Hey Everyone!
I hope everyone is enjoying the last week or few weeks of summer! It's
crazy to believe how fast the time has flown by; I feel like summer
was just beginning a few days ago, and it's already almost over.
Things are going well, and we are continuing to work to progress the
work forward here in Azusa - East.
Tuesday, August 19th, 2014:
It was Elder Crane's first full day in Azusa, and he really
demonstrated how ready and willing he is to work. We are going to have
a lot of success this transfer; it is very inspiring to see how
consecrated he is to missionary work. He is willing to lay everything
on the altar of sacrifice to be able to help others in their
progression in the Gospel. We began our day by reading in the Book of
Mormon with Oscar Peralta. He continues to amaze me by his questions
and understanding of the Book of Mormon, despite the fact that he
doesn't come to church and is less-active. That will be our next
hurdle to jump. We then went to visit Richie Rios and review with him
about the importance of temple work. Richie has his sights set on the
temple, and he is preparing himself very well to, one day, be able to
enter and receive of the blessings available there. Elder Crane and I
also began contacting a number of different people on the street and
visited a number of potential investigators and former investigators.
Elder Crane's strength is definitely contacting people because he
doesn't have any fear of anyone or what they will say; I have a lot to
learn from him, and I hope to improve over these coming weeks! We
later visited Jose Garcia and talked with him about the relationship
of the Atonement and baptism, and why we need to invite others to be
baptized to access the full-reaching effects of the Atonement of Jesus
Christ. He then came with us to visit a less-active member, Hermano
Carmona. They are apparently really good friends, so it was basically
like having a member-friend in a lesson with a less-active. It really
helps to treat our investigators like members and our members like
investigators; we can help them progress by applying the same teaching
methods for each group of people. Jose Garcia then took us to
Mauricio's again to eat with him. He is probably one of the most
humble and loving people that I have ever met. Jose Garcia is truly
the example of service and charity, in addition to humility. Elder
Crane and I concluded our day by visiting the Magana family to teach
Kim and Carlos. We had an awesome lesson with everyone about obtaining
an individual testimony during the conversion process. It was really
powerful to hear the conversion stories of both Hermano and Hermana
Magana. It is such a privilege as a missionary to be a part of the
lives of members of the Church and learn about how they came to know
that the Church is true; their testimonies continue to strengthen mine
each and every day.
Wednesday, August 20th, 2014:
Elder Crane and I got up early in the morning to play tennis with
Hermano Peralta. It was a lot of fun, and I wasn't as rusty as I was
expecting (thank goodness!). Playing tennis definitely makes me miss
playing every day, but it was just a lot of fun getting some quality
exercise in before we started our day. We began our day of work by
reading with Oscar Peralta again in the Book of Mormon. Once again, we
stopped by to visit Richie. We want to continue to help our recent
converts grow and progress, so we have been stopping by them often to
ensure that they are continuing to do the basic things to help
strengthen their testimony. We later went by Paula Lopez to continue
the trend of visiting with our recent converts. Paula is doing very
well, and we read a chapter out of the Book of Mormon with her to be
able to relate what we read to helping her begin to do missionary
work. We are trying to help her begin the process of inviting those
she knows to enjoy the blessings of the Gospel of Jesus Christ. After
visiting with Paula, Elder Crane and I spent a long time trying to
contact different potential investigators and former investigators,
and almost no one was at home. We then got a call from Elder Marchan
that one of the less-active members in our area recently experienced
the death of a daughter. Elder Crane and I went right over. Her son
answered the door and said that they had all just returned from the
viewing of the body and that we should try stopping by next week. I
just hope that the family will be able to feel at peace, even though
it is such a traumatic time for all of them. We concluded our day by
heading up to the church for correlation meeting with Hermano Torres.
He is probably the best ward mission leader that I have during my
entire mission, and I love working with him. He has the desire and the
drive to help this ward get up and running, even if other members of
the ward might not yet have that same vision.
Thursday, August 21st, 2014:
District meeting felt a little different than normal today because
half of our previous district changed. It is very interesting to see
how the whole feel of a group can change based on the individuals in
the group; some districts are full of humor, whereas others are very
quiet, etc. Elder Marchan taught a lesson about finding through the
help of the members, which was very powerful, as always. Our role
plays gave Elder Crane and I some ideas to try with the members to
help motivate them to do missionary work. As missionaries, especially
now in the Hastening of the Work of Salvation, we are supposed to
assist the members in their own missionary work, not vice versa. Elder
Crane and I then went down to Glendora to try to contact some
potential investigators before we went to teach Leocadia. We had
marginal success in Glendora contacting different people. When we went
to teach Leocadia, it was a very spiritual lesson, but she wasn't
receptive at all to what we had to share. It turned into a bit of an
argument about there being only one true church with Christ's
authority. I asked her if she was willing to put her eternal salvation
at stake by not even listening to anything else that we had to offer,
and it really caught her off guard. She kind of shrugged off the
question, so we knew she wasn't actually interested in acting on
anything that we shared. It is really sad to see people turn away from
the truth when they can feel the Spirit, but we can't continue to
teach those people if they aren't willing to or ready to listen and
act. We finished our day by returning to visit Noe Baza, a man who we
contacted on the street the other day. He and his son, Eric, both
graciously invited us in to share the message of the Restoration with
them. It was a really awesome lesson, and they both said that they
would be baptized if they came to find out that our message is true.
Noe prayed at the end of the lesson and asked to know if the Church is
true, so they have the real intent. When people have the desire to
receive an answer and are also willing to act, God will answer them.
God knows the desires of our hearts, so He also knows if we are
willing to take the step of faith needed to receive an answer.
