Adam

Yeah the subject title is creative, I know. 

Well hi there everyone! This week has been awesome!

Okc 3 is awesome and so is Elder Washburn! It's been fun here this past week, giving Book of Mormon's to people at the dam, getting our bikes stolen (woo hoo mission life), changing apartments, being with Elder Mursett now that he's in my zone and shopping for winter clothes (which I have never done before. Also sorry mom and dad for the bill you're about to get). Don't worry about the stolen bikes. Just like Ryan believes that Satan stole his chromosome, I think Satan stole our bikes. But we filed a police report and we're still doing missionary just the same! and we got upgraded to sister's bikes that have no brakes!!!

But what a great place to be in! The missionaries here are truly amazing and fun and hard working people! The ward is also fantastic with the love I've been able to feel and the absolute fun it has been to be with them! Such funny, family oriented and goofy people that I absolutely love, they remind me of our ward back home a bit!

I think my highlight of this week was the night of our Halloween party. I got to meet most of the ward members and it was just way fun getting to know them and love them. Just like that Sister in Guthrie, I just felt pure joy and love for these people! I bonded with Brother Nygren the most, our young mens leader. He has a cousin in our stake that we made a connection with. I think he taught my mission prep class a couple of times before Brother O'hare. Anyway it was just way fun feeling the Spirit and feeling that pure love of Christ for this ward. I know it's going to be an awesome transfer! 

This week in personal study, I came across Ether 12, my new favorite chapter in the Book of Mormon. It talks all about faith and "making weak things strong" but I think my favorite thing was the focus on the three things that are essential to salvation. Faith, hope and charity. I'm going to be studying these Christlike attributes this week and I'd like to extend the invitation for anyone who reads this to do it as well. I'd love to hear what you learn and I'll share what I learn as well. All three of those attributes are kind of deep I know but I feel like they are something we can all work on. can't wait to hear what you all learn!

Love, 

Elder Wold

Transfer Day!!!!

Transfers!!!!

Adam’s new address is:
For letters:
7917 NW 21st St. Apt H14
Bethany OK 73008

For packages:
 1967 W. 33rd St. Ste:100
Edmond OK 73013

Transfered to OKC3!

Good morning everyone! Man transfers are coming up this Wednesday and it's about to get crazy here! So many new changes! As you can tell from my subject line, I will no longer be in Guthrie, but I will be in OKC 3, wherever that is! My new companion's name is Elder Washburn, and I have no clue who that is! So throwback to 3 months ago to not knowing anything or having any idea of what's going on. It'll be fun though. Guthrie will be missed for sure and Elder Kilmer was a great trainer and companion. I've learned so much from his experiences and counsel, I'm so glad I was with him. There are some people here that I'm really going to miss. Who knows though, maybe I'll be headed back here towards the end of my mission. That'd be exciting!

This last week was interesting to say the least. We probably only got 3 hours of proselyting time in our area if even that. This was due to getting a new truck (a sweet white 2016 toyota tacoma instead of the stupid 2015 nissan frontier), being on exchanges like 4 out of the 7 days in this week and a surprise visit to Ponca city for some Marshalese people to visit. The exchanges went super well, lot's of cool contacts with people in Enid. There was a specifically fun contact with Elder Larsen (spanish speaking missionary) where I got to talk to a 2 year old in spanish about the plantas on his gate and how there were cuatro of them and they were all verde. I said more but it was just kind of fun being able to somewhat talk to this kid (I guess 2 year old spanish is my level, thanks spanish 2 class).

My favorite part of this week would have to be Sunday, when I was able to give a talk on the sacrament. I'm sure I hurried it and spoke super fast, but I think it went well. But it was a not about that for me, I was able to learn a lot as I studied for it all. It's cool how when you really seek and try to understand what the Lord would have you say, you'll bust out this 4th draft talk that was waaaaaay different than the first draft! We also had the chance to teach Gospel Principles class and we had a great discussion about the best topic in all the gospel... MISSIONARY WORK!!! It was a cool discussion, everyone in the room participated and we all learned something. In the end, it all came back to love and remembering that we as members of the church should do all we can to remember that in reality, we are all brothers and sisters and that we should do all we can to help these spiritual siblings receive the gospel that has helped us so much in our lives.

