Wow, I am 19 and guess what… it doesn’t feel any different than being 18. But that’s okay. This week was a pretty good week overall and wasn’t a bad way to spend a birthday. Nothing too crazy happened this week as far as people but none the less it was good. Highlights would be Wednesday, we went tracting pretty much all night. One of the people we found was super awesome. So, we knocked on the door, and I saw behind him a small deer head and made a comment about it being pretty nice. He then invites us in to show us the 3rd biggest elk that has ever been shot in Washington. It wasn’t even shot by him, it was shot by his wife. Anyways, we got some pictures with it and they told us all about their hunting. Finally, they asked us why we’re there in the first place and we shared about the plan of salvation, which was perfect since the wife was pregnant. The husband suddenly exclaimed, “Babe want to go to church!?” Anyways, they ultimately did not end up going to church but still, it was good, and we’ll visit them later this week maybe.

We also this week discovered that the Ring doorbell is the best thing ever. It has a mic and a camera, and if someone doesn’t answer in 15 seconds, we start giving a little lesson and then leave them with our number. It’s pretty fun. Also, this week I got the gifts that Elder Weeden left me. One is a shirt which he signed, and the other is this awesome hair wax that he used, which he also signed.

Hmm what else. Well, for my birthday we found a 1 candle, and we didn’t have any matches, so my bright companions decide “hey let’s take a paper towel and light it by turning the stove up to high” . . . it worked but was still dumb. This week I also made pizza which was pretty fun and easy, thanks to the dough recipe from Mark. Thanks Mark! [Gideon’s oldest brother]

Friday, we had interviews with President Auna which were good and I enjoyed. After, we had to get our oil changed, and it took an hour and went to Dairy Queen. On the way we found this cool mural.

Saturday night we tracted for 4 hours! After, we had dinner and carved pumpkins which was a pretty good way to spend a Saturday night. The best thing this week is that we invited the daughter of a less active [not coming to church regularly] family to be baptized, and she said yes, and we invited their son to prepare to receive the Aaronic priesthood. That was awesome and the Spirit was so strong. Yeah that’s about it for the week.

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Questions-How are things going over there? – Good good. I enjoy the work part of the mission and studying the Gospel every day and the language

Do you like it?- Most of it, it’s not all fun, but that’s life

Do you wish you had taken a different path? – No. Not at all. School would have been good for me now too, but this is the best thing I can be doing right now with my life. Giving my life to God, he can do a lot more with it than I can. 

Do you like your mission location? – Yeah, it’s green out here just like VA but a lot cooler and cloudier, but overall it’s pretty over here

Can I send you anything – like something from Lynchburg?? – Hmm not really, just send something you think would remind me of it I guess. Or that I can keep in my apartment. Like, this week my little sister for my birthday gave me a painting she made and it’s one of the best gifts I think I have ever gotten.

How is exercising going? – Good mostly, it’s gotten really cold in the mornings which makes it hard to find motivation to not just sit in the chair in the morning.

Are you getting all you need through reacting or are you doing more?  – I am assuming you mean tracting? Uh this Friday we’re going to start an English class which will help bring more people.

How many steps do you average?- Depends on how much tracting but probably 9000 but up to 20000 or as low as 5000 some days.

Is there anything that you wish you had prepared for more before arriving in the mission field?- Hmm I guess just the amount of talking with people you don’t know and just being more comfortable with that.

What is some way your companion has blessed your life in the last week?- Elder Poncio got me ice cream at a local creamery this week which was pretty nice and made my birthday a little bit different than any other day

Favorite teaching moment or interaction? – One night this week in a trailer park we met a woman and she was looking pretty down, smoking outside the trailer and we just stopped to talk to her. We just shared a short message about how God loves each of us individually and personally and is aware of our needs and she started to cry. We invited her to church and she said she wanted to come. So we sent the sisters [female missionaries] over. 

This week I have been studying in 3rd Nephi in the Book of Mormon and Christ’s personal ministry to the people in the Americas. It is such a wonderful blessing to have the Book of Mormon as it so clearly teaches of Christ’s divinity and His doctrine. Along with the Bible, the Book of Mormon can guide us how to act and be more like Christ. One of my favorite verses this week was 3 Nephi 27:16 “And it shall come to pass, that whoso repenteth and is baptized in my name shall be filled; and if he endureth to the end, behold, him will I hold guiltless before my Father at that day when I shall stand to judge the world.” The gospel of Jesus Christ is just that. It’s so simple. We need to have faith, use Christ’s great gift to us in His atonement and repent, be baptized by water and by the Holy Ghost, by receiving the gift of the Holy Ghost and Endure to the End. I am so grateful to be able to share that message with others and bring that hope and light to their lives. 
Love,

Elder Tonkinson
https://eldertonkinson.home.blog/
PS: this is Elder Harris speaking, whoever emails Elder Tonkinson will be blessed. Also, he needs ice cream… fyi. 

Well this week was all over the place and kinda a rollar coaster with lots of highs and lows. After preperation day, we went over to our new friends house Sabrina (She speaks English), and we taught her and her family for like an hour and fifteen. They had lots of good questions, but it became apparent that Sabrina’s mom was not very interested and just wanted to argue with us. Sabrina on the other hand is straight golden and commited to read the Book of Mormon and pray about it. She is awesome, but wait there’s more on that later. 

After that fire lesson we went to the branch president’s house and Elder Poncio and Elder Williams burned their shirts (it’s a weird thing) for their one year mark. It was fun but also kinda dumb and left my clothes smelling pretty smokey. Tuesday was mostly just tracting around but we had some fun experiances. Like one guy we knocked the door and he asked Elder Davis, “What are ya pushing?” his wife in the background goes, “They’re pushing Jesus honey!” Then he says, “Well we’re all brothers and sisters here, and I don’t need you peddling on my porch.” another fun experiance was when we knocked a no soliciting door. The man opens it up and reads for us, “NO SOLICITING” and I said “Legally it’s procelyting, and we can knock.” He was like “No it’s soliciting” and shuts the door. All the other doors with no soliciting were nice and knew the difference, oh well. Finally, the last door we knocked that night was good. He opens the door and says, “Are you Mormons or Jehovah’s?” We say “Mormons, but we try to go by the full name of the church, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints.” Anyways ,he was like we can talk and have a good discussion, but you’ll never convince me the Book of Mormon is the word of God. I was ready to say “alright well have a good day”, but Elder Davis was like, “Well personally I’m not that well versed in the Bible and maybe we can come by and study it with you sometime.” Well that was a good move. We ended up talking to him for teb more minutes and hopefully sometime he’ll call us or we can go back and set up a time to do it.

