Suffer the children to come to Me

Dear Family & Friends,

It's P Day again! I'm so happy to email all of you! This week was

AMAZING! We had so many spiritual moments that will last in my memory

for a lifetime. I love serving here in Gilmer 2 Ward. It's just

incredible what is going on here. We just are running around teaching!

We teach so much. It's so great.

On Monday, we were trying to figure out how we are going to have the

baptism this weekend for Ariell. We could no longer do it on Saturday,

because we would be going to Dallas for a meeting with Lawrence

Corbridge of the Seventy. We called her family and asked if Friday

night would be possible for them. They said it was fine! We were so

relieved because we really wanted to be there for Ariell's Baptism.

The next day, something crazy happened! We split up with members of

the Ward on Tuesday night in order to teach all of the appointments we

had scheduled. Elder Holst went to see Ariell and I went to see

Jessica & Brandon. Brandon is Jessica's 9 year old son. He is a huge

reason Ariell felt so comfortable getting baptized. They ride the same

bus to school and Brandon once accidentally dropped a Book of Mormon.

Well, Ariell saw it and asked him where he got the Book. He told her

"The Missionaries gave it to me. I'm getting baptized." Ariell was so

excited after that. I ended up sharing that with Jessica and Brandon.

Jessica wasn't going to be ready for baptism like we had planned, but

Brandon was. The spirit impressed me to ask if Brandon would want to

get baptized the following Friday with Ariell. He said yes and his mom

thought it was a good idea! I couldn't believe it! Not often does a 9

year old join the church without the rest of his family. But he was

ready and wanted to do it, so we went for it! There is something truly

special about Brandon. He is an exemplary little boy. We ended up also

convincing Jessica to sing at the baptism! She got pretty excited

about it, and she wanted to sing "Amazing Grace."

Friday was the day of the baptism. We taught a lot of people

throughout the day and prepared for the baptism that night. We set up

the chairs and the room, filled up the Baptismal Font, and got all of

the baptismal clothing together. Brandon & Jessica arrived first so we

got Brandon ready to go. Ariell came shortly after. I was honored to

baptize Brandon, and Ariell's step father was going to baptize her. We

were able to have Elder Westover Skype in to watch the baptism as

well! It was a really good baptismal service. The spirit was very

strong there, and Ariell & Brandon had huge smiles on their faces.

Ariell was trying to hide it, but she couldn't. She's so funny. She's

pretty shy and won't talk to you unless she's pretty comfortable

around you. She was just so happy.

The next day, we traveled to Dallas for the Meeting with Lawrence

Corbridge! It was exciting because the whole mission was there! There

were so many people to see and say hi to it was ridiculous! Elder

Hansen was there, Elder Casper sat by me at the meeting, Elder

Westover was there, and so many more missionaries! Lawrence Corbridge

was a very intelligent speaker. He talked about how it takes little to

no faith to believe that there is a God. It was smart and very

interesting. I was intrigued for most of the meeting. On the way back

from the meeting, we were able to eat at Panda Express! I MISS IT SO

MUCH! Haha! I was glad we were able to eat somewhere we normally

wouldn't be able to in Gilmer.

Sunday, Brandon & Ariell were confirmed and received the Gift of the

Holy Ghost. It was a great feeling. They were both, again, smiling

from ear to ear. It was a good ending to an amazing week in Gilmer.

I'm so grateful to be serving here. I'm grateful for my friends and my

amazing family. I love each of you so much. Keep pushing forward.

Christ is with you. He will strengthen you. I know He's there!

2 more weeks until Mother's Day.

I love you all.

Elder Joshua Needles

19 Months Down!

Dear Family & Friends,

How are you? I miss each of you so much! Happy Preparation Day! I love

Preparation Day, because I get to email all of the people I love.

Guess what. Yesterday marked 19 whole months since I left on my

mission. It's been FOREVER since I've seen y'all! But time has flied

and continues to move fast. Especially in Gilmer! I love serving here

in Gilmer so much. The work is just exploding! We are so blessed! We

taught 46 lessons this last week. I've never taught so much in a week

in my whole mission! We also now have 23 people who have baptism

dates. Holy moly! God has prepared so many people here it's

incredible! I am just so grateful for the chance I've had to serve in

Gilmer. What an amazing place to serve.

This week was incredibly busy! It felt like we were running non-stop.

It was great! Monday was interesting. It was toward the end of our

Preparation Day, and the sisters wanted to go get some dinner. So we

all went to this restaurant called "La Carreta." It has some really

good Mexican food. Well, while we were eating we started hearing

sirens. At first we thought it was just police or an ambulance. But

then people in the restaurant started standing up and looking out the

windows. Some people started to look scared and the TV in the

restaurant changed to announce a severe weather alert and that a

Tornado was coming through Gilmer. It started raining like crazy. I

was beginning to get a little nervous, but at this point I was still

pretty calm. I looked up at the sky and it had a greenish color to it.

