Author Archives: Elder Wilkes

August 29, 2016 – Week 99

FROM TIJUANA TO AFRICA

This week has been pretty great! I delivered my last talk in church yesterday and it was MARAVILLOSO, there was a mom who cried from my talk as it reminded her of her sons that she has out in the mission field. Everyone said it was really good.

Mom, my convert from Terrazas (my first area) just became the Elders Quorum President, and this month he is looking to go through the temple! It’s amazing what the gospel can do to people. And this is exactly what I talked about in my talk yesterday. It was called our Everlasting Conversion and how we really need to be converted to the Lord. Out of all the things this world has to offer, we need to be truly converted to the Lord. I delivered a powerful message and I might do something simililar on OCT 9th as everyone said it was really good.  Followed by me our stake president spoke, and it was just a really really good Sunday service.
Our investigator shared his testimony during Elder’s Quorum and it was really good. The sisters in my district had a baptism but their convert said that he wanted me to baptize him.  I would send you pics but this Macbook doesn’t accept my camera. He also received the Priesthood yesterday in the 3rd hour, and I was able to ordain him and it was really really awesome. Really spiritual! It was probably one of my best Sundays here in Mexico.
You guys should pass by the temple there in Johannesburg, and did you guys go to church down there is well? Tell me all about it. Everything is going really well. I’m going to keep my messages short because if I tell you everything I won’t have anything to share for when I get home! LOVE YOU! Be safe there with the sharks – but tell them I said hi (:
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August 22, 2016 – Week 98

WHERE THERE’S A WILKES THERE’S A WAY!

Hey everyone,

I’m sorry that I didn’t get to write to you guys last week. We had a lot of appointments and we ended up going to write at 5:45 and there was only one computer so I just let my companion write to his family a second because he has a lot of time left and I’m coming home in 5 weeks. Last Monday was the start of the new transfer and I’m in the same place and with the same companion. They even decided to put me ahead and to be the District Leader.
Last Sunday the old district leader said to me “good luck elder, you have 2 baptismal dates in the whole district.” I told him not to worry, as of yesterday I had reported a total of 27 baptismal dates, and things are going really well. Tomorrow is my last conference with the Mission President and the Zone, so I will be giving my testimony. Remember my goal of hitting an attendance of 200 people in church, well this past Sunday we had hit 199. I’m really happy with my Father in Heaven because He has been blessing us big time! The other ward in Tecate ended up having an attendance of 151, and that was increased by about 30 people. So things are going really well as a district leader here in the mission. The President and my zone leaders are really happy with my efforts.
I got a little disappointed yesterday to only have 2 of my investigators go to church, but you know what its okay because thats is ALL I COULD DO. Mom, I am really tired, this past week we had 49 lessons and that is by far the most I have ever done in one week in my mission. Things are going well, and I’m working my tail off these days to get some baptisms in. if everything goes well, I should be baptizing at least 7 more people. And I know for a fact that the Lord will bless me with it!
This past week I gave some blessings for some kids that were going back to school, and it had reminded me a lot of when dad had given us father’s blessing before we had entered school. It was a really cool experience.
Anyways I just have a short 5 weeks left, and just about 1 month honestly. I didn’t get to tell Madie happy birthday last week but now I can tell dad happy birthday!!! And that is legit that he is going to be spending it in Paris. You should buy me a Paris soccer jersey while you’re there!!! Anyways hopefully you can get me an African megaladon shark tooth in Africa or a raptor claw! That would be pretty legit haha, but anyways I really hope you guys stay safe and have fun down there! That sucks that dad has to get his surgery a week before I get home but it will be good for him.  I was hoping to go golfing with dad when I get home, but oh well, maybe in a couple months more!
Anyways love you guys! UNTIL NEXT WEEK! Caudate en Africa Mama, te quiero!
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August 8, 2016 – Week 96

This week I talked to our ward mission leader about the 4th Sunday of the month and it is going to be my last talk that I will be giving in sacrament meeting – at least until October jaja. I have been thinking lot of what I want to speak about and what I wanted to leave my ward with, and I’m going to be talking about the Priesthood. I’m really excited to be giving this talk and I’m going to be starting early and taking my time with it so I can just give it powerfully. That’s one of the things that I really liked to do here in the mission and that is to give talks. I love just talking to a big group of people.

