April 7, 2018

Fam,

Looks like I forgot to say this was an end of transfer P-day. Officially we are going to be a trio for another transfer, but we are getting a new elder in 6 weeks and another in like 12 weeks.

Preach my gospel defines an Investigator as someone who has received at least one principle found in chapter 3 of PMG and has accepted a return appointment. Elder Magalei, Rencher, and I were all talking about how the PMG definition sets a pretty low bar on the people we teach. Continuing on that thought we were thinking about the people we've all taught and how very few would actually be someone who was investigating the church and searching for truth like you'd imagine an investigator might do. Tuesday we had a lesson with Jose and Tamara. Jose had a super cool experience with The Book of Mormon as he read through it in like 2 weeks while Tamara on the other hand really hasn't caught the same spirit that Jose had. We really have been focusing on helping those we teach become true investigators of what we share with them, and with that same spirit we talked with Tamara and what she needed to progress. As you really focus on what individual needs and not worrying about making sure they understand everything you want them to understand you really find more needs in the people we work with. Tamara talked about some specific challenges she works with and some of her fears and we were able to have a super productive lesson with her. Hopefully by setting better expectations with the people we work with it will help people progress better. 

It can be really hard to have a resounding faith in someone you don't have a rounded understanding of their character. Part of the Restoration of the Gospel, maybe even one of the most important aspects, is a much greater understanding of the importance of Jesus Christ in the context of the plan of salvation. One of our investigators, while he has a really deep understanding of many aspects of the gospel really lacks in his understanding of his relationship with God. We had a really fantastic lesson with him Wednesday where we talked about that need he had. We planned a lesson around that idea and as we walked in and were talking with him he asked, "Why is Jesus Christ so important aside from him having died for us?" which was exactly what we had planned! That was pretty cool. Elder Magalei read John 3:16 with a slight reiteration. For God so loved the ___ family, that he gave his only begotten son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life." It was a super cool moment. This investigator is a talker, but when the spirit is really strong he quiets down and you can almost see the things we teach actually stick to him. We used that moment to talk about what he needs to do to come to a full and strong knowledge of the truth, specifically by diligent seeking and prayer as well as paying attention to moments when he felt the influence of the spirit. He finally has been praying. It was a good lesson.  

April 2, 2018

fam,

We've been back in a trio. We've been covering both Spanish areas since Tuesday afternoon. The best part was being able to go back to the people I taught on that side. Thursday morning we had a really fantastic lesson with the Francos. They mentioned that they had recently made the decision to close their taco shop on Sundays from here on out. It was pretty sweet to be there when they mentioned that. That lesson made it clear the role of the Holy Ghost in the conversion process. We encouraged them to close Sundays so they could come to church and taught the blessings and did everything we could to invite them to do so. It wasn't until they received their own spiritual witness that that became something of importance for them and then something they would actually do. Stake conference is next week, but after that they'll be joining the branch!  

Conference was insane! We watched nearly every session with a different investigator. I think the highlight was Sunday morning. The Sarmiento family couldn't watch the sessions as planned but could watch a non-live session with us at 7pm. This let us pick and choose what we were going to watch which was super good. We chose the first and last talk from the Sunday morning session to re-watch with Daniel and his family. Daniel has had some hesitancy to pray about the BoM but with the lesson we had with him we talked about how to pray and how to recognize answers to prayers. He had that on his mind as we watched the first and last talk of the Sunday morning conference. After the session we talked about what we each liked. From what he shared it was clear that he finally figured out and understood that prayer typically is a process. He really liked the line that was mentioned that no matter what we are only ever one prayer away from a loving Heavenly Father who is ready and waiting to answer prayers. 

26 March 2018

fam,


We had some good experiences this week. A part of the missionary schedule is weekly planning. Its a struggle sometimes. 2-3 hours of planning + goal setting is tough. Our weekly planning day was pretty nice outside and we live in an apartment building that flows into a little wooded area. Best weekly planning decision I've ever made was to go on a walk and plan in the woods on a fallen down tree. Our planning was much more fun and we were also accompanied by 12 large white tail deer.

