It's Weeks Like This That Make It All Worth It

Hola Family & Friends 

I hope everything is going well. Life here in El Paso this last week was one to remember. Not to mention that the weather is amazing (70's) perfectly sunny, with a light breeze. I hear it will get up to 120 here in the next few months so I will enjoy it while I can. Anyway, other than that, the missionary work here has been picking up.

I have a love/hate relationship with knocking doors. This week we started back up the knock at least 1 hour a day, because we were promised to have 1 baptism per month if we do that every day. The first few days at the beginning of last week where one of those hate days. We have a returned missionary (named Marshall) just come to our ward 2 weeks ago and he was in the San Jose mission (His mission president was President Watkins), and actually served in the Spanish ward in Holister. (small world)  He is just golden for taking out because he is still in missionary mode and knows all the tricks, so I have actually been learning a lot of stuff from him. We took him out knocking Tuesday and it was super hard. Even though we had a pro with us and our approaches where good enough to convince Rocky Balboa that he was a woman, the people where just too hard hearted. Marshall asked us how we could even deal with the hardness of the rejection down here. The Catholic religion has a super strong hold on the people down here.


So the next day we decided that we would do an "Appointment with the Lord" which means we pray about the area and the street we should knock and we each choose 5 streets and see if they match. Well we had 2 the matched. so we prayed and told the Lord we would be there at 2 o’clock and asked that we find someone prepared to hear the gospel. Well we found 2 referrals for the english elders, 4 return appointments, and a lady who's mom was a member, but she never joined the church and is now wanted to have religion in her life. How great is that?


On Friday we had "Zone Conference" which was like a spiritual recharge. It was from 8 am to about 3 pm, super long. President talked about Christ and his Names in the scriptures. We also had someone come over and teach us table manners for 2 hours. I know know how to properly eat a 10 course meal. The funny thing is 99% of the time we get a paper plate and tortillas to eat with instead of silverware. So basically it was for later in life when I have the money to hire me a butler to make me really fancy meals.


After zone conference we had "Exchanges" where Elder Perez went to another area and I got a Greenie for the day. His name is Elder Krebs, and he actually knew Landen from BYU before he left. Anyway he has been out for only 3 weeks now and his Spanish is still pretty rough. It was my chance to see what I could do and also to see how much I have grown in the last 5 months. We had an appointment with our most progressing investigators which are also my favorite. Alicia and Raoul Castillo. They are an older couple who are just so amazing and actually remind me of Grandma and Grandpa Stewart. Just an older Mexican Version of them. She loves the Lord so much and all she wants is for her husband to be a worthy man of God and to be married in the temple. Now thats what I like to see. Anyway we taught the Gospel of Jesus Christ and when we got to baptism they accepted to set a date for their baptism. So I asked them is they had a calendar and we got it out, and I saw that there was only 2 Saturdays left (the 3rd and the 10th) until the end of the transfer and one of us may leave. And they have not been to church yet so it would have to be the tenth, but I decided to give them both options anyway, knowing very well that it would have to be the 10th. Anything the both decided on the 10th and even wrote it on the calendar. They have the feeling that "It is their baptism date and that they got to pick it. :)"


There was a flooding in our chapel a few weeks ago and so our ward is now meeting at a building that was 10 minutes farther away now. But despite of that we still had 4 people come to church which is my record so far on my mission. Alicia and Raoul came and also Olga and Moi. They where welcomed by everyone and really enjoyed church. I can see the effects of our hard work with this ward now and we are receiving the blessings from it.


Anyway thats all i have time for,


I love you all,


Elder Stewart

Almost at six months

February 20, 2012

Hola Friends and Family

I hope everything is going well. This week was kind of a slow one. Not really a whole lot has changed. It fact it was a little frustrating. But the key is not getting too discouraged so that you can give your all to every investigator. I don't want to find out in heaven that the reason one person wasn't converted is because I was discouraged by the indecisiveness of another investigator.

If you guys don’t already know, I'm talking about Olga. She had another baptism date drop last Saturday. Things with her are just so confusing. but we finally decided that she needed a little push or some pressure to go through with it. So we told her that there is really nothing more that we can still teach her without going over them for a third time. So we had an idea to have her pick her own date for baptism. Which has an up and a down. The upside is that she will feel like its really "Her" date and probably make sure she is ready for it, on the downside, it will probably be after either Elder Perez or I are gone. But then again that's not really what is important. They still have not been able to find work, which is actually probably one of the things that is putting too much pressure on her. Hopefully something changes.

Other than that we have like 5 people who have a testimony of this church and of the Book of Mormon and would be solid baptisms, BUT they all have some family member, friend, or the law keeping them from being baptized. I keep praying for something to change in the hearts of their loved ones. Hopefully something will change soon.

Anyway, love you all.

