Wow. I honestly never thought I would get to this point. It doesn’t even feel real. It just feels like any other week on the mission, but I literally go home on Friday. It’s definitely hitting me a little bit. Having my last Sunday here was definitely tough. I hate thinking about leaving everyone, leaving the members, our investigators, other missionaries, English Class students, etc. There is so much I’ll be leaving here in Texas. I don’t know if I’m ready to say goodbye.
It’s officially been a week with our new mission President, President Taylor and his wife! I miss the Seitz a ton but the Taylors are pretty cool. On Tuesday morning last minute the ZLs told us we had interviews with them during district council so I was super excited to meet them and get to know them. Of course since I’m going home they interviewed everyone except for me. I was sad but I got to talk to Sister Taylor the whole time as we were waiting for everyone to finish their interviews. She told us about their luncheon they had with all the new mission presidents and their companions, the quorum of the 12 and the first presidency. Elder Christofferson made his way to President Taylor and said, “You’re President Taylor correct?” He said yes and then Elder Christofferson proceeded to tell him that he sends the best missionaries to the Texas Dallas East Mission! They both kinda chuckled and continued talking. Fast forward a little bit, Elder Gong was serving the soup at the luncheon and says, “You’re President Taylor for the Texas Dallas East Mission!” He then said, “You have the very best missionaries!” President Taylor chuckled again like he did with Elder Christofferson, but Elder Gong responded differently. “I’m not joking. I’m being serious.” He then said this to President Taylor, “We send the best missionaries to the Dallas East mission. I know that because I have assigned them to your mission myself. Let me explain the process.” Elder Gong explained that President Nelson calls these young missionaries, but the quorum of the twelve assigns them to their missions. He then explained to President Taylor, “I pull up their picture, and I read a short bio about this person. I look back to their picture, and there is a white glow around their head. I then look at a map and a white glow surrounds the Texas Dallas East Mission. I’m being serious President Taylor. We have sent some of the best missionaries the entire church has ever seen to that mission and we continue to send them there.” President Taylor was stunned, especially because later Elder Gong pulled him aside 2 more times to say the same thing. Elder Gong and Elder Christofferson never pulled anyone else aside and even made these comments in front of dozens of other mission presidents. Hearing President and Sister Taylor tell this story gave me chills. It was so cool hearing that!
After district council and interviews with the Taylors we drove home. In Texas there are frontage roads that you exit onto after exiting the highway. There are usually about 4 or 5 lanes of traffic and the speed limit is 50 (most people go faster than that). After we exited to head back to our apartment we saw this guy pushing his car. We wipped around the corner, threw the car in park and in full suits we sprinted over and helped him push. It was us 4 missionaries pushing this car up the slightly inclined road with all our might. We pushed this car probably a good 1/4 mile. God definitely helped us because the car should not have been moving as fast as it was when we got it rolling. When we pulled into the shop and stopped pushing I was so exhausted. Literally when I stopped I had nothing left in me. I was breathing so heavily and I had no energy left. I was literally shaking afterwards. But it was cool that we were able to help him. I’m curious to see what other people thought as they drove past seeing 4 guys fully dressed in suits pushing this car up the street haha. But when we pulled in, the guy in the car said something about always being able to count on the Mormons cause we always help lol. So that’s sick that he knows our church as people always willing to help and serve.