Elderly missionaries are pretty awesome. I think they play a super important role that we can't always fill being 18-26 years old. We ate a dinner with a less active and her family was in town. They're from Honduras and prepared some delicious fried plantain topped with some ground beef, cabbage, and some pico-de-guyo, and a tomato sauce. After the meal Sister Pectol turns to me and asked Elder Magalei and I, being as we were on trade-offs, if she could share the spiritual thought. Hermana Pectol doesn't speak spanish, so I translated for her. It really was a touching moment. People tend to look towards older people for advice as they've definitely just had more experience than a 20 year old missionary can have. Sister Pectol shared a really simple thought that very clearly was exactly what the Honduran sister needed to hear and the spirit made that abundantly apparent. Its really good we've only had fantastic Senior couples serve in the Spanish branch because they're such good examples and really make me want to go on a senior mission. 

Santiago probably is one of my favorite people we are teaching right now. I've learned a few things from the short time I've taught him. The first time I meet him was on a trade off with Elder Guerrero a while ago. In that lesson he was drunk, vulgar, and crude but wanted to listen and was interested in what we had to share. Time goes by and eventually tells the missionaries never to come back, ever. He wasn't sure if Joseph smith was a prophet or if the BoM was the word of God, oh and he definitely didn't want to give up coffee or alcohol. Fast forward a few months he calls us asking us to come back, that was back when we were a trio with Elder Magalei. He had been reading bit by bit and was working on giving up coffee, his language was significantly cleaned up and he just looked a lot better. We've been teaching him for like 2 transfers and as of late he finally knows the Book of Mormon is true. Truly he is a really good guy. The problem is he just has a problem with about everything related to commandments and actually obeying them. The Book of Mormon has helped him make a lot of changed is his life already just by reading it with real intent. Even though he really struggles with alcohol he knows what changed he has to make and more or less how to move forward, and we've really been with him every step. The next big step for him is involving his wife more. He has been super hesitant to involve his family because of really bad experiences he's had in other churches, but at this point he has gained enough of a testimony to know its something he wants to involve is family in. Santiago is super hesitant and his wife doesn't like us...yet. The whole process so far really has shown me that, first off sin isn't a good thing, but if we're trying our best God will know and see that and bless us for that.     

We also saw lamb of God this week. Super inspiring! We went to Kalamazoo for the performance. Throw back to last year.

19 March 2018

Elder Sterling Fillmore at the Chicago Temple during his mission in the Michigan Lansing mission. He was one of Eric's YM leaders.

fam,

This week was pretty interesting. On Thursday we had a really good member lesson with the Miranda family and had lunch right after. Well right before I left for my mission I got a note from a former young men's leader by the name of Sterling Filmore saying that he had also served in this same mission. I later forgot about that message but it all came back into focus when during our meal Hma Miranda starts joking and pulling out old photos of past Elders that served in the branch. She's just throwing us photos as she's talking about each on and I saw one with a face that looked familiar. Looking closer I recognized the Elder to be that same Youth Leader I had! It was pretty funny and we grabbed a photo. 

Wednesday we had a good zone leader trade off. We'll as good as a knock-a-thon can be. I think the last three transfers we've been moving away from the very well set and ingrained mission tradition of only using knocking as the mode of finding. It's been pretty successful as we are almost entirely working through members, though slow, we teach more solid people. The added blessing is not having had knocked a door in like two transfers. With Elder Clark we knocked for like 6 hours and just about everyone we talked with did not speak English. We even were in a nicer area but like two people spoke English. We got invited into this one home and just could not communicate with this guy who was about our age. We grabbed his information and asked if he wanted to learn English. For the fourth time we just could not understand his name and asked him to write his name in our planners. The plan seemed good up until he wrote his name in a non-English alphabet haha. Luckily it's not my area. 