All of the sudden a HUGE gust of wind went past the restaurant

slamming the doors closed. Rain and hail were coming into the

restaurant and I started getting REALLY nervous. Sister Howell was

shaking so bad. Sister Van Den Berghe was keeping her calm while Elder

Holst and I were figuring out what we should do. Everyone in the

restaurant moved to a part where there was no windows. A guy came up

to us and told the sisters to get under the table. We stayed in there

until the weather calmed down a little bit, and we all ran out to our

cars to get to the church, because we would be safer there. I could

hardly see anything because rain was pouring down so hard! We were all

soaked by the time we got to the church, but we made it safely and I'm

grateful that God kept us safe through that experience. I definitely

will never forget that.

This week we went to meet with Meagan, and she told us that her son

Zachary wants to be baptized! We were so excited to hear that! He saw

his mom get baptized and really felt the spirit. He talked to us about

his desire to be baptized and we told him we can make it happen! We

are teaching him now, and he should be getting baptized either this

weekend, or next. Friday was fun, because we got to do some exchanges!

Elder Holst is the only Spanish missionary in the whole Stake. So he

covers any Spanish work from here in Gilmer all the way up to DeQueen

Arkansas. Well, there is some Spanish work happening in Mt Pleasant,

so we set up some exchanges to happen. Elder Bair came here to Gilmer

with me! Elder Bair's last companion was one of my old companions!

Elder Casper! It was a lot of fun serving with Elder Bair. We were

able to teach Monda, who is typically very shy and has a hard time

talking to new people. We also met a cat named "Weedles." Haha! The

reason I bring that up is because we have a recent convert in our Ward

named Wendy. Her car recently had a baby, and Wendy wanted to name the

kitten something special. So, she combined Westover and Needles

together! Weedles! Lol! I don't like cats, but I'm honored to now have

a cat named after me. Elder Westover should be happy to hear that too.

That night, we were able to go to the church to have Ariell's baptism

interview. She was pretty nervous, but did a great job! She is now

ready to be baptized! All we have to do is wait until this weekend!

It's scheduled for this Saturday at 4:00 PM. We got a call last night,

though, that there would be a Mission wide meeting on Saturday at 3:00

PM. It made us pretty sad, because that's right on top of the baptism.

We are going to try to change it if we can, because we really want to

be there with Ariell as she gets baptized. Pray for us that we get

that situation figured out! Later, we exchanged with some OTHER

Elders, so I got another new companion for the next day while Elder

Holst was teaching Spanish up in Mt Pleasant. The other missionary I

got was Elder Jeffrey. We had a good day together, teaching a lot of

people! I was happy to have Elder Holst back that night. The next day

we had church! We sadly didn't have a lot of investigators attend, but

we aren't letting it get us down. That night we taught two new people

and they accepted the invitation to baptism! Their names are Kristin &

Clifford! We're excited to teach them!

I'm just so happy to be serving here. I can't explain how grateful I

am for it. God is so good to me and I just can't express my gratitude

enough. I am so grateful for each of you as well. You make my life

meaningful. You make my life great! I love you all so much! I know

Jesus lives! I know He's real and loves us.

D&C 88:63

63 Draw near unto me and I will draw near unto you; seek me diligently

and ye shall find me; ask, and ye shall receive; knock, and it shall

be opened unto you.

He's there. Just draw near to Him!

Well, in three short weeks it will be Mother's Day. Which means I will

have my very last Skype home on my mission. Then in 5 short months I'm

Utah and Idaho bound! I can't tell you all how much I miss those

places. I can't wait to see all of you again! Even all my friends here

in Texas that I email. I can't wait to see every single one of you

again! You all mean so much to me.

19 Months Down! 5 To Go!

Have an incredible week!

Elder Joshua Needles

Trust in the Lord With All Thine Heart

Dear Family & Friends,

Wow. I love each of you more than you know. Seriously. I miss you all

so much! I hope your lives are so great! I hope and pray that God is

blessing each one of you with so much! You all have blessed my life so

much I can't even begin to explain it!

This week was really good! It was the first week of the new transfer,

and it went pretty darn well! We were able to teach like crazy! We

taught 29 lessons, so essentially we were running all week long! I

LOVE it! We also currently have 15 baptism dates, so we need to be

going fast in order to help all of these people! Monday was a sad day

for me and for Gilmer! Nobody wanted Elder Westover to get

transferred! We went to say goodbye to some people that Elder Westover

had grown particularly close to while he was in Gilmer. It was

definitely very sad! I LOVED having Elder Westover as a companion.

After he left I realized how much I genuinely appreciated my time

serving with him. He taught me so much and helped me grow even though

I'm prideful and stubborn sometimes, haha. The next morning he was all

packed up and ready to go. The Mt Pleasant Elders came down to Gilmer

that morning to carpool with us to Dallas. Brother Tucker took us!

Well, we had a little more bags than we expected and ended up playing

tetris all morning with the luggage, lol! We got there, though, and I

was able to see Elder Casper in Dallas! Elder Casper is one of my best

friends IN THE ENTIRE WORLD and we hadn't seen each other since

October of last year! It was so cool to see him and briefly talk about

life! I was hoping to see Elder Hansen too, but he had already left by

the time I got there. /: Well, I found Elder Holst and we were on our

way back to Gilmer!

