It seemed as though there were a few question´s soo i´ll start by rockin those.
Did you get Mom’s package? Does FedEx deliver to Bucaramanga?
Yeah! Got the package. It was awesome. We all dined to tasty carmel corn and starburst. I think Mom won the heart of Ortwin (our investigator that is Josh´s age who is getting baptised this Thursday) with the popcorn. Thanks so for sending a Little bit of the mother land to me. I got it Tuesday, they either send it to the house of the leaders of the zone (who are going to be in my house for the next transfer) or the leaders of the zone pick it up when they go to bogota for zone leader conference. Elder Andrews mom sent his package to his house here in Bucaramanga and he had to pay like 30 dollars extra to pick it. By the way, if I'm serving in Bogota you can send it directly to my house and it wont cost anything extra.
Do Columbians like to barter as much as the Mexicans?
Yeah they love to barter. It´s che-che (fake things) central here in Bucaramanga. I love it. They actually make pretty quality shoes and belts here for next to nothing. I once talked a guy down from 40.000 to 15.000 for a sombrero. Btw i bought a pretty sweet watch this week for $3.50. I would love to send a package back home but im pretty sure its up words of 50 bucks to send from here in the buca. But i´ll check it out. When is transfer week? Does it look like you will be in Bucaramanga for Christmas?
This is the last week of the change E. Reynoso is living on this coming Wednesday, so i´ll have a new companion here in central. Pretty close to positive I´m staying here in central for this change, but have no idea for the the change after, which is right before christmas.
Any requests for what to include in your Christmas package?
A pepper shaker (with pepper ), their pepper is ghetto here If it is posible to send a can of dr. Pepper I would feel home for Christmas. I didn´t think I would miss peanut but but I do. I forgot how much I ate it at school when I was poor – like I am now. Its probably heavy though.--- I believe josh groban has a good christmas álbum which includes some mo tab. – he speaks to me (really if you could send it through the internet sooner that would rock.)
So let me start by telling the story of a wonderful girl of 20 years of age named Andreli. So we met Andreli through our english clases. A member of the Ward brought her along. We had our first lesson with her family which included Garufa (or Mr. T, whom I mentioned in an earlier email) which was boarder line contentions with his very strong beliefs intermingled with what the Jehovah Witnesses had told him. We invited her to church the coming Sunday, which she attended. We countined to teach her. In all her timidness she never really told us of her interest in the Gospel. But she made up for it which so many others lack, in her actions. She took a taxi form her house to the chapel or a house of a member so we could teach her everytime. She accepted the invitation to be baptized and she prepared for it. She had problems with the commandments. We taught her that they were going to bless her life, if she followed them. Everything was going good until she didn´t come to church two Sundays ago. We countined to call for the following 5 days and we never got through and she never returned our calls. Finally we had a lesson this past Friday with her, we talked about her baptism that was scheduled for Saturday. She expressed how she felt unqualified for baptism, then we taught her what these qualifications truely are, she excepted and 20 minutes later at 7 in the night we had the baptismal interview, and that Saturday afternoon she was baptized.
I´m not going to lie, with not hearing from her for 5 days before her baptism I was lacking a Little bit of faith for the date that we had scheduled. But I learned, and confirmed what I had been taught is that our plans and dates that we make with sincere prayer, in reality are not our plans, but are made with divine help from Him that knows all. I learned that if we work with all our energy to reach our goals, because we have faith that our prayers will be answered. Like I learned growing up playing sports. You play until the whistle blows. Like preach my góspel teaches that we do all we can to reach our goals with respecting the agency of others. Andreli is now a confirmed member of the Church of Jesus Christ, and i have faith that this very smart girl will be a blessing to barrio central.
Soo Today we went to a garden bitanical today with the brother of Ortwin that we met this past week. Pretty sweet. Bucaramanga is known in south america as `ciudad bonita` (beautiful city) because of there many many parks.
The baptism of Ortwin is planed for this coming Thursday. I love seeing the rapid change in the people we have the opportunity to teach as they accept and keep commitments to repent and come unto Christ and their willingness to take his name upon him for ever. They are all examples to me.
I kind of just kept writing today. Sorry for my very long letter.
Thanks so much for everything and I love you all so much,
Elder Adams
Monday, October 26, 2009
Monday, October 19, 2009
Loving the Latins
OOsh. Another semana rapidismo.