It is pretty cool to be able to have the opportunity to be able to talk in front of about 200 people. Thats one of my goals here in Los Olivos, not only to be able to baptize 9 people in this month but also to raise the attendance of our ward to 200 people. This past Sunday was really low it it was 154, but we have about the range of 165ish or 170. I want it to be raised to 200 people! Right now in our ward we are working with the members to help out the work of salvation, especially the retention and the conversion, and the reactivation of the less active members.
Today I saw Claudia, she has family where we are living at, and I was talking to her and she said she is going to Florida in December.  She is going to visit her family in Naples, and she is also going to Orlando.  Maybe we can do something with them when they come to Florida.
We are preparing several people to be baptized this month and I really, really, really hope that all of it works out just perfectly. I’m really excited it is literally going to be 7 points after the whole game just to win it all. We just hit the 5 minute mark on the clock, and we are up, but we are going to shove another one through just to show the other team who’s boss. And sorry but I am not going to the singles ward when I get home. I’m not about that life. I’m just going to go to institute, but who knows where I will meet my future wifey. But the Lord will prevail.
Love you!!!!!
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August 1, 2016 – Week 95

Hey Everyone,

Sorry about not be able to write to y’all last week. I just couldn’t get it done because we had a lot of stuff going on and the fact that I got sent to another sector and it is probably my last sector in the mission and I will be finishing it up here in my last days.
These weeks have been pretty good. We are getting ready to baptize a lot of people and hopefully it just goes really well. I’m a trainer for Elder Ramos and he is from Merida Yucatan, so now we have a reason to go to Cancun!!!!! I have 8 weeks left here in the mission and I’m killing it right now! These past two weeks we have made 284 contacts of random people and we are just talking to everyone about the gospel. I have definitely completed my goal to give out a Book of Mormon everyday and I have been doing so for 7 weeks now, or 6 no me acuerdo. But everything here in the mission is a blast, we are having a lot of fun and next Monday me and Elder Woods are going to be running from Tijuana to Rosario. It’s 20 kilometers  or 12 miles and it’s about a half marathon. It should be pretty fun to do so! This week i have to train up for it and I’m going to be running every day to get warmed up. Hopefully it will only take about 2 hours but it should be fun.
Training is a blast too but its something that you have to do with a lot of patience and that is something that I definitely have a lot of because i fish!! Honestly fishing has helped me have a lot of patience here in the mission and just waiting for the people to bite the hook. Tijuana just had their EFY and 1100 people went to it. and our ward here in Los Olivos had the most people there out of another ward in Mexico. Our ward had over 80 youth attend EFY and a lot of them are not members so me and my companion are contacting these people and we hope that they all go on missions in the future and all of them want to get to baptized as well. Hopefully we can have a lot of success here in this sector and so far out of my whole mission this is my favorite sector. The members are absolutely wonderful and they are great! Yesterday we spent the whole day on the side of a mountain trying to look for some less active families but we couldn’t  find them so we basically spent the whole day doing stair steppers basically because it is literally the side of a mountain here in Tijuas. Things are going really well.  I ripped out my ingrown toenail like 3 weeks ago and it is doing really good. I took a video of it as well and it is pretty gross with a lot of blood at the end of it but it felt pretty good to get that sucker yanked.
Mom I just want you to know that I’m really tired, and I’m excited to come home just tired of working, it feels good right now in this one hour that I have to be able to sit down and just relax and to get out all my feelings in writing. Also i just hit page 371 in my journal; I write everyday. Sometimes I go back and read some of the stuff I wrote a while ago and it’s pretty funny. I’m excited to see you guys again and hopefully Madie will be there too. Out of everyone I really miss her, jajaja and you too Mom. I miss having siblings and people annoying me all the time, but in a short time I’ll be back home – just 8 weeks!!! Dad and Pawpaw told me that you are really excited mom. Anyways keep strong and when you guys get back from Africa I’ll be just another few weeks away. Love all of you – have a great week!
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July 18, 2016 – Week 93

There is a lot going on here in the mission. Three missioanries just left to go back home. Two of them were sick and one had some other issues. But that means my trio that I’m in is going to get split up probably. We still don’t know what is going to happen right now but we are waiting for the president to come here to tell us all that is happening. I honestly think that I am goong to change and going with one of the companions whose companion went home. I think I’m going to a sector called Ojo de Agua and if I go there is a big chance that i will just finish my mission there. It’s another sector that not much is going on there right now. But they always baptize a ton of people so maybe it will be somethmg that I need to finish my mission. I honestly want to baptize at least 5 more people before I go home. But oh how much better it would be if I hit 10. I thought I could do it here in Paraíso, but it didn’t initially work out how I wanted it.

