Hey family and friends,

This week has been a very good week. Our investigator Palu has been progressing super well. Our Bishop and his wife went to her house and talked to her parents and looked likes the baptism is going to go through this Saturday. To be honest it is kind of a miracle to have the opportunity to teach Palu. The work has been so slow in this area and having the opportunity to even teach is rare, and to find somebody to baptize is even rarer.  She is super awesome and has already been taught by missionaries before, and I can see that she already has a super strong testimony of the church. 

  

Our other two investigators, Epenisa and her son are doing iffy jiffy. We are just trying to make sure she actually has a true heart to join the church. We have a baptismal date with her on Saturday as well. We'll hope for a miracle and will work hard and see what happens.

Elder Loto'aniu and I gave talks in Fatumu yesterday and it actually went pretty well. He spoke about the Book of Mormon and I spoke about missionary work and how we need to work together with the missionaries. Maybe its because there was only 30-35 people in church, but I feel like I've been getting a lot better at giving talks in church. 

We had a ward activity night on Friday. We invited every family in the ward (5) to come to it with an activity and to invite a nonmember family to come. We started at 7... nobody was there. Fast forward 40 minutes of us feeling bad and then everybody showed up. haha. It went alright, a couple of non- member and a lot of less actives showed up. 

Besides that work has been going well, Hoping everything goes well for the baptism this Saturday. 

Ofa Atu ,

Elder Wilson

Malo e leiei,

It was super good to talk to everyone last week and the house is looking insanely nice.

  

This week was honestly a pretty long week that tested my patience. I think I had to kick youth out of our house 4 times after repeatedly telling them not to come in. Then I also got the fever and chills on Thursday and still haven't completely recovered from it. But last week is gone and this week is going to be a good one. 

The work has been going OK. We had the opportunity to teach our investigator, Palu, 3 times the past week. It's been a long time since I've actually got to teach an investigator who has a baptismal date and it's really fun. We are still waiting to know the true intent of her Dad to see if she can be baptized or not. Our other investigators have kind of gone hola (fled). We have gone to their house a bunch of times and nobody's there and we see them drive by and keep going. So we'll see about them. 

Last week randomly some less active youth came to church and told Bishop he wanted to come back to church. We have been with him a lot trying to help him stop smoking. I finally was able to make a map with all the houses, names and the church they belong to just to help out the future missionaries who are going to work in Fatumu.

One recent cool thing was a satellite conference yesterday with everybody on the islands of Tonga, Samoa, Vanuatu, Fiji, Tahiti, and Marshall Islands. It was a great conference and Elder Renlund, Elder Pearson, Stephen Owens, and Sister McConkie all spoke. A lot was spoken on faith and how the family is the first defense against Satan. 

I testify that God knows us all personally and that he can help us and that he overcame everything big and small, so that we can conquer all of our problems big and small. I love you all. READ THE BOOK OF MORMON.

--

Elder Wilson

Hey Everyone,

This week has been fun and interesting. To start off, I'm training and my companion is Elder Loto'aniu from Tonga and he's amazing. He comes from town and lived right next to a missionary house so he is super excited and wants to work hard. We are going to have a lot of fun in this area.

Speaking Tongan full time really hasn't been a hard adjustment, but I'm going to try and take advantage of the fact that I have a Tongan companion to learn a lot. He also really wants to learn English. 

This week was really fun because I got to go stay with the zone leaders until my comp came from the MTC in New Zealand on Thursday. So I got to chill with my comp in the office, Elder Gardner, for a couple days.

In terms of the work it's started to pick up a little bit. We have 3 investigators right now which is a miracle in and of itself. Hopefully we can see them progressing in the next couple of weeks and find new people to teach. 

I've been thinking a lot about how much the Church of Jesus Christ and His Gospel has blessed me. Even though times can get hard, God is always there, the Plan of Salvation is always there, and Jesus is reaching out to us. 

Love you all! Sorry I didn't get a chance to respond to all your emails. I'm SUPER excited for Mothers day next week. READ THE SCRIPTURES.

Elder Wilson

P.S.  Huge shout out to Peter Wilson and his letter, guy's a legend.

Hello Family and Friends,

It has been another good week in Fatumu. This week was transfers and we got the news that Elder Manu is going to Vava'u (a different island group) and I'm staying and training. Because of that I don't yet know who my new comp is but will find out on Wednesday.  It's kind of crazy to think that I'm going to be staying here for another 6-12 weeks in these tiny towns with little really to do. But I know that if I continue to work hard then my comp. and I will be able to see blessings.

This week was a pretty cool in terms of some things that we did. Last P-day we went to a cave in our district which was really interesting.  Then we got to go to the one resort in our area, and on this side of Tonga. It's famous for being one of the best places to eat in Tonga. Elder Manu and I went on Friday and ate some Feke (octupus) and some super good pig.  Out last day together we also had the chance to Tunu puaka( roast pig over a fire) which is so amazingly good.

Another experience from last week is that I was in Fuamotu, a little more advanced area in my district, and THE JAZZ/CLIPPER game came on the screen while we were talking to the dad of the home. The picture below shows how much self-mastery I have gained on my mission. 

I love you all, and I invite you all to take the Prophet's challenge at conference and read the Book of Mormon. Kinda crazy to think that I'm training. It's gonna be fun. 

OFA ATU

--

Elder Wilson

Hey everybody,

I'm still working hard in Fatumu. Last week was our Stake Conference and on Thursday we had a family history fireside. Only about 30 people showed up, but the whole fireside was a riot, mostly because this super funny Ward Mission Leader in another ward, who is from America, got up and sang two Elvis Songs. I almost died laughing.  

