3 Nefi 5:13- Week 9

Hey everyone!!!

It has been a pretty good week!! We work with the ward a lot and there are a ton of times where we will be helping out at the church and members will come up to us and ask us advice on how to bring up the church in a normal way without feeling weird about it and a lot of them asked for Book of Mormon's to give to them! The members here are so great! Whenever they ask how I like it here I get to tell them I love it because the way that there ward is (loving, kind, caring, Christlike) just like my ward at home! And they love that answer! It has been a huge blessing for me to be here in this ward and the work is really progressing here because of all the hard work between the members and the missionaries! 

Also, I have heard of so many people at home getting their mission calls and I am so excited!! Missionary work is super fun. I have been able to share my adventures of why I came on a mission lots of times and a young man in the ward here was planning on going to college instead of a mission and I shared my story and he also had heard Elder Thacker's story and he started his papers this last week and I am so excited for him and for all of the soon ti be missionaries! You are all going to be such great missionaries! The awesome thing is, we are all missionaries! It is all of our responsibilities to gather scattered Israel and be missionaries! 3 Nephi 5:13 says, 'Behold, I am a disciple of Jesus Christ, the son of God. I have been called of Him to declare His word among His people, that they might have everlasting life.' That is directed to ALL of us! Exchange the I in the scripture to your name. Sometimes we think it is super hard to be a disciple of Christ, but it is actually very simple! By just living the principles of the gospel and being a light of Christ you are being a disciple! If someone asks what you are did over the weekend and you went to the temple, TELL THEM!!! Tell them how you felt while you were there! It doesn't have to be long, something like 'I had the opportunity to go to the temple and I felt so strongly the love that God has for me and all of His children. It is so peaceful even just to be on temple grounds because of the Spirit that is there at the temple!' It brings great joy when we are able to share simple things like that to everyone and who knows! Maybe they start asking more questions and are interested in what you say and then you could have them start taking missionary discussions! 

I talked about Eric last week and he is still an awesome guy!!! I always feel the spirit so strongly when I taught him. He is from Arizona and he moved here a couple months ago. This last week he called us one day and asked if we could come up right away. He lives about 45 minutes from where we live but we sayed of course and he let us know that he had to go back to Arizona. He left on Thursday and I am sad that he is gone but I think that he felt he needed to go back because he wants to change his life and needs to fix some things there before he can progress! The Spirit has been working on him and he has grown so much while I've been here and I know the spirit is going to continue working on him! 

I also had the privilege to have a baptism of Michael this last Saturday! He was going to get baptized about 3 years ago and before he got baptized he just didn't feel like it was right, but we started teaching him again and he felt really good about it and knows that this is the true church and got baptized this last Saturday and confirmed on Sunday! There was also a little boy in the ward who turned 8 and got baptized the same day as well! It was so amazing! I could really just see the light coming from Michael and it amazes me how the Gospel of Jesus Christ changes people and how Christ puts His light in each and every one of us if that's what we desire and are working and trying to be like him. I am so glad I was able to witness and be apart of that!

We got to go help the youth for their mutual this last week and we helped them do a service project scavenger hunt! So they had a paper that had a whole list of projects that we could do and we went around the neighborhood around the street knocking doors and trying to give service and it was really fun to be with the young men and get to know them better and serve others!! The ward and youth here is great! 

Also, real quick!!! There is this super cool thing happening in my mission on May 17th for the Spanish speakers here in Wisconsin and also the Spanish missionaries!! There is going to be an apostle and 4 other general authorities coming and speaking to us all in Spanish!!! After they speak everybody that comes gets to greet them and shake their hands so I am really looking forward to that. They haven't announced who all of the speakers and apostles are going to be but all the missionaries think its going to be either D. Todd Christoffersen or Ulisses Soares from the Quorum of the 12 because they both speak Spanish! So it will be excited to see who's hand i get to shake which is awesome! I'm looking forward to it:) 

It's Analee's birthday this week on the 2nd of May!!! She is going to be 12! Only one more year until she is a TEENager! Happy Birthday Analee!! I love you❤ (Your letter might be un poco late getting to you!)

Thank you all for your love, support and prayers!! I hope you all have an amazing week! Keep me updated on all of your adventures at home as well! Love you all.

DO GOOD, BE GOOD 

Love,

Elder Ricks

Making some deep fried cheese curds - Go Wisconsin, yay

Michael's bautismo

New Buck's gear

A cool dessert from a member that fed us! 

Time Flies When You're Having Fun- Week 8

Hey friends and family!

It has been another great week for me! I hope it has been for all of you as well. Thank you all so much for your love and support!! It feels like I was just writing this email last week yesterday! This last week I put up my family calendar that my mom made for me with a couple other pictures on the wall by my desk and it looks pretty good! It makes me feel like a little more at home. 

