Rodeo Week

Elder Wood collected money at the local parade for the food bank

What a great week. We had a amazing lesson with that lady that we ran into on the road that wanted to hear what we have to say. We taught her the restoration and its probably the best lesson ive had since being on a mission. The spirit was SOOO strong! At the end of the lesson we committed her to baptism. It was a picture perfect lesson. This week in St. Paul was rodeo week! They do tons of stuff for rodeo week including a parade at the end of the week. Me and my companion got to be in the parade with the food bank. We volunteer at the food bank each week. We helped them build the float and then walked with them and collected money. It was a blast!  Before it started I saw that there was a Philippines float so I had to go get a picture with it to send to my sister! Also that night we went to the St. Paul rodeo! Its been a great week! We had to speak in church again this week.. It went good. I spoke on the holy ghost and my comp spoke on the Book of Mormon. They had out branch mission leader speak as well because they learned there lesson last time. hahah

The Filipino float (for Courtnee)

 

local Filipino's

Elder Wood and Elder Blatter helped build the float for the food bank

Udo!!

Elder Wood didn't send any pictures this week. So I chose one of my favorites :)

So I'll cut right to it. Udo M.  the investigator of ours that got to go to Utah and sing with the Mormon Tabernacle choir and tour temple square with my family is getting baptized on September 13th!
He had an amazing experience there, and all of his questions and concerns were answered while he was there. We met with him twice this week and have had awesome experiences. Im so stoked! He's the coolest and nicest guy you'll ever meet. The rest of the week has been a pretty average week. We tracted a ton this week and not to much luck, but its all good we have some pretty cool stuff to look forward to.
We just gotta keep working hard. Yesterday we had a cool experience while street contacting. A lady came up to us and just wanted to know what we talk to people about because she said she always sees us walking around. We talked to her about who we were and pulled the golden restoration pamphlet out and talked about our unique message to the world and she was totally interested so we have a return appointment with her this Thursday. We waited until Thursday because we have exchanges Tuesday and Wednesday and I'm not missing out on another appointment. haha
Have a great week
Church is true,
Elder Wood

Brother M. on his visit to temple square

Singing as a guest of the tabernacle choir

Cold Lake

Elder Wood said this was the best pizza he's ever eaten!!

The District

Its been a good week! 
So we had exchanges this week so I was up in Cold Lake for the first part of the week and I love it there! The missionaries up there have a weight set in there apartment so I LOVE going there! And then the next day me and my companion had to go into the city because he had a doctors appointments and also we had ZTM so we stayed at the mission home on Wednesday. My companion has had stomach cramps so he thought it was kidney stones. Turns out that he was fine, no stones.   ZTM was great. Its always nice to see other missionaries. One of our investigators here in St. Paul spent time in Utah this week and my parents were able to take him around temple square and to the Ogden temple open house and he got home Saturday night and came to church the next day so we were able to talk a little bit but we have a lesson with him tonight that I cant wait for! Hes the coolest guy and also one of the most active people in our branch. HE"S READY. Ill let you guys know next week how it goes. Also Sunday we had a lesson with 2 ladies we tracted into in Elk Point that went awesome!!! Finally. I"ll also keep you updated on them as well. While we were in Elk Point this week tracting I heard a bunch of guys talking in a garage and I noticed that they were Philippines and were speaking Tagalog and I remembered we had a Tagolag restoration pamphlet so I ran back to the car and got it and talked with them. Turns out they're from a city kind of by Laoag where Courtnee my sister is serving so we talked about that and had a good discussion with them. No wonder my sister is having such good luck, Filipino people are so easy to talk to.... haha That pretty much sums up my week. 
Have a great week everyone!!
Elder Wood.

