Una Semana Mas Con La Fiesta En Tha Cliff

Hola! Wow this week has just flown by and we've been able to see some good and...not so good experiences. We've come up with a whole new battle plan on finding and working with the members down here so we're stoked to see how that goes. But as far as this past week we've had a few interesting experiences while out tracting. One of my favorites was when we found this one Mobile Home complex that I have to say, is possibly the sketchiest area I've ever walked in in all of my life. We decided to go out of the area that we normally search in and went down the our borders deeper in Dallas, and found this complex somewhat secluded in this little jungle area off the freeway. It felt like I was an Indiana Jones movie the whole time being chased by I don't know how many different creatures, almost falling into the nails protruding from the roof, floor, and steps, trying to leap up the stairs with just about zero foundation (and a couple of those wood planks that they used as an excuse for stairs totally gave way.) There was one home where I thought I would be safe as I made it up the stairs, but once I stepped on the porch floor, I came to learn really fast that there was absolutely nothing under the linoleum lining and one leg went straight through. So after getting out of that hole and wondering just how many people had fallen in that trap, we knocked and found out that she wasn't all that interested haha, just another day in Texas! It also had the natives that looked just like they were from the movie, but all that they lacked was the blow-darts and that was about it. 

Another awesome time was when we were coming down another street just knocking doors, and we saw this old lady that looked like she was about 85 years old that was sitting outside on her porch. Once she saw us coming down the street, she just about launched herself off the chair, and was crawling at the wall to get inside. Her legs just weren't as fast as her arms though, so she was stretched out to the point where it looked like she was just crawling to the door, reached for the handle, and just about collapsed from the doorway inside her house....safe from the Mormons. Given her age, this process took about a whole minute to happen and looked like it was going in slow motion, so we just about lost it watching her use all the energy she had to escape the missionaries. We also saw this as another opportunity to perform service...and we thought it was pretty ironic anyways that we would be helping her to avoid us, but the experience made me see someone go to measures that I have never seen before just to escape the missionaries!

Another great experience was when we went to follow up on a referral that dear old Elder Lee left us. He said that the family was way solid and that we need to follow up with them. So we were pretty stoked at the possibility of new investigators and went to search out this family. Well it took this house that was way secluded from its neighborhood out in the middle of some bamboo forest and was built on the one existing hill in Texas. It had a couple hundred stairs leading up to the front door, but once we got up there, we found out that the porch (which extended around the corner beyond our sight) was gated off. So we tried to open it, but found that it was nailed shut, which was a little weird because you think that someone would try to open the gate to the front door every now and then but whatever floats your boat I guess. So we went around the house to see if there was maybe another way that they came in or another door that they would normally use, but only found the backyard and decided that taking them from behind would be a bad idea for a door approach. So we decided to go and hop the gate guarding the front door, and right as I got to the other side, I heard a clicking sound come from the other end of the porch. About two second later, I saw a dog/alien/creature (think of "The Beast" from the Sandlot) come around the corner with its two counterparts. After one second of complete silence...while the Alpha dog stared me down....I just ran and leaped (probably higher than anything y'all will ever see in the 2012 Olympics) over the gate and took off down the stairs. Elder Henze was still trying to get over the gate when I first saw the dog, but he most definitely got the message after my glorious bound over the fence. After we were safely over the fence, we saw that these dogs (no joke) had nails that were about 3-4 inches long and looked like the offspring of a rottweiler/bulldog and the Chupacabra. So we decided that maybe there would be a better time to come and try to bring this family the gospel haha.

Well thank you all so much for your prayers and all the support you guys give me out here on the mission! I miss you all and hope everything is going well!!
Con Amor
Elder Justin Wilson