New Address:
Elder Neal Thomas
308 E 1ST ST Unit B
Corvallis, Montana 59828
United States
Oh. My. Goodness Gracious. I don't know how I am going to be able to convey the enormity of this week in writing, but i'm going to do my best.
First of all, my companion rocks. The moment he looked at me and said, "Elder, let's be EXACTLY obedient," I knew we were going to get along. It took about eight hours of driving to get to Corvallis from Billings. Elder Angle was waiting for me at the stake center in Stevensville. We headed straight back to the apartment and discussed our individual and companionship goals for the transfer. What a great way to begin! Elder Angle and I have agreed on almost everything related to missionary work and we are having so much fun working ourselves silly!
Also, our bishop rocks. Bishop Criddle is the most missionary minded bishop I have met or heard of so far in this mission. We had dinner at his house my first night there, Wednesday, and he got me so excited! He is very involved in the missionary work and incredibly helpful. It is obvious he has been through Preach My Gospel more than once. That night we tried to follow the spirit in everything we did and we both feel that we were exactly where we needed to be the whole night.
On Thursday we did weekly planning. Weekly planning was intense because there are SO MANY NAMES. This place has so much work going on and we have to work our heads off just to keep up with it. A little bit about this area: In our area is a little place called Pinesdale. Pinesdale is a community based on the Mormon religion, but it is not the Mormon religion. Those in Pinesdale are a group broken off of the FLDS religion which broke off of the LDS religion. They see The main body of the LDS church as the organizational part of the church, and they see themselves as the priesthood. They feel that polygamy should still be practiced and that only white people should hold the priesthood. They feel that because the LDS church does not do these two things that we lost our priesthood power. None of this phased me much because of two things.
First, Christ taught that by their fruits shall ye know them. The fact that many of their church leaders have been convicted of things such as sexually abusing their children, stealing tithing funds, forgery and many other crimes tells me that something is amiss. Many of those in Pinesdale are starting to feel the same way.
Second, many of the people in Pinesdale are sick of feeling confused. When we have talked with many of them they tell us that the main thing they feel when others of the group tell them they are feeling the spirit testifying of truth is just confusion. Just like the stupor of thought talked about in D&C Chapter 9.
Pinesdale is going through a mass exodus. Many of those who have been raised in this community have never practiced polygamy and many more are seeing the incorrectness of the traditions of their fathers. One of these families is the Allred's. Charlie and Julie Allred were both raised in polygamist homes. They both have talked about how their parents were good people but that they know their beliefs are wrong. Charlie and Julie live in Pinesdale with their 11 year old daughter Jean, 9 year old daughter Anika, 6 year old son Quincy and almost 2 year old son Ted. About three months ago they began the process of being baptized and confirmed in the LDS church. This process is harder than for most investigators because they must have an interview with President Wadsworth and a general authority before they can be baptized, but they went through all the steps they needed to. I met this amazing family on Thursday and fell in love with each of them immediately. We went over there to have them try on the baptismal jumpsuits and to have a testimony meeting. It was amazing and before the night was over the 11 year old, Jean, had asked me to confirm her a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints. Words can not express my excitement.
On Sunday they were both baptized and confirmed. I don't understand fully the reason it happened on Sunday. It was one of the most incredible and unique experiences I have ever experienced. An astounding 190 people showed up to the baptism, many of which came from Pinesdale. The spirit was so strong and both talks were by Pinesdale converts who boldly and beautifully bore their testimony of the incorrectness of the traditions of their fathers and the purity and peace found in the true church. Elder Angle got to baptize Jean and when the time came, I was able to confirm her a member of the church. What an incredible experience, to have the Spirit place words in my mouth and to see how promising and bright this young girls future was. After the blessing Jean stood and began shaking the hands of those in the circle. When she got to me I reached out my hand for a handshake but instead got a big 11 year old hug. It was not fair for her to make me cry like that in front of everyone.
I'm afraid I don't have time to write about the multitude of other miracles we saw this week, but hopefully I will have more time next week.
I LOVE YOU ALL!
love,
Elder Thomas
A clever idea Elder Angle had. We left one but didn't take one :)
Can you spot the Book of Mormon?
A cute little grass couch an investigator had in their yard
I always get the prettiest areas in the mission.
We saw these cool cars when we dropped off the truck at the auto shop this week.
THE ALLREED'S (Charlie and Julie are the parents, Jean has brown hair, Anika has blonde hair)
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