Week of Miracles

Weaaaapa!

Que lo que mi GENTE.

This week was MONSTROUS, and super wet. Its rained every single day this past week. My shoes, scriptures and mission manual are just soaked!! Honestly it's a nice trade off from brutal heat because after 20 months its been really taxing!! My skin is FRIED. 

This week I have seen some amazing miracles and they all have come back to studying and understand a very basic gospel principle. GOD LOVES US. I think that this principle is soo over looked; how often do we take advantage of our all-knowing and loving Heavenly fFather? Well for starters I know that I could poner mas confianza en el. I think that this week my comp and I saw great miracles because we decided to do all we could and put the rest in God's hands.

Lemme take y'all through a few of the miracles I saw. 1st off Juan Alberto did NOT go to church this week. I was soo soo worried. It turns out he got home super late on Saturday and over slept until 12 30, we gave him a fat bolche Sunday night. And something super cool happened. First off let me say that he and his family LOVE me and I LOVE them. I can't really explain it but we have just really clicked on sooo many levels. They honestly say that they just feel a light when we are in their house. Juan Alberto told us about a dream he had. He told me that he and I were sitting on his porch with bird seed in our hands and that a large white dove landed on my hand and started eating. He said that doves DON'T just land on people's hands and that in his dream he was very amazed but that I just stayed calm. He called his grandparents and parents to look at the Dove gently eating and relejándose. He asked us what to dove could possibly have meant and we talked to him about Christ's baptism about how the Holy Ghost came over him as a dove. He took it as a message that we are the Lord's missionaries who have the Lord's spirit....super cool stuff. Please pray that he and his family keep progressing.

2nd Yassenia and  Yeusdies went to church on Sunday. We went and picked them up and yassenia said the opening prayer in principos del evangelio. She prayed that she could become a member of the Lord's church. Also yesterday she told me that she also dreamt of me. That I was on a path and calling to her to follow me on the path. Muy profundo también. We only have one obstacle with Yassenia - she has been living with a man for about a year and has to get married before baptized. We are now going to focus hard core on her husband so that we get the WHOLE family. Por favor oran por ellos!

3rd. Elder Corder, my kid, called me today and one of the most back door santa investigators that I had contacted in Moca got baptized on Saturday - a dude named Ramon Antonio. When I met him he had an awful foot infection and wasn't able to walk, but he always told us that he wanted to go to church. He then disappeared for about a month and came back to Moca with his leg cut off. We taught him a few more times but it seems that he had progressed a whole lot after I left. Elder Corder tambien me dijo que algunas otras personas se van a bautizar pronto ya, like Anthony. Soo dope that the seeds we planted are now being harvested!! I MISS MOCA!!

As I send at the beginning of this email I think that having focused more on God's love for his children allowed us to have miracles in our work. We are striving towards a few baptisms for the 28th. Please pray for Ronnie and Juan Alberto, also Yassenia su esposo and Yuesdires. I love this work and know that Cristo esta a la cabeza de esta obra!!

Hasta luego!!

Feliz dia de las Madres!

Elder Blake

 

Walking the campos de Bonao, con las vacas

This dude in a guaga had his fighting chicken, i asked him if I could hold it.

Comiendo cena con Juan Albeto.

In honor of Big Papi. Wall murals here are brutally ugly. Ill try to take some more pics

Elder Paulino y yo hicimos oreos fritos.

Con mangos!

I have Tevas haha

My comp and I

 

Harley, Ronnie y Juan Carlos!!!

Hello mi gente,

Wow this week se fue demasiado rapidoooo. I honestly can't even grasp time anymore - it just slips right between my fingers. However, Elder Irish and I are doing work!! We are working hard and having a really good time doing it. We sat down to plan on Thursday and decided that we were going to do ALL in our power to help our area and our zona then just put the rest in Gods hands. De verdad we saw some miracles this week!! Lemme explain a few.

1. On Saturday we were invited to eat lunch with Harley and his Parents. We ate fried rice, and had a nice conversion. Quickly after we finished Harley's dad peaced out but we were able to talk to Carmen and Harley about charity. Basically just trying to slowly and kindly plant the idea in Carmen's mind that Harley should be allowed to make his own decisiones. She opened and then on Monday we had an epic lesson with Harley about valentía. I don't remember how to say that in English. But he told us that he would build up the courage to talk to his parents. I gave him my CTR ring to siempre hacer lo justo!! and we both shed a few tears. I love him sooo much.  