I Don't Drink Coke

Meet Garry, the Branch mission leader. We had dinner with them out at the lake by St. Paul called Lac Bellview way sick

Soo this week has been a slow week... Nothing to exciting happened all week. We worked everyday and haven't had the most luck but something pretty interesting happened yesterday while tracting. 
We knocked on this door and a guy answers it and we talk and introduce ourselves and we start kinda going back and forth because hes way into the bible and not meaning for it to go this way it gets kinda heated so hes like fine. Come in lets talk. So we go in and his wife and another couple are sitting there and hes like we got some Mormons here that are going to answer some questions for us. hahaha im just thinkin to myself im so screwed. I dont know the bible well at all. Hes like I'd offer you some tea or a coke but I know you dont drink that stuff so you can have water. My companion is  like NOPE we drink coke! You have to realize its kinda heated and I dont drink pop but this guy was trying to get to us so we both said we would love a Coke! So we both sit down drink our Cokes and talk. I havent had a coke since I was about 10. It felt horrible. So we sat and bible bashed (well mostly my companion) and I just once in a while threw my two sense in then listened to them go back and forth. hahaha I loved it!! They were throwing bible scriptures everywhere... I had to be careful what I said tho because I'm not the best at backing it up. I never listened in seminary and got my bible scripture masteries down and my companion did and it helped im so much! I kinda regret it now... So things were heated for about an hour strait so im finally just said This isnt going to go anywhere, I think we both know that. We testified what we knew to be true and told them we had a dinner appointments we were late to. We left them two Books of Mormon and a restoration pamphlet. Before we left the lady said lets pray! So out of know where she starts doin some halleljuia prayer and the three other people were sayin amen after everything she said and I honestly couldnt help myself. I  was about to burst out laughing. hahahah such a cool experience. 
Well that really was the coolest thing that happened this week. Life is great here in St. Paul.
Have a great week,
Elder Wood

Exchanges

Elder Wood

This week we had exchanges on  with the zone leaders and i stayed up here in St. Paul. 
Elder Sorenson is who i was with and he is total stud of a missionary. We Tracted the whole time pretty much because we didnt have any appointments but we found 3 new potential Investigators in one night! It was great. We already taught one of them again about the restoration and things are going great with her:) 
Things are starting to pick up here in the St. Paul area! We have a lot of less actives in the area so that has been a big focus lately to meet with all of them and get things goin so that is what we have been doin a lot lately. 
This week the primary president asked if i would teach in sharing time about the Holy Ghost so this week I prepared for that and then Friday night our 2nd councelor in the branch presidency called and asked us if we would speak in sacrament meeting... So last second we had to throw stuff together and get talks ready for Sunday. I spoke on the role of members in missionary work and my companion spoke on the Plan of Salvation. Kinda random but it was good. Our branch takes about 15 min to get started and get through the sacrament. I wasnt even thinking about that! I spoke first and talked for like 15 min then i got done and we still had like 35 min! hahaha i sat down and my companion look at me and just said. " you suck so bad. " I looked at the clock and I almost lost it up on the stand. hahahaha:) by time he got done we had like 20 minutes till it ended so our branch president just got up and talked a little bit. It was good sacrament though. And the talk in sharing time went great! We had a big primaryon Sunday because of visitors (10 kids). 
That was my week in a nut shell... 
Have a great week,
Elder Wood

Studying hard

Answered Prayers

Elder Wood in his workout....tights?

