March 30 2015

Paul and some past companions

Skit time!

Drinking coconut water

Paul and his "son" and "grandson"

still drinking coconut water

Well, this has been a fun week. On Monday we went to Paita and on Friday we had a multizone conference in Talara, about an hour and a half away. In the conference we learned a lot about the importance of testimonies, both of the missionaries and of the people we teach. We also learned a lot about how to help people with doubts accept a baptismal invitation. Afterward we did a skit about Ammon and King Lamoni and it was awesome. It was really funny. The other zone of Talara had a skit of Alma and Amulek. We found a few new investigatores this week and one has gone to church before, to another ward. So we'll see how she wil progress. Her husband is a member so hopefully he will help her out. This saturday we will receive transfers. Some say I will leave Sullana, some say i´ll stay. I really hope I can stay one more transfer. I love it here. 

Hope you guys have a great week!! And enjoy General Conference!

Elder Evans

March 16 and March 23

March 16

Hey everybody! Hope you're all doing awesome. I am enjoying and taking advantage of all the time I have left. I am super happy because for about 50 weeks (two weeks short of a year) I haven't had a baptism but now on Sunday we have two planned. Alejandro already passed his baptismal interview and on Wednesday Jairo will be having his. The following week Rosa is planning on getting baptized. Elder Bradford and I are working and praying incredibly hard with them and doing everything we can to help them make their goals. It's been a little hard to find new investigators this week because we're constantly visitng the investigators we now have to help them get baptized. We will try focusing more on finding new investigators this week because we need to improve on that.

Today we played volleyball in the stake center as a zone and it was pretty great. Next Monday we will be going to Paita (one of the biggest ports in Peru) to watch Meet the Mormons with President Rowley and the Paita zone, I am prettty excited for that. 

I am now almost finishing 1 Nefi and marking all the scriptures that have to do with the principles of the Gospel of Jesus Christ and the Atonement and it is great. I feel like it's more eficient to read the Book of Mormon searching and marking all scriptures that have to do with a certain subject. Normally a subject you want to learn more about. You can always ask the missionaries at home to give you a paperback to do that type of study. 

Love you all, have a wonderful week, and Hayley have a great birthday! Happy 18 years. Have fun in Relief Society! 

Elder Evans

March 23

Hey everybody, hope you're all doing well. And Hayley I hope you had a great 18th birthday!

This week was pretty crazy but it all turned out well. It rained super hard this week, for the first time ever in the mission I used my raincoat. It was extremely dificult walking through the dirt roads. Our investigator Alejandro seemed to have fallen off the face of the planet for a few days and we couldn't get a hold of him but then one day he answered the phone and we set up an appointment to finish the lessons. He and Jairo got baptized on Sunday after church. It was great. A TON of the members were there to support them. We had to do the program in the Sacrament room and then go over to the baptismal room and people watched from outside the windows as well because there wasn't seats for them. Jairo's parents were so happy he had finally decided to get baptized. I baptized him and the bishop's son Brygham (named after Brigham) baptized Alejandro because they are super close friends and are in a band together. 

Today we went to Paita and saw Meet the Mormons with the missionaries there. The chapel of Puerto Paita is right on the beach. We walked a block along the coast to go to a big dock and talk and eat lunch and visit. It was a great time, many of us got sunburnt even though it was all cloudy today. Oh well. 

Hope everyone has a great week, love you all! 

Elder Evans

First time wearing his raincoat

The reason he had to wear his raincoat

baptism!

baptism!

group of zone leaders

Elder Paul and his companion, Elder B

Elder Paul and some missionaries he has known for a long time

Elder Paul says there is a cat in this picture

The prince and the pea (Elder Paul's bed for one night)

coming home from Paita

March 9 2015

Hey everybody. Hope you all had a happy Woman's Day this week. I don't know if it's the same everywhere but here it happened on Sunday if I'm not mistaken. Hope you are doing well. I had a pretty good week. We learned a lot htis week from President Rowley and the other zone leaders and sister trainers/leaders in our council. We had a great zone conference (pictures are below) and taught a lot more about some iniciatives we have started to work more with members and how we can be more involved in the ward councils. 

This week we found out that Jairo (an investigator who wants to get baptized) will be going to Paita for this week to work so he won't be getting baptized until the 21st of March but it'll be fine because that's when Alejandro will be getting baptized as well. They're 18 years old. We are super excited for them and they are doing great. They just lack a few lessons more. They're all ready and are reading the Book of Mormon. It's great to see how much Jairo has changed. Beforehand he wasn't very talkative and didn't participate much but now he loves the lessons and he participates way more and is excited for his baptism. 