Wedensday was a fun day. We helped move someone after district council, and they had this nice hill overlooking the mountains ,and we got some pretty good pictures. It was a good mini photo shoot for sure. Later, we went to Jo Fish, the member-owned restaurant to celebrate the actual one year mark of Elder Poncio, then we went to a member’s to bless his house ,and he fed us hot dogs. I was already stuffed. Then we went to another members and had another lesson, and they were eating dinner and fed us pizza. Also with the last members house I kinda messed up and when they opened the door and took a step forward, not into the house but close and then the father of the home moved to the side and let us in… Either way it wasn’t good as I accidently invited us in, but hey who knows if I hadn’t we wouldn’t have had the lesson. 

Thursday was… gross. Some of the other Elders enlisted us for service. All they were told was that they needed an army. We get there and what we’re doing and taking their personal dump (pictures included) and putting it in a uhaul (also picture of that). I am not sure how aloud that is to put trash in a uhaul but we did. Elder Lee, who goes home at the end of this transfer, said it was the nastiest service he’s ever done. The nastiness soaked through my shoes and Elder Lee, and I were definetly the two there who despite the nastiness tried to do our best. About half way through they said “This is too gross for you all so, come help with this other stuff.” So we did that and that was better. As soon as we got home though we all put our clothes in the wash and showered. Thursday night was awesome though. We met with Jonathan and invited him to church. We met with a woman named Carmen, and we planned to start studying the Bible with her and gave her a Reina-Valera church Bible complete with footnotes and all that good stuff. She said “Wow this bible is so much easier to read than mine,” and she went crazy over the footnotes and cross references. Finally, we had another lesson with Sabrina. That was good. We went to a coffee shop as she realized  her mom was not going to let us get anywhere. We had intended to teach her lesson 1 on the Restoration of the Gospel of Jesus Christ, but just spent that time answering more questions like: Polygamy, temples and church buildings, and the sacrament. After she found out that anyone could attend church, and it wasn’t a closed group she was like, “Well can I come this Sunday?” We were like, “Of course… but ours is in Spanish as we’re Spanish missionaries” and she was said, “Well I speak Spanish and I want to get better.” So we gave her the address. Yeah she’s great, like she invited herself to go to Church!

Friday I spent the day with the Zone Leaders while, Elder Davis and Elder Poncio went to Seattle to training. Most of the day was spent doing Zone Leader stuff, blessings, phone calls and such. On top of that, every Friday, Elder Thompson, who also is leaving at the end of the transfe,r has “My Plan” which is a class for missionaries during their last 6 weeks to help them plan for their future. So, not much got done as far as work goes, just service, studying and them going to the other side of the room for private phone calls, but it was good. After all the people going to training got back, we had dinner together which was fun well until the sad news came up. Elder Weeden, my boy from Australia, the legend, because of circumstances he can’t control, had to go home. That was sad. But we did get some pictures and some stuff of his that he signed. Yes, we had him sign stuff because he’s that awesome. Plus he’s going to go play pro rugby when he gets home so… couple years down the line the signed hair wax might be worth something haha. Or the signed rugby ball, which Elder Davis got. That part of the day was very sad, because he was becoming a great missionary (he came out with me). We finished the night with a branch activity which are always fun. We had tacos and played volleyball. Volleyball is always crazy with the branch cause no one is good but they all talk trash and want to win. It was great.

Saturday we had exchanges, Elder Davis went with the district leader and we worked with Elder Hart. Most of the day was studies and service. At the end of the day we knocked some doors and one opened it up, and I wrongly assumed the language. So this young girl opens the door, probably fourteen or something and I start speaking spanish, because she had darker skin… yeah she wasn’t hispanic…That was embarrasing but Elder Poncio told me that it’s a common mistake, and you just have to wait for them to speak first or start in English. Sunday for the first time we had people come to church. Sabrina and Jonathan both came which was awesome. Sabrina joined us for Sunday school, and she understood more than I did, so her Spanish is not too bad. Still after Sunday school I mentioned to her that she could go to English, she still said no. So yeah, looks like we’ll keep teaching her if she wants to keep going to Spanish. She also was surprised that we didn’t have a Joseph Smith statue that we worshipped and liked church and committed herself to come again, and she wants to bring her sisters. So yeah… but also sad thing, Carmen dropped us. She went to her church and then called us and said, “My church said I can only use my bible. You all shouldn’t come over today (we had a lesson planned at 5)” So that was sad but not unexpected as her husband wasn’t too happy that she agreed to have us back over. We then had dinner with Pablo and Chica, who have us over all the time, because they, as previously mentioned, know Elder Poncio’s family. There they had some good soup and some tiny chillies… the chillies hurt so bad. I had three at once because the first one was kinda not bad and then Elder Davis told me to eat two more and being prideful I did.  There’s a video that’s  decently entertaining. [a little long, but really quite funny at parts]

Also when we got there the TV was on, and they were watching the Seahawks game and we didn’t  ask for them to turn it off. Well, I learned my lesson from that. For the prayer they muted but during dinner they had it on and while I was engaged in the conversation at times during some moments it was pretty easy to just zone out. During our lesson they just turned it off for those 10 minutes. Either way, after, I felt we definitely should have turned it off as it didn’t invite the spirit and it distracted us. But we have to live, learn and improve.

Over all just an interesting week that felt all over the place.

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Questions I mailed your jacket before I left last week.  It should have arrived by Thursday or Friday.  I ordered a few things form Amazon for your b-day.  Unfortunately it probably won’t arrive at the mission home until today or tommorow.  Sorry about that–Yup got all the packages. It’s  alright as far as birthday presents, it doesn’t even feel like anything. Like I don’t feel like I have a birthday this week. As far as presents, I haven’t opened Addie’s gift or the letter and those will be my gifts. Plus we bought steak,  ice cream and sparkling juice for my birthday this week.

Share a time you felt guided by the spirit this week.- Hmmm, I guess one time this week was when Sabrina’s  mom had all these questions and wanted Bible references for the doctrine and the verses kept coming to my mind on how to answer the questions.

Are you starting to feel you know your way around your area?- Yeah it’s not too bad, but I also don’t drive.

What is something you have learned about yourself over the past few weeks?- I need to teach simply and practice it. In Spanish, I’m forced to as I don’t have a big vocabulary, but for English I tend to say too much.

How have your served your companion this week?- They really like banana  bread so I made some for them for their trip down to training.

Happy birthday to Thomas, my new nephew on Oct 14, Whitney my favorite sister-in-law with three children [He also has a favorite sister-in-law with two children]–Oct 22 (expect a letter) and my father dearest–Oct 25 (expect a letter too).
Love you all lots, 
Elder Tonkinson

Family and Friends,

Well three months have gone by now since I left dear ol’ Virginia. It’s gone by fast. I mean, as many missionaries say, “The days are slow. The weeks are fast.” 

