Made it!

Kumusta Lahat!

My last week in Scottsdale was very bitter-sweet. I was super excited to get to travel to my original mission, speak the language I've been learning and meet tons of awesome new Filipino people! On the other hand, it was incredibly difficult to leave so many wonderful people in Scottsdale! The ward members and those we taught in Arizona had really worked their way into my heart, and I was found myself holding back tears during multiple farewells. In spite of the challenge of leaving, I was able to find some comfort in the great miracles the Lord had blessed Elder Smart and I with during the six weeks I was in Cave Creek. We were blessed to play a critical role in supporting a family going through very rough times. The Lord granted us the opportunity to help a man come back to church after a 47 year hiatus. By showing our faith going door to door for hours, the Lord saw fit to lead us to several people who were prepared to at least start down the path of His Gospel. So while I will miss Scottsdale dearly, I was at least able to leave in peace, knowing that the Lord had, does, and will continue to sustain me (and everyone who seeks to do his work)

The trip to the Philippines I guess marks the single longest day of my life. All in all, I think it was composed of 26 straight hours of flying, layovers and bus rides, followed by a full day in the Manilla MTC. Yes, back to the MTC... :P I also managed to time travel as well...I left Monday morning and arrived Wednesday morning... I'm still trying to figure that one out.  It feels a little weird being back in an MTC (with pretty much all of the people I knew in the Provo MTC nonetheless), but I'm hopeful that my experiences here will help me continue to grow before I depart for Baguio next Tuesday (American date). 

I'm out of time, but please take care and I'll have more times to write in the future!

Elder Dickison

Explosions Anyone?

"Are you able to go shooting on P day?  We have a great time blowing up bombs with AR-15's out in the dessert."

-Brother Driggs (ward missionary)

"We would love too! But we aren't allowed to go shooting sadly.... so we'll have to pass"

- Elder Smart and I

Missionary work in Cave Creek in a nutshell.

Anyways, this week we've seen some awesome progress made through miracles the Lord has provided. A couple of weeks ago, I was finally provided with a loaner bicycle from the Scottsdale Mission. However, due to the temperature and gigantic size of our area, Elder Smart and I have been rather hesitant to use our bikes. Finaly, (after being slightly told off...) we decided to follow our mission leaders' instructions and use the bikes. I don't think I've ever been as sweaty as that in my entire life...but blessings did result! We found were able to sit down and visit with a really interesting man. He's a retired playwright named Bruce with lots of questions about religion in general. We were able to give him a book of Mormon, discuss it with him and committ him to read it. We're hopeful that when we go back to visit again, good things will continue to come of it. :) Had we not been on bikes, Elder Smart and I would not have been in that area to meet Bruce, so it was a good opportunity for me to learn of the blessings of following the instructions of my leaders (obedience) even when it seems like they want me to end up as a bleached skeleton on the side of the road.

Member missionary efforts have also made an HUGE difference for us this week. The forequoted Brother Driggs and a couple other awesome members have done everything from coming with us on visits, going finding with us and bringing people to church for us! Because of these efforts, we were able to get a member to church who hadn't been since 1958! Proof that missionary-minded members can and do make all the difference in the work of bringing people unto God.

At long last, after weeks of hearing nothing, the visa news has started to trickle through. At least two of my MTC disrict-mates have had their visas approved, and another one has definitely not been approved yet. As of the writing of this letter, I still have yet to hear anything about my own status. I'm not sure whether this is a good thing or a bad thing...but I'm hopeful that I will at least have some more information soon. As before, I trust that whatever is meant to happen will happen. As with some things in life, the status of my visa is currently out of my control. So all there is to be done is trust in the Lord's plan and work my hardest to fulfill my calling.

Though it will require me to develop further patience and faith if I'm in Scottsdale for another 6 weeks (or longer), I am still so happy to be out serving God's children every day. Getting to know new people every day and seeing their awesome character traits in action has really helped to grow my love for the people here in Cave Creek. No matter when or why I leave this area, I will miss their smiling faces and funny quirks. Truly all of us are children of God with amazing beauty and potential. Never forget that. :) Take care until next week!

Love, Elder Dickison 

Pictures include:

1) The panorama of a lifetime from the top of Black Mountain

2) Biking in the desert...for fun :)

Addendum 1: I just got an email literally 37 seconds ago from the Scottsdale mission office saying that my visa is on the way! A travel itinerary has been issued, and I'm headed to the the Philippines next Monday the 20th! Yaa!

Fun in the Sun (or Monsoons)

Another week gone...another week passed...my oh my, how time flies so fast. This has been an interesting one though. Elder Smart and I have stopped teaching four of the people we were working with. The reasons for this range from simple flakiness to one of these people having a business deal with a member of the LDS church go sour. So our teaching pool has shrunk quite a bit. However, Elder Smart and I have been blessed to find several new people that we're hoping are better prepared to learn about the gospel. We're not entirely sure how interested most of these new people are, but we're going to give them the very best blast to the Spirit we can. :)

On a more exciting note, we finally got one of our people on date to be baptized! She's a 12 year old named Haven who's been working with missionaries for years now. Consequently, she's heard the missionary lessons many times, but hasn't wanted to be baptized due to anxiety. After much prayer and fasting on the part of Elder Smart and I, we were finally able to get her to commit to being baptized in December. Unfortunately, this means I probably won't be in Cave Creek to see it happen, but I am super happy for Haven, and grateful to God for this miracle. (Missionaries have been trying to do this for years, and I finally got to be a part of seeing it happen. :)

