Elder Hunter and I had a fantastic week this week!  We had an experience yesterday that I will never forget.  We were going to teach Mathew and he lives fairly close to our apartment so we decided to walk over to his trailer and talk to anyone we saw on the way.  As we were walking there was an older guy on his front porch smoking a cigarette.  He was wearing an Alabama hat so we had an immediate conversation starter.  We began talking about Alabama how he has family there and I have family there as well.  The conversation morphed into what we share as missionaries.  As we were talking about prophets we then asked him the question, "If there was a guy on the earth right now like Moses would that be important to you?"  He immediately answered back, "Are yall Mormon?" We said yes and he told us that he doesn't believe in the Mormons.  We then asked him what he doesn't believe about us and he could only say I don't believe in the Mormons.  I was shocked at how someone could not know anything about our message and say that he doesn't believe in that.  As I reflected on it, I thought about it on the flip side, How many of us say I am a Mormon and don't know hardly anything about what we believe.  Back at home I had a very limited knowledge of what I believed.  I didn't know what the difference was from a Jehovah's Witness and a Catholic.  I didn't even know what the Restoration was.  I had seen the 20 min. movie, but I could not explain it.  I only knew the very simple and basics of what we are taught in church.  The reason for that is because I was not studying my scriptures daily and prayerfully.  I was crippled by my own lack of diligence.  It is so important that we don't cripple ourselves by allowing meaningless things to take up our time so that we don't allow the scriptures to be a part of our lives.  I love the scriptures, like Nephi I delight in them.  As I read I am uplifted and edified.  After reading my scriptures everyday I just feel happy.  Scriptures are the medicine for happiness as we apply the principals into our lives.  I know that as we read the scriptures that we can be free of the chains of the adversary and we will not be crippled.  When someone asks you what you believe your mouth will be filled and the spirit will testify to your words.  I invite everyone reading this email to make a personal commitment to start reading the scriptures daily and if you already are then to continue that pattern. 

  We were able to see Mathew a few times this week.  He is doing okay.  He has the mouth of a sailor, but we are going to work with him on that.  We are going to have to work pretty hard on him to get him ready, but he will get there.  We were teaching him about the Plan of Salvation and he was just loving it!  He loves the idea of the three different Kingdoms of Glory.  We also were talking about the importance of living what we know and why we can't just live in sin.  It was an interesting lesson, but a good one at that.

  We had an awesome miracle this week as well!  We received a Media Referral which comes from Salt Lake that some missionaries had ran into a guy that seemed really interested.  We went over to meet him, his name is Thomas.  As we pulled up to his house he was outside working on his yard.  We began talking to him and he was a really nice guy.  He asked us if we had a Book of Mormon that he could have to read.  We quickly gave him the one in our hand.  He was so grateful.  It was like we gave him the most precious gift anyone could give.  After we set up an appointment to come by on Saturday and left.  We went back and taught him the Restoration.  It was very spiritual and he just soaked all of it up.  After we asked him a question he told us that he has just been looking for truth and that's all he cares about.  He could care less what religion it is he is just looking for the truth.  We are very excited to continue to work with him.  

  We were also able to meet with Bino this week.  He didn't read what we committed him to so we read with him.  We talked about the Book of Mormon and about the importance of church.  It was a good lesson and we will be seeing him sometime this week and hopefully we can get him to church.  

  We also had stake conference this week.  They called a new Stake President and a new Counselor.  It was awesome.  There were two Seventies there and they both were able to speak.  One of them was Brother Corbridge.  He wrote a famous talk amongst missionaries called The Fourth Missionary.  It was a good conference and we all came away uplifted and edified.  We didn't have any of our investigators there because none of them wanted to drive from Cleveland to Kingwood to go to church.  

  I hope yall have a good week and have a good start to the Holidays:)

Elder Willden

These are pics of Elder Willden's and Elder Hunter's Halloween pumpkin carving this year:

This was an inside joke.  Every time Elder Hunter calls me dude I look over to the side and talk to my imaginary friend John and say, "Did you hear something John?  I think I did too."