TEMPLE TRIP AND A GREAT WEEK

This week was GREAT! We had an amazing miracle to start out the week. So the Spanish speaking Elders had some lady just contact them on the streets one night and she said wants to meet with Missionaries again, so they got just her address and had to head home because it was late and gave the info to us. We went over on Monday and contacted this lady. She was so happy to see us and invited us right in and we taught a lesson on the spot. Her name is Shakeema. She is from New Jersey and is about mid 20's. She wants to change her life and find the truth. We talked about the Atonement and the Word of Wisdom, because she has had some issues in this area. I felt inspired to be bold with her and tell her what we believe concerning the Word of Wisdom and after she was like "see that's what’s up, I want that!" we met with her 3 times last week . We gave her a church tour, which she brought 2 of her friend’s ha-ha. It was GREAT! She told us later that she felt so good when she left the church that day. Then our lesson on Saturday she didn’t come to the church like planned, so we went over to her apartment and she was there she said this was her last hurrah ha-ha. We picked her up an hour later and had a great lesson at the church where we set a Baptismal date for October 30th! She is SO stoked. She wants to be a member and she knows what she needs to do. Only problem is she lives with 2 other guys...so next lesson, tomorrow, we need to let her know that if she is living with them she can’t be baptized, pray that all will go well with that. Any who, she came to church yesterday and enjoyed it! So she is our miracle for the week! We were only able to stop by Dana real quick this week, he had family stuff this weekend, and we'll be meeting him this week at the Bishop's house! That should be good.

TEMPLE TRIP 9.24.10 (L-R The Autens, Elders Tolman, Tabil, Henricksen,Reimann,Spencer, Furniss, Loveridge and Bradshaw.)

We had our temple trip on Friday, and it was great! We had the 10:45 session and man I just love going to the temple and feeling the love, peace and spirit of it. After wards we went to Panda express there are only 2 out here I think, so it was good to be eating that orange chicken again! But yeah we left at like 7:30am and didn’t get back till like 4:15ish, so a lot of driving that day but a member helped us out with a ride and the Spanish speaking Elders. This week we are driving to Raleigh for Zone Leader Council...more driving...ha-ha. but Saturday and Sunday I’m STOKED for! General Conference, MISSIONARY SUPER BOWL!! We have invited a lot of our investigators to that, so hopefully they'll come listen to a Prophets voice.

Thank you so much family for all you do i know that this church is true and the Gospel of Jesus Christ can bless us more than we know, its central to everything we do. I love this work and everything about it. And I love all of y'all! Take care and I miss you. By the way, President Cotterell left me a message and said that my date has been change to coming home on 29th to the 28th, so the 28th I will be home, not to be thinking much of that right now ha-ha. But I love you!

-Elder henricksen

STAKE CONFERENCE - MISSIONARY WORK ON BIKES

Today is not our p-day, but for us Wilmington missionaries were given permission to email today since on Friday we are going to the Temple and we probably won’t be getting back till 4ish, so after this we're going to work!

Yesterday was our Stake Conference. And it went great! Dana came with Bro Sullivan, he is a great fellow-shipper for him. The day before he went over and visited him with a watermelon ha-ha and brought him on Sunday! Also Don was there and apparently he told Elder Spencer that he hasn’t smoked for 2-3 days! We are hoping that will continue on. It was a great Conference, instead of having like 4-5 speakers and they spoke for 30 mins each or so, there was like 8-10 speakers all pretty short talks, but it was powerful. A recent convert in one ward spoke, a returned missionary and just great talks. I was hoping they would've done what dad always did and had the people attended for the first time stand up ha-ha. There were I think 790 people in attendance. But that went well, we'll see what Dana thought about it when we see him this week. We got up with Kayleen! I called her room-mate last night and she said that she (the member) has been working a lot so thus why Kayleen hasn’t been coming, so she is going to call us this week and have a lesson and work something out to where Kayleen will be at church and get a ride with some other YSA friends. We talked to a great family the other day our side of their home, they’re a young family with 2 kids, I’m guessing like 8-9 and 6. We were riding home for lunch and saw this family outside about to go boating. So we talked to them for like 20 minutes. The husband believes there is a god and wants to believe in Christ but his faith is weak, and the wife is Catholic, but they are amazing. they want their family to be stronger and their relationship, and we promised them that the Gospel of Jesus Christ would and just about other things about life and who we can all some unto Christ, so they said call them up this week and well set something up, the husband was like ok whatever but the wife really wanted to, so I’m stoked for that! Kim and Kenny.

Wow it’s crazy to think that September is pretty much almost done and General Conference is in a couple weeks, time is flying and I’m bitter sweet about it ha-ha. We have interviews tomorrow with President Cotterell . We saw him yesterday at stake conference, he and Sister Cotterell bore their testimonies during the conference and we had the Stake Correlation meeting with the Bishops and Branch Presidents after Stake Conference which went very well. All is well here in Wilmington! I hope and pray that all is well wherever y'all are at. I know that this is the work of the Lord. We are his imperfect servants doing a perfect work! I love it and will always cherish it forever! I love and miss all of y'all!

