August 6, 2018

Deuces---22

Hey Y'all..

Want to start off by saying thanks for all the birthday wishes!! Hard to believe I'm 22.. Mission birthdays are weird, and I've been blessed to have 3 of them lol. God really likes to tease me ;)

I cant believe the day for me to leave the West Virginia Charleston Mission has come. There has been days that I've felt like I was never going to leave, and then there were days that I thought it came way to fast. I'm so grateful for my mission and all that it has taught me. I want to walk you through each of my areas and what I have learned from each of them.

Ashland Kentucky:

I really learned how to become a missionary work was and how to go about it. This was easily my most ghetto area but I also learned what it meant to love others there and not to look at them through the worldly eyes, but through the eyes of my Savior. 

Vinton Virginia:

Man Vinton was a hard area.. But it was in this area that I found family away from home. I got to teach Abbie and see her grow so much in the gospel, I got to see their family's life be changed by the gospel and see them progress. I got to see what training was all about and had to deal with a lot of change. I feel that it was in this area that I truly grew the most due to all that I went through. 

Galax Virginia:

hahah Galax was a party. talk about a beautiful area. In this area I learned how to be my self and still do missionary work, I gained a love for the "country folk" and leaned that there is so much more to life than all the materialistic things that are all around us. Though I didnt see very much success in this area, I definitely had so much fun getting to meet so many different types of people. 

Clarksburg West Virginia:

My first Zone Leader area, and my first time experiencing what WV is all about haha! I loved this area, It was hear that I truly learned who God wanted me to be. I learned that its ok to show people that you have struggles, I realized that God molded us to be our own person and that we shouldn't have to be like others to be like. I learned how to lead by love and compassion. I grew so close with so many people and laughed more than I ever have!

Buena Vista Virginia:

Mini Provo haha, what an amazing place with amazing people. The spirit that resides in this valley in amazing. I have been blessed to have met so many amazing members of church here and have been able to see so many people recognize the blessings of the restored gospel. I also truly found what it means to minister and serve people. I found that God has a lot in store for me and that as I put my trust in him, he will bring about great things in my life. I have loved it here!!

There is so many more things that I could say about my mission. I'm grateful for all the many people that I have been able to rub shoulders with and learn from. You all have changed my life in so many ways. I think the thing that I have learned the most on my mission is that the Savior truly did suffer for all of us and that because of him, every day is a new day that we can write our own story. We have a Father in Heaven who truly loves us and is in every detail of our life, and is waiting for us to submit to his will and love him. I know that this Gospel is for all of God's children, and I know that with out a shadow of a doubt that the Book of Mormon is true. Missions are an amazing experience, and as you allow it to mold who you and and change your life, it will be something that is ever so sacred to you. If any of you on here are thinking about serving a mission... DO IT. but first pray and ask Heavenly Father if its what he needs of you at this time. I want to thank all of you guys for being there to love and support me and to help me through this time of my life. Because of you and my Savior, I have found strength each and every day, and can say I made it. 10 white shirts, 9 pairs of slacks, 6 pairs of shoes, 2 suits, 12 companions, and 5 areas later.. I made it! Thank you. I look forward to seeing you all again here soon. I love you all so much. 

2 Timothy 4:6-7

6 For I am now ready to be offered, and the time of my departure is at hand.

7 I have fought a good fight, I have finished my course, I have kept the faith:

God be with you till we meet again,

Elder Robbie Wilson

Ya boi is dyin..

The funeral

Elder Moody and I.. Zoey was telling us about her pink doughnut haha

(My Favorite)

Mission accomplished and served with honor!

July 30, 2018

GETTIR DONE!!

Hey Y'all!

Hard to believe July is just about over. Next week at this time ill be writing my last weekly email to y'all. Weird to think, so we are going to stop talking about that now lol.

This past week was great! Miracle after miracle. I love being a missionary and being on the front line of God's love being made manifest to his children. He truly does love us and wants the best for all of us. And to think all we have to do is just look to him and align our will with his and BOOM. He helps us out! I love it. 

