Time is going quick, I think the heat has something to do with it.

It is always a nice temperature of really hot here, but I'm gettin used to living in it. The week passed really fast, like normal time is going out of control and speeding by! 

 

We have been focusing a lot on finding, because we don't have very many investigators right now. So I've been reading a lot in chapter 9 which is "Finding people to teach." I really do love this chapter, it talks a ton about having the faith to find people. That is what I always focus on, that there is at least one person waiting to hear the gospel, and if we´re doing our part, we´ll find them. So that is what we´ve been doing a lot of is contacting and looking for more people. 

Having been in this same area his whole mission and having this proccess of always looking for new people to teach and always contacting has been hard on my companion. Yesterday was a little tough for us, because here in our area on Sunday unless we have our appointments for the night super confirmed, we don't have anything to do. And our appointments fell last night, so we were looking for what we can do. On Sunday nights things get a little crazy here, and people are either out with their friends at bars, or reject in the first few moments of us trying to talk to them. Many of the people we know we can't visit after the sun goes down because we can't enter many parts of our area at night. So it was a little hard searching for someone we could visit. 

But we have been working and we have been finding. We were able to meet with the man who lost his son, and we taught him the Restoration because he asked us why there are so many churches in the world. He liked it I think, but it is hard to meet with him because he works all the time this week. I'm hoping we can meet with him atleast one more time to teach him the Plan of Salvation.

Our investigators came to Church!!!!! There is one guy named Jorge, and he is really really good. He is an old friend of a less active lady that we have been trying to re-activate, and we were able to teach him and invite him to be baptized. He accepted and felt really excited, he came to church yesterday and said that he loved it!! He told us in his 40 years of living he has never had the opportunity to pray, or go to church, or to learn a whole lot about God. He has always believed but was never given the opportuntity, and he loves it. When he prayed to end our first lesson he said he felt really good. Like he could feel a power or a feeling that he hadn´t before. We are working hard to be able to guide him to baptism the 13 of Febuary!!! He has loved everything so far. 

We didn't have an apostle, but we did have an Area 70 come and teach us, which was still amazing. He is the 70 for Colombia, Bolivia, Peru, and Venezuela. It really was so good, I learned a ton!!!!

That is how the work has been going here, this week was a little rough, but really we are being so blessed!! I love doing this work!!

LOVE YOU,

Elder Kendall

MY HOUSE!!!

Time Is Flying, just like me on my bike

HELLO PEOPLE IN AMERICA!!! Is it still cold over there?

 

This week went really fast, time just keeps speeding up! I'm working on adjusting to the heat, yesterday when we left the chapel, it was 45 degrees Celsius, I'm not sure how hot that is in Fahrenheit, but I know it's a lot. I get home pretty pooped each day but just cause we`re workin hard. 

 

Our branch is really big actually, there is only one branch in all of Girardot, and it has about 200 members more or less. There are a lot of good families, and I'm glad to be here. We also have 8 missionaries that attend this one branch, so that is interesting. 

 

My new companion is Elder Justiniano, and he is from Bolivia also. We are learning how to teach together, we both have about the same time in the mission. I have 4 months and he has 4 and a half months. He has served all his time here in the same area in Girardot, so he knows the area pretty well. 

 

We're working a lot with contacting, we have almost no investigators right now. It is a lot different contacting on a bike and also the houses are different here than in Bogota. We also have some parts of our area we can't go in, and some that we have to leave at night. But we have been working hard looking for those people who are waiting for our message. 

 

A cool thing happened yesterday: After lunch Sunday, it was super super hot and I hadn't slept at all the night before because my stomach was giving me trouble. So I was pretty darn tired already and was a little reluctant to leave. I also new that we were going strait out to contact people, because we didn't have anyone to visit at this time. While we were getting ready to leave, I was thinking about how I wasn't super excited to go out and contact. But then a thought popped into my head "Nah man, Satan is just trying to put you down because he knows that there is someone waiting for you guys to leave and talk to them, because he knows that he is going to find messengers of God and Satan doesn't want that for this person." I knew that it was true, and that it was the Holy Ghost helping me realize that there were people waiting to talk to us, even if they didn't know it. So we got to work. As we were going around, like a lot of the people around in this area, didn't want anything or to listen to our message. We weren't sure where to go to contact, and I was pretty much just following my companion around just trying to keep up, because I knew that someone would want to listen. After contacting for a couple hours, we went into a part of town that I hadn't ever been in. And as we were going a long we talked to a guy who was watching his grandson run around and playing with a dog. We were able to have a conversation with him and we learned that his first son drowned in the river by their house when he was a child. We felt a lot of love for this man and testified to him about how he could be with his son again, and he agreed to learn more. We gave him the Plan of Salvation pamplet, which he said he would read. We are going to visit him and his family this week to share this wonderful plan with them. 

 

I have a testimony that there is always someone waiting to hear the Gospel, and that if we just go out and do our best to be worthy to be in the right place at the right time, we will find them. 

