A week of adventure

This last week was an adventure indeed. First of all, we went to transfer meeting on Wednesday to take a companionship of walking Elders, since one of them was being transferred. The one that stayed, Elder B from Spanish Fork, got a new companion that NOBODY likes. Why, you might ask? I personally, am one who is adamantly against hypocritical actions and words. And this new Elder, Elder N, is quite the case. I don't know how he got on his mission, because it seems like everything he does is focused on him. President S actually made a comment about how priestcraft is turning the focus from Christ to us, and that by dressing very loudly, with lots of colors and sunglasses and shoes that are weird and belts that are red, we begin to preach priestcraft. Plus he likes to BS a lot of what he says. For example,"They're inventing a car that can fly by putting a magnet on the bottom and reversing the polarity so that it floats." I can see Dad grinning in my mind right now. Then he made several other ungrounded comments that I proceeded to let slide, since they were pretty darn outlandish. SO, back to the story. We went and got burritos for lunch after transfers, got some other errands done, taught a few lessons, and that was about it.

On Thursday, I'm not sure what we did. I've been so tired lately, and I tend to forget a lot of details when I'm tired. All I remember was having some weekly planning, and after that, I can't quite remember. I think that we visited some members that we'd never met before, and they were the second family to be baptized out in Mexicali, which is in the Imperial Valley. They're super nice, and offered to feed us sometime this week.

Friday, we had district meeting, which went quite well. We then got a referral to a family that we hadn't met yet, and gave them a copy of El Libro de Mormon to give to their friends. We talked a bit on the doorstep, since there wasn't a man in the house, and the Sister, Sister B, gave us some PRIME home-made hamburgers. OOOOOHHHH they were SO gooooood. I think I finished mine in less than 2 minutes. I just kinda inhaled the burger...heh. We then went and tried to visit some other members, but they had forgotten our appointment, and we just ended up going home for the night after that.

On Saturday, we went and helped the H family to clean their pool. The pool they have is made out of metal bars set up in a frame, and then a special pool-tarp that makes up the thing that holds the water. We got there, looked inside, and saw the Dead Marshes from Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers. The water level was about three inches, since they drained it. There were piles of leaves, moss, and little wiggling worms that appeared to be mosquito larvae. It was deh-rish-ous, (Delicious). Using buckets, we began scooping the sludge and throwing it out of the pool. Then, as the level went down, we used sponges to clean off the algae on the sides of the pool, and then sprayed it down. Then, using rags, we soaked up the water and squeezed it into buckets, which were then emptied over the side of the pool. We then went to an appointment with F, and had a fantastic lesson on prayer. At the end, he finally, FINALLY, agreed to say the closing prayer, and it was a GOOD one. After that, we spent the day doing some more service with the H by helping them take a bunch of trash to Bro. H's work dumpster. Then we...uh...did something else...dang. I'm blank. Oh well.

Sunday, we had normal church meetings, and our members brought F to church. He really liked it, and said that he liked the gospel principles lesson on fasting. The stake leadership has been making a huge emphasis on the law of the fast, lately. We actually have a dinner for every day of the week, for some miracle or another. How neat is that?! :D Then, after church, we went to the Mission President's fireside in Santee. Only the Spanish-speaking missionaries were invited to sing, so the choir was pretty darn small at the beginning. They then called some English elders to come and help out with the choir. The fireside went well, and afterward, I got to visit with all of the members from Ramona, and I had the night of my life. It made me so happy to be able to see all of those people again. I really have missed them.

 

At the Mission President's Fireside

Yesterday, we...uh...hmmm....OH. Right. We had zone conference from 9:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m. Needless to say, I was pretty beat last night. Cool thing happened, though. We had the special privilege of watching the "Meet the Mormons" movie early. It releases October 10, and we got to see it yesterday. Dad, you may have to sit REALLY close to Mom for the last of the six segments. She'll probably cry a lot. And all of mah sisters as well. They'll probably be pretty weepy as well. Jus' sayin'. Then we had dinner with a member family, talked a bit about the movie, and finished off the night with teaching a less-active how to tie a tie.

And that's the week. Pretty crazy, huh? Most of the things we did this week weren't even planned. They just kinda happened.

Thank you all so much for writing me and sending me letters. They really do give me a much-needed boost. I hope you all have a great week!

Oh yeah. And I'm SUPER STOKED for General Conference next week. :3

-Love Elder Crook

Hot! Hot! HOT!!!