Friday we had a miraculous lesson. Teodoro is an awesome guy who has been coming to our branch since I've been here. Finally he is getting baptized. He was being taught initially and once he was ready he for baptism his future wife got pregnant and didn't want to get married until after the baby came. Well the baby came and we had a dinner appointment with them with full intentions of setting wedding dates and baptism dates. We had no idea how but felt like it was the right thing. Half way through our dinner appointment the Relief Society president shows up and joins us. Apparently they called her and asked her to stop by to reserve buildings for their wedding, baptism a few weeks later for Teodoro, and the baptism of their oldest daughter a few weeks after that. So things went really well. I'd say my most productive dinner appointment yet. We set goals for him to get the priesthood in time for him to baptize his daughter and to go over the missionary lessons one more time. I think the wedding is planned for July if I remember right.

12 March 2018

fam,

We had a really good lesson with Francisca this week. She is a recent convert on this side as of 3-4 months and is awesome. She is on fire trying to sharing the gospel. She tried to teach her friend something about the plan of salvation but had some questions brought up she couldn't answer. A well taught plan of salvation lesson covers really basic core questions I'd imagine most people have who don't grow up Mormon or religious in general. We reviewed why are we here, where we came from, and where we go after we die. Most people just have no idea and just go around in life slightly under satisfied with what they have. 

Wednesday we meet with Axle and had a great lesson. Another lesson on the plan of salvation. Unfortunately a few months ago his older brother passed away and we, due to various circumstances, were never able to teach a whole lot to address that need but that changed. Death was something that we talked about, because that was what was scary to him. To teach about death and the time between death and judgment we opened up to Alma 40:11. The line that really impacted Axle was when it said that "The spirits of all men, whether they be good or evil, are taken home to that God who gave them life." We then shared the talk by Elder Eyring called "the spirit as your constant companionship." The spirit really was the true teacher and he was definitely helped out by our lesson. The Book of Mormon has a lot power to it, in this moment that power was to give comfort to someone unsure about how his brother who had past away was doing. Anyone seeking that same power will find it. The promise in Moroni 10:3-5 is that anyone who reads, ponders, and prays about the Book of Mormon will receive an answer by the holy ghost. Everyone needs a current and strong testimony of the BoM and that is easily done through daily prayerful study of it.   

Friday we ate dinner with a really nice member who sells her food for a living. She makes the best mexican food in the branch and it's always super good to go to her house. We had a great visit with them and celebrated the birthday of Rosa Cervantes at the same time. She has a husky that is super easily excited and playful, and apparently destructive. As we left I found my shoes gnawed through and ripped up a bit which was awkward but we jumped out before anyone else saw. Lesson learned is that you never leave shoes in someones porch when their dog gets thrown in there haha.   


-eric

5 March 2018

Wednesday we had some good progress with the Sarmiento family. Turns out their day and our day was a little crazy. Our day was not like their day, but it was pretty nice. We planned a trip out to Holland to stop by a not-so-recent convert member who is having some trouble that we've been thinking about. We normally can't do trips that far away, as its 40 miles just to get there but we prayerfully picked out some other people to stop by hoping and praying that those we chose would be home. It turned out to be a really good trip and we saw a bear on the way out. Of the 6 people we stopped by all where home. It was pretty sweet. It wasn't until after the third or fourth person that we were like, "wow, no one ever is home. What's going on?" I know God guides this work. 

Wednesday ended with the Sarmiento family. We walked in and things were a little somber. We were talking at the beginning of our visit and it turned they had spent the night in the hospital. We prayed and talked about that a little more. Turns out their daughter had a really high fever and at some point they found her not breathing and rushed her to the hospital. By morning things were all good but it was definitely a scare. A few weeks back our mission president asked us to be "masters of the questions to the soul section in Preach my Gospel" and that turned out to be inspired. PMG recommends Alma 14 which is okay for some reasons but we used 2 Nephi  2:6-14 and ended with Ether 12:27. Trials make us stronger and are a natural part of life. It makes sense if we understand that this life is a time of preparation and if we want to grow we also need to work at things. Daniel won't pray about the Book of Mormon but the spirit was super strong in that house that night and I'm certain he felt the same. We invited him to search for more answers in the Book of Mormon.  

