Tuesday, December 28, 2010
Monday, December 13, 2010
It's beginning to feel a lot like Christmas!
Dear family,
This has been quite an interesting week. First off, I don´t remember if I told you about the flea problem we have been having. Anyways, Elder Mathews has been getting more and more bites so finally we had an extermination day. We washed all of our clothes, everything we had. We vacuumed the floors. And then we went at it with 10 cans of Raid flea and tick killer. We sealed off that room and slept in the members house on a couple of mattresses on the floor. It was intense...
On Thursday we had our Mission´s big old Christmas Bash which was way fun. Each zone had to wear some kind of matching clothes. We all wore long red Nike socks, basketball shorts, white shirts, and bandanas with our name and zone on it. We had Zone olympics, a soccer tournament, etc. Then we changed, ate lunch, had a Christmas devotional, and finished the night watching It´s a Wonderful Life. That was a fun day.
On Saturday we planned a LARGE Family Home Evening and invited everyone we were teaching. We planned a bunch of Christmas games and to watch a movie outside using a projector. Unfortunately everyone showed up late and it was raining so we had to move it inside the house. We watched Joy to the World and then had a Christmas raffle which was way fun. We raffled off a Nativity scene, some Chilean toys, a nice CTR ring, and a few other things. About 28 people showed up and it turned out great. I have decided that all of the memorable and worth while activities in my mission have come after a lot of stress and planning. It's always worth it in the end though.
Mom and Dad, I want you to know that I did get the Christmas package and I love it. Its horrible though because I can´t open anything.. The twelve days of Christmas is no fun for an impatient kid. Haha thank you so much though.
I think the thing that has blown my mind the most is that Kelly recieved her mission call. I want to talk to her so bad now. I hope she is doing great. I am really proud of her.
Well thank you so much for the love and support. Sorry about not sending pictures, but these stinking computers won´t let me. I will when I can.
Love you all,
Elder Matthew Mooney
Monday, November 29, 2010
Thanksgiving has come and gone!
Dear family,
So this past week has been an adventure. I have ridden through rocky mountain shortcuts, almost crashed several times, gotten into bike battles with Elder Deaver, and much much more. Pirque is huge! Really we spend hours and hours riding bikes every day. We usually have to plan our appointments thirty minutes to an hour apart so that we can ride all the way over the the next house. The first few days I could really feel it in my legs and rear end, but now I am pretty much accustomed to it.
This whole last week the three of us have been low on money and mooching off the family we live with. It is going to be really difficult to manage money well here because we have to take the bus several times a week and each time costs a dollar. It doesn't sound like much but a bus ride to the store and back is two dollars, then a bus ride to zone classes and back is another two dollars. It just adds up quick.
Thanksgiving day was nothing special. We had to pick up lunch and bring it back to the house. Noodles with red sauce and some vegetables with mayonnaise. It tasted pretty good though. When we got home at night though we were starving and it hit us that we were about to end Thanksgiving day without celebrating. So we ran to the corner store by our house and bought some Cheetos, potato chips, ketchup, cookies, and soda to celebrate. Now that is what I call Thanksgiving... The next day, Friday, we ate lunch with the richest family in our branch who made us a Thanksgiving dinner with two giant roasted chickens, potato salad, vegetables, and apple pie with ice cream for dessert. That was pretty awesome.
We have been working a lot with three people, Veronica, Vicente, and Amparo. They will all be getting baptized next Sunday!! Last week we also put a baptismal date on a foreign exchanged student named Wes from Indiana. He has a bunch of friends who are members and he wants to go to BYU when he returns home. He should be getting baptized on Christmas day if his parents give him permission. The other day we also found an amazing older couple. We talked to the lady on the side of the road on Thursday, then passed by her house on Saturday. It turns out they are stinking rich and live on a giant beautiful property. We taught her and her husband. They had never heard of Joseph Smith, the Book of Mormon, living prophets. They said that they had never accepted to listen to anyone outside of the Catholic church and when we came in we shook the ground from under them. They loved the idea of a living prophet and twelve apostles. They immediately committed to coming to church.
Unfortunately they attended the wrong church on Sunday (even though we gave them a map), but they have a full desire to learn more about the gospel. I feel like I am almost back in time a little bit, preaching the gospel like the missionaries of old used to. It is very cool.
I still have not received my new companion. Tomorrow morning all of the trainers will be going to the temple in the morning and after we will be receiving our new companions. I am so excited to find out who he is. We spent all day today cleaning up the pension, killing spiders, cutting our bunk beds into four separate beds (it wasn't me), and trying to get everything nice for us and the new kid. I still think he will think the place is a mess though. At least that is how I felt when I first showed up.
Thank you for all the love and the letters. I loved the pictures as well. You are the best family ever.
Love you lots,
Elder Mooney
So this past week has been an adventure. I have ridden through rocky mountain shortcuts, almost crashed several times, gotten into bike battles with Elder Deaver, and much much more. Pirque is huge! Really we spend hours and hours riding bikes every day. We usually have to plan our appointments thirty minutes to an hour apart so that we can ride all the way over the the next house. The first few days I could really feel it in my legs and rear end, but now I am pretty much accustomed to it.
This whole last week the three of us have been low on money and mooching off the family we live with. It is going to be really difficult to manage money well here because we have to take the bus several times a week and each time costs a dollar. It doesn't sound like much but a bus ride to the store and back is two dollars, then a bus ride to zone classes and back is another two dollars. It just adds up quick.
Thanksgiving day was nothing special. We had to pick up lunch and bring it back to the house. Noodles with red sauce and some vegetables with mayonnaise. It tasted pretty good though. When we got home at night though we were starving and it hit us that we were about to end Thanksgiving day without celebrating. So we ran to the corner store by our house and bought some Cheetos, potato chips, ketchup, cookies, and soda to celebrate. Now that is what I call Thanksgiving... The next day, Friday, we ate lunch with the richest family in our branch who made us a Thanksgiving dinner with two giant roasted chickens, potato salad, vegetables, and apple pie with ice cream for dessert. That was pretty awesome.
We have been working a lot with three people, Veronica, Vicente, and Amparo. They will all be getting baptized next Sunday!! Last week we also put a baptismal date on a foreign exchanged student named Wes from Indiana. He has a bunch of friends who are members and he wants to go to BYU when he returns home. He should be getting baptized on Christmas day if his parents give him permission. The other day we also found an amazing older couple. We talked to the lady on the side of the road on Thursday, then passed by her house on Saturday. It turns out they are stinking rich and live on a giant beautiful property. We taught her and her husband. They had never heard of Joseph Smith, the Book of Mormon, living prophets. They said that they had never accepted to listen to anyone outside of the Catholic church and when we came in we shook the ground from under them. They loved the idea of a living prophet and twelve apostles. They immediately committed to coming to church.
Unfortunately they attended the wrong church on Sunday (even though we gave them a map), but they have a full desire to learn more about the gospel. I feel like I am almost back in time a little bit, preaching the gospel like the missionaries of old used to. It is very cool.
I still have not received my new companion. Tomorrow morning all of the trainers will be going to the temple in the morning and after we will be receiving our new companions. I am so excited to find out who he is. We spent all day today cleaning up the pension, killing spiders, cutting our bunk beds into four separate beds (it wasn't me), and trying to get everything nice for us and the new kid. I still think he will think the place is a mess though. At least that is how I felt when I first showed up.
Thank you for all the love and the letters. I loved the pictures as well. You are the best family ever.
Love you lots,
Elder Mooney
Monday, November 22, 2010
Fields, mountains and almost fresh air!
Dear family,
Well we received our changes today. It was a bit nerve racking for me, not gonna lie. It turns out that I got changed. Elder Jacobs stayed in our sector and Elder Tello, my old companion, took my place there. I had to pack up all my stuff (I have way too much stuff now) and haul it over to the change meeting. Then President gave us our changes and I was one of the last people to receive my new change. I got called to a sector called Pirque and I will be training. First of all, Pirque is a coveted sector because its outside of the city; fields, mountains, almost fresh air. We have to ride bikes in this sector as well. Oh and to top it off we live with members in a big farm house. They have pigs, chickens, dogs, and all sorts of animals. It's actually really cool. At the moment I am in a Trio because my new companion doesn't arrive in Chile until next week. I'm going to be a dad!!! Haha it is going to be quite an experience training a new Elder in a huge wilderness sector. Hopefully we don´t get lost...
Last week was a good week though. We had a really cool experience yesterday in our sector slam. Oh and a sector slam is when all of the missionaries from the zone and knock doors in the same sector. Elder Jacobs and I were tired and didn't really want to be knocking doors, especially in someone else´s sector. We pushed ourselves anyway and started knocking. The fourth door we knocked opened and invited us in before we even started the contact. The man´s name was Milton and he recently had moved in. He told us about his religious background and desire to find a religion that truly made him feel like a "child of God." He even told us that he had actually been wandering around that same day trying to find a church to go to because he needed to feel closer to God, but didn't find one so he went back to the house and was listening to radio sermons until we showed up. We shared the restoration and asked him if he would be willing to get baptized if he knew it were true. He told us that he would have to study it out well first, but yes. Milton should be getting baptized soon!
Also, a while back I went on division with Elder Reynolds, an Elder from my district and he told me they needed to find more investigators. I told him, well let's knock a door then. I knocked a door and did a contact with a teenage boy and his mom who happens to be a less active member. The teenage boy was just baptized the other week. It is amazing how some people really are prepared to receive the gospel, we just need to find them.
Oh and Melissa I want to thank you so much for the package you sent me. It is amazing! I love the candy, the plates, the music, the toys. Really thank you so much for thinking and worrying about me. And your new house looks beautiful by the way. I can´t wait to visit!
I love you all very much. I hope you are all doing well. I pray for you always.
