09/16/13

Hey family.

 

Do we know why Cola had a fracture? Was it from Miss Piggy, I can't wait to get rid of her. Cola was a good goat, I'm going to miss her :(

 

Man the new "Star Trek" sounds awesome, some members where telling us about it, that's one more movie to put on the list, I also heard that they are making an "Enders Game" so that should be cool.

I'm so excited that dad is getting a job, (I told him that is look like I have a new job, there is nothing official yet, indicators are good) I hope you do a great job with everything.

 

So this week was ok, all of our appointments fell through, but it's ok cause we met a couple of cool people, we have another super solid potential that came to church with a member, and she wants us to teach her!!!!!! yay I'm so excited, her name is Rachel. Jeff also came to church, so that was a plus, and we should be meeting with him soon.

 

Something else interesting happened this week, Elder Jerome and I gave a blessing to one of the sister's investigator that just had a baby and is having some health issues, then she asked if we could bless the baby too, so that was the first time that we have given a baby a blessing, the spirit was really strong there and she said that she could feel it. She has really strong faith.

So that was the just of our week, it seems like it was yesterday that I sent out my last email.

 

So I've been drinking power-aid and stuff like that, but I don't have to worry about that this week since its going to be in the 70s and today it's 60 outside, and we are going to be playing some soccer under the arch today with some other missionaries in the mission. it might rain today to, not sure yet.

Well I hope this week goes well for you all.

 

Love you all-Elder Dixon

 

 P.S. We get trainer calls tomorrow and transfer calls on Saturday, so you should know by next Monday of whats happening

Mission Conferene, late email and the Zoo

Hey family,

It looks like every one had a adventure this week. Cars are really annoying some times, I'm sorry that you weren't able to make it to the funeral. Do you know if the rest of the family was able to attend? 

So sorry that this email is getting to you guys late, I'll tell you all the reason being. So last week we where told that we would be having a mission conference on Wednesday, so it wasn't going to interfere with our pday, but then they changed it to Tuesday and on Saturday they changed it to Monday, so we just moved our pday to today... I hope that makes sense. 

This week was really hot, it hit around 98 :p man it was hot, I got super dehydrated even though I was drinking allot of water, so I felt like crap for the rest of the week. Don't worry I'm feeling better now. It could drop to the high 70s on Friday and Saturday yay :D So some cool things are starting to happen, we have a solid potential that we help carry his groceries to his house, his name is "L" and he has been going through some rough times, he was mugged and robbed, his car got vandalized and totaled and his insurance company wouldn't pay for it. He lost his job and got evicted, so to say the least his is super humbly and honest, and is interested to meet with us. He used to meet with missionaries back in Arizona, so he is familiar with what we believe but that was 20+ years ago, so he doesn't remember much. "J" came to stake conference on Sunday, he really enjoyed it and he had some good questions. We should be meeting with him tomorrow so we are excited for that since we haven't taught any one for a while. You should be getting a letter soon, I haven't sent it yet because all of the stuff that has been happening, I have most of it written while we where riding the bus to the mission conference.  To say the least this week was better than last week.


Love you all-Elder Dixon 

Here are pictures from when Jacob went to the zoo.

He said this is one of the biggest snakes that he has EVER seen.

September 3, 2013-Labor Day and Zone Conference.

Hey Dixon Family and Friends,

This week was ok, but we didn't teach anyone. We where sweating our brains out the whole week too, it's high 90s with 60% and above for humidity.  So it felt like it was 107, :P I really don't like this weather. No wonder why the saints left :) JK

Still no word from "L", but his main fellow shippers in the ward see him every once and a while, they said that he is starting to turn to his old addictions again. Ugh we've worked so hard on him and he came so far too. I guess this is how God feels when we mess up on something. We also had zone conference with president Morgan, it was good. The theme was urgency, so a lot of the trainings where given on that. We also got some sad news to, we wont be able to go to the temple anymore, we are only allowed to go once in our missions now. So two weeks ago was my last time going, and they said that we where one of the only missions that allowed missionaries to attend to temple once a transfer. So I'm glad that I was able to attend the temple for most of my transfers.

We went to the St. Louis city museum as a zone, it was a blast! The city museum is like a giant play ground for kids and adults, they have obstacles and tunnels and a lot of other things, so it was way fun!  I forgot to bring my camera, so I don't have any pictures. :(

I hope that the Camry can get fixed, and stop having so many problems.