We had went to do the audits in Guerrero Negro and San Quintin this week and it was a really cool trip. I’ll have to send you all the pictures of what we took down there. It was a blast and we had fun and the audits went okay. This week we are heading to San Felipe and it should be great as well! I took a lot of pictures there in Guerrero Negro and I’ll send them to you later on today if I get the chance. And also Mom I bought you a cool desk plate that says Guerrero Negro on it and it has a painting of a grey whale on there. It’s really cool  – it’s like Mexican pottery plate. I think you will like it but im going to bring it home and give it to you and there’s a lot of cool stuff that I want to get you guys here. I want to buy you guys something cool from San Felipe. So I’ll see what I can get different from down there.
I’m pretty excited though to be able to lesve from the offices and to keep going on like a normal missionary. Ojo de agua is really big. It is a massive sector. And it is filled with a ton of little pueblos throughout the whole area. My companion and I are going to be hitting it up like the old times preaching in the small towns. My companion and I are going to go ham. I’m pretty excited for what the president has in store for us but we have no idea what is going to happen here. I’m ready for whatever comes up!! I ripped out my toenail this week and it hurt like crazy. I took a sweet video of it as well and no it doesn’t hurt anymore. But in a month or so it might come back. This week I’m going to buy that medicine to help my toe. But everything is good I’m pretty happy. I honestly miss you guys a lot and im excited to see y’all in September! That’s cool Tina is moving to Florida but that means I have no were to stay if I go to the race in Bristol. Oh well, I can settle for Charlotte! Anyways love you guys!
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July 11, 2016 – Week 92

DILIGENCE BRINGS BLESSINGS

After last transfers blowouts, I’ve decided to take a quick pit stop and get 4 new tires and a full tank of gas and head on back into the field. Last transfer was tough dealing with my companions work ethic, but now I have a lot of support even from my new companions and also from the president and the assistants here in the misison.
I have been pretty much decided to work in 2 sectors this transfer so I can just kill it here in the last stetch in my misión to gain the checkered flag and take the victory at the Tijuana 730. I’ve been in last place and now I have taken the lead.  I might be a little behind right now but I’m ready to catch back up and to win it all!!
My companions are ready and everything is going awesome. My sector is still the same – it is in Paraíso and I just received my new companion last week Elder Gwilliam from Springfield Utah. Also, I am still with Elder Lopez as well. Things are going great. The family that we have been teaching for a bit FINALLY came to church and they have a baptismal date for the 30 of July. Hopefully we can be able to baptize that family of 3, well there are 5 people but 2 are still too young. We just received a new Ward misison leader and he is ready to kick it as well. He was inactive but he’s ready to kill it with us here in the Ward to help the Ward out and to help us out as well.
I really hope we can be able to baptize that family. The guy his name is G**** and it’s really sad becasue he has cataracts in both of his eyes and he can barely see. He has had them for several years, he just doesn’t have the money to be able to pay for them to get fixed so he can have a surgery. But I know the Lord will bless him if he keeps at it. I have been getting impressions that we should give him a blessing, and I will do so this week when we go visit his house.
This week me and Elder Gwilliam will be heading to Guerrero Negro tomorrow and we are going to be in a bus for about 12 or 13 hours. It’s not gonna be the most fun since the drive is so long, but the church pays for our road snacks so I’m gonna eat a ton of Candy and chips. 🙇 haha We are going to be eating pretty good as well. This time when we go down we will take a bunch of pictures as well so hopefully I can be able to send them to you guys. After this week and the time that has passed I have a bunch of pictures that I will throw in my dropbox later on today and I’ll also send you a picture of my toe. My surgery had failed but this time I’m waiting for the nail to grow out a little bit and im going to rip that sucker out. It’s gonna hurt like the dickens but it’s like an automatic pain releif at the end of it. I feel like I’m being a little prideful by not getting it taken out here in Mexico but I’m sorry I just refuse to do it because I know exactly what they are going to do.  I’m going to have the same experience from when I went to the doctor the first time, but the other day I saw on a commercial in the bus station was something called NAIL-X so I’m probably going to buy it to see if it will work.  Hopefully it’s not to expensive :/ But it’s pretty much a chemical that you put in the cracks of your toe to kill the ingorwn toenail and the infection that has been built up over time and I think it just grows out on its own. I’m gonna check it out and see what it does. I might just end up buying it.
I want to be able to lose more weight here so I probably shuld not eat 15 tacos but oh well! They are delicious! I weigh about 225-230 right now and I really want to get down to 200lbs or less if I can. But I feel fine, I’m starting to walk a lot I just wish my companion liked to run, because I would go every morning since it’s the easiest exercise, but oh well! I’m gonna send some picas later on! LOVE YOU GUYS!
P.S. I have given away a Book of Mormon every day for 3 weeks now! I have not missed a day. I will continue doing so! I have a couple of experiences to share but I will later. I have to go eat now! LOVE YOU!!
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