Que Tal Familia!
Buenos Buenos Dias! I pray that you all had a wonderful week. I pray that you are taking advantage of every glorious moment to be alive and experience life!
This week I have some very wonderful experiences, like every single week of my mission...hahah so I will try to explain a few of them:
This week was awesome because we went on exchanges (basically when you trade companions for a day) with some of the zone! The first exchange we went on this week, I stayed in our area and Elder Hadlock (see photo) came to visit. He is a stud and we had a great time together. The crazy thing is that he actually lives like down the street from us in Alpine and went to Lone Peak Highschool. We had a pretty successful day, I taught him some Spanish and we did alot of finding. Towards the end of the day we went to walk down by the river in St. Charles becuase there is usually quite a few hispanics fishing. We wanted to try a new contacting idea of asking people to take a picture with us while holding a picture of Christ. (judge me if you think it is a silly idea, but some areas around the mission have been having success with it haha) After you take the picture with them you start conversation about what/if they believe in Christ. So the first guy that we talk to down at the river was willing to take a photo with us (see photo) but the pictures looks like I beat him up to get it hahahah. The next 10 people we talked to were pretty anti and told us we were going to hell, but we smiled and laughed becuase at least we got a picture with Aguilar!
The next exchange was with Elder Barnes (see photo) in his area! Elder Barnes just came to the mission field this transfer, he is from Rigby, Idaho. He is a stud!! I am running out of time, but the highlight of this exchange was teaching Jennifer!!! The woman that I told you about last week. I have never met a woman so prepared in my life. I wish I could explain to you every aspect of the lesson, but needless to say, she is super excited about her baptismal date which is set for July 9th! Okay, I actually have enough time to explain a little bit about Jennifer so that you can understand just how prepared she is: She never stops reading the Book of Mormon and the Bible. She told us that the doctrine we teach somehow "just makes sense" to her. We taught her the Plan of Salvation and she was so excited and accepted everything we taught. The challenge with her baptism right now is that she is living with her boyfriend...the elders were scared about this because she can't get baptized unless she is married, or living alone. As soon as they talked to her about it, she sat down with her boyfriend and told him that she wanted to be married. He said he wasnt ready for that, and so she has made the decision that she will be leaving him! This is the saddest part...she doesnt really have anywhere to go. She doesnt make enough money right now to afford her own place, so right now we are doing a desperate search to find someone who can rent her a room or something like that. She even said that in the worse case scenerio she is willing to go to the shelter with her daughter until she can find her own place. To those who might not understand, this might sound incredibly dramatic. But she is determinded! She said that, "Satan has had enough chances to stop me from getting on this path, I am not going to let it happen again"
Why dont we all have faith like this woman???? It is incredible isnt it? This is the most inspiring thing about missionary work. The sacrifices people make to come closer to God.
I love you all,
tengan una buena semana,
Con mucho amor,
Elder Stewart-Chester
Elder Stewart-Chester
Buenos Buenos Dias! I pray that you all had a wonderful week. I pray that you are taking advantage of every glorious moment to be alive and experience life!
This week I have some very wonderful experiences, like every single week of my mission...hahah so I will try to explain a few of them:
This week was awesome because we went on exchanges (basically when you trade companions for a day) with some of the zone! The first exchange we went on this week, I stayed in our area and Elder Hadlock (see photo) came to visit. He is a stud and we had a great time together. The crazy thing is that he actually lives like down the street from us in Alpine and went to Lone Peak Highschool. We had a pretty successful day, I taught him some Spanish and we did alot of finding. Towards the end of the day we went to walk down by the river in St. Charles becuase there is usually quite a few hispanics fishing. We wanted to try a new contacting idea of asking people to take a picture with us while holding a picture of Christ. (judge me if you think it is a silly idea, but some areas around the mission have been having success with it haha) After you take the picture with them you start conversation about what/if they believe in Christ. So the first guy that we talk to down at the river was willing to take a photo with us (see photo) but the pictures looks like I beat him up to get it hahahah. The next 10 people we talked to were pretty anti and told us we were going to hell, but we smiled and laughed becuase at least we got a picture with Aguilar!
The next exchange was with Elder Barnes (see photo) in his area! Elder Barnes just came to the mission field this transfer, he is from Rigby, Idaho. He is a stud!! I am running out of time, but the highlight of this exchange was teaching Jennifer!!! The woman that I told you about last week. I have never met a woman so prepared in my life. I wish I could explain to you every aspect of the lesson, but needless to say, she is super excited about her baptismal date which is set for July 9th! Okay, I actually have enough time to explain a little bit about Jennifer so that you can understand just how prepared she is: She never stops reading the Book of Mormon and the Bible. She told us that the doctrine we teach somehow "just makes sense" to her. We taught her the Plan of Salvation and she was so excited and accepted everything we taught. The challenge with her baptism right now is that she is living with her boyfriend...the elders were scared about this because she can't get baptized unless she is married, or living alone. As soon as they talked to her about it, she sat down with her boyfriend and told him that she wanted to be married. He said he wasnt ready for that, and so she has made the decision that she will be leaving him! This is the saddest part...she doesnt really have anywhere to go. She doesnt make enough money right now to afford her own place, so right now we are doing a desperate search to find someone who can rent her a room or something like that. She even said that in the worse case scenerio she is willing to go to the shelter with her daughter until she can find her own place. To those who might not understand, this might sound incredibly dramatic. But she is determinded! She said that, "Satan has had enough chances to stop me from getting on this path, I am not going to let it happen again"
Why dont we all have faith like this woman???? It is incredible isnt it? This is the most inspiring thing about missionary work. The sacrifices people make to come closer to God.
I love you all,
tengan una buena semana,
Con mucho amor,
Elder Stewart-Chester
Elder Stewart-Chester