So let’s see… well most of this week was spent tracting (knocking doors) most of which were English. But we did hand out probably about thirty pamphlets and twelve Book of Mormons; so that’s good. We did also have twelve pretty good lessons, but we don’t have anyone who is really wanting to change, come to church or any of that, which is a tad frustrating. For example, Saturday we were with a man named Sergio, and we taught the Restoration of the Gospel of Jesus Christ  and invited him to church. He said he didn’t have a car, because his roommate and him share a car. So we called the service missionary in our ward and asked if he could take Sergio, and we got that all set up for him. Elder Brockett webt to pick him up on Sunday morning and Sergio says “Well, I actually have a car and will drive myself,” but then never comes to church… yah I was not happy. Anyway, back to the rest of the week.

Wedensday, we had transfers and no one in my companionship was moved around, but we did get a new Spanish Elder, and we got one of the Assistants who leaves after this transfer. So to welcome them, our companionship bought some pizzas and met with all the Elders in our zone who could make it and ate dinner together. 

Thursday after district council, I had mini exchanges with the zone leaders. From about 12:30-8:30, I was with one of the zone leaders (Elder Harris), and Elder Poncio and Elder Davis were with the other zone leaders (Elder Thompson). So Elder Harris and I went tracting, and we found this guy who was kinda interested and that they’ll meet with later next week. But man, this guy was a pastor and had switched denominations a couple times, and he knew his stuff. Anyway, we just had a nice discussion and he asked some question, and we tried our best as 18/19 year olds to answer them.

Saturday we went to visit a person who missionaries had met with in the past. Yeah that was fun… not really. Basically, we got there, and he was outside already. We got out and he says pretty energetically, “Los Mormones!” So, we thought “hey, that’s good; he seems pretty nice and open to talking.” So, we start talking half in English half in Spanish and then we find out that he’s pretty strong in his faith now and starts to kinda bash a little with us. We listen respectfully, and then tried to say how we fell about certain things and then he’d interupt and then re-iterate what he just said. At one point, he pointed to Elder Davis and said, “When you are judged Jesus is going to come to you and say, ‘Why did you try to lead away (his name) from the truth? Why did you tell him lies?'”–basically telling Elder Davis he was going to Hell if he didn’t convert over to his religion. So, Elder Poncio and I are trying to wrap it up, and then Elder Davis is trying to win this bash… so we ended up being outside in the cold talking to this guy for an hour… not fun at all. But, we now have a plan to get out of these situations and a signal to all of us that, that is what is happening.

Sunday I had to give a talk in sacrament meeting, in Spanish, for 15 minutes, I found out Wednesday. My topic was recognizing and understanding the Spirit. For those of you who are interested and can read Spanish here is the link;  and for those of you who want to hear me speak some Spanish, I attached a short audio of me reading part of the talk. It was good, but I just stood up there reading it as stiff as a board and looked up maybe for 2 seconds every 30 seconds. I’ll work on it.

In the pictures–We got some pizza rolls that some Elders had from member, but they didn’t have freezer room and gave them to us… Yeah, I lost my faith in pizza rolls, but hopefully I can sometime have money and buy some good ones and not be sad.

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Questions:
How are things like laundry, food shopping, and other basics of life going?–Good we have laundry stuff in the apartment which is nice so we’re not all day at a laundry mat, and we recently splurged and got not dollar tree detergent but Tide which is great… Yeah, I’m excited to have gotten Tide; it’s what you do when you don’t normally have money for it. Speaking of not having money… the mission office won’t reload our cards until Wedensday, and we have no money, so we’ll see how this week goes. I think it’ll be fine. We have some food in the apartment that I, with a little streching, can make edible and filling enough. However, now that we have three of us we, go through food like twice as fast, which is weird cause we didn’t double the amount of people. But, yeah, food goes quick.

Share one of your favorite gospel principles to talk with people about–Eternal Families because it is a wonderful belief that we have that families can be for life after death. 

Share a time you felt gratitude for something this week.- Opportunity to speak so I could practice thinking, writing and speaking in Spanish.

Are you adjusting to the climate in Washington.- Eh it’s getting colder which is not fun but it’s not too bad.

What is something you appreciate about your companions?- Elder Davis is just super excited about the work and wants to share it with everyone. Elder Poncio is good about trying to not focus too much on the fact that we don’t have that many people to teach or that many Spanish people in the area and just to do our best to help the work even if that means we’re finding a bunch of English people who we won’t get to teach.

When you go door to door with that, how many people talk to you? Like a 50/50? I was always curious as I’ve seen people walk around and do it before–Depends. By 50/50 I am assuming you mean like actually let us talk to them and not just say “not interested.” So as far as that goes 90/10 because most people will let us talk for a little, especially after we figured out how to not be super weird at the door. Our approch at the door about a month ago was to say “Hi we’re missionaries from the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, and our purpose is to share about Jesus Christ and to serve.” That doesn’t go well. We have changed how ever to something like: “Hi how are you?” they respond and usually ask how we’re doing and what we are doing. “I am doing great. We’re just out sharing a message about Jesus Christ because we find joy through Him. So we were just wonder what brings joy in your life?” and usually from there we can talk for about 3 minutes or sometimes longer. Sometimes, we just start after asking how they are doing with our question or we change the question to “what is most important to you?” “Where do you find hope?” Also, usually we try to leave them with a pamphlet about either “The Plan of Salvation“–God’s plan for us in this life which is centered around Jesus Christ, “The Restortation of the Gospel of Jesus Christ“- We believe that there was a Restoration of the Church that Jesus Christ established when he was on the earth which was lost after the Apostles died or finally “The Gospel of Jesus Christ“- Goes over the 5 points of the Gospel of Jesus Christ which are 1. Faith in Jesus Christ and His Atonement (Matthew 9:22 Have to believe his is our Saviour and that His Atonement [sacrifice in Gethsemane and on the cross] was for us), 2. Repentance (Ezekiel 18:30-31 and Acts 17:30 confession to God our mistakes and sins and trying to improve and change ourselves), 3. Baptism (John 3:5 Christ was baptized and we need to be as well by someone who has authority like John the Baptist did), 4. Receiving the Gift of the Holy Ghost given by the laying on of hands by some one who has Priesthood authority (Acts 8:14-17 Everyone can recieve a prompting from the Holy Ghost but the Gift of the Holy Ghost is when we have the Holy Ghost as constant companion) and 5. Enduring to the End (Keep having faith, keep repenting, partake the sacrament [bread and water] to renew the covanent we made with God at baptism and keep being worthy to have the companionship of the Holy Ghost). Sometimes, we also give them a Book of Mormon and ask them to read when Christ came to America after his resurrection and visited His people here (John 10:16 “Other sheep I have that are not of this fold: them also I must bring and they shall hear my voice.”) I used to really hate knocking doors; but having done it almost every day this week, it’s gotten a lot better. Sorry for the long response, but yeah, that’s what we do. For all of you that read through it, I am impressed, and if you have questions just email me.