Joel and Kelly made it to church with us this week. It was super good. They loved it and said they plan on being back next week. The Saturday before church we had a lesson with them and Bishop and Sister Hanson at the church and it went so well! they are planning on getting married August 18th and will be baptized September 8th. I'm so excited for them and the steps they are making in their life. I love being able to see the gospel change their countenance and who they are! truly is remarkable!

Troy is still on date to be baptized this weekend, Hes super excited to enter the waters of baptism and start preparing for the temple. I have felt so blessed to have been apart of his conversion. Hes a wonderful guy and has a rock solid testimony of the gospel. that's what missionary work is all about. Getting to see others strengthen their faith in Christ, and in turn having yours strengthened along the way. I'm looking forward to his baptismal service and being able to confirm him this Sunday. GOD IS GOOD!

other than that this week has been pretty good, the time is flying and I'm about to start my last full week as a Missionary. I'm ready to give it my all this week and see all the blessings that heavenly father has in store not only for me but for all the amazing people here in Rockbridge County. I want to close this weekly with a scripture from the Book of Mormon. 

Jacob 5:62

  62 Wherefore, let us go to and labor with our might this last time, for behold the end draweth nigh, and this is for the last time that I shall prune my vineyard.

Love you guys. till next week!!

Elder Wilson

We had to enter stuff in the planner and I got bored lol

Tracting in VA be like..

July 23, 2018

Miracles are all we know!

What up Y'all!

I wanna start this letter off by saying shout out to the little bro for getting his mission call to the Philippines Loaog Mission! I think I spelt that right.. Anyway, I'm pumped for you man!! you are going to do great things out there, you're going to see and experience amazing things in the service of the Lord! It truly is an amazing blessing to be numbered in his missionary force.

Well things here in BV have been great haha. This passed week honestly feels like one big dream. Crazy how fast the weeks are flying. I only have 2 more of these things left! We have been doing a lot of service for a lot of the members here which has been fun. Its given us a lot of opportunities to get to know some of the members. Since we cover so many wards we have close to 900 members we have to get to know. So we take every chance we can get haha. Other than service we have had the opportunity to teach a lot of people this past week. We also saw a lot of miracles as well.  Elder Moody and I were walking home one night and we just had a lesson with a less active part member family and when the lesson was over it was like 9 o'clock and we still had like a 20 minute walk home haha, they asked us for a ride but for some reason we felt prompted to just walk home and both wondered why.. anyway when we were about 4 minutes out from our car this guy stopped us in the street and said "Hey guys I just wanna shake your hand real quick, I met with missionaries in the past and I wanna start meeting with you again so me and my FAMILY can be baptized!"  What a blessing that was! The next day he was put on date for the 8th of September. 

We had exchanges with the Lexington Elders as well and that was a blast. I got to go with a new missionary who is in his first transfer of his mission. His name is Elder Bartholomew, and hes a stud! It was cool to see his ambition for the work. It made me think back to my first transfer in the mission and reminded me how exciting everything was at the point of the mission. Anyway on our exchange we talk to one of the coaches for the SVU football team and set a return appointment with him for Sunday evening. When Elder Moody and I went back last night we taught him about the Book of Mormon and what it is and what it can do for us, and when we finished he said "You know the first time I heard about his I was skeptical about it, But hearing it now I think this actually could be true!" He committed to read the BoM and said that he wanted to meet again the next Sunday!

Miracle after miracle. The Lord truly is blessing us this transfer. I'm so grateful to be apart of this wonderful work. I love being able to stand said by side with the prophet Mormon in saying "Behold, I am a disciple of Jesus Christ, the Son of God. I have been called of him, to declare his word, among this people, that they might have everlasting life." (3 Nephi 5:13) Feeding the sheep brings joy and everlasting happiness. I invite you all to reach out to a loved one this week that stands in need of love. Minister to them and help them feel the love of God. I promise as you do so you will find joy.

