IF WE PUT ON THE ARMOR OF GOD, OR STUDY THE SCRIPTURES AND PRAY AND KEEP THE COMMANDMENTS, WE CAN MAKE SATAN FEAR US AS WELL BECAUSE WE WILL NOT FALL INTO TEMPTATION.

hey mom!

i am studying in alma right now. i just started the war chapters and yeah. not much to report there. just war. i did like though how captain moroni first prepared his warriors with armor and then he sent them off to battle. the lamanites were afraid of them when they saw the nephites. its the same with satan. if we put on the armor of god, or study the scrips and pray and keep the commandments, we can be able to make satan fear us as well because we will not fall into temptation. elder h is awesome. he is almost like a long lost brother jaja. he is on his second area. so big news. we got an email today telling us who is going to be the new mission president starting in august around there. he is 53 years old and from elche, spain. so that is something cool to know. one of the other elders is here. he is elder p. he is from st george utah. he was supposed to train but his newbie didnt get his visa from what we know. so since thursday we have been in a trio. its not easy because the people see us as three north americans who are dressed wierd, who would let us in their house? so its been a challenge but we are getting through it. hopefully his newbie gets here sooon though. so we are trying to find new things to do. we have spent a lot of time in centro area and it hasnt really worked out. so we are venturing farther and farther away from the middle of bolivar. 

we had two new investigators last week. neither came to church. we also had two investigators in church. two kids of that one family who lives far away. they are 10 and 12 years old. we just need to find a way to get out there and teach them. as of right now, we need to keep up the animo. the zone leaders told me yesterday in our phone call to pass the weekly stats that we lacked the hunger to find. i guess i could see it. sometimes as missionaries, we see the people sitting outside drinking mate and just talking with a bunch of people and she inch away sheepish like. i am gettting better at it but it is still hard. i remember a conference talk about having to be commited. he gave the example of two kids gettting ready to cliff jump and right as one was about to jump the other said wait, but he couldnt stop, he was alreeady committed. its the same with us. if we just throw ourselves in there and say hola, then we cant back out. i thought a lot about that these last couple weeks. we are really trying to be 100% obedient and its working out well. last week we got eaten alive by the mosquitos. they were horrible here. so as district leader, i have to plan district meetings and relay what goes on in my district to the zone leaders.  so yeah. well mom, i cant think of anything else. so take care! love you!

elder jones

BIG NEWS. BOLIVAR IS GOING TO HAVE FOUR ELDERS NOW!!!

hey mom!

im glad you enjoyed my email :) so transfers have come and gone once more. elder w has left me for edo. castex. i am now with elder h. he is from idaho falls. he is from the same group as elder l and elder w. so its pretty cool i guess. big news. bolivar is going to have four elders now. although the other two elders arent here yet. one of them was going to train another, but the newbie didnt get his visa so he wont be getting here this week i believe. but i have also been made district leader here. i guess presidente really trusts me! jaja. so it rained a bunch last week. after lunch on thursday, we got a ride back to the house because we needed our jackets and boots. the water was up to knee height. i took a video and will send it home next week. it was like we were in a boat almost. 

so c didnt make it to church. neither did j. we already dropped j though. she wasnt progressing. c, i am losing faith on. she is never home. i think we will stop passing by. we really just need new investigators. this sunday, a family from a city about 50 kilometers away came to church. they are a less active family. they have four kids, three of whom are not baptized and over the age of eight. so tomorrow we are heading out with the mission leader hermano v. they feel alone out in the pueblo, urdampilleta. so we are going to try to teach them too. the dad teaches tae kwon do. so maybe i may learn a thing or two :D since elder w got the call that he was leaving, we have been meeting a lot of people. today, on the way to the ciber, we met a dude named m. he said hello as we walked by and then we ended up talking to him and he gave us his number. we also got the number of a taxi driver named a. and the parents of elder w's convert, m, told us to pass by this week. we gave the mom a blessing and a book of mormon. so we are going to try and start teaching them this week today. well mom, that is about it for now. i love you! i have all my pics saved on a usb flash drive. so i will just keep the sd card for now. i love you!!!

 

con cariño

elder jones

I AM TRYING TO DO THOSE THINGS THAT I HAVE LEARNED, LIKE DOING THE WORK IN THE LORD'S WAY INSTEAD OF MINE, TAKING THE TIME TO UNDERSTAND THE SCRIPTURES ETC.

hey mom!

well, yes i got your package. well, with all the new investigators we found, not any progress. werent able to find any of the new investigators to teach once more. we called c saturday night and found out she was in the hospital with her five year old, he had had an accident or something and she wasnt able to make it to church that day. so we pretty much didnt have any investigators at church on sunday. j did come to church. but we talked with her afterwards and have pretty much dropped her now. she doesnt want to get married and neither does her marido. so we really just need to find more newbies. today, we are in olavarria. we came to be with the senior missionaries. they had all the missionaries from olavarria over plus us to have lunch. then they showed us pictures of their missions in southafrica, madagascar and china. pretty much they are amazing. i want to be like them. i also realized i want to go travel the world. we also had interviews with presidente  this week. he gave a great talk before interviews about doing things in the way of the Lord, instead of our way. in 1 nephi 17:8-10 it talks about nefi building the ship in the Lords way instead of his way. but he had to wait to be shown how to do it. before he was shown, he had to follow all the commandments and then after everything he did, he was shown how to build the boat, where to go to get the materials and then he did it. it was pretty awesome and i learned that i need to read the scriptures even slower to try and get the things the spirit is telling me. we shouldnt speed through the scriptures when we read. we are to learn and apply what we learn to ourselves and our lives. i havent been the best at that and now i am trying to do those things that i have learned, like doing the work in the Lords way instead of mine, taking the time to understand the scriptures etc... we got a new mission leader called as well. its the old branch president. so i think we will have a lot more success having another mission leader. our old mission leader is still having problems though. members have stopped coming because of the hipocrisy they have seen in the church. so we are having to do a lot of damage control. elder f talked with us today about how we reallly are here to fix problems. not just go for a cake walk. he said we should take a step back sometimes and just realize that we are here to fix the problems and that we pretty much set apart to fix them. well mom, i love you. take care! 

love elder jones

EVEN THOUGH WE FOUND A LOT, WE CAN'T STOP LOOKING, WE HAVE TO KEEP INCREASING OUR TEACHING POOL AND TEACH TO THE NEW INVESTIGATORS

howdy mom

 

well last week was pretty good i can say. concerning our mission leader, he is no longer active or so he says. he resigned from his calling. and he didnt come to church. so we are trying to figure out what to do with him. elder w and i are getting along well. no problems. no, i havent got my package yet. we did divisiones last week. so i stayed here in bolivar with elder j, our district leader. we found 6 new investigators. and when we switched back, we got two more, elder w and i. so i think we had a pretty good week. and we now have a total of 9 baptismal fechas. for now, only one of them seems really solid. she is about 23 years old and she has a kid about 5 years old and another about 6 months old. a year ago, she lost another child, a girl, to cancer i believe. the girl was about 1 year old. but she read and believes its true. we only have to get her to church now. but other than that, we just have to keep finding newbies. even though we found a lot, we cant stop looking, we have to keep increasing our teaching pool AND teach to the new investigators. so we have to balance our time even better this week. well mom, i love you. take care. until next week!

 

elder jones