Top Efforts and Top Golf

To start my email this week, I want to thank everyone at home for all of the support that you send me! I love hearing from all of you and I love being able to share my feelings with you... But, if you want me to tell you more, I need to actually hear from YOU. Haha, I hear about people back home telling others to email me for them. But, I want to hear from you!

Anyways, I really don't have the drive to email today. I just want all of you that I love you! The mission is hard, but it is the greatest choice that anyone can ever have! As I have thought about what the mission has done for me, I have made a list...

- Strengthened my testimony

- Helped me understand the Book of Mormon and Bible

- Built my testimony upon the rock of our Redeemer

- Molded my thought process of why I want to be on a mission

- Helped me understand why I want to stay an active member of the church

I love this Gospel! I love the Lord! I love my mission! And I love the opportunities to serve the people of Houston.

- Elder J.T.Yates

Elder Whetzel and I in front of Top Golf

Me, mid-swing

A member's cat that fell asleep during our weekly Book of Mormon study.

It's a Mean One, Mr. Grinch!

Even though it's not Christmas time anymore, Mr. Grinch was still very applicable! 

On Tuesday of this last week, there was an ice storm warning that went across the area telling us to stay inside. The temperature dropped below 20 for about 2 days and everything froze! There were some plants that I grabbed and they broke in my hands like glass, it was super weird.

During that time of being locked inside, I had plenty of time to reflect on my missionary work. I realized that when I was at home, and when I go back home is where the real missionary work is! Member missionary work is the most essential when it comes to having people come unto Christ by being baptized.

A statistic showed that the chances and the likelihood of someone being baptized IF they have a member friend almost doubled! Think about that! IF each of us found a friend that we knew could accept the Gospel and would thrive in it, the world would be a lot more unified and would have a lot of people really converted to the Gospel of Jesus Christ. 

I really started to regret my choices in the past when I though about all the times that I could've taken someone under my wing and really helped them come closer to Christ. But, from my last email... "No unchanged thing will even want to" enter into the Kingdom of God. Well, I can testify to you with a certainty of heart that I have been changed! I have been molded by my mission, and have been a witness to the blessings of the Atonement. 

My heart is changed, now... Is yours? How many times are we "humbled" by the spirit and move on with life hoping that we can just forget? Because if you are a normal human being like I am, it happens a lot more than anyone would want to admit.

In one of my favorite scriptures of all time it says:

"27 And if men come unto me I will show unto them their weakness. I give unto men weakness that they may be humble; and my grace is sufficient for all men that humble themselves before me; for if they humble themselves before me, and have faith in me, then will I make weak things become strong unto them."

I love this scripture because of the promise that He makes at the end. If I humble myself, then God promises to strengthen me. Isn't that incredible? How many weaknesses do we all have? Think of how many strengths we can then have through the power of His Amazing Grace!

I can testify that even in our darkest times, in our weakest moments, and in our most difficult adversities, Christ wants to make us better! It is only up to us to make those our strongest attributes.

I love all of you! I know that as you really and truly humble yourselves and become that Disciple of Christ that we all need to be, and help bring others into the Gospel, we can become the happiest that we can ever be!

-Elder J.T.Yates

1) Danelle's baptism and every missionary that has helped her come into baptism!

2) Free food that we received after a food truck service that we did at a Methodist church.

3) The biggest freaking meal I have ever had!! It's not even the "Texas size"!!! The Texas size is double that chicken and double the sides!! Like, WHAAAAA???

4) I also didn't know that Hell could freeze over... Haha

His Grace is sufficient

Monday: We had a schwaked P-Day last week! We went and got haircuts for 2 Elders and then went to the Guitar Center near us to get some new strings, and ended eating at Steak-N-Shake. Holy Moly, they make a great Garlic Burger!!

Tuesday: In the morning, we went down to Bacliff to try and see a recent convert, Julie. She ended up not being there, so we knocked doors for an hour or so. Which, in Bacliff is scary sometimes. Luckily it was cold outside so there wasn't anyone outside that was very sketchy. Haha, in the afternoon/evening, we went to Sister See's home. Her and her family have been feeding the missionaries for over 40 years, and almost every week!! That is a lot of charity!

