Week 17: Great Lessons

Hello everyone!

Pretty solid week here in Provo, I'll get right to it with the great lesson we had with Felipe on Tuesday....  We talked about how the gospel refines us, and I shared the analogy I had made about the Provo Tabernacle being burned and now remade into something far greater and more celestial than it was before: a temple. He enjoyed that, and the lesson in general got him very actively asking questions, particularly some specifics regarding baptism and why we do it differently that others.

With Alejandro, we finally had a lesson with a member fellowshipper, who actually happens to be Hermano Sean Seagers, my teacher from the CCM!  He lives back in Alejandro's new apartment complex, and he is one of the best fellowshippers we have ever seen in action. We taught him about the importance of attending church, and we hope to see him at Sean's YSA ward soon. It was cool seeing him too! (picture included)

That same day we went to the temple with our recent convert Carla.  We also helped our other recent convert Sergio teach us the restoration in preparation for his mission.  We also were able to see Toree again after a while and she is doing well!

We went to reteach the Colombians the Restoration lesson.  We also taught Sylvia about the first vision and learned it was her first time hearing about it.  It went very well!  It was a gret day filled with lots of teaching which made it hard to live up to for the rest of the week. Thursday I went on exchanges with Elder Cox, which was great to see his area and catch up with an old friend.  Elder Palomares and Elder Zina taught Maria that night.

Saturday we had high hopes because the other elders and sisters all had baptisms, like seriously we went to four that day and there were seven happening.  We had invited all our investigators to one, but none of them could make it, which was the same with their own wards on Sunday. So the end of the week flopped a bit, but they were all still good, and there's another baptism coming up this weekend we will invite them to.

It is great to be in this mission, with so much support not only from the members but the other missionaries, and so many chances to see the church working full steam ahead for all the good we can do for individuals, families, and the world. It is a blessing to be serving in Provo at this time, and I'm hoping it won't go by too fast! God bless all of you!

-Elder Martin

Elder Cox (From Prineville, Oregon)

 On splits with Elder Guo (from Beijing, China)

Hermano Sean Seagers from the CCM

Week 16: Move to Asian Ward

Howdy y'all!

Life continues to be good here in the Utah Provo Mission, and getting better all the time! Monday was a bit nerfed with "Deep Cleaning Day," but the apartment needed it sooner or later.

We had a lesson with Chris that was canceled on Monday.  On Tuesday we contacted nearly every Ward Mission Leader out of Heritage Halls and we're getting much closer to our goal of meeting all 67 of them. We also had a lesson with Alejandro that day too.  He exclaimed how the Book of Mormon was true and how much he loves reading it, but he doesn't feel quite ready for baptism just yet. We will keep at it, he is reading, praying, and going to Church, so it's bound to come in sometime.

Maria and Felipe are also both doing well, we gave them baptismal dates to pray about and prepare for in early March, so we are excited for that! Had exchanges this week with Elder Guo from Beijing, he's one of the Mandarin Elders in this area, but luckily the people we taught that day could speak English just fine. He is such a cool cat, I swear he'll be a General Authority in China once it's opened up to the church.

We also went to the Temple and ate at Cafe 22 together as a district that day, which were both great. The Colombians are solely ours to teach no, and although Diana F. was in California this weekend, she texted us to say she was still going to church down there, which was great! The other three roommates who stayed decided to go to the Asian YSA ward since Daniela M. wanted to go since she's rather fond of Asians. So, attending the Asian ward was better than no ward, and luckily it was all in English so they could understood most of it.

We went to the Temple on Saturday with Ximena, and that was great fun.  She enjoyed it a lot too.  We had two lessons with Carla.  We will be going to the temple with her this week.  Both Zone Conference and District Training Meeting gave us some new ideas on how to work.  Elder Palomares and I continue to become better friends day by day. We run together nearly every morning for daily exercise.... so my cross country running skills are still hanging in there!

In short, life is darn good here, and it will continue to get better as I strive to be a better missionary. But that's all for now, have a nice week everyone!

-Elder Martin

The Provo River

Elder Cox, Elder Zina, Elder Palomares, Elder Brown, and Elder Guo

Lunch at Cafe 22 with our District

Week 15: Working Hard

How can so much happen in one week, and yet it feel like it passed by so fast?

