We See Miracles Everyday

Man this week went by fast, I feel like I just wrote home yesterday!

Things are picking up for us. We have been working like crazy and so we are beginning to see some fruits. I am very happy with how things have been going for us. Some days it feels like its been very slow, but since we first got here to alicante, things have drastically picked up. We got here with absolutely nothing. The Zone Leaders gave us a new area book and it has been our job to fill it up with investigators! Since getting here, we have about 5 investigators and 3 of them came to church this past sunday. this past sunday was rough though, the first two talks by the youth were really good, and then an older member of the congregation gets up to give his talk and he says, "brothers and sisters, today my talk comes from a book that we don´t really use to often for talks, but I feel that I must use it." In my head I was just thinking, please don´t say Mormon Doctrine or something out there. He continued, " my talk come from the book Doctrine of Salvation Vol. 2" I literally, on hearing those words, smacked my forehead with my palm. I was not happy. He was attempting to expound deep doctrine and this was the FIRST time two of our best investigators (Jose and Monica) came to church. the whole time she was asking me questions.

Some words were shared about what is allowed to be said from the pulpit. He wasn´t even sharing doctrine, it was basically his ideas for 20 minutes. I wasn´t too impressed. But anyway, things are going great, we see miracles everyday, I wish I had time to write them all out for you. We met with a poor gypsy family last night and they were literally bug eyed listening to us. They just ate up everything we said.

We had a specialized training this past week with the mission president and it went over really well. this was our last one with him before we get a new president in June. It was nice, while we had the interviews with him, his wife was talking to my comp. elder Bird and she told him, "one day you will appreciate so much what your companion is doing." It made me feel really good. This has not been easy. Starting a new area with nothing and on top of that training a newbie has been a real challenge but it has also been such a great experience. I am so grateful for this chance to serve.

I love this work so much. It is the work of God and I feel so grateful to be part of it.

Sorry I don´t have any pictures for this week, but hopefully I´ll get some for next week!

Os quiero muxo!

Jason

The Big Cured Pig Leg

I don´t have too much to say I guess. The week went by really fast but the work was pretty slow. this past week was their Spring break so lots of people were out and a ton of tourists were in. However, I did get to see some fun stuff. They had huge "proseciones" processions where they have the KKK guys out and the big floats with the virgin mother and all the other virgins and saints. It was very interesting to see. I bought a little Nazareño candy figure from a semana santa stand. Oh yes, the KKK guys are called Nazarenes. Cool huh?

Another easter tradition in spain is "La Mona" It is a pastry bread thing with a hard boiled egg sitting on top of it. You have to play a prank on a buddy or sibling or whoever really, by smashing your hardboiled egg on their forehead. then you can eat the egg and the sweet bread. It´s kind of silly.

So I finally did it! I have wanted to do this for SOOO long. The 4 of us, there are 2 companionships in the apartment, we bought "una pata de jamón"! Oh man it is so good! It is the big cured pig leg. They are super expensive so the 4 of us split the price and we just share the leg. We also took fun pictures with it, more to come next week. But you put it on a stand and there is a special knife that you use to cut the meat off. Picture beef jerky but about 2x better. It is gooooooood stuff!

Well, the work is going good, I´m having a great time and the time is just flying!

con mucho cariño,
Jason

Another General Conference

I really can´t believe that we´ve passed another General Conference. I also can´t believe its already April! The time is flying! I loved Conference and it was such a good chance to recharge the spiritual batteries.

Last week we contacted an African lady and we met with her this past week. We were talking and she interrupted us and said that normally, when people talk to her about religion on the street or really when any one talks to her on the street, she says she isn´t interested and continues on. However, the day that we contacted her, she said that very morning, she had prayed to God asking her from some spiritual help. So because of her prayer that morning, she gave us her information that afternoon.

This is a work of miracles. Stuff like that doesn´t happen normally. This new challenge here in Alicante has really been such an amazing experience.

Alicante is HUGE, there are 8 missionaries here. But the part of the city I am in, is an area that they TOOK missionaries out of. My question has been, why did they take them out to begin with!? What happened!? But whatever the reason is, we just keep doing our thing.

I remember when the President called me and said I would be getting a new companion and a new area that I was terrified. It might not sound like that biggest challenge and people and missionaries have had worse, but to me, it freaked me out.

