God's Insurance

Its hot and muggy here, probably like most of the US haha. Its like 85% humidity.. gosh, its really hot. 

Palos Verde

So we met James last week. Really cool guy, he is in the Army and lives on base here in San Pedro. We texted him to meet up and he told us to just walk up to the base. We arrive and then this huge car from the 70s pulls out, and we hear a voice, "Get in." so we get in, and its James! haha just kidding we knew it was him. Anyway we go get his laundry, and head back to base and sit to talk about what we do as missionaries. HE then asked about the Book of Mormon and after reading 3 paragraphs of it he stops and was like, "Wait, you mean that this book fills in the gaps that are missing in the Bible?" "Yes!" "Dude, why doesn't everyone know about this?!" "We wish we knew. That's why we are out here man!" Dont think Ive met anyone so sincere to read and know if the Book of Mormon is true. AWESOME! 

Palos Verde coast

Oswaldo! Its been an awesome week with our friend Oswaldo. Fun story, he txted us Saturday night and told us he was going to go to the Spanish ward instead of our ward. What? We stopped by in the morning and no one was home, so we were a little confused and had lost hope. 10 minutes after church we were in the hallway of church talking with a member about how Oswaldo had said he was going to come to the Spanish ward, which started 10 minutes ago, and then the door flys open, and Oswaldo comes in!! WOOOOO!!! He walked probably 2 or 3 miles in the hot sun to make it to church, and he hates being hot! 

"Tithing is like God's Insurance. Nothing is better than God's Insurance, not even ObamaCare." - Oswaldo

"Jesus made everything. He made the book Im holding, he made me, and even my caramel skin." - Oswaldo

When your investigator isn't home but you need that daily fortification and the Samoans just fed you dinner.

​​We have been trying to increase our work with members because when the members and missionaries are united, the work hastens and progresses so much better. Get out and help the missionaries! A new thing we introduced to our ward and our zone here in PV is a ward council email. We give a brief update of our progressing investigators, their needs and concerns and what the next steps of action are, and we send it out to the ward council and the ward missionaries. We sent our first one out on Thursday and immediately the ward responded back with little things that they could help out with! It was awesome! 

Some things we can do to find those who want to hear the gospel. 

- Pray for opportunities

- Be aware of opportunities

- Invite friends to help with church callings

- Invite friends and neighbors to church events

- FHE

- Visit new neighbors

- Your own idea

Thanks for all the support! California is good! Keep it up! Love you!

Our sink got all backed up from our neighbors, so we went to town fixing it so it didn't stink up the whole apartments all night.  #howghettocanyougo?

#BaptismMelonCops

Autumnrain and Mikey's baptism.  Baptized by Uncle.  

First week down in San Pedro, but that doesnt mean we cant return to Downey for Autumnrain and Mikey's BAPTISM!! Super glad that Heavenly Father lead us to find them and their family and they were so ready to come back to church! Richard Jr, the older son in glasses also received the priesthood yesterday! Now its just onward and upward to get to the temple to be sealed! :) So happy for them! 

First week here in Pedro, we run into an old investigator Oswaldo, neither E Griffin and I knew him. We knocked on his door and he kind of shooed us away. The next day we are walking in a completely different area, and Oswaldo rides by on his skateboard and yells, "Missionaries!!" We were mid-convo with another lady and told him we would meet him at his house in 5. We stop by and find out that he was all set to be baptized about 7-8 months ago, he just had a small biff with tithing. We met with Oswaldo a couple times this week, resolved his thing with tithing and he even came back to church! He was so afraid everyone would judge him and he would feel grief and shame but he conquered his fear and came!! We are super excited to have been put in Oswaldo's path and to have found him!

Elder Griffin - San Pedro 

Here in San Pedro (Palos Verdes area), we are on the coast so it feels NICE! We get that cool ocean breeze almost constantly. The summer is going to be a blessing. :) Also, there is quite a bit of police activity down here, it gets a little wild. Last week some guy took 6 bullets to the chest just down the street from our apartment. #LA Tis fun and we get a light show (Ghetto-Chopper Police Chases) every night. 

Maybe try this investigator a bit later?  