So we had our Ward conference this week. It was a big deal because the branch in the north bogota, which was being ran by our bishopric for like 40 years. It became an actual branch with the calling of a new branch president. Pretty rockin. So for the past two weeks we´ve been inviting all the members and inactive because we had a goal to have 200 of the 207 members there. We actually had 207 because of investigators being there as well. So the bishop is buying us pizza this week. What´s up!
Part of the conference week was a culture session where various groups, like the primary, young women, etc, danced some rockin native Colombian dances. It was the best. Loved it. I don´t think very many people have more fun than Colombians. They´re outrageous. I think we could use some more quality entire-ward fun more up in the states. Maybe i´ll bring some in a bag. They seem to make it work with loud Colombian music and empañadas and soda, so maybe that is a possibility.
So due to the fact that we aren´t going to be receiving missionaries here in Bogota North for a while, they´re sacking 11 areas this change. Bit scary. Hope and pray its not mine. It would kill me to just peace out and leave my investigators to no one. Its very possible due to the fact that I'm new and Reynoso is leaving. But i know Who´s hands this mission is in, and have more confidence in Him than anyone in the world.
So we found this pretty rockin neighborhood this past week. Last Sunday we went out knocking doors , and we were completely stumbled on where we should contact, and did the best thing we can do when we lack wisdom, Pray. Trying our best to follow the spirit, after 30 minutes a nice mother of 3 let us in. Then I tried to test my luck yesterday (more like faith) and go there again. And with out fail, 30 minutes and the doors opened and we taught my new friend Diego and his mom. So it was my first lesson with a new investigator without Elder Reynoso so it was very different. Was a bit hard cause Diego is a firecracker and was spitting off questions. But some who, like things do when you trust in the Lord, it worked out. Both of these new friends we have follow up lessons with. OH how important it is to pray. Always. Never should we think its `not necessary to pray.
One of our investigators, Ortwin, he´s 13 and lives in our complex, was in a crazy car accident this week. He was with his mom and step dad and they were driving through a canyon and suddenly the steering wheel stopped working. And the car lost control, hit a boulder and flipped over onto the roof. He was in the back, and like always in Colombia, without a seatbelt. But with divine help, everyone came out with only a couple scratches. I´ve learned to never look at things as coincidence here in the mission. We then had the opportunity to make lunch for them, and I think the accident softened the heart of Ortwin´s mom enough to come to Church with us this weekend. Great family, and so grateful they were all alright.
Love beautiful Bucaramanga, Colombia so much. Hope you guys are all good!
Con muchismo amor,
Elder Adams
So we had our Ward conference this week. It was a big deal because the branch in the north bogota, which was being ran by our bishopric for like 40 years. It became an actual branch with the calling of a new branch president. Pretty rockin. So for the past two weeks we´ve been inviting all the members and inactive because we had a goal to have 200 of the 207 members there. We actually had 207 because of investigators being there as well. So the bishop is buying us pizza this week. What´s up!
Part of the conference week was a culture session where various groups, like the primary, young women, etc, danced some rockin native Colombian dances. It was the best. Loved it. I don´t think very many people have more fun than Colombians. They´re outrageous. I think we could use some more quality entire-ward fun more up in the states. Maybe i´ll bring some in a bag. They seem to make it work with loud Colombian music and empañadas and soda, so maybe that is a possibility.
So due to the fact that we aren´t going to be receiving missionaries here in Bogota North for a while, they´re sacking 11 areas this change. Bit scary. Hope and pray its not mine. It would kill me to just peace out and leave my investigators to no one. Its very possible due to the fact that I'm new and Reynoso is leaving. But i know Who´s hands this mission is in, and have more confidence in Him than anyone in the world.
So we found this pretty rockin neighborhood this past week. Last Sunday we went out knocking doors , and we were completely stumbled on where we should contact, and did the best thing we can do when we lack wisdom, Pray. Trying our best to follow the spirit, after 30 minutes a nice mother of 3 let us in. Then I tried to test my luck yesterday (more like faith) and go there again. And with out fail, 30 minutes and the doors opened and we taught my new friend Diego and his mom. So it was my first lesson with a new investigator without Elder Reynoso so it was very different. Was a bit hard cause Diego is a firecracker and was spitting off questions. But some who, like things do when you trust in the Lord, it worked out. Both of these new friends we have follow up lessons with. OH how important it is to pray. Always. Never should we think its `not necessary to pray.
