This blog is kept by Elder Asher Wilson's family. It will include his general emails and various pictures. It will be updated each week after each new email is received. We hope you enjoy it!

Tuesday, July 5, 2016

Monday. July 4. 2016-Week 99



Happy Fourth of July!!!!!!!! God Bless America!!!!!!!!

So I just wanted to start off by answering your questions. This is the last time I am going to write you guys because this is my last week here in Paita. I am going to be here until Sunday and Monday I head to the mission house for the finishing up the mission stuff and to go and visit my old areas. 

So honestly I have been thinking a lot in these last few days. About the mission and life and everything that has happened in these last 2 years. I have been thinking about my family and friends and also all of the amazing people that I have been able to teach here in Peru. I have been thinking about how hard I have worked and all the miracles that I have seen. I have been thinking about how much everything has changed and it all just amazes me. I don't know where the time has gone but I am finishing my 2 years as an official representative of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints. I still remember when I got my calling and all the fear and excitement that I felt. Now I am feeling a different kind of fear and excitement. Just to be honest with you guys, I am super nervous to be going home. Like I am crazy nervous because everything is going to be so different and I am so used to mission life but I know that everything is going to turn out just how it should because that is what the Lord has promised. Ahhhh its honestly just going to be so weird to see everyone..........but before going home and seeing you I just want every one of you to know something. Today I was talking with some of the other missionaries that are getting ready to finish their missions here in a few months. They were talking and asking about all my experiences and advice that I had for them but in the end they asked me a question that really made me think. They asked, Elder Wilson, what is the most important thing that you have learned while here on your mission? I honestly didn't know what to say exactly because that is a huge question but after thinking for a while I was able to respond and I only want to share with all of you what I shared with them in those moments. There is a scripture that has changed my mission. It is in John 13:34-35 and it says, 
34 A new commandment I give unto you, That ye love one another; as I have loved you, that ye also love one another. 35 By this shall all men know that ye are my disciples, if ye have love one to another. While I was sitting there on the beach with those Elders this scripture came to my mind. I told them that the Lord, Jesus Christ, has called me to be a disciple and as a disciple of Him there are many things that I must do. I must preach the gospel to everyone possible, I must serve, I must keep the commandments and I must repent constantly but there is a key to all of that. What is preach and teach and serve if we don't love the people that we are teaching and serving. How can we ever have success in this glorious work if we don't love every single person. If we don't love the people that reject us and spit upon us, the people that throw water at us and talk terribly to us. I told them, like I am telling you know, that if we truly desire to be disciples of the only perfect, sinless person to ever walk the earth we must forget ourselves, our pains, our weaknesses and our doubts and we must love with all of our mind, spirit and heart. I can say without a doubt in my mind that this is the most important lesson that I have learned. If we serve with a heart and spirit full of love and if we serve with all our strength every single day the Lord will use us to work miracles in the lives of the people that most need us. I have served these last 2 years because I love God and because I entered the work with that mentality the Lord has helped me to love these amazing people of Peru. I love them with all my heart and it is going to be the hardest thing that I have ever done to leave them here but I know that the Lord will bless them because they are strong and they have changed their lives and other amazing missionaries will keep helping them. I want every single one of you to know that I know with all my heart that this church that I represent is the true church. I don't have a single doubt in my mind about that. I know that Joseph Smith is the prophet that God called to restore His gospel here in the Earth and I know that if any of you have doubts about that the only thing that you need to do is pray with a humble heart to God asking and He will reveal the truth unto you. I know and I testify with all my heart and soul that the Book of Mormon is the word of God and that anyone who reads it with the desire to know it will gain a testimony of its truth. More than anything else I know that my Lord, Savior and Redeemer, Jesus Christ, suffered, bleed and died to pay for my sins and all of our sins. We are not perfect, we make mistakes but the Lord has promised every single one of us that through our ability to try, to just try to the best of our ability to follow Him and be better that He will forgive us and that even our worst sins will be forgotten. I know that He loves us because I have felt His love so many times in my life and my mission and if any one of you feel that He doesn't love you, doesn't hear you or has forgotten about you, you are mistaken. He is always there, even in our hardest and darkest moments He is there so just look for Him. These last 2 years have changed my life. I am not the same person that I was before because I have accepted the calling that the Lord has given me. 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. (3 Nephi 5:13). I love you all and I thank you so much for all the support that you have given me in these last 2 years. It hasn't been easy but with your help it has been much easier. The church is TRUE, God lives.......I know it. I pray that God may bless every one of you and I will see you soon!!!

Much Love

Elder Wilson