Love,
Elder Mooney
PS - Just want you to know that I ate a sandwhich de potito on friday.. It means butt sandwhich :S One of our investigators bought one and made us try. Its a sandwich made out of the organs and innerds of animals. It didn't taste too bad, but the texture was horrible.
Well we received our changes today. It was a bit nerve racking for me, not gonna lie. It turns out that I got changed. Elder Jacobs stayed in our sector and Elder Tello, my old companion, took my place there. I had to pack up all my stuff (I have way too much stuff now) and haul it over to the change meeting. Then President gave us our changes and I was one of the last people to receive my new change. I got called to a sector called Pirque and I will be training. First of all, Pirque is a coveted sector because its outside of the city; fields, mountains, almost fresh air. We have to ride bikes in this sector as well. Oh and to top it off we live with members in a big farm house. They have pigs, chickens, dogs, and all sorts of animals. It's actually really cool. At the moment I am in a Trio because my new companion doesn't arrive in Chile until next week. I'm going to be a dad!!! Haha it is going to be quite an experience training a new Elder in a huge wilderness sector. Hopefully we don´t get lost...
Last week was a good week though. We had a really cool experience yesterday in our sector slam. Oh and a sector slam is when all of the missionaries from the zone and knock doors in the same sector. Elder Jacobs and I were tired and didn't really want to be knocking doors, especially in someone else´s sector. We pushed ourselves anyway and started knocking. The fourth door we knocked opened and invited us in before we even started the contact. The man´s name was Milton and he recently had moved in. He told us about his religious background and desire to find a religion that truly made him feel like a "child of God." He even told us that he had actually been wandering around that same day trying to find a church to go to because he needed to feel closer to God, but didn't find one so he went back to the house and was listening to radio sermons until we showed up. We shared the restoration and asked him if he would be willing to get baptized if he knew it were true. He told us that he would have to study it out well first, but yes. Milton should be getting baptized soon!
Also, a while back I went on division with Elder Reynolds, an Elder from my district and he told me they needed to find more investigators. I told him, well let's knock a door then. I knocked a door and did a contact with a teenage boy and his mom who happens to be a less active member. The teenage boy was just baptized the other week. It is amazing how some people really are prepared to receive the gospel, we just need to find them.
Oh and Melissa I want to thank you so much for the package you sent me. It is amazing! I love the candy, the plates, the music, the toys. Really thank you so much for thinking and worrying about me. And your new house looks beautiful by the way. I can´t wait to visit!
I love you all very much. I hope you are all doing well. I pray for you always.
Love,
Elder Mooney
PS - Just want you to know that I ate a sandwhich de potito on friday.. It means butt sandwhich :S One of our investigators bought one and made us try. Its a sandwich made out of the organs and innerds of animals. It didn't taste too bad, but the texture was horrible.
Monday, November 15, 2010
Thank you for all your letters and support!
Dear family,
This change has gone by really fast. I think partly because my companion and I have been together for so long and also because this change consists of 5 weeks instead of 6. What happened is, a group of missionaries should be going home the week after Thanksgiving according to the change schedule, but they wanted to be home for Thanksgiving so they go home this next week. Then we will have one weird week, and then we will be receiving like 25 new missionaries here in the mission.
I am quite excited for Thanksgiving and Christmas. On Thanksgiving we are going to be doing nothing special because nobody celebrates it here. Maybe we will order pizza or something. Luckily it's the last one outside of the United States! Then comes Christmas. I'm kinda hoping I get to stay here in my sector for this Christmas because it's lame to get sent to a new sector just before the holidays.
Something funny happened this week. As we were walking down the street, out of nowhere we heard a loud screeching noise. We turned to see what it was and it was a van stopped directly in the middle of an intersection. We looked to see who was driving and to our surprise it was a Nun. I guess she didn't see the light was red and noticed just as she reached the middle of the intersection. It reminded me of Sister Act for some reason.. Haha
We found a really cute old Peruvian couple here in our ward. They moved here to Chile about a year ago and in-activated from the church when they got here. When we first knocked on the door the lady, Gloria, immediately let us in, even though her husband Walter told her not to. We talked with them for a few minutes and then Walter brought us a plate of food to share with them. They both committed to returning to church and said that they will be waiting for us next Saturday with a plate of food. ;)
Thank you all for your letters and support. This week I opened my mail and had an email from practically everyone so that was really encouraging. I love you all very much.
Love,
Elder Mooney
This change has gone by really fast. I think partly because my companion and I have been together for so long and also because this change consists of 5 weeks instead of 6. What happened is, a group of missionaries should be going home the week after Thanksgiving according to the change schedule, but they wanted to be home for Thanksgiving so they go home this next week. Then we will have one weird week, and then we will be receiving like 25 new missionaries here in the mission.
I am quite excited for Thanksgiving and Christmas. On Thanksgiving we are going to be doing nothing special because nobody celebrates it here. Maybe we will order pizza or something. Luckily it's the last one outside of the United States! Then comes Christmas. I'm kinda hoping I get to stay here in my sector for this Christmas because it's lame to get sent to a new sector just before the holidays.
Something funny happened this week. As we were walking down the street, out of nowhere we heard a loud screeching noise. We turned to see what it was and it was a van stopped directly in the middle of an intersection. We looked to see who was driving and to our surprise it was a Nun. I guess she didn't see the light was red and noticed just as she reached the middle of the intersection. It reminded me of Sister Act for some reason.. Haha
We found a really cute old Peruvian couple here in our ward. They moved here to Chile about a year ago and in-activated from the church when they got here. When we first knocked on the door the lady, Gloria, immediately let us in, even though her husband Walter told her not to. We talked with them for a few minutes and then Walter brought us a plate of food to share with them. They both committed to returning to church and said that they will be waiting for us next Saturday with a plate of food. ;)
Thank you all for your letters and support. This week I opened my mail and had an email from practically everyone so that was really encouraging. I love you all very much.
Love,
Elder Mooney
Monday, November 8, 2010
Everything's all right.
Dear family,
This week has been mas o menos. We did find an awesome new family though. We were looking for a less active family and found out that they had moved. We talked with Margarita, the new owner of the home. She told us she was separated from her husband and had 6 kids (5 actually living in their little house). Unfortunately she rejected our offer to share a message with her told us she wasn't interested. I asked her if we could just share a prayer with her and she said yes. I prayed and left her with a Restoration pamphlet and that was all. Two days later I felt we should pass by there again and ask if they needed help or had any questions. She said all was good and then we asked if we pass by another day and share with her. She thought about it for a second and said, yes. We went and taught her with the young men's president from our ward and she seems pretty interested. She has a lot of questions and a lot of doubts, but those are the kind of people we like to work with :)
The Jonas Brothers also had a concert right here in our sector the other day. It was crazy. Thousands and thousands of girls with their moms and dads were waiting in line all day long. We could hear screaming all day. Supposedly it was one of their biggest fan groups they had ever seen. That was interesting.
We had a Ward Family Night on Friday and the primary acted out the Tree of Life story. Elder Jacobs and I had to be Laman and Lemuel, which was fun because we got to go hang out in the Great and Spacious Building. What was funny about the whole activity was that a lot of adults were pulled away into the darkness and into the building, but every single primary kid made it to the tree of light and partook of its fruit. It was a great activity, extremely disorganized but great. Kevin, Jaqueline, Isabel, and David all made it there (some of our investigators).
Everything's all right though. Please pray for my companion and I, for our sector, and for our investigators. Thank you for all of you love and support.
Love,
Elder Mooney
This week has been mas o menos. We did find an awesome new family though. We were looking for a less active family and found out that they had moved. We talked with Margarita, the new owner of the home. She told us she was separated from her husband and had 6 kids (5 actually living in their little house). Unfortunately she rejected our offer to share a message with her told us she wasn't interested. I asked her if we could just share a prayer with her and she said yes. I prayed and left her with a Restoration pamphlet and that was all. Two days later I felt we should pass by there again and ask if they needed help or had any questions. She said all was good and then we asked if we pass by another day and share with her. She thought about it for a second and said, yes. We went and taught her with the young men's president from our ward and she seems pretty interested. She has a lot of questions and a lot of doubts, but those are the kind of people we like to work with :)
The Jonas Brothers also had a concert right here in our sector the other day. It was crazy. Thousands and thousands of girls with their moms and dads were waiting in line all day long. We could hear screaming all day. Supposedly it was one of their biggest fan groups they had ever seen. That was interesting.
We had a Ward Family Night on Friday and the primary acted out the Tree of Life story. Elder Jacobs and I had to be Laman and Lemuel, which was fun because we got to go hang out in the Great and Spacious Building. What was funny about the whole activity was that a lot of adults were pulled away into the darkness and into the building, but every single primary kid made it to the tree of light and partook of its fruit. It was a great activity, extremely disorganized but great. Kevin, Jaqueline, Isabel, and David all made it there (some of our investigators).
Everything's all right though. Please pray for my companion and I, for our sector, and for our investigators. Thank you for all of you love and support.
Love,
Elder Mooney
Tuesday, November 2, 2010
We threw ourselves a party!
Dear family,
Well Halloween was fun. Yesterday we had a Noche de Hogar (or family home evening) with the Familia Carrasco and one of the daughters, Sara, age 19, isn't a member. Supposedly its really hard to get her to trust you, but we made friends with her and we'll see if she progresses. We made homemade Reese´s and then we read 1 Nephi 8 and watched the cartoon of it. It was good! Then in the night time we saw a whole bunch of kids trick or treating, and people partying. I am happy to say that I just celebrated my last Halloween in the mission :) It was great to hear about the Halloween party back home. I miss the good old ward parties.
On Thursday night Elder Jacobs completed a year in the mission so we threw ourselves a party. Elder Jacobs bought a huge Torta de Mil Ojas. Its basically a bunch of crispy layers of pastry and huge layers of manjar inbetween. We attempted to eat half of it that night but failed because we also ordered a large pizza with chaparritas and garlic bread. It was a wonderful night. Haha and Elder Jacobs burned a shirt. Oh and it also rained that night, very unexpected. I forgot my umbrella and got pretty wet. What memories....