So I've been seeing and hearing some things about the whole Syria thing happening, and that the U.S might be deploying troops over there soon, Is this true? If so will it be effecting Jason, Roscoe and Adam with being deployed?

Well I don't have as much time to email today, since it was Labor Day yesterday, we are given a small window to do it this morning.

Love you all, I hope things work out the best for every one.

-Elder Dixon

p.s. If you see Dayan or Devin, tell them to email me when they have the time. thanks :)

August 27, 2013

Hello family.

 

It sounds like you guys had quiet the adventure this week, I'm glad that it wasn't the pump that failed, aren't those expensive to replace?

 

So we have been doing all of those things with our ward mission leader, even our zone leaders and mission president know about the problem, I think the problem is that we are getting so many baptisms with 3 sets of missionaries in the ward that it looks like he is doing a good job, but it's really just us missionaries and some members, pulling most of the weight, so we don't know what to do, just hope and pray that he changes and has more of a drive to do better.

 

So this week was good and kinda bad, we have a new investigator, his name is Jeff, he was brought to church by his friend, Mike who is a awesome member. We have taught him the first lesson and the second, he didn't come to church because he broke his foot about a week ago, so his pain was acting up on Sunday, typical, but he is way cool and is accepting things very well, and is open. He used to be catholic and then jumped around from church to church, and then he kind of went on the deep end. He wants to change all of that and become more like Mike, cause he sees all the good that he does and stands for. Mike is also a convert and has a similar back ground, so he helps out a lot when Jeff doesn't understand things.

 

Kinda sad news,  on Friday we where teaching Jeff and while we were there the phone goes off and someone leaves a voice mail, so after the lesson we listened to the message and it was from Leland. "He said that he wasn't coming to church no more, thanks for the baptism, it meant nothing to me, I don't want to hear anymore about Joseph Smith and all that bull crap (censured). Don't come looking for me, don't call me, if you do I'll hurt you". It didn't make me happy to hear when he said it meant nothing to him, I know he felt the spirit, and everything else. So that through us for a loop.

 

So as we are walking to dinner, we missed a call and a voice mail, guess who it was? If you guessed Leland, you where right. He apologized for the words he said and was telling us that he has been drinking and is drunk and didn't mean any of the words that he said, and that he still wants to come to church and everything.

 

He came to church but he left in the middle of sacrament meeting, I thought he was going to use the restroom or something, but he actually left the building, and we couldn't find him. We have tried calling him and knocking on his door, but no answer, and this is like the 5th time he as pulled something like this. For real, I haven't talked about it a whole lot because he always comes back, but this time I have a feeling he isn't, so I don't know what to do.  I feel like we've done all we can on our part to help him.  I'm also getting tired of him backstabbing us every time we extend our arms, I don't know if I can trust him anymore.

 

So that was the just of my week, there is more info in the letter I'm sending. Sorry that this email is a little bit late, we had a crazy morning that we didn't have time to do emailing, so we are just doing it really quickly.

Well got to go love you all,

 

-Elder Dixon

August 19, 2013

Hey family. Sounds like you guys had a busy week, picking up Roscoe, going to farewells and doing a lot of traveling, the pictures you sent look good, Roscoe looks really different in those pictures, and he looks like he is getting taller, how tall is he? I might have to cut his nee caps so he isn't taller than me, haha Jk.

So what do you mean by a shut in? when you went on team ups with the missionaries.

I'm glad to hear that Ashley is dating a good guy, she deserves someone that well treat her well.

