Continued Blessings - March 21, 2016

Hello Everyone! I hope that you all had a great week with everything that is going on back home! I for sure had an amazing week this week that I cant wait to tell you about. So on Tuesday we got back to work in our area and we were able to have so many members come with us to teach that are recent converts. It was so awesome to see the spirit that they had with their testimonies and just how quickly a true testimony can come through the spirit. We have been able to teach a small family that has been super interested. But when we teach them it doesnt look that way. The Dads name is Vianet and when we teach him it looks like he doesnt care and doesnt pay attention. But in the end he always asks a question that seems to stump us. It has been some of the times where we have felt the spirit the strongest in answering his questions because they are sincere. He is trying to make changes in his life and he really cares about learning about the gospel. Yesterday we stopped by his house to invite him to church and he told us that he was planning on coming. It was the first time that he had set foot inside a church and it was a miracle that he could come. We are hoping that his whole family can come next week. I told you all about Eder and Andres that we have been teaching. Those two continue to have huge changes in their lives as well and are accepting everything that we teach them. I feel so inadequate because all we are doing is teaching simple principles but they are having such a big impact on all of these people and I know that it is because of the spirit. Yesterday I had the chance to speak in sacrament meeting. It was the first time that I was able to write up points in spanish and say everything else from my thoughts. I had the chance to talk about the Light of the Gospel. And especially at this time of the year the light of the gospel is the chance to repent and be forgiven through the atonement of Jesus Christ. Without him we would be in a world of darkness and apostasy. But with this simple principle of repentance that is present again in the world, we have the chance to bring light into our lives if we are willing to make changes to follow him. My favorite scripture to illustrate this is Alma 36:20. It is the light that we can all experience through Jesus Christ. His true gospel is here today and we are the blessed few that have the chance to partake of the blessings in it. But there are so many that need this same light and the spirit will bear manifest of this light if we take the time to share it. And those who are in need of it will come unto Christ no matter what it takes. I hope that you all have a great easter weekend and remember this light that is in Christ.

Zone Conference - Zona La Costa, March 11, 2016

Traveling! March 15, 2016

Hello Everyone! I am sorry that I wasnt able to write yesterday it is the first time in 6 days that we have been in the area. We have been traveling throughout the whole coast this week doing splits with many missionaries in the zone. Ill quickly let you guys all know what happened in all the adventures from Oaxaca this week! And so at the start of the week we started out doing splits with Elder Maldanado and Elder Cook. I had the chance to have Elder Cook come and teach with me and it was hard because for the first time in a year here it rained and it rained hard! There were floods in some parts and it was hard to get to many places to teach. But we were able to help a new investegator Andres gain a testimony that Joseph Smith was a prophet. He told us that he had never heard anything that made more sense before in his life and about how the way that God works and that he was willing to keep on progressing and learning more. We were also able to find a new investegator named Eder, we taught him and helped him in the same areas and Sunday he came all by himself to church! It was a few of the small miracles that we were able to experience in our area. It has been so amazing to be able to teach because as me and Elder Valadez have tried to improve our teachings we have found many more ways to bring the spirit into the lessons and it is something that we have found a greater testimony in. It has helped so many people to start to have a true conversion unto the Lord and to help them realize that he always is wanting the best for us in any situation. On Friday we went to Puerto Escondido and had our Zone Conference with President Madsen. He was able to motivate us and help us to be more efficent missionaries. He stressed us in one area that brings true conversion and that is the story of the Restauration. If we know for a fact that Joseph Smith was a prophet, that he saw Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ, and through him all was restored, we will comprehend everything about the Gospel of Jesus Christ and never doubt anything in this gospel. It has helped me to strengthen my testimony as well that all of this happened and that nobody can take that away from me. And the only way we can find out is between us and Heavenly Father, not through the words of anyone. We need to ask when we have doubts, seek when we are questioning, and it will all, always be opened unto us. We were able to put that into practice as I went with the Puerto missionaries for the weekend. On Monday we had our zone activity and we went to the beach and played beach volleyball and the temptation was HUGE to go into the water because it was so hot but yet it was so fun! We ate pizza and ice cream and got to relax a little bit and in the end I was able to go do more splits with the Puerto Angel missionaries. I have learned so much and have realized just how lucky I am to be surrounded by amazing missionaries. But it feels good to finally be back home for the week. I hope that everyone has a fantastic week and I look forward to hearing from you all next week!