Indeed, it has been a raging inferno here in Poway for the last week or so. We have a thermometer in our car, so every time we get in, we check to see just how blazing hot it is. Usually it's sat in the 100's for the last week or so, and the humidity is blowing my mind. Every time I get out of the car, my LEGS and BACK start to sweat. Sure, everything else has started sweating as well, but my LEGS and my BACK are the things that start sweating last of all. It's horrible. Not to mention that I haven't been sleeping well for the last few weeks. Last night, I woke up in the middle of the night, and I felt like I was marinating in my own sweat. Our A/C is probably the wimpiest piece of junk I've seen in my life. We had it on since around 4:00, and our apartment was around 20 degrees hotter than outside when we got home at 9:30. Oh my gravy it was hot last night. I had some weird dreams.

Wednesday was interesting, and I really can't remember the whole of it because of a slew of problems that came up this week. We set up the day well, with a good number of things to do, and then everyone started calling and telling us that there was this and that and the other at this time, that time, and this time, and all of a sudden, our whole day had turned into an explosion of ink in our planners. So Wednesday was stressful.

Thursday, we did some planning and stuff, and the day went...mostly smoothly...but there were still a bunch of problems and misconceptions going on that caused a lot of confusion and chaos. Same story for Friday.

Saturday, there was a baptism for two investigators of the Sisters A and D. They had invited two of the branch missionaries to share the Restoration as part of the intermediate bit of the program, and they didn't show up. So Elder M and I had to do it. Then a bunch of white people showed up, among them was our Area Seventy, which added a bit to how well we taught the lesson. When we got up to teach, we both had the impression to teach three points of the lesson: Dispensations and prophets, Christ's earthly ministry, and the Restoration of the Gospel. We taught those three, and only those three, making specific emphasis on God wanting to speak to all of His children, and the Spirit was strong. Afterward, a bunch of the white people and our Area Seventy came up and said that even though they couldn't understand us, they felt the Spirit. And I wonder if maybe that's a part of the Gift of Tongues. Maybe you can't portray ideas or concepts in a language that one understands, but they can feel the power of what you say.

That same Saturday was the leadership stake conference, and the adult stake conference. Elder M was invited to help translate at the leadership session, so we got invited to go to that session. It was mostly all focused on the Law of the Fast, which interested me, and I actually got a really strong impression to teach my children, (sometime in the distant future), to pay fast offerings when they're really young. Maybe just 10 cents or 50 cents, but teach them that it's to help some other little boy or girl that doesn't have any food or water. They even taught that principle, that there is no age limit to paying a fast offering. I thought about that for a bit that night. The adult session was alright, and was focused on the hastening of the work. President and Sister S came and talked a bit. I don't know why, but I don't feel as personal of a relationship with the S's as I did with the C's.

Sunday, we went to the Stake Conference general session, and there were some very good insights given there. Elder M ended up having to translate again, so we sat in the High Council room and watched it on the TV. After that, we had lunch, and went out to find people. After all of the sessions, I wanted to find the members from Dos Picos in Ramona, but I only found them after one of the sessions. I really hope that I get to see them again soon.

(Oh. Side note. No changes in the Spanish District for transfers. We're all staying, so that's nice.)

Something that I noticed in my studies this last week was in Alma chapters 40-42. I started reading them, (having read them many times before), and something popped out at me this time that I'd never noticed before. I began counting and highlighting every time that Alma says "my son" to Coriantumr. Yes, Alma is chastising Coriantumr for leaving the ministry and going after the harlot, but even with all of this going on, he still makes the effort to let Coriantumr know that he, Alma, still loves him as a father and friend. It's the same with the Lord and us. We break a commandment, and He feels sorrow. Then, He leads us back, sometimes with a chastising hand, but always with the love of a tender parent. I then compared it to Mom and Dad, and found that the model holds sure with them in my life. I did stupid stuff, but even with a chastising hand, they always "show[ed] forth an increase of love". So thank you, Mom and Dad, for being such loving and tender parents to me.

Last week, we did indeed go to the temple. It was a good lesson on a lot of things that I'd been missing, and my soul feels refreshed and rejuvenated. Hmm. I just noticed that I waxed a bit eloquent in this email. Sorry 'bout that. I guess that I shou' do somthin' 'bout dat. BLEHH. Anywho, that's about it for this week!

Love, Elder Crook

A Jam-packed week!