First day here, we park to go visit an investigator, we say a prayer in the car, open our eyes and we are surrounded by 3 cop cars. Then 6 cops go and start scoping out our investigators house! Seemed as if they were a bit busy, so we tried our friend at another time. :) 

My new comp is E Griffin, from Far West, Utah. We are both about the same time in the mission, and he hit his year mark this week, so we had to beat E Kuyoth and I's burning shirt ritual, please enjoy. 

Shirt burning #2 (with a melon? and a Christmas tree?)

We are serving in the Pacific Ward, which is an English congregation, and we are teaching in English but there is PLENTY of opportunities to speak Spanish. We actually talk to more people in Spanish but we teach investigators in English. Rumor has it that there is a Persian lady in the ward and that there are a few Persians that live down here. It is quite the melting pot since we live so close to the harbor and the LA port. Very cool place and I love it! 

Thought: 2N8:21-22 - (Isaiah 51) - "Therefore hear now this, thou afflicted, and drunken, and not with wine: Thus saith thy Lord, the Lord and thy God pleadeth the cause of his people; behold, I have taken out of thine hand the cup of trembling, the dregs of the cup of my fury; thou shalt no more drink it again.

Isaiah gets it right, the Atonement makes repentance possible. We all go through afflictions, trials, things that test our faith and sometimes leave us feeling as if we are drunk, numb from the love and care of the Spirit and God. Jesus has taken the cup of trembling and atoned for each and everyone of us. He knows how you feel, how I feel and wants to help. He will plead for our cause as we follow him. The Atonement and the forgiving power enables us to conquer those things that weigh us down. Choose to follow him! Find new life, through Jesus Christ! 

Love you all, have a great week!

Cuessy family from Downey

Chillin with Elder Griffin

Torres Family

به پلاس وردس ميروم (I'm going to Palos Verdes)

It wouldn't be the Los Angeles mission without huge changes every 6 weeks haha. After only 6 weeks down here in Downey, Ill be spending the next transfer down in Palos Verdes, as far south as you can go before going swimming! Haha As far as E Kuyoth, he is staying and finishing the mission here in Downey. My new companion is E Griffin, E Kuyoth's last companion, so I'm super excited! Loved my time here in Downey, E Kuyoth, the ward, the people here are awesome! Sad to leave, but still excited for the next one!

4th of July was awesome! We live on the 3rd floor and our apartment faces the street and a park so we had a 180° view of all the illegal fireworks here in So-Cal haha. We found gingerbread mix in our cupboard and decided to make them. Bad idea, they were not very good, but we stayed up and watched fireworks for almost 2 hours since we had to be in early. 

This week was a little slow. It seemed like we walked and walked and talked and talked but no one was interested. Some weeks are just like that but it was a little discouraging, this whole transfer has been on FIRE! However Sunday, while we were walking and walking haha we met this girl out in her front yard. We said hello and asked what the most important ting in her life was. She responded that family, her niece and nephew were the most important thing to her. We talked to April for probably 15 minutes and the more and more we talked she kept saying how impressed she was that two 19 year olds would come out for 2 years to do this. She has been looking for a way to strengthen her faith and she told us she has been up and down, on and off the right path in her life and wants her niece and nephew to grow up to be like us! Haha it was awesome to be able to meet April. After we left, E Kuyoth and thought about it and decided that if we had been there 10 seconds earlier or later, we would have missed her. The Lord really does put us exactly in the path and spot we need to be to be able to bring to pass His work. He loves us and blesses us when we are diligent and obedient. 

As far as Santiago goes.. He went MIA again this week. 

Quick update on our part-member family, the Sailors! Autumnrain and Mikey, their two younger kids are set to be baptized next week! Woooo! It has been super cool to be able to work with them and feel their enthusiasm to learn and follow Jesus. We taught them the commandments with a cool hand game to remember all 10 and they quickly went inside and taught their parents right after! We had a lesson with their older brother and he was a little rusty on prayer and Autumnrain who is 10 was helping him along! We asked them why we read the scriptures and Mikey who is 8 said, "So we can learn more about Jesus!" Ahhh they are the best! :) 

California has these really interesting plants everywhere. 

