December 30, 2016
Today wasn’t as great as yesterday, but it was still an
above average missionary day. This
morning we had our first planning session and companionship study. I realized that Elder H. is way more prepared
for the mission than I was when I left.
I feel like the MTC really wouldn’t teach him much that he doesn’t
already know. I am not the best choice
of a trainer for a missionary who is as well prepared as he is. But, I will try my hardest and do my
best. The first thing that we did today
was contact for 2 hours straight. We
found 3 possible investigators and got to know each other a lot better. The only lame thing about having bike as a
trainer is that it is impossible to chat in route.
Miracle #508: On our division at the end of the day,
plans A,B,C, and D all fell through. My
last ditch effort ended up working out and we had a good lesson.
December 31, 2016
Well 2015, an entire year in the mission field, has come and
gone. By this time next year I will be
with my family and friends. It has been
a very unique year. I have been blessed
with many things including one of the greatest blessings of my life, that of a
strengthened personal testimony. I just want to dedicate what I have left in my
mission and go all out.
Today
was a decent day. This morning we had a
service project, so we had to do our studies after lunch. It was incredibly
hard to study on a full stomach. We both
hit a wall and on more than one occasion, we had to spray each other with water
to stay awake.
Miracle #509: One of our most difficult investigators
actually listened to our lesson today about the life of Christ and for the
first time in a long time, I felt the spirit while teaching him.
The funniest part of the day was eating dinner with some
members for New Years. We just had a
blast. For example, at one point we started talking about Americans and they
said, “Well we are Americans too!” I
told them that in the states, many people think that everyone who lives south
of the border speaks Spanish and is Mexican. They thought that was pretty
funny. These last three days with my new companion have been both fun, and
spiritual. I have felt the guidance of
the spirit more than in most of my mission.
One of the coolest quotes that left my mouth today was, “We need to sin,
or make mistakes, in order to learn, but we need to repent in order to
progress.”
January 1, 2016
Today was not a good day for me. I slept in (until the usual time to wake up)
which was a mistake for me. After
studies we went to play soccer with the zone.
I hate soccer, but my comp is a fanatic so we went. On the way, my comp rode straight through a
pothole despite many warnings to avoid them, and busted a tire. During the
activity I got way too much sun because I forgot to wear sunscreen. When we got back to the house, I had to
replace the tire because it already had 5 patches on it. I got really irritated
when I found out that the bike shop gave my old companion a tire tube that was
too small. I ended up putting it on
anyways and I really hope that it doesn’t explode. It was not a fun p-day at all.
To top it off, the work was slow. In the one lesson we had, I decided to go
and visit a member who is struggling to
stay active. He is very bitter and
wouldn’t listen. He kept making excuses for his choices and it sucked the life
and the spirit right out of me.
Miracle #510: Even though we weren’t in a lesson, we
decided to work until the last possible minute.
We offered a special prayer and were led to someone who normally doesn’t
get home until 10 p.m.. That is too late
for us to visit, so the fact that they were home early was really a miracle.
The funny part of the day was getting hit in the head by a
soccer ball. I was playing goalie and
when an elder went to kick the ball in, it bounced off my head and still went
in. I am the worst soccer player
ever.
January 2, 2016
Today was a far better day than yesterday. This morning we were able to do all of our
studies and had extended language study.
Wen lunchtime rolled around, we found out that we didn’t have a lunch appointment. So, we bought some ingredients and had a
bonding time cooking a sauce for our spaghetti.
It actually turned out super tasty and it made a ton so we started out
our fast very full and happy.
Miracle #511: As soon as we started the fast, clouds
came out and cooled the afternoon down.
My sunburned face really appreciated that. The other miracle of the day
was also pretty funny to me so I will explain it below.
The funny part of the day was after our missionary
correlation meeting. I was doing my job
as a trainer and teaching Elder H. how to use El Rescate, which is a computer
program that theoretically helps to find less active members. I hate the program, but it is my
responsibility to train him with it. So
as we printed our list of 100 names (narrowed down from 800), I was whining
about the program. Then later that day
there came a point in the day when we really didn’t have anything to do, so my
kid wanted to use the list. Taking it
more like a joke, I accepted the challenge and we went to visit ONE of the
people on the list who happened to live in the neighborhood we were in. Believe it or not, they were home! Not only
that, but they were receptive and we taught them a lesson and they want us to
come back. My kid is a BOSS!
January 3, 2016
Well I got run over by a bus today. Technically, my bike got run over, and
miraculously I was uninjured. I was
riding along next to the sidewalk and a bus was getting ready to turn right,
but was stopped. I started to ride past
the bus at the same time the bus pulled away.
The driver didn’t bother to look in his mirrors and just started to cut
me off. It freaked me out and I
desperately tried to get up onto the sidewalk.
Unfortunately, I was too close to the curb and instead of making it onto
the sidewalk, I just skidded along the curb until I fell and the bike slide
under the bus. The driver didn’t even
slow down or stop. Luckily it only ran
over the tire and even though it screwed up the rim, I was able to fix it and
make it ride-able.
Miracle #512: I could have easily been badly hurt or
even killed by the bus today, but I was unharmed.
The funny part of the day was when a family “made” me break
my New Year’s healthy food resolution. I was doing so well until they opened
some packages of my favorite Chilean dessert cookies. Everyone was laughing at my lack of self-control
after having eaten just one cookie. I
just can’t stop myself.
January 4, 2015
Today was a fairly typical work day. All of our plans fell through and we ended up
contacting for around 4 hours straight. The contacts weren’t that bad, but they
weren’t the best either. Elder H. is
still trying to get past the whole talking to strangers block so the contacts
are sometimes a little bit uncomfortable, but they are fun anyways. Overall, it was fairly uneventful day. I didn’t even get run over.
Miracle #513: I was able to fix my tire even more
today. Not it is acceptable to ride on.
The thing is that the store we went to didn’t have the type of rim that
I needed to replace it.
The funny part of the day was pretty lame. Usually I ask people if I can give them
something and then when they say yes, I hand them a pamphlet. But, today instead of giving a woman
something that taught about God, I gave her little grandson a can of peaches
that I randomly had in my bag. You would
have thought that I had given the kid a hundred bucks. She immediately opened up to us after that
and we had a pretty good contact lesson.
January 5, 2015
Well today was a great day!
I went on a division with Elder Anderson because elder Diaz is my DL
again. We had a rally good day, but
there were some bad parts. For example,
we went to visit our very difficult investigator who started complaining about
me to poor Elder Anderson who is so new in the mission field that he can’t
really understand anything that is said if the spirit is not present. So here
is this crazy mean man ranting to this American kid about this other American
kid. In the end he called me the devil
and returned the Book of Mormon that we gave him. I was upset, but really not sad about losing
him. He was really difficult to teach
and we weren’t getting anywhere.
Miracle #514: One of our other investigators did a
full fast and is super set on moving forward.
The funny part of the day was probably when we had a super
talkative member of our ward accompany us to a lesson. He has a specific story
that he loves to tell and I have heard it man times. When he started to tell the story, I leaned
over to Elder Anderson and said, “we are late and this story will take 20
minutes. We have to excuse
ourselves.” I managed to tactfully make
it out of there and to one last division and lesson. We ended up the day with a
whopping 7 lessons and 3 divisions.
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