Last Monday evening, we had the most wild storm come through Cave Creek that I've ever seen. We were casually driving down a highway when we suddenly noticed very large looming dark clouds not too far away and a dust storm starting to form underneath. Then a gust of wind suddenly almost blasted our Toyota into the adjacent lane. Thankfully we arrived at our destination quickly and went inside before the worst of it hit. Shortly after sitting down inside a member's house, the wind was joined by a ridiculous downpour and a lightning bolt every second or so. This particular house had windows on all sides, so we had quite the light show: bolts flashing in front, to the left, behind, in front again, and to the right all in 5 seconds or less. The lightning continued after the rain had stopped, and we got back the car to head back to our apartment for the night. Suddenly a huge multi-pronged bolt split above us and struck around us on at least six different sides of the car simultaneously. Thinking I was clever, I rolled down the window and stuck my ear out to hear the thunder. BIG MISTAKE. 

This past week, I've been thinking and studying a lot on the process of gaining a testimony of the truthfulness of the gospel. For some of the people that we have stopped teaching recently, it seemed that they thought it was simply too much work to gain a testimony. As I've thought about it, I've recognized that there is some truth to their words, gaining a personal witness that the gospel is true isn't necessarily "easy". It requires effort. It is not an event. And no single event, no matter how powerful or memorable it is can produce a deep testimony. (See 1 Nephi 3:29-31) As Alma described in Alma 32, you must experiment (act) upon the word, or else your faith will never grow and you can never know with a certainty. As I though about the process of my own testimony building (which is ongoing) I realized that having powerful spiritual experiences wasn't what convinced me that the the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints followed the truth. Rather, it was the fact that if I read, prayed and pondered with a truly sincere desire to know, the Spirit spoke to my heart every time I did so. That consistent feeling in my heart more than anything else is an undeniable witness to me that the gospel is true. But again, it requires reading, praying, pondering and acting on the things I've read. And doing it over and over again. So gaining a testimony is not like ordering a pizza for delivery, it's not going to be brought to you on a platter. But it is 100% possible to gain, and 200% worth gaining, because knowing and living the truth changes everything in life for the better. :)

Have a wonderful week and take care of yourself! Don't accidentally fall into a cactus! It hurts...

Love, Elder Dickison

Arizona is Little Peru...?

This past week has been an awesome one for missionary work in Cave Creek! As the summer months wind down, more ward members are returning and more people actually answer the door. Hallelujah! Elder Smart and I have picked up two new people that we are teaching/working with, one of which may turn into a whole family of new people! We're super hopeful that this trend will continue and we'll keep finding people who have been prepared to receive the restored gospel. :)

This week has also been pretty crazy activity wise. On Tuesday I attended my first zone conference, which I was asked (coughnotoptionalcough) to wear a suit to. Since, as a Philippines missionary, I was told not to bring a suit on my mission, I ended up borrowing one from Elder Smart. Thankfully he was gracious enough to lend it to me and we're roughly the same size. The conference itself was amazing. Good messages, good instruction and a tangible spirit made it worth being in a wool suit during a 118 degree Arizona day. 

On Saturday, the stake that I'm serving in held one of the most interesting events I've ever been a part of. Apparently the 28th of July is the Peruvian Independence Day, and having a very large Peruvian community in the stake boundaries, the stake decided to throw a full scale Peruvian celebration. No one had any idea how many people were going to show up since many of the invitations were sent out over Facebook. So, to be safe, the stake made food for about 250 people and set up tables and chairs for that number. You can imagine our surprise when about 480 people walked in the door, about half of whom were actually Peruvian. We really though we were in trouble at that point, but after a bunch of frantic scrambling for furniture (I think we were literally using every table and chair in the building) and a miracle to the effect of Jesus multiplying the fishes and loaves, there was enough seating and food for everyone. There was traditional clothing displayed, a legitimate Peruvian band was brought in and even church members who knew nothing about Peru were soon joining in dancing to the music. With the huge turnout, good interaction, and several missionary referrals obtained, the event became a smashing success.

Sunday I had the opportunity to speak in sacrament meeting for two of the three wards Elder Smart and I cover. One of the talks I had 15 days notice for and came well prepared. The second I was informed of 15 hours beforehand and ended up having no time to prepare for. Oh missionary life. :) I actually ended up just throwing my well prepared talk in a mental blender and then pouring the resulting idea smoothie out of my mouth for the second talk. This created a better flavor than expected (it's raining miracles!), though I still don't want to feel that unprepared for a talk ever again... Especially when, ironically, the subject I was speaking on was "Preparation" :P

Finally, this morning we went on an awesome hike up to some Native American ruins on a hill in our area. This particular hill also happens to be in one of the most heavily guarded communities in America, so we had a bit of help getting in. The Meyers (Yup, still those Meyers) happen to live on the side of this hill, so we called them up and got their permission to get in. Being so removed from outside people (like me), the ruins were pretty much untouched, and it was cool to see lots of ancient pottery and intact stone walls. The view was incredible at the ruins, making it worth the roughly hour climb.

All in all, it's been a great week for missionary work in Cave Creek. We are making real progress, and we are hoping to have one of the people we are working with on date to be baptized within the next week. I am so grateful to God for the blessings He has poured out upon Elder Smart and I, and I'm grateful for the support of each one of you. Please take care and have a wonderful week!