Elder Jackson Beach: Welcome to T-town

Hey everyone, I hope y'all had a good week. This one was pretty stellar, though it was sad to leave Hamilton after only six weeks. As some of you may have heard, I have been transferred to Tuscaloosa! I am going to be serving with Elder Erickson. He was in Birmingham when Elder Corbett and I were in the YSA, so we were able to see them a little bit while we were there. He's a cool dude, and he loves Star Wars and the Office, so the two of us spend a fair amount of time just quoting them and other shows haha. It's a hoot! He came out one transfer before me, so I will likely be killing him in about 11 more weeks. Elder Erickson and I cover both the home ward in Tuscaloosa and the YSA. We are on bikes and don't have a car, and due to the fact that the home ward meets in Northport and the YSA meets in Tuscaloosa (which is much closer to where we live) we will probably mostly spend time at the YSA, which is fine by me. There haven't been Elders in our area for about a year, so we are basically starting from scratch here haha. The Sisters gave us a few names to work with, but most of them are just old referrals from like a year ago or more. One guy named William we have had some success with so far, and I will tell y'all about him in a bit. Other than that, we are mostly just finding.

The actual church building for the YSA here is not a regular church building. I'm not really sure what it was used for previously (if anything) because it has only been used as a church for about a year. It's in the basement of some type of law enforcement office. I'm not really sure how that happened, but it's a pretty awesome church building/facility. Since it is being leased and is not Church-owned, it is not fully dedicated in the same way that it would be if it was completely Church-owned. As such, there are some awesome features to this building that usually aren't in fully dedicated churches. Things like ping pong and billiards tables, air hockey, darts, foosball, and even a Wii haha. We aren't going to use the Wii but we have been using everything else during our p-day today. It's pretty sweet. We have designated the church address in our area book as "The Club." It's pretty sweet haha.

The branch here is about thirty or so active members. They seem to be a lot younger on average than the Birmingham YSA, which is cool. The Bham YSA seemed like all of them were like 28 haha. But here they seem younger, and there are a couple of them with mission papers in and others who are preparing to go. I'm sure things will get pretty sparse here come summer time due to school letting out, but for now we have a good little branch and some awesome members.

As I mentioned before, we were able to meet and visit with a guy named William this week. He is someone that some of the Sisters had taught here several months ago, but stopped for some reason. We got in touch with him and went over to teach him on Saturday. It was one of the best lessons I've had in a while. Elder Erickson and I have both been out here for quite some time and have a fair amount of experience teaching, and it was just a good lesson. I enjoyed having a co-teacher who had taught the Restoration as many times as I have. You definitely become a better teacher with experience. William is not a YSA, so I'm not really sure what we're going to do about that when he decides to come to church, but we'll cross that barrier when we get there. We taught him the Restoration, and it went really well and the spirit was very obviously present. He was super excited to read from the Book of Mormon, and we made another appointment for the next day. Unfortunately he had to call and reschedule, but we are going to see him again on Wednesday. At least he called us first! Most people just cancel on the doorstep, so I have high hopes for William at this point.

Another cool thing here: the Sisters are teaching a kid named Nicholas. He's in the band here at Alabama and he is such a stud. I'm not sure how they met him, but he might be the most solid dude I've met. He wants to get baptized so badly, but his parents and grandparents and other family are very against it. They have threatened that if he gets baptized, they will pull him out of school and bring him back home to Texas. They even have friends and family in the area here in Tuscaloosa who keep tabs on Nicholas and make sure that he is still going to a Baptist church. He has to be kind of sneaky in going back and forth between our Church and the Baptist church haha. His family seems pretty crazy, but Nicholas is just awesome. He is so ready to get baptized. If I didn't know that he wasn't a member at church on Sunday, I would have just thought that he was. Please keep him and his family in your prayers that their hearts may be softened.

Dang, seems like not a whole lot else happened this week. Things are going well, but it's just going to take a little bit to get picked up here. Like I said, we are basically starting from square one given the fact that Elders haven't been here for about a year. I do want to share a little scriptural thought before I close out....

I've been reading in Helaman for the last couple days, and it's crazy how sad some of those chapters are. The book of Helaman shows the pride cycle just wreck the Nephites and the Lamanites over and over and over again. Seems like they never learn. Anyway, along with those chapters which detail the pride and destruction of much of a civilization, there is a line from one of the gospel topics essays that is really cool. It reads, "Pride is incompatible with progress; disunity is impossible between exalted beings." God's work and His glory is for us to become like Him. In order to do that, we have to be unified with Him. We need to align our will with His. With General Conference coming up, I know that the words of the Apostles and Prophets are the words of God. As we listen and apply their teachings, we will be able to bring our thoughts, actions, and lives in harmony with God's will for us. Then we will be enabled to receive the greatest of all the gifts of God - eternal life. What an awesome day that will be. Let's lay down our pride and prepare for it now.

I love y'all! Hope everyone has a good week!

Elder Beach
#RollTide