Closing our sector

So this week was super awesome but kind of really sad too.

Starting off. This was the last week of my mission President, John Rappleye. And he has really been like a dad to me. I can hardly explain how much he has helped me while i was here in Chile. I know for sure that he was a man inspired by God called to help me in this work, because looking back at some of the challenges that i had in my mission, there would have been no way that i would have been able to get through them without his help. He even sent me a letter telling me about how happy he was to see how much i have progressed and changed as i was here in the mission. Im gonna miss him. But i am excited to get to meet my next mission president.

 

 The other sad thing about this week was a little phone call i got. This week we were supposed to get our transfers in. And i was sitting there, and the zone leaders called me (even though they live with me and i could hear them through the wall haha) But they asked me to give the phone to my companion, when they proceeded to tell him that he is getting transferred to Chile. But then they ask him to pass the phone to me, and said ``Elder Crockett, the news for you is....You´re going to Calle-Calee in Valdivia.!´´ And i then gave a little sarcastic chuckle and said ``right, president would totally take both of us out of our sector. Whats actually happening?´´ And they said ``Elder Crockett, were not kidding, there is a lot of missionaries who ended their missions this week, and there is almost none coming in. President had to close 10 different sectors. And since there were 8 missionaries serving in our ward we were one of the first ward that got missionaries taken out´´ And so i accepted it. It was super sad knowing that i had just spent the last 3 months working like crazy, just to get my sector closed.

But knowing our hero, Elder Crockett, i did not let that stop the work here. thankfully this past sunday, one of the missionaries that lives in my house got super sick, and i was asked to stay home with him, so that my companion and his companion could go to church and see which of our investigators came to church. So as soon as our companion left, i went to my desk, and made a list of every single progressing family that i was teaching, with their address, phone number, hours of availability, and a ton of other super important information, and i put them all together on a couple of pieces of paper (because even though all of the information that i was writing in there can be found in the area book, i know how lazy some people are, so i figured that if that had it all just handed to them on a golden plate, that they would be alot more willing to visit my investigators (the mission just combined my old sector with the sector of the Elders that i live with)

Then after church i switched with my companion, and i started showing elder Bate, around my sector and introducing him to alot of the families that he is going to be teaching.

I am sad about having my sector shut down, but at least i know that i did absolutely everything possible to get the work of the Lord rolling there. And then made it even easier for the missionaries that are going to follow so that they can keep it rolling.

Welp i got to go love you all!!!!

Watermelon Seeds

So random fact, i havent read any of your emails yet, because i opened up my email today to discover a bunch of emails from different sister missionaries all writing me telling me that they heard i got dear johned and wanted to send me their support. I was honestly super grateful, and thought it was awesome. But in between reading them, responding, and on top of my normal missionary stuff that i have to do before i write you it used up like half of my internet time. So i just copied and pasted all of the family emails i got, and will read them when i get home today, so sorry if you had any questions i can respond them next week if there are any. But just in case i am assuming you want to know about the blood thing. I still havent taken the test, and i doubt i will for like another month, but its cool because i doubt that i have any problem.

This last week was really awesome. In my district meeting this week i taught all of my mission about contacts, and how if we talk to more people in the streets. We are going to find more people to teach. And then i told them about a ton of different things that they can do to do contacts to make it fun so that they will be more excited to do it. And i wanted to tell some of them to you

One of the things i told them was ``Turn contacting people into a game´´ And then told them with one of my companion something that we would do everyday is, I would choose a word, any word that has nothing to do with the gospel, and to use it in a contact. And then after your comp does it, he would then choose a word for you, and then you would have to use it

To help you guys understand more i will give you some of the word my comp and i used this week.``Pink Monkey. Watermelon seeds. Boston Red Socks. Brittney Spears. Honda´´ And there was many ideas. 

I do want to tell you the watermelon seed story though because that one is freaking hilarious.

We were walking down the street, and i see a man that looked pretty annoyed, and just to be funny i turn to my companion, and say ``Watermelon Seeds.´´ As we approach the man he says ``Hey sir. I have a question for you´´ the man looked kind of busy and annoyed but stopped to hear the question. And my companion said ``My companion was just saying that my freckles, look like watermelon seeds. What do you thing?´´ The man just looked at him like an idiot and said ``are you kidding me?´´ I then jump in to the rescue and point at his freckles and say ``Just look at those things! They are Gigantic! They look like watermelon seeds!´´ The man then said ``let me see´´ he then comes up to my companion and starts staring at his arm and said ``Your right kid, these are huge´´ And then i turn to my companion and say ``TOLD YOU!´´ And the man just starts cracking up. And i cant remember how but somehow we transitioned that into teaching him the plan of salvation. 