Things are good here though. Just trying to keep fighting the good fight. Thank you for your prayers and your support. You are all so amazing. Thank you for everything. I love you very much.
Elder Matthew D. Mooney
Well Halloween was fun. Yesterday we had a Noche de Hogar (or family home evening) with the Familia Carrasco and one of the daughters, Sara, age 19, isn't a member. Supposedly its really hard to get her to trust you, but we made friends with her and we'll see if she progresses. We made homemade Reese´s and then we read 1 Nephi 8 and watched the cartoon of it. It was good! Then in the night time we saw a whole bunch of kids trick or treating, and people partying. I am happy to say that I just celebrated my last Halloween in the mission :) It was great to hear about the Halloween party back home. I miss the good old ward parties.
On Thursday night Elder Jacobs completed a year in the mission so we threw ourselves a party. Elder Jacobs bought a huge Torta de Mil Ojas. Its basically a bunch of crispy layers of pastry and huge layers of manjar inbetween. We attempted to eat half of it that night but failed because we also ordered a large pizza with chaparritas and garlic bread. It was a wonderful night. Haha and Elder Jacobs burned a shirt. Oh and it also rained that night, very unexpected. I forgot my umbrella and got pretty wet. What memories....
Things are good here though. Just trying to keep fighting the good fight. Thank you for your prayers and your support. You are all so amazing. Thank you for everything. I love you very much.
Elder Matthew D. Mooney
Monday, October 25, 2010
Time flies when you are working like crazy!
Dear loved ones,
Another week has come and gone. Phew... October is almost over as well. It is amazing how time flies when you are working like crazy!
I received my package this week. THANK YOU SO MUCH! I love the tie (I've already worn it twice). I love the cookies. I loved everything! And I especially love the Warheads. We have been having some fun with warheads down here. We have shared them with our investigators, with members, with the Bishop, with everyone. We have also managed to capture a few quality videos of people freaking out after eating them. Two people have actually cried haha.. They have all enjoyed it though and most people ask for more.
This week something incredible happened. We have been working with a less active woman named Ana María for about 3 months now. She lives with her adult son and they own a little grocery corner store connected to their house. She has been active, inactive, active, inactive for a long time. We have been working with her and she has been attending church every week for the last two months about. Her only problem was that she has a lot of debt and didn't think she would be able to close her store on Sundays. She says she tried it for about two months and it went really bad. We kept working with her and just kinda taught everything but that because she knew what she had to do. She reactivated completely, but then had doubts about the temple and said she didn't want to go there. We left her with the video "Between Heaven and Earth" that talks about Temples and that cleared up all of her doubts, but she still didn't want to commit herself. We committed her to reading the entire Book of Mormon and she has been reading every day since. Then on Thursday we were reading with her in the Book of Mormon and after finishing the chapter she told us that she was ready to change everything. She told us she wanted her Patriarchal blessing, she wants to go to the temple, she even want to do all of her genealogy! Then she started crying because she was so happy. It was amazing how happy I was as well. I felt this complete joy come over me and I knew that the Holy Ghost combined with the Book of Mormon convinced her. She even said that she had a spiritual thirst or hunger. It was a powerful experience. She has an interview with the 1st counselor on Tuesday night.
It has been a good week though. Kevin and Jaqueline have baptismal dates, but we are not sure when they are going to do it anymore because Kevin is having an operation today. We are hoping that in a week or two he will be all better. Matías went to church again as well but still doesn't want to be baptized. We are going to fast and pray with the Bishop for him.
Thank you all for the love and support. You are amazing!
Love,
Elder Matthew D. Mooney
Another week has come and gone. Phew... October is almost over as well. It is amazing how time flies when you are working like crazy!
I received my package this week. THANK YOU SO MUCH! I love the tie (I've already worn it twice). I love the cookies. I loved everything! And I especially love the Warheads. We have been having some fun with warheads down here. We have shared them with our investigators, with members, with the Bishop, with everyone. We have also managed to capture a few quality videos of people freaking out after eating them. Two people have actually cried haha.. They have all enjoyed it though and most people ask for more.
This week something incredible happened. We have been working with a less active woman named Ana María for about 3 months now. She lives with her adult son and they own a little grocery corner store connected to their house. She has been active, inactive, active, inactive for a long time. We have been working with her and she has been attending church every week for the last two months about. Her only problem was that she has a lot of debt and didn't think she would be able to close her store on Sundays. She says she tried it for about two months and it went really bad. We kept working with her and just kinda taught everything but that because she knew what she had to do. She reactivated completely, but then had doubts about the temple and said she didn't want to go there. We left her with the video "Between Heaven and Earth" that talks about Temples and that cleared up all of her doubts, but she still didn't want to commit herself. We committed her to reading the entire Book of Mormon and she has been reading every day since. Then on Thursday we were reading with her in the Book of Mormon and after finishing the chapter she told us that she was ready to change everything. She told us she wanted her Patriarchal blessing, she wants to go to the temple, she even want to do all of her genealogy! Then she started crying because she was so happy. It was amazing how happy I was as well. I felt this complete joy come over me and I knew that the Holy Ghost combined with the Book of Mormon convinced her. She even said that she had a spiritual thirst or hunger. It was a powerful experience. She has an interview with the 1st counselor on Tuesday night.
It has been a good week though. Kevin and Jaqueline have baptismal dates, but we are not sure when they are going to do it anymore because Kevin is having an operation today. We are hoping that in a week or two he will be all better. Matías went to church again as well but still doesn't want to be baptized. We are going to fast and pray with the Bishop for him.
Thank you all for the love and support. You are amazing!
Love,
Elder Matthew D. Mooney
Wednesday, October 20, 2010
Nothing to do but keep working.
Dear Family,
Well we received our changes last night and....I´m staying in my sector! as well as my companion! And to our surprise our whole zone pretty much stayed the exact same. Three people left, one of them because he finished the mission and one new guy came into the zone. My district stayed the exact same which kinda shocked us. Especially in one sector where they only have had like five lessons the entire change?? ANyways, there is nothing to do but keep working.
The work here has still been pretty crazy. We find lots of investigators, but to find them again and keep teaching them has been difficult. We did find an awesome less active man named Carlos and his three kids Kevin, Jaqueline, and Neffi. They are a really cool family and Kevin and Jaqueline accepted baptismal dates. They went to church with us on Sunday and everyone already knew them because they used to attend church. We have high hopes with them.
A sad thing also happened this week with an investigator named Marcos. He was a really cool, sincere guy. We gave him the Book of Mormon and he said that if it filled him, he would get baptized. We had some trouble finding him for a while and when we finally found him he was drunk. He talked to us outside his house and told us that our book didn't help him at all and that he wasn't interested. He said all it talked about was Joseph Smith. That made us a little upset, but mostly disappointed because anyone who actually reads the book realizes that the Book of Mormon doesn't even talk about Joseph Smith. We will have to see if we can find him sober. I just hate how alcohol messes people up. It ruins people and it ruins their lives. It takes away all intelligence and spirituality a person has and turns them into something they are not. I am glad that alcohol has never had an influence over me and I am positive that I will never let it into my life.
We also had two really nice Family Home Evenings this week with ward members and investigating families and less active families. We taught about Temples and they loved it. We gave them copies of the new Liahona on temples and they enjoyed that. We finished the Family Nights playing funny games like "Black Magic" and a memorization game "I'm going on a trip and I'm going to bring a (something that starts with A, then B, etc.). Family Nights or Noches de Hogar are the key to making people comfortable in the ward and the church here.
Mom, Dad, and Diana I am quite jealous of your San Francisco trip. I wanna go to China Town so bad! I miss chinese food. Chinese food and Mexican food. That is what I want to eat when I first get home haha. I am proud of you Mom for doing such a good job helping out those organizations.
Well Halloween is coming up! Then Thanksgiving! Then Christmas! These next few months should fly by! Thank you for everything and I love you all very much.
Love,
Elder Matthew D. Mooney
Well we received our changes last night and....I´m staying in my sector! as well as my companion! And to our surprise our whole zone pretty much stayed the exact same. Three people left, one of them because he finished the mission and one new guy came into the zone. My district stayed the exact same which kinda shocked us. Especially in one sector where they only have had like five lessons the entire change?? ANyways, there is nothing to do but keep working.
The work here has still been pretty crazy. We find lots of investigators, but to find them again and keep teaching them has been difficult. We did find an awesome less active man named Carlos and his three kids Kevin, Jaqueline, and Neffi. They are a really cool family and Kevin and Jaqueline accepted baptismal dates. They went to church with us on Sunday and everyone already knew them because they used to attend church. We have high hopes with them.
A sad thing also happened this week with an investigator named Marcos. He was a really cool, sincere guy. We gave him the Book of Mormon and he said that if it filled him, he would get baptized. We had some trouble finding him for a while and when we finally found him he was drunk. He talked to us outside his house and told us that our book didn't help him at all and that he wasn't interested. He said all it talked about was Joseph Smith. That made us a little upset, but mostly disappointed because anyone who actually reads the book realizes that the Book of Mormon doesn't even talk about Joseph Smith. We will have to see if we can find him sober. I just hate how alcohol messes people up. It ruins people and it ruins their lives. It takes away all intelligence and spirituality a person has and turns them into something they are not. I am glad that alcohol has never had an influence over me and I am positive that I will never let it into my life.
We also had two really nice Family Home Evenings this week with ward members and investigating families and less active families. We taught about Temples and they loved it. We gave them copies of the new Liahona on temples and they enjoyed that. We finished the Family Nights playing funny games like "Black Magic" and a memorization game "I'm going on a trip and I'm going to bring a (something that starts with A, then B, etc.). Family Nights or Noches de Hogar are the key to making people comfortable in the ward and the church here.