Until next transfer

love,

Elder Tonkinson

This week was definitely a memorable one. Well the experiences were at least.

Tuesday was good. We were given more miles for the car, so less walking to keep from going over which is good. We also are working on teaching two new people, one is the sister of a member (Lucy) and another is a man who was found in street contacting in California (Anatolio). So, thank you to those two sisters. We have the first lesson with Anatolio tomorrow and are still working with getting a lesson with Lucy. Also on Tuesday night, we had a lesson with some recent converts, Carlos and Wendy, who are awesome. As with all lessons there was a “snack” that they had made us, which this time were pupusas. So tasty! These one’s had cheese and beans.

The final big event on Tuesday was Elder Poncio’s parents needed some information from him, and we had to call the Assistants to get permission for him to message his parents since it wasn’t p-day [Monday]. So, they said yes and at the end they just asked if they could do anything for us. I jokingly said “Can I get a new companion?” Well Elder Lee replied, “Well, I can’t do that but how about another companion?” Elder Poncio and I look at each other confused and Elder Poncio said, “Wait what!?” “Well we have visa waiters [missionaries assigned to foreign missions that require visas where those visas have not come through by the time they leave the missionary training center] coming in tomorrow, and we’re giving one to you all. I would have actually forgotten to tell you if Elder Tonkinson hadn’t said anything.” They then hung up.

So Wednesday we picked up Elder Davis. He is visa waiting for Trinidad Port of Spain mission and is speaking Dutch, not Spanish. It’s still pretty cool because we get to hear him pray in Dutch and practice in language study. There is a bit of a Dutch population up here, so we just have to find them so he can practice. We went to visit some people that night and found two people who said that we can visit today at like 5:30 PM, so we’ll be ending preperation day a little early. We finished the day meeting with Antonio, the guy who a few weeks ago invited us right in and who we gave a Book of Mormon. He has been wanting to go to church but because he works all around (like last Sunday he was in Oregon) he hasn’t been able to. Anyway, he has read some of the Book of Mormon, but not a lot again because of time. So, we helped him download the app [Android] [Apple] so that he could listen to it when driving. We also showed him a talk from President Nelson and invited him to watch or listen to conference. The talked we talked about the Restoration, Eternal Families and Priesthood power, which was perfect and a miracle because we just selected the first talk that popped up on Youtube. Antonio had questions about all of it. As we told him about it, he was eating it all up; it was amazing. One question he had was about the gift of the Holy Ghost, because it talks about it in the Bible but he said that he had never found a church that believed in it. I got so excited I just started talking about how we believed in it, and we did it by the laying on of hands just like they say they did in Acts. It was crazy becasue the words just started coming out, I doubt that they were perfect Spanish but, like, I didn’t have to think about what I was saying. That was so awesome, because earlier that day I was struggling to say anything, truely a gift from the Spirit to be able to say what I needed to.

Thursday was just an average kinda day, but we did end with a good part-member family lesson and exchanges.

Friday was an adventure. For exchanges, I was Elder Hart, who came out from the MTC with me, and Elder Davis–the three new missionaries all out together, in the Spanish area, with only one novice Spanish speaker. Because it was my area, and I am technically senior to Elder Davis, I got the sim card and the keys to the car. Driving was so weird for the first like 10 minutes, and I had to figure out how to use the brakes again, with out slamming someone’s head into the glass. We spent pretty much all day doing studies and tracting as our two lessons both fell through, but it was good for learning. Every door we knocked unfortunately was English, but I learned a lot about how to actually get people to talk to us from Elder Hart. We knocked about 44 doors and we talked to most people for about 2-3 minutes which is the most I have ever done at a door with English speakers (Spanish will listen to the lesson then say not interested). There were three people who we had about seveb minute conversations with and whose names we sent to the sisters because they said that we could come back. There was also this one woman who I think was trying to bash with us, which was a good time. We kept answering her questions with Bible verses and stuff and eventually she was getting uncomfortable because she realized we knew more about the Bible and scriptures than she did and just ended the conversation. Finally, we re-exchaged at the end of the day.

Elder Poncio drinks a lot of Caprisons (trust me this is related), but during that exchange we had, as a group, gone through a box of them. So in the car, knowing his love for them, we all took one and were drinking them as we stepped out of the car. He was very mad, luckily we brought one with us for him, but he immedialty knew it was from a new box because it wasn’t cold, so he got a little more mad. He then started drinking them and we were okay. During this, border patrol roles up, slows down and stops to talk to us on the side of the road. “What are are you all up to?” Elder Holloway– “We’re missionaries of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and we’re exchanging back.” Officer- “Exchanging what? Drugs?” Elder Poncio–“NO CAPRISONS!”…. Officer–“Well you all take care and have fun with the caprisons,” and drove off. Funniest thing that could have been a lot worse and ended up with us getting our cars searched.

Saturday and Sunday were conference [two times a year the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints has five, two-hour broadcasts over Saturday and Sunday where we hear from the prophet, apostles, and other church leaders. This occurs on the weekend of the first Sundays in April and October. All talks of the conference are available here], which was awesome. What an opportunity to hear from the prophet of the Lord. I really liked the talks about how we can choose joy and how we can share the gospel easily if we just talk to people like their our family, because they are! Just a very good conference and from what President Nelson said at the end, next conference is gonna be crazy. Was a little sad though that they didn’t talk about or announce the new handbook yet for missionaries, which we already know from President Auna is coming out sometime this month.

This week was also full of service. Thursday, we had the food bank and helped an English speaking member move boxes out of her house. Saturday after conference, we helped a non-member move in to a house. Sunday, we helped another English speaking member move out of their old house. That one was gross. There was dog and cat hair everywhere and poop all over the floor. I vow to never let my house ever get so dirty. That’s pretty much it.

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Questions-
What has been the most interesting food that you have eaten on your mission?–Hmm, I guess so far the oddest thing was these corn and bean tamales. They were all right just really dense and didn’t have much flavor.

Impressions or favorite talks from Conference?–Elder Holland’s was such a good one to start on. As I said I just liked how they talked a lot of choosing to be happy. We can almost never choose what happens to us each day, but we can choose how we react. It’s a legitimate choice.

Share a teaching moment you have had recently (you as the teacher or being taught).–One thing I recently learned from Elder Hart on exchanges was to evaluate how we did at the last door we had knocked and what worked and what didn’t. We’ve found that the cliche “Hi we’re missionaries from the Church of….” doesn’t work well. But what does is, “Hi how are you? I’m doing great, we’re knocking doors and sharing about the joy we find from following Jesus Christ. What brings you joy?” This causes people to think and most answer the question and from there we can share about a truth of the Restored Gospel.

