Week 93: Rise and SHOUT!

So for church we meet in the same building as the metro ward (the English ward) and one of the members talked to me at their linger-longer and asked me if I'd heard about the BYU game. I said no, and then he told me that they SMOKED Texas!! Ranked 15th in the nation! YES! Anyway, returning to normal Elder Gardner mode.

Mom - Thanks for the pic :) Sounds like you're working hard with the canning! I've been thinking about food and how fun it will be to cook you some real down home arroz y habichuelas Puerto Rican style! And tostones and all that stuff. It'll be great. That's pretty interesting that Matt and his friend Aryn leave the same day. It's great though to hear about all the missionaries coming out to join the ranks! I heard we'll be topping off around 100,000 in the field by the end of the year!! Awesome. :) There's a kid here who just sent in his papers, so we're all guessing where he's gonna go. :) I remember those days...

Marilee - Hey! Now I have your email address so there's no excuse to not write me! ;) I'd love to hear from you and how you're doing. Love you!

Dad - Oh man… the best time of year: Halloween, football, and basketball seasons starting. That's really cool about that missionary fireside! It sounds like you had a pretty good experience with that.:)

A Utah plate in Puerto Rico

Anyway, it was a pretty sweet week this week. We did a lot of contacting, and we had this great experience. We were contacting in an urbanization in our area, and we saw this guy sitting outside his house. We talked to him and found out that he was a less active of a few years! We talked a bit more and he invited us over again later in the week. Then, not 3 minutes later, we talked to his neighbor, who is not a member, and he said he'd love to hear our message! Oh man that was really awesome. We were both super happy, and we were able to teach that less-active again. His neighbor was home but then had to leave for an emergency, so we'll hopefully be seeing him again this week. We also talked to the less active's neighbor on the other side, and she was really cool and so was the guy that was visiting her there. Besides that, we had some really spiritual lessons where we just taught pure doctrine and saw peoples' hearts start to change. We taught a less active about covenants and repentance, and he just straight told us what was stopping him from coming to church, as if it had been bothering him for a while and once he understood the doctrine, he decided to move on. It was really great. We had similar experiences with our investigators, too, and it's been great to be able to find some new people to teach this week.

It's really fantastic to be a missionary. :) I'm thankful that I have had this time to serve and that I have a little bit of time left. It's been a great adventure, and this week I want to testify of the Restoration. I know that this is the true Church of Jesus Christ. After Christ's death and the death of His Apostles, the authority was lost, and for the children of God to return to Him, there needed to be a restoration of the authority. Without the authority, no ordinances can be done. I know and testify with all my heart that in the spring of 1820, a young man's humble prayer was answered, and Joseph Smith saw God the Father and His Beloved Son, Jesus Christ. They told him that none of the other churches were true, and so in time, the priesthood was restored through the Prophet Joseph Smith, along with the ability to receive general revelation for the children of God. 12 apostles were also called, thus reestablishing the Church of Jesus Christ once more upon the earth. I know that this is true. Joseph was a prophet. He translated the Book of Mormon, which is the convincing evidence of the divinity of his calling and this church. I know that Jesus is the Christ, and that He leads and guides His church today through President Thomas S. Monson. He loves us. :)

Thank you for everything! I enjoyed the package, and I'm sure Elder Mello will love his once he gets it out there on Dominica. It's here in the office for right now, but it'll get out there at some point haha. Thank you, I love you all so much. Talk to you soon. :)

--

Elder Kimball Ray Gardner

Puerto Rico San Juan Mission

Week 69: We Had a Baptism

Hey y'all, we got a baptism this weekend!! Yay!! :) Anyway, I'll write to you all now. :)

Mom - I can't believe Easter is already here again! It was just barely Easter! I hope you have a great weekend with the Easter Egg Hunt and stuff - we're trying to pull off some kind of activity here for the investigators and stuff to come to; it'll be cool. Anyway, I pray for you always Mom, and just think - it's almost Mother's Day! :)

Dad - It seems like the whole theme of reach out and rescue is churchwide, because that's what our focus is as a mission. No more proselyting - we find the less actives and then we find investigators through them, and then we bring back the less actives and baptize the investigators. It's really cool to see how it's working so well here in Puerto Rico. But yeah, I'll keep my eyes out for the package, and thank you! That's really cool about the missionaries from the stake though! That's really amazing actually. And thanks for everything Dad, I keep you in my prayers too, as always! 

Marilee - Hey you! I hope you're doing alright! Tell me about school, about anything so I can write you back! I'll be sending some stuff for your birthday soon, so keep your eyes peeled. :) Love you!

Anyway, moving to our area, we had a really great experience like I already said with R… and his baptism, and he's already wanting to go out with us! He's going to come with us Tuesday evening with the nights of rescue, and he said he'd come with us on Thursday. He's so great!!! 

We had a really cool experience also with C…, who was sick. She asked us to come by and to give her a blessing of health, and she loved it. She came to church yesterday, and she said she loved it! She already knows it's all true, but for whatever reason she's a bit weak on her commitment for baptism.

We also want M… G… to accept a baptismal date this week. We had another great lesson this past week with her, and her friend accepted a Book of Mormon and said she'd go visit the church in the DR, because she's moving back there. Oh well, it was a cool experience. Anyway, M… said that she'd get baptized, but that she won't commit to a date until she really feels like this is the true church. We focused on her reading the Book of Mormon so that she can know, so we're really hoping that that will all work out for her.

We had a good lesson also with N… A… on the Word of Wisdom. We definitely have the support of his future wife, who said that she hates drinking and doesn't like that he does it. We're not sure if he totally understood everything about the Word of Wisdom, but we'll be following up on it, and I think M… will really help out with that.

And finally we have A… S…, a guy who just kind of found his way to the church and asked us to go teach him! He plays the accordion and is pretty cool. However, he's a bit hard to find, so hard to teach. We still need to sit down and go through how to begin teaching and the Restoration with him, so those are our plans for him this week.

Talking about less actives now, there was a cool experience this week where a man named J… M… just showed up to church out of nowhere, saying he wanted to come back! I remembered what you said during the meeting with Pres. Rosa about how because of the efforts of the members, the less-actives come back, even if it's not those who they visited. He's just a guy who came out of nowhere to visit the church! He has some problems with his mother not accepting us, but he says he's going to come every Sunday, so I'm really excited to start working with him and helping him on his way back.

Also, on Sunday, we went with Pres. Reyes, the EQP to Hno. Feliz' house to give him a blessing, because he had been sick. It was a really great experience, and I know that there was a friendship forged there. They were talking and getting along great, and who knows? Maybe a future counselor to Pres. Reyes? Not my call, but I could see it happening. It would be great for the both of them, but the Lord knows and whatever He wants is what'll happen.

Anyways, that's the week, and I'm going to try and send some pictures now. :) Love you and look forward to hearing from you next week!

Con mucho amor,

Elder Kimball Ray Gardner

Puerto Rico San Juan Mission