Week 42 - And another one gone, and another one gone...

Well,

I love you all sooooo muuuuuuuucccccccchhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh hhhh h        h h h.

Things are good here. This week was really good. The coolest things were the following

Elder Morgan and Smalley

We did this sweet activity where we went to the Swap Meet and had a little stand and contacted people for like 2 and a half hours. We handed out over 100 pamphlets and took down like 15 people´s addresses. It was a success and lots of fun!

Then, one of our converts threw us a Carne Asada which is basically like a BBQ party thing. It was cool.

Then we had the zone conference!!! It was so good, and I got my package finally!!! Thanks so much for the stuff and especially for the photos! I also got a great package from Auntie Annie that had a bunch of great goodies in it! Thanks Auntie Annie! The funniest part of the zone conference was that I had been feeling for like 2 days before that they were going to call on me to recite Doctrine and Covenants 4. I've done it in the past and it didn't go very well because I didn't have it memorized and I still don't!! haha. But, I put those feelings off and went into the conference. Sure enough, I was called to do it and I just lip synced my way through it as everyone recited it along with me. Every one was laughing at me. It made me humble though! Whoo! I´m going to study it!

We also had stake conference this week. It was really good. They called a new Stake president here so a few 70´s came and spoke with us. It was really good.

Then the most exciting part. We knew transfers were coming up so Elder Smalley started getting ready to leave because he has more time in this ward than I do. So he was like saying goodbye to everyone and everything. Then on Saturday night they called us. Big shocker! Elder Smalley stayed and was called as District Leader and is training a new elder!!! Whoo!!!! But wait.... what about Elder Morgan.....  I got transferred to Ensenada as a Zone Leader! Ensenada!!! That's super cool. I´m so excited. My companion is Elder Mejia. He's from Peru. Actually from the same part that Mark Lahtinen served in! He's super great and I'm so excited to work with him! He only has 4 months left in his mission!

Elder Morgan and Mejia

Elder Mejia

Anyways, so I got to the bus station at 7:30 today and took the 2 hour bus ride down to Ensenada. It was the nicest charter bus I've ever seen, but it was so jiggly in the bus that the Elder that I was sitting next to threw up half way through. So I got to sit there and smell barf for an hour. But then I got here!! It's so nice. The weather is great too, not too hot and not too cold. I also saw the ocean!!!! Whoo!! Then Elder Mejia told me that the dad of one of his old companions was coming down to Tijuana. It's the dad of Elder Cerdhe. He's from my same generation. Both his mom and his dad went to this mission too! Anyways, they came and took us to go eat. So we ate at this great Brazilian buffet and stuffed ourselves full of meat!!!! (It would be a good idea to find them on Facebook or something and thank them.)

Anyways, that's what's new in my life. I don't know anything about being a Zone Leader, but I'm going  to give it my all and do the best I can.

I know that this church is true.

I love you all so much!!!!! Have a great day and stay on that straight and narrow!


Elder Morgan 

Outside Elder Morgan and Smalley's apartment

Elder Morgan and his Ward Mission Leader

Elders Morgan, Smalley, and Juan family

Elder Morgan and Hernandez

Elder Morgan being Derek!!

Elder Morgan and Erickson

Perez Family

Perez Family

Elder Morgan, Elder Smalley, and Frida

Elder Morgan, Elder Smalley, and Frida

 

Week 41 - Where does the time go?

Hello friends and family! I love you all soooooooo muuuuuuuuuch.

They say that time flies when you're having fun, so I must be having a blast because time here is like fast forwarded 10x.

This week was good. 

Sister Missionaries with Juan's wife and daughter

Our district is doing really well. This week I had to do a total of 8 baptismal interviews and 6 of them were in one day! Needless to say I'm a little wiped, but it's really good. I love interviewing these people and see that they are truly repentant and wanting to follow the path that our Savior Jesus Christ set for us! I love the special time to sit and talk with them and feel the Spirit testify that they are ready. I've learned a lot about how to feel this special gift that we've been given. 

We've had many opportunities this week to give service. The other night we got a call at 1:30 in the morning. Obviously we didn't answer, but in the morning they called again needing our help. It was a less active lady who's been living with her rather aggressive father trying to help him out. Well, they had a fight or something and ended up calling the cops. Basically she needed us to move all the furniture out of her house so she could go move. So, early in the morning we spent a few hours moving furniture! haha. It was pretty crazy, but it's also good to help out.