How is the new language coming along?- Better, but it’s still not perfect, and I hate messing up so that makes progress slow as you don’t learn much if you aren’t corrected for your errors.

Something that made you feel joy this week?- the Caprisons

Do you need anything? – No, not really. Some good knives would be nice or a knife sharpener, because the ones we have are so bad haha. Honestly most of what I miss is stuff for cooking.

You have a bday coming [Oct. 23], do you have any suggestions for us?–Books that are church related. “Return and Continue with Honor” by Uncle Brock [Booher] would be good even if it’s a long way out. Also, all the talks from John Bytheway digitally? “A Marvelous Work in a Wonder?” I don’t know what else. Kitchen stuff. Written letters are way nice; I got some from the three younger Ownby children and Sister Ownby this week.

There where a lot of changes during general conference!!!! What are your feelings on them?–I thought most were good changes. The new young women’s theme is good. I like it.

I am a beloved daughter of heavenly parents, with a divine nature and eternal destiny.

As a disciple of Jesus Christ, I strive to become like Him. I seek and act upon personal revelation and minister to others in His holy name.

I will stand as a witness of God at all times and in all things and in all places.

As I strive to qualify for exaltation, I cherish the gift of repentance and seek to improve each day. With faith, I will strengthen my home and family, make and keep sacred covenants, and receive the ordinances and blessings of the holy temple.

I think that’s all. Love y’all lots,
Elder Tonkinson

Pretty  mundane week. Nothing too exciting. Wedensday, we had District council with the other district which was fun. Thursday was interviews [I assume with the mission president], and those were good. Yeah, that’s about it nothing too crazy, just mostly knocking doors this week.

No one is really progressing which is frustrating but not much we can do. There where two baptisms this week in the English wards. Elder Poncio and I gave lessons at the baptisms, so that was a pretty good day, and awesome to see people enter the waters of baptism. We also this week have found three new friends for other missionaries to teach because they speak English. That’s annoying in some aspects, but it’s good work and it is helping someone come unto Christ which is fulfilling our purpose. Oh, also I got mail this week and that was awesome. Just getting some hand written letters was great. I plan on writing back. But hey, to all reading ,if you want to surprise me, send me a physical letter, that would mean a lot. Definitly looking forward to General Conference this weekend. [replays here]

Now on to questions
Non-family question–What made you finally decide to go on a mission?- Well, I mean, I’ve never been very shy about being a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, and I generally like sharing and talking about. I also have always wanted to since seeing two of my older brothers serve and seeing the positive changes that they experienced, and I wanted that too. Finally, because the Gospel of Jesus Christ makes me happy. Mission life isn’t easy, but so far even if we don’t have lots of success right now it’s fulfilling. 

Top 5 things you have learned about yourself since starting your mission? -Alright hmmm

• 1. Life is better when I try to focus on what I can do.
• 2. I can have a very low patience tolerance sometimes and at others I can be pretty patient. 
• 3. I am a lot more orderly and clean and OCD now that I pretty much just have to worry about myself.
• 4. I am not as homesick as I thought I might have been. There are flashes of homesickness but even then it’s not terribly awful even if I do miss everyone lots.
• 5. I enjoy cooking for the most part, even if clean up is annoying.  Cooking feels good, and the results generally are pretty tasty too.

Thoughts on the new children and youth program?- I think it’s awesome! I wish I could have experienced it. I like that they focus on the individual more and they choose their goals. By doing that, they can later know how to do that. Plus, everyone is different so its great. There were some youth in the meeting, whose parents are not super active,  so I got to help them. It was weird cause for a moment I felt kinda like a dad, which obviously I’m not. But, it was a cool 4 minutes.

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Dear family,

Last week I misspoke, it was week 8 not week 9. To be honest its just hard to keep track of everything. What day it is of the week makes almost no difference  except for Sunday and Monday, other than that I’m just lost in a limbo. So father, please correct the title of last week to be “Week 8- Meals and Miracles” Now on to this week, week 9.

Pretty low key week. We found a couple new people this week and tried to visit them yesterday, but they weren’t home. It seems to be a constant issue here, that people just don’t make time, forget we’re coming back and because of that either they are not home, or if they are, they are too busy. It is mildly frustrating. Another frustrating thing is most people work from 6am-9pm, with a short window of time at home mid-day, where they eat and then return to work. So if they do have a day off, then they want to spend it with family and shopping and all those things. So many people are interested, but just have no time. 

Winter started this week. Winter here is rain, constant, slow, wet, cold rain. It rains most of the day here. Currently I am using a rain coat that was left here, it’s a couple sizes to  big, but for now it works. Ugh rain. 

Another thing that happened this week was we had zone conference, and I had an exchange with the district leader. Zone conference was on Friday, we talked about working with your companion in unity and working with the ward mission leader [the person in the local unit called to work with members and missionaries to do missionary work locally] to best serve the area you are working in. We also got driving instruction on how to drive in the fog, in snow, and when we hit an ice patch. The vehicle coordinator also is going to start giving out awards each zone conference to good drivers or whatever he deems worthy. Well Elder Poncio and I got it this time around, you can find it in the pictures. We, for the past two weeks, have been trying to get our car fixed, because when we got it the trunk would not open at all. So we took it in, they said they needed a part and then this week they actually fixed it. So, when they were checking the car out in the shop, they unplugged Tiwi, which is the box that monitors us and says “CHECK YOUR SPEED!” any time that you go 7 mph over the speed limit, and unplugging it can get your driving privileges revoked permanently. So when we got in the car and saw Tiwi was unplugged, we immediately called the vehicle coordinator. He said that he was impressed that we called him before he called us; I was just trying to stay out of trouble, haha. 

Exchanges were good. I enjoyed meeting with English speakers and members, because I could speak what I wanted to, I could contribute and I did not have to think too hard about what I was trying to say. That was wonderful. This week, we have mini exchanges (12:30-6:00) with the zone leaders on Wednesday where I will again be in the English area, as I am not confident enough yet in my Spanish.

Food this week. We went over Friday to some one we teach’s house after zone conference, and they asked if we wanted food. We said no we’re fine, and they still made us carne asada, with home made tortillas. Oh sooo good. Also, last night I made banana bread from left over bananas and then cinnamon rolls, which are now frozen so we can make just like one or two at a time when we want some.  

