Family Night Inspiration

Met the new mission president, President Montoya from Peru, suuuper awesome guy, he taught a lesson on super deep, profound doctrine which blew us all away

Also his conversion story is cool. He grew up Catholic but always had questions about God and the church, he went to a ton of other churches, adventists, Jehova's Witnesses, other Christian churches, etc. but found that they were all missing different things, and one day two sister missionaries contacted him by accident, looking for someone else, and as they were walking away, one turned around and was like "you wouldn't want to hear a message about Jesus Christ would you?" and he was like heck yeah, they came in and he said they taught like crap haha, they didnt ask any questions or anything they just taught the first lesson, he said after he still had a million questions but he was interested in seeing how the Mormons were, he kept meeting with them, read the BoM in 2 days then Doctrine and Covenants as well, just looking for answers, and after praying and thinking for about 2 months he got baptized, and now he's a mission president

We traveled to Sucre, the Capitol of Boliva, and in the city area its suuuuuuper nice i forgot i was in Bolivia, it was super beautiful and nice, unfortunately we didn't have much time for pics and sightseeing, ill send a few pics later

Since we had to travel with like 30 plus missionaries we just rented a bus for the 4 hour drive and it was super fun to just chill with every one

No baptism, all her fam was out of town for an emergency so it got postponed

After knocking doors for like 4 hrs one day me and my comp were desperate for ideas for finding new people to teach, and we came up with the idea to do family nights at members houses and they can bring friends or investigators, we just wanted more member help cause there was none, so we were gonna bring it up in branch council and before we even said anything branch pres turns to us and basically tells us the same idea, like him and the whole branch and us had the same idea at the same time, super cool so now we have all the members addresses and numbers and fam nights scheduled, idk why but there was like no member help before, now there is, Uyuni is finally an area :D

Hopefully not too boring of an email, ill send cool pics later hopefully!

Elder G

Yellow!

Asked a little kid if he knew any english words and he's like yeah, yellow, and we asked him what it meant and he's like yeah, hola

Things are going great with the new comp, were actually working and following rules and its great, already seeing the blessings

Saturday we had 9 appointments and 8 canceled :D so we tried to contact but these two idiot dogs that aparrently love us started following us around to all the doors, and so wed knock on a door (literally everyone here has like 3 dogs) and they're dogs would start barking and our pokemon pet dogs would bark at them and then the person would answer and they'd get in a fight like right in front of us, when were trying to talk to a stranger about the church, that happened a few times, nice and awkward, and we couldn't get the dogs to go away no matter what we did lol they even came to church with us yesterday

2 awesome lessons from this week:

We contacted this dude on the street and found out he actually lives right above us, he just moved in. We went yesterday for the first appointment and were talking for a bit and asking questions, and he came out to us and told us everything, he started crying he said he had just gotten back from the cemetery visiting his friends, and was like would you like to know where they are right now? and he said yes and we taught a very good lesson on the Plan of Salvation, whether he gets baptised or not, it was awesome to share that with him

Another lady, first lesson as well, probably one of my best lessons on the mish, she asked a ton of questions, and was very interested, after literally 2 hours, we had taught 3 lessons as well as a lesson about the book of mormon, then she bore her testimony to us, she is one that has always been interested in religion, and tried some churches but they always lacked in something, it went very well and we're inviting her to baptism tonight

Awesome week. I will meet the new Pres on Wednesday in Sucre, the white city!

Elder Swenson

Be of Good Cheer

Elder Stevens from Idaho! First American comp

So I got a new comp this week :D my other comp had some issues with his back and the cold so he complained to president and he took him out

New comp is Elder Stevens, my first white comp so we can speak english :D He's super awesome and not lazy, we workin hard

Also got a new mission president! President Montoya, haven't met him yet, ill kinda miss being able to speak english with the president

Moved houses which was extremely fun

knocked on a door and like 5 little kids came out and we asked for their parents and they said they weren't there, so we were like oh ok, were missionaries we talk about Jesus Christ, do you know who Jesus Christ is? and one of the little girls was like no, Jesus doesn't live here. lol dang it

Elder G

These things I have spoken unto you, that in me ye might have peace. In the world ye shall have tribulation: but be of good cheer; I have overcome the world. John 16:33

Joseph Smith was a prophet!