Mom, Dad, and Diana I am quite jealous of your San Francisco trip. I wanna go to China Town so bad! I miss chinese food. Chinese food and Mexican food. That is what I want to eat when I first get home haha. I am proud of you Mom for doing such a good job helping out those organizations.
Well Halloween is coming up! Then Thanksgiving! Then Christmas! These next few months should fly by! Thank you for everything and I love you all very much.
Love,
Elder Matthew D. Mooney
Tuesday, October 12, 2010
I am grateful to be serving here in Chile.
Dear family,
This has been quite the average week. We taught plenty, found a bunch of new investigators, and are praying that some of them will progress. The problem is, a lot of our investigators like learning, but don´t really want to act in any way. With those people we just teach and testify as strongly as we can, but that is about all we can do. We have been trying to work with ward members a lot. Speaking of ward members, one of our friends here who always accompanies us to lessons, Fabian Gonzalez (Xavi), just got his mission call to Argentina! It was funny because he was praying not to go there. On Sunday he testified that he knows that Heavenly Father hears our prayers. Ha ha
News about Marilyn! I went and visited her with the bishop on Wednesday and she explained that she has received two answers - that the church is true and that she should get baptized. Unfortunately she is using her family and hectic work schedule as an excuse. We will see what happens with her.
We also brought one of our new investigators to church. His name is Matías and he is 15 years old. His family is catholic, but likes talking and sharing with us and he has relatives that are members of the church. At first he wanted to get out of church right after sacrament meeting. Then we introduced him to the bishop and the bishop rushed him off to the young men. He ended up staying 30 minutes after church and walking home with a family from our ward. The ward secretary thinks he stayed because of the girls ;)
Today we spent a lot of our Preparation day painting a room with the Hermana Maria Eugenia and her son Hernan. When we finished, I was a little uneasy because it needed another coat of paint or two, but she liked it. We then ate lunch with them. Afterward, I got my haircut for 3 thousand pesos. It was a little more expensive then I normally pay. The funny thing is, 3 thousand pesos is only 6 dollars?? And what´s even crazier is that McDonalds costs like 5 thousand pesos, or about 10 dollars?? The money here is wacky!
Well I love you all very much. Thank you for your emails, letters, and prayers of support. You don´t know how much they really help. I am grateful to be serving here in Chile. Thank you for everything.
Love,
Elder Matt Mooney
This has been quite the average week. We taught plenty, found a bunch of new investigators, and are praying that some of them will progress. The problem is, a lot of our investigators like learning, but don´t really want to act in any way. With those people we just teach and testify as strongly as we can, but that is about all we can do. We have been trying to work with ward members a lot. Speaking of ward members, one of our friends here who always accompanies us to lessons, Fabian Gonzalez (Xavi), just got his mission call to Argentina! It was funny because he was praying not to go there. On Sunday he testified that he knows that Heavenly Father hears our prayers. Ha ha
News about Marilyn! I went and visited her with the bishop on Wednesday and she explained that she has received two answers - that the church is true and that she should get baptized. Unfortunately she is using her family and hectic work schedule as an excuse. We will see what happens with her.
We also brought one of our new investigators to church. His name is Matías and he is 15 years old. His family is catholic, but likes talking and sharing with us and he has relatives that are members of the church. At first he wanted to get out of church right after sacrament meeting. Then we introduced him to the bishop and the bishop rushed him off to the young men. He ended up staying 30 minutes after church and walking home with a family from our ward. The ward secretary thinks he stayed because of the girls ;)
Today we spent a lot of our Preparation day painting a room with the Hermana Maria Eugenia and her son Hernan. When we finished, I was a little uneasy because it needed another coat of paint or two, but she liked it. We then ate lunch with them. Afterward, I got my haircut for 3 thousand pesos. It was a little more expensive then I normally pay. The funny thing is, 3 thousand pesos is only 6 dollars?? And what´s even crazier is that McDonalds costs like 5 thousand pesos, or about 10 dollars?? The money here is wacky!
Well I love you all very much. Thank you for your emails, letters, and prayers of support. You don´t know how much they really help. I am grateful to be serving here in Chile. Thank you for everything.
Love,
Elder Matt Mooney
Monday, October 4, 2010
Wasn't conference just incredible?
Dear Loved Ones,
Wasn´t conference just incredible? I find it so ridiculously amazing how much I really do enjoy listening to a bunch of "old men" talk for TEN HOURS. I know that those "old men" are prophets of God and they deliver His message to all the world. I feel so greatful to be able to listen to them every six months in conference. I also feel grateful because we were able to watch it all in english. I feel like that is a great blessing. I´ve tried listening to it in spanish, but it´s not just the same (that´s why the Lord speaks to us all in our own language). I also found it interesting how the themes seemed to be The Plan of Salvation - Agency and Follow Priesthood Authority - Prophets. Of course they talked about alot of subjects, but those were two large themes that we noticed as missionaries.
Oh and mom you mentioned that Sobe had a new Chirimoya drink right? I just ate a Chirimoya the other day. What a coincidence?! We´ve been eating really good lately. Too good, at times. We´ll have to work on that.
So we had about ten people who agreed to come to conference with us this weekend, but when it actually came time for the conference all ten of them backed out or cancelled. That was fairly discouraging. Well, life goes on and the work continues forward.
Conference also made me think of how grateful I really am to have such an amazing and supportive family. Thank you Mom and Dad for absolutley everything you are doing for me. You do so much and continue to do so much. Thank you Diana, Melissa, and Becky for being such great sisters. Thank you for writing me and sending me your love always. Thank you to all my friends and family who are reading this and have helped me to be where I am today. I love you all very much and pray for you often. Thanks all around!
Well I want you to know that I´m well. There are always difficulties here in the mission, but I´m where I need to be and I´m learning every day. Thanks for the concern.
Love,
Elder Matthew D. Mooney
Wasn´t conference just incredible? I find it so ridiculously amazing how much I really do enjoy listening to a bunch of "old men" talk for TEN HOURS. I know that those "old men" are prophets of God and they deliver His message to all the world. I feel so greatful to be able to listen to them every six months in conference. I also feel grateful because we were able to watch it all in english. I feel like that is a great blessing. I´ve tried listening to it in spanish, but it´s not just the same (that´s why the Lord speaks to us all in our own language). I also found it interesting how the themes seemed to be The Plan of Salvation - Agency and Follow Priesthood Authority - Prophets. Of course they talked about alot of subjects, but those were two large themes that we noticed as missionaries.
Oh and mom you mentioned that Sobe had a new Chirimoya drink right? I just ate a Chirimoya the other day. What a coincidence?! We´ve been eating really good lately. Too good, at times. We´ll have to work on that.
So we had about ten people who agreed to come to conference with us this weekend, but when it actually came time for the conference all ten of them backed out or cancelled. That was fairly discouraging. Well, life goes on and the work continues forward.
Conference also made me think of how grateful I really am to have such an amazing and supportive family. Thank you Mom and Dad for absolutley everything you are doing for me. You do so much and continue to do so much. Thank you Diana, Melissa, and Becky for being such great sisters. Thank you for writing me and sending me your love always. Thank you to all my friends and family who are reading this and have helped me to be where I am today. I love you all very much and pray for you often. Thanks all around!
Well I want you to know that I´m well. There are always difficulties here in the mission, but I´m where I need to be and I´m learning every day. Thanks for the concern.
Love,
Elder Matthew D. Mooney
Tuesday, September 28, 2010
"With or without clothes?"
Dear friends and family,How are you? I´m fine. This week has been kinda interesting. We have had some good times, but at the same time, its been kinda a slow week. For some reason the work is just going pretty slow. We found eight new investigators this week so we are hoping to see a little more progress this coming week.We have been unable to teach our beloved Marilyn this entire week. We set four appointments with her and she cancelled or wasn't there for every single one of them :S We called her and asked her if she wants us to pass by and she says yes. It's difficult. We´ll see what´s going on with her this week. Hopefully we can get her to attend General Conference with us!On Wednesday night I learned how to make Chilean Empanadas de Pino. They are delicious! Maria Eugenia, a really nice ward member taught us how. We made the dough from scratch and everything that goes in it. Pino is a hamburger onion mix that includes a hardboiled egg and green olive. I´m going to write it all down so I can celebrate the next 18 de Septiembre with you all in the states ;) We didn't have time to cook all the empanadas so we had to carry a big cardboard tray full of them 2 miles back to our house and bake them in our oven. I ate a lot of empanadas those next two days.While we were there we taught Zulema, the crazy 81 year old lady, who is best friends with Maria Eugenia and always attends church. The missionaries have been trying to baptize her forever and she finally said she will get baptized. She then asked us if she had to do it with or without clothes (she´s a crazy lady haha).That´s how the things are going here. I am way excited for the General Conference this weekend. It´s such a blessing to be able to listen to the words of living profets all weekend. I hope everyone can watch and enjoy every minute of it.I love you all so much and thank you for everything you are doing for me.Love,Elder Mooney
Thursday, September 16, 2010
"Cooouunt your blessings.... name.. them.. one.. by.. one.."
Hello,
Well unfortunately this Monday I will not be able to email you thanks to the festivities that are going on here in Chile. Friday, Saturday, Sunday, and Monday are just gonna be a big old 200th birthday party for the country of Chile. It should be fun.
Tomorrow our ward is throwing their yearly 18th of September party. It starts at 10am and goes till like 6-8pm. It´s craziness I tell you. They are going to make empanadas, mote con huesillo, pan amasado, y arto asado. Basically a big old Chilean BBQ. They are going to dance the national dance "La Cueca" (I think that´s how it is spelled?) and all the boys are gonna play fútbol. We are gonna pass it well.
So this week I had to do back to back divisions in other sectors. I had to go to the Nuevo Amanacer ward for a day with my old companion Elder Tello and then to Los Copihues with Elder Walters. It was exhausting. 48 hours away from my apartment and from my sector took alot out of me. It was sad because I had forgotten how blessed I am to live in a nice apartment building. It was freezing cold in Elder Tello´s apartment and there were 2 slugs in the bathroom. "Cooouunt your blessings.... name.. them.. one.. by.. one.."