So this week was pretty good, Leland gave us a scare this week too, so he was baptized on Saturday morning and he was super happy and excited, well later that day I called him to see if he had a ride to church, but he started to tell me that he wasn't coming back to church ever and that this whole thing was him putting on a show and that he had many reason not to become Mormon, and then he hanged up, so I was really down when I heard that come from him, because he has always been excited about every thing we taught him, and he said on multiple occasions that he knew this was true.  So come Sunday we get there early and we are still depressed about the whole thing with Leland, so we help hand out programs and greet people as they come in to church, and lo and behold we see Leland come walking in.  We went and talked to him in a class room to see whats up with him, and why the sudden change again, and it turns out that he had invited his family to come to the baptism and none of them showed up, so he was sad because of that, and he called them after the baptism and talked to them, and the just of it is his family has pretty much disowned him and told him that he is going to hell because of his decision to be baptized in the Mormon church, so he was just really angry and depressed when I called him, and he apologized for the way he acted and he still wanted to be confirmed a member and receive the gift of the holy ghost. so after talking to him for awhile we could tell that he still wanted to go through with this, so the bishop did the confirmation, and he was really happy after that. I just hope that nothing happens between yesterday and today, cause we are going to go to his house today to start teaching him the new member lessons, we are trying to teach all the recent converts the new member lessons, because there are about 30+ converts from 2011 to now, and we feel like the ward isn't supporting us, so we are getting worn out trying to maintain the missionary work with just 3 sets of missionaries. Our ward mission leader only meets with us after church for like 1 minute and then just leaves, so we don't get much of a chance to tell him our concerns and plans for the week. We spent the rest of the week trying to get in contact with the rest of our investigators, but we don't have a good size teaching pool any more cause most of them have been baptized. man I've never had this kind of problem before

So that was the summary of my week, other than that we are doing good, Elder Jerome and I are getting along well, no trouble yet. He is a good missionary from what I can tell, he is from Sacramento California and has been out for 4 months and this is his 2nd area.

We also went to the zoo in forest park on Monday, I'll sent some pictures next Monday, since I forgot my camera at the apartment.

Love you all and hope for the best

-Elder Dixon

P.S. Any more news on the interview you had a couple of weeks ago?

August 12, 2013-Baptism and Transfers

Hey family.

This week was Awesome!!!!!!!!!!!!!! we had two baptisms, Mohammed and Jessica, it was really cool, half of the ward showed up to support them, it was a great baptism.

We also taught Leland the word of wisdom, he accepted it really well, he was excited about it, and I've never seen that happen before, he was telling us that he was already working on quitting smoking and the other stuff, and he asked for a blessing afterwards to help him fight against his addictions.

He also came to church!!! He said he really liked it, and we are moving his date up to the 17th, so this Saturday.

 So time for some sad news, we got transfer calls on Saturday :.( I'm staying, but Elder Toki is leaving to MT Vernon, Illinois. I didn't wat him to leave, he is probably one of my top 3 companions that I have had, he is really cool, and a hard worker, we worked really hard, more than any other area or transfer.

My new companion well be Elder Jerom (pronounced Gerom) all I now is that he has been out for 4 months, so he is relatively new, I'm kinda scared, cause I don't have a big Tongan to intimidate people, now we are just two skinny white boys walking the streets, with man bags We have a new rule in the mission, we cant use backpacks anymore :/ not to happy about that, we have to carry satchels, but we don't have to get them right away, we just need to get them asap, so im going to be looking at some places today, or I'll just convert my back pack into a satchel.

 I'm excited to hear that dad had a great interview, I hope you get it.

It sounds like a lot is happening back home, Ricky has is farewell this week right?

and Dayan and Devin are coming home soon, wish I could be there.

so its not flooding where we are, we haven't had to much rain lately, but it might today. the weather is nice.

well I hope every one is doing great, love you all.

Elder Dixon

Cool cloud that I took a picture of

Back pack blessing at some church, really?

Jessica who was baptized by her boyfriend Preston

Left to right me, Elder Toki, Jessica, Preston and Mohammad

Our district left to right 

Sister Fisher, Sister Linton, Sister Minyard, Sister Collet,

Front row of elders: Elder Terrazas (zone leader) Elder Toki, Elder Gubler, Elder Muir and Elder Vincent, has his face cut off in that one, back row Elder Dahle, Elder Anderson(zone leader) and me, (I'm standing on something, so im not that tall)

"...the plan of salvation..."

8/5/2013
This week was good, we where able to confirm Dian and Amanda and Chris on sunday and they where way happy about it, I love seeing the gospel change peoples life's for the better, it s one of my favorite things about being on a mission. we also taught Leland and it went well we talked about the plan of salvation and he was asking really good questions, so we know that he is learning. we have also been teaching Mohammed( Furats brother) he was able to get permission to start teaching him, its like teaching someone who has been in the church for a long time, he know every thing that we are teaching him, and he is always asking awesome questions.

I'm probably  staying in this area for another transfer, but we will find out on Saturday. and by tomorrow ill be out for 14 months, Crazy.

 and they haven't let us get on Facebook yet to do proselyting, I'm guessing that by the time I go home they well have it up and running.

-Elder Dixon