He is full of real charity for everyone

June 22, 2015

HEY THERE!


Okay I understand that I have to make up for last week so I will try to tell you everything that happened but then I realized that I can't even remember what I did the whole week except sweat a whole lot haha. It has finally started to get hot.


Well last week was stake conference and President Garcia came and gave the funniest talk ever! He told a bunch of stories about all the bad things that have happened to missionaries while tracting and then exhorted the members to give more referrals. haha pretty nice tactic if you ask me. Also that weekend the x Elder George came back to TJ with his family and it was way fun to see him again! His sister just got her call and said that she knew Erinn because they were in the same missionary prep class.

Camilo officially has one year baptized!!! Can you believe it? I can't! That day I was on exchanges with Elder Morgan and we had a really fun time. Well the work is still going a little slow here but yesterday we had a new family of 4 in church so that was good! I just really don't know how to help the ward. I want it to be like the Short Hills ward, where it was a WARD effort and not just a MISSIONARY effort. I have fond memories of playing with investigators kids, having investigators taught in our home, and just the members being involved with the process. I will keep trying with them.

Oh, today are transfers, but we are staying the same again! I am seriously grateful for my companion.

He is full of real charity for everyone, something that I am not. We met this man named Pedro this week who has serious drinking problem. While we were teaching him he just leaned to the side and started throwing up in front of us. I thought it was absolutely disgusting and maybe even a little funny. I looked over at Elder Hadley to see his face of genuine concern for this man. That is just one of the many ways that he is teaching me.

Happy Fathers Day dad!

Love you all!

I read exactly what I needed to learn in that moment

June 8, 2015

Hello!

Well It is finally starting to warm up a little bit here so that's good. My keyboard is really weird today just so you all know haha.

This week has been pretty tough as well. As far as investigaotrs, it has been really slow, but we have tried to stay busy, and to my amazement, 3 different familias menosactivos that we visited this weekcame to church! I was so happy!

My companion has decided he is going to help me prepare to enter into the real world (even though I STILL have a LOT left) and is now letting me know of everything that i do that will bother my future wife. After about 5 minutes of that, I came to realize that I have no hope of getting married. His response was that anyone can get married, but that my problem will be STAYING married. haha thanks Elder.

This week in our district meeting I talked about diligence. I was super excited about it! We analyzed The New Testament teachings of the Savior. My favorites were the Savior's profound warning in Lucas 17:32-33 and the example of the poor widow in Lucas 21:1-4. That is just so important. There are so many things out there trying to distract us from our real purpose. It is so important that we don't just give a lot of time and talent, but all of it! I am just so grateful for the scriptures. Every time I open El Libro de Mormon I read exactly what I needed to learn in that moment. That is so cool!

Oops I'm out of time again. 

LOVE YOU!Elder Smalley

All hope is NOT lost!

June 1, 2015

This week was super hard and frustrating so mom's email was perfect. Thanks a ton for that simple reminder because right now I am just really freaking out. 


Last week we had a lot of promising baptismal dates and now almost all of them have fallen. gah! I am not going to pretend that i don't know why, there is SO much more i can and should be doing! I am really grateful for personal revelation. How real it is. I am glad that the impressions we receive from the spirit and turn seemingly complicated things into simple ones. It teaches truth, whereas the adversary teaches lies that are so easy to believe  sometimes. 


All hope is NOT lost! we are just going to have to keep on! I love this. I really do! We just really need to find new investigators. It has been hard, because we are no longer allowed to knock doors anymore. LOTS AND LOTS AND LOTS of street contacting, yay!



hmmm what else. Oh I spoke in church yesterday. Yes, I cried once again. I would really like to not be known in at least one ward for the Elder who cries all the time....

I usually don't participate in mission
traditions such as this, but my companion
has 6 months now so we did a
fire celebration ...huck fin style

HUGE shoutout to Shannon! I got three letters from her all at once!! Made me so happy! Where are the rest of you? I still get dad and grandpa's letters as well. So sorry, next week I promise a long letter!

Elder Smalley

"I am just so distracted"

Hello there fam!

Wow, so it has really happened. My little sister is on her way to the CCM in Madrid! It has definatley not sunken in yet. By the way I really don't even know what her email address is so if this is not it then please let me know!

We had a pretty alright week! I'm sorry for the short ones but this week I am just so distracted by all the good news and just so excited for Hermana Smalley! 

I think i learned something very important this week. I have really struggled my whole life with not getting discouraged so easily. Well we had a leadership meeting this week with the president and he showed us this video and that's when it all clicked! If I try, if I go outside of my comfort zone and try my best and things still don't work out the way I thought they would, I can come back, analyze what i did wrong, what tools I can use more fully, seek advise and help, and set out again until I have success.

Sometimes i just go looking for this big complicated answer that i can never figure out to solve all my problems but, the gospel really is just so SIMPLE! It amazes me! Well if you are reading this and just thinking "well DUH!" just know that so am I, haha.

Like I said, the week was pretty alright! The best part was the intercambios that i did with Elder Morgan. haha old times....

