Monday, May 22, 2017

Week 42: Walner is baptized!

Warner's Baptism
Saturday May 20th, 2017
Elder Moradel & Elder Wolfe together for at least 3 more months
Zone Conference 
This is back when we went to the temple a few weeks ago
Well first off, sorry I didn’t write a big email last week. It was mother’s day so I got to talk with the family and didn’t have the  biggest desire to write a big email. I will talk about the best and worst parts of last week though.
Tuesday and Wednesday where normal in the sense that we left and visited people like normal. Thursday we helped some near by missionaries move houses. That was fun but I sweated a lot because we did it at 2 in the afternoon when the sun was roasting us. We came back to the house and got all cleaned up. We went to our appointments and the first 3 fell through so we tried to find new people and didn’t get anyone. We also had a meeting  and then our last appointment fell through. Just a rough day.

Friday wasn’t  any better. We were cooking lunch when we got a knock on the door. It was odd because people don´t come to our house very often. I opened the door and I found one of the member’s daughter telling me ¨He died.” I was thrown off because I didn’t understand who but she then said that her dad died. He was 40 years old and was a less active. I have been visiting the guy ever since I got here in this area. He was super cool and fun to visit and was really progressing! He was in the process of preparing to baptize his daughter. He passed away of a heart attack.  We later went to his house to help the family out. He has a wife and two daughters who live with him. They were very strong to be honest. What they do here in this country is they have the casket in the house, open for the people to see him. Finally we helped a lot of friends from the ward load him up into a truck to go straight to the cemetery. Once we got there my companion and I were some of the people who helped carry him to his grave. That was something I have never done before, especially someone I knew pretty close. They buried him and then we went back to their house. We sang hymns and talked with them about how this is part of life. It was a very sad day in the mission for me.

This week went by really fast! On Wednesday we were invited to eat at a member’s house. That was super fun because we ate and played a lot of dominos. We ate white rice with pigon beans and ham in the beans. Super good! 

Thursday I got to help a member out by fixing part of her washer. It was something super easy and I had it done in like 3 minutes once I got the part. The member’s mom is of a different religion and doesn’t like that her daughter changed churches. She still lives with her mom because she got divorced.  We are now teaching the member’s daughter so hopefully we gain a little trust of the member’s mom. We had a good appointment with a friend of ours that is having troubles leaving an addiction. We made a plan with him how he is going to drop this addiction & so far so good!

Friday we had a zone conference. The same stuff as normal but I forgot some things so it was good. That took almost all day but we did get to go visit a couple people in the evening. One of my recent converts in this are in going to seminary on her own now!

This week is transfers and we all thought I was going to leave so we have been talking to the cooler families and planning lunches and dinners so Saturday we ate a family of investigators. All the appointments fell through pretty much but luckily we had a baptism at night. The baptism went really well! His name is Walner. He is 31 and he is SUPER cool! He is what we call gold here on the mission! Sunday he received the Holy Ghost. I also ¨played¨ the piano. It’s electric and no one in the ward took the time to learn how to play it. It helped invite the spirit a lot! After church we met some new people and also the bishop left with us for a bit. We ate at a members house. It was SOO good! I will attach a picture. Its called ¨Mangu of plantane and salami¨. It was a good week! Not super awesome spiritual experiences but a good week!


Elder Wolfe

Week 41: Mother's Day Chat

Mother's Day Chat  
Family Photo Op
Jeff called us on our way home from church for our Mother's Day chat.  It was so fun to hear & see him.  He was at the church on a member's laptop.  It was pretty clear in the beginning, but as he added other lines on it became difficult to hear him.  Grandma & Grandpa Wolfe came up to the house to say hi.  Grandma Joyce & Aunt Jackie called in to say hi.  Zach, Brady & Jennica were on  the call as well.  He stayed on for 3 hours.  He had some great stories of baptisms, funeral processions, dogs, companions, wet weather & life in the DR.  He didn't write a letter the next day as we had just talked to him.  He's doing very well & is happy.  Everything a momma needs to know about her kiddo.  Ben, Hannah & I are going to the DR for a dental humanitarian trip in June.  We won't see him, but Jeff gave us a list of things to bring to the mission home for himself & his companions.  Some wet weather gear.  Logically ask the Oregonians to help you in that department.  We're so grateful he's working hard, loving the people & enjoying the work.

Tuesday, May 9, 2017

Week 40: Dariely's Baptism!

Group 5-8-17

Dariely's Baptism Day

Well what a week! It was very fast again! Gratefully it wasn’t full of rain. It has actually been pretty dry and we have been able to dry a lot of things out. My bed even felt wet at night when I would go lay down because of the humidity.

Last Monday we had a very solid P-Day because we went to the mall. I love going there because I feel at home in the sense that it feels like America. We headed over there & then cleaned the house.