Love you guys, I hope everything is going well. I have had a good p-day because we have an investigator who brought us to a gym for free because he works there and it is the nicest I've seen on the mission. I'll just say I got to run 4 miles on a treadmill. You can understand how excited I am. The administrator there is a member and told us we could go whenever we want without paying. We are very happy. 

Oh yeah, and President Rowley invited us to read the entire Book of Mormon before July 1st because that is when he goes home and the new President Rasmussen gets here. We will underline everything that has to do with faith, repentence, the Atonement, baptism, and the Holy Spirit. I started it and I realized every page so far has scriptures about at least one of those topics. 

Love you guys, have a great week!!

Elder Evans

March 2 2015

Hey everybody! Another week went by. Weird. This week was pretty great. Very eventful. One recent convert, the mom of Jairo who will be getting baptized on the 14th got super sick. Her heart swelled up and affected her brain and was suupper sick. We gave her a blessing on Tuesday night. Then President Rowley on Wednesday wanted to acompany us for the afternoon to a few appointments and we ended up going back to that family's house to see if she was better but was much worse. The husband and then President both said a prayer for the family and it was super powerful. We prayed for that family all week and visited them every night to see how they were doing and they all ended up going to church yesterday. She had gotten better and she and her husband and son Jairo went to church. We were super happy to see her better and with her family. Jairo is excited for his baptism and we are finishing the lessons.

This week will be pretty eventful as well with the mission leader council and a meeting with President Rowley and President Inga (the Sullana stake president) on Wednesday and Tuesday. Hope you all have a great week and make it the best it can be!

[Replying to some of his mother's questions] With my companion we do speak english, but in the street we speak spanish because we already call a lot of attention. Sometimes while talking in english in the room we'll accidentally say two or three sentences in spanish. It's strange doing that.

Ah yeah Dad told you about me getting robbed with my last companion. It wasn't really that bad. We couldn't tell if they had any arms or not. And that is true,  there are a lot of strange things that have happened on the mission that I'll save to tell you guys until I get home. I'm trying to get better to stay happy and calm despite the stress that comes from being the zone leader senior companion after just one transfer of learning what to do. It's not bad but sometimes it's stressful. 

Today we had a fun zone activity and everyone had fun. Elder Eddington is in my zone again. He was my zone leader in Castilla and now I'm one of his zone leaders here lol. He brought the game Bang to play as we did as a district in my last area. 

Have a great week. I pray for the family too.

Elder Bradford and Elder Evans

Love, 

Elder Evans

Feb 23 2015

Hey everybody! This week was pretty great! After working and not baptizing anyone for almost a whole year I feel like I'll see the fruits very soon. Our 21 year old investigator Jairo Fiestas is excited for his baptism on March 14th and we are gettting close to finishing the lessons with him. Yesterday one investigator, the sister of a less active that is coming back to church, attended again for the 3rd time and she told us she wants to get baptized and asked if she could get baptized next week or the week after! I don't think anyone has ASKED me if they can get baptized the next week in my whole mission. We didn't set a sepcific date for her baptism yet but we are hoping to set it up for the 21st of March. She's 17 years old and has a ton of new friends in the church. Also, another investigator, Alejandro, who is best friends with the bishop's family, asked us if he could get baptized soon. We set the baptism date for the 14th of March, for the same day as Jairo. Alejandro is 17 I think as well. He is way excited.

Alejandro and Rosa, the girl that wants to get baptized, even stayed after church yesterday for the baptism of 8 year old twins. It was a great service. We four missionaries sung a special number, we sang a primary baptism song in spanish. "Me encanta el arco iris despues de ver llover...." It's like "I love to see the rainbow after the rain..." I don't remember it in english haha. We also sang Come Thou Fount (in english). It turned out great. They loved it. 

Oh yeah and today we had transfers. Elder Arce my Argentino companion went to Talara and Elder Bradford from San Diego arrived as my companion. His birthday is July 6th, 9 days before mine and he has a year and a little more in the mission. I'm showing him what zone leaders have to do. Today I was running around the whole city of Sullana in moto taxis paying for the bus tickets of the missionaries leaving Sullana. It was a bit hectic but I'm all good. We'll see how Sullana treats two gringo missionaries hah. 

Hope you all have a great week and that al is going well. Love you guys!

