Week 71: Great Week

Hey Everyone, 

We had a great week. Lots of cool stuff going on! We had work visits, meetings and a lot of proselyting. It's gettin pretty toasty down here and I'm pretty content about that. The ward has been getting a lot more excited to help us so we are stoked about that! Now we have members coming with us to lessons every day! And they are taking investigators and referrals to church! YEEET! 

We are a little unsatisfied lately with our investigators that aren't coming to church, that's been our focus over the past couple weeks buts it's barely improving. Everyone says they'll come but basically nobody does!! BUTTT....we did have a CHRISTMAS MIRACLE yesterday. We were waiting at the doors before sac meeting, and a girl walked in that we hadn't seen before, we talked to her and found out that she came to church for 3 years when she was a teenager but her parents didn't let her get baptized cuz their fam is more Catholic than the Pope. But she came back for the first time after 4 years and we are gonna work with her hardcore so that she can get baptized on the 30th!!!! 

Also, changes are today!!! They AP´s will let us know tonight...I feel like I got a 50/50 chance of staying. It's got its pros and cons. I would enjoy a new companion though! This guy is finishing his mission in a month and he's gettin lazy and selfish. 

We'll see though!

Have a great week and everybody watch the #lighttheworld vid if you haven't already, and follow the daily challenges!!!

-Nos vemos amigazos

EATING AT THE DONCS!! I've missed McDonalds!

Classic pizza selfie, work visit with Elder Martinez.

Week 70: Just Pics

Jarett didn't send a group letter this week, but here are some great pics:

When we were looking for a reference at the top of our area.

My comp clocked out on the way home for the leadership meeting.

With members.

We found the rare Lima Lion.

FHE with some converts.

Week 69: Ups and Downs

This was probably the fastest week of the whole mish so far! It's cuz we were so busy, heres the scoop:

Monday—Killer p-day filled with ping pong and foosball.

Tuesday—Special meeting with president about our goals for December and how to reach them.

Wednesday—Temple trip!! It was awesome, we got to do the first session in the morning, then did baptisms for the dead with the ward...they did over 200 baptisms and my comp and I were the witnesses for all of them. It was awesome!

Thursday—Interviews with president—we have the biggest zone in the whole mission so it basically took the whole day. :/

Friday—A big service project to start Light the World! We cleaned the sidewalk of the main highway from one end of our zone to the other! 

Saturday–District meeting, work visits, and trying to invite everyone and their dog to church on Sunday!!!

Sunday—Our efforts were in vain because only 2 investigators showed up...and they weren't even the investigators that we have with baptismal dates. :/ We were a little bummed out...But we HATE losing to the Adversary so this week we are gonna work triple hard!!

Love you guys!!! Have a great week and everyone do service for someone and LIGHT THE WORLD!!

—Elder Hale

Just your classic Temple selfie.

The fist time I've seen a beaut like this here in Peru so I had to take a pic.

Huge service project to kick off #lighttheworld!

Week 68: Challenges

This week has been good! We finished up another month, its always a little crazy at the end of the month cuz we are running everywhere trying to get everyone baptized and interviews and work visits and stuff! But we finished November pretty bad. :/ Idk what's going on with the zone rn....well actually the whole mission, the numbers were pretty bad. Guess we just had a bad month. But we are excited for December. We're going in with lots of potential and with new ideas so that we fix what went bad!

My new area has a lot of new challenges, I kinda feel like God is putting me to the test to see if I can take it and still accomplish what He wants me to accomplish. I love being a missionary and that makes the time fly by!

—Elder Hale

Goood grubbin! Shrimp ceviche.

Found a skateboard in a members house while waiting for lunch!

A p-day well spent! The Forehand Hero hasn't lost his touch.

Week 67: Just a lil update!

Hey Everyone!

Just your pal Elder Hale with a little update on thngs down here in the M.P.L.N.!

-its getting warmer and the farmers tan is getting stronger

-I eat more and more but get skinnier and skinnier...I hope there are no worms in my tummy #peruproblems

-my comp and I are getting along great, it was nice to get a new one!

-the area is getting a lot better!! We are setting baptismal dates for December!

-we have interviews and zone conf coming up so we are stressed and busy preparing trainings n stuff

- I'm LOVING the mission still, haha

Also, we had Christians baptism on Saturday and man he is a champ! He is a member's boyfriend and he's only been to church like 5 times but it seems like he's been attending for years and he knows more of the ward than my companion, hahah. He is the boss of a food administration business and he is going to college so he's a busy guy but he is super dedicated to the church! The bishopric is already thinking of calling him as the young single adults counselor. He was super ready to listen to the gospel and the Lord definitely prepared his heart! 