Puerto Escondido

Me and Elder Valadez

Puerto Angel

The Beach of our Zone Activity

My photography skills

Preaching in Paradise - March 7, 2016

Hello Everyone! Well this week was another great week here from Huatulco! There was some pretty awesome things that happened this week and others that were a little bit sad. At the first of the week this week Elder and Sister Dewolf told us that they were getting changed to work in the temple in Oaxaca, and this week was their last week with us. They had become our mission parents here and we had spent a ton of time with them. We celebrated National Pancake Day with them this last week (or should I say international pancake day) and they made us pancakes for lunch. It was just the small things that they did that made us feel so much at home with everything. Elder Dewolf couldnt really speak spanish and he wanted to bear his testimony to the branch yesterday and so we worked Saturday night to help him write a testimony that he could read to the branch. It was so awesome and so spiritual to hear it! We also got to go to the beach with them and walk along the edge yesterday before church and it was so beautiful! We saw another part of Hualtuco that is way nicer than any part, I cant believe that all this is in Oaxaca! Anyways to talk about the mission part of it, at the first of the week we had the Assistants here to do splits with us. I got to go with Elder Tomala from Ecuador. We started out visiting a lady named Nico that we had met before but she didnt seem interested that much. We started teaching her the lesson of how the Gospel blesses families. We got halfway through when Elder Tomala asked if she had any questions. She replied with "Yeah how can I be a part of your church to recieve this promise of an eternal family" It was so powerful and it is such a special promise to know of the truth of that! Afterwards we had the chance to go and visit Edith, who is a grandmother of three little kids who are very very energetic like all 5 and 6 year olds. They were all running around and we were teaching a lesson about Faith in Jesus Christ. She broke down and told us that on that day 20 years ago her son passed away and that she had never found the answer of how she can be comforted. She said she had found her answer and that it was through Jesus Christ. I wish that I could share all of these experiences with you because these were only 2 of the many that were the same. It has been amazing to see that as we have focused more on putting Christ into the lessons and as the main focus, Christ has entered the lives of all of these people and has found a way to help each and every one of them. The gospel is personal to each of us because Christ is a Brother to each of us. If we focus on him and find him he will find us and focus on us in everything that we need. I hope that you all have a great week this week! Elder Peterson

The Missionaries of Huatulco

Yes that is real and yes it is alive

Ballers of Hualtuco

We got lost in the woods...

The only hard part about being a missionary ;)

The outer walls of the church here

95 Degrees and Getting Hotter! - February 29, 2016

Hello Everyone! Well it has been another really hot week here in Hualtuco. I have never been in a place hotter than this and I have never had a hotter February in my life but hey, it is awesome here and I am loving it. Today we played a basketball game against the Jehovas Witness missionaries and they were friendly with us. Elder DeWolf who is the senior missionary here set it up and it is something that the missionaries here have been doing for weeks. But it was so fun to play again and we won! This week was a great week that flew by, I was finally able to get used to everything here and to be able to meet most of the members of the ward, and guess how I did it? Through the ward choir! So last week I forgot to mention how this all happened. The first day that we were here we had lunch with the Branch President, and the first thing that he asked me was if I played the piano. I told him I did and he said "Great you have choir practice tonight at 7" and so we had been practicing a ton for the choir. But something that was also awesome was that we found out that one of the Sister Missionaries in the Branch was able to play the Violin and so she played that while I accompanied on the piano and it was just like old times with my sisters. Yesterday we were able to have Branch conference with everyone and the choir sounded awesome and really brought the spirit into the meeting. It was also really special because we had 4 of our investegators in church that were looking for an answer to their prayers and they all said that they could feel the spirit through all of the music. We have two brothers that we are teaching right now that were there as well yesterday. The Branch mission leader spoke in sacrament meeting about the missionary work and when we stopped by the brothers house that night he wanted to learn more about the missionary service and said that he wanted to serve a mission as well. Our ward mission leader is awesome, he is a convert of 1 year and is 17 years old. His family has opposed his work in the church and his parents hardly give him permission to do anything for the church, but every time he expresses his feelings to serve a mission he starts to cry and you can feel the spirit and desire so strongly in that. Anyways this is a little of what happened this week in beautiful Hualtuco, thank you for all of your letters and support and have a great week! Elder Peterson

The Madsens, DeWolfs, Sister Training Leaders and Us yesterday in Branch Conference Huatulco branch choir

Branch choir practice - I played the piano and Sister Muñoz the violin.

The famous Huatulco Letters

Teaching them while they are young