Hello everyone, and how are you? I'm doing quite well, and my only setback is that it seems the harder you work at the mission, the faster it goes by... contrary to what you'd want. Either way, it was a great week and a lot happened!

Starting on Monday, we had a rather chill p-day of roaming around Center Street and checking out different places, and went as Elders to Station 22 Cafe, one of my favorite summer hangouts.  It was great to be there again, not just with new friends, but fellow Elders in the field. We then had a great "get to know you" lesson with Alejandro.  We had another lesson later in the week, both of which demonstrate how spiritual he is.  We feel that with proper direction and guidance, he can come to know of the truth for himself quite powerfully.  Also, that night, we finally got Angel's new phone number; he had changed it without us knowing and we were finally able to hear his voice again. His work schedule is ridiculously crazy, but we'll set something up soon.

Our days and spare time in the evenings were filled with tracking down and setting up 30 minute meetings with different ward mission leaders, which has been a great help in finding the work "hidden" amongst the YSAs. We have a goal of having one of these meetings with each ward mission leader by the end of the transfer. We also found out that the apartment of Colombians we've been teaching is actually within our boundaries of a YSA ward (right on the edge actually, what luck!), and so we've been making extra effort to get to know the ward and fire them up about the work, since the Colombians want to try the YSA now to practice their English. The whole apartment is more engaged in the lessons now, so hopefully this will shake things up for the better!

Toree, Chris, and Carla weren't able to meet this week, but we'll catch them this coming one. Ximena is doing as well as ever, we'll be going to the temple with her at some point, in addition to all the recent converts we have.  Sergio is a boss.  We learned that he wants to serve a mission soon and we are so excited for him. The faith and willingness of these new converts to serve The Lord is a huge example to me, I strive to be like them more each day.

On the investigator sphere again, we had our second lesson with Maria from Peru, and man is she amazing! We did the lesson on the Book of Mormon, and due to great friends supporting her, and her own reading (from the introduction through the testimonies of the witnesses down through a few chapters of Nephi) she was already quite aware of what was happening. Very lively, very engaged in the lessons, it is a pleasure to teach her; and we'll see how things go on this week, as she went to church this Sunday too, though we weren't able to go with her.

Felipe, however, is probably the biggest story of this week, as we narrowed in on him, and extended the baptismal invitation to him. We had two powerful, spirit filled lessons, and answered his concerns and questions about it, but he still feels he is not ready. He is luckily still reading, praying, and going to church, so we hope and pray that the Spirit will touch him soon, please keep him in your prayers. He is a wonderful guy, and already knows so much of the truth of this church, like him testifying to Maria when were all in the ELC together after class one day as to the truth and power of the Book of Mormon and how it helped him feel the Spirit in his own life. He is amazing, and we hope and pray that things continue to work out the Lord's way with all of them.

As for things on a personal level, my hot chocolate making is becoming better each week! I've finally found a way to sneak milk into my system, Mom, albeit through double proportions of hot chocolate mix and coffee creamer.  Elder Palomares and I are becoming better friends day by day and our talks get deep!  But yes, we are working hard and working smarter each week, and things are all good and well.  We have Zone Conference this week, and I wonder if we'll get another area change. But yes, the Lord blesses this work and his own, and I aspire for both!

Love to all,
Elder Martin

Week 14: No Super Bowl for Me, Only a Super Week

Man, this week went fast and well!

I don't even know where to begin, we packed a lot into this week. I guess I'll start with the more exciting news, which is our two new investigators: Chris and Maria.

Chris was raised in Utah, but born in Mexico, so we teach him even though the discussions can be in English. He has no foreknowledge of religion at all, and so we are teaching him from the ground up, like who God is and everything. It is very cool as he is very honest about not understanding anything, but he's really trying to see if the Church is right for him.  Especially since he feels like now is the time in his life he needs religion.

Maria is from Peru and she is in the US to learn English at the ELC.  She said she'd like to learn about the Church. She is very young but very smart, and took everything in stride the first lesson.  She even said that if she came to know these things were true, she'd be baptized.

We're meeting with both of them again this week, quite exciting! As for our other investigators, we finally got something set up with Alejandro again, so we look forward to meeting with him again and starting up discussions again this week. Things also have been going very well with Felipe, he's our best investigator right now and we're going to extend the baptismal challenge to him again this week. 