That night we were able to eat with Wendy and Little John (two recent

converts in Gilmer). Well, Elder Holst and I ended up being super

clumsy, haha. Elder Holst spilled ice all over the table and I

attempted to open the crackers which went all over the floor when I

did! Wendy and Little John thought it was hilarious so it brightened

our day. We then went and had our monthly meeting with the Stake

President! It was such an amazing meeting! The Gilmer Stake is so

amazing with the missionary work happening! They genuinely have a

desire to just help people come unto Jesus! I love it!

Thursday we were able to drive back into Dallas for Mission Leadership

Council! It was a lot of fun to be in the mission home again. I love

it there. President and Sister Taylor are truly remarkable people.

They inspire and lift me every time I talk to them. We had some great

discussions at the meeting and also some really good tasting food! :)

The next day a Hispanic member had us over to teach us how to make

guacamole! It was awesome and some really good tasting guacamole. Her

daughter (Ariell) has a baptism date, so we were able to teach her as

well. She is 11 years old, so she's a bit nervous for it. She loves to

dance though, so I showed her some pictures of my sisters dancing. She

asked if they had been baptized and I said yes! Her face lit up a

little more and got more excited about her baptism!

Saturday was a great day! It was Elder Holst's birthday! On top of

that, Meagan Pruett got baptized! It was so great! Meagan is hilarious

and has such a bright attitude about her! I was honored to be able to

baptize her. Elder Westover also got to Skype in to see the baptism

which made me super happy! The next day, Meagan was confirmed and was

able to receive the gift of the Holy Ghost. She was just so happy! We

were happy for her as well. I was able to bear my testimony in church

that Sunday. I talked about Aber and Meagan and how far they have

come. My testimony in the Savior has grown so much watching them

change and become better!

Later that day, Sister Howell and Sister Van Den Berghe had a baptism

in the 3rd Ward. The girl's name is Livia, and she's nine years old. I

met her on Easter this year, and she decided that she would like me to

baptize her! I was so honored to do that as well! It was a great

baptismal service and I know that her life is being blessed because of

the covenant she has made! We went to the Auld's that night. I love

the Auld Family. Their youngest daughter, Aly, ended up in the

hospital so we went over to give a blessing and teach a new member

lesson with Brother Yates. Well, on the way out I sort of accidentally

drove our car into a ditch. It was a small ditch, but it was big

enough to get us stuck! It's the closest thing to a car accident I've

ever been in, haha! Luckily the car had little to no damage and we

were perfectly fine! Hermano Ibarra came and pulled us out with his

truck. We were super grateful for him! I felt like an idiot, but the

Auld's said that so many people have gotten stuck in that ditch! It's

really hard to see at night and apparently it catches a lot of people!

Well, like I said, my testimony has been growing so much lately. I

love my mission. I love Jesus and all that He does for me. It's

because of Him I'm able to be away from all of you and still find

happiness. I've really had to learn to trust in the Lord with all my

heart. As I have done it, He has truly directed my paths. Thank you

for everything. I love each of you dearly.

Have an incredible week.

Elder Joshua Needles

Happy Endings and Good Beginnings

Dear Family and Friends,

How are you all doing? I miss each of you so much! SO MUCH! I hope you

all had an amazing week! Well, I have to inform you all about

transfers! I am staying in Gilmer 2 Ward again! I'm so happy to be

staying! I love this area. My new companion's name is Elder Holst.

I've been on an exchange once with him and I really enjoyed it! I

think we'll really get along great. Elder Westover is an Assistant

now! I'm happy for him. He might end up in Dallas 4th Ward too! I'M SO

EXCITED FOR HIM! I loved when I served in Dallas 4th Ward! Some other

fun facts: Elder Casper (one of my past companions) is a District

Leader now! He'll be the best District Leader ever! Also, Elder Hansen

(the missionary I trained in Dallas 4) is going to Forney and Kaufman

with Elder Ahmad! I love those two Elders. They're going to do amazing

things!

This week was a really good one. Especially because it was Aber's

baptism. It truly was one of my very favorite Baptisms I've been to.

Aber is also hilarious so I was so happy. She's been one of my very

favorite people to teach on my mission. Elder Westover baptized her,

and I was able to confirm her! I also was able to conduct at her

baptism which was a blast! It was an emotional day for the Sullivan

Family and truly was something I'll never forget!

Meagan also had her baptism interview this week! It was so awesome!

She is so prepared and ready to take upon herself the name of Christ!

This is a shorter email, because I don't have a ton of time, but I

love each of you so much! I'm sorry if I don't have time to respond to

your emails. We are incredibly busy, because we have to figure out how

to transport missionaries in our zone to their new areas! But that

doesn't change the fact that I LOVE every single one of you. Please

know that I cherish each relationship I have with all of you.

I love Jesus. He lives and loves each of you! Have an amazing week!

Elder Joshua Needles