Also shout out to one of my comps Elder Barnum for getting engaged! Only 5 weeks home and he secured the bag. Felicidades Willy B
Tuesday was the 4th of July so we went downtown to talk to some people. There was a carnival from 11-2 but since we had interviews we didn’t get there until 2:15 but we just talked to everybody we could. Downtown usually sucks. Everytime we try to talk to people they always bash us or are super rude so I was a little nervous. The first people we talked to were taking a selfie so we offered to take their picture. Their names were Caleb and Rachel. Caleb knows Spanish cause he went down and lived in Mexico for a bit. He has talked with missionaries a bit and has had some friends that were members of the church. He asked us about our missions and stuff and it was a really good conversation. We have them our number if they needed anything and it was sick! We walked down the street a bit and talked with this guy Peyton who was 16 and he was with his mom. They moved here from North Dakota like a week ago. They hated North Dakota lol. But he had a family friend that was a member who served in Florida and then now he’s in Utah for school. But it was cool just talking to them about what they knew about our church. Even when people aren’t interested I like just talking with them so they have a good impression of the church and see that we are just normal people not brainwashed robots. After that we say this older guy sitting on a bench with his grandson. We asked if we could share a scripture and he looked at us super skeptical but said we could. He asked us a few questions about the Godhead and some things we believe. He didn’t really bash us but definitely threw out some Bible verses to prove us wrong. He then said, “I’ve gotta be honest with you, I’m a pastor at my church up in Oklahoma.” AWESOME! (That was sarcastic) But he asked us a bunch of questions cause he said he has always wanted to talk to us before. We answered his questions and it was actually really productive because now he knows what we believe. He actually listened to us and agreed with what we said for the most part. He brought up a scripture in John telling us what it says in the King James Bible and said that he had a “mormon bible” that said something different. I was like, “Actually the Book of Mormon is a completely different story about the people in the Americas.” He looked at me and agreed but proceeded to tell me that in the book of mormon john says: blah blah blah because he has read the Book of Mormon and has one at home. I was like, DOG THIS ISNT THE BIBLE! He just couldn’t understand that lol. He was like, “Give it to me, let me see.” So we gave it to him and he looked through and sure enough, there is not a book of John in the Book of Mormon! smh. He had a very puzzled look on his face and was like, “I wonder what book I have then”. In my head I was like, “Dang that’s crazy! It’s almost like you lied to us to prove us wrong! Too bad we’re RIGHT”. Lol I actually wasn’t mad or anything it was just funny. He then hit us with the, “The bible is the only scripture we need’ So I explalined how we have the book of Mormon and he was like, “So you believe that you have continued scripture?” I responded bluntly, “Yes, we believe in open cannon that we can still receive revelation today because God is the same yesterday today and forever meaning he talks to us just as much as he talked to his children back then.” Then his wife walked over and said they needed to leave. It was good though because now he knows what we believe and not some random crap he has read online. Before he left he told us to read the bible and to just stick to the bible and that he’d pray for us. I told him I was glad he is firm in his faith and that I would pray for him as well. Overall pretty productive so I was content.
On Wednesday we had like a mini Zone conference just with 2 Zones and the Taylors introduced themselves. It was fun to see some homies too before I go home. That night we had a lesson with our friend Ramón. He is the guy we met in Allen a few weeks ago that is from Chihuahua Mexico and has talked to a ton of missionaries before. He has a book of mormon and I think he told us he has read it all before. But we talked about the Restoration and he was super engaged in the lesson. We asked a few questions and helped him understand that the priesthood, or God’s authority, left the earth for a time but because God loves us, he called another prophet to restore the priesthood here on the Earth again. It was a fire lesson and we just read through the Restoration Pamphlet we gave him. He told us he was gonna come to church on Sunday and he wants to bring his nephew! He ended up not feeling good on Sunday so they didn’t come but when we called him he’s like, “When can you come back? Tomorrow? Yes come tomorrow if you can” (Obviously in Spanish) and he basically set up our lesson haha.
On Thursday we had a lesson with Omar! It was a pretty good lesson but didn’t go how we thought it would. He talked to us about how he wants to meet new people and wants to find a wife too and whatnot because he has been going to Christ Fellowship church cause they have a ton of activities. As we were talking about the Plan of Salvation he just asked us what our purpose is as missionaries. Like what our purpose is in talking to him and what our goal is. We wanted to be bold with him but not specifically in that lesson. But I dove straight into it. I explained to him that we believe we are the only true church on the Earth, that no other church has the priesthood or authority to perform sacred ordanances. I said a few other things but then I got pretty bold with him. I was like, “Omar you want to get to know more people, you want to find a wife. We totally understand that. But you need to put God first. You need to do everything you can to get closer to Christ and your Heavenly Father. He knows the desires of your heart. He knows what you want and I promise you that if you put God first in your life, God will help you find a wife. God will bless you according to your desires because you are prioritizing him over everything else.” Definitely gift of tongues too cause I don’t even know how I said all of that in Spanish haha.
That night we went up to Melissa and Anna to find some people. We walked down one street and talked to one lady that was pretty cool that we passed on to the English sisters there. We walked a little farther down the street and saw this kid playing with his dog in his backyard. His name is Patrick. He told us he had a friend he would go to church with but that pastor moved to Georgia and he hasn’t been back since. He asked us questions about our church and what we do as missionaries. He was interesting for sure but seemed pretty interested. He asked us our names so we explained Elder was just a title and then told him our first names. I told him my name was Dallin and he goes, “That makes a lot of sense. I mean look at your hair too.” I have no idea what that means… But we gave him the sisters’ number and stuff and he called them the very next day and they had a lesson! I also thought he was like 16 or 17 but I asked him how old he was to see if he was in highschool or what. He told us he was 22. I was like WHAT? Homie was mad skinny and looked so young. A few of his coworkers thought he was 14 lol.
