Episode 31: Working Crazy Hard!

Hey everybody,

Things are going really great here. We have been working crazy hard with our investigators and have had a lot of success. We had 5 that attended church and the ward helped us out a lot with fellow-shipping them so they really enjoyed it. Unfortunately we still do not have any baptisms for these next few weeks but we are starting to have more investigators in church so we are excited for that.

We really haven't done anything special here for Easter. Here for Easter everyone makes sweets from different fruits and those are super good but no one celebrates with the Easter Bunny or anything like that. But it was still cool to see everybody a little bit more focused in Christ, although a lot of people used "Holy Week" as a chance to drink and party, which was sad to see.

We have been getting a lot of references from the members about who to teach. They have been super helpful because those investigators already have support from their friends and neighbors. One family, the Moreno family (family of Rafael) have been super helpful and it's great because they are all recent converts as of a year or so. So they have been able to help us with new people to teach.

For my health, right now I feel really good. My companion has a few problems but I feel great and am working hard to stay that way. 

I still have no idea what is going to happen with transfers. I feel like I'm going to leave but it's also possible that I might stay. Whatever happens is going to be super great though.

I hope everything is going well at home. Forest and Felicity look great and I can't wait to see everybody in a few months.

Elder Parker

Episode 30: Progress with Less Actives!

Hey everybody,

This week has been really good. We have been able to make a lot of progress with our less active members and many are returning to the church. It is so satisfying to be able to help the members make this change in their lives. 

These past few weeks we have been having a lot of difficulties with investigators so we haven't been teaching as many lessons with them, but this week we made goals to focus even more on the investigators so we can have more people joining the church because right now we have very few perspective baptisms. We have a lot of great members here helping us out too so things are going very good.

Haha things won't be that bad for Kaleb in the MTC because everyone speaks English but he might struggle a little in the field. But then again, he will still be in the United States so there should be someone, if not his companion, who speaks English. 

We have transfers next week and I am pretty sure that I will be leaving Valledupar. I'm a little sad to go but I can still hardly believe that it has already been 4 transfers. I have had so many great memories here and can't wait to meet new people and have new experiences. My companion has been helping me a ton to improve and to prepare to be a leader so that's been really helpful.

I hope everyone is doing well at home and can't wait to see you guys in a few months at Mother's Day.

Elder Parker

Episode 29: Rafael got baptized!

Hey everybody,

Things are going great here. Time is seriously flying by; it feels like I just wrote you guys yesterday. We are doing so much here and it's really awesome to see how much has changed since I got here 5 months ago. 

This week Rafael got baptized!! It was so great and he was so happy. And what's even better is that now the whole family are members of the church. They are all getting ready to go to the temple next month to do baptisms and a few are going to receive their endowments.

For the most part we are still really struggling with investigators attending church but we had a sister attend yesterday named Reyes and she really liked it and is excited to go next week. We also had 23 less active members attend so that was really cool too. 

Transfers end in 2 weeks, but I'm not sure if I will leave or not. I probably will but there have been missionaries who have stayed for almost a year in some areas. I would not be too mad if I left though, because everything is becoming a routine here but I am fine with whatever happens.

I can't believe it is already Easter. We got a letter from the mission president saying that we are going to receive the cards for the Easter video soon but I'm not sure if that will be before Easter if it is in 2 weeks. But thank you for the cards. I will try to print them today.

Um, that's about it. Nothing really exciting is going on. See you guys in a few months.

Elder Parker

Rafael's baptism

Episode 28: Welcome to the world Felicity!

Hey everybody,

It sounds like there are a lot of crazy things going on at home. I can't believe that Felicity finally came. It seems like I haven't been out long enough for it to already be time but congrats to Adam and Aubree. I can't wait to meet her at Mother's day.

I can't believe that dad got hurt. I still can't believe all of the injuries that have happened since I got here. This is all just so crazy. But I hope that he will feel better and be able to heal soon.

This week has been really good. We have been working a lot with less active members and have been having a lot of success, but we haven't been able to work as much with the investigators. We are going to try to balance our time a little bit better this week to be able to help more investigators attend church. Rafael is still getting ready for his baptism this Saturday and we are working with Edwin to be ready in a few weeks too.

I got the picture books!!! We got home one night and the man who lives in the apartment beneath ours gave me the package. The books are super helpful, thank you so much. I have been using one to teach in the lessons and we are trying to think of a few families that we can give them to.

Mom, I haven't heard about the Easter video but I will try to look for it soon.

Dad, I'm not quite sure how you sent the reference because I haven't seen anything in my email. If you could remind me of the information that you sent that would be super helpful. Thank you.

I hope everything is good at home. I can't believe it's already getting close to mothers day. Time is really going by so fast. I'll see you guys in no time.

Elder Parker