On Saturday and Sunday Elder Cardon from the Area Presidency, who actually happens to be my Grandpa's cousin, came to Tonga.  I got to shake his hand and tell him we were family. haha  It was super funny. He hit me two times on the shoulder and said,"Hey Cousin" and I, still shocked from a Seventy hitting me, said,"ummm hey cuz". Pretty crazy that we made the connection 10,000 miles away from America.

Elder Cardon gave some pretty good talks. He talked about repentance and how the Priesthood is a blessing and we need to be worthy to bless others around us. He also talked about education, and how my great-great-grandma (his Grandma) said she tried to learn something new every day of her life. He said that even though in Tonga there aren't a whole bunch of opportunities to access higher learning, all of us still need to learn. It was a great stake conference with a bunch of food. President Tui'one and his wife and family came as well as the Temple President and his wife.

As far as the work goes, we found 9 new investigators last week! But one of our main investigators went back to another island which was a bummer. Hopefully we can get some of the new investigators progressing this week.

Not much else has happened this week. We have a musical fireside this Sunday and President Tui'one is coming to it and we also have transfers this next week. Time has flown this past transfer. I studied a lot this week about the Holy Ghost. I know that having the Holy Ghost's presence all the time is such a huge blessing and that we need to live worthy of it.

Love you all. Keep doing good things,

Elder Wilson

Conference

I feel like I say this every week, but for reals, it was another good one. I'll give my random things before I blow up about Conference :

1. All dog lovers will cringe, but I ate dog twice this past week. It kind of tastes like roast beef, picture attached.

2. I got to go to the Scenic Hotel and ate a burger for the first time in 8 months. 

3. Elder Manu and I had 3 really good potential new investigators this week! Then 2 fell through because their parents won't let them be baptized. But we are going to check out another one today, so we shall see.

4. Built a chicken coup.

5. I think my Tongan is actually improving. What has been hard for me was speaking as Tongans speak and not like an English speaker speaking Tongan. But I think that a lot of people are understanding me a lot better. 

As Gavin Baxter and I used to quote,"Shasta is the best thing this side of the Mississippi."  As I was pondering this great saying a thought came into my head - Conference is the best thing on both sides of the Mississippi River. We went to our Stake Center, 3 towns over, to watch it and were lucky because we could watch it English.

Something that I did this General Conference that I haven't done before was go to it with 5 questions, some of which were pretty specific. It was crazy and a testimony builder that all 5 of my questions were answered, and answered well too. My favorite talks were probably Elder Bragg about the Light of Christ and Elder Ballard on Visions, Goals, and Plans. Also I loved President Uchtdorf and President Eyring in the priesthood session. 

10 Ma'ongo'onga(great) things from Conference:

10. Family History work is central to the plan of salvation - Pres Eyring

9.  A repenting sinner draws closer to god than the self-rightous - Elder Renlund

8. The light of Christ is as real as the actual sunlight - Elder Bragg

7. All Christlike attributes are intermingled. As we develop one we influence another-

Elder Hales

6. Elder Ballard - It's our duty to listen, also to have goals and vision to increase desire.

5. Pres Uchtdorf - Be Thankful but don't inhale it. You cannot get into Heaven by campaigning for it, In leadership, don't direct, let God direct us.

4. Elder Choi- One small thing I do on my mission and in life can make huge differences throughout generations.

3. Pres Uchtdorf- Don't use fear as a motivator. Look forward with faith, not fear. Perfect love casteth out fear.

2. Elder Bednar - Called to serve, labor in a country. Worthiness is the KEY to receiving  blessings.

1. PRES EYRING - God's work isn't to be super effective but to build people up.

My favorite line of conference was the above one by President Eyring.  I realize that trying to work extra hard and smart to find new investigators isn't the most important thing. I'm also here to build people up. Other than that we have Stake Conference and I think Elder Cardon is coming who is my grandpa's cousin. Hopefully I'll be able to talk to him.

The Church is true, The men who lead this church are inspired from God, We can learn so much from listening to there words. I invite all of us to listen to words of the Prophet and gain our own testimony and read the Book of Mormon.

Ofa lahi Atu

--

Elder Wilson

Hey Family and Friends,

It's been another great one here in Tonga. This past week was our Stake's "International Youth Night," where each of the wards was assigned a country/place, and they had to explain the country and do a dance. Lavengatonga's assignment was Texas and Fatumu's was India.  It was insanely funny and I took some serious pride in the fact that Fatumu and Lavengatonga, (the two smallest towns in the Stake, and where I work) definitely delivered. I really wish Tonga had good internet so I could upload the video.

We also had a mission conference on Wednesday that was really good. President talked on the topic I have been trying to study, which is diligence. He spoke about some specific things that we can do to be more diligent in our areas. On a side note, Elder Manu and I had to wake up at 5 to go to another town to catch a bus to our conference. Kinda stunk but the sun rise was way tight. 

Random things:

1. We ate some Tongan Piranhas.

2. Played 2-on-2 basketball this week.

3. Still waiting for General Conference next Sunday.

4. My Branch President just starting talking to me in gibberish for like 5 minutes yesterday. It was so funny.

5. We are eating dog today, they tried to make me kill it, YEAH RIGHT.

6. We might have an investigator for reals, hopefully.

7. Church is still true.

8. Went on this exchange with a new white guy who came in last transfer, Elder Cox. He's way tight   and his Tongan is pretty good for a new guy. 

9. TWO of our inactive families turned up to church in Lavengatonga. We also had 12 men that had the priesthood come to church, definitely a record in my time here. 

10. I don't think I was sick this week. Life is GOOD.

Ofa lahi atu kiate kimoutolu, I encourage you all to read and listen and reread and relisten to the confrence talks, One of the best times of the year is listening to the these great men. Just do it.

Elder Vilisoni