One of our investigators, Ortwin, he´s 13 and lives in our complex, was in a crazy car accident this week. He was with his mom and step dad and they were driving through a canyon and suddenly the steering wheel stopped working. And the car lost control, hit a boulder and flipped over onto the roof. He was in the back, and like always in Colombia, without a seatbelt. But with divine help, everyone came out with only a couple scratches. I´ve learned to never look at things as coincidence here in the mission. We then had the opportunity to make lunch for them, and I think the accident softened the heart of Ortwin´s mom enough to come to Church with us this weekend. Great family, and so grateful they were all alright.
Love beautiful Bucaramanga, Colombia so much. Hope you guys are all good!
Con muchismo amor,
Elder Adams
Tuesday, October 13, 2009
And it clicks
Cambios
Cabins. Plays. Evenings with the Symphony. Classy. If you want you can make the journey to Bucaramanga and we can keep it classy by eating in chicken heart soup with the hot sun and biyanato music (the typical music of colombia, bassically mariachi music with accordian, it rocks.) Quieren? Its great!
Congrats to the abuelos for closing on the cabin. Im absoutley positive their soul intentions for buying it was to give me and my friends a place to crash before snowboarding. Thanks so much! Ha loved the comment by Grandpa about Utah.
So yeah. 4 months. 20 left. How nuts. With E. Reynoso finishing his misión its made me think a Little bit about what it will be like to leave, what things, great things I have yet to experience. And what I'll be like when im done. I feel like I have already changed so much. No worries. Just so excited for life, and the great things to come!
It's getting harder and harder to write coherently in English, or for that matter, to talk in English. I speak English for about a 20 minutes every week. Everything else is Spanish. Its been such a blessing to be immersed in Spanish, and not being able to talk in English with my companion. Honestly my highlight of the week was that my abilities with Spanish aren’t much of a concern anymore, it finally just started to click. Its just strengthens my testimony more to know that the Lord has heard my prayers for help with this language. Not saying I KNOW Spanish, for I have so so much to learn, but its just so great to know that I can finally really know and find the needs of these people. This past week we have been preparing for the coming ward conference, so we have been in divison with members with the ward throughout the week. Twas a little nervous do to the fact that I'm always with e. reynoso who has 7 months here, but it turned out great and was a great opportunity to start to step out of the footsteps of my father (your trainer is your [dad] here) and grow. Its crazy to think that im going to have to show my new companion around in three weeks.
On Saturday we had a lesson with the son of an inactive member we had invited to the ward conference. We were teaching about the restroation and why the gospel needed to be restored. He like many people in Colombia has a little knick nac store in the front of his house. And like most he sells minutes. Its actually pretty genis, they buy contracts for all the 4 cell phone service providers with free internetwork plans, and every network starts with a different area code, so when people need to use a phone, they just tell them the area code, and they give them the corresponding cell phone. Anyways, we had just taught and and quoted Joseph Smiths first vision, seconds later the person using the phone jumps on a motor cycle with the phone and speeds off. Resulting in him having to spend 20 minutes to fix the problem and ask around to see if anyone recognized the thief. Coming back discouraged, we finished the lesson with only a fragment of the Spirit that was there. Oh how satan fights to stop people from learning and receiving the blessings of the restored gospel of Jesus Christ. It has seemed to me, and Im probably not alone, that so often these distractions that present them selves are when we are quoting and explaining the first vision. Satan is going to do everything in his power to inhibit people to know that Joesph Smith received an answer about which church is true, and thus inhibiting these people to receive the fruits of this vision. I know that there aren’t coincidences in missionary work, so many little miracles everyday.
I love. Miss. And pray for you all. And may we all look for how much the hand of God in our lives.
Con mucho amor,
E. Adams
Cabins. Plays. Evenings with the Symphony. Classy. If you want you can make the journey to Bucaramanga and we can keep it classy by eating in chicken heart soup with the hot sun and biyanato music (the typical music of colombia, bassically mariachi music with accordian, it rocks.) Quieren? Its great!
Congrats to the abuelos for closing on the cabin. Im absoutley positive their soul intentions for buying it was to give me and my friends a place to crash before snowboarding. Thanks so much! Ha loved the comment by Grandpa about Utah.
So yeah. 4 months. 20 left. How nuts. With E. Reynoso finishing his misión its made me think a Little bit about what it will be like to leave, what things, great things I have yet to experience. And what I'll be like when im done. I feel like I have already changed so much. No worries. Just so excited for life, and the great things to come!