Much love,
Elder Henricksen

GOOD OL' MISSIONARY WORK - THE GONZALES PLAN

Well this email might be short today. We didn’t do that much teaching this week sadly, but we still had a great week. We had some investigators not show to appointments and just a bad week for those whom we are presently teaching. But this week I definitely felt like a good ol’ missionary. We biked a lot, just talked to everyone that we could and pounded on them doors. One night in particular it felt like a good ol’ missionary out tracting in the light rain, don’t care about getting wet just care about preaching the gospel.
9.11 IN WILMINGTON

Don is doing better, slowly but surely he is getting there. He hasn’t come to church the past couple weeks though so we're going to teach him the importance about church attendance and feeling the spirit there. We weren’t able to get up with Kayleen this week, we never heard from her, so it must have been a hectic week for her. But other than that, we had some very good conversations with people while out and about. One in mind was Pete. We contacted him outside working on his yard. he told us that he grew up Catholic and was confused on why he was praying to statues or Mary and repenting to men...so he quit that and is looking for something else. As we talked to him and asked him questions he became more interested, so he said give him a call today and set up something so we can teach him. We have been working a lot with members and strengthening them and encouraging them to do missionary work and get some referrals. We present something called the Gonzales plan. It’s just some ideas that Elder Gonzales from the Quorum of Seventy had for sharing the gospel. We have been doing that with our members and its working great so hopefully we'll be getting some good referrals! Only the Zone Leaders and Assistance to the President do this Gonzales plan and it’s just our mission as well, and I guess President Cotterell will report back in November how his idea went.

We have Stake Conference this weekend, so President Cotterell will be in town for that, and right afterward we are having our Stake Correlation meeting with all the Bishops and Branch Presidents and Stake Presidency. I have been learning a lot about teaching in my studies, in my Book of Mormon reading I’m in Alma 31 so I have been reading some great examples of teaching, and have been reading chapter 10 in Preach My Gospel, everyone's teaching has gotten so much better since that leadership training, it’s amazing. Our Zone did great this week; especially in Jacksonville they tore it up this week.

Well my familia, I hope that all is well and I miss you and love you. I know that Christ lives and this is truly his work. The Spirit is essential in our teaching, we cannot teach without it. I love this work and this Gospel! Take care y’all PEACE!

Much love,
Elder henricksen

SURVIVING HURRICANE EARL

What’s up!! I hope that all is well wherever y’all are at, because everything is great here in Wilmington. Well to start it out, our appointment with Kayleen last Monday went very well. We had Andy and Jennifer join our lesson since both Jennifer and Andy have parents who didn’t like the fact of them getting baptized. It was good to have them share their testimonies with Kayleen since she is in the same situation right now with her parents. We're going to teach her the lessons and review with her and build her faith to take that step and become cleansed from all sin! It may take time, but you never know with God's timing.

Y’all might have heard about the hurricane Earl that was going to hit North Carolina a bit, but it didn’t even phase Wilmington. We didn’t even get a tropical storm ha-ha, it was just a normal night that was a little windy and maybe like 2 specs of rain. Don’t worry all is well. And I wanted to live through a hurricane, which would've been fun ha-ha. Elder Spencer and I survived Black Saturday and will be together one more transfer, so as the mission goes on, the more likely it is that this is my last spot...but we will see.

We had a small little miracle and just proves that God works in mysterious ways...Don father of a member, he got sick this weekend and couldn’t make it to church, since he got sick on Friday he hasn’t smoked all those 3 days! and said that he was planning to hopefully commit and stop from there on out, they are ready with the nicotine patches and we're seeing him tonight, so we'll see what the outcome is. We did a lot of traveling this week again ha-ha. Tuesday we had to travel to Raleigh for a Zone Leader Council meeting, which went from 9-3 and it took like 2 ½ hours to get there, so took up our whole day pretty much, then Wednesday night we went up to Wallace for an interview, so took up that night ha-ha. Then Thursday we went up to Jacksonville for their district meeting and it takes like 1 hour and 15 mins to get there, so that took half our day. We are pretty sure that we don’t have to travel that much this transfer ha-ha.THE DISTRICT
Speaking of cars, Elder Spencer drove our car into a table in the garage ha-ha and that messed up our front bumper and bent the hood. Later that day, this was yesterday, we were driving home from dropping off the Spanish Speaking Missionaries and the hood flew open and slammed against our windshield and cracked it hard core!! It was so scary, so we drove home slowly and it will be replaced tomorrow morning. I took pics don’t worry ha-ha. Christ was watching out for us and thankfully it wasn’t as bad as it could've been.A FIGHT WITH A TABLE AND THE TABLE WON!

Well my family, I miss all of y’all so much and hope that everything is going well. Thank you for everything that you do and the support that y’all give me. I know that the Book of Mormon is God's word and it truly is what it says it is, Another Testament of Jesus Christ, our Redeemer. I love this work and I love the spirit that helps us teach and guides us daily! I love you!!

Much love,
Elder Henricksen