Finally, last night, we met with one of the English wards. The area seventy has asked that the  area focuses on the getting the Hispanic members active in their wards. So they invited us, the Spanish Elders, and then the Hispanic families. Well the families did not show, but we did get to meet with them on how they are going to work to reach out to the Hispanics in their community and try to create more unity. We worked out that the English ward is going to try to reach out to those Hispanic families in love and become friends with them, not just out of duty and trying to get them to become active, but to let them know they are loved and to become a real friend. We also worked out that we are going to try to start a bilingual church self reliance course. This way, it will unify both the white and hispanic population; and it will allow them all to better themselves, and it is a way we can serve the community. They asked for our opinion a lot. We love this idea, because it will help me with my Spanish, serve the people we are trying to serve, and potentially open people up to hearing our message. Our only big concern is that the people won’t have time. But we will see how this turns out. I am excited either way.

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Questions:

Did your packages arrive?- Probably. The letters they will forward to us, for packages, someone has to go down to the mission office for them and bring them up and distribute them. So it will probably not be until October 9th (next transfer) that I get the packages. 😦

3  Favorite moments from the week.- Okay so we met with members on Tuesday night I believe, and I got laughed at by all of them for saying Utah, weirdly, when I tried to say it with a Spanish accent. Then we were tracting and Elder Poncio says that house is Spanish speaking. I was like how do you know? And he just said look. So above the door it said “Aloha,” but I was like well that must be why he thinks it is Spanish speaking. So I not thinking said “Ahola? What word is that?” Elder Poncio still hasn’t let that go yet. Turns out there was a Mexico flag, and I just missed it. Finally one… hmm. Oh, when were getting the car fixed, it was in the other Spanish Elders half of the zone, so we did studies with them. Well studies finished, and they have a weight set and we starting putting all the weight on it. Elder Poncio said it looked easy, so he tried to curl it… He almost got it, but it was just really funny to watch him struggle.

A challenge you have faced this week- Finding people to teach. We mostly teach when we find. So we usually teach at the door. Of all the new people we have found we have not been invited in yet. We just teach at the door. Also, we now have to do more tracting as we have no more potentials (people who in the past said they are interested), but the issue is finding where there are a lot of Spanish speakers. Usually in a neighborhood there is like one or two, and then five to six in a trailer park. So it is just hard to figure out where we can go, where we are not just knocking doors just to find: a) they are not interest or b) they are English speaking and there are no Spanish speakers

How is the cooking coming along? – It’s alright, just not tons of time to cook for dinners

Budget?- Not too bad. We luckily do service at a food bank and they let us take some fresh produce home. So, we have some good stuff that isn’t just pasta or quesadillas.

How is spanish coming? (I added this one as it is always a question)- It is alright. I can understand most gospel related topics in Spanish. So church I can get most of. Outside of that, when it comes to everyday stuff, it gets a little harder. I am starting to understand more, but it is still tough. The slower the better. Also, there are many different accents which makes it tough to do but I will work through it.

Tell me something you admire about your companion.- He always asks for referrals. I do not remember if I told you all or not, but we tried to go tracting in one area, which was all English, and the first door we opened just started swearing at us and telling us how stupid all of Christianity is. Well after he finished, Elder Poncio, like we are supposed to, asked, “Do you know if anyone of your neighbors speaks Spanish?” He just does what he should be doing with out fear. 

Love,

Elder Tonkinson

So this week was just filled with a lot of good food and a couple miracles. So lets get started

Monday was pretty good, I wrote last week’s email early and then went to the Stake center and played volleyball with the other missionaries. We then got groceries and then went to Coconut Kenny’s which is a pretty good sandwich shop. Oh man that was a good sandwich. 

Tuesday, we had to get the trunk of our car fixed, because since we’ve had it, the trunk has not worked. So we were told it would take about 2 hours to figure out the problem. So we tried to go knock doors. First door we opened, the guy, who seemed high, immediately said, “I don’t want to talk to either of you.” in English. I was ready to leave and then Elder Poncio, says “Do any of your neighbors speak Spanish?” I was ready to hit him right then, but he was doing what he was supposed to and asking for referrals from everyone. This man then started swearing at the both of us about how stupid Christianity is. So, I called the other Spanish Elders, whose area we were in, and for the next two hours we just did studies in their apartment. I know, I know, very lame, but I was just not ready for that. 

Wedensday, we had lunch for free at one of the members restaurants. It’s a seafood place, so I got fish and chips and that was so good. We can go once a week, but it’s so expensive that we decided we would only go on special occasions. Later we went tracting in this apartment building that was on one of the farms and every door was Spanish speaking, except one, which spoke Mexteco (I think that’s how it’s spelled) which is a native language from Mexico. We got four new people who wanted us to return Sunday. That was a miracle, given how I was feeling the previous day about knocking doors. One of the door contacts we taught the “First Vision,” which is one of the few times I can speak Spanish coherently. I could feel the power of the Spirit as I delivered from memory the “First Vision.” It was a testimony of the divinity of this work, and the reality of Joseph Smith being called as a prophet of God.  

Thursday, we had service at a food bank and a soup kitchen. I burned my hand pretty bad when getting some soup. My hand was under the bowl, and I was serving the soup over the pot and the bowl was tilted and soup spilled over my hand. I couldn’t just drop the bowl in the soup, so I quickly moved the bowl to the counter and then shook the boiling soup off my hand (took about 7 seconds). The top of my palm was bright red. I put some cold water over it and the workers had me put my hand on some packaged frozen pork. The miracle is that when we left about 20 minutes later after, my hand which had started to blister in some areas, was normal color and no where did it hurt, even when holding or touching something. It was a legitimate healing and a miracle. Later, we taught one of the people we had found in the apartment, his name is Francisco, he’s about 16, and he seems pretty receptive to our message. I could feel the power of the words of Elder Poncio even without really being able to understand everything he was saying. Later that day we met with two recent converts Wendy and Carlos. We got there to teach and they had plates and food out and drinks ready for us to eat. (We’re only supposed to have dinner appointments on Saturday and Sunday) We thought we were only going to be teaching. The food was good ,and they gave us a cantaloupe agua fresca which was pretty good. 

Friday, we had to go back down to Everett for more training. It was nice to see Elder Durbano and Elder Slack (the two other new Spanish Elders), and see how they were doing. The fun part was on the way back to our area, we had taken the district leader and his companion in our car. We while in some pretty slow traffic, we put copies of the Book of Mormon up to the windows, and we got a lot of thumbs ups and smiles. If they looked Hispanic, we would put up El Libro De Mormon. Overall, it was a good time. Did not get much else done because training took so long.

Saturday was good. There was a baptism for one of the children in the branch. Elder Poncio and I had to give a lesson during the baptism so that was nerve racking. Rather than like in the past at door contacts, we decided we would switch off points. So, yeah, that was tough. Baptism was good though.