We have been teaching this kid names Micheal. He is super awesome! We have the opportunity to welcome him into our church through baptism and confirmation and I am so excited! He is enlisted in the military for the Air Force. He wants to fix/make jet engines or something like that! He was going to get baptized 3 years ago but just felt like something was off. And we started teaching him again at the beginning of March! He loves coming to mutual and church and he's just a great and happy dude! I'm excited for his baptism next week.

Eric is another person we are teaching and he has a lot of Word of Wisdom addictions so it is a little hard. He is trying to change his life around and prayed for some direction from Jesus Christ and the day after he prayed, we the missionaries, showed up in his life and he was like daaang! He is from Arizona and moved here a couple months ago. The missionaries before I got in the area were having a rough time following up with him and teaching him. He has come to church 6 times in a row but it's been kind of a slow process trying to teach him. But we have reached out to him a lot and he is progressing faster now that we are able to teach him! This last time we were teaching him we were just teaching about Jesus Christ. And it was so cool to see him before the spirit was in the room and after the spirit was there. As we always strive to live our lives in line with what Heavenly Father wants for us, the spirit will be to touch other people and they will see a light in us and will want to know what it is, so always keep trying to follow the example of Jesus Christ, love the people around you, learn about the characteristics in Christ, and lean on Him! 

Last P-Day we got together as a zone and played basketball and it was so fun. We were going to play one more game and i could just like feel something off on the bottom of my toe so I just tried to not put that much pressure on my big toe. But the game was intense so for the most part I just kept playing because I wanted to win! After the game I looked at my toe and there was a maaaassive blood blister haha! It was pretty awesome. I let it stay there for a day but it started to hurt pretty bad and was kinda annoying, so i stuck a needle in it and pushed all the blood out! It was the weirdest kind of blood/thing I have ever done but it was pretty cool! 

We have taught a couple lessons in Spanish but for the most part I just study super hard to learn more! It's pretty cool. I have started putting sticky notes all over my room with the Spanish word of whatever it is. So on a chair I have the word silla, door I have the word puerta, blanket manta, and so on and it's awesome! My companion said that Spanish is locked in his brain. He said that it is going to take a long time on my mission to learn it because we will be speaking a lot in English but once we have the Spanish it will be awesome because we will be able to be able to switch between the two languages easy because we have to use the two languages so often! I read el Libro de Mormón every day! At least 8 pages so I can finish it in Spanish the first 12 weeks I am here. Reading that book in Spanish is so hard and it takes me forever! But I still like it. 

Yesterday we got a random call right when Sacrament meeting was starting. There was a lady from a different area of Wisconsin calling and her mother was in the hospital. She had gotten moved to the ICU that morning and called us and asked to give her a priesthood blessing. We heard the mom was given a couple more days to live, and when we got to the hospital the doctors gave another update and gave her anywhere from a couple minutes to maybe 1 or 2 hours. We were able to give her a priesthood blessing and I just felt so much peace and I felt comforted that she was going to a better place and I am am grateful for the Atonement of Jesus Christ and that He was able to break the bands of death and be resurrected!

So that is a little bit about my life! There is also so much that happens but I don't want to take up too much of y'alls time! But always feel free to email me about your lives and I'll try my best to answer!! Thanks for all of your love and support! You are all the best!

I hope you all had a great Easter and keep the Spirit of Christ with you always! I am so grateful for the Atonement of Jesus Christ. It gives me so much hope and joy in this life and for the life to come. I love you all!

DO GOOD, BE GOOD 

Love,

Elder Ricks 

Primero semana en Wisconsin- Week 7

Hola!!!!!

So I got to Wisconsin last week exactly! It's definitely different than I thought. It's super exciting though! I got my training companion Elder Thacker! He is super cool. He lives in Highland Utah, super smart, fluent in Spanish, likes dancing and teaches people here how to do hip-hop, he loves theater things and acting, he has even been on a Broadway Production on the biggest stage in New York City! 

This week I didn't get to do much teaching. I am in a city called Marshfield and it is kind of out in the middle of no where! I have a super big area but only have one ward! We are in the process of either splitting the ward or getting a new building so we can fit everyone! It is the smallest building. And it used to be smaller! They have added into it in recent years. There is mostly English people so when I speak Spanish is mostly in my apartment or when we are doing language study!! But we still run into a couple hispanics! There are a lot more in Milwaukee, Green Bay, and Madison! Also there are 15 Spanish missionaries and about 11 of them are going home by the end of August! 