Things are going well here though. The work is tough but well worth it. Oh and one lesson I learned this week, don´t Bible Bash. A man wanted all answers to come from the Bible in our lesson the other day and even though we could supply all the answers using the Bible, he hardened his heart and didn´t want to change. A powerful testimony is the best thing you can do.
I love you all very much!
Love,
Elder Mooney
Monday, September 13, 2010
"I felt the Spirit! I´m getting baptized!"
Hello Everyone!
I am happy to be writing you all on this bright sunshiny Monday. Sabrina was confirmed and recieved the gift of the Holy Ghost on Sunday. We are way happy for her and for her family. Her grandpa performed all of the ordinances and we could tell that really strengthened him. Her less active mom was at sacrament meeting for the first time and had to leave after the first hour. We invited her to stay for the last two hours and to our excitement she said "maybe next week", which means she is planning on going to church again! We also taught and challenged her less active uncle to reactivate and he said ok. Things are going well.
Marilyn went to church for the second time. We are still progressing towards her baptism on the 26th of September.
Right now I would like to say hello to all of the mothers and relatives of the new missionaries who just arrived here in our mission. They are a cool batch of missionaries and they all have good trainers. They are all safe and happy, no worries!
Some crazy things have happened this week. We had to clean the house of a crazy old woman and her husband. It was probably the dirtiest and smelliest house I have ever been in. We scrubbed that puppy clean while avoiding the extremely explicit homemade wall paper of her husband. :S On September 11th we had to enter into our pensions early (6pm) because I guess it is the date of when the Government was overthrown here in Chile and there are bombs, fights, protests, and destruction on occasion. Nothing that big really happened though.
The best part of the week was that I had the priviledge of interviewing three people to see if they were ready to be baptized. The first one was a 16 year old kid who had listened to the missionaries for about a year in another ward and never got baptized, then he moved here and was completely prepared. The other two were husband and wife. Their daughter had listened to the missionaries and was baptized a year ago and the parents never wanted to listen. Now the parents are more animated then she is. When we got to their house the wife was really upset because her husband wasn´t home and had said that he wasn´t going to be baptized. We called him and invited him to the house. He came in angry and said he didn´t want to. He said that his car had broken down and he would have to spend over 800 dollars on it and just didn´t want to get baptized. We tried talking to him, but he wouldn´t change his mind. FInally Elder Simbaña said, "we´re going to all go upstairs and you and Elder Mooney are just going to talk about the baptismal interview a bit." The two of us prayed, then talked for about 30 minutes and went over the baptismal questions. In the end I invited him to be baptized with his wife tomorrow and he said yes. We prayed and afterwards he gave me a huge hug, then looked at me and said, "I think I felt something, like the spirit." I told him that he was exactly right. He then ran up the stairs and walked in to the room of Elders and said, "I felt the Spirit! I´m getting baptized!" Everyone was shocked, his wife more then anyone. It was a great experience.
I love you all. Thank you so much for everything you do! Be safe!
Love,
Elder Matthew Mooney
I am happy to be writing you all on this bright sunshiny Monday. Sabrina was confirmed and recieved the gift of the Holy Ghost on Sunday. We are way happy for her and for her family. Her grandpa performed all of the ordinances and we could tell that really strengthened him. Her less active mom was at sacrament meeting for the first time and had to leave after the first hour. We invited her to stay for the last two hours and to our excitement she said "maybe next week", which means she is planning on going to church again! We also taught and challenged her less active uncle to reactivate and he said ok. Things are going well.
Marilyn went to church for the second time. We are still progressing towards her baptism on the 26th of September.
Right now I would like to say hello to all of the mothers and relatives of the new missionaries who just arrived here in our mission. They are a cool batch of missionaries and they all have good trainers. They are all safe and happy, no worries!
Some crazy things have happened this week. We had to clean the house of a crazy old woman and her husband. It was probably the dirtiest and smelliest house I have ever been in. We scrubbed that puppy clean while avoiding the extremely explicit homemade wall paper of her husband. :S On September 11th we had to enter into our pensions early (6pm) because I guess it is the date of when the Government was overthrown here in Chile and there are bombs, fights, protests, and destruction on occasion. Nothing that big really happened though.
The best part of the week was that I had the priviledge of interviewing three people to see if they were ready to be baptized. The first one was a 16 year old kid who had listened to the missionaries for about a year in another ward and never got baptized, then he moved here and was completely prepared. The other two were husband and wife. Their daughter had listened to the missionaries and was baptized a year ago and the parents never wanted to listen. Now the parents are more animated then she is. When we got to their house the wife was really upset because her husband wasn´t home and had said that he wasn´t going to be baptized. We called him and invited him to the house. He came in angry and said he didn´t want to. He said that his car had broken down and he would have to spend over 800 dollars on it and just didn´t want to get baptized. We tried talking to him, but he wouldn´t change his mind. FInally Elder Simbaña said, "we´re going to all go upstairs and you and Elder Mooney are just going to talk about the baptismal interview a bit." The two of us prayed, then talked for about 30 minutes and went over the baptismal questions. In the end I invited him to be baptized with his wife tomorrow and he said yes. We prayed and afterwards he gave me a huge hug, then looked at me and said, "I think I felt something, like the spirit." I told him that he was exactly right. He then ran up the stairs and walked in to the room of Elders and said, "I felt the Spirit! I´m getting baptized!" Everyone was shocked, his wife more then anyone. It was a great experience.
I love you all. Thank you so much for everything you do! Be safe!
Love,
Elder Matthew Mooney
Monday, September 6, 2010
Awesome
Dear family,
I am quite happy to say that Sabrina was baptized yesterday! It was awesome. The situation with her was interesting because the first day Elder Jacobs and I were together we asked references from everybody. People would throw out hundreds of names, naming less actives, old investigators, people that may be interested or used to be interested and we just took down the good sounding references. Our second lunch in the sector we ate with the Hermana Barrera and her husband. They are a quite old couple that got baptized over 21 years ago. As we were eating I was remembering that someone had told us something about their family. As the lunch came to an end their two grandkids came home and then it clicked, the grand-daughter was ten and wasn't baptized. We started teaching her that same day and things just went smoothly to her baptism. Her mom is less active and her dad is not a member. This last week we had her mom participating in every lesson and is excited for us to come back every time. We plan to keep working with that family.
Another awesome thing that happened yesterday was that our 21 year old investigator Marilyn attended church for the first time. The night before she accepted a baptismal date for the 26th of September, but with some doubts. She liked church though and we immediately introduced her to a 25 year old returned sister missionary and her returned missionary husband. They helped her feel right at home. She also got along great with Pamela, the 21 year old recent convert in our ward. She also agreed to coming to the stake baptism that afternoon and saw three baptisms. Our president was there and gave a powerful speech that left everyone laughing and crying at the same time. He then talked personally to Marilyn and told her to invite him to her baptism. She agreed. We are very happy with everything.
My companion and I have been trying to get into better shape by going down to the gym for about 40 minutes in the morning and running up the 14 floors of stairs afterward. It hasn't been happening every day though... We are going to try and improve on that. I don´t think the french fries and choripan that we ate for lunch today are going to help either :S
Last week I got a letter from Melissa and a card from Liberty Market which was awesome. It made me remember life before the mission a bit. Thank you all so much.
Well I just want you all to know that I love you and pray for you always. Thank you for everything you are doing.
Love,
Elder Matthew Mooney
I am quite happy to say that Sabrina was baptized yesterday! It was awesome. The situation with her was interesting because the first day Elder Jacobs and I were together we asked references from everybody. People would throw out hundreds of names, naming less actives, old investigators, people that may be interested or used to be interested and we just took down the good sounding references. Our second lunch in the sector we ate with the Hermana Barrera and her husband. They are a quite old couple that got baptized over 21 years ago. As we were eating I was remembering that someone had told us something about their family. As the lunch came to an end their two grandkids came home and then it clicked, the grand-daughter was ten and wasn't baptized. We started teaching her that same day and things just went smoothly to her baptism. Her mom is less active and her dad is not a member. This last week we had her mom participating in every lesson and is excited for us to come back every time. We plan to keep working with that family.
Another awesome thing that happened yesterday was that our 21 year old investigator Marilyn attended church for the first time. The night before she accepted a baptismal date for the 26th of September, but with some doubts. She liked church though and we immediately introduced her to a 25 year old returned sister missionary and her returned missionary husband. They helped her feel right at home. She also got along great with Pamela, the 21 year old recent convert in our ward. She also agreed to coming to the stake baptism that afternoon and saw three baptisms. Our president was there and gave a powerful speech that left everyone laughing and crying at the same time. He then talked personally to Marilyn and told her to invite him to her baptism. She agreed. We are very happy with everything.
My companion and I have been trying to get into better shape by going down to the gym for about 40 minutes in the morning and running up the 14 floors of stairs afterward. It hasn't been happening every day though... We are going to try and improve on that. I don´t think the french fries and choripan that we ate for lunch today are going to help either :S
Last week I got a letter from Melissa and a card from Liberty Market which was awesome. It made me remember life before the mission a bit. Thank you all so much.
Well I just want you all to know that I love you and pray for you always. Thank you for everything you are doing.
Love,
Elder Matthew Mooney
Friday, August 20, 2010
Things here in Chile Santiago Este are great!
Dear Loved Ones,
Well this week has been interesting. We have spent a lot of time searching for new investigators because at the moment there aren't any. We have been getting to know the ward members little by little and they have been a great help. We have been trying to build up their trust in us by sharing lessons with them and it is already paying off. The members seem to be happy to have us in their ward. (That´s always a relief).