Its been a good week. Since last week wasn't the most successful week we worked a lot harder this week to find investigators. We did a ton of service this week as well. We do service for the local food bank and they got a huge shipment in of like 30 pallets of food so we unloaded food FOR EVER on Tuesday. We got a big huge box of little honey packets so thats good! Instead of peanut butter and jelly everyday I can go with the change up:) After doing service for most of the day on Tuesday we went out to a town called Elk Point where we thought we would go tracting for about 30 min before our dinner appointment. When i woke up that day i just had this way good feeling that we were gona find somebody so i was way excited! We knocked a street and didnt have any luck and we had to go soon so i was determined that we were gonna find somebody. We walked across the street to a lady watering her garden so i introduced ourselves and told her about who we are and she actually seemed interested so we talked a little bit more and then she talked about how shes been curious about religion recently and has been listening to religion radio stations and such trying to find more information on questions she had.  She talked about the bible so i introduced her to the Book of Mormon and talked a little bit about it and how it compares to the bible and how it contains the full gospel of Christ and the answers to all her questions. She said I've always wondered what the he** I'm doing here!!" I got so happy. Once again I said this book has those answers. Then she said "I'm gonna have to get a copy of one of those!" I gave her my Book of Mormon and a restoration pamphlet and asked if we could come back tomorrow and talk a little bit more about it. She said we could! I walked away from that house soo happy knowing that my prayers were answered and that we could finally teach somebody! We got to the next house and i remembered that the next day i had exchanges and i was going up to Cherry Grove. I was sooo mad!! Words can explain how mad i was. Its okay though..  when i got back from exchanges my companion said she had a no show and then was busy so she said to pray for her when to come back...? I dont even care cuz now i get to teach her the first lesson and baptize her:) oh and my companion told me this week that i have to much greenie fire... not gonna argue that one but St. Paul definitely humbles that fire. haha sorry to go off on one experience but that was probably the highlight of the week... Exchanges were sweet Cherry Grove is a way cool place. Its a huge Mormon community in the middle of no where right by Cold Lake. Our apartment there is in a basement of an old farm house with an awesome couple that lives there. It was pretty much just like visiting grandma and grandpas house. That night there we played floor hockey with a nonmember family that the missionaries are teaching up there. It got way intense! We were still in our missionary clothes and by time we were done we were soaked in sweat! And also the Elder i was with broke his foot while playing so i spent that whole night there in the hospital waiting with him.. We were there til about 1 in the morning but we got to sleep in the next day so it was all good. And they drive a 2014 Chevy truck so i got to drive that around for two days. It was sweet. And one of the Elders in my zone hooked me up with a Enya CD that pretty much made my life. We listen to it over and over in the car. My companion hates me. That was pretty much my week...
Have a great week everyone,
Elder Wood

Hail in St. Paul

A Day In The Life.....

7-11 Free Slurpee Day

Apparently Elder Wood is not doing his dishes :/

Todays been a slooow week. Good week though. We did'nt have one lesson this week. Every single person was a no show. haha its so frustrating! Yesterday we tracted for about 7 hrs and didnt get one potential investigator. We do lots of service around here for the community and were the go to people for our little branch whenever people need help with something so service keeps us pretty busy a lot.

My day kinda goes like this. Wake up workout. Go to the local track or park and do pull ups on the jungle gym toy then we study for three hours. Every missionary that starts out is on a 12 week program that allows you and your companion to have an extra hour of study. Then we do service or eat lunch and then tract till dinner. After dinner we tract and then go to bed. Then repeat every day:) Days go forever but the weeks go by fast! So yea i dont have any stories to tell about investigators cuz our 2 investigators are on trips:) were gona keep working hard though to get some more! These last couple days ive been starving cuz i eat all my food within just a couple days! haha i had to learn the hard way this week. And they forgot to pass the clip board around this week in relief society so we pretty much ate chips and apples for dinner all week. Church was awesome this week. The patriarch came and spoke with his wife and they both gave really good talks. He spoke on marriage and then to me and Elder Blatter about finding the right girl to marry. Yes he talked to us because were the only two in sacrament that are close to marrying age. haha we actually had a lot of people this week in sacrament because two families were visiting. Everybody goes crazy at church when something like that happens here. It reminds me of the movie cars. haha they doubled all the young mens and young womens and primary classes just from there families. 7/11 was this week so you already know i made my companion drive to 7/11 to get us free slurpees! Oh i guess something exciting happened today! I found a pull up bar at the local store so now i dont have to go to the jungle gym toy thing. haha

Thank you everybody for the great support back at home im grateful for such awesome friends and family, im grateful for this gospel and the opportunity to serve the lord for two years and ive already seen it change me, for the good. Im grateful for Jabari Parker going to the Bucks, im grateful for Lebron going back to the Cavs. There is so much to be grateful for.   -Elder Wood

 

 

Elder Wood's apartment

Happy to see that he made his bed