Shoot i am pretty much out of time. I will write you more next week. Love you all!!!!

Iron Rod

So this week was super awesome. I am sure that you may remember that while i was in the MTC i had a companion, and how i had to fight super hard to get him to stay on the mission.

Well this week, he was living in my house!

Its actually kind of a sad story, but ends good. His companion, had a medical emergency, and had to get flown up to Chiles Capital City, Santiago, and he was there in the hospital pretty much all week, and so he is  now an incredible missionary, couldnt spend a week alone, so he moved into my house for the week, and that was so awesome, and he told me his whole story of how he decided to stay on the mission. But he told me how pretty much every single step of the way that he would ask about me to see if anyone had known what had happened to me in the last year and almost a half. And He said ``Dude, i dont know how you did it.´´ And he just told me about how every single missionary he met had heard about  crazy stories that had happened to me in the mission. Everything from that house burning down, to baptisms that i had. And i want to go into more details about our conversations that we had but i am going to decide not too. But there is one that i want to share about.

There was one night we were sitting at home, and we were talking about how much we have changed on the mission, and with him it was super noticeable, how he was when i was companions is not even a shadow of the missionary he is now. But he told me about how much he has noticed that i have changed too, and we were just amazed and how different we are then we used to be. Granted our personalities are pretty much the same, its just alot of the bad things about us now are gone, and were replaced with good things.And alot of other really personal things that i am not going to share through email, in person ill totally do it some day. 

 This week we planned a huge activity in our church that was super awesome, and it was a giant representation of Lehi's Dream, and we got everyone in the church blindfolded, and we set up a bunch of fishing line to be the iron rod, and we put them all the way on one end of the building, and they had to find there way through the darkness to get to the iron rod, and then follow that until the end.

We had some of the missionaries play the role of the still small voice to guide people and other ones to try to distract them and take them off of the path.  I had the fun job to play the part of Satan hahahahaaha, so i spent the night deceiving people, getting them away from the iron rod, what my personal favorite tactic though to get them off the rod when they were already on it was find an important intersection in the lines,  and then try to get them to follow my voice, and oh my gosh i got way too many people to fall away hahaha.  but the the sister missionaries who were the angels later saved them when they saw how bad i got them lost haha.  but i learned something awesome from that.

Alot of times in our lives, in really decisive moments is when temptations is going to get harder (because thats when its more effective haha), and its just really important to never let go of the iron rod, not even for a second, because thats when you get lost. It was actually a really spiritual experience for everyone, and a ton of people bore their testimonies about it the next day in sacrament meeting. It was awesome. I really want to do that activity again in my next ward.

Well there is a bunch of stuff that i need to do right now, and i dont have alot of time. But keep me posted on how you are all doing! Love you!

Persecution

So this week was pretty awesome.

I got to do another baptismal interview of one of my friends actually, his name is Ivan, and he actually used to live in my proselyting area, but then he moved out of my area, and was being taught by a couple of other missionaries that are in my district. But this man is awesome i love his so much. And i love how spiritual baptismal interviews always are. Ive noticed that every time we end up getting onto a topic that is a real need of the investigator but has nothing to do with the baptismal questions. When i was with him he totally aced the test he passed the baptismal interview without any problems. 

But as i was interviewing him i felt the need to ask him a specific question. And after i asked him he told me about how he used to be a member of a Fascist Group, and how even though he had repented of all of his sins, he was still kind of weighed down by the hate that he felt/expressed toward different groups of people through his life. And so i taught him alot about the example that Christ gave us to love other people, and just a ton of other stuff that i wont get much into. And taught him that through Christ he can overcome these feelings. And as i didnt teach this to him but as i am writing this is reminds me alot of the apostle Paul in the new testament, about how he used to persecute the church, but then throughout many different events, starting from when Christ appeared to him on the road to Damascus, he turn into a strong disciple of Christ, who was then called on a mission, and was the instrument of bringing many souls to Christ. And was the Apostle who ended  writing like half the bible.

Speaking of the bible not too long ago, i started an in depth study of the bible, and right now im just in Romans, but i decided that i would take out everything that Christ did (in regards to establishing his church), and all of the things that were added by his apostles, and am mapping them out, with of the scripture references where they show up, and even though i have always been taught this, i´ve came to know that the Organization of the modern day Church is exactly the same as the ancient church. 