I believe that Satan knew that we would find this man, and that is why he was pushing me so hard to not go out, to give in to my weaknesses. But we kept going, and found someone who was touched by the Gospel. I hope that we are able to teach him more. 

 

I LOVE THIS GOSPEL!!!!!!! 

 

I am extremely sad to hear about the boy Ethan, I feel along with all you back home and will pray for his family. 

 

I hope you guys keep smiling out there, and I want you to do something for me, watch an episode of the Office called "Code Level Midnight," and think of me while watching, it's one of my all time favorites. I believe it's in the 4th or 5th season or somewhere around there.

 

I LOVE YOUR FACES!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

 

Elder Kendall

 

Where's Elder Kendall?? :)

 

Greetings from Giradot, The hottest place in the mission.

Hi mom!!!  I'm still alive and well, just sweating a little bit more.

So yeah, I start with the changes, because there were a lot of them. The way we know our transfers is they call us at night on Sunday, and we leave in the morning on Monday. They are really sudden actually. So what happened with Tintal.....

At about 10:40 we got the call of the tranfers, and they said, to be quick... Both of you are going.....

That's right!!! Elder Espinola and I both got transfered!!! We both got kicked out of there and moved to other places. And I'm just a little outside of Bogota now.... about 3 hours away in a big city called Giradot. That's right baby I'm in Tierra Caliente!!!! And dont worry, its actually not hot, its HELL! XD Only because it is extremely hot, not in any other way. Really it's amazingly beautiful down here, I love the difference of that of Bogota, that it's not all huge with millions of people living in tiny apartments. It is awesome, and I'm going to get used to the heat while getting to know the area. Right now its about 90 to 100 degrees all day everyday, and we can only use long sleeve shirts (not sure if it is possible to send me more or I can buy more here, because I only have 2) and so yeah it's hot stuff. 

Getting around is easy peasy though because we have bikes!!!! That's right, I'm now cruzin around like a homie in the streets of Colombia. I love having a bike it is really nice actually, the only thing I need to fix is the seat, because my booty is just a little bit sore. But I'm getting accustomed, and don't worry I have found a new love here, and her name is water. I LOVE WATER!!! haha

My companion stayed in Bogota, he is going to be a District leader, train again, and open an area, so he's got his plate full of work to do.

Not sure what's going to happen for Darwin, and all the other wonderfull people I left in Tintal, but I really hope somehow Darwin can still have his baptism like we had planned for this Saturday.

I got to call Darwin the morning we left, so that was good. I just hope he keeps progressing and is baptized. It's hard to change but I'm excited to be somewhere new. 

I love all your stories and that stuff, keep it comin!!! :D

So yeah, that's my life so far with all the changes that have happened

 

Love love love, more LOVE I LOVE YOU!

Elder Kendall

Tacos for New Years, and almost finishing Training.....

Woooooo time is going by so darny darn fast, I cant believe how fast this transfer has gone. 

New Years happened, and it wasn´t very bad at all, it actually was pretty calm, pretty tranquilo.

People still drank like crazy but thats pretty normal for Holidays like that so nothing to crazy. There were some fireworks and that kinda stuff but nothing major, me and my companion however cooked tacos, and really good ones at that, so that was pretty crazy. I love the recorder I have, we got some pretty awesome stories on there for you guys when I get back :D

We have been working hard and should see some baptisms coming soon. We are planning on Darwin for the 16th of January, Lorena for the 23rd, and Alexandra for the 30th, all in January!! If all goes well and they come to church, we will be having a lot of happy and saved souls coming into the branch. Our time changed to 8:00 in the mornings for sundays, and attendance of the members was pretty interesting. But we still had our normal amount of people attenting by the end of sacrament so that was good. 

Darwin should get back in Bogota today, so we are happy that we can start working with him extra hard for him to be baptized the 16th. He is awesome, he called us like twice, once during Christmas and once during new years to see how we´re doing. It was pretty legit.

Other than that we are working hard for good things to come in this next transfer.

Oh yeah, I ONLY HAVE ONE MORE WEEK OF TRAINING!!!! How crazy is that to think, I´ve nearly had 4 months in Colombia. After this week, I'm going to be one of the normal missionaries that is just doing his thing. I can't believe how fast this time has gone, it is kinda weirding me out. Also next week we´re having transfers, and I think that Elder Epinola and I will be staying here for another 6 weeks in Tintal, which I really hope, because we have so many good things coming.

It's so okay for Ian to use my guitar, the truth is that I miss it a lot actually, I want to buy one here one day, with awesome Colombian sound.

I really wish I could do my jury duty but, darn, its just to bad haha!!! I cant believe papa and I have been selected, that's pretty funny haha.

Looking forward to the future, to continue workin with my crazy but funny comp.

Con todo el amor en todo el mundo,

Elder Kendall

New Years tacos

That is the arrow through the bag from the bow...