It´s awesome mom that you have been talking with Joselyn. She kinda acts like our mom here in the Chile and always wants to give us food even though we don´t always have time. There was a stake disco activity with the youth this week and that was entertaining as well. Also, The President of the Elders Quorum has also been really cool to us. He was a missionary here back in the day. He´s from the north of Chile and moved back here to go to school. He now has a wife and three kids... He´s way cool though. He teaches crazy interesting classes and gave us a huge lunch on Sunday. That was nice. The ward is good and we are getting comfortable now.
Good news! Christian, the only investigator we have, told us that he wasn't ready to be baptized about a week and a half ago. Elder Jacobs and I taught him a powerful lesson about 2 Nefi 31 and he accepted a baptismal date for the 29th of August. The spirit was strong and it was way exciting. Hopefully you'll be hearing about that soon enough.
Things here in Chile Santiago Este are great. Thank you for all your love and support!
Love,
Elder Mooney
PS - I saw a really cool video the other day. You should look it up on youtube:
obra de teatro cristiano - bien contra mal crisitano
Well this week has been interesting. We have spent a lot of time searching for new investigators because at the moment there aren't any. We have been getting to know the ward members little by little and they have been a great help. We have been trying to build up their trust in us by sharing lessons with them and it is already paying off. The members seem to be happy to have us in their ward. (That´s always a relief).
It´s awesome mom that you have been talking with Joselyn. She kinda acts like our mom here in the Chile and always wants to give us food even though we don´t always have time. There was a stake disco activity with the youth this week and that was entertaining as well. Also, The President of the Elders Quorum has also been really cool to us. He was a missionary here back in the day. He´s from the north of Chile and moved back here to go to school. He now has a wife and three kids... He´s way cool though. He teaches crazy interesting classes and gave us a huge lunch on Sunday. That was nice. The ward is good and we are getting comfortable now.
Good news! Christian, the only investigator we have, told us that he wasn't ready to be baptized about a week and a half ago. Elder Jacobs and I taught him a powerful lesson about 2 Nefi 31 and he accepted a baptismal date for the 29th of August. The spirit was strong and it was way exciting. Hopefully you'll be hearing about that soon enough.
Things here in Chile Santiago Este are great. Thank you for all your love and support!
Love,
Elder Mooney
PS - I saw a really cool video the other day. You should look it up on youtube:
obra de teatro cristiano - bien contra mal crisitano
Monday, August 9, 2010
¡Woo hoo!
Dear family,
Wow, so there is a lot to tell you and a lot of details and information to send so I´m just gonna throw it all together into this one email...
I have a new companion! His name is Elder Jacobs! He has 9 months in the mission and we are already friends because I did divisions with him his first week in the mission and it was a lot of fun. I feel blessed, and happy, and relieved.
This whole last week has been nuts with Elder Wyatt leaving and all. He had to pack up all of his stuff, say goodbye to the ward and a few other families, go sight seeing with the President and his wife, have a final interview with President Laycock, and have the goodbye night next to the temple. I, of course, was present for almost all of it. It was a blast...
It´s way cool mom that you are working on your spanish because we are going to be speaking in spanish all the time after the mission. It also makes it easier because people here that want to write you can do it easily and you can translate for everyone else. As for my spanish, I am speaking farely well. I need to improve on it a lot. Like A LOT! I want to be able to speak like a CHILENO. Someday it may just happen.
I recieved my amazing package the other night when we were at the office for Elder Wyatt´s interview. It was amazing! Thank you so much. I am sharing the candy with everyone, my companions, the chilean security guards, the jovenes, and everyone loves it. The socks from grandma are greatly appreciated! The camel story is inspiring and the camel is a little goofy but I´m diggin it. Dad´s new business cards and flyers are incredibly cool. I like them a lot. I wanna see the office now as well! But really, thank you all for everything.
This week I have a burning desire to get some work done here in JP Alessandri and we hope to find millions of people to teach. We will be relying greatly upon faith, fasting, and praying. Please keep our ward in your prayers.
I am dying to see more pictures from everyone. Please send them! I especially want to see pictures of Kelly´s africa trip as well and Sara´s wedding! That´s crazy that people get married?!
I love you all very much!
Love,
Elder Mooney
PS - Send Gilly my love and support!
A lot to do...
Hello loved ones,
Well this has been an interesting week. I have really come to learn a lot about the kind of missionary I am and recognize the blessings I have here in the mission. My new ward is small but strong. There are only about 60-65 active members, but there is a list of about 600 members in the ward. That makes me happy because it gives me a lot to do.
My companion has inspired me to push myself a little more. I get up just a little bit earlier now and work out a little bit harder. Haha it´s progress. We go down to the gym sometimes, because the apartment complex has equipment and a pool. We´ve been swimming a lot lately.... NOT. I also bought a bunch of stuff to make myself chocolate egg and oatmeal protein shakes. Don´t expect any drastic changes though. I just bought the stuff becuase it tastes good.
At the moment there is no progress here in the sector. There aren´t any investigators either. So in a week I will be getting a new companion and we will be getting down to business. It should be fun!
Just want you all to know that I love and miss you all. Thank you for your letters and support. You are 2 good!
Love,
Elder Mooney
Well this has been an interesting week. I have really come to learn a lot about the kind of missionary I am and recognize the blessings I have here in the mission. My new ward is small but strong. There are only about 60-65 active members, but there is a list of about 600 members in the ward. That makes me happy because it gives me a lot to do.
My companion has inspired me to push myself a little more. I get up just a little bit earlier now and work out a little bit harder. Haha it´s progress. We go down to the gym sometimes, because the apartment complex has equipment and a pool. We´ve been swimming a lot lately.... NOT. I also bought a bunch of stuff to make myself chocolate egg and oatmeal protein shakes. Don´t expect any drastic changes though. I just bought the stuff becuase it tastes good.
At the moment there is no progress here in the sector. There aren´t any investigators either. So in a week I will be getting a new companion and we will be getting down to business. It should be fun!
Just want you all to know that I love and miss you all. Thank you for your letters and support. You are 2 good!
Love,
Elder Mooney
Thursday, July 29, 2010
Changed...
Dear family,
I was changed! Yesterday night at about 10:20 they called me and told me that I would be leaving Turquesa. If I had received that call about two months ago I would have been jumping for joy, but last night it was the complete opposite. It crushed me. I really didn´t want to leave the Turquesa Ward. Over these last four changes there (24 weeks), I have really developed a love for that ward and the members there. We spent so long developing relationships and working with them in the missionary work that it is hard to leave them behind. It is also heart breaking to leave behind all of the people who are now investigating the church.
We finally taught the entire family of Angelina and Bastian. Her husband Andres didn´t want to leave the house, but we made friends with him and dragged him out. We then had a lesson with the Guerrero Family. Andres now supports Angelina and Bastian in their decision and wants us to keep passing by to teach him more. It is so sad to have to leave them behind. Angelina and Bastian should be getting baptized in 2 weeks.
Then we have Ana Maria and Yanara who were a blessing and a miracle. Ana Maria is a little quiet lady who stopped us in the street two Mondays ago and asked us what she needed to do to go to our church. We immediately set an appointment to teach her. She and her 13 year old daughter accepted the invitation to be baptized and are way excited for it.
We also had an amazing experience with our ward mission leader this week as well. When we first started working with him, he didn´t seem to care about us or anything. Over time we began to develop a good relationship and we started having him leave with us to lessons and doing divisions. Then this week he invited us to come eat dinner (chilean "once") with him. He is a convert to the church and the rest of his family aren´t members. We had seen them before, but he never gave us the chance to talk with them. This time he invited us to teach his family. We realized that he trusted us enough to teach them a little bit. We felt good to be able to help him and I am sure Elder Deviagge will try to keep working with them.
There`s also Nicole who is 16 years old and has been going to church and seminary for like a year now, but hasn´t been able to get baptized without her Dad´s permission. Yesterday we went to her house with the 1st Counselor of the ward and taught her dad. He now gives us full permission to pass by the house and teach her any time we want. She should be getting baptized in 2 weeks as well.
The list really goes on and on. Darling, Camilo, Christian, Cristian, and Francisca... The Lord has been pouring out his blessings upon Turquesa. Not to mention that we are also having ward members working with us every day of the week to help us out. Unfortunately my time is up there. It was heart breaking at first, but now I just have to move on. I trust that Elder Deviagge will be doing a good job with the sector next change. He will also be training a brand new missionary over there, so it should be really exciting for the both of them.
Right now I have been called to the JP Alesandri Ward. My companion is Elder Wyatt (a weight lifting health nut that goes home in 2 weeks). And I am the District Leader over here. One thing that makes me really happy about the new change is that we live in a really nice apartment building on the FOURTEENTH floor. We each have our own bathroom and lots of space as well. It´s weird though, in 2 weeks I will be receiving a new companion again. We´ll see how things go around here.
So yeah, that is basically my life. I know that everything happens for a reason and that changes are necessary. The Lord has plans for each and every one of us.
I love you all and hope everything is all good at home! Thank you for everything.
Love,
Elder Mooney
I was changed! Yesterday night at about 10:20 they called me and told me that I would be leaving Turquesa. If I had received that call about two months ago I would have been jumping for joy, but last night it was the complete opposite. It crushed me. I really didn´t want to leave the Turquesa Ward. Over these last four changes there (24 weeks), I have really developed a love for that ward and the members there. We spent so long developing relationships and working with them in the missionary work that it is hard to leave them behind. It is also heart breaking to leave behind all of the people who are now investigating the church.
We finally taught the entire family of Angelina and Bastian. Her husband Andres didn´t want to leave the house, but we made friends with him and dragged him out. We then had a lesson with the Guerrero Family. Andres now supports Angelina and Bastian in their decision and wants us to keep passing by to teach him more. It is so sad to have to leave them behind. Angelina and Bastian should be getting baptized in 2 weeks.
