Sad Week, Infestation and Great Blessings

Hey All!!

Well... Quite a sad week. We had Zone Conference on Wednesday June 13th and it was President and Sister Christiansen’s last Zone Conference before they go home. It was also the last time I will get to see them before they go home... So it was actually really sad. When returned missionaries say how much they loved their mission presidents, I know why. I love President and Sister Christiansen sooo much.
And was so blessed to be able to serve with them. They have blessed my life and taught me a ton! They were pretty emotional as they gave their departing testimonies... President said he would serve with us another 3 years if he could. He loves us and you can just tell by the way he looks at you. I'm not going to lie.. I almost cried after saying goodbye haha I felt like I was saying my good byes at the MTC all over again! I just didn't want to say goodbye. But they will be leaving July 1st. The new mission president flies in at 4:00pm June 30th!
I also had to say goodbye to my favorite elder in our mission! Elder Palmer.. He is our assistant and he has been an assistant for 9 months. When I got to the mission he was only a Zone leader.. But he was the first missionary I talked to when I came into the mission 10 months ago! He is from Lyman Wyoming and he and I have grown close ever since. He lives in Arizona now.. But I love the guy! He calls me his Wyoming Brother. I sent a picture home of me and him! I looked up to him a ton. And will miss him as well.
West Virginia Never ceases to amaze me.. Haha while working one evening we were in the wayyyy back hills of West Virginia. Like there was no signs of life anywhere. Well we pull up to this house and begin talking with these people. I quickly recognize that these people don't use electricity, power or anything like that. No cell phones, phones or anything. (They were not Amish) haha anyways we sat down on the wooden chairs on the front porch looking out at the West Virginia trees and hills..and I really did feel like I was back in the old days.. As we were talking I asked the older gentlemen to use his restroom. He answers yes.. And says "It's in the back" and he points behind the house. Now.. If you can imagine my face when he said this then you would see my jaw drop and sit there in shock. Haha I looked at my Companion and just gave a little sly smile of shock.. Haha I walk around the back of the house and sure enough.. There is a little wooden OUTHOUSE just back in the trees!! And yes.. I used it! Hahaha I can officially say I used a West Virginia Outhouse!! Hahaha while using it I just couldn't stop laughing.. I mean, you only see this stuff in the movies! We then walked back around to the front and washed our hands in a plastic tub because they didn't have running water.. Crazyyyy. And to make it all better.. These people have never in their lives seen an actual CD disc.. Haha Anyways it was quite the experience and I will never forget it.
This week was awesome though. We have been working with an investigator named Bob and he is awesome. We taught him the Gospel of Jesus Christ this week and the lesson was sooo powerful. At the end of the lesson I looked at Elder Munden and mouthed "Baptism" at him. He gave me a wink back so I knew we were going for the biggg commitment. So at the end of the lesson we invited Bob to be baptized and Confirmed by someone holding the Priesthood Authority of God. He said Yes!!! We said the goal of July 14th. So we will see what happens! Pray for him!

We also had another Infestation of Cock Roaches this week... They are now everywhere and it makes me sick to think about. They are getting into the food and it makes me not want to eat! We even found one in the fridge!! Anyways we cleaned all our cupboards out and trashed 80% of the food. So we are broke now.. Haha it's been pretty disgusting. Not only do we have roaches.. But we have spiders EVERYWHERE. And we also have ants EVERYWHERE. I'm going to lose my mind. Everything and everywhere has at least 1 bug on it at all times. Gross..

While driving in the back hills of West Virginia, we noticed a little white beater car following us for quite some time. Every turn we made, the white cat made. This car was trashhhh haha anyways it kept following and following. And then started honking at us as if they wanted us to pull over. But the only way I was going to stop was if the spirit told me to.. And it was for sure telling me not to. So we never did! Eventually it stopped following us. I'm surprised they didn't start shooting at us.. Haha