Well...have a good week and read the Book of Mormon everyday!!!

-Elder Hale

just grubbin

My comp sleeps with his eyes open!!!! I mean what???!!!

Christian's baptism

Week 66: New Companion

*Jarett didn't send a group letter today, so here is an excerpt from my letter:

We had a good p-day. We ate Chinese and it was delishhhhhhh. I ate pollo w/pineapple, won tons, and coke with lime!! I found root beer today too while shopping #YEEEET. I saw a cool remote control car too...I was thinkin of buying it but wasn't sure its its against the rules, hahaha. My new comp is a good fella! He's from Arequipa Peru! He's dying (meaning he only has 2 months left). He's a lot more obedient than my old comp. We get along better too!

Elder Hale

Me and Will Clark's cousin are in the same zone!

Little rascals!

Week 65: Howdy!

Well, well, well!!! 

Another p-day and another crazy week! haha life is never boring over here in the M.P.L.N.! 

We have been busssyyy. We had zone conference this week so my comp and I had to clean the whole church and prepare trainings and stuff, but we had a great conference!! Pres exploded our minds with full doctrine about the plan of salvation and then he talked about how we can help our investigators understand and get converted with inspired questions. 

On Saturday Luis was baptized!! Woohoo! it was a interesting experience cuz the church was out of water on Saturday so we couldn't fill up the font!! We had to rig up hoses and fill it up from far away haha, BUTTTTT...the missionaries that were in charge of turning it off, wern't paying attention and it OVERFLOWED!!! hahah. There was a lot of mopping...but it all turned out good.

Have a good week folks. 

A pigeon sniped me from the telephone wires....DURING A CONTACT!
Hahah but hey you cant win em all right?

Just another pizza pic!

This bad boy tried to sneak up on me when I was opening the church...he was huuugeeee!

WITH LUISSSS :)

Week 64: Tough Week (Kinda)

Hey Everyone!

Sorry for not writing in a week or 2 or 3! Life is good and busy!! This week was good and bad! We have been doing work visits with our zone all week to help them with their investigators with baptismal dates. It has helped a lot and our zone is getting better!!! BUTTTT...since we've been working so hard with the zone we have lacked organization and planning in our own area and we had a slower week. :/ We only had 1 investigator come to church....BUTTT he will be getting baptized on Saturday!! His name is Luis! He is an awesome guy, his wife died a few years ago and he started drinking, but we found him and taught him the gospel and it has filled the hole in his heart!!! He hasn't missed a Sunday since we found him and is super ready for Saturday. :)

Yesterday, all of Peru has a census!! Everybody in the country had to stay in their house from 8 am to 5 pm! Church meetings were canceled and we stayed inside. My comp and I took advantage and did some hard core planning and organization so we can hit this week strong!! Also, I got to read the scriptures with I sadly don't have as much time for anymore....and wow let me tell ya, I LOVE the Book of Mormon! That book is FULL of truth and light! It literally is like a big ole bag of problem fixers! These past 3 weeks I haven't had much time to study cuz we've had lots of meetings and interchanges so my study time has plummeted and my spirituality too! But yesterday when I read the BoM I realized how much I've missed it and how much I love it! It brings the spirit into our lives!

Well...I'm out of time but I love you all and may the force be with you!

-Elder Hale

We had a pet for a day! Made me miss being a puppy deliverer, hahahaha.

Exchanges with Elder Anderton—we tried some coco water.

Week 63: Busy, Busy

(This is just an excerpt from my letter, because he didn't write a group email and just sent pictures.)

I talked again in sac meeting yesterday. They called me on Friday to prepare a 10 min talk for Sunday—haha, these rascals. But it went good! I talked about elder Sabin's talk of being "all in". and challenged the ward to think about what they need to do so that they can be "all in". 

Being a ZL is fun and cool but it comes with stress too! haha. Our zone had a badddd weeek and I'm really feeling the pressure of it. In our mission if your zone doesn't have success, then you get taken out of your position really quickly. My zone has a lot of new missionaries, so its tough to train them to do the right things, but we're working on it. My comp is a little disobedient, but he knows a lot and still works hard. We get along pretty good.

On Thursday everyone and their dog watched the Peru game to qualify for the World Cup, 

which made teaching very hard, but earlier in the day a member gave us funny Peru hats.

My comp contacting with his hat, hahahahaha!

Just being a goofball.

Week 62: Good Week

Hey everybody! 