All these lessons, talks and experiences have taught me some things that I really found I need to work on and improve on to further improve not only my service as a missionary, but improve me as a son of God. I need to truly love others and also keep that perspective of us being all spiritual siblings. I find that a lot of times, I worry and focus solely on myself and that's really when the mission gets hard. This scripture has helped me to remember what it's all about (sorry if I've already shared it). "He that findeth his life shall lose it, and he that loseth his life for my sake shall find it" Matthew 10:39. I will be doing the latter part of this scripture as I try and see people for who they truly are and love everyone as Christ would. I know as I do so and as anyone does so, we will ffind true joy in this life!

love you alll,
Elder Wold

Short letter this week

 I love the emails every week and hearing from so many people! You guys are awesome and I hope you have a great rest of the week! I'm loving it out here and these members are truly amazing, I am really loving them! They treat us so well and just are a joy to be around! Super proactive too! 

I'll leave you with my favorite scripture right now that I've based my studies off of in John 13:34-35:

"34 A new commandment I give unto you, That ye love one another; as I have loved you, that ye also love one another.

35 By this shall all men know that ye are my disciples, if ye have love one to another. " 

Love, 

Elder Wold

With Elder Munns, Elder Mazzarelli and Elder Kilmer.

Elder Wold's group of missionaries who arrived in August and have graduated and are no longer "greenies"(or new missionaries)!

Guest Speaker...

Hey hey hey! Got to love it here in Oklahoma! 

Oh where to begin! Hmmmmmm

I did a lot more this week when it comes to planning and figuring out what we should do, (that can be kind of hard). My companion is awesome and has been pushing me. Of course I don't like it, but it's necessary to grow and to progress as a missionary. 

I got to go on exchanges in Enid with a Marshallese speaking Elder. That was super interesting...

I had no clue what was going on all day with that language but I did learn something cool at a lesson. The family we taught were members except for the mom, who we were there to teach. Elder Watterson asked the man to bear his testimony and when he did the Spirit was so strong! I had no clue what he said, but I knew it was true! So that was a cool little tender mercy. Just proof that this gospel is so real and so important. 

We'll come back to Saturday.

Sunday was pretty great too! Fast and testimony meeting was great and full of the Spirit. I can definitely say with a surety that power in a testimony really comes in sharing it and keeping it short. That leads to my most favorite part of the week and what I learned on Saturday.

Saturday, we had an all day event with all 200 missionaries in the mission meeting at the Moore building. We had a guest speaker who was actually really good friends with President Mansell. It was phenomenal and the way this guest speaker taught was fantastic! Instead of lecturing us, he had us ask questions and then he would answer them and ask us questions! And we had him all to ourselves for 3 hours! There, I truly learned how a testimony should be borne, it should be about the Father, the Son and or the Holy Ghost and the Restoration, and that it should be things we have come to know by the Spirit. Long super crazy stories aren't actually some requirement to a powerful testimony. I totally applied this on Sunday at testimony meeting and it was a great experience for me, I'd highly recommend it, especially because that's how he recommended it. 

That night we had a new member firseside with that same guest speaker.  There were so many people there, it was great! Same format of teaching, a lot of questions were asked and I know everybody learned.

(okay you can look at the pic now to see who the guest speaker was. It was more fun this way)

Both of these meetings, the one with us and the one with the new members was great! I truly know Elder Bednar is an apostle of the Lord! The Spirit was so strong and being in his presence was so amazing. I learned a lot about myself and what I need to be doing from both meetings and I am so grateful he was able to come! I truly loved his testimony, it was actually very simple and basic, no stories or anything, just what he knew to be true. But it had so much power to it. We were also blessed with an Apostolic blessing in both meetings and they were very powerful and heartfelt. What a blessing it was to have him there! 