With our recent converts like Carla, Toree, Ximena, Sergio and Reuben, we are focusing on the temple and trying to set up times we can go with all of them. As for our free time, we are setting meetings with Ward Mission Leaders like crazy, and sucking out all the work we can out of each of our 67 YSA wards. It's been great, we've been able to meet so many wonderful, ready to work members, and we're finding more and more leads for more work with each ward.

As for myself, things are really great. Elder Palomares is proving to be not only a hard worker and great teacher, but a friend and cool cat on so many levels. I already don't want to get transferred from him by the end of it! We are happy and fed and warm, and I only wish it would snow again while the winter lasts! Ah well though, the important thing is the work, and I can testify of that! I know this Gospel is true, and I'm so glad I have the chance to embrace it fully for these two years! Thanks for your prayers, and know you're in mine too!

-Elder Martin

Tyler's family sent me a package!

Joy made me a personalized blanket

Week 13: A New Companion!

Well, change is always for the best in the end, right? It's been a busy week so we'll start from the beginning:

Diana Gabriela, who left Utah in December, has met up with the missionaries at home and is getting baptized now, and even her family is showing interest! Glad to see that turned out well, even though we don't get to be there!

On Tuesday, Elder Rivera and I went to the temple, and that a was wonderful way to kick off our last day together. The day was filled with lessons setup for Elder Rivera to say goodbye to our investigators.  It was very powerful to each of them and had set us on a good footings to transition. 

 

We had a district breakfast at the new Chic-fil-a the next day before transfers, where half our district was changed!  So, my companion, Elder Rivera is off to Orem to cover just a single Spanish ward there. He is so happy about it and I'm glad.

My new companion is literally the best, I will be so sad if we get only one transfer together!  He is such a hard worker, its astounding.  His name is Elder Palomares.  He was actually the trainer for Elder Meyers, the only guy who came with me from the CCM.  Elder Palomares is from Dallas, Texas (but was born in Mexico City and lived there until he was 9, so his Spanish is perfect).  He has been on his mission for six months. He loves a lot of the same music I do.  We both love tons of the same bands and he even plays guitar.  We've played together where a family had two guitars. But like for real, we sometimes sing songs and discuss lyrics as we walk down the street.  At first few days it felt almost too good to be true, but now I'm diving in and hope we become great friends for life.

He is a really hard worker, which is perfect since we have less stakes to cover now and we can really hammer down on getting to know them. In fact, after two meetings with the APs in the mission office and talking to many different missionary companionships, we've discovered a whole heap of overcoverage and crossing boundaries in terms of stake assignments. As such, our new area, at least for this transfer until the APs sit down with President McCune and hash it all out, is just 7 YSA stakes, nothing more. That means that we will lose the north family stakes and a couple of our investigators, but otherwise we keep a good portion of our teaching pool.  That is nice, because for all intents and purposes, we're opening a brand new area.  Our last assignment was so large that we suffered from a sort of "area paralysis".  For now though, Elder Palomares and I are determined to suck out all the work we can out of our assignment, which means a lot of this week was contacting YSA leadership and sitting down with ward mission leaders.

We're working our tails off together in our smaller area now and having a great time doing it, I am so behind on my journal and stuff like that because we come home so tired every night. This is going to be an amazing transfer. We don't have our Spanish ward anymore sadly, nor a car, but I love walking and Elder Palomares is a former Cross Country runner like me, so we're gonna run in the mornings to work out!

We have continued meeting with most of our old recent converts, and focusing more on Felipe and Alejandro, our two current investigators. Neither has a baptismal date, but we'll solve that soon enough! We went to church with Felipe and his RM roommate also from Chile named Tomas, and that went well enough. We're going to the temple with Ximena this week to do some baptisms, and are following some leads on some potential investigators we have. Things may be slowed up again, but we're laying good foundations, and I expect our area to be flourishing by the end of the transfer.

Thanks for all your prayers, and for the thought and support you all give. I will do my best to make the most of it!

-Elder Martin

Week 12: Four Months, No Longer a Greenie!

It is the end of an era here,

Hello everyone, and how are ya? As of a few hours ago, transfer calls came in, and here's the news: Elder Rivera is leaving, and I will be staying in this area and getting a new companion. The area is changing too, and we will no longer have all the YSA's in Spanish, only the northern Provo family stakes and possibly some left over YSA's that get tossed over our way as they divvy it out. As such though, we at the very least have a particular Spanish ward we should be covering as their sole elders, and maybe another. The specifics are a bit vague right now. Suffice it to say, we will no longer cover 27 stakes! 