This week was awesome. Sorry I don't have time to talk but here's a quick summary:

We had interviews on Tuesday. Meetings on Thursday. Work visit on Friday with Elder Christofferson's nephew that is in our mission, he is a cool guy, he's new in the mish. Saturday I got super sick and we had a baptism!! Donna got baptized but I couldn't even go cuz I was so sick, haha. I couldn't even open my eyes cuz they were all swollen and red, it was a doozy. So, I don't have pics. :( Sunday the bishop gave me a surprise call out to give a testimony/talk in sac meeting. 

-Elder Hale

Me and the comp.

With Cheetos stuffed in my mouth.

Week 60: Here Comes the Sun

Well, well , well—Howdy everyone!

Life keeps cruzin by and its going great! Its warming up finally, I'm feeling pretty happy about that. I've missed the sun.

We had a great week. The best part of the week was The Quiroz fam's baptism on Saturday!! Man they are just the best. I'll tell you a little about them:

They were a reference that we found like 2 months ago and they were Jehovas Witnesses for a few years (if you know about the JW's, then you understand how challenging it is to teach them), and to make it even harder, they are pretty rich and down here the rich people are notoriously a lot harder to teach. So basically, we had our work cut out for us but...NOTHING IS IMPOSSIBLE WHEN YOU HAVE THE SPIRIT ON YOUR SIDE! haha They said they would never get baptized but, 7 weeks later, they haven't missed an attendance and they are baptized!!! (All of them but Carlos, the dad...BUTTTT, he is applying for new jobs so that he can start coming to church and be baptized in October!!!)

This last week Satan has been working HARD against them. Jenny invited all of her friends and family to the baptism but EVERYONE told her she was crazy and that the Mormons are this and that and all kinds of stuff. She has seen basically it all when it comes to anti-Mormon material but THEY ARE STAYIN STRONG! When she gave her testimony in her baptism she started crying and said that her life has completely changed since we've met with them and that she's "ended the search that she didn't know she was on." I love their family, they are some of my favorite converts in my mission.

Well, everyone, this church is so true. Jesus Christ guides it from heaven today. There is NO other path to follow that leads to a happy life now or salvation in the eternity.

Love you folks, have a good one.

-Elder Hale

The district

Me with me pals from my first district 

(Elder Sanchez the AP and my best pal Elder Tirado).

The Quiroz Fam

Saturday's baptism

Week 61: Transfers

Hey Everyone!

I don't have much time today...and from now on my email time will but cut hard core cuz I have to do a ton of reports and stuff. :/ SORRY!

But life is going GREAT and I'm still loving the mish! 

Sadly I got transferred and had to lead Bayovar!!! It was easily my fav area, we had a ton of success there and the ward was great!! And I had to leave my kid, Elder Java too. But he's in good hands so that's good, haha. I got transferred to Mariategui. It's only like 10 mins away from my old area but its in a different stake and a different zone. My comp is Elder Gutierrez. He's from Bolivia, and he's a good fella! A little interesting but he knows how to work smart! He does have like 15304 ideas an hour and a bunch of them are super random and bad but besides that he is great. We are the zone leaders over the Wiesse Zone. We are prepping for a GREAT October; we are trying to break the record for baptisms that our zone has had! More saved souls for the Lord! Woohoo!

Conference this week was KILLER as always. I was a big fan of Elder Holland's, Christofferson's, Anderson's, Oaks', and Callister's talks! And it almost jerked the tears when the choir sung, "I believe in Christ!" Man, sometimes a good hymn just pumps me up!

I'm grateful for my mission and I love serving the Lord. I know that He is in the very details of His church and in the very details of our lives as Elder Rasband said this weekend! 

Have a great week everyone! :)

-Elder Hale

Saying goodbye to my kid :( ELDER JAVA

Anotha one

Reuniting with the MTC pals after a meeting

Week 58: Too Busy

Jarett either forgot to push "send" or ran out of time, because all that came over this week were pictures. :)

First time I've ever seen a Peruvian keepin it real with an E30.

Some killer smoothies in a super American-ish restaurant.

Our jackets we ordered as a zone!

More pizza, lol.

Week 57:  No Time

Hey Everyone!

This week was crazy! And despite our best efforts, a ton of stuff fell through on us! But hey, part of life right?

We had Anderson's and Nancy's baptism on Saturday. Idk if I explained what happened last week, but she wasn't baptized last Saturday because the water was too cold. So this week we got someone to fix the water heater for her baptism. Then on Saturday when we went to prep, the HOT WATER WASN'T WORKING AGAIN. Haha so we had to rush and start boiling water and dumping it into the font. We were using pots on all four burners and doing all we could to heat it sufficiently for Nancy. I stained my fav tie with ash in the process. :/ BUT it was worth is because we BARELY got the water warm enough that Nancy could get in and be baptized.

Well, I am already out of time. So see ya next week!

