Miracles

Again, this week has just been CRAZY!

I like it and I don´t. It makes the week go by quick, but hey, everything is just so CRAZY!

Well anyway, like last time, Monday started things off to a wild start.

I had a huge miracle with the residency for the Deere family. I will use vocabulary that might not make sense to you, but here it goes, so Salt Lake sent the "transmites" to Madrid instead of Málaga, so what this means is that they could only apply for residency in Madrid. However, we didn´t have time to send him and his family up to Madrid. There is also a deadline, you have 30 days to do it once entering the country. At the start, it wasn´t looking like it would work out, but thanks to a small miracle (i mean, really it was a HUGE miracle to me) everything worked out. I don´t think I can express the drama that was going on all this. If they weren´t able to do the residency in Malaga, they could have been kicked out of the country. I had nightmares about it! It stressed me out SOOO much, but, with A LOT of prayers and moments to stop and breathe, I got it taken care of. I felt like I was in a boxing match with the people at the residency place trying to get them to allow the Deere´s to apply for residency in Málaga they were only accepted in Madrid. Seriously, my hands were shaking I was so nervous.

On Monday we also got 6 new elders! It was so exciting! They are all super solid and will make great missionaries!

It didn´t hit me until these new guys were talking with me that I realized I am pretty old in the mission. they were like "you only have a fourth of your mission left!" I still feel like I just got here.

Tuesday: We finished the "Trainer Training" and I had a nice time given to me to teach and it was great, we talked about expectations of the next few transfers with the new elders. The trainers were so exciting and expected nothing but the best from themselves and their new companions.

This past week we had something very special happen in the mission. In April, we did an experiment to leave a day only for contacting people in the street. We got 1400 future investigators is what they are called (people that give us their information to contact them later) as a mission. We did this with the means of baptizing 50 people for the month of May. We BARELY got the goal in may and 50 baptisms is the most baptisms in one month that the Spain Málaga mission has ever had. We were all pretty excited.  We obviously wanted to do it again, but this time it wasn´t so much of an experiment because we knew better of what we were doing.

We set the goals as this: July 13, get 3000 futures, 200 baptismal dates for the month of August and SEVENTY baptisms for the month of August.

We went out to work yesterday with the faith to get as many futures as we could.

My comp and I got 40 in the first three hours. It was incredible. People were everywhere and so I went up the right side of the street and my comp elder Nally went up the left side of the street so we could cover more ground.

Our afternoon took a dramatic change and we only got 9 more for the day. But 9 is still way good for an afternoon. We ended the day with 49 and that is definitely a new high for me. 49 futures in ONE day. It was such a miracle.

As a mission we got 2627 futures. WOW! 2627 people in the south of Spain gave us their information to contact them later. We are so excited to get teaching these people and get 70 baptisms in august!

Things are going great!
Os quiero!
Jason

Monkeys!

Wow what a week!
SUNDAY:
So I guess this week really started with Spain winning the Eurocup. It...was...INSANE! Oh my gosh, it was like the world was ending and everyone was going into the streets to party and get their last bit of sinning in! My camera battery was actually dead so I didn´t get any pictures. But my companions did so I will have to snag some pictures from them. There is a big round-a-bout with a giant fountain in the middle and the ENTIRE city of Fuengirola walked out to this rotunda and piled into the fountain. They were shooting off fireworks, screaming, taking their clothes off. Again, insane. We watched this all from our balcony, part of me really wanted to be down there in all the festivities, but it was just INSANE! I can´t even begin to explain how crazy it was! So it was better that we were safe in our apartment. 

MONDAY:
We had zone "concilio" (council) where all the zone leaders come to the mission home and we talk about the mission and the goals for the next month. It is always a nice experience and very spiritual.
President Deere is amazing. He is so cool and such a humble guy. At the zone concilio he opened up the discussion for questions and someone asked if he could see this (being a mission president) coming. He said "you don´t receive a premonition that you´re going to the moon if you´re not an astronaut." He talked about how it was such a huge shock being called as a mission president. I love that he is not your typical "Utah Mormon", his family converted to the gospel when he was 10 and his wife´s family was inactive in Ohio for most of her upbringing. Their testimonies are so strong and I love that they just seem so much more normal. Pres.Clegg was bishop, stake president and all the typical stuff leading up to mission president, but Pres. Deere went primary teacher, young mens / scouts, then bishop for 5 years, back to primary, then mission president. I love them both, but pres.Deere has a sense of "realate-able-ness".
He brought his 16 year old daughter and 12 year old son. But they are such a great family and it is just crazy because I am so used to president Clegg who was more grandpa age and I had to use Pres. Deere´s passport and he was born a year before dad. They are still a way young family. But he is incredible and I just love the guy.

TUESDAY:
We finished the concilio and then elder Nally and I had to go to the office for the rest of the afternoon to catch up on the office work.

WEDNESDAY:
FOURTH OF JULY!
We were still catching up with stuff in the office but in the afternoon we had a really good lesson with a reference from a member. It was nice to finally get out and do some regular missionary work. We walked into the house and it was the reference and her friend, and she told us to wait a second because her husband and the husband of her friend were on their way. The husbands got there and they brought another couple with them! It was such a miracle. We had a good lesson and they were all very interested. The only bummer is that there were a tons of couples, but none of them were married. So at least we know where our work is.
After the really good miracle lesson we went home and we had a BBQ. It was great! we have a little grill on our patio and so we made burgers. I was on the grill with the spatula in one hand and a tall glass of cold coke in the other hand while we blasted MOTAB singing the nation anthem. It felt so right.