We had a jam-packed week this week. In fact, it was so jam-packed, that there wasn't any peanut butter packed in. *ba-dum-tss* Starting with last Wednesday, we went on exchanges with one of the zone leaders. He came with both of us, and we went around as a trio for the day. We started of with some quality contacting, walking, and sweating. We started off by a college that's in our area, to try and find students walking around. Instead, we ended up contacting a guy at this table out in the park area. As we talked to him, we found out that he was from Guatemala, and that his family was still back there. We somehow got onto the subject of God, and he told us some basic beliefs that he has. We then shared the Gospel with him, and how the Lord can carry us through our tribulations. We shared the Book of Mormon with him, explained its worth as another witness of Christ, and he said that it was as though we had given him gold. He said that he loved to study those kinds of things. We kept talking a bit, and randomly, we invited him to prepare himself for baptism. He surprised us by accepting, and set up a time for us to go visit him this Wednesday.

 

Thursday, we went and had some lunch with our members, L and R, and as we had lunch with them, we were able to meet some of their friends that they work with, and we had some quality time with them. We shared our message, and went on with our day, trying to find people to teach, and getting some lunch from the Sisters because they had extra and didn't want to save it. We've been really blessed with the Sister missionaries in our district. They've all been very selfless and eager to serve, and they've been a great relief to aleviate a lot of the stresses that a district leader normally has. Later Thursday night, we had coordination with our branch mission leader, and for some reason, he asked Elder M to share some random thought that he had. So Elder Merren went off on this deep doctrine thought about the identity of God. At the beginning of my mission, I would have soaked up anything like that. But now that I've been learning a lot, teaching a lot, and doing a lot, I've noticed that there's always a time and a place to share such deep doctrines. Because of that, I kept myself out of the conversation, and let them go off on their topic.

 

Friday, we had district meeting, and we started it off by fixing lunch for the district. We made Poppyseed chicken, and even though it didn't quite turn out right, it still tasted really good to me. After finishing the food, we had our meeting, and then proceeded to make some cinnamon rolls for our less-active family (the Bs) since they just returned from Guatemala. Elder M was in his element, so I just sat around and plinked on the piano for a bit. We took the rolls over to their apartment, and met A's wife and kids. His son is quite the little devil. And for some reason, whenever I hear any child under 8 years old speaking spanish, I think it's just the cutest thing in the world. I went over and played with him while Elder M helped them make dinner. (I'm usually the one that ends up just distracting all the kids anyway.) We then came home, and settled for the night.

 

There was a parade on Saturday, so we went out and tried contacting the people out standing and sitting. We ran into this guy named S M, a black guy that really REALLY resembles Samuel Jackson. His voice, his attitude, everything. It was really funny, especially since he was a bit drunk, and he was smoking something that I couldn't identify. He told us a bunch of stuff, and then the marching bands came through, and I lost the conversation. I got REALLY trunky when the bands went by. MAN, I wish I had my trombone. Oh well. We finished up contacting, and went back into our smoldering apartment. It was SO hot that day. We had a lesson with F about the Gospel, and shared scriptures from the Book of Mormon and Bible to show how each point is found in both scriptures. After that, we went and visited the H family, and found out that they'd been to the temple that day, so we had dinner with them, and shared a spiritual thought about the temple.

 

Sunday, F came to church, and loved it. We went around trying to find things to do after we'd eaten dinner, and found a member named E N. He sat us down in his apartment, and finished watching the last few minutes of a football game. After that, he talked to us a bit about how he came to be a member of the church, and explained his conversion. It was a really needed boost for me, because he said that even when things get really down in the dumps, to just keep going; because there's someone like him that really needs us to knock on their door, or talk to them in the street. He's a really solid member that we'll be visiting again soon.

 

And yesterday, we had zone meeting, in the which I was called upon to teach about Ammon's conversion in the Book of Mormon. Beforehand, I had read through the story of Ammon, and decided to take it in a different direction, moving it around the known story, and pulling out little points here and there that I thought were important. One of them was that after the sheep were scattered, Ammon called to the other servants to help him catch the flock. After getting everything back in order, when the Lamanites came to scatter the sheep again, Ammon told the servants to encircle the flock, and that he would contend with their enemies. I noticed a symbol of Christ in this. When the dangers came, He told his servants the prophets, apostles, stake presidents, and bishops to encircle the flock, or give them security and protection. Then He went out and faced the sins "not a few" all by Himself. Against the odds, both He and Ammon came out victorious in the end. Both were the sons of a king, and both became shepherds. How neat is that?

 

Anywho, other than that, not much has happened in the last week. (I know, I know. That was quite the long email, so there was quite a bit that happened.) And we'll talk again next week!

 

-Love, Elder Crook

A very full week

Last week, we spent a lot of our empty time doing service with our less active member, A. His family came home last Saturday, and so we were helping him to get everything in order before they got back. We helped him with setting up some shelves in his storage room that's connected to the apartment, and on MTE's last Wednesday, we went with him to get some of the materials needed at Home Depot. We had Elder H from Ramona come with us, and it was a blast to have him with us. The MTE went really well, and we were able to teach some quality lessons. We were even able to find some less active members that can only speak Spanish that are members of the English wards. On top of that, we were also able to make contact with some of the active members that are native Spanish-speaking.

