanks for telling me about grandma and grandpa (about his Davis grandparents), it gives me time to prepare and brace for what might happen.
Mike doesn't have to go to the court date anymore, his parole officer talked to the state attorney and they where able to change it to next year. So we no longer have to worry about it, but we did go over and talk to him. Lately he has been thinking and asking us if the church can help out with his bills and food, we have told him multiple times that we as missionaries can't really do any thing about it. We keep on telling him that he well have to talk the branch president, ugh I don't like it when people think that we can fix all of there problems. We can only help them with their spiritual side and not there temporal side, so we are hoping that he isn't investigating the church only to free load off of it. I really wish people would use common sense and try to find a job, that's the problem with this world, too many people out there expect everything for nothing, I really don't like it.
Anyhow, nothing much happened besides that, we are still tracking, we find potentials, but a lot of them are people pleasers  and will say anything to your face. So we are having a hard time with that.
I also crashed my bike for the first time, we where on exchanges and I was in the district leaders area and we where biking back to there apartment and it was dark, and I think my bike lock some how got caught in the front tire and it pulled to the side and I tried to pull it back but I over corrected and fell and braced myself with my hands. Then rolled on my back and slide for a little while, but not too long maybe a couple of seconds, but I'm alright, just some bruises, thankfully I was wearing a helmet and we weren't going too fast, my bike is ok as well.
Yeah so that was my week. Exciting stuff, and me and Elder Rausch are getting along great, no need to worry about his impatience, I think it was just me, I wasn't in the best mood last week.
That's so awesome that the Kwok family is getting baptized, you'll have to send some pictures of them
Well I have to get going, I have allot of people to write so I probably won't be able to do what i did last week.
Love you all,
-Elder Jacob Dixon
P.S. I got the package you sent me, thanks allot, the cookies where way good, ate a whole bag in one day :D

Tuesday, October 15, 2013

"...Picture Perfect"

Hey family.
 
The temple looks so awesome, I cant wait to go inside someday. Hopefully it will be done by the time I come home, cause that's the first stop I want to make before I'm released. (he is talking about the Payson Temple. Angel Moroni was set in place last week)
 
That's a cool story about Kwok family, I hope they get baptized soon because that would be way cool. I'm glad that mom is fellow-shipping the mother, they all sound like cool people, it would be super cool if I get to meet them when
I get back. So have you guys had the opportunity to feed the missionaries lately?
 
This week was ok, we didn't teach MJ because she is in the process of moving and we haven't found any new investigators yet, but we are finding some potentials that might become investigators.
 
We taught mike on Saturday, it went well, we read from the book of Mormon, and we found out some bad news. He has a court date for the 22nd and it's 3 hours away from where we live, and we cant find a ride for him and he is having trouble finding one also. If he misses this court date, which is just a review, they are going to issue a warrant for his arrest and he is heading back to prison until next September, so to say the least we are praying a lot that the lord will provide.
 
Other than that all is going good, we are getting along, I'm just trying to be patient with his impatience, but we are still having a good time down here in the hood.
 
So I do have our cousin's blogs so you don't need to worry about sending me the emails.
I'm glad that Roscoe is doing a good job and leaving a good impression on his bosses that they are going to let him weld. (Roscoe now works at Goodfellow, same place Adam works.)

Yep so that was my week.
I hope you all have a great week too
 
Love Elder Dixon
P.S. I hope you enjoy the picture, it's postcard perfect
 
 
 
We saw this while we where waking past a parking lot
 
 

Thursday, October 10, 2013

"... my favorite talks was by Elder Ulisses Soares, he talked about the attribute of meekness and how we can obtain it by living in the spirit. "

Dear Dixon family,
 
First off I'll answer your questions.
So the Elders that we replaced ended there missions in this area, so their time was up, and yes I'm out of journal paper. Thanks for the pictures of the Payson Temple, IT'S SO BEAUTIFUL!! Do we know when it well be completed?
 