Have a happy birthday Dad! Love you!

Elder Evans

Feb 16 2015

Hey everyone, I don't have a whole lot of time but I just want to let you know I am doing great. Elder Arce and I invited a 21 or so year old to be baptixed and he accepted for the 14th of march so we are super excited. The zone had interviews this week with President Rowley and as zone leaders we went on splits with the assistants so my companion and Elder Sosa could go to some lessons and Elder Parra (from the CCM, you may recognize the name) and I had to check all of the area binders of every companionship in the zone. It was only slightly boring but it was kind of cool because it was new, but I would've rather been out in the lessons haha. This week I fought through a bacterial infection or a staph infection. They're not sure which but I took antibacterial pills and put on a cream and it's pretty much all good now :) It was pretty ugly. Oh and today we had a pretty cool Pday. We had a barbeque with the elders in our district and with a member family in the Sullana Ward. It was soooooooooo good!I hope everyone is doing great. Love you all!

Feb 2 and Feb 9 2015

Feb 2

Hey everybody hope you all had a fantastic week! This week was pretty crazy. Running aroung helping missionaries in my zone move into new rooms and we had a small activity in the church on Friday night for investigators and members. We watched the Restoration movie of 1 hour and it turned out well. We also found a pretty cool family this week sitting down in the street and so we talked to them and they let us in and we taught them. They each had their seperate families and kids and such so we started by sharing with them The Family, a Proclamation to the World. They really enjoyed it. One of their husbands looks like a gringo (white ,person). Here they called white people gringos or "colorado" (they call me that all the time) and well his friends all call him colorado as well for his blue eyes and lighter skin. But he is in fact Peruvian. Also, a single mother Elena and her 8 year old daughter are very interested in the restoration and were 100% sure they'd go to church. After a lesson she told her daughter "on sunday we're going to their church" but something came up and they couldn't but we'll continue teaching them.

Today We went to an area called Marcavelica outside of Sullana about 20 minutes out in the country and played "carnavales" a tradition of throwing water balloons and using waterguns to soak friends or random people you dont know. However, we only played as missionaries in our district and some members that joined us. It was super fun. A wasp stung Elder Espinoza in the arm and me in the neck...but that's fine, we're all good. I tried sending pictures but it doesnt seem to have worked. I'll try next week...

 

Oh yeah I'm already accostumed to streets without stop signs, they don't exist here in Piura or sullana or tumbes as far as I know. In lima there were a few here and there. That's aweomse. Is it a large tourist area? 

The best lesson we taught this week was with a single mom and her 8 year old daughter because we taught about the book of mormon and she promised to read it and was really excited to go to church to investigate. She never made it but we'll keep trying to encourage  her to go this coming sunday. 

On wednesday Ill have my first zone leader traing meeting but we talk about how the mission is improving and what it needs to do to change and get better. Stuff like that. 

I took pictures and sent them to dropbox but  I cant tell if they are good or not. I couldnt see them after putting them on dropbox...

Love you, hhave a great vacation!!!

Love you guys, have a great week! Especially Mom and Dad in vacations!

Elder Evans

 

Feb 9

Hey  everybody again. Wow the time is flying faster every week. This week was pretty great. We had a council of the mission leaders (zone leaders and the sister leaders or whatever they are called in english and assistants with the president). It was great. We learnede a ton and President Rowley asks our opinions on how we can become better missionaries and how we can become a better mission as a whole. We're going to receive small cards to give to members so they can set goals in the missionary work. They wil place the starting date and the date in which they have to have completed the goal(the final date). 

Well this week we were super happy because finally one of our less active guys here named Ivan finally went to church after many years and he brought his sister Rosita who is investigating the church. Their both young adults and he felt super good after returning to the church and wants to keep coming. His sister really liked the church as well. We are working super hard but we still don't have baptisms set up. Maybe in a few weeks.

About two weeks ago you asked if I had seen a llama or an alpaca in the mission and I said no but about 20 or 30 minutes later I saw one in the plaza and this guy lets you take a picture with it for 2 soles (about 75 cents). I didnt have time to take one but the next time I see him I will. Ill for sure check the pictures on dropbox. I also sent a few pictures from our meeting we had in piura. Elder Mulford who is in the middle of the picutre is already going home in two weeks. I remember in Morropon talking with him about the year a 10 months I had left and he talked about the year and 5 months. And now he's already going home. Elder Chen is going home in April. 

Love you!

Hope everyone is doing great. Love you all!