2. On Wednesday we had a dope second lesson with this guy named Ronnie. He is 18 and super super sincere. We met him about 2 weeks ago and on Wednesday he had read all of the intro to the BoM. We talked about prophetas and invited him to be baptized. He acecpted and asked us what time church started. We told him and he said that he would go without doubts. We went to his house on Saturday and he told us that we was going to have to work from 7 pm to 7am in a bread shop but that he was still going to go to church. At 8:30 am he was standing at the door waiting for us with two huge pieces of cake haha. We told us he ran home at 7, showered and ran back to the church, all with cake in his hands haha. So we ate cake for breakfast quickly before sacrament meeting started. We haven't seen him since Sunday but he really enjoyed it, and seriously sacrificed to go. It was soooo dope!!

3. We had a ROUGH day on Saturday, for about 4 hours we were blank!! With nothing to do. We decided to pray and ask God what we should do. We walked and walked with out feeling impressed to teach a single person. Saturdays are super rough because almost everyone leaves to visit family or drink in los colmados. Anyways it was rainy and wicked, I felt pretty darn desanimado, but at 8 we walked passed this house and I felt an overwhelming impression to stop and talk to this young looking guy. We instantly hit it off, I spit off all the Domincan slang I know and he LOVED it. We shared a quick message about the gospel of Jesucristo and invited him to church. He said he would go sin fallar, and told us to come by at 8:15 to pick him up. On Sunday we showed up at 8:15, he was ready to go but asked us if he could invite a friend to church. Dijmos claro que si entonces se fue para buscar un amigo. We ended up just walking to church and Juan showed up with his buddy. We ended up talking about the modern day church in Gospels Principios and the spirit was super strong. I love love love teaching this class. Pero igual que ronnie, he wasn't home last night so we are going to go find him tonight. Pray for Harley, Ronnie and Juan Alberto!!!

Disculpe, estoy sufriendo con el ingles y quisiera dejar mi testimonio con ustedes en español, por que para mi de verdad es mas fácil a testificar en este idioma. Se que esta es la obra del senor y que soy su siervo. La obra que estoy efectuando no es tan fácil pero veo los frutos cada día. Amo este país y las personas que conozco acá. Se que la iglesia de Jesucristo es la verdadera y que el evangelio restaurado cambia vidas y ayuda familias a poder unirse. Yo lo se por que lo he visto. Veo cada día las manos del senor obrando con esa gente, y he podido amarlas como amaría jesucristo. Se de estas cosas en el nombre de Jesucristo Amen!!

Elder Blake 

I found the beast from sandlot. You can't really tell but this dog is HUGE!! Its paws are the size of my hands.

This is Juan Alberto and his cousins. We contacted them on Saturday and Juan ​came to church on Sunday he is dope.

I saw Dad's old truck!!

I found a TOAD last night, BTW its raining SOO much here. Erry day!!

Isaac met someone at our church who is from Santiago and knows some of Brigham's friends.

Traslados, ya me falta dos y pico?

Helllllo,

Wow this transfer FLEW bye. Honestly I think it flew bye because I wasn't expecting ANY changes but out of nowhere president transferred Elder Paulino to Moca. We only had 6 weeks together. We were both really surprised and disappointed, however we will see what happens. Anyways I'm still in Bonao - now with Elder Irish. He is a stud from Nibley, Utah and wrestled in High school. We actually figured out a few hours ago that we both tore our ACLS our senior years playing sports. He in wrestling y yo en Football. Raider craziess for life!! 

Anyway I have nothing really to report on. Life is cruising here in Bonao. We put 6 fechas for the 21st of May. We put them with a family of four and two other woman. Pray for la familia Mejia, por Yassenia y Yeudies. They all need to start coming to church regularly!! I have faith that they complete with these metas que he puesto.

Sorry I'm out of time. I LOVE this work. I know that I'm on the lords errand and that my time is ticking away. I love being a missionary and pray every day por el bienestar de ustedes y por las personas que enseno. Les quiero mucho!!