Friday we met with Cezar. He is a pretty cool guy and we read with him a little and talked about authority and baptism, something that he really is interested in. We used 3 nephi 11 to talk about authority and baptism in the Americas along side Mathew 10 and Christ's ministry. What we discussed and shared with him really resonated with him and he opened up about how he had been praying for direction in his life and has felt pretty strongly the need to be baptized again. He wasn't quite ready for a solid date so we focused more on praying about the Book of Mormon to gain a witness of its truth. It was a pretty good lesson. He seems to be doing decently. 

Saturday was our second trip to Holland. In the morning we had a few appointments here in Grand Rapids and we were going to start our daily studies at 12. At 12:15, we got a call from President Brennan to come to the new senior couple's apartment, which is like 100 feet away to drop off the keys to their apartment. We ran over and meet our new senior couple the Pectols. We showed them around and President brought us all out to lunch. We ate a long lunch with them but that was fine. We helped them unpack and we ran to Holland again. We had a great lesson with this one couple who were taught like two years ago. I don't know what the deal is with chiwawas but I've not had the best luck as of late. During our visit I pet their dog and it nearly ripped my finger off haha. The dog was quickly snatched and thrown into a back room. With the senior couple we'll be able to actually be in Holland way more often. Our Holland trip ended with a sprint to the beach to grab photos of the sun set. 

-eric

19 February 2018

fam, 

Some good news came in this week. We are getting another senior couple this week! From what we know, it looks like it might be this Thursday.  

Zone conference was on Friday and like always was a really great meeting. Unfortunately it went a little long. After the meeting there was a leadership training for the missionary leaders, which Elder Rencher had to stay for. After that we got word from the Assistants that if we could, we needed to help unload some of the things the mission has supplied the new couple. We could, so we spent and hour and a half unloading furniture. The mission housing coordinator came with us and treated us to dinner after. That was super nice. We raced down to the Franco's taco shop and ate there before our afternoon appointment. The Franco's tend not to let us pay, but between the language barrier of the Francos and Elder Gosling's persistence in making it so they'd accept his money, it was both humorous to watch and was enough to let us pay for our meal. 

Saturday we started the day off with Santiago. He is doing pretty decently. He is starting to recognize the testimony I think he's had for a little bit. We talked a lot about choices and why they're so important. We shared 2 Nephi 2:27 which explains that things either bring us closer or further from God. It was a pretty good lesson and we were able to be pretty bold with him. We talked about some of things that affect him spiritually. 

After Santiago we went to a less active member to help him translate for a phone call with a credit card company. It was a little awkward because at first the people wouldn't let us talk for him, which is understandable, but the member did not like the interpreter at all. He was getting a little heated and we basically took the phone call over to diffuse a little bit. We figured out the problem but then the last few steps couldn't be done by us due to some policy. But we got it all resolved.  

We had a really good lesson with the Sarmientos this week. Daniel, the father of the household, I think finally has connected some important dots. We talked heavily about the Book of Mormon and modern day prophets. We've constantly asked Daniel to pray about the BoM and read from it to gain a testimony that it's true. Some people get answers to prayers quickly and some don't.  The same goes with some questions that are answered quickly while others don't get answered as quickly. We shared 1 Nephi 10:17 which in few words explains that if we have faith and a desire to know something we can get answers to those questions through the Holy Ghost by diligently seeking. You could almost see the dots connect when Daniel said that, "God sometimes holds off on answers because we first have to show that we truly want something." Things are looking pretty good for that family, but they still won't accept a baptismal date. 

Heads up, next P-day will be this Saturday as it's the end of the transfer.