Then, this week one of our investigators broke down crying in the lesson we had with her and explained that she was being kicked out of her house. She's a woman of like 50 years and has her 25 year old son living with her too. It was really hard to see her so distraught. Well, we offered her all that we could. We told her of places for rent that we've seen and offered our help with the move when it comes around. We've been praying a lot that she can find a place to live. She's super cool!!!

Juan's wife got baptized this week! It was so cool. She was an investigator of the Sisters (long story short, they were teaching her and we were teaching him) All in all it was great and I was honored and blessed to be the one to baptize her! That family is so cool and we're working with their kids right now to help them as well. The whole family went to church yesterday! Juan got the Aaronic Priesthood and will get the Melchizedek next week, His wife got confirmed, and the kiddos stayed all 3 hours and went to their classes! It's so great to see the whole family progressing! 

Juan's wife's baptism

Juan's family and the Sister Missionaries and Elders

But probably the most unique story of this week had to do with a less active that we went and visited. We went and got to know her last week, but she told us to come back another day so that we could meet with her husband too. He's not a member so we were excited to help out the family. Well, we came back and everything was good, she invited us in, gave us some water, we started to chat and she told us her husband was from the US. Born in LA. I thought, oh that's cool we'll be able to speak to him in English a little bit. Then, all of the sudden her husband who's all tattooed up came downstairs and started to swear at us in English. Basically he spent the next 40 minutes cursing and "Preaching" to us about how there's no God, that is doesn't matter what you do, that he had spent 10 years in jail and that it doesn't matter. He also said some really blasphemous stuff that I will never ever repeat. We just sat there as he blocked us and the door. He was really confused and probably drunk. He kept telling us how he respected us a lot, but he didn't really show us. I haven't heard that many swear words in all my life. There were probably at least 600 curses that he used. About 1 every third word. It was the most filthy language I have ever heard. Well, eventually we got up and left and he gave a rousing goodbye using more curses. I can't

even really explain what went on. I never once felt scared, he didn't want to hurt us. He's just a confused man. The whole time I was just praying for him and thinking about how bad I felt for him and the confusion in his life.

Juan's Family

I testify that God DOES EXIST. That he sent His Son, Jesus Christ, to pay for the sins of the world. I know that through the atonement we can be made clean. I know that God loves us. If any of you who are reading this doubts for one second what I testify to be true, I invite you to drop onto your knees and pray to your Heavenly Father. Ask Him if it's true. Don't just believe some 20 year old snot nose kid. Ask Him for yourselves. 

I love you all and I love this mission.

I hope that everyone has a great week!

Love,

Elder Morgan 

Week 40 - This week.....Wow

Hey there family!!!!

I love you all so much!!!!!

This week was super weird. We were so busy, but then at the same time we did like nothing. 

To start off with, this week we spent a whole bunch of time planning this Ward Open House that we did on Saturday. We went out with the youth for a few hours and passed out like 400 invitations and we were inviting everyone that we talked to this week. It was so great. The day of the actual activity came and everyone from the ward had done a great job. Basically we set it up so that all the organizations had a room in the church and had to give a 5 minute schpeel on what they do in that organization.  Well, everybody did a great job. So, then it came time to start and NOBODY CAME. Not a single investigator nor non member showed up. We were pretty bummed, but the good thing was that the ward all pulled together and saw that we are trying to work. I even tried to get people that walked by to come in by standing outside holding a sign that said, "Free passports" haha. I didn't really do that. We would have had a way bigger turnout though. 

So anyways, that really hurt our week because we had been planning that activity and everything. Oh well.

Our zone here is doing really good right now. Our zone is known as like the worst zone of the mission basically, but it's really turned around. When I got here, the whole zone only baptized 1 person in that month. The record here is 19 baptisms in one month, really really low! However, we've been working really hard and focusing on the people, not the numbers. As a result of that we should end up with like 25 or something this month. A huge improvement. 

Juan baptism

Juan baptism

Anyways, there's not much else to tell. This week we tried to get permission to go over to the San Diego temple because Frida, our recent convert was going, but I guess the missionaries here can't go to the temple anymore. which is a bummer!  Oh well. She went and had a great time!!!