Con AMor!!

Elder Blake 

 

 

In a private email to me (Julia):

 

Yeah, we pàssed by Harley's house three times this week. His parents work all week long and when we went on Sunday they weren't home. Harley can't receive us unless his parents are home. Hopefully he calls us to meet up with him this week. 

Anyways love you mom, the work is going well! We put 6 baptism dates this week. We will see what happens!!

Pray and Fast for Harley!!

Hello family and friends,

This week has been super super AWESOME. Wow I've felt just so happy and peaceful with the work that I'm doing. I KNOW that this is the Lord's church and his gospel. As many people have said Conference was awesome. The internet was somehow down in our chapel so I watched the sessions in Spanish with our branch. It was the first time I had watched conference in Spanish. I enjoyed it and loved it but it was sad to see our prophets and not hear them in the native tongue. Or simply stated conference isn't the same in Spanish!! I would like to focus on a very spiritual moment that I had this week, and would ask my family to please fast with a new investigator and I this Saturday.

After the afternoon session of conference on Sunday my companion and I left the chapel to go contact a few houses in the bordering neighborhood. Here in Bonao contacting is super hard because everyone is catholic and hard hearted. We contacted about 2 houses and nothing, we kept walking and my knee started to really bother me. I can't deny that I thought, well, the week is over its 7pm we have to call for numbers in an hour so it wouldn't really hurt if we went home right now. But I know that's not what the Lord would do. So we kept walking around. Then I felt a very sudden yet slight impression to contact this one house. Visually from the door their were MANY pictures of Catholic Jesus and this family was obviously super super Catholic. A woman (Cameron) answered the door and let us in, she told us right off the bat that she is a radical catholic but would let us come in because her mother in law is a member, who came from the capital, was there in her house and had actually just finished watching conference. We invited Cameron to invite all in the house to come and listen to our message. In few seconds, her mother in law and Cameron's 17 year old son named Harley came out. We started teaching about the restoration and Cameron got really defensive, almost yelling at us that she is cathloic and will never change. After a few minutes she went inside to go answer the phone and Harley opened up. He told us that he had watched all 5 sessions of the conference and after the last session ended, asked God if he would confirm to him that this was the true church. Not 20 minutes later did we knock on their door. I testified that it was an answer and he began to cry. He then opened up and said that he knows this is Christ's church but is afraid of what his parents would do to him if he told them he wanted to be baptized. Anyways we left it tranquillo at that and yesterday at lunch he called us to ask if we could meet up and teach him in the chapel. We met him there and he told us more about how his grand mother had told him about the church and the mission. He asked us what he could do to become a member and a missionary. We talked a little bit about sacrifice and being valiant but then I felt inspired to  teach him about fasting. We decided that this Saturday we are going to fast together so that his mother can open her heart and let him make his own decisions. We then finished with a kneeling prayer and Harley POURED his heart out asking God to help his mother. Harley is soooo dope and could be such a strong member. These past three days I have thought endlessly about his potential. I know that God has a plan for him and that he wanted us to answer his humble prayer that Sunday afternoon. I have faith that this fast will help him out - help him be able to receive the gospel. 

This is really like those crazy conversion stories we read about in the Ensign every month. I plead that you fast and pray for Harley and his family so that he can receive the blessings of the gospel!!

I love this work!!

Elder Blake

Weekly Update, Transfers, New comp etc

This week has been another challenging week! I guess I can't really put my emotions into words. Haha I think it's just a combo of stress, exhaustion and trying to work my hardest. Despite my hardest efforts our investigators are just not really progressing anymore. Those who had baptismal dates stopped going to church an our new people aren't really making an effort to go to church. I think it has to do with exact obediencia; with Elder Preston we had slipped a little bit and we were doing things that distracted us from our work and didn't work in the best way. There is a lot to improve on, especially planning and getting home on time. I think that I will be able to see success this transfer if I start to do ALL the little things again. and then Ill start to see improvement.