Wednesday: The morning hours are usually pretty boring, but on Wednesday morning, we went to a Less-Active member's home, Brother Falcon. He is a very deep thinker, and when he reads something in the scriptures, it is basically doctrine. So, whenever anyone says anything that is contradicting, he flips out. But, when we visited him, we just talked about what he wanted to talk about, that way we knew that we would be good.

Thursday: Thursday was crazy! We had District Council from 9:30 to 11. Then we had interviews with President and Sister Hall as well as the APs. That went really good, as always, and then we went to Taco Bell for lunch with the Spanish Elders in the District. It rained like crazy! Nothing like Harvey, but it was still enough to get my clothes soaked from standing in the rain for like 2 minutes... Oh well, it's Texas so there's not much you can do about it. We visited a couple recent converts and shared uplifting messages with them. To end the night, we helped the South Shore Elders move one of their members. That was a work out! I tell you what!!

Friday: Like most Fridays, we started at an Episcopal Church and helped with their garden. Honestly, I love helping them! I am able to learn a lot from them about the Apocrypha. Not something that you'd think that I would learn about on the mission. We then went to our Bishop's house to watch President Monson's funeral and have some lunch with them. The funeral was so great!! The spirit was very strong and made me cry a little. We visited Brother McCutcheon this week, can't have a week without him! Haha, he is really close to being fully active again!! We had some bomb home-made burgers with some extra gouda cheese... Oh yeah!

Saturday: We had a bomb lesson with Sharon this morning! She had been being taught in the past, about a year ago in Friendswood. She accepted a baptismal date for Feb. 10th! Our day was mostly sitting inside because we hadn't done weekly planning for the whole week, so we were trying to keep from not going insane. After weekly planning, we went back over to Brother McCutcheon's house to help him clean part of his house. 

Sunday: We had a nice long day of meetings today! We had Correlation with our Ward Mission Leader, Ward Council, Church, and then had Danelle's baptismal interview. We helped out a member in the ward who's house was flooded. We ended our night by eating dinner at a family's home who I now love! They are so great and love doing missionary work, so I am going to be working with them a lot more lately!

Alright, now that is done and over with, something that I want to talk about is Grace. What is Grace? How do we apply it? Well, there is a fantastic talk given by Brad Wilcox called "His Grace is Sufficient". In that talk he gives the example of drawing 2 dots at opposite ends of the paper, and told someone to draw a line representing how much of that distance Christ fills in, with a couple failed attempts, he went on to say that there was no line, but instead Christ covered ALL of it. He didn't just pay everything but a few coins, He payed ALL of it. 

Another quote that I love from that same talk is, "No unclean thing can enter the kingdom of God, but no UNCHANGED thing will even want to." I can testify that through Christ's Atonement, everything can and will be forgiven. I know that even though we may feel like we are too far away from a return to Him. But, as He says in the scriptures,

"21 Then came Peter to him, and said, Lord, how oft shall my brother sin against me, and I forgive him? till seven times?
22 Jesus saith unto him, I say not unto thee, Until seven times: but, Until seventy times seven."

If Christ can forgive us EVERY TIME, how often should we keep returning to Him? Every time! 

I love the Savior and love His Gospel. I know it's true! I invite you to find that same testimony.

- Elder J.T.Yates

Me in a fire retardant suit. 

Elder Fleming and I after helping Brother McCutcheon.

Elder Whetzel and I post-exercise.

New Year Resolutions

As a missionary in the great Texas Houston South Mission, I have been taught how to have a Vision, Goals, and Plans. Without these, we cannot be as successful as we would like to be.

For me, I define success as helping someone that we teach or talk to; Increase their faith, Repent, Be baptized, Feel the Holy Ghost, or help them endure to the end. I have loved helping people come closer to Christ!

A vision: When we start our goals having a vision. You have a vision of what you want to do.

A goal: All of you know what a goal is and when you set one. Having these really helps bring a stronger purpose in your missionary work.

A plan: Make plans to accomplish those goals.

Making these Visions, Goals, and Plans are essential to our missionary work.

My challenge for all of y'all is to take these next couple of days is to think of what your Vision, Goals, and Plans are going to be for this year. Take these things and write them down. Remember to read them every week!

- Elder J.T.Yates

 Elder Yates in the wild. Cooking French Toast.  

The original tres amigos.

When I was able to baptize JJ!!! 

My 'son', Elder Smith!