Elder Josh Carlile's Mission Blog: May 22, 2017 -- It's All Good In The Hood

Boy has it been a crazy awesome week! A wide variety of things have happened --things like going to the Temple, to getting lost on my way to Albany, and everything in between.

Elders Gubler, Shore, and I went to the Palmyra temple on Monday with Brother Walton (a super awesome member in Liverpool). Man, if had to describe the whole experience in one word, it would be refreshing. The Spirit I felt while there was so refreshing. That trip was our last hoorah as a trio since transfers were the next day.

So I got to Troy on Wednesday. It has been a blast the past five days! First off, there are tons of cool people to talk to in our area. Troy is kind of like a sub city to Albany. Troy definitely has its ghetto places and there are tons of black people and you know what that means. . . STREET BALL PROSELYTING!!!! We live in a suburb just outside of town so mom you don't have to worry about us getting shot or robbed or something. We have a car but we use the bus and walk around Troy most of the time. The car is mainly for going to church and P-day stuff. Overall, I love this area so far. Since it is springtime, everyone is out walking and usually in a better mood.

Elder Thomas is awesome!! I love him so much!! He is from Scottsdale, Arizona, just outside of Phoenix. He has been out for three months. He is a solid 6 foot 3 guy and played Offensive Tackle on his football team in high school. He is good one too. He got offered scholarships from multiple D1 college football teams including some from the Pac 12 but he chose to turn them down so that he could serve a mission. He is a good easy going guy and is very relatable. He likes to joke around and so we have been having a good time the past five days.

One night, Elder Thomas and I were tracting this one street and we saw a women sitting on the stairs of her apartment using her phone. So, being missionaries, we decided to OYM her. As the conversation rolled on, she told us that her boss is a Mormon. She works in an oral surgery clinic. On top of that, she was open to hear our message so we taught her the Restoration right there. The lesson went really well and she said she was interested in learning more. Her name is Ivy by the way. We teach a lot of restoration lessons in a week but this one seemed different. Ivy is super open-minded and respectful in listening to us and she really wants to learn more about Jesus Christ. We are going back to teach her this week so we'll see how it goes.

Another person we are teaching is James. He is super solid and golden. Apparently he just showed up at church three weeks ago and said, "I want to join." He has a friend in Salt Lake that is an amazing member missionary who started sharing the gospel with him and he was hooked. This friend was actually passing through town for business yesterday and she came to church with him. It was cool to meet her and hear her side of the story. James is going to be baptized on June 10th and coming along great. We, and his son Levi, got him moved into his new place and this past week. I can't wait to see how this changes his life.

Overall things are going good in the hood. The sky is blue, the Church is true and life is good!

Till next week, Elder Carlile