Here are some updates from Kendall's letters for the past number of weeks...I will not count how many :
WEEK 24
I got transferred!!!!!!
Right now I'm in a place called
Triunfol! My new comp is Hermana Chil. She is from Florida but her
parents are from Peru and Dominic Republic. Another gringa companion,
but she looks Latina! I don't have a lot of time to right but I'm doing
great and excited to work in a new place! There will be news and pics
next week! Thank you for all of your love and support!
I know that Heavenly Father has a plan for each one
of us and there is a reason for everything. Why we are in a certain
place, why we are in the family we are in, and everything that we
experience. There is no doubt in my mind that I'm here in Ecuador for a
reason. I'm so very grateful that I am a missionary! That my job is to
preach the gospel! We are so very blessed as members of the church to
have the truth of the gospel! Ive seen the atonement change lives. The
Atonement is so much more than a cleansing of sins but a power to change
us. To make us better people! I know that my Savior lives and that
families are forever because of Him!
WEEK 23
Everything is going good here in Quevedo. We contacted two girls in
the street and got to know their family. It turns out the dad is an
inactive member and was baptized with 12 of his siblings. He says he
doesn't remember why he stop going to church, so we are going to work
with him(Miguel) and his wife(Gina) and his daughter(Angie) and his
niece(Melissa). Angie and Melissa came to church with us Yesterday and
accepted a bautismal date right there in the church! We meet them
saturday night and just got to know them, and did "how to begin
teaching" which is we pretty much just present what we do as
missionaries and how their lives will be blessed by the gospel. Then
sunday morning we decided to stop by their house by surprise and invite
them to Church(which would start in only an hour) and they said Yes! We
were having a hard time just to commit our other invests. to come to
church when they had time to plan for it, and Angie and Melissa only
had an hour notice! I feel good with this family!
Some times the work is hard but it is so worth
it! Im so grateful to be working here in Ecuador! This next week I'm
probably going to be a trainer! We are having like 30 new missionaries
coming in. like 3 weeks ago all the missionaries had interviews with
pres Riggins and in my interview he asked me if I was ready to train. I
said If its what the Lord wants me to do, I am! Then he wrote down by my
name "ready to train." So we will see what happens!
SO I live in a 3rd world country, right? I had the "amazing"
opportunity to eat COW STOMACH! It is EXTREMELY chewy. Luckily it was
prepared well and drowned in the peanut butter like sauce. Do i want to
eat it again? No.
WEEK 22
So we are still trying to find new people to teach. We are working
with a lot of less/inactive members. There are like 300 inactive members
in my ward. Yes three hundred. finding them is half the battle. They
dont have addresss here like USA. this is an address for example: by the
school "Issac Montes," Street O(we are lucky if we get a street name),
blue house, in front of a big tree. One thing, like maybe every third
street is marked and no one knows street names and there are like 6 blue
houses in every street. You walk around the area asking random people
if they know the person you are looking for and most of the time they
dont. Or they live in the other ward or they moved. Once you find
them(sometimes it can takes an hour) you talk with them why they left
church, if they have family members we can teach and you have to discern
if its their time to come back. You can usually get a feel if its time
in the frist lesson, if not the second. But one awesome experience that
we had was we spent like a good half hour looking for some one and we
could tell once we found her(Laura) it was her ime. She left the church
becuase she had heard some things that werent true. In that first visit
when we were clearing up here doubts the spirit was so strong. she
started to cry and she told us that she knows the church is true! We are
working with her son, who is inactive, and his significant other and
they have three Kids together. The mom wants to better her family and
has an interset in our message.
I have learned some much in these last 5 months! But
the thing i have learned the most is that we cant do anything with out
the help of the Lord. HE is their in every moment of our lives we just
have to trust in Him and heed His warings. I know with all of my heart
that the Church is true. I know that only through our loving Savior that
we can overcome all things! And because of His Atonement and power we
will all live agian; but we determine if we are going to be happy in the
next life. WE do that by keeping the commandments.
