Blessings from O/L/A

Alrighty, how are people? Good? I hope it's good!!!

So, this week went by crazy fast, I don't know where all the time goes. Our week was pretty good, we have some really good progressing people.

 

So we have been working a ton with O/L/A, or Orar, Leer, y Asistir. In english P/R/A, pray, read, and attend. These three things are the key for our investigators to get an answer, grow in faith and to be ready to be baptized. So we have been focusing on that a lot and it has been working.

 

Today for p-day we got our haircut from the Haircut place that our convert Zulma Sanchez works at. After that we went home and didn't do much else, the time goes by even faster on p-day.

 

It was a pretty good week, we had a lot of lessons, and a pretty sweet experience with our investigator Carol Enciso on Sunday. She came to church on Sunday and brought her son!! She is the one that should be baptized this week, we are working really hard to pull it off. The biggest thing we are working on is that she has a little bit of a problem with smoking. However, she has already almost completely given it up and today we have an appointment to make sure she is doing good with that and that she has stopped smoking completely to be ready this week before her baptism!! On Sunday we had a really powerful lesson with her, where she was able to tell us how she felt about her baptism coming up. She has a big fear of the commitment of baptism. She is afraid that she will get baptized and make this commitment with God and then that she will be forgotten and left behind. We were able to talk to her and help her through it, especially because we had the help of two members backing us up and letting her know that she will not be left alone. It was key to have the members there to support and help her, and this week we are going to be doing everything possible to help her make this step. She is fantastic!!!

 

Sundays are just good days, we were able to have four investigators at church and almost all of them are progressing toward a baptism date. Good things are coming ahead!!!!

 

Still struggling on finding new investigators but this week we are going to try everything possible to change that.

 

I heard that Presidente Baquerizo said yes to the skyping with Janica!!!!!! He is the best President ever, so darny darn excited!!!!!!!!!

 

I love you guys, like a whole lot

 

Elder Kendall

 

PHOTO! Of Mashed Potatoes!!!!!!

 

Teaching with Luis Bohorques is the best!

Transfers!!!!!!!!!!! Are you ready........... Building up the suspense.......

Here we go................. Transfers.............

 

I'm staying here in Girardot with Elder Melendez!! Haha, pretty unclimatic actually, usually they take forever to tell us the changes but this time they called at like 9:15 and told us we both stay! But it's good, because we got lots of good people we've got to baptize. 

 

This week was about 100 times better than previously, we had lots of lessons and lots of powerful moments!!! We truly gave our all and worked a whole lot, and it payed off. That Sunday at the beginning of the week, I did a fast so that we could have a better week and finally find some new people to teach. Then on Monday we went out planning to contact the whole world, talking to every person we saw. Some of the first people we talked to was a family of 10 people that a lot of them used to attend church in Bogota and were taught by the missionaries but moved here to Girardot and lost contact. So this week we will meet with them to teach them, they are really cool! We have to teach them in the chapel, but that will be a lot better anyways.

 

Wednesday we had to do my first divisions in my mission. We had two appointments at 6:00pm so I was in the church with our ward mission leader to teach our investigator Larry and my companion went with two other members to visit Carol who has her baptism date set for the 30th of April. It was pretty crazy, but it worked out. 

 

Sunday was amazing!!!! At least the church part. We had a multi-stake conference with Colombia, Ecuador, and Venezuela, and Robert D. Hales and Dallin H. Oaks were the two apostles that presided over the conference. Dallin H. Oaks spoke part of his talk in Spanish, and it was flippin awesome!!! He had a strong accent, but it was super cool to hear. 

 

We were able to have 3 people in the chapel this Sunday. Carol, Norbey, and Jorge, and it was fantastic. All of them have dates for May and they are really progressing for that day!!!

 

Other than that not much, pretty good week, and oh yeah......

 

MY SISTER GOT PROPOSED TO!!!!!! LIKE WHAT!?!?!?! 

 

Super super happy for ya sis

 

That's it for this week, 

 

All my Love,

 

Elder Kendall

 

(Elder Kendall... who is Luis Bohorques??)

 

Ohhhhh haha, I can't believe I forgot to talk about him!!! Luis Bohorques is flippin amazing. He is the only member of his family and he was a missionary in Ecuador, but he is only just a little bit special, so he couldn't finish his work. But he makes up for it for accompanying the missionaries like every day of his life. He is a stud.

We are going to contact the whole world this week

Hey fambly and all! 

 

This week not a whole lot happened to be honest. Wasn't the best week for teaching for us. Lots of appointments falling and all that kinda stuff, but we are making it.

 

Monday was pretty good, one of the highlights was that we had a lesson with Angela the mom of a family and Norbey her adopted son, they are really good people. We finally put a baptism date with them and they accepted for the 7th of May! Which is exciting!!!