On Friday we had a lesson with our boy Jose Cruz and his wife. It’s kinda sad because they aren’t progressing at all so we’re gonna drop them. But they talked with me about going home for like 30 min. It was super sad, they’re super cool and I’m gonna miss them. I got a picture with Jose tho 
Saturday we went over to Lolo’s house and talked to his grandson Alex who was around 25 years old. He asked us a few questions about the BOM. He had friends that were members and so he’s heard a little bit. He told us that his mom had passed away and that he was kinda drifting away from God and us talking with him showed him that he needed to start praying and get closer to God. We gave him a BOM and got his number, it was super cool! Then we hit up an apartment complex and knocked a few doors. On guy opened the door but didn’t know English so he had his 10 year old son translate for us. He then proceeded to bash us in Chinese through his son. So that was a first 
Sunday was a crazy day. We didn’t have anyone come to church which was super sad but it was fire meeting. Hermano Lopez gave a talk and didn’t look down once. It was just straight from the heart and it was so good! He talked a little bit about star wars too and how Obi Wan talks to Anakin who is turning to the dark side saying, “You were the chosen one!” and he talked about how many are called but few are chosen. He talked about having faith to see miracles and talked about Nephi getting the plates and how through his faith, miraculously, they were able to get the plates from Laban. Then Elders Quorum was soooo good!! We talked about Joy. What does joy mean? Joy is the feeling of pure happiness through the spirit. We discussed Lehi’s dream and how the tree of life contains that fruit which is pure joy or the pure love of Christ. I want to share a few of my thoughts that I shared during Elders Quorum. In Lehi’s dream there are a few people that make it all the way to the tree, all the way there! Which is not easy! They even PARTAKE of the fruit! But yet the crowd from the great and spacious building deters them away from the joy of the gospel. We know that wickedness never was happiness. The world veers away from God’s plan, away from the eternal truths of the Gospel. People seek joy through the wrong things. They may find some pleasure through these worldly things, but in reality it’s just a happiness that is completely hollow and always insufficient.
President Nelson said, “Now, you may be thinking this sounds more like hard spiritual work than rest. But here is the grand truth: while the world insists that power, possessions, popularity, and pleasures of the flesh bring happiness, they do not! They cannot!” He continues, “The truth is that it is much more exhausting to seek happiness where you can never find it! However, when you yoke yourself to Jesus Christ and do the spiritual work required to overcome the world, He, and He alone, does have the power to lift you above the pull of this world.”
This church is not a gospel of comfort. This gospel is not a gospel of comfort. Progress cannot be made through comfortability. Change happens when we are stretched beyond our expected capacity. This life was not created to be comfortable. We all must experience change, heartache, disappointment, sadness, despair, etc. in order to grow. As president Nelson has always said, “The joy we feel has little to do with the circumstances of our lives, and everything to do with the focus of our lives.” When we focus on the gospel, when we focus on Jesus Christ, when we put God first, we can feel joy.
It was sad thinking about it being my last sunday on the mission too. English classes were hard because I had to say goodbye to all the students. The teacher grabbed me at the end of the class and stated, in the most gringo white-trash spanish, that I will be “going home to my mommy” this Friday lol. Hermana Prisbrey explained that we serve for 2 years and that I will be ending my 2 years this week. To add the cherry ontop, the teacher made sure to tell everyone that my girlfriend back home is married. Yep thanks bro Peterson. Much appreciated.
But wow I can’t believe this is it. This is the end. It does not feel real to me at all. I am gonna miss East Texas so much. I have had so many amazing experiences here that I will never forget. These past 2 years have been by far the most difficult but the most rewarding. I have never grown spiritually so fast in my life. I have come to love my Savior Jesus Christ personally as I study his gospel. I have a testimony that Joseph Smith was a prophet and translated the Book of Mormon through the power of God. I know that there is no other way back to our father in Heaven without the atoning sacrifice of his son Jesus Christ. I know God lives, I know that he loves us all individually and personally. He has a plan for every single one us. I have never felt so much joy in my entire life than testifying of my Savior Jesus Christ. If you want to grow your testimony, share it. Testify of his restored Gospel. I know it’s true. It has completely changed my life and I have seen it change countless other lives. I love you all and appreciate the love and support I have received over these past 2 years. Your prayers have helped me more than you could ever know. Muchos Besos! And remember, God is good all the time, and all the time, God is good!
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All my love,
Elder Grubbs
