Monday, January 30, 2017

Lake Charles- Baptisms

Hello everyone! I know in my last emails I've said I've been having
some crazy weeks, but this week has been crazy y'all! It started out
with a great exchange with Elder Malm, who is an awesome missionary.
While on our exchange we taught  a man who has been
wanting to change his life around. He used to live the thug life until
he left the slammer and took to life on the streets, then he got to
know Brother Floor, a really good member in the Sulphur ward, who
meets in our same building, and he and his wife took him under their
wings. During the lesson, which was on the Gospel of Jesus Christ, and
focused a lot on repentance, he cried a lot, and he usually cries
during our lessons, the spirit tends to do that to people, and at the
end of the lesson he expressed to Elder Malm and I how weird that is!
He told us, "I used to never cry! I cried when I got shot here
(pointing to his gut) and here (pointing to his shoulder) and when I
got stabbed here (pointing to his hand) and here (pointing to his
arm),  but sittin at home chillin with a couple a grown men? Na, I'd
never do that! Not until now, until I found y'all!" So yeah, that was
really cool to hear 😊

We also got to baptize this week! Which is also what made it crazy,
trying to set everything up just right for them, anyone who has served
a mission, you know what I'm talking about. The week of the baptism is
the week Satan really throws all he's got at them! It was crazy.  A lot of things were going on to try and stop the baptisms.
 Meanwhile... On Friday, Elder Dominguez and his companion are trying to get here for the baptism.
 I'll skip,ahead to Friday night, when the baptisms
took place. We got all the preparations ready for it, Rodarius,
William and Joyce were all able to make it, Alexis's salvation would
have to wait for another week. It's six thirty, and the service starts
at seven. The baptismal candidates have changed into their whites, we
got pictures with them, it's all great, 6:45, now rodarius and William
are in the gym with the friends they brought, playing basketball in
their white jumpsuits, still no Dominguez. Seven roles around, we ask
our ward mission leader to stall for time for Dominguez, so we start
at 7:05, opening hymn, I believe in Christ, perfect song for stalling
because it's really long. There's a nice talk on baptism, then we head
for the font at 7:25, still no Dom. Alright, this part is really cool,
Joyce went first, and I had the wonderful privilege of Baptizing her,
she loved it, when she came back up out of the water she exclaimed,
"oooh, that feels so good!" That's what it's all about people. Now
it's Williams turn, he and elder Crim step down into the font, I stay
off to the side at the top of the stairs to watch, and as Elder Crim
is finishing baptizing William, who steps through the bathroom door to
the font? None other than Elder Dominguez himself! He was already
dressed in his whites, he changed in the members car on the way over.
As Elder Crim was coming up he stairs, we all gave each other big
hugs, Elder dominguez stepped down into the font and baptized
Rodarius, and it was all wonderful. No one was expecting him to be
there, so it was a big surprise for all the ward members to see him
back, and we all had a great time.

So yeah, that happened.

To cap it all off, Saturday night Felicia texted us that she would
have to take William, who is eight, to the hospital Sunday because
he'd gotten tissue paper stuck in his ears, but not before she took
them to church to get the Holy Ghost! So they came the next day, along
with Joyce, and they all got confirmed and were sustained as the
newest members of the church and the ward, and elder Crim and I
collapsed in Exhausted  joy, feeling victorious over the forces of
evil.

Also, we had a missionary broadcast this week, I guess there's a lot
of stuff happening with the schedule, I'll tell y'all about it next
week.

This weeks ponderize scripture is 2Nephi 2:28, read it, live it love
it y'all. I sure do love y'all! But I love the Lord more, I'm going to
serve Him with all I've got for as long as he wants me to! Keep up the
good work wherever you are, and remember to have fun too!
Love,
Elder Murdock
 True to the Faith


Baptisms-Happy Day!

