Hey,

Okay, so last week was a mission changing week. We set a goal as a district here in Buenaventura as 6 missionaries, or 3 companionships, to find 100 new investigators for each companionship. It was an entire week of contacting people and teaching them the message of the restoration in about 5 minutes. We ended up the week finding 102 each companionship, making it 306 as a district. That slaughtered anything I had ever heard of before or I had ever done. It was awesome!

It started on Tuesday when Elder F. and I were talking to some people outside of some store on the corner and we were like "hey, we can teach you guys something?" So we went over and sat down on this rock and taught about the restoration to a group of like 30 people. It was like John the Baptist or Jesus sitting on a rock back in the day preaching to the people...it was awesome! Afterwards, we told them that anyone who wanted a Book of Mormon could have one. We only had like 6 on us at the time, so we gave those out and had to sprint down to the apartment and fill our backpacks up with more books and gave them out to all the people. We ended up giving out both backpack fulls of Books of Mormon and had to sprint back to the apartment to fill them up again and we gave them all out again! We ended up giving out a box and a half of Books of Mormon which is like 50 to 60. It was awesome. We just told everyone they had to read the book and ask God if its true and they could have one. We've found some people who have already read and prayed about it and have a testimony of it without even really knowing what it is...it was way awesome.

Oh yeah, and for the first time in my mission, I am staying in the same area with the same companion for more than one transfer. Woot.

We met someone the other day who had a pet sloth. I got to pet it. It was legit.

La semana pasada fue loco pero fue chévere. Queremos que las personas tengan un testimonio del Libro de Mormón para que puedan superar todas las dificultades. Vamos bien. Estamos trabajando todos los días y disfruto de cada minuto. Nos vemos.

Elder Chase

Hey

So last week we had some baptisms. As a district we had three. Two of those were ours. They were Roberto, an older guy who had to move from his girlfriend's house in order to get baptized, and David A., a 15 year old kid who's the son of a church member. The whole district worked really hard and we were really happy about the baptisms we had. But, we we're also a little disappointed because a large amount of people who were supposed to get baptized didn't. 

Oh yeah, for some reason they extended this transfer a week, which kinda messed up Elder F.'s and my plan. But we're just gonna try to take advantage of it. We won't know until next Monday night if there's gonna be changes.

One thing we've really learned is the importance of a testimony of the Book of Mormon. All the people who didn't get baptized were the ones who didn't really have a strong testimony of the Book of Mormon, but the ones who did, did. We are always trying to get better and help the people with all this.

Anyways we are still working hard. Last week, I had worked harder and been more stressed out than any other week up to this point on the mission. We were doing marriage papers, getting members to visit investigators, and baptismal interviews. It was nuts!

Elder Chase

 

Hey everyone,

Another week in BV. This next week is the last week of this transfer. For all I know I could be out of here. I sure hope not though. We're having baptisms this Saturday. We currently have 4 people who have enough church attendance to be able to be baptized. We're gonna try to work hard with them so the can do it. We would have two more but, they're living together and not married. It blows because no one in this country is married and they all live together and no one can afford to get married. It's a pain sometimes.

Saw something funny the other day. Everyone here likes to have stuff in English. Whether it's on their clothes, their cars or whatever. One guy had the title of Tupac's "Only God Can Judge Me" on his windshield. It would have been a lot cooler if it hadn't been spelled "Only God Can Jodge Me" haha. Not like anyone heer would even notice or even know what it meant anyway.

One of the things we've learned is that there are a lot of people out there and a lot who are ready for the gospel. The hardest part of everything, I think, is deciding who to keep teaching and who to leave behind. It sounds terrible, but we have to leave behind the people who aren't progressing and aren't keeping their commitments because it's not fair to the people who are out there waiting and are ready. The two major commitments that help us figure out who to continue visiting and who to leave behind are if they come to church and if they accept a baptismal date. Obviously if they never accept a date, they aren't going be baptized and, in this mission, you have to come to church twice before you can be baptized. So if an investigators isn't coming to church, it's a better use of your time to move on to someone who is more serious about the gospel.

Entonces vamos bien aquì. Queremos terminar bien èste cambio y vamos a hacer todo lo posible para tener bautismos èste sabado. Que estèn bien.

Elder Chase

Hey everyone!

So I forgot to bring my agenda that has all my little notes of stuff I wanted to talk about. I do remember one thing - I don't know if I already mentioned the time when we were talking to one of our investigators outside her house and some guy comes up and tells her "These men are from God but don't worry about me though. I'm crazy. I'm a little bird." and then starts flapping his arms and hopping away. It was hilarious.

We worked hard last week to get people to come to church and had 10 people come. We were super stoked about that. They are also in the process of buying the land for the chapel they are gonna build here.

Time is flying by. Tomorrow I hit my 7 month mark. I'm in the second quarter of the game. If I end up staying here 4 transfers, by the time I leave Buenaventura , I could be almost halfway done, haha. It's been good though. We're working hard and always trying to improve. Sometimes, as you get more time in the mission, you develop habits and tend to do the same things all the time. But we are trying really hard to always mix it up and try new things. We are teaching a lot of great people and finding new people and leaving behind the ones who don't keep their commitments. The next baptism day is the 16th and we are working like crazy to try and get as many as possible. We can't have services every week because it costs money to rent out the pool.

Todo esta bien aquí. Siempre trato de mejorar y ayudar a las personas a venir a Cristo porque así es el propósito misional.

Elder Chase