Semana Ochenta y Nueve (Round Two on da' Bayou!)(Minden, LA)

¿Qué esta pasando mi gente? 

Great news everyone! We got our transfer emails last night, and it looks like I'll be staying here in Minden for another transfer (six weeks) to finish training Elder Patchett. We were both honestly pretty relieved. It's a good area (if not wild at times), and there's still so much we need to do. So we're looking forward to another six weeks togther. One thing that's going to throw us through a loop is that the Brownlee Elders (Elder Meyers and Elder Per) got doubled out and are getting replaced by....... sisters. Unfortunately this means that our district is now a Relief Society. (meaning we're the only elders in the district.....) Pray for us. No I'm sure we'll survive. 

This week we meet some of the craziest, if not THE craziest people of my mission. Buckle up for some stories.

Sister Tokata 

Alright, alright. I've met a lot of whackos on my mission, but this lady takes the cake. She's a super old, super nasty, insane lady (child of God) that lives WAY out in the swamp on the edge of a lake. She lives by herself, because her family left her because they thought she was evil. (and she was teaching their kids evil stuff) During the last Presidential Election she actually ran for president, and instead of reading the bible or book of mormon (she's a former member) she now worships the constitution as holy text. She believes everyones out to kill her, and she was telling us some of the nastiest crudest things I've heard on my mission. I mean I've baptized a wiccam on my mission, but this lady was a legit witch. I was on exchanges with one of my zone leaders when we stopped by, and it was the craziest visit. We literally had to forcefully remove ourselves. She wouldn't let us go.

Dorothy

Dorothy was a referal we recieved Friday night. We called her and she seemed like the sweetest black lady. We went by the next morning to answer her questions about the Book of Mormon, and we got halfway into the Restoration Lesson when she all of a sudden started spouting off the craziest doctrine I've ever heard. She was telling us how because Pharisees accused Christ of being a glutton and wine bibber, and how he healed on the sabbath that he was a horrible, filthy sinner. And that when Jesus explained to the pharisees why he was doing what he was doing that he was just making excuses for he and his disciples sinning. Then she told us that it was actually John the Baptist who was called to be the holy one. "I mean they both had disciples, right? And the wicked one (Jesus) just got what was coming to him on the cross." 

I was not going to let her get away with a remark like that. I hear people slander Joseph Smith all day long, but I'm not going to let them slander Christs name like that. And I'll be honest, I've gotten a lot better at not engaging in bashing and just walking away. But this was about to be an exception.

It was glorious. I've never expounded the doctrine like I did during that lesson. I felt like Paul in Acts 17:2 

2 And Paul, as his manner was, went in unto them, and three sabbath days reasoned with them out of the scriptures,

Now one thing you need to understand about bashing/reasoning from the scriptures, it's never effective...... unless your name is Dorothy! After an hour of intense discussion (in which I was using three bibles at once), she admitted defeat and humbled herself. She gave up her foolish and false beliefs for truth. She realized we were preaching truth, and she asked us to come back next Saturday to teach her more about the Book of Mormon. She was humbled and accepted truth. I couldn't believe it. That never happens. Missionaries 10 - Satan 0 Hopefully next time we can just read the Book of Mormon and the focus on the simple, pure truths found therein.

A lot more happened this week, (including Elder Patchett getting hit on by a gay person) but it would take forever to explain. Here are some quick explanations to the pictures. 

2) Some smashed in the back windshield of the Shreveport Elders car..... Luckily they got it fixed pretty quick!

3) We found this hilarious chiuahua that would make the funniest/angriest faces 😂

4) There's a record player in our apartment, so we've been bumping the black gospel music in our apartment..... it is in fact, the best. 

5) I rescued a turtle crossing the road, and had to take a picture.

6) The Brownlee district! (+Zone Leaders)

 

This work is true ya'll, and I wouldn't want to be anywhere else.

Be blessed, and love life!

Elder Clark Fox

(La Iglesia De Jesucristo De Los Santos De Los Últimos Días)
(102 Emerald Drive Apt. 7 Minden, Louisiana 71055) 

Semana Ochenta y Ocho (I Guess They Have Light Sabers in Louisiana!)(Minden, LA)

Hey ya'll!

In the words of..... well me.... "Another week, another email!" 

