Week 66: Transfers!

Well it’s that time again! After a quick 6 week run with Elder Thompson, it looks like our good times together are coming to a close. He’s been transferred down south to Piura, and I’m going to be staying here in the bustling city of Tumbes for at least 6 more weeks. I’m super grateful for the chance that we had to work together for this transfer. It was absolutely a blast and we made some good memories. One of the best things about the mission is all the really close friends that you get to make, and I definitely consider Elder Thompson just that. He’s going to kill it down in Piura. My new companion is Elder Westergard from South Carolina! He’s also one of my good friends that I made in Sullana when I got to the mission, so it should be a good time with him. We’re hoping to have a solid transfer in the zone this time around. Tumbes va a cambier!

This week our entire zone took the 5-6 hour bus trip down to Piura for a special mission conference with Elder Held from the seventy. We all headed down on Wednesday and had the conference on Thursday, but Elder Thompson and I had a special leaders conference with Elder Held on Friday, so we didn’t get back to Tumbes until Saturday. So that is where most of our week went, The conferences were pretty sweet with Elder Held. The guy is just on another level spiritually. He is from Columbia, but all of his family is from Germany, so he fluidly speaks Spanish and German, and also knows near-perfect English and Portuguese. It was kind of weird to see a white guy that spoke Spanish as his native language, haha. He spoke to us about being higher quality missionaries, and about being “MTC” missionaries, which is an acronym for “Misioneros de Tiempo Completo”, or, always being “full time missionaries”. He explained this as just talking to every single person at every single place at every moment, always looking to teach. This is something that I feel I could definitely improve on, and I’m definitely going to put it into practice. 

While we were down in Piura, I also got to visit my old area in Ignacio Merino! It was super cool to go back there and surprise visit some of my converts and member families there. Like I said earlier, I just love the mission for all the incredible people that I have met here. There are just so many people that I have really grown to love and consider family. It’s awesome.

Also while down in Piura, me and Elder Thompson took a trip to one of the only American restaurants you will find here in the mission: Chili’s. We went all out and each paid a whole 33 soles for some awesome bacon burgers. It was definitely the most expensive meal I think I’ve had on my mish, but definitely worth it, haha. Good stuff. 

On Sunday we saw a little miracle. Due to being in Piura all week, we were walking around Sunday afternoon trying to hit our weekly goals for our area. We weren’t really seeing any success, and we were still five new investigators short as the day rolled on. We then decided to go visit a member named Sharon and we had taught her uncle a few weeks back. Sharon is 24 and she leaves for her mission in Colombia in just a few weeks. The cool thing is that she is a convert, and despite being absolutely the only member in her family, she is super strong in the gospel. After chatting with her for a little, we headed over to her uncle’s house. The last time we taught her uncle, Armando, he was completely alone in his house and we figured that no one lived there with him. However, this time as we knocked on the door he opened the door and we saw his full family of 6 all sitting inside his living room! They invited us in and listened to our message on the restoration. They all had some doubts on what we talked about until they were put to rest by Sharon’s testimony. She honestly gave one of the most powerful testimonies I’ve ever heard. It was so cool to see her share and testify of what she knew to be true as the only member of her family. She has told us before how hard it is to be the only one in her family that believes in what she does, and says her family makes fun of her all the time. As she gave her testimony, her uncle’s family all sat quietly listening intently and without doubt feeling the spirit strongly. After she finished there was just a silence throughout the room and everyone seemed to be moved. It was such a cool experience. The family agreed to let us come back next week, and their interest seemed to be sparked. We were able to find a big family to teach and were able to reach our weekly goals of new investigators! It’s funny how the Lord always seems to provide a way!

Have a good week!

Avanza Su Verdad!

Elder Bailey

Week 65 - From Pres. Nelson to Angelina Jolie...

This week was pretty action packed! Let’s get right into it.

Well to give a little follow-up info on the hermanas that left for Piura due to medical issues, it looks like they are going to be staying down there for good. Hermana Ruano finally left the hospital and is doing better, but they are going to have her and her companion, Hermana Coca, stay down in the area in the mission closest to the hospital in case of any more problems. The good news is after almost 3 weeks with a hole in the zone we finally got some reinforcements! This week Hermana Valencia and Hermana Wilkey packed up their bags and took the trip up here to take over the old Hermana’s area. Upon arriving they were super excited to be here in Tumbes and had a great attitude about getting the emergency transfer and having to leave their old area, including all their investigators. We’ll miss the old hermanas but we are pumped to finally have a full zone again in a time that we desperately need it.

This week was multi-zone conference and interview week for la Zone Tumbes! On Tuesday we all had our interviews with President Vega, and us zone leaders revised each companionship’s area book. Everything went well, but we got done with everything super late and missed our lunch, so President offered to take us and the AP’s out to lunch. We hit up a place called “Norley’s” (a Peruvian classic) and Pres let us get whatever we wanted. It was super fun to sit and chat with President a little in a less formal setting and get to know him a little more. (Also fun to not have to pay for your meal.)