Contacting
Eating cake after District meeting

Joyce's Baptism


Monday, January 23, 2017

Working Hard-Lake Charles

Hey everybody!
This week was pretty wild, a lot of it was spent trying to set up
baptisms for the end of the week and planing when the rest of the
district can have their baptismal interviews for their investigators,
which turned out to be a lot more trouble than we first thought! We
will be having a baptism on Friday though, our investigator Joyce is
getting baptized! And so are the kids of a family Elder Dominguez and
Elder Crim taught before I got here, their mom was baptized last
transfer, so now it's her kids turn! And it's been quite the adventure
trying to get them ready! The devil was working hard to try and keep
them from it for this next week, but Elder Crim and I decided to fast
and pray about when they could be baptized and right before our
lesson with them yesterday evening, we both agreed that the Lord wants
them baptized this week, now or never, get it done! So we went into
the lesson with that mindset, and it was actually the best lesson
we've had with them in a while! The kids were paying way more
attention than usual, and by the end of it they were really excited
about the baptism! So now it's our job to make sure they're ready by
Friday no matter what!
Joyce is also doing really well, in our last lesson we taught her she
told us about the first day we contacted her, here's the story:
Elder Crim and I were tracting in the ghetto, like we do, looking for
people to teach, when we saw her standing out in her pajamas by her
front door wearing a shower cap, so we decided to go up and start
sharing the gospel with her. On her side of the story, apparently, she
was wanting to just turn inside and brush us off without talking, but
something told her to stay out and talks to those nice boys, they have
something important to tell you! So she stayed and listened to us, and
even told us about her New Years resolution to quit smoking, which she
has been keeping for 23 days now! She is so prepared and I'm so
excited for her to be a member of Christ's church!
That's about it for this week, I sure do love y'all, but I love the
Lord more! I'm starting into my last six months out here (so weird!)
and so I've decided to start having a pondering scripture each week,
this weeks is D&C 88:125, read it live it love it y'all!
Love,
Elder Murdock
True to the Faith
Bayou in Lake Charles
Mardi Gras King Cake Shake- "Best Shake Ever!"

District Training

Monday, January 16, 2017

Hello everyone! I sure had a crazy week, I hope you've had a good one too! 

 Elder Crim and I took on a new mission challenge and decided to do the best that we could and leave the rest to the Lord.  As we've done this, we have seen miracle after miracle! Almost everyone we contacted this week was solid, and has wanted us to come back and teach them more. This has not really happened to me once on my mission, so I'm a bit overwhelmed, but in a good way! There's just tons of stuff to do, and there's really nothing wrong with that if you're a missionary, in fact, it's wonderful to be overwhelmed with things to do each day! I know that might sound crazy, but as Elder Crim and I have relied on theLord, we've been able to accomplish these things He has given us to do :) 

We also had a couple of exchanges this week, I went with Elder Esplin over to his area in Sulphur, Elder Malm, his comp, went and spent the day with Elder Crim in our area. I had a great time with Elder Esplin, he reminds me a whole lot of my cousin Howard. Elder Esplin's family owns a lot of property and cattle down in southern Utah and Arizona, so we talked a lot about horses and working cows, it only made us a little trunky ;) but he's a really good guy, we taught one of their investigators, Steven, who ended up getting baptized on Saturday, which was something else that happened that was really cool! I gave Steven his Interview on Wednesday, he's an interesting guy, he used to be in the army as an artillery man, so he connected a lot of the gospel with military terms, he really liked when I shared the story of Captain Moroni with him. 
We also had Elder Denton stick around the rest of the day on Friday to help us in an exchange in any way he could. The night before the Sulphur Elders stayed with us in our apartment to save on miles, and because the man who owns the house that they stay at died on Thursday, so there was a lot of the family over and they decided it was better to not be there for a night, so with Presidents permission we got to have three other elders in our apartment! Elder Denton, Malm and Esplin, so it was pretty fun :) 

One last thing! Elder Crim and I are teaching a wonderful lady named Joyce who lives in the ghetto, and is the sweetest old lady that you've ever met!... in the ghetto :) we had a lesson with her on Tuesday where we brought a recent convert over, who just so happens to be another old lady, Mary, who lives down the street from her, and they became friends real quick! It was funny, they both forgot to put in their teeth, so they were both a little shy and laughing and funny, it was pretty much adorable :) the best part is, Joyce came to church yesterday and plans on getting baptized on the 28! She is wonderful, I'm so glad I've been able to teach her! 