One of the best parts this week is that I got a reactivation of mine to go on a mini-mission. It is very common here for the young men above 18 years old to go on little missions. This one in specific will be going to the countryside for about 3 weeks or more. We went and dropped him off on Wednesday.
                
Another cool thing this week was Thursday we had splits with the assistants to the president. One of them was in this area before and his converts needed some of his inspiration, you could say.  I had some really good help with  the baptism this weekend. It’s all planed out! I didn´t have to say anything!
                
Friday was good but nothing worth noting here. Saturday was fun because we had a baptism. In the morning we played basketball then we cleaned the chapel. We came home for lunch and got the clothes all ready. We left for a little bit before the baptism. We reminded people about the baptism and even brought another investigator to it. Getting started was a goose chase and I was pretty ticked off. The baptism was planned at 6pm and so many people showed up late. We couldn’t start because no one from the bishopric was there. The bishop didn’t say he couldn’t come, and one forgot, and the other thought the others were going. Only one of them came and he got there at 7:30p. At least we had a good turn out. There was about 30 or more people there and we had about 10 other investigators come and see it. The baptism went so well and the reverence was amazing! It all went smooth and I got to baptize her. After the baptism we went back to the house of Dariely’s & we ate hot dogs. It was a super good Saturday.
                
Sunday was another amazing day. Our companionship had 9 investigators at church, but together with the other set of missionaries in this ward we had 18 investigators in church! We also had over then 12 less actives in church. We hit a high in attendance at church of 123 people. Dariely, the girl we baptized, even shared her testimony! After church we had a couple members leave with us to some of the appointments and we set 2 more baptism dates. One for the 20th of this month that I am pretty much positive will go through, and the other for the 10th of June that is about 80 percent positive. There names are Walner and Ashly. The girl Ashly went to the baptism and asked me if I could baptize her. I said yes if she prepares before I leave.
                
This week was so fast and the work is getting a lot better. We have to keep it up though. I hope I don´t get transferred in two weeks. We have a weird transfer of 3 weeks and I hope I go after that. That would make it so I can baptize Ashly on the 10 of June. I thank all you guys for all your love, prayers, and support!


Elder Wolfe

Not worthy to be called a motorcycle.

After helping with the flood damage.

Off to serve a mini mission!
Dariely's Baptism








Thursday, May 4, 2017

Week 39: What more can you ask for!

Group 5-1-2017

What a week!  It was an odd week because we went to the temple and had to change our P-Day but it wasn’t to bad. Just to let you know, it was another full week of rain. It rained every single day!
                
Anyways to start things we had the wonderful opportunity to go to the temple on Tuesday. That was super fun and well needed. We got to eat lunch there and my companion and I got to eat one on one with our mission president and his wife.

On Wednesday we had exchanges with other missionaries again from my district. His name is Elder Agilar from Mexico. I live with him but we left for my area for the day. He is super fun, a little short Mexican! What more can you ask for!  We did have a sad appointment because we found, once again, another less active. Once again the reason is because she doesn’t have a testimony of the Book of Mormon. We did have a good appointment though with an investigator named Ashley. She is the daughter of a member that didn’t like the church at first but now she is a lot more engaged and animated to grow closer to our God. It is super fun to teach her and that day we taught her about
the sacrament and the endurance until the end. I always share the words from Elder Bednar, from the Quorum of the 12 Apostles of Jesus Christ that live today. He said that to endure to the end is if we are continually exercise our faith in Christ through repentance to be worthy to partake of the sacrament in remembrance of His sacrifice for us. If we are doing that we are enduring to the end. I love those words from him and it makes me think if we do not endure to the end, we let Jesus Christ suffer every pain and sickness, to the point that he bleed from every pore, so that we could be of the world and his sacrifice pretty much was nothing. You are going to live again thanks to him but the quality of your next life depends on how you act here. Don’t postpone your day to repent please.

The best part of my Thursday is that we had a great meeting with our new Ward mission leader. This is a member of the ward that helps the missionaries find specific members help specific investigators. This new guy is super great and is very dedicated! Also it was dad’s birthday and a cool members birthday also!

We always have good days but nothing out of the normal. Saturday was cool because my whole zone went to an area in the zone to help people. It has been raining a lot and a river overflowed and damaged a lot of houses and filled every thing with mud so we helped out with that. We got there at 7 in the morning and left at 3 in the afternoon! It was super fun though to help out! I also got to ride a bike that has a motor. It isn´t worthy to be called a motorcycle but that was fun! Take a look at the pictures of that bad boy! We also had a baptism interview and our investigator passed! She will be baptised this next Saturday and I will be doing the ordinance. I hope that this Ward will give her support.
                
Sunday was also normal. We found out that a family is having some pretty big problems but we are going to help them fix it. It  was  a good week and I hope you all have another great one. Awesome to hear all of these mission calls!


Elder Wolfe
Elders are still 18-20 year old boys!


As his mother, I'm thinking, "does that wig have lice?" 

Service day: Helping after a river overflowed & flooded people's homes.