I prayed that night asking for the courage and a quote from Pres. Packer came to my mind. "Fear is the opposite of Faith." That has kind of been my motto since coming here. If there is faith, there will be no room for fear.

This past week we ate with some members and for desert we had something just, so Spanish. It was called "Brazo de Gytano" (Gypsy´s Arm) and it was this sweet bread roll with raw egg yoke inside. I wouldn´t trade my mission experiences for anything in the world! =] But they make this giant roll of it and they wouldn´t let us leave till it was all gone. I think I ate half because elder bird said he couldn´t handle it. Needless to say, I wasn´t feeling too good afterwards.

But this week was great and I look forward to another one! write me lots of letters to my new address! =]

Con mucho cariño, 
Jason 

New Address and Pictures

**Jason’s new address is on the right** – Ashley

This week was pretty crazy!

Monday to Wednesday we just met with my converts in Elche because on Thursday, we moved up here to Alicante! We are white washing (neither my companion nor I have ever served in this area) and we are starting with absolutely nothing! It has been quite the experience!

We have been in the streets everyday contacting people walking by, or knocking on doors. From Thursday to Sunday night, we had filled up a page and a half of the missionary planner section for "potential investigators" (People that give us their name, address and number)

So all this time in the street has earned us a few miracles, so I will share one.

We got the information for a guy named Jose on Thursday and on Saturday he said we could stop by. We went on Saturday and he wasn't´t home, so we were pretty bummed. Sunday night comes around and we really wanted to have a lesson because we had only had one since getting to Alicante. I look at our list of futures and see Jose and think it would be best to visit him. well really, I didn't´t think of it, the spirit for sure told me! So we go to his building and ring the bell for where he told us he lived. Nothing. Since we had been knocking doors all day, I rang the top bell (it is an intercom system here) with the plan to ring and talk to all the people in the building. The top bell answers, and it was Jose! he ended up giving us the wrong number to his building (he has only lived there for a little while) and he let us in!

We talked with him and his wife and they are just awesome! The wife has been church hopping, going from one church to another looking for the truth. And he is Colombian and just ready as ever to get baptized! We had a nice lesson with them and we have another appointment with them tonight. We are so excited!

The week was quick and I am excited to start up another one!

I hope you can all write me letters soon to my new address! =]

Os quiero muxo

Jason

Mityu´s baptism, it was excellent! His dad, another one of my converts, baptized him. It was really special!
me and my waffle creation. It was delicious. Strawberries and cream!
That´s me looking over the huge city of Alicante!

Crazy changes!

This past Tuesday the mission president called me again and told me that I would get a different elder to train and that we would go up to the city of Alicante and do a "White Wash"!

So right now, I am with Elder Triana (my last companion) and elder Bird (my new companion) in Elche while we wait for Elder Triana´s companion to get here on Thursday. So once Thursday comes, I´ll be in a different area!

So Next week I´ll send my new address!

We had a "trainer training" This past week in the mission home in Fuengirola and it was a lot of fun. I learned a lot. I was so excited to pick up my new companion!

I got paired with Elder Bird from Las Vegas area Nevada. He is great! I love the guy already! He is very quiet but he has some raw new missionary energy and that is very helpful.

When I first picked him up, we went back to the apartment and put the bags down then we sat at the table. Before we planned for the next day, I bore my testimony to him and told him what was in store. It was a great experience and a great foot to start our new companionship. After I finished, I asked if he had anything he would like to say and he just had a big ol smile on his face. It was great. I am so excited to have a fresh new missionary! I am a little worried about white washing an area WHILE training, but it will be alright. I´m more excited for it than I am worried for it!

Well, I´m running out of time, So I guess I close.

I got to bare my testimony for my Elche ward for the last time, and boy it was rough. This area has been so good to me and I am so sad to say goodbye. We had Mityo´s baptism yesterday ( I would send a picture, but the computer I am using is a dinosaur) and I don´t think there could have been a better way to finish working in one area. It was a great baptism and we had lots of support from the members.

Os quiero mucho!
Jason

our BBQ for the trainer Training
Elder Bird and I pointing at Zion!
on the couches, enjoying a moment with Elder Barney during the trainer training

Two Stories

This week was a good one,
But today I´ve got 2 stories.