In Elder Bednar's fashion of testimony, here is what I've come to know by the Spirit:

I know that this church is truly run by Prophets and Apostles of the Lord. I know God cares about each and every one of us and does not forget a single person. He is a true source of confidence and power in our lives. I know that Christ is truly a way back to our Father in Heaven, as long as we turn to Him and seek Him in all we do. I believe Christ suffered for us and knows all of our pains and sufferings, and that he is the remedy for all our hardships here in this mortal state. And that as we follow Him and "look unto [Him] in every thought, doubt not, fear not" we will be able to have true joy and successfully and righteously "graduate from mortality".

Love you guys!

-Elder Wold

Great week!

Yowza yowza yowza, I have got a lot to write this week!

So first off, GREAT week! Lot's of stuff happened and I'm really enjoying the mission. It's always sunny here. We had interviews on Wednesday and I was able to meet with President and Sister Mansell and got some counsel from them. They are so great and truly help so much. Right after interviews we got to go to the temple!!!! That was so great! The Lord really was very generous to me too because I got to watch a video that I hadn't already seen! Great session. 

That night and the next day Elder Leavitt and I were together on exchanges in my area (he's been out as long as me, GREENY POWER). We had a great dinner message and then got to do some quick proselyting in Guthrie until the night was over. Then Thursday started. We got up, made plans and then headed out. Elder Leavitt and I took mostly east Guthrie while Elder Kilmer and Elder Larsen took west. We met a lot of great people but nothing too promising. At about 2 we were still biking around trying to talk to people, we got some names and numbers from people but nothing very promising. It was a bit discouraging when nothing panned out. We headed back to the West side and went to go clean up the yard of a struggling but awesome member. We didn't want to talk to her because she had recently found out she was getting a divorce and had way too much stuff going on for that to be happening (she's very sick, has two kids under 2, doesn't have a job, has some neighbor problems with dealing drugs and other things I can't say). We biked onto her street to find that she was sitting on the porch. She actually waved us down and motioned for us to come over. We started talking and shot the bowl for a while. Eventually she brought up her recent issues with the husband and really unloaded on us. She shared how she was so overwhelmed and felt like she was nothing. Why did all this bad stuff happen to her? She shared how she had done so much good in her life, that she is a good person at heart and so willing to be better, why would God do this. She kept saying how if God would only give her direction, she would do so in an instant. Now this is where I have a hard time finding the words to describe what I felt. I have re-written this part multiple times in my head but this will have to suffice. 

As I listened, I heard and felt the same thoughts and feelings in my life. Obviously she's had a much harder life but I've asked the same questions. Sometimes this life just seems so stupid and we ask what the heck God, I'm doing my best, why won't you give me some direction? Why won't you help me? Why have you abandoned me? 

But then my heart filled and reminded me that we are all sons and daughters of God. I felt and truly know right from that moment that she is so very special to our Father. I have never felt so much love for one person in my entire life and I know it was because it wasn't my own, it was Christ's love I felt. That He is very aware of her and that He knows what He is doing. I don't care how simple that message should be, it's something we forget. We have a divine purpose. I shared that with her and she started to see. Then Elder Leavitt told her how God has a plan for each of us. We may not know the plan but He NEVER forgets us. The Spirit was very strong under that porch. 

That story was long and maybe unnecessary, but it taught me something. A lot of times we tend to forget why we're hereon this earth. We get caught up in this world and get in waaay too deep. Even out on a mission. I loved this General Conference and it truly had some fantastic talks. Great points on faith and invitations to draw closer to Christ. I've learned a lot on what I need to change and how to better center myself on Christ. But I think the most important and meaningful talk to me was Neil A. Andersen's closing to conference. He truly spoke to me when he reminded us how important conference is, how "we don't know everything, but we know enough", and how important it was to heed the words that we had heard. Then he talked about Robert D. Hales and his recent death. The way he put it was something along the lines of "he has graduated from this mortal experience". What a marvelous phrase! What a great way to look at this life and remember that it is merely a probationary state. It gave me a remembrance of who I truly am, who I strive to become and how this life here, although painful and difficult, is so important. 

We are all sons and daughters of God. This life is a hard one. But remember, it is only a small thing compared to what is in store. Until then, we need to prepare, by centering our lives on Christ and helping others on the way. I truly love this gospel and know that Christ is the remedy to our hardships. Love you guys!

Elder Wold