This week was swell. Lots of good learning and growing experiences. The work is definietly still progressing here in our swampy neck of the woods, but Satan certainly threw us some fast pitches this week. I swear, all the bashers and anti people in Louisiana had homeing beacons trained on us and they just seemed to follow us around. My personal favorite was this bearded dude who walked up to us at a Mexican restaurant (while we were eating with a member!) and had at us. It was quite the show!  😂

We set another person on date this week, but then we found out she's lesbian, so....... we're still trying to figure things out. 

One day this week someone invited us into their home to show us this sick light saber they had. Pictures were taken. In other fun news, we had interviews with President Dalton last P-Day. After interviews he walked into the gym and pulled out some mad volley ball skills! (He thorghouly shreked us......)

All and all, another great week here in Louisiana. Happy Labor Day! 

Be blessed ya'll! 

Elder Clark Fox
(La Iglesia De Jesucristo De Los Santos De Los Últimos Días)
(102 Emerald Drive Apt. 7 Minden, Louisiana 71055) 

Semana Ochenta y Siete (In Which the Swamp People Gather.... And We Set a Baptismal Date! 🐊)(Minden, LA)

Goodmorning my peoples! 

We had a great week here in Louisiana. Though oddly enough, it really didn't started until Thursday because of exchanges on Tuesday and Zone Conference in Longview, Texas (my last area!) on Wednesday. But luckily that did little to stem the flood of miracles and crazy experiences this week. Here are the highlights! 

- One night we were driving back when we saw this huge armadillo  in the middle of the road. We hit the thing head on! I swear, it must have done more damage to us than we did to it. The thing rolled into a ball and smacked the bottom of our car hard. We parked and jumped out to see the squashed critter, but to our surprise it ran away unharmed. Lesson learned. Armadillos are tough buggers. 

- We had stake conference this week, and Bishop Causse, the presiding bishop of the church, was in attendance. He's from France so it felt right hearing him with his French accent speak to a bunch of Cajun swamp people. Our mission president, President Dalton, and the Dallas temple president, President Elmer, were also in attendance, so that was pretty dope. Great conference. (especially because a member made brisket sandwiches for all the Shreveport missionaries afterwards!) 

- Last night we set the coolest guy on date for September 28th! His name is Phillip Edwards. The elders found him a week before we got here, but they only taught him once. We've been over a couple of times, and on Sunday we were reading in 3 Nephi 11 and we got to the part where Jesus Christ gives authority to Nephi and few other men to baptize, and you could almost see the light bulb of realization light up over his head. He completely understood the idea of authority, and after he told us he believed everything we were teaching was true, we invited him to be baptized and he accepted. He might be the fast turn around convert of my mission, so we're pretty excited! 

- In an effort to conserve miles (Ha! miles...... that's a good one....) we've been biking all over tarnation this week. I don't think my trainee, Elder Patchett, likes it, but hey, it's good for him.

- During our exchange with the Brownlee Elders (Elder Per from Guatemala and Elder Meyers from Idaho) over in Bossier City, I got to use my Spanish again. They have the assignment of starting the Shreveport Spanish group, so they've almost entirely dropped all English in favor of Spanish. So it felt really good to bust out the Spanish again, even if it was just for a day. 

All in all it was a great week! We sweated (a lot), a biked (a lot), and we just did the missionary thing. Before I close want to leave you with a verse and an idea that I've been pondering on a lot. This is Peter's response to Christ right after many people abandon the Savior. 

67 Then said Jesus unto the twelve, Will ye also go away?

   68 Then Simon Peter answered him, Lord, to whom shall we go? thou hast the words of eternal life

Where will we go? Is there anywhere to go but the gospel? Sure you may leave the church, but are you really going to something else or are you just trying to get away from something. Most likely the latter. If we let it, the gospel truly can and will fill our lives. It gives us purpose, it gives us hope. Not just some temporary hope such as we might have that our favorite team wins or that the weather changes, but ultimate hope. The hope that comes from the Atonement of Jesus Christ. I love this gospel, and I love being a missionary here in Louisiana. It's the place to be. 

Catch y'all next week! 