So. In English wards, the dinner calendar for the Elders/Sisters is always full to the brim. There's always enough members to go around, and there's only one companionship per ward, so there's never a shortage of dinner appointments. With the Spanish branch, there aren't that many members, and there's more than one companionship of missionaries, so there's a double-factor that goes into this. We, as the Elders, don't hardly ever eat with the members, because the members are more compassionate towards the sister missionaries. SO, we have been setting up a lot more dinner appointments down in our area with the members of the wards there, and have even set up a way to get a dinner calendar passed around to the members that speak Spanish.

Along with that, we've met some new less-active members in our area. One of them is L G, whose ancestors were the first members of the Church in Mexico. His cousin runs a museum in Provo that has all of the historical information about the first members in Mexico. From what it sounds like, he's received a lot of persecution and hatred from members of the church in the past, so it sounds like he's not all too eager to come back to church. We're hoping to merely focus on getting him set to get a stronger relationship with Christ, and no one else. That way, once his relationship with Christ has been strengthened, we can then work on getting him back to church to partake of the sacrament.

And as a cherry-on-top miracle, we were able to add a new investigator this week. He was brought to church by one of our members, and sat with us during all three hours of church. The whole time, he told us that he just felt happy being with us at church. He especially liked the classes, and enjoyed sacrament a lot because of the fact that the members of the congregation are the ones who give the talks in the sacrament meeting. We went to meet with him on Saturday, and he wasn't home, so we went and got some Carl's Jr. burgers for cheap. Right as we sat down to eat, he called us and told us that he had just run out for a quick errand, and asked us to come back and teach him. So the burgers had to wait. But, as we taught him, we made sure that he understood the significance of everything that we taught. Elder M hasn't taught the lessons very much, so he was a bit rusty, but we were able to teach it well. He told us that everything made sense, and even told us about how he went to the Catholic church, sat there for ten minutes, said he didn't feel anything at all, got up, and left. Then he said that he felt something really good at our church. (AWWWW YEAAAAHHH). We've set up an appointment with him this Saturday.

We went to meet with this less active man, B, and his son, N. He's in his 50's, and his son is 26. We arrived, knocked, and were invited in to eat some food with them. They gave us some frijoles and carnitas in a red sauce, and after that, we scooted outside because it was cooler. We sat down with them and their neighbor M. M has met with the missionaries before, but he likes us anyway, so he stuck around for the lesson. Our goal was to teach about the Atonement, which we did. Then, B, out of nowhere began to bear his testimony about the atonement, and how powerful it is in his life. M then had a bunch of sincere questions about how one can be completely free from sin. From there, we taught the gospel, with the atonement as the key power that makes it possible. B then bore testimony about the gospel, the importance of faith, repentance, baptism, and the gift of the holy ghost, and even went into the sacrament. I don't know where our less active B was, because really-active-sounding B was giving some powerful testimony.

Later last night, we went to have dinner with some members of an English ward. We showed up, and they were with some friends of theirs. J was the man's name, and he was flippin' hilarious. He was big, burly, bald, and white with a little soul-patch beard. His wife was this African-American woman that was very talkative and friendly with us. I ended up playing with their kids, and keeping them distracted as they all laughed at us playing and made conversation. After a few minutes, J and his wife left with their son, and we ate dinner with the members. It was really interesting to see how they interacted, since the members can barely speak English. It didn't seem to matter that they couldn't speak very well, they were still very good friends with these people. Our members, the C's, then told us that their car had been stolen the night before, so we weren't quite sure how to react. After a bit, they started talking about the current world problems with the Middle-East and Ukraine with Russia, (which Elder M can't get enough of), so I went to talk to their son, who had gone to sit by himself on the grass and mope since his friend had left. We sat there and talked about games and school and super-powers and explosions and Mario Kart 7. He was a cool little kid.

 

To be honest, the Lord has been really merciful with us this week, especially with me. I've been extremely thankful for all of the tender mercies that He's given me. I've had some very revelatory experiences this week, that have pushed me over the edge and caused me to feel over-blessed, if that's even possible. I was hoping to be able to go to the temple this week, but because of last-minute circumstances, we won't be able to. So I'll just have to wait to go until next week.

And have a great week everyone! I love you!

-Love, Elder Crook

P.S. I'm letting virtue garnish my thoughts...