I hope you have a great week! I love you all :)

Elder Robbie Wilson

Betty, Elder Linford, and I 

Betty, Elder Linford, and I 

Elder Bartholomew and I

July 16, 2018

We Came To Play

What up Y'all.

well holy cow what a week its been! Hard to believe that its already Monday again. This past week was super crazy. We had so much happen and saw a lot of success. the windows of heaven is definitely opening up! We had to do a ton of planning this week which is both good and bad. Not gonna lie its getting harder and harder to find a desire to plan haha but I love it because when we plan things the spirit is so much stronger than when we just "Holy Ghost it". Any way ill try to get everything in here with out writing a huge letter haha.

SO to start off the week, since we are on the SVU campus we get to see all the church events happen. Well these past few weeks they have been having EFY and one of the counselors asked us to bear our testimony to all the EFY kids. So Wednesday morning we got to share our testimony in front of 350 teenagers. haha it was a lot of fun and a great experience to teach and expound our testimonies to so many youth, many of which are planning to go on missions! after that we had exchanges with the Lexington Elders, that was a great success. We were able to get into a lot of people homes that we have been trying for a while to see. Gotta love the exchange magic :)

Thursday we had Zone Conference which was my last one. We had to teach for a total of an hour at that, which was a great time! afterwords I had to bear my departing testimony to the zone which was a lot harder that I thought it was going to be. after zone conf we had exchanges with the APs which was great. I got to go with Elder Linford who is one of my good mission buddies. He goes home with me and he served in BV a year ago so he was saying his last good byes to a few people. But we found a total of 2 people on that exchange so it was a great success!

Yesterday elder moody and I had to speak at church. He spoke in BV, I spoke in YSA and Rockbridge. I never thought Id speak twice on one Sunday, but anything is possible right? ahah It was a good experience. By the time 9 o' clock rolled around last night we were both wasted and ready for bed. All in all it was a good week though, We got facebook which was really weird.. still don't know how to feel about that, we picked up 5 new investigators this week. and Troy is still progressing very well towards baptism. I love teaching people the message of the restoration. What a blessing it is to be used a tool in the lords hands! I'm grateful for all of you in my life. I hope you are all doing well!!

Have a good week, I love y'all :)

Elder Robbie Wilson

I saw brother Hodge when we were doing bishop store house! love that man!

Wednesday EFY hashtag was #friendsdayWednesday and they told us to get a selfie with one of your besties so me and Moody hit it up with the team Jesus selfie :)

Elder Moody and I found a colored school building in the middle of Rockbridge county 

Some of my pals at my last zone conference :)

July 9, 2018

That's Just My Life

Sup Y'all.

This past week was HECTIC. I'm so tired, we have been grinding day in day out. The 4th was super bomb. We spent it with a family called the Clark's. They invited their non member friends over so that was a good time, we got to share a message about the Book of Mormon with them after the dinner, though they weren't all that interested, they were happy that we shared a message of hope with them! Afterwords we watched some fireworks, that was lit.. haha punny!

MLC was super good! we talked a lot about consecration and the effect it plays on us as missionaries and each of our individual areas. President and Sister Lindhardt are truly amazing people and really know how to urge and inspire us to be better every time they teach us. I'm grateful for their influence on us as leaders and missionaries as well. Hard to believe this week will be my last Zone Conference. Time is a weird concept isn't it? time is just a memory.

So the smart phones transition has been interesting. Every time I use the thing I feel like I'm breaking the rules in someway.. its interesting haha but they are going to do a lot of good for the work. There are so many new tools and ways to reach out and invite people to the Gospel. Gets me amped to come home and apply all the things that I'm learning!

for my spiritual though I want to share a scripture from the New Testament.