Haha I know I'm making it sound like I've had the worst week of my life. But it really hasn't been that bad, I just feel lot of pressure from myself and from the Lord. I know that this is His church and that as missionaries we teach the gospel of Jesucristo. I know that this gospel has blessed my life more than anything in the world. I know that the atonement of Christ will help me to become a better person and to be able to help my repent of my sins. I know that the Book of Mormon is the word of God and I LOVE  my savior Jesus Christ. 

Sorry for the WORST weekly letter I've written but next week it'll be better.

BTW I will either be writing on Tuesday or Thursday becuase on Wednesday we have our leadership council with the area presidente Elder Cornish. 

Love you guys!

Elder Blake

 

 

Mostly Pics - wrote to Anna instead

I'm going to write to Anna instead of my regular letter. Just to let you know, life is going well. I am happy, even though this week was SUPER hard. My companion has lost some animo. He has just gotten super relaxed and our investigators aren't pulling through. It's been a hard week in all aspects but I have a feeling that this week will be better. I finished the BoM and The New testament this week and that really kept me happy. We went to constanza for a district meeting and intercambio aswell. Pass on any of this info with the family!!

Feliz Miguel!! This guy is a hugeee stud. He is trying to get in the waters of baptism in a few weeks! He also lives in the most rural part of our area. We have to cross a sketchy river to get to his shack. haha.

The sisters had a baptism. But I love gregory as if he were my convert. He asked me to baptize him which was a huge honor

We ate this crazy fruit called niespero. It tastes weird!

Elder Preston fell asleep coming home from Constanza, its FAR. He tucked his tie into his shirt for the win.

Semana Bacana

February 24th, 2016

Esta semana me fue muy bien!!!!

Wow hello family and friends I can't believe how quickly time flies by. This week flew by in the blink of an eye. I wish I could go through and my journal and write down EVERYTHING that has happened but it would take wayyy to much time. Like all weeks let me go through a few of our highlights.

Last Tuesday we found a super cool family of 3 young adults who are progressing super rapidly. We taught them Tuesday and then Friday we went back and finished the restouracion. As week testifies of the Book of Mormon the spirit filled them room and we committed them to be baptized and come to church. Anyways Sunday came around and we called them at 8 to invite them to church. Their phone rang once and them it just shut off, we called a few more times and it seemed like them had blocked the number. We were super sad and thought for sure that they were really interested. We went to church a little let down and RIGHT before sacrament started they walked in!! It was a huge back door santa, and the best part about it was that they LOVED the Gospel Principles class. My companion taught them on Monday but I was in Cotui on an intercambio. He said that the lesson was very spiritual and that they are progressing a lot! Pray for Amilcka, Amarelis and Ricky!!!

Last night my companion and I felt inspired to go check up on a few contacts we had done about a month ago. As we were walking past the first house we felt that we shouldn't follow up with them, then from the porch we heard someone say in perfect English, yooo whats up Mormons!! It turns put the girl we contacted had her New York boyfriend over. We went to talk to them and he had a lot of questions. We taught in spaniglish and focused on the BoM. After the hour long lesson we invited them to read and pray. Johnny (the dude) said, 'Well I don't really know if this is right, but this book makes a lot of sense and I just believe that its true. Yeah, I know its true.' It was super super cool and he invited us to come by on Thursday. It was super super cool.

As a zone leader I have felt very pressured from presidente to baptize and lead our zone in all los indicadores claves. Here, in all honesty, its HARD to baptize because its soo hard to find people who actually have real interés. Its been something that has really bothered me these past few weeks. I feel like I'm doing things the right way and just not seeing results. However yesterday we had a very spiritual lunch visit with a recent convert and her sister. Cauhana is a recent convert of 2 months and her younger sister Catolice has been progressing a lot, but she has been neglecting a fecha para bautismo. My comp and I decided that we needed to fast with her. Yesterday we taught about this principle and invited her fast to receive an answer to her prayers. We finished our fast ahorita and we feel really positive that she will be baptized in two weeks. Please pray for Catolice!!!

Life is going really well. I cant believe than my mission is acabándose super rapidly. But I'm going to keep working con todo mi corazón!! 

Until next week. Elder Blake

While contacting up in Los quemados we found this crazy river!

We found a dam in our area and they let us take a quick tour

In Compamento with Christopher last sunday before he left for Guatamala

Yeah we found some wild bananas.