On Tuesday night me and Elder Thompson went with President Vega to have a meeting with one of the counselors in the Stake Presidency here in Tumbes. We talked a lot about the trends in the numbers of new investigators, church attendance, and baptisms in the past few months and also about our goals for the future. Towards the end, it got a little uncomfortable because it was super obvious that the stake has made little to no progress on the goals that they set in their last meeting together with Pres. Vega, and that us as missionaries haven’t really had a ton of support from them. You could say that President did a little constructive “chastening” on this poor stake counselor, haha. Our meeting pretty much ended when he admitted that they hadn’t met together as a stake presidency in over 5 months. Imagine that. He then promised us that they would be better in supporting the missionary work from now on. As uncomfortable as it was, I think that meeting is what we needed to finally get a little more help from the members.

Wednesday was the multi-zone conference! I was really nervous leading up to the conference because we were in charge of getting almost everything prepared like cleaning the church, setting up tables and chairs, getting the program ready, and teaching a class to our zone. I agreed to conduct the meeting which I was also a little nervous about. Luckily everything went well, and it was a super awesome multi-zone. President talked to us about the Book of Mormon and its role in our conversion. As much as I love multi-zone conferences, I’m glad we made it through this one. A little bit of the stress is gone now, haha.

Despite all the time it took getting ready for interviews and the multi-zone, we had a GREAT week of progress in our area. We were able to find a lot of cool new people who look like they really have some promise. We taught a guy named Francisco and his wife Erica, who have 3 small kids and really loved our message. We taught them about following Christ and showed them how he was baptized. They all agreed that their baptism in the Catholic church wasn’t the same, and that to truly follow Jesus they needed to be baptized in the way that he did. Francisco, Erica, and their oldest son Frank (age 8) all accepted dates for December 1st. I felt the spirit super strongly in that lesson and feel really good about them. The only problem is they aren’t actually married (like most people here) so we’re going to work with them on that. 

Also, this Saturday was Olivia’s baptism! We planned to start at 4:30 in the afternoon, and thought we’d start on time if we told everyone that it started at 3:30, but we were wrong again, haha. We started at about 5, but the important thing is that Olivia was finally baptized! As I say every time, it doesn’t matter who gets baptized or when, there is always such a special spirit present. This was once again true as we saw Olivia be baptized by her son, Josue. It was SO awesome. Olivia is really a special convert for me, and I will never forget the amazing change that I was able to see in her. I can honestly say that she has been “born again”. We are now working with her to prepare to be sealed as a family in a year. 

As some of you may have heard, President Nelson is visiting countries in South America right now. On Saturday he was here in Peru! In the afternoon we all went to the stake center to see two special broadcasts from him: one specifically to the missionaries, and the other to all the members in Peru. The first broadcast to us missionaries was super cool. President Nelson got up and told us that we are completing prophecy by doing the work here in this part of the world by taking the fulness of the gospel as Gentiles to the Jews, or the remnants of the Lamanites. (3 Nephi 16:4-5) He also told us that as missionaries obviously we are what the Savior called “fishers of men”, and that we (the missionaries serving here in South America) are where the fish are, haha. It was so cool to hear a message from the living prophet directed specifically to us. After the broadcast, we had the second one that was directed to all members in Peru. After all the speakers had gotten up before him with all their respective translators, President Nelson got up with his translator to give his closing remarks. After greeting the crowd for a minute or two, President Nelson did something I will never forget. After pausing for a minute he looked up into the big crowd in Lima and said: “ I now wish to speak to you in a language that is not mine.” He then told his translator to go sit down and he gave his entire talk in Spanish!! It was honestly unbelievable and indescribable the spirit that you could feel as he gave that message. I can truly say that I received another witness that he is a prophet of God. I’m sure that has to be the first time in this dispensation that a prophet has delivered a message to such a large crowd in a different tongue. So cool.

Well, that’s all for this week folks. I wanna give my sister Erin a quick shout out for making it to and playing in the state championship for LHS soccer as a freshman! You’re a stud. Also want to wish her a feliz cumpleaños this Saturday. Love you, Erin :)

(And yes, that really is Angelina Jolie in my pictures. Tried to give her a Book of Mormon but there was just too many people…)

Avanza Su Verdad!

Elder Bailey

Week 64

Muchachos!

Not a lot of time to write today but heres a quick update on the week. Everything is still going smooth here with my guy Elder Thompson. He is the man, and each day we're working hard and are starting to see the results comin.

This week we weren't able to have Olivia's baptism this week due to a few complications with general conference, but turns out she will have to pass an interview with President Vega anyway, so as of now the plan is this Saturday! Like I said before, she is honestly so awesome and it has been a true miracle to see her conversion. We are pumped for her!

