Entry Fifty: Undercover Gringo

Ello loves! What a week it has been! I hope that you all had the most bestest Christmas ever and your days were in fact merry and bright! Let’s get into it though, shall we?

First off, I want to pay tribute to Elder Holland. This was some hard news to hear for me, as he has grown to be by far my favorite speaker of all time over the course of my mission. In fact even as I’m typing this up I’m listening to an old BYU devotional of his called Cast Not Away Therefore Your Confidence (go listen to it, it is fantastic!) I know that it is all part of God’s plan though, and I am very grateful for the direction towards the Savior he has given me. Please pray for the Hollands to be comforted at this time. 🙏

Christmas was good! We hit an exchange on Christmas Eve with our district leader, so I ended up partying with the Spanish Branch that night. It was hilarious being the only non-Spanish speaker there, but I think I blended in, because according to some *cough cough* I have an “olive complexion.” Luckily almost everyone there knew English though. Also, I absolutely destroyed this one man in Jingle Bell Drop (you don’t wanna know what it is 💀) so I guess I can put that on my resume…

We also got to meet Pancho Clause! He is Santa’s Hispanic brother who takes Christmas to all the Hispanics… apparently. He also has some crazy dance moves and knows how to shake what his momma gave him… But I got to watch bro beat up the grinch and he gave me some gifts! Hispanic parties are so crazy, but I absolutely love them.

As for Christmas morning, I woke up exhausted because my DL snores. Buuut like it was a chill morning and I caught up on rest. We also un-exchanged at breakfast, but everyone was so late and the food took forever to cook, so it was more like lunch. Then, we just texted a bunch of folks because everything was closed and we had to hit 100 church invites somehow 🤷

The rest of the week was pretty insane. Elder Hall and I have been trying a new strat of giving people second chances if they say no to an initial church invite by offering to read a scripture. In the south, everybody LOVES to talk about Jesus and scripture, so they say yes and fall right into our trap (muahaha). Then we use that as a launchpad to introduce the Book of Mormon. It has been working really well for our area! 

Not to boast to all my missionary friends, but we found 22 people this week, highest I’ve gotten in my mission so far! Although it was definitely the Lord blessing us, we had some insane chance encounters with those previously taught and those who have been so prepared. Unfortunately, most of them ghosted us and those that didn’t had things come up (the adversary bruh) and couldn’t make it to church. We’ll get them soon enough though.

I wanted to close with a brief scripture I had shared to me from a friend this week.

For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus hath made me free from the law of sin and death. (Romans 8:2)

Guys, I just want to express to you all how grateful I am for the atonement of Jesus Christ. True reception of this gift is life changing, especially when we get to live life with the gift of the Holy Ghost. Parley P. Pratt put it best when he said,

“In short, [the gift of the Holy Ghost] is, as it were, marrow to the bones, joy to the heart, light to the eyes, music to the ears, and life to the whole being.”

I testify that this is the greatest gift given to us not just this Christmas season, but of all time! And I say that in His holy name, Jesus Christ, amen.

Oh dearly, dearly has he loved! And we must love him too, and trust in his redeeming blood, and try his works to do.

Holy cow, how is it new years already? Hope y’all have a good celebration and a Happy New Year!

-Elder Clayton

So my phone was crashing and wouldn't let me add photos (plus I kinda forgot to take some 😅), so they'll be back next week!

I’ve been asked for an address so here’s my mission office: 9145 Cross Park Dr Ste. 104

Knoxville TN 37923

United States

Email Archive (if pictures don’t work, they’re always on here):

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1nv9hQehdVq0D_EP2lqnE7QFaN21mE70QBloWU_heK7E/edit?usp=sharing