Sunday, we went to church and there was actually about 20 people this time, so it felt a lot better and like an actual branch. Branch president mistakenly confused this week with next week and thought it was Branch Conference. It wasn’t, so he called Elder Poncio and I to speak, an hour before the meeting started. Yeah, it was tough; I gave the shortest talk in Sacrament meeting I have ever given. Afterwards, I was told by some of the members that they were impressed by my Spanish given how short I had been out. One of the members even said my accent sounded like I had been serving two years instead of two weeks. So that made me feel good. One of the members also gave us frozen tamales. Oh man were they good! We then after lunch went to the appointments we had in the apartment complex. All but the one with Francisco fell through, which was frustrating. So we took that time to go visit Brad, who was the man we blessed a week and a half earlier. He was doing well. He said he had been going without alcohol for two weeks and didn’t even really crave it either. So, that was a miracle to us, and I was happy to hear he was doing well. In addition to that miracle, the power went out unexpectedly right as he was about to leave for work around 2:30, so he called in and said he was going to not go in so he could get ice and save the food, because the power company said it would probably be 12 hours until the power could get back on. When he got back though from getting ice, the power was back. So rather than working overtime, he decided to stay home, and then we knocked on the door. So, if it weren’t for that power outage we would have missed him. We then had dinner with la Familia Chaj. They made these really good tacos from Guatemala. They had homemade tortillas, pork, and then a lettuce, cilantro, lime slaw. Oh so good.

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Anything you WANT right now that is allowed??? – A good pillow. The pillow we are given is garbage. Oh so bad. I wake up several times a night because my neck hurts from it. Also a hand mixer? I have lots of room right now to take all this stuff in my suit case. But we don’t have hand mixers so that would be great to make some foods easier. Address is in the pictures. 

How is Spanish coming along?- It’s tough but it is getting better. I am starting to understand a little more and speak a little better. Slowly but surely.

If you could only ask three questions to people at home what would they be?- How are you doing? What’s the best thing that happened this week? What’s it like having the sun instead of clouds all day?

What is your favorite song to listen to in the field?- Song… hmmm, BYU Vocal Point. All their songs are good.

If someone could send you anything you wanted what would that ONE thing be?- Reese’s

What are you most proud of doing this week?- Proud, I don’t really know if there is much to be proud of this week. I guess, I am still trying to work out daily, and I haven’t lost motivation yet.

What do you want people to write to you about?- Their life. I just want to know how they’re doing, what’s going on, all that stuff.

If you could go on a vacation to anywhere in the world, where would you go?- Somewhere with the sun and lots of Spanish people to teach, so California maybe?

Tell us about a time your life was blessed this week by your companion.- He blessed me this week by letting me call the other Spanish Elders after that guy cussed us out. I am thankful at that moment he didn’t force me to continue.

Something that you are grateful for?- The ability to cook some foods, so I am eating better than just raman.

Something that made you laugh this week.- Uh, so Monday night, I was taking out the trash, and I hit my name tag into the trash and didn’t notice until we got in the car. Luckily, I have two. So we ordered some more for me, but yeah I was frustrated but now it’s funny. Also Elder Poncio, whenever we pass any female, doesn’t matter who, he says “Lock your heart Elder” it’s pretty funny most of the time.

Tell us about your best teaching or contacting moment?- Fransico, because he seems engaged and doesn’t flake on us.

What significant did you learn in the scriptures?- I am in Alma for personal study and I read Alma 5:14– Need to have a change of heart when we repent, not just a change of behavior. If we have a change of heart a natural consequence will be a change in behavior. Also Alma 5:33 we see as dad likes to point out, Christ is always stretching out His arms of mercy towards us, and we just have to take grip.

Is there something in particular that we can be praying for on your behalf?- Less anxiety of door contacting and speaking the Spanish I do know. Oh, and that we can find people who are ready and willing to listen to our message. Please and thank you. 

Love you all very much thanks for the questions! I have already come to love all the people we teach and all the people in the branch. I already know I may not like some aspects of the area now but it is going to be hard to leave after 12 weeks (that’s how long in field training is).

Love,

Elder Tonkinson

https://eldertonkinson.home.blog/

Hola hola,

Oh man what a week. Where to start…. I think I am going to try to make these a litttle shorter, because it can take so much time to write these haha. 

Sunday, we had a good devotional on what we can learn from Joseph the son of Jacob [starting in Genesis chapter 39]. We can be put in a tough situation and say, “I will do the best I can and be the best I can be.” I think that that is such a wonderful attitude to have, we can not always choose the circumstances we are in, but we just have to roll with the punches.

Monday, Elder Keeler and Elder McQuinn both left in the morning. Sunday night all the Elders stayed in one room which was nice. We didn’t sleep until 1:00 AM because we were talking, and Elder McQuinn had yet to have packed. Monday night I was asking to give a blessing to one of the sisters in my district, which was my first blessing where I was the one actually giving the blessing [acting as voice/saying the words of the blessing]. It was a cool experience, as the words didn’t exactly come to my mind, but rather more of impressions and feelings. I could also feel the power of the priesthood, which was incredible.

Tuesday was pretty good. Elder Boyle and three of the sisters left at like 5:00 in the morning. Then Elder Willis left at 10:00, so then it was just Elder Durbano and I and 2 sisters who wouldn’t leave until Wednesday morning. We got sack lunches and then ate together one last time, and then we were off [they traveled by light rail from Provo to the Salt Lake Airport]. We got to Seattle at like 6:00, and then were greeted by President and Sister Auna, who had the biggest smiles on their faces. We went to the temple which was beautiful and awesome. We then had dinner and interviews and then went to sleep at the assistants [assistants to the president, two missionaries who the president calls to help him train missionaries and help with other oversight functions] apartment. 

Wednesday, we had some training and then met our companions. At the beginning of our meetings, we recite our purpose in all the languages that the missionaries present teach in and our scripture 3 Nephi 5:13 “Behold, I am a disciple of Jesus Christ, the Son of God. I have been called of him to declare his word among his people, that they might have everlasting life.” So the languages in the mission are English, Russian, Spanish and ASL. It was pretty cool to hear everyone try to speak Spanish just by copying the person was leading. Funny thing was, I knew the missionary purpose in Spanish and didn’t  know it in English.

My companion is Elder Poncio; he is from Guatemala, so he is fluent and can speak English almost fluently. He is going to be such a help to me and my Spanish. Fun fact, his dad was the mission president in Nicaragua and his parents are in one of the safety videos we had to watch. Our area [the geographic boundaries they are restricted to teach in] is Bellingham, which is the biggest and most northern area. Our apartment is two miles from the Canadian border, like we could run to the border and back for a work out. We split the zone with another companionship of Spanish speaking Elders, but still its such a big area. Geographically, we cover about one-fifth of the entire mission with the other Spanish Elders. Yeah, it’s crazy. I got $23 in my card for food before getting in the field, and Elder Poncio had $15. We were white washing the area (both new to the area) [usually, when missionaries are transferred, one will stay in the area so that there is continuity in teaching and contracting. However, sometimes, the mission president feels inspired to move both missionaries out and two new missionaries in, which is commonly termed “white washing” the area], so we had no food and currently are living off cereal, mac and cheese and such. Luckily, we have $90 each for the next 2 weeks now, so hopefully I can make and eat real food this week. But, Wednesday was just spent getting settled in.