 

We were able to meet with some new less-actives in our area which was pretty sweet, hopefully we can teach them and they can show us to their non-member friends!! We have been trying to do some finding through service here as well but the people never accept our help. They just tell us to pray for them, which is still good and we are always willing to help that way!!! 

 

Our branch actually has 8 missionaries all working in it because in the city of Girardot it's the only branch. We are working with the members but we only have 2 families that are active in our area, and we have plans to meet with some of their friends this week. 

 

Sunday nobody showed up to church, we went to go pick them up and bring them before sacrament meeting started but everyone was asleep or not at home. 

 

We are focusing on finding, because we really need new investigators, so we are going to contact the whole world this week, its going to be pretty fun actually. When you get into the groove of just talking to everyone that you see it gets to be pretty fun because you meet so many cool people. 

 

The rest of Sunday our district leader was sick, so I stayed in the house with him while my companion went with his companion to work in their area. 

 

We are really hoping to find new people and we are going to do everything possible to meet new people. 

 

The scriptures are a huge help, and recently I was able to read one of my favorite chapters in the Book of Mormon. Alma 26, it is amazing.

 

I cant wait to hear where Scott´s going to go!!!! 

 

All my Love for ya´ll

 

Elder Kendall

General Conference Pure Amazingness

Hey Ya´ll! How´s it going??

 

So mom, first off the moment I heard Thomas S. Monson talk about Alice in Wonderland I started going a little crazy inside from excitedness because I knew that you would be doing the same thing over there at home. Thomas S. Monson is called by God to be his Prophet. I know it.

 

All of Conference was perfect, just what I needed. Nearly started crying when Come Thou Fount was sung, darny darn that was good memories of stuff, it was pure goodness.

 

I was able to watch it in English which was wonderful, I loved every second of it.

 

This week was a little bit of a struggle bus teaching wise, we have been having a really hard time here in this transfer. We are doing a lot of contacting but we don't have very many investigators. However, we have seen some progress, and this week we have made a lot of plans to change that. And this week we will change it.

 

Whenever we offer to do service for people here, the only service they accept is for us to pray for them. So we are trying to find some sort of project we can do and always looking for unplanned activities but here people aren't as trusting.

 

This transfer is extra long, it is for 8 weeks, so here in two weeks we`ll be getting our transfer calls. I think Elder Melendez and I will be staying here together for another transfer.

 

Not a whole lot to update this week, but we can summarize by saying that General Conference was definitely the highlight of the whole entire week. 

Lotta love!!!

Elder Kendall

 

Me and my companion Elder Melendez (who is from Lima, Peru... home of the newly announced temple!!)

 

Semana Santa and Zulma's Baptism

Hello

 

So this week was filled with a whole lot of good moments and hard days, but Saturday and Sunday where pretty darn amazing.

 

During the week not a whole lot happened, we are really having a hard time finding investigators right now, we have done a whole lot of contacting and met a lot of interesting people.

 

Wednesday we had a conference with the zone in Ibague and Presidente Baquerizo, it was pretty powerful we learned a lot about setting goals and how our studies should help us out. And I got to see my companion from the CCM Elder Marsh!!! He is doing really good, having a lot of fun. He is a good Missionary.

 

The other days we didn't have all that much, a lot of contacting, a lot of rejection. But that's part of the work.

 

Saturday we had the baptism of Zulma!!!!!!!!!!!! She was really prepared by the Lord, and has an amazing testimony! The day was pretty crazy, inviting everybody we could to the service and getting it all ready. But the ordinance when really smoothly and my companion did a great job! She was really happy afterwards, there was a spirit of joy that doesn't come from anything else. Also we had a appointment with Leonardo Luna who baptized Christopher, and as we were getting stuff ready he asked me about how the mission papers worked. We told him about it and he shared with us that he wants to go on a mission! He is going to talk with the branch president to get them started.

 

Sunday..... It was a good one!! So I got to confirm Zulma as a member of the church, and that was a pretty exciting moment. I was pretty darn nervous, so my Spanish wasn't perfect but I felt like it went well. What a wonderful opportunity I have been given here as a missionary!!!

 

On Thursday the branch was able to go to the temple in Bogota and a lot of the youth got to go for the first time. Leonardo was also one of those, so he got the chance to go and do baptisms. He was invited Sunday to share his testimony about his experience. Now Leo is a really quiet, shy kinda guy, and I've never really heard him bear his testimony. Then he got to the pulpit and started to talk.... and that's when he just put his head down and started bawling. He felt the spirit big time, and gave one of the simplest and most heartfelt testimonies I've ever heard. There has been a wonderful change taken place in him, he's doing really well.

Semana Santa was kinda crazy, Colombia also played against Bolivia and so there was pretty much no one home this week.