Also, there was a Methodist lady here in Romney that stopped us while we were walking down the street and asked if she could buy us dinner at the new BBQ place here in Romney. We didn't refuse of course ;) we get there and no joke.. She buys us $50 worth of smoked meats. Including 2 racks of ribs. It was legit. We took a lot of meat home! Haha as we were eating some of it with her she explained how impressed she was with our church. She said she loves and is so impressed by its structure and organization. She said we are wayyyy ahead of the game. She then went on to say "This food is the least I could do for you guys. You guys light up the streets and bring them to life.". She then says "we as Christians try to Evangelize and help others when we can.. But your church and your religion blows us wayyyy out of the water. You are way ahead of all other religions. Thanks for all you do for this community.". It made my week! Great people like that make very thing worth it! 
It's been pretty dang hot over here this week. This humidity is kicking my trash. I'm sweating through my suits and that is disgusting.. I instantly start sweating as soon as I walk outside.. Haha it's really weird. Yesterday I got a paperback book of Mormon out of the car so we could go knock doors, and the humidity was so thick that the Book of Mormon pages were starting to wither up and look like they were soaked and then dried hahaha it was crazy

Thanks for all the emails!! I love and miss you! Have a great week!

Love, Elder Welling! 

Service, Stray Cats and Cowboys

Hey All

This week has been much better!! The Lord definitely gives us sour experiences so that we may appreciate the sweet ones he gives us each day. I learned so much last week from it and I can't be more thankful. 

We haven't had any run in with anymore bashers luckily. I wouldn't be able to keep my cool. I told some members up here in Romney that I wanted to punch a wall I was so angry and I don't want to be that mad again. Haha

This week we had a killer week! We picked up 3 new investigators and it was awesome and even had one show up to Sacrament! So that's was super cool to see.  Some were on the very outskirts of our area wayyyyyyy back in the hills of West Virginia.. Haha it was wild. You see something new in the back hills of West Virginia every single day. Haha it's actually quite entertaining!

I can't begin to tell you how much this area has blessed my life. I have seriously learned so much here. It has taught me so much and it has been amazing. The love I have grown for the branch grows every week. Romney may be small, but it will have a big place in my heart the rest of my mission.

My finger still hurts.. Haha I drilled into the nail to release all the pressure. And all the blood can out! Haha it was quite nasty. But it felt amazing. Haha

I can officially make my own ties now! An elder in my district showed me how to make them and so I cut up an old shirt that was in our trailer and made a tie out of it and I think it actually looks pretty dang good! I will send a Pic of it.

This last week we actually had a dude legit walk pretty much into our trailer and ask us for money. I was cooking dinner and he knocked on the door. We open and he just walks in and asks if our church can pay his bills.. Haha we kindly said no. But then 4 different people asked throughout the week as well. 3 people asked In our trailer park and 2 others in a different trailer park.. Hahahahhahahaha it was so weird. We didn't have money to give them though. 

Well, a member of our branch we did service for this week gave us a Zucchini plant and some Green Bean plants.. So we took them home and planted them in front of our trailer.. Haha honestly wouldn't be surprised if our Zucchinis were stolen right off the plant here in the trailer park! Hahaha anyways I hope they grow good. I've never been good with this stuff.. So we will see!!

This last week Elder Munden and I saw 2 baby cats out in the rain. So we picked them up to get them out of the rain and took them into our trailer.. We fed them and let them dry off a bit. There was a little white one we named Robin.. And a little orange one we named Garfield! Unfortunately we are not allowed to have pets.. So we had to put them back that night. But it was fun while it lasted! Haha

Have a great week! Watch out for them tornados in Wyoming as well ;)

Love Elder Welling

s

Rough Week and Miracles

Hey everyone!!