THURSDAY:
We had zone conference and it was really nice. Elder Nally and I got there late because the Deere´s are having some small residency issues and so I had to go take care of those in the morning. All is well now. After the ZC I went on splits with Elder Triana (actually one of my old companions) in Málaga and it was really weird to be back there. It has been over a year! But we visited my converts the Martinez family and it was really good that we did. Elder Triana is serving in Málaga and didn´t even know where they lived. They are going through a rough patch on their spiritual progression so it was good that we could make a connection again.

FRIDAY:
Transfer plans!
Transfers are this next week so President Deere finalized the transfers and I have been working on the travel plans for all these missionaries since. This is the first time I have had to do so and it is a pain. The Spain Málaga Mission covers 40% of the land of Spain so when people travel, they take cross country trips. Last night we found out the at the CCM (the Spain MTC) forgot to tell us that another elder was entering the mission, so we didn´t have any plans for him. So we were up till 2330 trying to figure some things out. We left the office at 2330 and then went over to a bar (Bars are different in Spain, they are outdoor restaurants) and got dinner because none of us had eaten anything all day and then we went to bed at midnight-ish.

SATURDAY:
We woke up normal time at 0730 and then we had a special Pday planned with the Deere family. We drove down to Gibraltar and I finally got to see the monkeys! Yay! It was a HUGE hike but I really enjoyed it and I think it was nice for the Deere family to get away from a bunch of meetings. It was also really fun to talk to the Deere family about non-missionary things. It was a good time to get to know them.

Today was a really clear day so the 2nd picture I attached is of a landmass off in the distance. That is Africa.

We hiked all the way down the mtn. and drove home. I was zonked on the way back. We ate some food, showered, changed, and here I am writing you now.

It has been a full week. Really, every week since getting here to the office has been typically crazy, but I finally have a chance to fill you in a little bit on the craziness of mission-office life.

Well, I hope you all have a great week! I love hearing about all your fun activities!

Jason
(PS. I realized this morning when I looked at my agenda that today is 7 months left, or 6 months and 30 days, however you want to look at it. Man time is flying!)

Futbol!!!!!!!!!!

I can´t believe that June is over. I don´t even remember when it started. I remember the end of may and now tomorrow starts July. Where is all the time going.

Oh yea, we got the new mission president yesterday! It was way cool! Things in the office have been crazy. We have 2 lessons so far this week (starting on Monday) because all our time has been dedicated to getting things ready for the big switch. We´ve had to change contracts for apartments (all these things had Pres. Clegg´s name on them) we are going through some residency issues that need to be cleaned up, and missionaries, well, they´re just being missionaries and getting themselves into all kinds of silly problems.  Oh, this past week, I think it was Wednesday, President Clegg calls me at 2230 and tells me to go back to the office, we were on our way home, and figure out some way of sending a missionary home the next day. (she had been sick for a long time and finally decided to go home, probably for the best) so I was in there working on it until I think 2330 trying to figure out how to get her home, how to get the other missionary another companion the next day as well. It was a mess. But since it was already so late and well past bed time, my companions and I decided to go get some food at an outdoor bar and watch the soccer match. It was incredible.

Am I  aware that Spain and Italy were going to the Eurocup? Is the Pope Catholic!?

Man it has been CRAZY here. Every apartment window has a Spanish flag hanging out of it!

Ok, so here is the story.
Well...a little bit of reader discretion. I do not condone being disobedient to the mission rules and what they say about being in on time.

But anyways, it was a BLAST and I will probably always remember it. We are planning on doing the same thing for the actually final. Haha. Ahem...

Ok so it was really late, and this night it was the office elders (me and elder nally) and the Ap´s(elder Manning and elder Hall) in the office trying to figure out all these changes that we had to make for this sister missionary going home. So we are all just beat and hungry and tired. Portugal and Spain had been playing and this is a pretty heated rivalry, I mean, same landmass, this match is blood. Our apartment is right above two outdoor bars and in order to get into the front door, we basically had to walk in front of the outdoor big screen TV. so EVERYBODY sees us go inside. The four of us sit down in our chairs and we are just quiet and elder manning says, "what the heck are we doing up here?!" We had all been thinking the same thing, so without any more words, we all jump up, run into our rooms, change into our Spain jerseys and Spain gear and head down and join the crowd.

Just 2 minutes earlier, the huge crowd saw us all go into the apartment in our missionary get up and then we run out the door decked out in Spain gear. People pointed at us and were like "hey! its those American guys!" and the front row applauded us and so we gave the front row high fives. It was at the 85 minute mark when we got down there and so we were cheering and singing spanish fight songs and it was just a blast. After the penalties the whole city just went crazy! I have videos. They are too big to send, but someday I´ll show you! After the match these old ladies wanted to buy us drinks, so we figured that was our cue to go inside and get to bed.

It was a blast, and I probably shouldn´t tell you, but we are going to do the same thing for the final. I mean, this is as big as the world cup for these people, there is NOBODY that isn´t watching the game.

I sent a picture with me and elder manning in front of one of the bars we were watching the game at. i had to borrow a barcalona jearsy, I don´t have a spain one, YET, all i have is Real Madrid, and Chritiano Ronaldo plays for them, so I couldn´t be seen supporting a portugal player.


I can´t remember what the other pictures I attached are, but I hope you enjoy them!


I sure do love you all!

Os quiero,
Jason