Well i love you all but i got to go i have a ton of stuff i still need to do right now, sorry about not writing more.

Love you!

Sweet! but No sweets

Thats Super Legit!!!!!! Dos Elder Crocketts hahahaha hey, one thing that i would do for shopping for stuff is talk to people who served in the same mission, you should be able to find a page on facebook of the mission who served there, and ask them what kind of clothes and stuff he is going to need. Also Send me his Myldsmail email address so i can talk to him when he is in the MTC and what not

And the severance  makes me super happy too, all of the people in the internet place all looked at me weird when i shouted with joy.

So this week was actually pretty awesome, that lady that i interviewed the other day got married on friday, and she invited me to her wedding, and that was super awesome, and then the next day she was baptized with her daughter, and that was even better, i had a ton of investigators that came to the baptism, and it got them super excited, one of them is planning on getting baptized in a couple of weeks, and the other one i was getting ready to drop because she wasnt really showing any progress, but then after the baptism she was super receptive, and it became alot easier to teach her, so i am not dropping her.

All the missionaries in my district (there are 8) we all sang a musical number in the baptism of  Nearer my God to Thee (in spanish though, obviously haha) And we did an awesome 4 part split version of it.

Actually something happened there that i dont want to tell you about but i think i should. But back story first. The other day i went to visit a couple of members, and they randomly started talking about Diabetes, and what the most obvious symptoms of it are, and they were all things that normally happen to me, and so i made a joke to my companion saying ``Well that would explain alot, im totally Diabetic!´´ And we both just laughed a ton, because it was a joke.

But then we were practicing the song a couple days later, and one of the missionaries that i am in charge of is the mission nurse, and as we were there my companion said ``Hey Elder, You should talk to the nurse about that Diabetes thing, because even though we were joking around those symptoms that the members were talking about were actual problems that you have.´´ And at first i didnt want to but, he talked me into asking her about it, and so as i was talking to the nurse i told her about those couple symptoms that i knew about, and then she asked me ``Well, i am going to need a little more information to know for sure, what other symptoms do you have?´´ And i respond ``I have no idea what the symptoms are, just tell me some of them, and i will tell you if i have them or not´´ But then she didnt want to tell me, justifying that if she told me than i would start imaging that i had them. And so i said to her ``Well dont ask me then, just ask my companion he´s with me all day, he`d probably know better than anyone else´´ And then i left them and went and played the piano and sung and had a ton of fun. But then after a couple of mins the nurse comes up to me and says ``Elder Crockett, you really need to watch your sugar intake, this week i am going to head up to Osorno, and i am going to buy one of the blood test machines to test for diabetes, and we will get you tested, because it sounds like you have diabetes but we need to test to be sure´´ And then i was just like ``Crap´´ hahahahahaha

So i am thinking tomorrow i will be getting tested, she told me that IF i have it, its just in its starting stages, and so it isnt that bad, and will be easier to control.

But man did that throw me into an eating healthy obsession haha, that night of the baptism, i refused to eat any cake, or cookies, or soda, and a couple of members even tried forcing me to eat stuff because they noticed that i wasnt taking anything, and so they would go and personally cut me out a giant piece, and so i told them that i was fine and that i didnt want cake, so i gave the piece to another person, when they werent looking. My companion and i had just made a bunch of brownies too that we left in our house, but i just gave all of mine away to the other missionaries that i live with.

I dont know if i actually am diabetic or not, but just to be safe i have just been avoiding sugar at pretty much all cost since ive  talked to the nurse, and will continue to do so up until i get an actual test.

But this week was actually pretty awesome for me though, i got one reference from the church that was such a miraculous reference it was a man named Patricio, and we went and contacted the reference, and he was super receptive, but when we contacted him, he asked ``How do you know my name?´´ And so i told him ``Well i just got a call from the mission office saying that you talked to missionaries and that  you gave them your address, and name and told me to contact you. When was it that you talked with missionaries the last time?´´ And he told me ``The only time in my life that i have talked to a missionary, was when i was 12 years old, about 10 years ago´´ And then told me everything that he remembered about that conversation, and how he felt after, and everything.