We were gonna visit an investigator, he told us to come back in 30 minutes, we did and were greeted with two cold water bottles and a note.  Nicest Rejection ever haha. 

Someone decided to cook steaks on their porch and forgot about them.  #FreeFood?

When it gets hot, pull out some Christmas tunes.  #KuyothJams

#TanLines-SkinCancer-BearlyMakingIt

Happy 4th of July! Hope you all have a blast! #funpuns

Am I a real missionary with a real missionary tan line yet?

This is Santiago! We went up to the Visitor Center this week with him to help him prepare for his baptism! Its been really cool to see how much he has grown in the past 3 weeks. There are still days when he is kind of flaky, but he is trying his best and we can feel it! We went to go pick him up with a member for church Sunday morning and we found him talking to a lady on the street. I guess this lady was trying to get him to come to the Christian church down the street but he was being a missionary and was inviting her to come to our church!  Super cool! 

While at the VC, we ran into Zane and his mom, who went on the school Europe trip a year ago! Zane was actually my roommate and we did everything from swimming in a Swiss lake to frolicking through Austrian fields together. It was cool to see them for a little bit! Also, a member from the Downey 3rd ward drove us up and we ran into the missionary who taught and baptized him 30 years ago in France! What a small world. 

We went on exchanges this week, I got to go to the bike area in our zone. :) #itshot It was super fun, change of scenery, but after exchanges we noticed this weird looking burn on my arm. Not sure how it got there, dont remember touching anything, but none the less here is a nasty picture of my skin cancer. Enjoy.

President Weidman bounced and President Haynie arrived and the mission got to meet him on Thursday and Friday. I was asked to play the piano for our "Meet the President" meeting on Friday and little did I know Id be playing background music for 2 hours while everyone else went up to have little chit-chat with President. 2 hours later of hymnals, twas tired. :) Im super excited to have the Haynies here and I feel super blessed to have had a year with President Weidman and now a year with President Haynie. 

We had car troubles again this week. Rather than our oil cap, our coolant and radiator went all whack. Thursday night as we are driving home for the night our car overheats and freaks out. 0 coolant. Great. So we had a very early start Friday, tried to fix it, car kept overheating throughout the day and we ended up getting a loaner car for the next couple days. And its blue! :) You know you are a missionary when the color of your car makes you excited. I feel like Gus and Shawn in the Blueberry. 

We were checking out potentials in an area we had never been before this week and we ran into the Noriega family. Turns out they LOVE the elders, but they stopped coming by a couple months ago and know one really knows why. But their son Lorenzo had moved to Utah for 6 months and went to church and knows EVERYTHING about the church. When we would explain things to the rest of the family about our purpose or why we do this that, Lorenzo would jump in and explain it all. Haha It was super cool to meet them and they are super nice! :)

Cool experience! We were in another area, visiting potentials, near the creepy paper lady in the chair and skull on the stick, and we felt like we should knock on a couple doors. We knock on one, guy comes to the door and asks why we knocked on his door in Spanish. We explained that we were missionaries and we felt like we should, we didnt know exactly why but here we were. He said ok, hold on. He leaves and we think "Ohh man he is going to get the shotgun." Haha he comes back and tells us to come on in. What? So we go in and sit and he asks again why we knocked on his door. Earlier that morning, Edgar felt like he needed to get back to church. He has been going through a rough time in his life and needs peace but didnt know where to turn. His whole family is Christian but his wife and her family are Catholics, so he was kinda split. Then we pop up and knock on his door. Edgar had lived in Utah for 10 years and was so impressed about how nice the people were, how they helped him find work and even help him move out here to CA. He then told us that his oldest son had actually been going to the Mormon church and got baptized! What?! We shared a video and a scripture out of the Book of Mormon and promised him peace and he was all smiles. Great referral for the Sisters! :) Ive always heard of stories about cool knocking-the-door miracles, but its so cool to look back and realize that they actually happen. :) God is good. 

Please enjoy all these pictures of E Kuyoth and I having too much fun while we visit potentials. Have a great week! 

ارشد اِكبرگ