That's about it for this week, I hope each of you is relying on the Lord as you're going through any of your trials. He has told us to take up our crosses and to follow him, but the beautiful thing about this is, as we continue to follow him, he will make our burdens light, and our pathway bright, and he is there with us every step of the way. Trust in Him, with all that you've got, and hold on tight because he won't take you through the easy way to make you stronger! 
I sure do love y'all, but I love the Lord even more! I'm right where he needs me doing his work, I hope y'all can say the same wherever you are! 
Love, 
Elder Murdock
True to the Faith
Elder Murdock and Elder Esplin

District

Gators

Elder Crim and Elder Murdock at Lake Charles

Monday, January 9, 2017

Snow

Hellaux y'all! I hope life's been treating y'all right, and that you've all had a chance to see some good in the world, if ya haven't, look harder because it's there! 
This week has been pretty great down here in the great state of Louisiana, it hasn't gotten any less crazy, which isn't a bad thing, the only thing that's really changed is...
IT SNOWED ON FRIDAY!!!
Well, there was a little flurry of snow flakes after zone meeting in Orange, we walked out of the chapel and all the missionaries were going crazy because it was SNOWING and really cold. It wasn't quite like the snow we get back home, but hey, I'll take what I can get. It was really weird, I hadn't seen ice on the ground in a long time, yeah, it was weird seeing it while we were walking around. 
Anyway, after zone meeting I had a chance to give my first ever baptismal interview, wahoo!  The interview went well, it's just that the baptism went a little nuts. Before my mission, I just sort of thought that missionaries got people baptized and that they would go off without a hitch, but yeah, I was wrong! The morning of her baptism was really cold, and she is sort of frail, and has health issues, so she just decided that she wasn't getting baptized that day, while in the meantime, elder Crim and I along with the other elders had been setting up the church and the font for the baptism, and the members were all coming too expecting it to happen, and it just sorta turned into a fiasco! But the good news is, another family in the Sulphur ward had planned to have their eight year old boy baptized that same day, so the good news is, they had a lot of support from both the wards! Yup, missions are crazy y'all. Oh, speaking of crazy, yesterday the city of Lake Charles had a big power outage, so we had a short sacrament meeting in the dark and went and had some soup and gumbo and hot chocolate at the bishop's house afterwards, because his part of town still had power, so that was really nice of him! Our power in our apartment didn't come back on until approximately 9:21 p.m.Sunday night, but it's ok, we were out doing missionary work all day anyway! 
That's about it for This crazy week, I sure do love all y'all, but I love the Lord more! I'm so glad I can be his servant for just over seven more months, I'm giving Him my all and I hope y'all are too! Stay close to Him and He'll stay close to you! 
Love, 
Elder Murdock 
True to the Faith


Freezing!

Frost on the Windshield.  A novelty in Louisiana

Waffle House. It's a Southern Thing


Monday, January 2, 2017

Happy New Year from Louisiana

Happy New Year y'all! I know it's fixin to be a good one, it sure
started out on a good note and I hope y'all did too!
So, update on my mission life right now, where I'm at and what I'm doing:
Last week at transfers I found out I'd be going to the wonderfully
crazy state of Louisiana in a city called Lake Charles! My new
companion is Elder Crim and he's great! He just got done being trained
by Elder Dominguez so he's still got a greenie fire burning, which is
good because I have no idea how to be a missionary in crazy Louisiana!
Haha, I'm just joking, it's not that bad, but Elder Crim has been
doing a great job showing me around the area, we're working with some
good people, a family that he and Elder Dominguez were working with is
fixin to be baptized some time in the next couple weeks, and we've
found a few other people with good potential, so that's exciting.

So, Louisiana is actually way different than Texas! Like, there is an
actual different feeling here, and you can feel it as soon as you
cross the border, it's really crazy. It's pretty much like a whole
other country here, everyone talks differently, there's street names
and signs all written in French, it's just a different place, but
really cool too! This is also probably the most city area I've been to
yet, Lake Charles is really big and really cool, it's an old city so
there's a lot of old southern/French style buildings around town,
mostly down town, so it's fun to see those.

It was pretty hard leaving good old Atascocita and Elder Harmon
though, I really grew to love that place and the wonderful members who
all lived there. I've got a whole new adventure ahead of me here
in Lake Charles, and I've got a new friend named Elder Crim too, and
I'm excited to just get right to work out here! I sure do love y'all,
but I love the Lord a whole lot more. I'm excited to see what He's got
in store for me out here, it's really weird to think that this is the
year I'll be coming home, but until then!
Love,
Elder Murdock
True to the Faith 

PoBoy Sandwich.  One of the Best things Elder Murdock has eaten down south!

Elder Crim and Elder Murdock

WhoDat!

Louisiana Christmas.  Elder Murdock's Dad served in the Baton Rogue Louisiana mission, so he loves seeing
these pictures! It reminds him of his mission.