Ward Spanish Night

Spanish night was super awesome! Since there are so many different cultures in the ward we have a Spanish Party every year to celebrate them all, apparently last year was bigger but they still had a ton of food and it was really fun. They had dances and a band and Elder Gunn, from our MLS couple sang and it was the best thing I've ever heard. Like I swear it was Elvis back from the dead. We had our own booth to represent heaven, I think we had the best food.

Things are rough with our investigator lately, I think she feels really unready for baptism still and is experiencing the spirit of opposition like crazy. We invited her to an English class by some members of the ward and Spanish night and she didn't show up to either of them, or church this Sunday. We aren’t giving up yet though, we are visited her tonight and shared a verse and tried to help her with her doubts and fears. I'm sorry but I gave her the hot chocolate you sent to replace her coffee and she thought it was so funny, also those gloves since I've already got some and she works in Park City. She's from Venezuela so she definitely needs them more than me. But we're visiting tonight too so let's hope things get better.

There seems to be a lot of talk about temples lately, one of our recent converts has been worried about doing baptisms and so we've been trying to help and Wednesday we are going to Oquirrh Mountain with her to do baptisms! We had our bishop come for one of the lessons and he seemed to really settle her fears. She's still anxious but much more willing to go.

I’ve learned that if you join the church just because you like some of the principles of it or because you like the people you are not converted. It's the parable by Christ about the different seeds, some fall off to the side and never grow, others fall into the rocks and grow but don't have a firm root so they blow away when there's even a little opposition. But the ones that are firmly rooted grow up strong and are safe when the winds start to blow. When I don't agree the church's stance on something or think a certain part of our beliefs are weird, I always have a testimony of the Book of Mormon and Joseph Smith to fall back on. It's because I'm converted to the pure and perfect gospel that I follow the church. With that also though I've realized how important having at least a study journal is. Because it is so incredibly easy to forget your testimony and feelings from spiritual experiences. Elder Rasband's talk at general conference was about that and it's so true.

This is something I've tried to implement in missionary work, the lessons are super important but I'd rather focus on making them feel the spirit and being able to recognize those feelings.

I finally got to meet this returned missionary named Thomas Hunter Mason yesterday. He's a legend from our mission, I've heard him be mentioned almost everyday since I've been here. My companion tells me all these crazy stories of all these miracles he worked and how great of a missionary he was. He always says he's going to be an apostle or something. He was an awesome guy and everything and I was glad to meet him.

Te quiero mucho,

Elder Bessey

"Open Your Mouth-ing"

I think that “Open Your Mouth-ing” (OYMing) and tracking was exactly I needed to get past this week. I've never been comfortable with it but this week it's the majority of what we've been doing. So this week we had tons of lessons set up, 11 of them. All of them except 2 fell through. We were just super discouraged by the end of the week. And to top it off Saturday night we passed by some building clear full of Latinos having a party or something, it was just salt in the wound. I wanted to leave a note or card or something in there, but my companion said that would over-stepping our boundaries to enter a party uninvited. 

Sunday an RM was telling me that what happened this week was because God was testing my trust with sharing the gospel with everyone, and when he trusts me with that, then he'll give me someone to teach. Then I realized then how many people I had tried to OYM and all the doors I knocked on. I think if I didn't gain his trust from that I don't know what will, but I have a good feeling that this coming week is going to go great. 

I've noticed that I've been pretty pessimistic about people yelling stuff at me as they pass by or curse at me, it's actually really funny. Cause for everyone person that does something like that, about 20 more honk at us or offer us food or yell out "We love you!" or smile and wave at us. Then we have a meal literally every night with a member, and that's in a Spanish ward too. So I don't really worry to much about them anymore. 