The prank you guys played on the new sister missionary was soooooo funny! Hahahaha I'm sure she was just dying on the inside!! I don't think I have ever had rabbit so I don't know how I would feel about it either!
This week has been fast and slow at the same time. Some days went pretty fast and others went brutally slow. Haha
I'm sure everyone over at home. Is ready for summer and excited. It's been raining like crazy here. Well.. Let's put it this way.. Our trailer didn't float away. West Virginia got nailed this week with rain. You know how in Wyoming you can't see the roads when you are driving because of the snow?! Yeah.. Well it's that way here, but you can't see the roads because of the rain.. I didn't even think that was possible, but it is!! We couldn't see the roads when we were driving due to rain! It was crazy!
This week we actually had a lot of little miracles. We had one of the most spiritual experiences I have had on my mission. It was amazing. The spirit made itself perfectly known to our hearts and I never have before felt it like that. The will of the Lord and his work has been perfectly known this week and His love present.
Not gonna lie, I hit a low point on my mission. You could say it was a Mid-Mission Crisis, instead of a midlife crisis. We were walking around Romney this week and it began to rain hard! We were not close to our car so we were getting soaked. So we run to the nearest Gas Station which was Sheetz. We walk in and shake all the water off, and we notice a man looking at us funny. He begins to approach us and sparks up a conversation. He says that we really stick out and that he has seen us before. He gets talking to us about our missions and college and what we will do after. He was actually a pleasant man to start off with. As the conversation goes on we get talking about how he was an electrician and what he did for a living. We then ask him if he belonged to a church in the area? He answers yes and said he went to the Baptist church down the road. My heart dropped. He then immediately asks: "Were you both born into the church?" we answer yes and he says "So what takes Preference? The Book of Mormon or the Bible?" I immediately answer: well Both! And he answers firmly and quite aggressively ".. No." I say: yes and he says "No, I have talked with you Mormons Before.." and then he just starts going off on us right in the middle of this Flippin gas station. Well I went right to defensive mode and I start right back on him. As the heated discussion keeps going I say "I ran into a man from your church about a month ago and he told me I was going to hell. How Christ Like is that?" and he gives off a laugh and says "Well have you been born again?" and I say: well of course, I have been baptized. He says "No. That's not what that means." I the ask "Well what does it mean then?" So he pulls out the Bible and shows us John 3:3 and says if you haven't been born again you will not see the Kingdom of God.. period. And so I say rather sarcastically : "Thanks for the scripture, but you didn't answer my question. What does it mean to be born again?" and he says "I'm not your enemy sir, I'm your friend and I'm trying to help you." I then say "Well if you are my friend, help me out and tell me what it means to be born again." he then looks at me dead in the face and no joke his face was about a foot from mine and has the guts to say "You my friend are spiritually dead." I can't describe my anger in this moment. It made me want to pick him right between the eyes. This man was a jerk. And was in the process of tearing down a church that I love and a Book that I claim and profess to be true. His goal was not to "help" me. But rather tell me how I am wrong and he is right. His goal was to make me angry and he did just that. So I walked away. I didn't even say another word. I walked right back out into that rain and was tore down. Well after a few hours, we again returned to the gas station to fill our car with gas before heading home for the evening. While sitting in our car, we saw a different man approaching. He came to the window and asked if we were Mormons? We answered yes and he immediately asked "Do you believe in the Trinity?" we answered no. He says "Can I show you in the Bible where it proves that there is a trinity?" so he pulls his Bible out right there on the spot and shows us all His scriptures. We show him ours and that was the end of that conversation. He then asks if he can leave us with a scripture to consider? We say yes. And he gives us Revelations 22:18.. He then went to attack mode and starts going on the Book of Mormon just as the other man did.. 2 times in 1 day and 2 different men, came and attacked us for no good reason. They attacked a church and a Book that we love. They told us we are false and aren't Christians. They told us to go home and to not preach false doctrines to the world. As you can imagine we went home quite destroyed and pretty sad. 2 times being attacked for more than 20 minutes each in public. It was a pretty rough experience. It was one of the most awful days I have had on my mission. But it's days like that that make me drop to my knees and plead with God to reassure me that what I am doing is right. That night in the Book of Mormon and the day following I found and reread a scripture. It is Mosiah 24:14. "And I will also ease the burdens which are put upon your shoulders, that even you cannot feel them upon your backs, even while you are in bondage; and this will I do that ye may stand as witnesses for me hereafter, and that ye may know of a surety that I, the Lord God, do visit my people in their afflictions." just moments after 2 men tell me that the Book of Mormon is fake, I find a scripture that retestifies to my heart that Jesus Christ is aware of my struggles and my afflictions. The scriptures in the Book of Mormon are not just some old scriptures. They are scriptures and messages with a heart beat. They have the power to heal and mend broken hearts and spirits and that's because the Book contains the spirit of Christ. Let me tell ya.. These men are missing out on this miracle of a book!! The Lord has been so good to me and I thank him for these moments of growing. And to make the whole day worse, guess what happened at the very end of the day?! I slammed my Flippin finger in a car door and messed my finger up.. Haha so I guess you could say it's the worst day I have had on my mission so far. Haha

Sorry for the long rant session I had up there.. But also thanks for all the emails! I'm sure you are all excited for summer and all the good stuff that comes with it! I hope you have a good week! I love and miss ya!

Love, Elder Welling!