Elder Hale

You gotta watch out for the sleepy bugs! They seem to
bite my poor comp from time to time in personal study.

He tried on my glasses, lol!

Nancy and Anderson's baptism.

Round 2 for Nancy in the baptismal font, haha.

Week 56: Even More Opposition

Hey everyone,

So last week I talked about Satan tryna throw wrenches in the Lord's work over here in Bayovar and well, he's been working EVEN HARDER this week. Let me briefly explain cuz I only have like 5 mins and although I have a year in the mission, my keyboard skills are suuuuppper terrible and I write like 2.6 words per min.

So for this last Saturday we had 5 baptisms planned—Orlando, Auria, Vanessa, Nancy, and Marcos- buttttttttt, only 3 ended up getting baptized. What happened is that this week Orlando got married on Friday, and his baptism was for Saturday. But on Tuesday his friends took him to do a bachelor party type thing and he GOT DRUNK. He fell into temptation and although still got married on Friday, he did not get baptized on Saturday and it will be postponed for a future date.

Nancy was also going to get baptized with her family (Vanessa and Marcos). She is 65 y/o and has bad arthritis. She said that she couldn't get baptized unless the font was warm. We have been preparing all week to get everything ready for Saturday but EVERYTHING FELL THROUGH. The gas to heat up the font was out so we had to order one from the area offices in La Molina, then we got it in and turns out that the tubes are broken! We spent the afternoon boiling water but then magically the electricity in the church went out—leaving the font still freezing cold. We sent the baptismal clothes to be washed but on Saturday, but when we went to pick them up the lady FORGOT to wash them haha! So we were short on a baptismal tunic! ALSO the bishop showed up 1 hour late to the baptism so we couldn't get started. And then.....Nancy went into the font but before getting all the way in screamed "it's too cold!! It's too cold!! I can't do it!!" and everybody's hearts dropped. She started crying! Then Vanessa put on the wet, cold baptismal clothes for her baptism. She almost didn't get in either because it was so cold. 

Well...although frustrating, it's all good and we are still happy! I LOVE my mission and am SOOO grateful for all the success that God has given us! We were able to baptize 5 people in August and hopefully we will baptized 8 or 9 in September! 

Love y'all and have a great week!

-Elder Hale

After a week of trail and error, I have become a
master of heavenly grade, grilled cheese sandwiches!

My comp with the cutest little kid in Bayovar.

Auria's baptism!

Vanessa, Marcos and kind of Nancy's baptism (explanation in email).

Post baptism grub sesh on a DELISH Carbonara pizza.

Week 55: Opposition

Hey everyone

This week was crazy and busy! 

We've seen miracles and been through crazy trials. This week has helped me learn about the realness of the constant battle between good and evil that has been taking place since the war in heaven before we came here. In these past weeks when we have had record breaking success, we have also seen fist hand how hard Satan is working against us. 

This week, Angelica's ex-husband (who is almost homeless and an alcoholic) has been threatening, bugging, trash talking and everything bad to prevent her and her kids from coming to church and being baptized. But she was firm and determined, and she got baptized and confirmed this week, although her kids no....we thought to not have them baptized until everything calms down with the crazy guy. 

With Orlando (investigator that will be baptized this Saturday) the adversary has been bugging him with nightmares and seeing ghosts in his house this week. The adversary has also caused him to get in arguments with his fiancee and caused them to almost not get married (their marriage is on Friday).

With Vanessa and her family, they got crazily hit with a sickness on Saturday night, preventing them from going to church the next day....just A WEEK before their baptism....

and theres more!!! but I'm out of time... 

And for me, ALLL of these cares have been so much PROOF that this IS the TRUTH. Because if it wasn't true, then Satan wouldn't try so hard to knock us down and stop our investigators from progressing. It's so obvious to see the eternal importance of repentance and baptism because Satan works SO HARD against it. I recognize the important role that opposition plays in the plan of salvation and these weeks have really opened my eyes.

I am so happy for my mission experiences, I love helping people change and accept the gospel! And don't worry, even though Satan is working hard, we still have God on our side!!!! He has been performing miracles in our area! We set another baptism date this week and now have 10 baptismal dates! We had 12 investigators come to church and have 5 baptisms planned for this Saturday, we are praying that everything will go good. 

I love my calling and I love God and His work. I love you guys too, have a great week y'all.

-Elder Hale

Zombie with a shirt.

Angelica's baptism!

Just cuz I've been in Peru for a year doesn't mean that I'm not still the most
patriotic guy in the world! This was last night, grubbin on some instant mashed
potatoes and gravy, clothed with red, white and blue! USA!USA!USA!

My comp and I with our new shirts.

Flooded apartment.