Crystal did tell me about Roscoe getting the job at Goodellow. I hope he enjoys it and from what I hear he is starting at a pretty good pay.

This week was pretty good, mostly because of conference, we watched it at the branch building. Me and Elder Rausch where the only ones there most of the time, and at priesthood meeting it was only us and the branch president. It was still great, I think one of my favorite talks was by Elder Ulisses Soares, he talked about the attribute of meekness and how we can obtain it by living in the spirit. How people who are meek are more often to receive the message of the gospel, because they are humble and can recognize there dependence on God.
 
I think the 3 main things that stuck out to me the most all together where the 1st and 2nd great commandments, the important roll of woman and mothers in the world and how the world is perverting the virtues that woman bring into this world. Then the importance of priesthood holders and what we need to do to stand up for what is right and stay steadfast in our morals.
We also taught a new investigator this week on Tuesday, her name is M.J, she is someone we tracked into and set up a return appointment, she is a single mother, and has a close relationship with God and knows that she can over come her trails that she is going through. She is interested to learn more about The Book of Mormon. The only problem that we see coming up is that we know that her uncle and cousin are pastors of another church, and most of the time when people ask the ministers or pastors about our beliefs they always say negative and false things about our beliefs.  That then scares our investigator so they don't want to meet with anymore, but we are praying that this doesn't happen with her.

Love you all,
-Elder Dixon

P.S. I liked Ricky's email, pretty cool.

Wednesday, October 2, 2013

"Nobody really gives us trouble because we are the "Jesus boys...."

Hey Everyone,

So East St. Louis is ok, it's not as bad as people make it out to be, in fact I think it's just as bad as my last area. It's ghetto but it's not as crowded like I thought it would be; there are allot of vacant houses and buildings. There are a couple of streets that we have to avoid, but for the most part we are safe. Nobody really gives us trouble because we are the "Jesus boys" so they know who we are and what we do.
 
My new companion is Elder Rausch ( not Roach, the zone leaders messed up with his name ). He is from Calgary Canada, he is pretty cool. We get along great so far, he has been out for 4 months, so I'm not training which I'm totally fine with.
The area is ok as far as work wise, we white washed in so we replaced two elders who just went home, and to say the least they where slackers. They didn't really do anything, and they where super rebellious. We found a whole bunch of movies in our apartment that are from the flea market, so they are pirated. They had Iron Man 3, The Avengers, the new Batman, and couple of other movies. We also found out that they left the mission boundaries with a sister in the ward to go to the Nauvoo pageant! Everyday we keep on finding out how big of piles they where, so that was frustrating, oh but they cleaned most of the apartment before they left, except the bath room. It was pretty gross, there was mold in a lot of places and on the shower curtain...eek, so we throw that away real fast. They did leave us with some people to teach, one of them we met on Saturday, his name is Mike. He is a good person, he just got out of prison and is still on parole and house arrest and wont be off of it till next year He is going to be taught by missionaries for a long time.
 
Other than that we haven't met with anyone else since we were busy trying to get to know our area better.
 
We also met with the branch yesterday, boy it's a small branch, only 15-20 people come and including there are only 8 priesthood holders. So we got to help bless and pass the sacrament one thing for sure is that we got our work cut out for us.
 
Thanks for the video link of Dayan, man I can't believe they are getting married in November.
I'm super excited about general conference this week end. Oh, and that reminds me, I got to buy Orange rolls today :)
 
Love you all,
 
-Elder Dixon
 
It may be a good idea to send that info, for future purposes and you guys should be fine to send me packages and what not, we don't live in East St. Louis, but we live outside of it in a town called Belleville, its a way nicer town. So we won't have to worry about any thing.

My address is 109 N 74th St Apt #1
Belleville, IL 62223


 
 
Pictures of East St. Louis
Vacant building
  Vacant school
 
 Illinois, its so freaking flat, I'm going to go crazy!