I know that this church is true. I know that because God has told me. I know without a single doubt in my mind that

we have a prophet that leads and guides us.

I love you all so much! 

Elder Morgan 

Elder Morgan's and Elder Smalley's desk at their apartment

Week 39 - A Juan Ton Potato

Family!!!

Love you all tons. Have like  no time to write!! I'll make it quick!

This week was pretty good. Highlight of the week was Juan's Baptism!!!

Juan basically is this 58 year old guy that has lived everything. He was in jail for 22 years for something he never did. And after 22 years, they let him out and told him he was innocent in the first place. Anyways, he's a really cool guy. When we found him, he had a Quadruple combination, but in English! He basically wanted to know more. Anyways, we've been teaching him for like a month and he finally got baptized. He's super cool. He likes to tell 30 minute long stories so sometimes we only could teach like 10 minutes without him starting up on a crazy story. He knows a ton about the Bible and has already read the Book of Mormon a ton and right now is reading D&C and Pearl of Great Price. He studies a ton. Every pamphlet that we've given him he's read at least 2 or 3 times and highlights them all up! He also asked for a triple combination in Spanish so we got him one and the next day he had it all nicely covered and had made his own divider tabs for all the books in it!! He also had us sign it and put our favorite scriptures. He's so cool. We're also working with his family and hoping that he can baptize his family here in another 2 weeks! Wooo! He calls my companion El Campion or The Champion because Elder Smalley is from German descent and Germany won the world cup this year. He calls me Mister Morgan haha. He also likes to cock fight. This guys basically the greatest. Yesterday he asked us to give a blessing to his kids and wife to start the new school year. It was legit!!!

I love this mission. I know that God loves us and that the church is true. As Paul in the Bible says, there is only one true Gospel and that Gospel is found here in The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints. I don't say that because I'm proud, but rather because God has told me so.

I love you all so much!!!

Love,
Elder Morgan

Week 38 - This week on ... A Life In Tjuana

Hey there fams.

Love you all so so so so so so much!

This week........ Well, this week was pretty good. I don't really remember what happened. One of the coolest things this week was when we did exchanges. I went with an Elder named Elder Zempoalteca. Pretty much the second hardest thing to pronounce here. The hardest is Parangaricutirimcuaro. Yup, I can say that. 

Anyways, we were on these exchanges and we had a really cool experience. We went with our first lesson of the day and it was with this less active family at like 11:00. Well, they like surprised us with breakfast and like forced us to eat it. It was good. but we were like so full. Anyways, fast forward in the day and we show up to where we were supposed to eat. We knocked on the door and the Sister walked out and told us we couldn't come in, but that she had made us some sandwiches. She made a bunch! So, we went to go find a place to eat. While we were walking we saw this homeless man. We went up to him and started talking to him. Elder Zempoalteca asked him if he had eaten and he said no, so he gave him one of the sandwiches and went and bought him some water as well. It was super cool and super kind of him. Then we went on our way looking for another spot to eat. We found some benches in this little store and bought some water. As we were in line with the water this guy came up to us and started asking us who we were and everything, that he has seen us walking around all the time, but had never talked to us. Well, we spoke with him a little bit and wrote down the referral for other Elders that are where he lives. Amidst us talking with him he explained that he was having a rough time finding work and everything. So, we offered him a sandwich as well. At first he refused out of pride, but eventually he took the sandwich and thanked us. Elder Zempoalteca and I just sat there afterwards thinking about the situation. We realized that had we not eaten that breakfast in the morning, we probably would have been really hungry and had gone all day hungry, but in this way we were able to help these two people and be full ourselves. I testify that sometimes we don't realize all the little miracles around us. "Lead me, Guide me, walk beside me."

We also did other exchanges with the Zone leaders. One of the zone leaders is Elder Lundbeg from Utah. He was the assistant to the president when I got here, and he leaves in 2 days. It was super cool to talk to him. He's a really great missionary and I was able to learn so much from him! Yesterday they baptized a man named Jose that has no legs! I did the baptismal interview for him. He's super cool. I am so thankful for the leaders that I have had out here in the mission and for all the things that I have learned. 

I love you all and challenge you all to do something that Christ would do this week if he was here in the Earth. 

Love you tons!

Elder Morgan