NEW COMPANION & GETTING RIGHT TO WORK

What’s going on y’all? Well this week has been great! I have a new companion. His name is Elder Marc Oslund. He is from Torrance California, which is near LA. So I don’t know if y'all know, but he is kind of a big deal, he is very humble about it though. There is an article about him in the Mormon Times. He is a convert of about 3 years ago, and he pitched at BYU and was a Freshman All-American. He has hit like 92 mph. and was drafted out of High school but turned it down to serve the Lord! He is a spiritual giant and we have learned a lot from each other just from this first week. I love him and I’m excited to continue to serve with him throughout the rest of this transfer, and hopefully longer...but Elder Oslund got straight into it. Right when he got into Wilmington. We ate a quick dinner and headed to our Stake Correlation meeting, so he had a great start. Elder Oslund had already served as a zone leader, so he fit in just right!COMPANION ELDER OSLUND

Felix is doing amazing! We taught him twice this week. And both times was amazing! We asked him how he feels about the Book of Mormon and he said, "I feel like this book can answer any question that I’ll ever have." and we also taught the Plan of Salvation and at the end asked him how he feels about it, and he thought about it and said "I now know where I’m going, I never knew that before." it was SO powerful, the Spirit gets stronger and stronger each time we teach him. We read Alma 40:12 about the Spirit paradise, and he lite up and knew that the Book of Mormon is true and that the Plan of Salvation is true. It was amazing. Then later in the week we just stopped by him to show him a picture of the LDS Ghana Temple from the October Ensign issue, and you should’ve seen his face when we pointed to Ghana Temple, so much joy overcame him. He is more than excited about his Baptism for November 10. He is ready. This week we have also been working a lot with the members and getting to know them and earn the respect and trust, and it’s been working. Every family that we stopped by last week for appointments and dinners gave us at least one name of less-actives or friends that need to gospel in their life. So we're excited to move forward with the work. Also, Bishop Lewis met with a mom and her son (non-member) that's here for school at UNCW and wants to learn more about the church. He comes from a part member family and was never baptized, so we're going to call him up this week. He came to church on Sunday to the YSA (Young Single Adult) sacrament meeting where the amazing YSA members engulfed him ha-ha, they are great and have done SO good with Felix as well.

We have the car back! it’s a miracle ha-ha. She looks good and it feels good to be able to ride around in the car after nearly 3 weeks without it. Oct 22 was brother Rains birthday ha-ha, so we surprised him! It was SO good. In the morning we put up a banner and a sun piñata that made us laugh. So he saw that and thanked us, but he didn’t know what we were going to do later.
HAPPY BIRTHDAY BROTHER RAINS We bought some cupcakes and party hats, poppers and surprised him when he came home from work! It was good, he needs that in his life, and all 3 of us have become really good friends. We love him so much!

Well my family, I love you SO SO much and think and pray about you all day every day. I know that this church is true without any doubt in my mind. We are truly blessed to be a part of the Lord's kingdom here on earth. I know Jesus Christ lives and loves us all. I love this work and I love y’all!

Much love,
Elder Henricksen

ELDER SPENCER BEING TRANSFERRED & BAPTISM DATE SETTISIM DATE SET

Well black Saturday has come and Elder Spencer is leaving, which we kind of figured would happen, it will be sad to see him leave, but the work goes on! I have no idea what will happen with me next transfer if I’ll be in a threesome here or send me somewhere else...I’m anxious to see what will happen. And I’m anxious to see how my new companion will be. I have a couple people in mind of who it could be, but we'll wait and see.
BEAUTIFUL SUNRISE @ WILMINGTON BEACH
Well this week was GREAT! I talked about a guy named Felix last week and how we didn’t get up with him and didn’t come to church. Well we stopped by this week and taught him and set a baptismal date for November 10th! We actually taught him on Friday as well. He is from Ghana and has actually had some contact with the church there, and when he moved here to Wilmington he said "something just keeps pulling him toward this church." but he is solid! He came to the YSA (young single adult) sacrament meeting and afterward during the announcements Ashley had first timers stand up and Felix introduced himself and also mentioned how excited he is to be baptized and join this family! You see it's for moments like that, that make missionary work so fulfilling! The spirit was so strong that sacrament meeting and he just added more to it! He's going to all the YSA stuff and just getting friend shipped very well, the ysa people are very good at that. We'll be teaching him tonight after the FHE (family home evening) at the church. Felix is amazing and I’m so stoked for him! The church is true and the spirit is real. There is no way I can doubt that one second. I love the feeling and it just makes you want more and more! I know that Jesus Christ lives. Don is starting to recognize the blessings from praying and reading which is great! and this week his son is taking away his cigarettes and not buying anymore, because they are starting to literally kill Don, so we should be good from here on out, now we just need him to start coming to church again. Then we are confident that he can make it to December 4.HA-HA I MET UP WITH ONE OF MY OLD COMPANIONS ELDER HARMON. BLAKE AND ELDER DEALBA

Well my family, I know that this is the work of the Lord. I know that this church is true and everything that it includes are real and true and can bless is more than we can imagine. It has changed me and i know it can change anyone really wants to. I miss and love y'all and hope and pray that everything continues to go well.