It's getting harder and harder to write coherently in English, or for that matter, to talk in English. I speak English for about a 20 minutes every week. Everything else is Spanish. Its been such a blessing to be immersed in Spanish, and not being able to talk in English with my companion. Honestly my highlight of the week was that my abilities with Spanish aren’t much of a concern anymore, it finally just started to click. Its just strengthens my testimony more to know that the Lord has heard my prayers for help with this language. Not saying I KNOW Spanish, for I have so so much to learn, but its just so great to know that I can finally really know and find the needs of these people. This past week we have been preparing for the coming ward conference, so we have been in divison with members with the ward throughout the week. Twas a little nervous do to the fact that I'm always with e. reynoso who has 7 months here, but it turned out great and was a great opportunity to start to step out of the footsteps of my father (your trainer is your [dad] here) and grow. Its crazy to think that im going to have to show my new companion around in three weeks.
On Saturday we had a lesson with the son of an inactive member we had invited to the ward conference. We were teaching about the restroation and why the gospel needed to be restored. He like many people in Colombia has a little knick nac store in the front of his house. And like most he sells minutes. Its actually pretty genis, they buy contracts for all the 4 cell phone service providers with free internetwork plans, and every network starts with a different area code, so when people need to use a phone, they just tell them the area code, and they give them the corresponding cell phone. Anyways, we had just taught and and quoted Joseph Smiths first vision, seconds later the person using the phone jumps on a motor cycle with the phone and speeds off. Resulting in him having to spend 20 minutes to fix the problem and ask around to see if anyone recognized the thief. Coming back discouraged, we finished the lesson with only a fragment of the Spirit that was there. Oh how satan fights to stop people from learning and receiving the blessings of the restored gospel of Jesus Christ. It has seemed to me, and Im probably not alone, that so often these distractions that present them selves are when we are quoting and explaining the first vision. Satan is going to do everything in his power to inhibit people to know that Joesph Smith received an answer about which church is true, and thus inhibiting these people to receive the fruits of this vision. I know that there aren’t coincidences in missionary work, so many little miracles everyday.
I love. Miss. And pray for you all. And may we all look for how much the hand of God in our lives.
Con mucho amor,
E. Adams
Wednesday, October 7, 2009
Post Conference letter
Conference was soooooo good! Oh how great is revelation from God for his people! Soo I watched two sessions in Spanish and 3 in English, wish I would have watched all of them in English but I didn´t know there was an
English room! Whoops! I could understand what were saying for the most part, but because I couldn´t understand everything, I missed a lot because I was concentrating on hearing what they were saying I couldn´t really apply it and learn from it, which is the most important part. But was have the liahona! So no worries! Just gives me incentive to continue to review the
talks and apply it for the next 6 months! I think this weekend had been my biggest shock on how fast time was going because I could remember the past conference and it felt like it was yesterday. In five days i´ll have been
serving for 4 months! Soo crazy, and sooo good! Dad you talked about how that guy you work with was an AP of his mission and how happy he says he was. And based on what his life seems like, he doesn´t sound happy. I don´t know him. But the first thing I thought was that he changed from always thinking and caring about others on his mission, that brought him soo much happiness, to always thinking and caring about himself. “If any man will come after me [He said], let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow me.
“For whosoever will save his life shall lose it: and whosoever will lose hislife for my sake shall find it” (Matthew 16:24–25)
Possibly what he wants is more important than what others want, or for that matter what God wants. Obedience brings us happiness, any other way we think we have happiness is just counterfeited and temporary. I loved Elder Oaks
talk on this. I don´t know who said it but ¨every problem in a marriage is from a lack of Christlike attributes¨.
Getting our investigators to conference was one of our main goals these past two weeks. We ended up with 6 which are all progressing.
Oh man. We found the perfect family this week, right before conference. There is a kid that hangs out in the court yard of our apartment complex, named carlos, we started talking to him last week and then we had a couple appointments fall through this week so we went up to visit him. Oh man. Chevere. On the way up the elevator we started talking with the lady that was in it, whom happened to be his mom, told her we were going to visit carlos, and she invited us
into her house. Soo nice. Both his parents were there for the lesson. We started talking and his dad told us about how they ´ don't have a church because there is so many and the doctrine is different in every church. So they have a Bible study night with there family once a week. We started to watch the Restoration movie, and the mother started smiling in the middle of
it and said ´I have had that question many times before, which church is true?´, sooo good. Then after the dad told us about how he had the same dream three nights in a row, and how he saw Christ and he looked very similar to what was pictured in the film, with long hair and glorified. Soo great.
