I Love to See the Temple

I don´t think I can express how much I love being a missionary. My two zone leaders have less time then I do, so they always bug me about the down side of the house, I try not to think about it and just work my heart out! (If anyone asks, I will finish my mission in two years!) 

Well certainly the highlight of the week was friday saturday and sunday. Friday we got everything ready for the temple. Saturday at 1 in the morning, we left the house to go get on the bus! We didn´t really sleep but our double-decker bus kind of let us sleep a little bit! We got to the temple at 7ish. We didn´t have enough preisthood to help out with baptisms so we got the wonderful oportunity down stairs while 8 people recieved their endowments and one family got sealed for all time and eternity! This branch is really moving along! Even if we were bummed out to not participate in the sealing, we got to feel the great spirit of the temple and got to see the progression of a lot of new memebers in this branch. We are working really hard with the leaders of the branch and that is really helping us out as missionaries to work hard and effecitively. We don´t get to go to the temple that much in this mission but everytime we do, I feel energized to tell people how they can feel if they just follow the spirit of christ and the holy ghost that is telling them that THIS CHURCH IS TRUE.

I really don´t have words when I see recent converts fasting and paying tithing on their own and they just show their faith. Everything that is happening here is helping me to just do everything I know is right and if I do something wrong to repent immediately and keep moving foreward. Let us be perfect like our Father in Heaven is perfect (3 Nefi 27:27 I think is the scripture) and not to get discouraged if we aren´t perfect. Just to know that one day we can be! 

Love you all! 

(Go to the temple more often!)

Elder Alder

Marriage is what brings us Together Today

(I sure hope everyone remembers this movie because it took me a whole week to remember what it was called) 

You may be wondering, or might not, what happened last week and what would ever have stopped us to write the week before. Well one answer is in the title. The other answer is that at 1 o´clock here in Huaquillas until 5:40 the whole city shut down. (Se fue la luz, por favor ayúdeme estoy olvidando inglés) We didn´t have electricity all of monday. So when the light came back there wasn´t enough time to write all of you so we didn´t write, did they give us time the next day to write a little bit? yes, but we got super busy, we forgot and we just kind of got (metidos?) pulled into the work. Well so last week, we spent our whole day in Registro Civil... CityCouncil ugh.... forgetting english.-  Well we helped out a beautiful family get married named the Samaniego Family. They apparently recieved the missionaries about a year ago and didn´t want to hear a darn thing. But I am sure the spirit just hit this family hard because they progresssed soooo fast and Saturday were baptized! And we were certainly shown that the adversary didn´t want this family to get baptized. (The day of their marriage, wednesday, they got just about all of their clothing stolen...) Turns out that the father (Dan, who looks a lot like my uncle adam) was baptized when he was 8 and doesn´t remember anything so the mother (Maria) and her two sons (Dan and Justin) were baptized this Saturday. The baptism was an experience that I will never forget. The branch had an activity before the baptism so we had a room full of people attending the baptism. They are also super excited to be able to go to the temple this Saturday (Which we will be doing this week as a branch and I am SUPER excited) Another thing I wanted to mention about the baptism is the two testimonies of our lovely couple. "I know that this church is true" I don´t think I have heard that from a recent convert with such power. They read the Book of Mormon a whole lot before being baptized and they prayed and even fasted to be able to feel what they felt! It was an experience that I will never forget! 

I am sure that I am forgetting a lot of information but I am just in shock with the blessings of the Lord. How do you find such an amazing family? I asked that a couple of times to myself. How do we find more families that are just ready. The answer is Member Missionary Work. We are visiting all the friends of the recent converts of this branch and we are finding so many lovely poeple. We have to work a little bit harder but we sure have met so many great people. Where do you find members who have so much faith that they ask you: "Elders, when are we going to go door knocking in my neighborhood, I am sure that we will find at least someone to listen to us?") People are waiting for the gospel. Your friends are waiting for the gospel. We just have to pray and fast that the Lord will prepare the hearts of these people and OPEN OUR MOUTH. 

I always considered myself a shy guy and not willing to talk to whoever is in my path. But the Lord helped me to follow the spirit and to not care what people think of me! (We are also blessed here in Ecuador because questions like: Do you live here? Are you married? When do you normally work? How long have to been married? And what are you going to do this Sunday? doesn´t weird people out.) 

Love this country and love these people (And not just because they give me a WHOLE TON OF FOOD)

Love you all and hope the best for all :) Mormon means Happy!!! 

Elder Alder

"I have a Family here on Earth"

Well this week was one of the most spiritual weeks that I have had in the mission. (And if you know my family and I that means tears :)) So we are learning a lot about how to find families. And usually that comes from the people that the members or the investigators know. So my companion has espeically been asking EVERYONE who we can teach. And we have found 3 families. We are super excited to be teaching them and helping them gain faith, repent, to get to baptism! But really we have more help from our Father in Heaven. We have learned a little bit more about prayer and how to put your heart in your prayers and our investigators. And we learned so much from the scripture Alma 17:3. Fasting with prayer. During weekly planning, we got to the end and my companion told me, "Elder we are missing something. We can talk to people. We can invite them to make changes but they are getting quite there. We need to fast" (Physically I was really happy because I think we eat 5 times a day just visiting people) but I felt the spirit so strong from the fast. And not to say that beacause we fasted we got more investigators in church, but we did have a quite a few that got to church (Even 30 minutes before us) Also another family got to church that we didn´t know. Turns out they are family of the missionary that is out on his mission in Peru from our branch! They aren´t members so we intorduced ourselves and said "So the other elders are  visiting you guys?" They said no one had visited them in a while. 