I love you all!

Elder Smalley

p.s. I never did get those easter letters. they arrived to the mission office, so I heard, but they somehow got lost. Of course, the one time my family writes me....haha I am going to tear all of Baja California apart until I find them.

Gatos y Perros were beating down on us all morning

Hello there!

Alright it is way too cold to be May. I have no idea what is going on. Maybe it is because we are close to the Ocean or I don't know but I am shivering...it was not like this last May!

This was another hard week. We were able to find lots of new investigators, but nobody really wanted to progress. I was actually really stressing out. We are basically starting all over because we lost so much time last week for random reasons. Well finally on Saturday we met someone who was pretty awesome and she came to church the next day and said that she was going to bring her family next week. Yesterday a family invited a friend over when we ate with them. It was such a good visit! The friend seemed really interested. I am excited about it.

Like I said it has been very cold. Extremely cold, and rainy all week. Friday was the worst day. Gatos y Perros were just beating down on us all morning. I thought that at any minute the zone leaders were going to give us the call to go inside, but it never came, haha, because the president and all the zone leaders had a meeting that day. 

Probably the funniest fake bill I have ever
seen. Elder Lier pulled it out of an ATM!

Well It was fun. Nobody let us in. Literally nobody. We had an appointment and the investigator told us that she was going to able to receive us in that moment, as we were standing outside her door in the pouring rain. That's alright. Did i mention that I had misplaced my raincoat that day? haha I can't complain because maybe the Lord was trying to teach me something about perseverance hasta el fin! Maybe it was a blessing! maybe.

Well I am just so proud of you Erinn! It is such a privilege to hold this sacred calling. I have learned that there are lots of things that Joel Smalley is afraid to do, but I am not Joel Smalley anymore. Being a missionary and a representative of Jesus Christ has really taught me how to put my fears and will everything else aside and serve my God. I see the hand of God in my life and other's lives every day. 


I am going to stop because I am getting teardrops on the keyboard, but I am so excited for you to experience these things! 

I LOVE YOU!
Elder Smalley

Next time we have this call, I will be at home & Erinn will be in the field!

Well I am not sure if I have very much more to say because i just barely talked to you for Mother's day. I'm sorry that i was all over the place. You were so blurry I really didn't get to see your faces, but I saw Mckay and Shannon! haha it was great talking to you!

Literally nothing has happened. We have had almost no time to work, which really stresses me out, but we are gonna make the best of it.

Alejandros baptism was super good! he bore his testimony at the end and it was perfect! he said how much he wanted to raise a family in the gospel and how he wanted to share it with other people as well. Like I said, he has just been the perfect investigator.

Look what I found ... Utah!

It has been rainy. i love it because it reminds me of Jersey, but at the same time it is gonna make it that much hotter when the sun comes out. Speaking of, my companion (Elder Hadley) was super bummed because he wanted to hear some Jersey accents! Maybe I do talk like a Mexican, but mom officially talks like a Utahan haha!

love you all! take care!!!

Elder Smalley 

Craziest Week Ever!

May 4, 2015

Hey there fam!

This week has been AMAZING!!! but supercrazy, but I really like crazy weeks! I don't remember if I told you guys last week but Elder Hadley went home for a surgery on Thursday. He should be back this Wednesday. It's been crazy because I am just tagging along with other missionaries while still trying to get the work going in my own area. 

On Monday I found an old copy of New Era, which I thought was odd to find in Mexico, it was an issue from October 2013. In it I found a quote from Elder Holland that really stuck with me: “I frequently say to missionaries in the field, ‘You make or break your mission every morning of your life. You tell me how those morning hours go from 6:30 a.m.until you are on the street in your mission, what ever time it is; you tell me how those hours go, and I will tell you how your day will go, I will tell you how your month will go, I will tell you how your year will go and how your mission and your life will go.’” Wow. I showed it to Elder Hadley and we both agreed that we could use the time to prepare more wisely. 

We also had an amazing zone conference and I learned a lot about really living up to the covenants I've made, and about putting everything else aside. Putting these things into practice, we really started to see some awesome miracles. People just started letting us in! It was so cool! Our district surpassed our goal for new investigators, which is super awesome! 

Then Elder Hadley left and it was just hectic trying to figure out how I was going to help all these new investigators progress while being shuffled around in trios. Thankfully, Elder Jimenez, one of the secretaries, came and stayed the whole weekend. 

Remember that Ateo that I mentioned last week. Yeah well he is awesome and his family is awesome. We were tracting on Saturday, and a TESTIGO DE JEHOVA let us in and accepted to come to church. That was cool! She didn't come :(. Alejandro is going to get baptized this Saturday. He really is prepared. I am so happy for him. Also Sergio has really started progressing as well. Right now I'm in a tri with the zone leaders and I don't know how much time I will get to work in my area before Elder Hadley comes back but I really hope it all goes well. Oh yeah, I had my interview with the President. he is the greatest. I am just so happy. Overwhelmed, but happy!

LOVE YOU ALL!
Elder Smalley