Elder Clark Fox

(La Iglesia De Jesucristo De Los Santos De Los Últimos Días) 

(102 Emerald Drive Apt. 7 Minden, Louisiana 71055)  

Semana Ochenta y Seis (How to Black Mail Your Trainer 101)(Minden, LA)

Goodmorning my peoples!

I don't know what it is, but I'm seriously digging my time here in  Minden! In a way it feels like it's taking back to my very first area in Idabel, Oklahoma with all the the memories and craziness which happened there...... except for it's Louisiana, and ironically possibly my last area. But let's dive into it because this week was a doozy!

This week was lit! One reason I love this area so much is simply because so many people are receptive to the gospel and want to hear our message. We ended up finding 14 new people to teach this week which was the most I've ever found. So that was great! Two of my favorites were, first, a super prepared lady named Linda who invited us right in to her home and called her whole family in to hear our message. It connected perfectly with her, and she was so excited she nearly wouldn't let us leave. Secondly, we were teaching a second lesson with this lady named Crystal, but this time her husband happened to be home so she invited us in and we started to teach the Plan of Salvation. At first the husband was pretty skeptical and wouldn't take us seriously. He kept trying to mess up the lesson, but as the lesson progressed, his attitude slowly began to change. Finally we invited him to say the closing prayer and to ask if these things were true. He said the prayer, but didn't ask, and didn't take it seriously. I wasn't about to let him off the hook so easily. I offered to give a prayer as an example, and then I made him say it again. I know, I'm so mean. He did it, but this time it was different. He said the perfect prayer, asking to know if our message was true, and when he did the spirit filled the room like a bomb going off. It was pretty lit. I could go on and with miraculous stories from this week. (I mean I didn't even mention how we found the Sims family [A family of six!], the Calloway family, etc.) I feel humbled to be allowed to witness and take part in Lords work here in Minden. He's truly pathing our path. 

Another absurdly spirit led story...... Saturday night, we finished our last appointments and drop bys for the night, so we were trying to figure out what to do next. So that's when I told Elder Patchett (my greenie) to lean back in the passenger seat, close his eyes and direct me which way to turn whenever we got to an intersection, and eventually yell stop when he felt prompted we were where the Lord needed us. The goal was to be guided by the spirit. Now for some quick backstory. That morning we had been doing service at this food pantry, and Elder Patchett and I were assigned to go with this baptist family that ran the food pantry to go and deliever food to people that couldn't pick it up themselves.  Now back to the story. We're driving and after ten minutes, Patchett yells out, "STOP!" We get out in this nicer neighborhood, and we walk up to the first door we see. That's when Patchett leans over and whispers, "wouldn't it be crazy if people we did service with this morning lived here?" We knock. They open. And to our utter bewilderment, out of the 13,000 people in Minden it's the very same family we did service with that morning driving around. It was the craziest thing ever. They invited us in, and we had a super great visit. This family has a bunch of influence in Minden, so our branch president was thrilled to hear it went so well, and even invited us up in sacrament meeing yesterday to tell the entire branch about it. It was the craziest thing. The Lord really does guide his servants.

In other less glamourous news, my greenie now has some perfect black mail on me....... One day some members took us out to this Asian Buffet for lunch and we were stuffed afterwards. I don't know what it is, but I swear Asian buffet food has sleeping drugs in it...... After lunch we were finishing up our studies, and it hit me hard. I was studying on the ground, don't ask me why, and ten minutes later when I came to, Elder Patchett had taken this picture of me while I was asleep..... Oh boy, good example his trainer is setting. At least I can now say that I've fallen asleep on the floor of a library! 🤣

All in all, life is going very well, the work is progressing, I only fell asleep once, and I'll be home in less than four months. Stay tuned for next weeks installment. (Hopefully we'll still be here.... our AC unit broke half way through the week......)

Be blessed ya'll!

Elder Clark Fox
(La Iglesia De Jesucristo De Los Santos De Los Últimos Días)
(102 Emerald Drive Apt. 7 Minden, Louisiana 71055) 

Semana Ochenta y Cinco (There Be Some White Dudes at d'Door! + Cockroaches for Breakfast)(Minden, LA)

Goodmornin' my peoples! 

What a week it has been....... Here are some highlights.

- Monday night we were having my final dinner in Longview with two of my favorite investigators, Miguel and Fernanda, when their "new" oven caught on fire and almost blew up. I could picture the head line perfectly, "Two Mormon Missionaries Incinerated In Freak Oven Explosion" Luckily we survived, and managed to drive safely to Frisco the next morning to pick up my trainee.