This gospel was made so that families can be together forever and as a missionary, I have never seen anything that makes me feel the spirit faster, which is a family that is attending church for the first time. Or another family that gets to church before the members. We are being blessed so much here just because the people here know their duty: "PREACH MY GOSPEL" 

Every member a missionary and remember we are here because of Him, so the only thing we should be doing is His will.

Love you all :)

Elder Alder

Family Home Evening

Priesthood blessings

Well I would just love to bring you all here to show you how amazing this branch is! I just absolutely love the energy that these members have for the work of the lord. We had the wonderful blessing to have a "Branch conference" this week. That means a couple wonderful things. One, we got to have President Moreno come to the branch with the assistants and they gave some powerful testimonies from them. They sure love to work and work to love. Other blessing from the conference was saturday, there were 5 men who prepared and received the Higher Priesthood (as you can see in two of the pictures below) I remember that receiving the aaronic priesthood was a big deal but I don´t remember feeling the spirit as strong. But the higher preisthood, "tears for days" as the uneducated would say like me :) And this experience was no different. The District president invited us to partipate in the room where they were going to give the priesthood to these 5 brothers recieve the priesthood. And the first brother was named Franklin and when they asked him who he wanted to give him the preisthood, he picked my companion. My companion looked at me and said: "what do I do?" Next brother is named Jorge (The fatter one in the second picture that looks a little bit like my dad, sorry dad) CHOSE ME to give him the priesthood. First time in my life and I "cried for days" I felt the spirit so strong in that moment. I saw and got to participate in the confirmation of Jorge and I´m amazed at the progess that he has taken. I feel so grateful for the authority and the fact that we can draw a line from Jorge Peñaloza right to Jesus Christ. We have the authority that is why it´s so important to share this gospel.

Love you guys. "Dare to be a Mormon"

Elder Alder

Franklin and Marisol

Elder Alder, Jorge and crew

I Love Talent Shows

Well another week, without pictures to tell all the wonderful stories that happened this week! I will have to write a thousand words to describe them suficiently (as you can see I will never be able to spell if it kills me) 

Well just a wonderful week here in Branch Huaquillas. Like I said before this branch has 2 years and there is nothing greater than being where the church has recently started. Let´s see what have we accomplished as a branch this week. We have 8 people that will recieve the Higher preisthood this week. We have a missionary out in the field and one waiting for his calling. And a SISTER started her papers!! We had a branch talent show that just rocked my world (and other churches say we shouldn´t dance. I beg to differ!) And we are saying goodbye to elder Humble. And everyone just loved him here so EVERYone is super sad. 

As far as work goes here, the youth are super excited are bring their friends to church and we were able to bring a whole family to church this week! It was so great and we are really excited to get working again!

Would love to show my year old cake but once again, pictures...

Love you guys!

Elder Alder

Spiritual Success

Thank you all for your prayers this week. We had the oportunity to have the baptism of Kenny! He was super happy and even if the water was cool, gave a great testimony to all of us in the service! In the photos We are in the recently built baptismal font(spell check?) and the other I´m with the family of Kenny in our little "Photo Shoot" With the name of a church behind us. The other elders in the branch also had two families baptized along with kenny so it was a wonderful baptismal service. And Elder Humble and I sang with the 1st counselor of the Primary, "I feel my savoirs love" (I just love singing) 

Maybe the only sad part was that the investiagators aren´t attending church. Now don´t think I am complaining or sad. If we read in Preach My gospel, success in the mission consists in feeling the spirit and trying your very hardest to do everything you can to help His children. Also says that true disciples of christ feel sad when their brothers and sisters chose the wrong path. So I have been pondering a lot about the success that one person has in his or her mission. There are missionaries that baptize a lot of people, there are others that don´t. There are missionaries that are soo involved in their investigators that they cry and others that just want people in the water. So where do we find success? Where do we find "joy in the journey"? It´s found in the Spirit. It´s found in Christ. I can´t help but put a huge smile on my face when we leave the house. I can´t help but smile to think about all the things I need to do to help better missionary work here. I can´t help but smile when 12 young single adults are called as branch missionaries this sunday and after church we divide them up and we did divisions in 3 groups all day sunday! I can´t help but smile to see my companion put his whole heart into the work that we do. Maybe we lack a couple of investigators in church but I don´t think I´ve been so happy in my mission! Why? Because my companion and I are trying to keep our "eye single to" His glory. And it is helping us a lot! 

Love this work, love this branch, love my companion, love the food, love the laughs, love the people.

Love you guys!

Elder Alder

Time is too Short

I think I end every week thinking: "No! I needed more time!" or everyday thinking or saying to my companion: "Where did that day go?" Time is so precious! And I am sure that I am loving my time here in Huaquillas almost too much! 

Why?

1) I eat way too much. Not becuase I want to but because the members and investigadores always tell us to stay and eat. I think 4 different families invited to eat yesterday.

2) The church is kind of new here so the members are full of energy to share the gospel with all their friends and family.

·3) Sometimes we love investigadores so much even if they don´t go to church that we have to let off the gas a little and look for more and BOOM some else that is equally as cool comes up!

4)The church (That is just a big old house) is filled to the brim almost every sunday! 160 people yesterday and almost 30 of them aren´t members! 

5) My companion is just the best! I don´t think I could´ve asked for a better "Son" We can laugh, work, and cry together and we just keep moving up!

And many other things! It`s not perfect but it sure is amazing to be here. The picture is of us doing a little Family home evening with a less active family and a couple of investigators. 

Just ask for prayers for Kenny Morocho who is going to be baptized this Saturday (he is in the picture so look for him next week) 

Love you guys! Keep the scriptures cool and actually read them!

Elder Alder :)