Much love,
Elder Henricksen

MEETINGS, TRAINING AND BLITZ

So this week FLEW by, I hate it when that happens ha-ha. We were out of our area for 2 days, so we didn’t get to work Wilmington for those days. Wednesday we headed up to Southport for the District Meeting there and afterwards we Blitzed the Shallotte area. Blitz means Elder Spencer and I both went to that area with another companionship and just worked in their area. I went with Elder Nickley and Elder Spencer went with Elder Miller. We had a good exchange with them. Elder Nickley and I taught a woman who accepted a baptismal invitation which was great! The timing was right and the spirit was there. While there though a miracle happened! So remember Keema, when we first gave her a church tour she brought two friends with her, Felix and Hiram. We gave them both a pamphlet with our number on it. Out of the blue Felix called us while in Shallotte and said he wants to come to church and to learn more! Man I was stoked when we got his call ha-ha. Sunday came and we went to go pick him up and he wasn’t there, so hopefully we can get up with him today. We both had a feeling, as did our exchange President Walker who was with us at the church tour, that Felix had some interest, we'll get up with him.

This week we also had Training. That was on Thursday in Fayetteville. Thank goodness it was only one day instead of 3 like the last time. it was great, we got the last 2 lessons that the MTC will be teaching I think in May. The two lessons we learned last week were the role of the Holy Ghost in conversion and revelation through prayer. The spirit was so strong, and just added to my testimony that this truly is the Lord's work and not ours. I read in Preach My Gospel today "This is HIS work, so we must do it HIS way and by HIS power. SO TRUE! During these training meetings, we do role playing; talked about the Doctrine behind what we're learning and have a great discussion about it and watch examples from the Preach My Gospel videos. All in all, it was a great revelatory experience.
THE AUSTENS, NICE LADY IN JACKSONVILLE, BROTHER AUSTIN AND HALE FAMILY TITLE OF LIBERTY

We had to move our baptismal date with Don to the 4th of December. We talked a lot about baptism and his feelings on it. His son was being pretty bold with him and asked if this is truly what we wants to happen. So we just need to really work on his faith, desire and mighty prayer. We did a lot of finding this week and we have some great appointments this week that will hopefully lead to something. I know this work is the Lord's work. I know that the Gospel of Jesus Christ will bless us more than anything if we accept and live it! And miracles will happen. We just need to pray for them and work for them. This work we're all in isn’t easy, it does require work, but that's what makes the results that much better! I love all of y’all and hope that all is well. You’re in my prayers and thank you for your support and prayers as well; it pushes me through the trials of life.

Much love,
Elder Henricksen

TROPICAL STORM - MISSIONARY SUPER BOWL (GERERAL CONFERENCE)

Thank you so much for the Birthday “heart attack” that I got on Friday. ha-ha. At Zone Leader Council on Friday in Raleigh they sang Happy Birthday to me at lunch ha-ha.VIDEO ZONE COUNCIL SINGS HAPPY BIRTHDAY And we definitely used the Texas Roadhouse certificate.TEXAS ROADHOUSE FOR BD DINNER W/BROTHER RAINS So thank you very much for that, it was good to have a legit steak :) You mother, work in sneaky ways ha-ha, I don’t know how you do it, but you know how to make anything happen ha-ha.ZONE LEADER COUNCIL 10-1-10

Well we had SO SO much rain last week ha-ha. in the total of 5 days we got 24.5 inches of rain! It was crazy! We didn’t see the sun for like 4 days straight. Some nights it was crazy to drive in, all I can say is luckily we had the car because the next 2 weeks the car will be in the shop to get repaired from the fight with the table ha-ha. On our way to Raleigh going through Hampstead we crossed a bridge that was flooded! The river was at the same height, it was crazy but we made it past ha-ha. I have never seen so much rain in my life, but now I can say i made it through a tropical storm, now I just need a hurricane!

Our week was interesting, with Keema we have stopped teaching her for now, she just can’t give up some addictions. So we had a lesson about having faith to overcome them and told her whenever she has the desire to stop give us a call and we'll continue. It was a hard lesson, but she knows we love and care about her. We will check up on her today. Other than that, Don is slowly progressing hopefully; he went to his grandson’s Baptism on Saturday. Hopefully he felt something while there besides the urge to smoke. He's on phases of not smoking for 3-4 days then smokes then doesn’t again, so we're still working with that. This week we'll be doing a lot of finding and getting up with potential investigators because we have a lot of them, we just need to touch base though.

General Conference was GREAT! Always love the feeling and peace and joy from it. I got 2 questions answered this conference so I definitely gained a testimony of our Heavenly Father's love and speaking through his chosen servants to help and guide us to our answers that we're seeking. The Hale family fed us missionaries between the morning and afternoon session both days. That was nice of them, I love that family ha-ha. It’s definitely hard to pin point favorite talks, I received great inspiration from all of them. I like Elder Oaks, President Utchdorf's and Elder Ballard's talk. To me a lot was focused on Agency and knowing which path that we should chose. But that's what it’s all about, Satan is trying to take away that special gift but we can’t let him ha-ha!

Well my family I hope that all is well and again thank you so much for the love and the “heart attack” y’all gave me, almost called 911 ha-ha. By the way, next Monday our library is closed for some reason, so we'll be emailing on Tuesday next week.

I love and miss all of y’all!

Much love,
Elder Henricksen