This week we also starting teaching a 9 year-old girl of a part-member family named Génesis. Génesis had gone to church with her grandma when she was younger, but the past year or two has stopped going due to a few medical problems her grandma is having. This past week her dad Edinson actually contacted us to come and teach and baptize her! The cool thing is, her inactive dad seems really engaged in helping his daughter prepare for baptism and seems to have desires to come back to church. At the end of our first spirit filled lesson with Génesis, her dad asked if we could arrange a meeting with him and the bishop to get him worthy again to be able to baptize his daughter. It was awesome. Génesis is really influencing her dad for the better. Sometimes other missionaries love to poke fun at you for baptizing 9 year-olds is if they weren't "real investigators", but almost every time there is a HUGE after-shock effect on the entire family after they see their young kid choose to follow the Savior and be baptized that really pushes them to make changes in their lives and be better. There are no "cheap" baptisms!! Génesis is preparing for November 3rd.

This weekend we got to head to the stake center to watch conference again, but this time with all of the members and our investigators. They delayed showing it a week due to all the crazy political voting that happened here last weekend. It was even better the second time! (Maybe because I got to watch in my native tongue of english, hehe) I really loved this quote from Elder Gary E. Stevenson:

"When we confront life's winds and rainstorms, sickness, injuries, and drought, the Lord-our Shepherd-will minister to us. He will restore our souls."

We always need to rely on the Lord during our most difficult times! He will always come to our aid.

Avanza Su Verdad!

Elder Bailey

#VamosLenin

Week 63

Another week in the books! I’m sorry I wasn’t able to get a letter written last week. Things have been pretty busy around here and sometimes it's hard to get a minute to sit down and write! This week though was pretty interesting…

On Monday we had to ship one of the Hermanas in our district down to Piura to get some medical care. Over the past week or two, Hermana Ruano from Guatemala had been having some terrible pains in her legs and back. She tried to just work thought the pain and stick it out, but the pain just got worse and worse. She went to the hospital here in Tumbes to get some tests done but they thought it would be best for her to go down to Piura to get a full body MRI to figure out the cause of the pain. Since they’ve been down there in Piura, things have gotten even worse. Her pain escalated even more, and for about a day she was put in intensive care, with extreme pain throughout her whole body. Right now we are waiting on the results of the MRI to figure out how serious the problem is. I feel so bad for her because she’s only been here in the mission about three weeks, and doesn’t want anything more than to be here preaching the gospel. If you can, keep her in your prayers! But yeah, that was definitely the cause for a little drama and stress for us this week.

This week we were able to work a little bit with Olivia. As I mentioned two weeks ago, Olivia was supposed to be baptized last Saturday, but she wasn’t able to pass her baptismal interview. We moved her baptism up just two weeks so that we could teach her a few things better so she can be 100% ready to enter the waters of baptism. Olivia is super awesome, and is making some really cool changes and sacrifices in her life to come closer to Christ. About 2 weeks ago, we invited Olivia to stay at church for all 3 hours. She wasn’t really a big fan of the idea, as she told us that she desperately needed to stay home after sacrament meeting to sell her fish so that she could put food on the table for her little 10 year-old daughter, Dayanara. After a short sermon on keeping the sabbath day holy and also trusting in the Lord, my companion Elder Thompson and I promised Olivia that if she came to church, the Lord would bless her and she would be able to sell ALL of her fish. Well she did as promised, and she sacrificed her time for the Lord by going to church instead of selling her fish. When we showed up the next day, she told us excitedly that she had in fact sold every single on of her fishes. It was really cool to see her learn a lesson of faith and sacrifice in such a personal way. Sometimes we just need to take that leap of faith and do what the Lord asks of us even when it’s hard. We always need to be willing to trust him and know that he will provide, as he did for our investigator Olivia. Olivia should be ready to be baptized this coming Saturday.

Well some old problems have returned… Over the past few months my infamous toenail problems have come back for revenge. I don’t know if I have too tight of shoes, walk in a funny way, or straight up just have messed up toenails, but I have ben painfully bothered by ingrown toenails my whole mission, haha. On Saturday we went in to get two more of those bad boys removed. Everything seemed to go well, apart from the fact that they didn’t give me enough anesthesia in my toes to numb them up before taking them out, so I just clenched my teeth and fists and embraced the pain. :) Hopefully the toe problems are done away with from now on.

This week we also went to town on some improvements for our apartment. Now that the water problem is fixed, we were able to clean things up around the room and get some new parts for the sink and toilet. We also went out shopping and got permission to buy a new dresser for a whopping 500 nuevos soles that actually has functioning drawers! We were pretty dang excited to bring that big guy home. Now we don’t have to live out of our suitcases anymore. Before I leave this area I’m going to get this room looking like a million bucks.

Conference was great! I absolutely love hearing from our living prophets and apostles. I felt so inspired from this conference and I can’t wait to study each talk for the next 6 months. I invite you all to do the same. :) I also love the idea of the new 2-hour church schedule! I think it will help simplify things and help us focus on the most important meeting we have which is sacrament meeting. How cool is it that we have a church that is guided purely by revelation? We as missionaries talk to so many people out here each day that simply think God doesn’t talk to us anymore or that he is no longer a God of miracles. How blessed we are to have the knowledge that we have that God is still a God of miracles and speaks his will to us through his living prophet. We thank thee o God for a PROPHET!

Avanza su verdad!

Elder Bailey

(Rumor has it that next conference it will be announced that tithing will only be 5% of our income… just kidding.)