Laying on some random half built house in the middle of nowhere it looked like minecraft

Sorry i tell yall the same things every week haha, we contacted a ton, taught some first lessons, not a whole lot really came of it. Its getting sort've rough to just contact all day, teach a lesson or two to a "new" investigator, but were not getting any new legitimate investigators

We still hustlin tho

We get a new mission president this week on Friday!

President Hansen has been awesome, super great guy, and inspiring, i'm glad he was able to get me started on the mish

Took another lovely trip to Tupiza, none of you know where that is, and neither do I really, but its a 7 hour bus ride from here one way, more than half is off road, and its at night when its super cold so its like a bumpy fridge that makes you super nauseated

Also love when people do the teaching for us lol, another story this week, we were teaching Mayra the girl thats gonna get baptized, we were teaching about tithing and her mom kept interrupting about random crap, not being rude but totally interrupting and asking a bunch of unrelated questions about Joseph Smith and the BoM, and finally her daughter just turns to her and is like but mom, you have to realize Joseph Smith was a prophet! Me and my comp looked at each other and were just like ye

Pics this week: llamma, and me taking a break from our minecraft house construction

Peace

The Lord Needs to be a Priority in Your Life

The house we painted (inside)

This guy could show Utahns how to food storage

A bucket of cement I pulled up on a pulley -- 

they had to load a bunch of buckets on top of the roof

yeah we found this cool guy who told us he was looking for a church to join, he's one of the few ppl here that has actually read the bible lol he knows it very well, and he actually read the pamphlet we left with him 😀

 his only problem is it says in a ton of places in the NT that there will be false prophets in our day, so he said he was skeptical about joseph smith but super nice about it, which i can see how he could see that as a false prophet, it was the first time in his life he had heard of him, anyways i was just like heres a book of mormon, keep studying the bible, be wed like you to atl east try this too and see what it says, and he said he'd read it, and i trust him cause he's read the bible multiple times and actually read our pamphlet lot

Contacted a ton more people, door to door to door to door, met some cool people

Moved a GIANT pile of dirt from the side of the pension's house to the back yard

Was a bolivian construction worker for a day -- did some construction work with one of the members

Ive been on a mission for over 9 months!!! 

After a lesson with a new investigator we made an appointment with her dad who was also there, he lives somewhere else so we got an appointment at his house and then we asked the lady what other day shed like us to come back and shes like i dont have time, and her dad turns to her and just goes off, like you need to make time for these hermanos, the Lord needs to be a priority in your life, etc. 

Galatians 6:9

Teaching English... I'm Amazing!

"You are amazing Swenson!" –Blanca

Set a baptismal date with someone :D July 17th her birthday

Also met another dude and I asked him if he had any questions and he's like yeah, how does someone become a member of your church?

2 baptisms in Uyuni would be legendary

BoM is a great book, very inspiring and motivational

That same guy that roasted a Jehovas Witness also roasted everyone else at church, he gets up to the microphone and is like yeah today id like to talk about in punctuality, and he proceeded to destroy everyone, like if you're not on time it means you don't have control of your life, and it shows lack of respect, and I'm not exaggerating, more than 10 ppl walked in late during this talk which lasted like 15 min lol it was great.

Painted 2 houses this week

Gar

Blessings Come to Those Who Wait

Serving a dinner for Mother's Day

 Rock on the island in the middle of the salt flats

Pics from Tupiza

Not a ton from this week, just did a lot more contacting 

Had our last interviews with the mish pres before he leaves, hell be missed he is awesome, hell be at my homecoming tho cause he's gonna live in Utah :D also in the final prayer blessed that my future wife will be attractive :D

To get to Tupiza its a 7 hr bus ride, but theres no road so its super comfortable haha and it gets so cold inside you can see your breath

One day we actually had some appointments and people to visit and they all canceled on us, I guess we should've called before haha but we went to all their houses and they weren't home or couldn't talk at the time, and so 2 hours later we had done nothing, 2 hours of walking basically and all we learned was the nobody was home, buuut i saw we had an appointment with someone that we made the week before, and i was like yeah she wont be home but lets go anyways we have nothing else to do, well long story short she was actually home and we taught a great lesson and got a new investigator, prob doesn't sound that cool or interesting but that day it seriously was a blessing!

Taught another dude but he thought we had our own special bible so were like aight bring yours and he whips out a bible from the jehovas witnesses which is pretty different so we were nervous but the scriptures we shared were pretty much the same.

I'll do cooler stuff this week lol so i have something to write

Bye