Thursday was a day, just did a lot of study, because for the first twelve weeks we have at least 30 minutes more of companionship study, wahoo! We just went around our area and tried to contact interested people from the past. Most weren’t home, but we tried. 

Friday was good. We got to visit with some members and went and tried to knock on some doors of interested people. We stopped by this older members house and turns out she has been sick, so we gave her a blessing. I anointed in Spanish and Elder Poncio gave the blessing. The sisters in our district got a call from a man who had been excommunicated but wanted a blessing, because he was at whit’s end. So because the district leader was too far, we were asked to go over and give the blessing. We visited with him for a little while and got to know him. Hearing his story was powerful. I won’t go into detail, but he through out all this time had kept his testimony, and I could feel the love that Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ had for him. Unfortunately because he is English speaking, we will have to give him to the sisters [to work with], but I hope that he can take the steps to return to the Church as he seemed truly repentant. That was very powerful. That night we also stopped by some other members and while we were teaching, they made us some elote, the corn with mayo and cheese. It was pretty good, a little weird but good. Elder Poncio was happy because the members were Guatemalan and actually one of them knew his mom, and so the elote reminded him of home. 

Saturday was long, we knocked out study in the morning and got to work and tracted for 7 hours… yeah long. Most of it was just walking and knocking on doors that never opened. Many of the members we hoped to have visited, were gone or had actually moved. We made some new friends(people who we taught and have a follow up for) and will go back and hopefully teach them on next Saturday. Anyways pretty discouraging to go to around and not even have members who can open the door, because they are actually no longer there. 

Sunday there was no one at church. They do Sunday school first and then sacrament meeting, and for the first 15 minutes it was literally just the Elders. Finally, we had, I think, twelve people show up. So, pretty much everyone got to bear their testimony. I did, in Spanish, and I could not speak, like all the words just would not come. Usually there are more people apparently but, two of the families who normally come, including that of the branch president, were out of town. We had a potluck afterwards, it was good, but all just chicken. No greens or anything else, just 3 different types of chicken. After the potluck we went tracting more. We have one person who said we can return this coming week, so that’s what we’ll do.

So that’s pretty much it here. Few members and little interest in our message. Issue is it’s hard enough to find Spanish speakers and they are all spread out so we spend a bit of time just driving. Most of our people who are “interested” are people who were found by other missionaries and then referred to us because they speak Spanish and couldn’t be understood by the missionaries. Most of the time we go, and they say they are not interested. Hopefully, as we start to get to know the area better, we can find some people to teach. We shall see.

Questions

Tell us about your new companion- Elder Poncio is pretty cool and chill. He has been out for ten months and is going to help bunches with my Spanish. He is from Guatamala city. He’s also funny

Tell us about your area- Huge, giant, the Spanish branch is for any Spanish speakers in the whole zone. From one side to other it is over an hour.

Tell us about the ward(s) or branch(s) to which you are assigned.- Small branch as you read. Most members are not active, and because of this, many have moved with out informing the church and we go to their address and meet new people.

Tell us about the mission president and his wife.  How was training with him?  Did he do a first interview with you?- Really super nice, especially Sister Auna. I finish my food for dinner and she was like, go, eat more, so I did. They’re from Hawaii and super nice. President Auna is pretty laid back, no really weird specific rules–if it’s in the handbook, we follow it. So like with music, as long it brings the Spirit, we are allowed to listen to it, so that means more than just Choir at Temple Square. Training was short, and we have to go back to the mission home (an hour and a half drive) Friday for more training. Yes, he just had 4 questions. Will you be obedient? Are you worthy to hold a temple recommend and to be here? Can the Lord trust you? I answer yes, yes, and I hope He can. 

What was the most discouraging thing this week?- No one to teach, all the friends who have been taught by the last missionaries here, have not been taught in a month, and most we have not been able to get in contact with.

What was the high point of the week?- Giving the two blessings and being able to exercise the Lord’s priesthood

What was something you learned in scripture study?- So I am back in Jacob [in the Book of Mormon] and he talks about how some are hear to hear “the pleasing word of God” but that because they are members of the church and not keeping their commandments he has to use the word of God that enlarges the wounded soul. Just reminded me that the word of God is pleasing most of the time and of love but when need it will call us to repentance and remind us we need to be better.

What was something you learned from Preach My Gospel- Well we started in the section on managing time, and it’s important to set goals to improve, because if you don’t you will decrease in your ability to teach with the Spirit, and if you do you will become the best you can be.

Something you love about Washington- They have really good apples (Sister Auna gave us each one), and I love apples.

A funny moment from the week.- Oh man, I have two. So we were contacting people in this trailer park and this woman stops by us in her car and says “You all are so young and have been taught the wrong way. You need to start to think for yourself.” She then goes on to tell us we have a corrupt bible and that the only true one is the King James Version (the one we use) and then goes on to contradict herself. We wanted to share a scripture form the Bible and then she said no and drove off. It was pretty funny, because she had ended up hurting herself, and it was just funny. I just wanted to say “Ma’am you just contradicted yourself, and I know that this church is true and otherwise I would not be out her serving for two years.” 

The second one is I can not roll my rr’s for the life of me. So we were having me practice as we were driving. I use my throat too much Elder Poncio says and he was just laughing at my pathetic attempts to roll them. I’ll get there he said. He thinks I’ll be able to understand most people and say most things I want to in about 6 months, I hope he is right.

Whatever is on your mind.- Spanish is hard. I thought I was doing pretty well, TRCs I could understand and I could usually get my point across. Yeah, not now. The combination of not knowing the person and not knowing the language kills. Also, with so many accents and the speed, it can be hard to understand people. I would say I can get the main points about 40% of the time. The issue is I will start to zone out after getting lost and then I will have no clue what is going on. 

An answer to a prayer you received this week.- I have been a little more homesick this week and overwhelmed with not knowing the language and being in an area with so little members and stuff. So I have been listening to talks on missionary work this week, and I it’s been helping. Also I spent some time, decluttering from the last missionaries (they left a bunch of clothes) and gave them to a donation center, and then I reorganized some stuff. So, it feels a little better here in the apartment. I am sure in about 2 weeks it will start to feel like home and I won’t be so uptight. 

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Love,

Elder Tonkinson