30 And if thy right hand offend thee, cut it off, and cast itfrom thee: for it is profitable for thee that one of thy members should perish, and not that thy whole body should be cast into hell

When the Savior is talking about our Hands he is talking about the friends and people in our life that may keep us from finding happiness or living the Gospel.  I want to invite you all to look at the people in your life. Those who may bring you sadness, those who are negative, liars, thieves, prideful, anyone that may keep you from living the life you want to live, to cut them out of your life. I know that may seem harsh or it may seem like a hard thing to do. But there is no sense in having people in your life that keep you from happiness. I promise you that if you do this you will find the happiness in your life that you are looking for. All you need is family and the Savior. Never trust in the arm of flesh. They will always let you down. I hope y'all have a good week.

Elder Wilson

Elders in my MLC Group

Happy 4th!

The Baety's from our ward

July2, 2018

July!

Hey Y'all!

Well this week I will be hitting my 23rd month mark.. that's just crazy to me! Feels like its been 2 months since my year mark. I look back at my mission with great love and appreciation. Just to think that none of this wouldn't have happened had I chosen not to go on a mission! Crazy.

So this past week was pretty nuts! We had transfers which is always a hand full. Plus on top of that we had to make the transition to working the three different areas. I have to admit its going to be super nice having a car. I look forward to not being in the humidity as much. Plus it will help us to get a lot more work done! so there is benefits to everything. The cool thing about covering 3 different areas means we cover 4 different wards too.. Yesterday we sat through 7 hours of church.. talk about a spiritual feast! haha it was great, but by the end of it we were wore out! It did make it a lot easier to fast though haha. 

This past week we put one of our new investigators on date! his name is troy and he is a YSA. He was taught by the other Elders before they left but he is a stud! hes on date for the 4th of August so we are super excited about that! if all goes well there is no doubt in my mind that he will be ready for that date. It will be a cool day because that will be my last weekend in the mission. #blessup

other than that things seem to be going pretty good! we are working out guts out as usual. This week we have Missionary Leadership Council and will be getting our smart phones so that should be a fun transition. Next week we have zone conference where the rest of the mission will get their phones. So it will be a crazy couple of weeks! it'll be over before you know it!

I hope y'all have a great week. Remember to read the Book of Mormon daily. The Lord is in the details of your life. He loves you and wants you to turn to him. DO IT! you will never regret choosing Jesus in your life :) I love you all and hope you have a good week :)

Elder Robbie Wilson

Our old District

Hammocking 

June 25, 2018

Blessed Up

Hey Y'all.

I don't even know how to feel about his last week. So many miracles and so many different emotions have flown through Elder Moody and I and our area haha. So first we will start off with the transfer news!

Elder Moody and I will both be staying in BV this transfer and we will also be taking over Rockbridge ward along with the two YSA wards that are still going, which means we will be covering 4 different wards. and on top of that we will be implementing the smart phones this transfer and have to stay on top of all our zone and mission business. Sooooo needless to say this next transfer is going to be the fastest transfer of my mission. What a way to end right? I look forward to my last 6 weeks, I'm ready to give all my time, effort and heart to the lord for my last 6 weeks of my mission. I want to wear out my life in the service of my God this transfer. I know it will be tiring but it will be good!

One Miracle in particular that I want to share with everyone this week that a lot of you have heard of at least back home.. So many of you know my Dad has cancer and has had it for a while now. Hes been a great example of faith in the Lord Jesus Christ and trusting in his plan for not only him but our family. Well this last week as many of you know he underwent a very life threatening procedure. It was hard for me to hear but I'm grateful for a loving heavenly father that knows us and hears our pleas. I'm grateful that my Dad is still here and that the doctors were lead by the spirit to know how to help my Dad and get him to where he needed to be. Though it was the hardest day I've had on my mission I am grateful that I experienced it, because now I can truly say that God knows what we each individually need and how we need it. The same day that I heard about my Dad, we went out and picked up 3 new investigators. I know this was because we chose to act rather than sit around and wait for something to happen. I invite you all to look to Heavenly Father. Trust that in your times of trial is when he is listening the most. Trust that the gospel can heal a broken heart, and do all you can to keep your covenants. The church is true, this I have no doubt of. I love you all and hope you have a great week.

Elder Robbie Wilson