Elder Junk's Washington DC South Mission Blog: 10-2-2017

Mail:

Elder Carson Lewis Junk

Washington DC South Mission

5242 Lyngate Court

Burke, VA 22015

From: Carson Lewis Junk [mailto:carson.junk@myldsmail.net]
Sent: Monday, October 2, 2017 2:17 PM
To: Kathy Junk
Subject: Missionary Blessings

Hello everyone! How has everyone been doing? I apologize for the long group e-mails all the time but I just have so many things I love telling everyone about. The mission is a wonderful experience and narrowing down each week into one e-mail is super hard. So... Shout out to all of you who actually make it through the long e-mails and continue on. It has been an amazing week. The Lord truly does love his missionaries. General Conference was incredible and this week was another one for the books.

I had the wonderful opportunity to go on a Spanish exchange with Elder Cottle over in the Spanish area on Tuesday. Elder Cottle is THE man! He has been out for 22 months and is from Lehi! I had one of the best studies I have ever had my whole mission with him. It was such a cool experience and he taught me so many things about The Book of Mormon. He opened my eyes and invited me to focus on one particular subject while studying The Book of Mormon. For example, one of the times reading, he focused on the Sacrament while reading The Book of Mormon and tied everything to the sacrament. He related it in ways that I had no idea possible. He invited me to think about what I need to work on most and study that specific topic in The Book of Mormon. We knelt down in prayer and I felt strongly I needed to work on repentance and study that in The Book of Mormon. Many times I find myself repenting repetitively and not sincerely. It was such a spiritual experience for me kneeling down in prayer and receiving my answer with Elder Cottle and knowing what I need to work on.

Elder Cottle also showed me how to better work conversation into the gospel with people who we street contact. We had a funny experience Tuesday night when we encountered a group of 6 and 7 year old's who wanted to work on their "roasts". I let them try them on me and I got responses like, "You're shoes look like they came from Walmart. Your clothes look they came from Good Will. Where'd you get you haircut the garbage man?" It was super funny and I will have to get the videos out we took of them because I was dying. Kids these days.

Wednsday, Elder Roper and I treated ourselves with the $50 we got from the man in Warrenton after our encounter with Pastor Santos last week. We went to Olive garden and had a great meal. Afterwards, we went across the street to Cheesecake Factory to get some dessert. While waiting in line, we met a member and she said she was buying us each a piece of Cheesecake. Wow, people are too good to us missionaries and I know the Lord is looking out for us. He is blessing us with small miracles even just having things bought for us. People are so awesome!

It gets better. We had another exchange on Thursday and it was my first time leading out the area. Elder Denning came to Woodbridge with me and he is hilarious. He is from St George and is also a Spanish speaking missionary. I was excited to lead out the area, but must admit I got a little jealous when Elder Denning met a lot of Spanish Speakers in MY area ;) It was an awesome time. We were biking back and stopped at a fruit stand. This Baptist guy name "Big Beau" insisted on buying us peaches or whatever we wanted because we were "servants of God". Blessings on Blessings. I loved Big Beau and had to get a picture with him. The Lord truly does love his missionaries and I am thankful for his hand blessing us with so many nice people in the area who love us! It is all because of Him!

General Conference was absolutely amazing. It is the best thing watching General Conference as a missionary. I loved every talk and there were so many dang good ones, I couldn't choose a favorite. A reoccurring theme that I noticed was that even if we are doing our best and following God's commandments, we will still face hardships and have to endure through our trials. BUT it emphasized that the Savior will make our burdens light. I really liked that because it said even though we will all have trials, the Gospel of Jesus Christ will help us push on. We will be much better enduring the trials WITH the gospel rather than WITHOUT. We must build our rock upon Jesus Christ and continue to stay strong in the gospel and not fall into the Worldly things, such as getting lost in comparisons and things that won't matter in the end. I loved Elder Rasband's talk about Heavenly Father being in all the little things. I promise to you all that God is in every thing we do. Without his merciful plan we would have no happiness. I love all of you and I love this Gospel. I am so thankful to be apart of this wonderful Church and be a missionary in the Washington, DC South Mission. The members and oeople look out for us so much here in Woodbridge 1st and they deserve a shoutout.

Another group email that is super long. Sorry for that, but I love the mission and I love all of you. Hope you all have a great week!

Love,

Elder Junk