 And then told me that ever since then he hadnt even seen another missionary. And so he was super curious as to how we knew who he was and where he lived, and i just made a joke saying ``Well we are representatives of Jesus Christ, and if it wanst a couple of missionaries that sent us here that means it was probably Him´´  And he got super serious, and just started to ask us a ton of questions about God, and about the church, and would frequently ask us to share our testimonies about specific things, and ask us to share personal experiences. And we spent just like an entire hour, just asking a ton of different spiritual question, and we got on every topic from if there was a man who currently talking with God (a prophet) to how will he know when God is hearing his prayers, and just a million of other super awesome question. and he wanted to visit our website and study a bunch of the things on there, and we gave him a pamphlet of the Restoration, and we sent up another appointment, and wow he was super receptive.

Welp i am all out of time Gots to run. Love you all!

Dog Attack

So it was super funny, when the missionaries and i left the house we were skyping in we all went home together. And on the way home there is one dog that always messes with us and has bit multiple missionaries. And we were walking home, it starts chasing us, and my companion didnt want to deal with it today so he just turns around, and start running right at it ( a trick that scares dogs in to running away, but we only do it when people arent looking haha) And the dog just books it, but my companion was relentless, and he just keeps chasing and chasing it. Until he gets super close, and i see the dog turn around to see if he was still getting chased, but he did it so suddenly that my companion didnt have time to stop, and he just slams into the dog, and trips over it. And i just hear a huge THUMP when his foot slammed into its ribs. And then it yelps really loud, and then goes and hides behind a bush.

I dont think we are ever going to have problems that that little demon ever again hahaha, if we ever do ill just sic my companion on it again hahahaha.

It was super awesome talking to you guys n skype All of the missionaries just made fun of me because i only get to see you two times a year, and the only thing that i did was teach you about the book of mormon and bore my testimony to you about how if you read as a family that the blessings that God is preparing for you are going to be more apparent in your lives.

 

And they made jokes saying things like ``Well its a good thing they have you, because none of them are ever going to be able to go inactive because as soon as they even show signs of drifting away you are just going to teach them. 

And thats the truth haha

Well i got to go i love you all keep me posted about the adoption and the mission call! Mom dont try looking for a new wife for me hahahahahahaha

Love yall

News Alert!!!

Big news. So i am going to try to skype you guys on Sunday!

Bigger News. I totally just got dear John´d today!!!!!! HAHAHAHAHA But im actually really happy for Jocee, i accepted the fact a while ago that i probably wasnt going to marry her, but that just sealed that fact today haha I am really happy for her though, and for me too, because it was actually incredible how strong i felt the spirit when i read her email. So i know its what God wanted.

So mom promise you wont kill me, but i will tell you more about the dangerous neighborhood. I was walking to an appointment lat at night, and there was a dark alleyway that we had to cross through in order to get to the neighborhood we needed to be in. And so as we entered there were two men that came out from another dark alleyway that runs half way through. And they just start yelling spanish swear words at us, and then one of them just starts threatening to kill us, and supposedly he had a knife. I didnt see it, but thats the rumor, and e just starts threatening us, and really my companion and i werent really scared, we are both pretty big guys, alot bigger than they were, and my companion is a freaking steroid taking monster (he doesnt actually take steroids, it just looks like he does haha), and we knew that God would take care of us, so we just walked toward them to get to where we needed to g, and they got out of our way, and we walked by. And my companion said after we passed them he turned around and saw one of them pick up a big rock off the ground, and was going to throw it at us, but th other guy stopped him.

In the same neighborhood, but when i was with Elder Munoz, there was a group of guys that were planning on jumping us, and robbing us, but as they were there talking to us, we became friends with them, and i started to teach those gangsters about the atonement of Christ, and how even though they were makng bad choices, that they werent bad people, and that thanks to the atoning sacrifice of Jesus Christ that could repent of their sins, change their lives, and have the inner peace that they needed. And then as they were there contemplating my words, my companion and i create a small distraction, and got out of there SO FAST HAHAHAHAHAHA

And so when people told me not t work in one neighborhood because it was dangerous i pretty much just told them ``Ya i know´´  But i actually dont care, because some of the best people that i am teaching live in that area, and are only home late at night, so i dont care about people jumping me, trying to rob me, or trying to kill me, there are alot of good people there who need me help. So im going to be there.

I want to write you guy s more but i am out of time, i had a bunch of things i had to do in my internet time today. But i am really looking forward to hearing from you guys this Sunday! Im not sure if i will be able to call before hand to verify everything good, because there is nothing open on Sundays here.

Love you all!

Elder Hamilton Denton Crockett