The First one is more spiritual and the 2nd a bit silly.
Roberto was baptized a couple weeks ago and he invited his brother to the ordinance. His brother felt the spirit very strongly and this past week we were finally able to meet with him and start the lessons. He accepted the baptismal invitation and as we were going to give him his own book of Mormon he said, no, I´ve already got one. We thought oh, well maybe Roberto gave him one. Angel. Roberto´s brother, put a smile on his face and said, its actually a pretty cool story. He started to tell us that when the 2 of them were headed off to work they saw a group of guys throwing away some wood and other furniture supplies. Roberto and Angel do home remodeling and so they stopped the guys and asked if they could take the supplies. They said go for it and they could also have all the stuff in the piles.  The loaded up their car and as Angel was going through the piles to be thrown away, he found a book of Mormon! It was a little dirty but regardless, it was a libro de Mormon! He told us that he felt like Joseph Smith when he first got the plates. (How he knew about that I really don´t know, we haven´t taught him yet!)  It was really cool and a testimony that the lord is preparing his children to hear his gospel, whether we know about it or not, people are being prepared! It was so cool to hear this story come from him!

Ok, story number two!
So this morning, Pday morning, the alarm goes off at 7 (our day starts at 7 in the morning as opposed to most missions) and my companion says, hey, its pday, 5 more minutes. I´m not gonna argue with a suggestion like that so I grab the phone and think I press snooze. Ends up, I hit "stop" instead of "snooze" and thus turned off the alarm. So our 5 extra minutes ends up turning into a little bit longer. For the mission president, we set a ringtone especially for him. It is a bunch of machine guns and explosions going off. So at 830, we hear gun shots and explosions coming from the cell phone. We both shoot straight out the bed and I run to the phone. I cough 4 or 5 times to clear my throat and then I answer it. He called to tell me that next week I have to go to Malaga to pick up my new companion who I am going to train. The whole time my hands were shaking and I was just thinking to myself, he knows he knows he knows! I felt so bad! Last time I "hit" snooze!
It was pretty funny but in the moment, man, I was scared. haha.
So there it is, next week I will get to pick up my next companion! He is from Chile. this will be my third native companion in a row. My Spanish has improved a ton. This past Sunday, yesterday, one of the speakers bailed out, so they asked me to speak. After the meetings, some of the members were commenting to me about how fast I talk. I just told them its natural. Its in my Mexican blood! ;p

well, os quiero mucho! I hope to hear from you all soon!
Jason

My first oyster

My week went by REALLY fast!

I don´t even know where to start because the week really seemed like one day! Crazy stuff.
Well we found out why one of our investigators doesn't´t want to get baptized! He has been saying he wants to get baptized, but not now, or now isn’t his moment. He doesn't´t have his papers so he feels bad about it so he won´t get baptized, when we found out I was thinking to myself, what!? that's it! God´s laws are higher than man´s laws man! but we´ll keep working with him and see what we can do.

For Pday, we went to a Chinese buffet and it was EXCELLENT. MMM...it was good. We went with an investigator from the other elders in Elche (the guy who had the angel wings) He really is the coolest. Too bad his profession isn’t in line with gospel standards.

But he made us all eat an oyster. Never tried one before. He (Atilla) grabbed a plate of 6 (there were 6 of us) oysters and every one had to grab there own. I thought we were going to eat them last, but everyone grabbed one and said they would do it now. So I got the last pick oyster. Normally, the oyster shell is flat-ish, but mine, the last pick, was deep. I mean, this oyster was fat, well fed and just big. I’ll send a picture of the shell next week. So we toasted oysters and went bottoms up. It wasn't´t too bad, but the texture was a little weird. But it was a fun experience, the first time I are an oyster!

Things are going great for me here in Elche. I love this place. I am so glad I get to stay for 6 more weeks! We have really baptized all our investigators so we are back to searching, but we´ve got lots of references lined up from members so things should start picking up soon for us.

The other day we went up to a little pueblo that has never had missionaries go there before. We were the first! So we left the entire day for this little pueblo. We knocked doors and contacted all day. A couple people gave us their information, but well see what comes of it. That really is one thing I think is pretty neat about my mission, is that there are areas that have never had missionaries before, we´re out here trying to get things started. It really is pretty neat. But we knocked on a door and this lady was being really rude and told us she had zero interest in what we had to say, her rudeness got to me a bit and I kinda yelled back at her and told her that what we had to say is the most important news the world has ever known, she looked a little taken aback, but still closed the door quickly.

The week was good and I look forward to another one!

Os Quiero mucho,
Jason