- My new trainee's name is Elder Patchett, and he's from Mesa, Arizona. He's english speaking, likes basket ball, hates bugs (which is really unfortunate because our apartment is infested with cockroaches....), and is straight out of high school!

- I meet Elder Patchett on Tuesday, but we didn't end up getting to Minden until 10:15 Thursday night, because of a two day mission wide MLC (mission leadership conference) for all the district leaders and zone leaders...... so I had to stick around for that. It was great, and I learned a ton, but I was itching to get out to Louisiana the whole time. So I was happy to finally arrive in the promise land!

- Louisiana is LIT. Everything's run down, and it constantly smells like trash and body odor. The roads are narrow, in bad condition, and the city lay out makes no sense. (There are a ton of five way intersections.....) But Minden itself is the coolest little town!     

- Also!  I ate a cockroach! Friday morning I poured myself a bowl of Captain Crunch, but upon realizing that the milk in the fridge was bad I started to just eat the cereal dry with a spoon. After a few bites, I took another bite except this time the texture felt different. I reached inside my mouth and pulled out this cockroach I had been chewing on. That was a pleasant surprise!  🤣

- The branch here is awesome! Some of the funniest, whackiest people I've met on my mission, but they love the gospel, and want to see the church grow. The old baptist church we meet in is the coolest thing!

I'm so excited to be here, and I've never felt so hungry to teach repentance and baptize converts. It's what I want to do all day everyday, and I'm so happy to have finally found that desire deep down. These are going to some lit months here in Minden!

Be blessed ya'll!

P.S- I'm attaching some pictures from our zone P-Day last week, as well as my new address. Also, the picture of all the green food was Elder Patchett's "greenie meal" that a member made for him!

Elder Clark Fox

(La Iglesia De Jesucristo De Los Santos De Los Últimos Días)

(102 Emerald Drive Apt. 7 Minden, Louisiana 71055) 

Semana Ochenta y Cuatro (TRANSFERS: Doubled in-DL-training on the Bayou! 🦐🐊 #wearenotintexasanymore )(Longview, TX)

Holy gator it happened! 

We got our transfer emails at 10:16 last night, and BAM! I'm off to the heart of Lousiana to teach the cajuns....... doubled in, district leader, and training to boot. This is going to be the most insane transfer of all time, and I can't wait. I've always wanted to go to Lousiana, and this is it. And what a chance it's going to be. Tomorrow morning we're head to Frisco early to go pick up my greenie, than a 200+ mile car ride out to Minden, Lousiana. (The extreme farthest point in the mission.....) 

We cover two small english branches, the Minden Lousiana Branch [which meets in an old baptist church] and the Magnolia Arkansas Branch. (Magnolia used to be it's own area, but then it was added to the Minden, so in reality we cover two super huge areas in the middle of nowhere.) Because we're getting doubled in, neither of us have any idea what the area is like, so it's going to be a wild cajun adventure to figure everything out. I could not be more excited for this transfer! 

In other news, Elder Gibbs and I had a great final week here in Longview. We went on exchanges with both the Marshall and Henderson elders and got a lot of good work done. We had a funeral for one of our Zone Leaders Tuesday after District Council, so that was lit. (Don't worry, that's not a sacrament cloth on the table.....) One night we were cooking shrimp in our apartment, and we tried to use pancake batter as breading but that went south very quickly...... you could hardly breath it was so smokey.(Hence the hebrew/towel head gear in the picture.....) We found a lit book while doing service at the library and we had to take a picture. It was about this guy who had eaten at every BBQ joint in Texas and wrote a book on it. Other than that, we taught some great lessons this week, spoke a lot of Spanish, and knocked a lot of doors. I'm really going to miss Elder Gibbs. Easily one of my favorite people I've met and worked along side on my mission. Love you Elder Gibbs. Thanks for an awesome transfer.

Stay tuned for next week: 

Adventures on da Bayou! 🐊

Elder Clark Fox
(La Iglesia De Jesucristo De Los Santos De Los Últimos Días)
(Saddle Brook - Taylor  1400 H G Mosley #2206  Longview, TX)