Then we have Ana Maria and Yanara who were a blessing and a miracle. Ana Maria is a little quiet lady who stopped us in the street two Mondays ago and asked us what she needed to do to go to our church. We immediately set an appointment to teach her. She and her 13 year old daughter accepted the invitation to be baptized and are way excited for it.
We also had an amazing experience with our ward mission leader this week as well. When we first started working with him, he didn´t seem to care about us or anything. Over time we began to develop a good relationship and we started having him leave with us to lessons and doing divisions. Then this week he invited us to come eat dinner (chilean "once") with him. He is a convert to the church and the rest of his family aren´t members. We had seen them before, but he never gave us the chance to talk with them. This time he invited us to teach his family. We realized that he trusted us enough to teach them a little bit. We felt good to be able to help him and I am sure Elder Deviagge will try to keep working with them.
There`s also Nicole who is 16 years old and has been going to church and seminary for like a year now, but hasn´t been able to get baptized without her Dad´s permission. Yesterday we went to her house with the 1st Counselor of the ward and taught her dad. He now gives us full permission to pass by the house and teach her any time we want. She should be getting baptized in 2 weeks as well.
The list really goes on and on. Darling, Camilo, Christian, Cristian, and Francisca... The Lord has been pouring out his blessings upon Turquesa. Not to mention that we are also having ward members working with us every day of the week to help us out. Unfortunately my time is up there. It was heart breaking at first, but now I just have to move on. I trust that Elder Deviagge will be doing a good job with the sector next change. He will also be training a brand new missionary over there, so it should be really exciting for the both of them.
Right now I have been called to the JP Alesandri Ward. My companion is Elder Wyatt (a weight lifting health nut that goes home in 2 weeks). And I am the District Leader over here. One thing that makes me really happy about the new change is that we live in a really nice apartment building on the FOURTEENTH floor. We each have our own bathroom and lots of space as well. It´s weird though, in 2 weeks I will be receiving a new companion again. We´ll see how things go around here.
So yeah, that is basically my life. I know that everything happens for a reason and that changes are necessary. The Lord has plans for each and every one of us.
I love you all and hope everything is all good at home! Thank you for everything.
Love,
Elder Mooney
Monday, July 12, 2010
Miracles every day
Dear loved ones,
Chile is doing well. I am doing well. My companion is doing well. It is so weird here in the mission. We have six changes - each change to get as much done as we possibly can. The six weeks always go by way too fast, but at the same time it feels like I have been in the mission for years. I think once I hit that year mark time will go by even faster though :S
Just so you know, Kelly wrote me and seems to be loving life over there in Africa. It sounds like they have a lot of responsibility and a lot of work over there. I am sure she is handling it great.
This week Bryan recieved the Priesthood and next week his sister Darinka is getting baptized. Fun stuff right? We also finally got to teach Angelina and Bastian, the amazing family we found like a month ago. Their church scared them away from us for a time but we finally had another lesson. In the lesson she told us that the spirit has been telling her so strong that it is all true. She tried to avoid it, but she explained everything that the scriptures say. She feels a light filling the darkness. She is happier. Her mind is at peace. And best of all her family has been getting along better ever since we passed by the house. The went on vacation this week but will be getting baptized the first of August. Also, we have a 14 year old girl named Darling who was afraid to go to church with us. We got her involved in Salsa dancing in mutual and she now is completely comfortable. She should be getting baptized soon as well.
I honestly feel like even though we see so much rejection, so much sadness and negativity, the Lord really is blessing us with miracles every day. I feel like it is so hard to recognize the affect the spirit has in every situation, but as I pay more attention, I can see the spirit guiding us and helping us at all times.
Well I love each and every one of you. Melissa, thanks for showing me the conversation with Juan. He was baptized my second change in the mission. He is an awesome kid! Keep up the good work all of you and keep writing me!
Love,
Elder Mooney
Monday, July 5, 2010
"Nothing bad ever came from being obedient"
Dear family,
Things here in Chile are crazy. This Sunday our bishop was released and a new bishopric was called. We can feel some electricity now in the ward. Obispo Juarez is our new bishop and we are already good friends with him so that helps us out alot here in the ward. He was also called to lead the missionary work in the stake recently so we are hoping that he will keep that focus of expansion.
Sadly I didn´t do anything fun for the 4th of July. I decorated the house with the stuff you sent me though. My Argentinian? companion sure loved the USA banner and US flags all over the place... Haha and I think he especially like how I kept singing "And I´m proud to be an American, where at least I know I´m free......" It was kinda a sad holiday though. I guess the Chilean community just doesn´t care about our Independence day.
Our investigators have been a little shaky lately. It seems that we have lost a few. It is really sad to see that happen too, because they still want us to pass by the house and share with them, but if they aren´t willing to go to church or make any changes in their lives we can`t. It´s difficult. We are still teaching Darinka who should be getting baptized in two Sundays now. We are teaching another 14 year old girl named Darling. Her mom and aunt are less active members. Darling was going to go to church with us on Sunday but got scared last minute and didn`t. We are going to help her to feel more comfortable by making sure that she goes to the salsa dance activity this Wednesday for mutual.
Two phrases have really been helping me to stay focused and work hard these past few weeks. "Nothing bad ever came from being obedient" and "SACRIFICE brings forth the blessings of heaven." As we recieve new rules and guidelines here in the mission, sometimes it is difficult to change how we have been doing things since the beginning. The truth is though, as we sacrifice our time and effort and make those changes, the Lord will bless us for our obedience. The concept is so clear! Easier said then done though.
Well I love each and every one of you and hope you are well. Thank you for your love and support. You are the best.
Love,
Elder Matthew Mooney
Tuesday, June 29, 2010
rollin' rollin' rollin'
Dear friends and family,
It`s so good to hear that things are great at home, especially to hear that my little sister had her ApPeNdIx ReMoVeD?! How random! But then she got her license and that makes up for it I guess. It`s crazy to think how things are changing so much at home, but I`m just doing the the same thing everyday. Sharing the Gospel.
First off, I would like to thank my amazing sister Melissa for her package she sent me! Really, it was amazing. Thank you so much Melissa for la bufanda (scarf) that you made. It is absolutely perfect. A couple of weeks ago Elder Laney and I were talking about how in AZ scarfs seem a little fruity, but here in Chile I think they are the best thing in the world. But really I have been using the scarf all day everyday and it goes well with both of my suits. Thank you so much. Oh and it smells really good too. The graham crackers blew up a little bit in the journey and the scarf soaked up the smell. It`s cool.
This week nothing new has really happened. We haven`t found anyone new to really teach. The drunks have been everywhere like usual. One good thing that did happen was that Bryan (recent convert), his grandma, and his sister Darinka all went to church on Sunday. Darinka should be getting baptized in two weeks. Let`s hope for the best. Abraham and Carolina are progressing well, but them and 20 other people didn`t go to church on Sunday because it was freezing in the morning. Ìt`s just getting colder and colder here. It`s below 0 degrees C everyday now. It`s just horrible because the temperature outdoors is almost the same as it is indoors. We can see our breath as we teach all of our lessons.
This week I have been really focusing more on the importance of a pure powerful testimony....
"And this he did that he himself might go forth among his people, or among the people of Nephi, that he might preach the word of God unto them, to stir them up in rememberance of their duty, and that he might pull down, by the word of God, all the pride and craftiness and all the contentions which were among his people, seeing no way that he might reclaim them save it were in bearing down in pure testimony against them." Alma 4:19
With that in mind we were teaching Rodrigo, one of our recent converts, how he can be a missionary right now by sharing his testimony with others. He told us that he had no idea of how to share his testimony? So we taught him and invited him to share his testimony with us, but he would not do it. After a few minutes he explained to us that he did not want to share his testimony because he was not really sure of anything. We shared our testimonies with him and explained that the best way to help your testimony to grow is by sharing it. He understood and agreed to start working on it until our next visit.
Another investigator this week astonished us with how powerful his testimony has become. He says that he knows that the Holy Ghost answers questions in the heart and the mind because he has been receiving answers. He said that the scripture, "by their fruits ye shall know them (Mathew 7)" has had a huge impact on him. It has dawned on him that we do not teach the beliefs of our own church, we do not teach what we want or what our church leaders want, we teach what God wants. His testimony, the testimony of an investigator, has strengthened mine this week. (Now all we have to do his convince him to get married...?)
I love you all so much. I know that this gospel is true. I know that Jesus Christ lives and loves us and that he guides his church today. You are all incredible. Thank you for all your love and support.
Love,
Elder Matthew D. Mooney
It`s so good to hear that things are great at home, especially to hear that my little sister had her ApPeNdIx ReMoVeD?! How random! But then she got her license and that makes up for it I guess. It`s crazy to think how things are changing so much at home, but I`m just doing the the same thing everyday. Sharing the Gospel.
First off, I would like to thank my amazing sister Melissa for her package she sent me! Really, it was amazing. Thank you so much Melissa for la bufanda (scarf) that you made. It is absolutely perfect. A couple of weeks ago Elder Laney and I were talking about how in AZ scarfs seem a little fruity, but here in Chile I think they are the best thing in the world. But really I have been using the scarf all day everyday and it goes well with both of my suits. Thank you so much. Oh and it smells really good too. The graham crackers blew up a little bit in the journey and the scarf soaked up the smell. It`s cool.
This week nothing new has really happened. We haven`t found anyone new to really teach. The drunks have been everywhere like usual. One good thing that did happen was that Bryan (recent convert), his grandma, and his sister Darinka all went to church on Sunday. Darinka should be getting baptized in two weeks. Let`s hope for the best. Abraham and Carolina are progressing well, but them and 20 other people didn`t go to church on Sunday because it was freezing in the morning. Ìt`s just getting colder and colder here. It`s below 0 degrees C everyday now. It`s just horrible because the temperature outdoors is almost the same as it is indoors. We can see our breath as we teach all of our lessons.
This week I have been really focusing more on the importance of a pure powerful testimony....