Exciting times are ahead for these next few days! But yes, I will have to say goodbye to Elder Rivera soon enough and that is a stilling fact.  He has been in this area for a long time, and is so excited to go to a new area, and so I'm glad for him. We'll go to the temple tomorrow together for the last time as a companionship.  He'll leave Wednesday morning and I'll get my new companion. Elder Rivera has been a wonderful trainer, companion, and friend, and now that it comes to it I'm really at a loss of how to explain it. We've had a lot of good times and seen a lot of things, good and bad, but hopefully both come out better from it, as I know I have. The very least, he will be missed.

As for the week though, many of our old investigators (who may now get reassigned to other sets of Spanish missionaries in the coming week) were able to meet with us finally. We had dinner with Toree and her parents, and that was great to meet her mom a bit more officially. We had a lesson after a while with Sergio, and a great spiritual one with Felipe. We had a good catch up with Alejandro, but work schedules kept us from Diana Fernandez and Daniela Moncada this week. That and we haven't seen hide nor hair of Angel since last year, althought we're trying to re-establish contact.  We hope everything is ok with him. If I may enlist some help, keep him in your prayers. 

We had a good lesson with Christian too, we'll see him tomorrow and teach the Plan of Salvation if he did read in the Book of Mormon. Its strange to think that I'm probably not going to teach more than half of these people anymore. We ended up doing a lot of work in our new family stakes this week, meeting an inactive family and going to their ward, The North Park Spanish Ward, which should be my official one now.  So lots of changes and good times this week.

Well, the mission rolls on, new experiences never at a lack. Hope all is well at home! Keep up your New Years Resolutions! (Already forgotten about them?)

-Elder Martin

Week 11: Time Doesn't Wait for Me, It Keeps On Rollin'

Well howdy y'all!

This week was an exciting time for the entire district as the semester has finally started! I think this week was best summed up by Elder Rivera and I running to a lesson to get there on time, and then realizing just how long it had been.... Yes, the holidays are over and its great to be busy again!  Of course, it will get much busier this week, as the ELC (the BYU English Learning Center) finally opens up and all the new international students arrive. That's where our real work begins.

So, here's what happened this week:

Diana Fernandez is doing well, we were able to stop by and talk to her a few times.  Her roommate Daniela Moncada is doing well too and we had a great lesson on Prayer with her. She got sick later during the week, so we'll go over the lessons again with both of them again per request. Diana ended up coming to Church again, but unfortunately since Daniela was sick she missed a really great meeting.

Ximmena continues to do well.  Sergio (another recent convert who just returned to Provo) is also doing well. We haven't been able to link up with Angel yet since he returned back to the US, but I imagine his life's been turned around a bit and we're trying to get back in contact as soon as we can.

Toree's niece turned 8 and was baptized this week, so we showed up to support their family. Afterwards we were able to have a short lesson with Toree, which went very well, and we saw how another baptism in her family brought up good memories for her about her own choice to be baptized.  She expressed how grateful she is for the gospel and how much happier and positive she is now with the gift of the Holy Ghost.

We finally got to meet with Rosa and Ismael again, after at least a month, and we are not sure how interested they are right now.  They are both very busy with their multiple jobs, but hopefully they can be touched by the Spirit and find a desire for faith in their lives.  

Sunday night we met up with Christan for the first time.  He had previously taken the missionary lessons before with other elders.  He couldn't meet for a while, but is now back and ready.  Because we are the YSA missionaries and he is now considered a Young Single Adult age, we will have the opportunity to teach him.  I'll share more about him as we get to know him better.  But man, the ELC hasn't even started yet and we're already getting new people!

Beyond that, all is good fun and well in the mission. I'm happy and warm and we are continuing to meet with interesting people and fun families!  Transfers come up next week, and the district will likely change quite a bit.  In fact, Elder Rivera or I will likely head out and get a new companion. It's a rather stilling thought, to be honest, that Elder Rivera wouldn't be my companion.  We've gotten a lot closer with all the walk-and-talk time we've had, but that's the way the cookie crumbles I guess, and either way the mission will still be great.

Everything is freaking amazing, straight up.  Hope y'all are doing well too, and that I can make you, and more importantly the Lord, proud by becoming even better in His service. God Bless!

-Elder Martin