Thursday, October 17, 2013

"Please Don't Use That Kind of Language" (October 14, 2013)

[Calvin caught Suzie driving  - I'm certain she pulled over to chat with him...!?]
On Oct 14, 2013, at 6:56 AM, "Robert Wiley" <robert.wiley@myldsmail.net> wrote:
   hey whattup

On Mon, Oct 14, 2013 at 4:10 PM, Wiley, Suzanne <swiley@king5.com> wrote:
   Crap!! Driving to work so can't chat!! Love u
On Oct 14, 2013, at 7:15 AM, "Robert Wiley" <robert.wiley@myldsmail.net> wrote:
   please dont use that kind of language

On Mon, Oct 14, 2013 at 4:31 PM, Wiley, Suzanne <swiley@king5.com> wrote:

   Write me a letter goof!! Not in office yet!!

ok starting now.

This was prob the longest week of my mission. very stressful. but everything turned out great.

Tuesday we had like the most frustrating lesson of my life, but also the most spiritual?? So there is an inactive woman who got baptized back in November. We had never met her before but Bishop asked us to go by. We go by one night, thinking she would be some crazy old lady, but she answers the door, and she´s like this gorgeous 40 year old blonde woman, who looked like a real housewife of beverly hills or something. She was really nice and let us in, and her house was SOOO nice. The biggest TV I´ve ever seen. We were thinking, this is the jackpot, she´s really rich, really nice, she´s gonna invite us over to eat all the time!!

Ok so she tells us she had a dream that an Angel dressed in white told her to get baptized, so she did. But then after the baptism she found out about tithing, and temples. She can´t believe that our church has so many temples around the earth. She says God doesn´t want temples blah blah blah. She told us she´s afraid because she read in the Bible about a Great and Abominable Church of the Devil. But it only mentions a great and abominable church in the BOOK OF MORMON!!!!! She said that the growth of the Church in 200 years was too rapid and that she´s afraid we are the great and abominable church...we bore our testimonies so hard. I´ve never felt the spirit so strong. After I finished my testimony it was really quiet. She looked like she was about to cry. It was obvious she felt the spirit. She stays quiet for a second, and then says ¨I just don´t think God wants temples. I´m afraid this is the great and abominable church¨. It was such a rollercoaster....  I honestly think it´s best if we left her alone for a while. We´ll see. Crazy...

Ok Thursday was the crazy day. So we have S...., who had a baptismal date Saturday. We go over to her house Thursday with the Zone Leader to do the baptismal interview. We all sit down (four of us missionaries) and are chatting with her. And she says, I don´t know, this seems really fast, I don´t know how I feel about it. This is the first time she´s ever had doubts. Then she says, well I heard that mormons have 5 wives. We said no, and explained that. Well you guys don´t believe in the bible, right? we said we do. Well why are there only white people in the church? we said there arent and explained that. We asked if she had any more questions and she said yes, but she couldnt remember. Then someone knocked on the door. It was "someone who comes and helps her with her chores" (although we had never seen or heard of this woman before). She and S.... go into the back room for a second, then S.... comes back and says, it just all seems so fast. i heard that you baptize dead people. i read it in a book. So we realized that that person who came over was a testigo, and she and a bunch of testigos had been talking with her and giving her anti-mormon stuff. We were freakin inside, but then elder lish interviewed her, and we all went into the other room and prayed for her to remember her testimony and stuff. she passed the interview and stuff, but then we left and she left too and was going to hang with her testigo friends all night. i thought for sure she was a goner. that night elder n cried his eyes out as he talked to one of [her] friends who´s a member. the friend said she´d go over and talk with S.... in the morning.

so friday morning was tense we had zone conference, but we were still pretty distressed. the friend called and said that she went and talked with S..., and brought a couple other members over, and they all just shared scriptures in the bible that just whipped up on the testigos, and everything went back to normal. what a relief.

president called after zone conference for transfers. elder nuñez left, and i´m going to be with elder buckway. we were in the mtc together and we were companions one day in the mtc. he´s a good guy, i´m excited. 

friday night the valiant (primary) girls invited us to a dinner at the capilla. we thought it´d be some little thing that they´d probably forget about. but we got there and it was a full meal they all made, with the table set and everything. they all shared a spiritual thought and we ate. they told us how nervous they were for the dinner. it was so adorable i wanted to cry. then they sang a couple songs. i have vids on my camera i´m not sure if they uploaded to dropbox.

then saturday morning, we called S... an hour before the baptism to see if she was on her way, but she told us she wasn't sure if she wanted to get baptized. so we run over there, thinking we´re gonna have [some issues], but we got there and everything was fine. she just had to get dressed. we showed up for the baptism a little late. but it was all good. then yesterday i confirmed her in sacrament, which was tough and i was nervous, but it was better than the last confirmation i did.

yayyy i felt really spiritual!!!!!

transfers were pretty exciting. excited to be in charge of this area [District Leader]. hopefully we can have a few more baptisms this transfer.

love ya!!!

Monday, October 14, 2013

I miss Reeses (October 7, 2013)

Doesn't this look like the Port of Seattle? Cruise Ship and all... (Cadiz)
Let´s see we saw all the sessions except for Sunday afternoon. They showed Saturday afternoon in the chapel between Priesthood and the Sunday morning session which we watched last night. It just wasn´t required so a lot of the members left to go home for a bit. But of course we watched it. I missed a lot of Saturday afternoon though because we had to find a way for one of our investigators to get to conference. I don´t remember seeing anyone with the last name hamilton...was it the sunday afternoon session? I really liked Uchtdorf´s in Priesthood as well. He quoted the Great Gatsby "and we float on, like boats against the current, borne back ceaselessly into the past". Also I really like Ulisses Soares about meekness, but it was hard to follow his talk so I´m gonna have to read it again. Bednar´s talk on tithing was incredible. President Monson´s talk Sunday morning was really good too. There was so much content in it I need to reread it. 

I took some good notes but I don´t have my notebook with me. One thing I remembered I wrote down was "do we keep the commandments because it´s a law, or do we keep them because we want the blessings?"

I miss reece´s

That´s terrible about Maddie [broken arm]. She must not be keeping the commandments. (lol)

I just have Pday with the missionaries here in Chiclana...elder nunez, hall, and gutierrez.

I added some pics from conference. the one at night that i´m not in (because i took it) is with the other elders in chiclana, as well as jacqueline, (the redhead tall girl) who´s a member in our ward and her little sister. i told maddie about J.... her mom is not active and was the only member in the family. one day a couple years ago jacqueline realized she wanted to change her life and she remembered that her mom was a mormon so she just went by herself to church one sunday and then got baptized. no one else in her family is member or really supports her. i invited her to invite her sister to come play soccer with us saturday morning, and she came and then said she wanted to come to conference too so we took her and her sister to conference with us. i´d like to baptize the whole family but i wont get greedy...



also there´s a photo of me and our investigator S... whos getting baptized saturday. shes in the white, and then the two peruvian women are members, and then the other woman is a member as well. FUN FUN!!!!

transfers are next week. i hope elder n leaves because i want to train. there are a bunch of people that can get baptized here and i feel like i can do it... i know thats not very humble but really, i´m ready. 

love ya muchoooooooooooooooo


hope conference was great and spiritual!!!!