Friday, August 22nd, 2014:
Before beginning weekly planing, Elder Crane and I went with Fred
Peralta to a park in Glendora to take a couple of picture for a
Facebook event called "I Follow Him." We also ended up going with Fred
to a bike store to pick up some miscellaneous parts for the bikes.
Personally, I have found that biking in this area doesn't really help
us get more work done, but it does make us run out of plans for the
day much quicker. Regardless, we have been biking the whole week. Our
area in Azusa is definitely one of the more challenging areas in the
mission because the majority of our area is full of rich Caucasian
people who aren't interested in anything that we have to say. We have
to be very creative and smart in our plans to find the
Spanish-speaking people who will listen to us. After we finished
weekly planning, we went to go teach Richie about the importance of
service callings in the Church. He always amazes me with his progress,
and the questions he asked today were very intelligent. Elder Crane
and I also taught Richie how to tie a tie. Later in the day, we
finally were able to meet Hermana Castillo, who has been in Mexico the
better part of the past two months. She seems like an awesome member
who has great desires to share the gospel with those she comes into
contact with. We finished our evening by teaching the Restoration to a
couple named Mario and Maria Perez. Mario was very quiet, but Maria
was a really stuck up Christian lady who kept saying that she already
knew everything about what we were teaching her. The Spirit can't be
present if we try to convince people that what we teach is true, so it
makes teaching stubborn people quite difficult. It made me think how
frustrated Heavenly Father must be when He is trying to teach me.
Saturday, August 23rd, 2014:
There was a decent turnout for soccer today, and it was really fun to
play with the ward again. I aways enjoy playing with the ward because
it is a wonderful way to build unity with everyone. Elder Crane is a
really good athlete, and he did really well for his first time playing
soccer. After soccer ended, Elder Crane and I quickly went over to
Glendora to have a lesson with Waldemar Turcios. To our dismay, no one
was home. It has been a nightmare trying to stay in contact with all
of our investigators because they almost never seem to show up to
appointments. Plus, they all have really inconsistent work schedules,
making it tough to set up anything. It seems like our area (Glendora
and San Dimas) is very rich, and the people living here have to work
double to be able to maintain their style of life; as a result, it
makes our job of helping them progress in the gospel very difficult.
Elder Crane and I decided to try to stop by a few of the potential
investigators who were scattered throughout San Dimas. We ended up
biking a giant loop that took well over two hours to cover. I was
exhausted, parched and starving at the end of such a long bike ride in
the sun without lunch. We have been trying to sacrifice anything and
everything to find people to teach, and nothing seems to be working.
We did, however, find out that a number of the addresses of old
potential investigators and former investigators are incorrect; for
instance, one of the names was supposed to be located in an apartment
complex, but the address given was actually a small business that
sells fountains for the yard. It is necessary to go through the Area
Book to go through and ensure that everything is current so that
future missionaries don't end up wasting time with things that are
very outdated. We made our way back from San Dimas and went to eat
dinner with the Martinez family. We talked with Hermano and Hermana
Martinez about the importance of staying faith-filled, despite the
struggles that we all encounter in life. Elder Crane and I then went
to teach a man named Steve. We began to teach him the Restoration
right there on his doorstep. He has a lot of experiences with LDS
people in the past, so he was kind of familiar with some of our basic
beliefs. I don't know how well he actually understood what we were
teaching him, but we are going to return on Wednesday to review
everything. To conclude our day, we stopped by Paula Lopez again to
read a little out of the Book of Mormon with her. We used the story of
Enos praying to invite her to pray more fervently for a missionary
opportunity. It is amazing just how powerful the Book of Mormon is; it
is truly the most powerful tool in the conversion of an individual.
Sunday, August 24th, 2014:
Church was really good today because there were a lot of people who
decided to come. It seems like there is never a consistent number that
attend; the attendance seems to fluctuate pretty drastically. I was
able to see Hermana Arriaga from Chino again, which made me miss my
first area a lot. It's kind of strange being so close to my first area
and serving in an area so similar because it makes me miss serving
there so much. I think I have grown really attached to Chino. It was
Elder Crane's birthday today, and Hermana Peralta's daughter, Vanessa,
also has her birthday on Tuesday; as a result, there was a birthday
party with all of the Peralta family at the house, and we were
invited! The Hermanas in our district also made Elder Crane a cake, so
we devoured it pretty fast after we all sang "Happy Birthday" to him.
During the day, we found out that a number of the addresses in
Glendora and San Dimas appear to be incorrect or don't exist. It is
kind of frustrating when people don't update the Area Book because we
are then forced to clean out four to five years worth of old names and
records that are likely outdated. We got a lot of work done, though.
During the afternoon, we talked with Obi Jimenez for a few minutes. It
sounds like he has received his answer that he needs to serve a
mission and that he needs to leave soon. He is worried about leaving
UCLA, but everyone sacrifices something to go out and serve the Lord.
If our desire and intent is to put Him first, everything else will
work itself out. Elder Crane and I also contacted a man named Jaime
Lopez and began teaching him about the Restoration. I don't what it
has been about this week, but all of the new people that we have found
are beginning to look pretty poor, in terms of quality of
investigators. People don't seem to have the desire to act on what we
share, and it is really sad to see! I feel like we are teaching well
(obviously there is always room for improvement), and I'm not sure
what the key piece is that we are missing right now. We concluded our
day by teaching Carlos Magana briefly about how fatherhood helps us
understand the nature of our own Heavenly Father. Of all of the titles
that Deity could have chosen to refer to himself, He wants us to call
him "Father."
This week has been really busy, and I hope that the business
translates into success in missionary work. The other Elders had two
baptisms yesterday which was really exciting to hear, and I hope that
our area will begin picking up soon! I appreciate all of your love and
support, and I hope that everyone has a fantastic week!
Love,
Elder Gabriel Valley
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