"And this he did that he himself might go forth among his people, or among the people of Nephi, that he might preach the word of God unto them, to stir them up in rememberance of their duty, and that he might pull down, by the word of God, all the pride and craftiness and all the contentions which were among his people, seeing no way that he might reclaim them save it were in bearing down in pure testimony against them." Alma 4:19
With that in mind we were teaching Rodrigo, one of our recent converts, how he can be a missionary right now by sharing his testimony with others. He told us that he had no idea of how to share his testimony? So we taught him and invited him to share his testimony with us, but he would not do it. After a few minutes he explained to us that he did not want to share his testimony because he was not really sure of anything. We shared our testimonies with him and explained that the best way to help your testimony to grow is by sharing it. He understood and agreed to start working on it until our next visit.
Another investigator this week astonished us with how powerful his testimony has become. He says that he knows that the Holy Ghost answers questions in the heart and the mind because he has been receiving answers. He said that the scripture, "by their fruits ye shall know them (Mathew 7)" has had a huge impact on him. It has dawned on him that we do not teach the beliefs of our own church, we do not teach what we want or what our church leaders want, we teach what God wants. His testimony, the testimony of an investigator, has strengthened mine this week. (Now all we have to do his convince him to get married...?)
I love you all so much. I know that this gospel is true. I know that Jesus Christ lives and loves us and that he guides his church today. You are all incredible. Thank you for all your love and support.
Love,
Elder Matthew D. Mooney
Rough week
Dear Loved Ones,
First things first: HAPPY FATHER´S DAY DAD?!!? Wow, I missed you on Sunday, especially when all the Young Women passed out cards to their dads and the primary gave them all bookmarks. It made me think of you. I also was reading the second talk in the General Conference Liahona about Priesthood Power and it made me so grateful to have a dad who honors and exercises his Priesthood. Thank you Dad for everything you´ve done for me and everything you´re doing now. Keep up the great work you cool guy you ;)
Love,
Elder Matt Mooney
Now unfortunately we have experienced many trials this week... Fights in the ward that have resulted in the releasing of the Young Men and Young Women presidents. Fights between couples that have prevented progression in the gospel. Laziness that prevented an entire family from going to church. Coldness that has developed into people sleeping in later and going to bed earlier. Winter has officially started and I officially have a cold. The list really does go on and on...
BUT we´ve got to be of good cheer so it´s all good. No worries. Today was a great day. We decided to go to the Mall close by because it has a bigger grocery store, they have office supplies, and they´ve got a food court. What we weren´t anticipating was the giant mob of thousands and thousands of people in the food court. Today Chile one another game in El Mundial de Fútbol, or the Soccer World Cup. It´s been going on for the last week or two. People are going nuts here. There are three games going on everyday and people are screaming throughout all of them. My companion has been suffering because Argentina has been playing well. The United States are in it as well, but nobody cares back home do they? I found it funny how it´s the biggest deal in the world here, but at home it´s nothing huge. But literally thousands of people were watching the game in the food court and when it ended everyone broke out in singing and dancing. All of the schools are showing the games here as well. It´s crazy.
When everyone left we entered and ate Taco Bell. It was really good. We then bought 2 weeks worth of groceries and carried them on the bus and the subway. Then we slept for an hour and a half. Good times.
This week I also got to know ELDER STOLLER and ELDER TILLEY. They´re both from Gilbert and we all have alot in common because of it. Elder Tilley knows almost everyone that I know. He and I have been at Kaitlin Gray´s house at the same time without ever realizing it. I think he was also In Skylar Peterson´s ward. Small world.
It´s been so weird to think that my best bud Jared is now a married man. That´s so weird. It´s amazingly cool though and I´m way happy for him. I wish them the best of luck and I send my love.
Well, there are a million other things to tell you, (like how a man almost died, literally and we gave him a blessing and now he´s fine), but I´m low on time. I love you all so much and appreciate your letters and emails. Please never stop writing me :S Haha
Until next week...
Love,
Elder Mooney
Tuesday, June 15, 2010
"Changes"
Dear family,
Wow, so that was kind of a surprise. We received our changes last night, but about 20 minutes before the phone call it started raining and the power was cut. We then received the phone call of our changes and to our surprise Elder Laney and Elder Mayberry were both changed and Elder Deviagge and I staying. What was even more of a shock though was when they told us that we would now be the only two elders in the ward. So Elder Deviagge and I live alone now... The ward is gonna flip out when they find out that there are only two missionaries in the ward and they have to cancel half of the lunch appointments now.
Elder Deviagge and I used our entire preparation day today to deep clean the house. We defrosted the freezer, scrubbed the fridge, cleaned the bathroom, etc, etc... I am actually quite sad that I didn't use any time to relax, but we have six weeks alone in our house now. We wanna keep it clean.
Weird occurrences this week. I was kissed on the neck two times this week by two distinct drunk men. In Chile its normal for men to kiss each other on the cheek or on the neck, especially amongst the gangsters. It wasn't a pleasant experience though.
I also find it kinda funny that here in Chile the gangsters think its cool to wear big flashy scarfs, whether its hot or cold. Also kite flying here is pretty popular. Yesterday we saw a big group of bone thugs in scarfs watching their two friends fly kites. I just thought how weird that would be in Arizona.
The missionary work is going well. We found a golden family last week who immediately wants to get baptized. They are so awesome that it makes me nervous. This should be a successful change though.
I love you all so much. HAPPY BIRTHDAY DIANA!! Ill be writing you a separate email. Thank you for everything.
Love,
Elder Mooney
Wow, so that was kind of a surprise. We received our changes last night, but about 20 minutes before the phone call it started raining and the power was cut. We then received the phone call of our changes and to our surprise Elder Laney and Elder Mayberry were both changed and Elder Deviagge and I staying. What was even more of a shock though was when they told us that we would now be the only two elders in the ward. So Elder Deviagge and I live alone now... The ward is gonna flip out when they find out that there are only two missionaries in the ward and they have to cancel half of the lunch appointments now.
Elder Deviagge and I used our entire preparation day today to deep clean the house. We defrosted the freezer, scrubbed the fridge, cleaned the bathroom, etc, etc... I am actually quite sad that I didn't use any time to relax, but we have six weeks alone in our house now. We wanna keep it clean.
Weird occurrences this week. I was kissed on the neck two times this week by two distinct drunk men. In Chile its normal for men to kiss each other on the cheek or on the neck, especially amongst the gangsters. It wasn't a pleasant experience though.
I also find it kinda funny that here in Chile the gangsters think its cool to wear big flashy scarfs, whether its hot or cold. Also kite flying here is pretty popular. Yesterday we saw a big group of bone thugs in scarfs watching their two friends fly kites. I just thought how weird that would be in Arizona.
The missionary work is going well. We found a golden family last week who immediately wants to get baptized. They are so awesome that it makes me nervous. This should be a successful change though.
I love you all so much. HAPPY BIRTHDAY DIANA!! Ill be writing you a separate email. Thank you for everything.
Love,
Elder Mooney
Tuesday, June 8, 2010
I'm just happy to be serving!
Dear family,
Yes, this week was MUCH better. Very busy and stressful, but great. Bryan and Cristian got baptized! Yay! We planned the baptism really well, informed people about it all week, assigned talks, prayers and testimonies. The best part is though, half the people bailed on us the last minute. Good thing missionaries are masters of improvisation and the baptism went smoothly as well. Best result of the baptism was that the entire family of Bryan went to the chapel and his 15 year old sister wants to get baptized as well. Yessss.....
Best announcement we received this week was on Tuesday. Remember Daniel? Boyfriend of Jacqueline? Father of her son? On Tuesday he informed us that he wants to get married now. They`re going to the court this week to set a date. How cool is that? We were speechless when he told us. He also told us that right after he wants to get baptized as well. We`re hoping that Alejandro will follow his example.
I received my wonderful, beautiful, delicious package this week. Peanut butter cookies, more cookies, reese`s pieces, reese`s cups, brownie mix, ranch mix, whole puncher, thousands of post it notes! The pension was rejoicing this entire week with all the wonderful food I received. Thank you so much Mom and Dad!
So yeah, things are going good here in Barrio Turquesa. We have a lot to do and we`re loving it. Unfortunately this is the last week before changes. I`m kinda hoping I don`t get changed, but whatever happens happens. I`m just happy to be serving.
Well I love you all so much. Thank you for everything you do for me, it really helps so much to be receiving so much love and support. I hope all is well at home, I`ll be praying for you.
Love,
Elder Mooney
Yes, this week was MUCH better. Very busy and stressful, but great. Bryan and Cristian got baptized! Yay! We planned the baptism really well, informed people about it all week, assigned talks, prayers and testimonies. The best part is though, half the people bailed on us the last minute. Good thing missionaries are masters of improvisation and the baptism went smoothly as well. Best result of the baptism was that the entire family of Bryan went to the chapel and his 15 year old sister wants to get baptized as well. Yessss.....
Best announcement we received this week was on Tuesday. Remember Daniel? Boyfriend of Jacqueline? Father of her son? On Tuesday he informed us that he wants to get married now. They`re going to the court this week to set a date. How cool is that? We were speechless when he told us. He also told us that right after he wants to get baptized as well. We`re hoping that Alejandro will follow his example.
I received my wonderful, beautiful, delicious package this week. Peanut butter cookies, more cookies, reese`s pieces, reese`s cups, brownie mix, ranch mix, whole puncher, thousands of post it notes! The pension was rejoicing this entire week with all the wonderful food I received. Thank you so much Mom and Dad!
So yeah, things are going good here in Barrio Turquesa. We have a lot to do and we`re loving it. Unfortunately this is the last week before changes. I`m kinda hoping I don`t get changed, but whatever happens happens. I`m just happy to be serving.
Well I love you all so much. Thank you for everything you do for me, it really helps so much to be receiving so much love and support. I hope all is well at home, I`ll be praying for you.
Love,
Elder Mooney
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