Actually just a few nights ago we were biking around and this skinny guy in a tank top and tats passed us yelling "I'm more Mormon than you!" Or maybe it was I'm more man than you, I don't know it was kinda hard to hear, but I thought about what he was saying for a few seconds when about 15 seconds later some mom honked at us to tell us she loves us. I couldn't stop laughing because it was just so weird how much people don't like the church in a state like Utah and how ineffective they are at trying to bring down the Church in Utah. Heck I just got back from the store and I found 20 bucks in my bag. At first it was kinda difficult to talk to people who I know aren't interested but now I'm trying to just bare my testimony after every OYM, you never know what will come of it.

We had dinner with Veronica, this kinda crazier Chilean lady we visit sometimes. She speaks Spanish super fast, but she asked me what I was doing after my mission. And I told her I would like to own my own business. She was pretty interested since she used to own a business in the past, so we talked about that for a bit. A few days later she drove to our house to drop off some Chilean sweets for my companion's birthday. And she told me she had a dream that I was supposed to go to college, and that she was supposed to tell me about her dream how I needed to go to college and everything. So that was pretty crazy. I'm trying not to think about that stuff to much but after she told me that it was kinda hard not to.

Lately I've been ready Teachings of Presidents: Gordon B Hinckley and the next morning I got to a chapter called "Continue in the Great Process of Learning". Really a super neat read.

Today we are having our district activity, I'm not sure how it's going to be though cause we are painting pumpkins and playing board games.

Serving in West Jordan!

This transfer has been nuts! We've seen a lot of success and we have pretty good teamwork in teaching. Things have been super successful and fun with Elder Fletes, we've seen miracles since our first day. We have 9 investigators on date for baptism so we are pretty excited about that. Elder Fletes is a convert of less than 2 years, but before he talked to missionaries he never read the Bible or anything. Elder Fletes is super humble but he doesn't like to seem dumb so he told me that when he would get home from church he would read the Bible and the Book of Mormon until 9:00 at night. So he knows a lot of Bible stuff and loves to bash. 

The few Hispanics that are actually Christian always answer the door with a Bible in their hand ready to prove that Mormonism is wrong and Elder Fletes gets really excited and quotes like a hundred other scriptures. Normally you aren't really supposed to do this, but the thing is the Hispanics really respect someone who is intelligent, especially in scripture, so we get invited back and have a chance to teach the restoration and set up more lessons.

The work has been good so far, I have a learned a lot from my new companion and we are making some really good progress together. Nothing is more amazing than visibly seeing the gospel bless the lives of a family or an individual.

Week 1 in Utah!

It's been tough not having a P-Day for so long but it's also been way awesome doing the real work. This mission works crazy hard and everyone is super obedient. President Lansing is so awesome and really an awesome president, and Sister Lansing is really smart and kinda reminds me of [my mom]. She gave everyone goodie-bags with a toothbrush and stuff, and it totally reminded me of

something [my mom] would do.

My companion is an awesome example and super nice person. It's been hard since I still can't really speak Spanish that well but he helps me out. He's from Argentina and fluent in English so it really helps a lot. It is so different to not have other people with you, it's not as fun as the CCM but I feel much closer to the Lord and the work.

We live in the basement of a members home, they're a retired couple. The man was a house contractor and helped build a lot of the houses here. They're so nice, they made us cinnamon rolls after Priesthood that tasted just like [my mom’s]. [Her’s] are still better though.

Latinos feed you so much and we get a dinner every night. One Elder I talked to who just finished up said he gained 40 pounds!

I loved conference this time around . So much of it was about missionary work and Christ. One of the sessions we invited our brand new investigator so I had to watch the Sunday AM all in Spanish so I understood basically nothing from it, but I still felt the spirit very strong and really enjoyed listening. In the past 3 days I already have my first investigator, María. She's from Venezuela like most of the Latinos here. I'm starting to think my real call is to Venezuela but since I can't go there God is sending the Venezuelans to me, cause like everyone I meet is Venezuelan.

My first area is one of the 3 bike areas and it's been so nice to ride a bike again, it's one of the ways that really helps me with stress. They weren't kidding when they said this was one of the highest baptizing missions in the world, exact obedience is the standard and we bring in so many investigators from it.