I love you guys so much!
WEEK 21
So this week hasn't been that great far as investigatores.... We
have dropped a lot of people... Including karen and Jennifer...... :(Niether
of their dads want them to be baptized right now. But I have faith that
in the future they will be baptized. We litterally spend all day now
looking for new people to teach, Its not fun, but i still love my
mission!
we had an amazing oppourtunity to work with Hermana
Riggins!! She accompanied us while Pres Riggins was in a priesthood
meeting! She is abousetly amazing, and her life storing is inspiring!
She is so down to earth and I love her a lot!
We played volleyball today with our elders abd it
was so much fun! With our last pres we were not allowed to. All of the
elders are super funny and cool. We are like a family!
Thank you for sending all the stuff! Im looking forward to it!! Tell
Mckay that I love her and to keep studying the scrpitures! It will be
good for her to focuse on piano if she gets called foriegn... they dont
know how to play down here... Haha they singing is pretty fantastic
too!! They have their own way of singing the hymns!
Thank you for all your love and support! Love you guys lot!!!
WEEK 20
I'm doing great!! The days are long and the weeks are short. Im
still with Hermana Scott! Its rare when you stay with you're trainer for
more then your training but I love working with her! So right now we are
kinda in a stand still... we have dropped a lot of our investigators
because they are not progressing, and we are working a lot with the
members so we can have new people to teach.(ps help the sisters out and
give them some of your friends to teach). Jeniffer, is living with her
aunt right now who is a member, and we have been teaching for like 3
weeks now, that's a long time. She has a date for the 24th but she wasn't
able to talk with parents this week and she cant until the 26th....
which means she probably will not be baptized on her date.... This makes
me sad. She is so amazing and she understands everything we teach her
and she knows the church is true but she wants the support of her
parents. Her parents live like 3 hours away in the "campo" and its
almost impossible to get a cell signal out there so we are going to have
to wait.
we are still teaching Karen, Wagner, and her mom, Mayra, and they're coming along nicely!
Our
mission pres and his wife are awesome!!!!! They are very personable and
caring. His wife served a mission in Mexico so she speaks Spanish. Pres
Riggins is so wise in regard to the gospel! We have a new baustimal
"rule." We always have to ask, whether we just contacted or its the
first lesson, "As you come to know what we are teaching are true will
you be baptized in the church of Jesus Christ?" If they say no we drop
them right then and there. Of course we ask them why and try to help
them with any doubts but if they still say no, we drop them. The Lord is
really hastening the work and there is no time at all to waste.
I love being a missionary. I love studying and teaching the
gospel all day long! I know that this is the only true Church on the
earth and the only church that holds all the keys of the Priesthood.
There is truly a hunger for the gospel that everyone has, some people
don't realize it but its there. I testify that if you pray, study the
scriptures, and attend church every Sunday that there is no trail that
you cant overcome. I'm so grateful for my Savior. It is only through him
that we can have peace in this life and the next to come.
WEEK 19
We having been working really hard this week. we have a lot of
referrals from the people in the ward and people we have meet in the
street and the investigators we have been teaching. Remember Karen? it
turns out her mom is a member, she was baptized when she was 13! So we
are working with the both of them and also here little brother(Wagner)
who also has a baptismal date! We have another Family, the San Lucas
family. Edith the mom, Edith the daughter(16) and María(13). We have
tried to teach the dad too but he always escapes when we come. The mom
is amazing, she already believes that the church is true, from the very
frist lesson. we tuaght them The plan of salvation first, and Edith(the
mom) said she was laying in bed thinking about everything we taught her
and was talking to her husband about it and even prayed about it! The
only problem is that they are really strong in their religion and are a
little scared to change their lifes but we are working with them!
I love being a missionary! All the hard work is
worth it! my Spanish is coming along really well! My zone leader told me
he is really impressed with my spanish and said that there are a lot of
gringos that have 8 months in the mission that are just beginning to
speak as well as i do! HECK YA!