 

I am really excited for conference, we should get to watch it in the Chapel.

 

Easter, I kinda forgot that happened XD That doesn't exist here really so we just got the normal rice and beans.

 

One guy we contacted talked a whole lot about how he had met with missionaries before and stuff like that, but then he started to tell us how "No offense, I respect all religions, but your beliefs are horrible!" And stuff like that. Always interesting to see the opposition there is in the world to the truth.

 

Looking forward to finding new people to teach!!!!!

 

 

Love for everyone!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

 

Elder Kendall

Oh yeah Alma 26 and D&C 18:11-16!!!!!!!!!!!!

 

Zulma's baptism

Elder Melendez

Elder Marsh from CCM

 

Workin hard=Blessings Received

Hello Family and Friends!!

 

So.... Ian is a rugby BEAST!!! Just wanted to get that out there.

 

This week we have been seeing some good things coming, although this coming week is "Semana Santa" (Holy Week) and that is going to be interesting.

 

The best part about the week is our investigator Zulma Sanchez. She is doing amazing. Each time we meet with her she has read a TON in the Book of Mormon. In between one of our appointments she was just starting 2nd Nephi, and then like 4 days later when we met with her again she had already gotten into Mosiah!!! We had an appointment this week and during it we talked about how we had planned her baptism date for the 2nd of April, but we forgot it was conference weekend(don't ask me how we forgot that) and so we were going to move it to the 9th. She was pretty sad we were going to have to move it back, and she asked us if there was anything we can do to move it a week early to the 26th of March instead. We weren't sure, but we called President to find out. We told him about how well she is doing, how she has told us repeatedly that she knows the church is true, and he said that she can do it!!!! So, this Saturday she is going to get baptized!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

 

It is a huge testimony of how the gospel blesses peoples lives and how there are people prepared for us. 

 

Also, we have another investigator that we contacted knocking on doors. Her name is Carol Ensisa, and she is really good too. She grew up learning a ton of the Bible from her father, and has been enjoying the lessons of the gospel we have taught. She told us she wanted to go to church and she if she liked it, because she was searching for a church to go to. She told us that if she liked what she saw at church and felt something, she was willing to be baptized. So this Sunday we went to go get her to bring her to church. We got into the chapel and she sat down near the front. Then our Ward mission leader took her and sat her down in between two ladies in the chapel, and we were sitting in the bench next to hers. I've never been so nervous during a sacrament meeting in my life!!!! The whole time I was praying so hard that she would feel the spirit and like church. The talks were good, and we were feeling good, but not sure how she was feeling. Then in the Gospel Principles class, we were divided into groups to learn about the life of Christ. Then all the groups shared what they learned, and Carol got up and shared a part about what they talked about in her group!! Her first time in church and she was already sharing stuff!! 

 

After it all, we talked to her and asked her she felt at church....... and she said she loved it!!!!!!!!!!!!!
She felt really good and liked it a lot, she has a baptism date for the 16th of April, and I really think she will be ready before then for baptism.

 

So yeah, those are my both big experiences this week, both on Sunday. Other than that we are working a whole lot on finding, and getting new investigators.

 

THE GOSPEL IS TRUE!!!!! I love this work!!!! If we do all we can to work hard, we can recieve blessings. 

 

Love, 

Elder Kendall

HELLO MOM!!! AND FAMILY!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Hey hey hey! This exchange is going fast, like all the time here in Colombia. 

(I think all the rice has something to do with it.)

 

We`re still looking for new people to teach, a lot of the investigators or less active families that we had when Elder Justiniano was here have stopped wanting to meet with us, because I guess they were used to my old companion and have lost interest. So, we are trying really hard to find some other people. But, we are doing it and working hard to get people to church.

 

Zulma is doing good, she has been struggling her sister is in the hospital and is not doing very well, so she is very worried. She wasn't going to go to church Sunday to visit her sister but her aunt (who is a member) helped her know that if she made the sacrifice to go to church she would be blessed. and she came!!!! 

 

The rule to speak English is there so that our Latino companions can learn English, because it's a big focus for them here in the mission. 

 

Easter here is for a whole week and its called "Semana Santa," and it is going to be a party. People take the whole week off and do stuff with their families, so it should be a good time. But I don't think it'll be like it is at home. I'm pretty sure we will have a conference with another zone in Ibague, but I'm not sure when it'll be. It should be pretty cool.

 

I LOVE that the reception is going to be in Cubbys backyard, I miss that place, and those people!!!!!!!!!!!!!

 

This morning in my personal study I read Alma chapter 5, and it is OUTSTANDING!!!! It really puts down sin and give testimony of how we can know if these things are true. It is powerful for real.

 

So things are going here, nothing crazy for food this week, I found some Trix cereal which is magical.

 

LOVE YOU!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Elder Kendall