The first day I was here in Marshfield it showed probably 18 inches!! There is still lots of snow on the ground and we still get calls to help people shovel their driveway haha! It's awesome. We had planned out our day and had prayed about who we should teach and had a super cool experience the first door we went to! We talked to this old lady named Rose and she used to be good friends with some members that had moved out of the ward. Her brother had just passed away and so we had the opportunity to share a message with her. She loves the Earth and animals and cats and birds. We were able to teach her about the restoration and Joseph Smith. We invited her to read the Introduction of the Book of Mormon and she said she would! Watching Elder Thacker teach her mostly (with a little of me baring my testimony) was one of the coolest things. That is why I am out here! To serve people and to teach them of the truthfulness of the Gospel of Jesus Christ and try to bring them the peace and joy that I have from this gospel!

Another individual that we are teaching is Kriss. She has such a hard life and in a bad situation and she called us and asked us to come over and help brighten her day. She says that whenever she is praying, reading the scriptures, and listening to the missionaries she is the most happy and that is when she feels the most blessed. And it's true! When we turn to the Lord and show Him that we are willing to follow the commandments and change our hearts he will pour blessings upon us. We were able to teach her the story about Alma and Amulek from Alma 14. I would invite you all to read it it's a good read!!

We also had this thing called Conferencia de Español where all the Spanish missionaries went to Milwaukee and had a conference together! An area 70, Elder Scott, was there and it was so cool to here from him all the things they are working on to help the Spanish missionaries in our area! There is no Spanish branch in my area currently but we are working on getting more Hispanics to come to church so that we can get one or two opened up by the time I leave! 

General Conference was awesome!!!!! I was kind of hoping that there would've been some announcements with some changes but wow! It was so amazing to hear from our amazing prophet, the mouthpiece of our Heavenly Father, and all of the apostles and general authorities! And I had the great opportunity to watch it at the CCM:) Super cool! I know the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints is true and that we have a living prophet to lead and guide us! I know Joseph Smith restored the gospel for our benefit and we should share the happiness it brings us to everyone around us especially through our examples and just love everyone and do what Christ would do! I am grateful for the opportunity I have to share this beautiful message with others here in Wisconsin!

Also, I am so grateful for you all and want to thank you guys for your thoughts and prayers! I love hearing about what's going on in all of your lives at home so don't be afraid to email me anytime! I'll always try to answer:) I love you all!!

DO GOOD BE GOOD

Love,

Elder Ricks

Elder Ricks in Wisconsin- Week 6

Elder Ricks arrived safe and sound Monday evening and spent Tuesday with local Spanish missionaries. He returned to the mission home last night for dinner, testimonies and interviews.

Tonight he is off with his new companion after training for most of the day. We look forward to working with him and are excited to have him in the Wisconsin Milwaukee Mission!

Mi Ultima Semana en la CCM- Week 5

Wow!!!!! It doesn't feel like I should be writing this email yet. Time has been flying by and it's crazy that I will be leaving to go to Wisconsin in less than a month(oops Week)! I still have a lot to learn and I definitely don't feel as prepared as I wish I could be but I am so excited to get out and serve the people in Wisconsin.

My teacher that is going to school at BYUI came to class yesterday and said that he is leaving to the United States today. He left la Ciudad de Mexico at 10AM. I am honestly so sad because we was like my best friend here. He always had great advice and was a great friend and such a good example and teacher. I gave him my parents info though so hopefully he reaches out to them and has dinner with them eventually! (I told him my favorite meal from my mom is bajio salads and this is mostly a hint for my mom to know what to cook when he asks to go to dinner haha).

Anyway we have had to start watching this thing called SafetyZone and it is like a T.V. show so I love it. It tells us all the ways that we need to be safe on our missions and how to be safe in general tbh. But at the end of the episodes there is always a 'Let's Get Real' part and it shows us a real example of whatever safety thing its talking about in that video. It's crazy to me how important it is to be safe all the time because our lives can change so dramatically if we don't follow all of the rules. And the same thing applies to our salvation. It is so necessary for us to follow the commandments that Heavenly Father gives us and to follow the prophets because they know what will keep us safe from the dangers of the world. I know that as we look to our Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ we will be blessed and He will protect us!

This weekend is general conference and I am so excited I get to spend my last 2 days here watching general conference! It's not every day where you get to have the experience of watching general conference at the CCM and I am so grateful for the opportunity I have! I hope that there is some awesome announcements this general conference! 

I think that Mexico is finally about to have their daylight savings this next weekend so that's exciting! I have also heard of so many people getting their mission calls and I am so excited for everyone who is. Missionary work is such a great thing. We get to go teach people and invite them to come unto Christ and change there lives for the better. I can't think of a better way to spend the time that the Lord gives us. 

Thank you for everyone's prayers and support! I wouldn't be able to do this without your help and without the help of my Savior! I love you all so much and hope you all have great weeks! 

DO GOOD, BE GOOD

Love, 

Elder Ricks