We then went to Priesthood session with the Carlos the son, and as we were leaving we ran into his dad, that had just been drinking with his friends, told us how much he wants to change and stop drinking and how he feels so
weak. The next day he him and his wife came to Conference, and he said he was very impacted by it. Soo pumped to talk with them tomorrow. Soo ready. I think one of the happiest, at peace moments I have had on my mission was
as we were walking to priesthood with three of our investigators. So so happy to watch them sacrifice there time to come and hear the prophet speak. Yohonny said after that he knows Thomas S. Monson is a true prophet. And
Carlos (18) and Ortwin (he is 13 and lives in our complex too, he came to 3 sessions and by the end was taking notes, so much better than I was doing at 13!) said they would like to serve missions. What a great week.
Oh man! And I forget to mention. We had the baptism and marriage of Nancy! So happy for her! Oh goodness, great week. And many more to come! Loved when E. Burton ? talked about missionary work and how the field has never
been riper. Loved that. Oh how great it is to leave conference just wanting to be your Best self. I pray that we can all implement those words into our lives.
Sad to hear about the earthquake in the pacific! I heard about how 24
members passed away in Philippines. May our hearts and prayers be with them.
Love you all so much!
E. Adams
English room! Whoops! I could understand what were saying for the most part, but because I couldn´t understand everything, I missed a lot because I was concentrating on hearing what they were saying I couldn´t really apply it and learn from it, which is the most important part. But was have the liahona! So no worries! Just gives me incentive to continue to review the
talks and apply it for the next 6 months! I think this weekend had been my biggest shock on how fast time was going because I could remember the past conference and it felt like it was yesterday. In five days i´ll have been
serving for 4 months! Soo crazy, and sooo good! Dad you talked about how that guy you work with was an AP of his mission and how happy he says he was. And based on what his life seems like, he doesn´t sound happy. I don´t know him. But the first thing I thought was that he changed from always thinking and caring about others on his mission, that brought him soo much happiness, to always thinking and caring about himself. “If any man will come after me [He said], let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow me.
“For whosoever will save his life shall lose it: and whosoever will lose hislife for my sake shall find it” (Matthew 16:24–25)
Possibly what he wants is more important than what others want, or for that matter what God wants. Obedience brings us happiness, any other way we think we have happiness is just counterfeited and temporary. I loved Elder Oaks
talk on this. I don´t know who said it but ¨every problem in a marriage is from a lack of Christlike attributes¨.
Getting our investigators to conference was one of our main goals these past two weeks. We ended up with 6 which are all progressing.
Oh man. We found the perfect family this week, right before conference. There is a kid that hangs out in the court yard of our apartment complex, named carlos, we started talking to him last week and then we had a couple appointments fall through this week so we went up to visit him. Oh man. Chevere. On the way up the elevator we started talking with the lady that was in it, whom happened to be his mom, told her we were going to visit carlos, and she invited us
into her house. Soo nice. Both his parents were there for the lesson. We started talking and his dad told us about how they ´ don't have a church because there is so many and the doctrine is different in every church. So they have a Bible study night with there family once a week. We started to watch the Restoration movie, and the mother started smiling in the middle of
it and said ´I have had that question many times before, which church is true?´, sooo good. Then after the dad told us about how he had the same dream three nights in a row, and how he saw Christ and he looked very similar to what was pictured in the film, with long hair and glorified. Soo great.
We then went to Priesthood session with the Carlos the son, and as we were leaving we ran into his dad, that had just been drinking with his friends, told us how much he wants to change and stop drinking and how he feels so
weak. The next day he him and his wife came to Conference, and he said he was very impacted by it. Soo pumped to talk with them tomorrow. Soo ready. I think one of the happiest, at peace moments I have had on my mission was
as we were walking to priesthood with three of our investigators. So so happy to watch them sacrifice there time to come and hear the prophet speak. Yohonny said after that he knows Thomas S. Monson is a true prophet. And
Carlos (18) and Ortwin (he is 13 and lives in our complex too, he came to 3 sessions and by the end was taking notes, so much better than I was doing at 13!) said they would like to serve missions. What a great week.
Oh man! And I forget to mention. We had the baptism and marriage of Nancy! So happy for her! Oh goodness, great week. And many more to come! Loved when E. Burton ? talked about missionary work and how the field has never
been riper. Loved that. Oh how great it is to leave conference just wanting to be your Best self. I pray that we can all implement those words into our lives.
Sad to hear about the earthquake in the pacific! I heard about how 24
members passed away in Philippines. May our hearts and prayers be with them.
Love you all so much!
E. Adams
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