-Elder Stewart

Prayers really truly and sincerely ARE answered

Friends and Family,

This week was a good one. And to start it all off last Monday, after emailing, we climbed "Mount Franklin" which is the mountain that our house is basically built on. It took us 3 hours to get up it and back down. It was actually not a whole lot of fun because we had to climb rock at a few points and we all wore shorts, which is the worst idea in the world. The whole way up and down I was reminding the bushes and cacti that one day they would be burned at his coming. but I don't know if they heard me because I still suffered hundreds of scratches and stabs. All in all though, at the top you could see all of Juarez, Mexico and El Paso, Texas which is quite the view. Plus I have a bunch of rocks that I'm gonna send home that are super cool.

                               ***************************************************

 

Prayers really truly and sincerely ARE answered! Our ward has officially changed mutual to Tuesday nights and that means volleyball as well. And we had 4 youth bring friends! 4! 4! 4! That's more referrals than I've gotten it 13 weeks. Anyway volleyball and the youth in this ward are the things that have been the most successful. So i guess that's what we are going to focus on. We now have 6 non member investigators that come to volleyball nights and also a lot of less actives come as well, which gives us a chance to get to know them and set up appointments... that is, if i don't go to much into beast mode and play too hard ha ha.

 

We had our first "Ward Correlation" this week and they called some new people this week. Almost the whole meeting was about missionary work and we got a few referrals right there. It seems to us that this ward has just been holding back all their referrals from the missionaries or just didn't realize they had referrals to give. But I think the "Missionary Talk" in the 3rd hour of the 5th Sunday of January really started things going. Pres. Perez (One of Pres. Miller's counselors) came and taught a combined 3rd hour class and at the end Elder Perez and I had to give a surprise testimony. I wasn't ready, but the spirit really helps missionaries out in times of need, and I spoke the best and most fluid Spanish I have on my mission. The spirit was so strong.

Anyway we started this "PMG class" for 3 families every Tuesday night for an hour. We will teach all 3 of the basic lessons, and role play introducing the gospel to their friends. As missionaries, we don't want the members to try to teach their friends everything, but to be able to at least answer some questions. But then to hand them over to us. Anyway we are excited to see this ward start to get more active and this area.

 

That's it for this week.

-Love Elder Stewart

 

Armor of God Lesson and District "Battle"

Another week in El Paso....

Well another week down, without much success I’m afraid. Dad your totally right about the fact of a lot of areas don’t have ward mission leaders or missionaries, but remember that investigators have to go to church 2 times before their baptism and 90% of the time they come once and then don’t come back which is the frustrating part. I did start p90x this week though :) it hurts so good.

Olga didn’t go through with it. Don’t you just hate agency. Now I realize why Satan was able to get 1/3 of all the hosts in heaven to follow him. Because on paper it is quite a good idea, but there is no progress either..... Hmmm kind of sounds like communism. But I guess she just needs a little more confidence. We get a feeling that it hast to do with her family who is all catholic. The reassuring part though is that she knows it is true, and comes to church every Sunday and feeds us twice a month, so it’s just a matter of time.

We have another investigator who is 14 and she really loves the church.  She goes to every Wednesday night mutual and came to church last week.  But here mother doesn’t want her to get baptized because she thinks that Mormons are a cult, that have multiple wives and do all this crazy stuff, but she won’t talk to us... any way her daughter has convinced her overtime to just go to church and see what we are like. :) God answers prayers! God answers prayers! God Answers Prayers!!! Anyway we are excited for that.

One last thing is really to my brothers and more importantly sisters. DO NOT MARRY SOMEONE OUTSIDE THIS CHURCH. And make sure he/she is a RM. It works out to be good 1/1000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000 of the time.  But other than that it always ends badly. So just warn whoever you guys are dating to be a member….. or else.

Love- Elder Stewart

It has officially been 5 months...

Hola Family and Friends,

How is everything going?  It has officially been 5 months on this 24 month journey and this week was the first transfer that I had the possibility of leaving the 3rd Ward here in El Centro. But it looks like I am staying here for at least 6 more weeks with Elder Perez.

Anyway this week was a really good one because we decided that if we where to leave this week that we would want to go out with a bang. So we worked harder than any week this transfer, and were actually blessed because of it.

This week we have really focused on helping Olga feel ready for baptism. She had her interview this week and she passed everything. She is living better than most Mormons live, following all the commandments, and even is able to bear testimony of this church. She just does not feel ready for it. So we just have to keep spending more time with her and lots of praying.

One of our investigators with a baptism date actually came to church, which is so much harder to do than you think.  We taught a ton of lessons this week and visited a bunch of less actives. We have really been trying to help people come back to the church and feel like it has been working. We have gotten a lot of people to come back and go to church. Too bad there isn’t a place in the numbers for "Less Actives" that came to church because we would be doing real well. But then again I guess that is the job of the members and ward missionaries.  Unfortunately, this is now week 3 we have gone without a Ward Mission Leader or anything. So all the work has basically fallen upon us. I sure hope that we can help get this ward back into missionary work and that the other wards in the mission are not like this one.

Anyway, not a whole lot this week.

-Elder Stewart