Week of January 29, 2017

Alright I'm finally in my area! I got here yesterday afternoon. My companion is Elder Moreno he is from Honduras and he has just one transfer. So technically I'm training him. We get along well and were both focused on our what we wanna do here which is baptize converts and building the Lords Kingdom here in Bolivia. We're still getting to know each other but he is great from what Ive seen. We live in a house with 2 other Elders and our house is good it just needs to be cleaned...a lot. I was thinking how grossed out mom would be in the house with all the dead cockroaches and other stuff in here lol, but I'm working on cleaning it. I sent a picture with the shirt and the cookies which are amazing! Thanks so much! Elder Cook was great and his wife was awesome too. He said a lot of cool stuff but the best part was when he bore his testimony about the Savior. He said "I want to be more clear in my testimony especially with missionaries, I want to say that I know the Saviors voice, and I know the Saviors face." It was so cool! If you want to be inspired in home teaching read emissaries of the church by Elder Holland this past conference. We have a totally different schedule now. It is a lot more flexible and now we don't count lessons or any of that stuff everyday. Only baptisms, people with a baptism date, investigators that came to church and new investigators. We also have raised our goal of baptisms to 3 every month. I'm very happy here and excited to get to work in this area. Have a good week 

Love

Elder Nelson

Week of January 22, 2017

Yea a ton of things happened this week. So on Tuesday we got the transfer calls and I was certain that I was gonna stay and Urrutia was gonna leave. The zone leaders called us and said Elder Nelson your getting transferred, your going to guayaramerin, you'll be opening a new area, and you'll be training a new elder. I was shocked and I waited for like 10 seconds to tell me he was kidding. Guayara is in Beni and its the furthest away from the city that you can be in and its 10 minutes away from Brazil. Its in the Amazon jungle! When I heard that I started freaking out a bit cause its basically throwing a little kid in a pool and hoping he will teach himself how to swim. But the thing is Elder Cook is coming to our mission and all the missionaries from Beni are flying in for it. So I have been living with the zone leaders and helping the new elders in the area. We also had two baptisms this Saturday so I was pretty lucky I could stay for that and baptize one of them. Its been the weirdest week in my mission kinda floating around companions and areas and I'm anxious to get to my area and go to work. I haven't met my new companion yet he has 1 transfer or 6 weeks in Beni right now and ill finish his training. I wont meet him til like this Wednesday or Thursday. I have only heard good things about him though. Super crazy week but I'm chilling and trying to stay focused. Hope all is well at home things are good here. I have seen a lot of help with my spanish this week, and a lot more comfortable. Something interesting I studied this week was really how much the Lord loves us and how He wants us to succeed and be happy. Have a good week next email I'll be in the jungle.

Love

Elder Nelson

Week of January 15, 2017

Honestly the only thing I wish I would have done before I came here is maybe read the scriptures more and gone out with missionaries, not for my practice but because it sucks when you cant find a member to accompany you for a lesson. I feel like there are just things you need to learn by suffering and experience in the mission. President Hinckley is a legend I cant wait to get the Liahona for January and read the segment on him. I know Im lucky for where Im serving and the people here are a lot easier to teach. Something interesting I read this morning is Alma and Amulek and their first time teaching together and it basically is a battle of words between them and the Lawyers of the land, and the lawyers in the scriptures are always bad, but it doesnt deter me. They are about to contend with Zeezrom and its always exciting to read. Have a good week, Love and Pray for you guys everyday

Elder Nelson

Week of January 8, 2017

Things are going good here, always lots of spiritual experiences but what is always the best is when our investigators keep their commitments and read the book of mormon. Bolivia is an experience everyday lol its pretty wild. It was a good week, we have a lot of good families to teach and I keep having weird dreams in spanish. The goofy challenge is cursed or something dad, but it seems like you're content with the results. Dang I miss the family trips and spending all our money ha. Here in my district I have the reputation for being the cheapest one, I hope that makes you proud, and its not being stingy its making an efficient budget and keeping to it strictly. We have to give money back to the mission if we have extra but that NEVER happens. My goal is to give the most money back to the mission in the mission history. Its tithing money and its sacred :) I'm glad all went well with your run I prayed for you and the family the whole week. We get an hour or so to study the gospel everyday and its my favorite time of the day. For me when I have a great gospel study I have a great day. It takes an effort though to have good studies and be focused. I'm going to a church distribution store today to buy a quad because the scriptures the mtc gave me are garbage and I want nice ones. I haven't read the BoM all the way through yet because I switched to reading in spanish and its a lot slower, I'm only in Mosiah. Our missionary library is also limited so we can only read certain things and it doesn't include any church history books except for Our Heritage, but I'll have plenty of time to read a bunch of church books when I get home. The one thing I thought about this week is how disappointing it can be when our investigators don't read or pray or attend church and I thought about all the times I've disappointed you guys. I hope you guys can be proud of me that I'm out doing what I should be doing. This is my last week of my official training, it all goes by so fast, but I'll have another Monday before I know if I'm getting transferred or not. I hope I stay because we have a lot of families that are close to baptism and I wanna be here, but I'll go where I'm needed. 
 

Week of January 1, 2017

Sorry to took so long to post, I was on vacation!

The weather here is super weird. Its really hot and windy or its rainy and then hot its just a big mess but it sucks when its super hot. To me it seems like I barely know any spanish but to you guys its totally different. I cant believe Carrie Fisher died thats crazy! I finished Jesus The Christ yesterday super good book. I learned a lot about our Savior and more of what he did in his earthly ministry. I want to read all of Talmage´s books but I have to wait til after my mission to do that.  It was definitely a good week the best part about new years was that we had 6 investigators at church! Our goal is 5 baptisms this month so that should be great. We have this week and the week after in this transfer window. There are like 7 zones in the city and suburb areas and 3 zones in the jungle area. Im in a suburb area like 30 minutes from the city. Keep being awesome I pray for you and the family everyday!