Short Report (Sorry mom)

Well, I have like no time, but this week was pretty cool. I got to learn a little bit about my new area and I met a bunch of the members, they are pretty cool. I am really excited for this week to try and find some new investigators because for now we dont have that many to work with. We had a really cool activity Saturday, it was an Open House of the church here in Piedra Pintada where they did a big tour of the chapel and explained everything about what we do there! It was the bomb! Yup, that's all I got for this week.

 

I love being a missionary!

Love,

Elder Kendall

I'll Go Where You Want Me To Go

Well, guess I gotta start off with the crazy news that happened yesterday. (Sorry mom that I didn't get to e-mail you)

So, Sunday night we called the assistants to pass the indicators for the zone. After we did that, they told us that because of the missionaries that finished the mission this week, there were going to be some emergency transfers in our zone. There were going to be three changes in the zone.  Two in Pation Bonito, and one in La Libertad. So we asked for the transfers in La Libertad first and they told me I was leaving!!!! It was a huge shock to me.... It was pretty sad to have to leave my companion and the area. I love La Libertad!

They told me I was going to Ibague, a zone outside of Bogota. I am now in Campiñas which is the hottest part of Ibague (of course). It is a pretty cool place, I will most likely finish my mission in this area. 

And so just like that, after 13 months total, I had to say goodbye to La Libertad. It was really hard to do. I left Monday morning and before I went, I called the Vargus family. That was a sad call to make, they are seriously the best family I have ever met in my whole mission. I will miss those guys a whole lot, but I have the hope that I will see them one more time before I finish my mission. The mission is hard, but sometimes not for the reasons that people think. Leaving Colombia is going to be the hardest thing I've ever done when It comes to it I think. 

But hey, that's why I love the hymn: "I'll go where you want me to go, Dear Lord. Over mountains or plains or sea. I'll say what you want me to say, Dear Lord.

I'll be what you want me to be"

I'll Go Where You Want Me To Go

Elder Kendall

 

Elder Thompson and the Vargus Family

 

Mother's Day, and Rain!

So this week it rained. That's it, all I got to say. Peace!

No, just kidding, but really it did rain way too much. It always gets hot right around lunch and then it starts to pour right when we start leaving to visit and teach. Oh well, rain is good.

 

This week, passed by like a flash of lightning! I remember talking with Elder Thompson last Sunday about how we were going to talk to our families in a week, and then I blinked and it was Sunday and we were talking with our families! So, yeah it was fast.

Well, the work is going good in our area. We have a few people that are really progressing, and there are a bunch of contacts that we did last week that we have to look for this week. That was a lot of what we did this week, on Friday we had an exchange with the elders in Bosa, and I went with Elder Gambini who is from Argentina. It went pretty well, although we didn't find all the people we were hoping to find. The Vargus family is still going strong, they are just amazing. They now have four attendances at church and are just preparing themselves to be baptized the 3rd of June. 

Saturday was a crazy day. We had to help with two moves, run to lunch, change and shower in the elders of Libertad 3's house because we didn’t have water, go to a baptism of the elders in Libertad 2, run back to the house of Libertad 3 to get a bed that we had to take somehow to another area, in Bosa. We waited for about an hour and a half for a taxi that could try and take the bed frame we had to transport, until we gave up and called the housing secretary who said that he would call a member who could another day take it to Bosa. So we took the bed frame home. That was a really short resume of Saturday. 

That was pretty much the week. This week Hugo Montoya is coming to the mission! He is in the Area Presidency for our area, and he on Thursday is going to have a meeting with the zone leaders and then Saturday talk with the whole zone, so I’m really excited for that! 

The mission, is awesome.

Love,

Elder Kendall

 

 

 

With the Lord, Only Going Up

Me and Elder Thompson!

Hi everyone!

Well, this week was pretty darn awesome! Just a whole lot of change, really good change. We talked about our goals for this month as a zone on Friday and the whole attitude of the zone has changed. They are so pumped to get the work going!! I felt so happy with that change. Everyone this last transfer were pretty un-focused and not wanting to do a whole lot. Now we have a quite a few new missionaries that are full of energy and we are going to do so much more stuff this month. We have already found half as many new investigators this week as we did in the whole last month. So we are starting to really do some good work as a zone. It is awesome.

In our own area, I just have to keep talking about the Vargus family. I really have never seen a more prepared and open and amazing family as this one in my whole mission. They are reading the Book of Mormon, praying, and they have attended church three weeks in a row now. They literally tell us each lesson how much they love the gospel and ask us questions about what they read. They also ask us stuff like "After we get baptized, do you guys keep coming to visit us?" To which we respond "Um YEAH! Of course we will!" Really, just pure awesomeness. 

We found a bunch of people this last week, and we just have good stuff going. Still lots of rejection from people, but we just keep going on and talking to people. My companion Elder Thompson is a super solid guy, and he helps me open my mouth and just keep going till the end of the day. It was a good week. 

This gospel is true. It simply is. I have never been so convinced of it in my life. There simply is nothing better. 

"Shall we not go on in such great a cause?" -Joseph Smith

Love,

Elder Kendall 

Transfers, and a Whole lot of 'em!

Hey everybody! 

Okay, so this week went especially fast, the time just slipped on by. Well, not a whole lot happened this week really, Elder Amato was pretty much just getting stuff ready to go home the whole week, and we didn't get to teach as much. 

But, there is still a really good thing about this week, and it is the Vargus family. They are really so very prepared by the Lord. They attended church for the second time this week, and they just loved it. This time the whole family went, and they all enjoyed it a bunch. We had to move their baptismal date to the third of June because the 27th of May is stake conference, but other than that until now there is nothing but time and more learning that is stopping them from being baptized. Carlos, the dad, has told us many times that he found the truth, and that he wants to feel and experience baptism so much. 

The daughter, Karen, told us she had a dream one night, where she couldn't sleep or do anything because she wanted to know the truth. She was praying a ton, and reading the Bible and the Book of Mormon. Then she dreamed that she saw some ancient scrolls like the ones the Old Testament was written on, and that while she was reading she heard someone tell her that it was the truth, that this was the correct path. Amazing!! They are so excited, and I’m just humbled to know that God has placed them in our hands to simply help them along. 

Also Transfers! So, Elder Amato left, and so did half of the missionaries in the zone! 9 of the 18 missionaries got transferred, and the zone is so new now. I’m super pumped to see how things are going to go, we are going to have a whole lot more missionaries now that are a lot more excited about the work. I have good feelings about this transfer, I know that we are going to be able to do great things. My new companion is Elder Thompson, he is from Moroni Utah, and is a great guy. It is going to be a great time. Also, there are now sister missionaries in Casablanca!!!! They kicked the Elders out and put sisters in! That is a huge change! It will be interesting to see. 

That was this week. I love the mission, gotta take advantage of every day that is left. Because time goes too fast. 

Love,

Elder Kendall