WEEK 18
The work is going really good!!!!! We have 5 people with a
bapt. date for the next two saturdays!! One was suppose to get baptized
last saturday, bryan palma, but it didnt work that sat so it will be
this saturday with a girl named Nicole. Her mom(Glenda) actually wanted
to speak with us! we were talkng with a member and said that there was a
lady that wanted to talk to us so we went over and started talking with
her and started teaching the first lesson but the spirit just wasnt
there and the lesson was just not going good.... she had to take a phone
call all during it, the moment she walk away hna scott and I looked at
each other and both said that it wasnt working out. When she got back I
felt like I should ask her why she wanted to talk with us and she
explained that she has a daughter (nicole) that she is worried about
especially with her boyfriend and she wants us to talk to her. SO that's
what we did! -nicole is awesome! I asked her to be baptize our very
first lesson and she was about to say yes when her whole family came
storming in... totally ruined the spirit!! But we were able to teach her
the next day and thats when she accept a date!!
we also have another family that is bien Catholic. We have
only been able to teach the dad once. But we have taught the mom, and 2
out of 4 kids. One has special needs the other is always at college but
has gone to church with his friends in another ward. They have two
daughters Cynthia and Laidy. Cynthia is so escogida(choosen)!!!!!!! We
extend a baptismal date for the whole family like a week ago, none of
them accept they all said they want more time. But when Cynthia
explianed why she didnt want to accpet then she said she want more time
but that she felt this peace and tranqulidad(i forgot how to spell that
in eng.) when we come and she was crying! BUT we set a date with Her and
Laidy Sunday for the 28th!! what is even crazy id that Cynthia said she
had prayed about baptism and then dreamed about getting baptized! and
then we ask her to be baptized!! The Lord truly does work in mysteripus
ways!!
The last person we have is named Kelvin. We have only taught
him about the sabbath day and invited him to church. After church we
were talking with him about it and he said that he felt good and
peaceful here. So i asked him to be baptized for the 28th of this month
and he said YES!!
The church is so true! You dont need to know everything about it
to want to be apart of it! There is nothing like being a missionary and I
love it!!!
WEEK 17
Hello!!
Im
officially out of my training!!!!!!! I could train a new missionary if
they asked me too! Im still with Hna Scott, I love her lots!! We are
like best friends! Pres Riggins(our new pres) comes tomorrow and we get
to meet him Friday!
Hna Scott and I are working hard. We teach all day long, walking
around 10 miles a day! I love being a missionary, it brings me so much
joy! A couple of days ago we ran into a old investigator, Karen. When we
were frist meet her she accepted a baptsimal date right then and there.
But we were never able to teach her because she was never in her house
and never came to church, this was over a month ago. We ran into her
acouple of days ago and said that "I want to go to your church." She was
able to attend church with us Sunday, and she accepted a date to be
baptized the 17 of July! But we still need to get the permission of her
parents... Her mom is really nice so hopefully that will be easy! we
are teaching a lot of people but she and Jennifer are the only one with
dates right now.
WEEK 16
All of our previous baptisms have dropped because once agian nobody
came to church..... but we found a family who seems really promising
and we do have a girl named Jennifer who has a date(she was the only one
that came to church) and a another guy named Luis Vergara who were are
teaching but he works A LOT and is really hard to find.
Because we had like none of our investigators come to church and
Nicole disappeared I was really sad on Sunday before church. But during
Sacrament meeting as I watched Bryan Palma being sustained to receive
the priesthood, Bryan Bravo passing the Sacrament, Virgina is now the
2nd counselor in RF, and one of our really less active coming back to
church for the first time, I was filled with joy that I was able to help
these people that I have truly come to love. I may not be having the
success I wish for but the Lord has helped me and He will continue to
help.
I testify that this church is true and that it is the only church
that has the authority of God. The Atonement is powerful. Ive seen it
change people and through the Atonement everything we do, all the
covenants we make, in the church are made possible. I love being a
missionary!
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