Translating already!

Jan. 28 2014

Dear Family,

Yes I did get the package with soccer shoes, two vests, and cardigan! Thank you so much for that!! And I have a question, where did you get those KIND bars? (Just FYI….they are DELISH healthy protein bars…..that actually TASTE GOOD…..Sam's club is cheapest place to get them)  Those are good!! Also, I think this is the last thing, I need to buy asmonex next monday. I can get it at walmart, there's a pharmacy. What do I need to do? Do I need to take anything, or should everything be there and good, or what? Thank you for sending me so much stuff, sorry I'm so needy haha...

This week was challenging. E Diaz and I do not get along as well as I thought we would at the beginning (danget), and I feel like we're both very easygoing people! I feel like E Diaz is so focused on getting numbers that he skips the part where we're supposed to care about people and teach by the spirit, so that's been a really weird transition. And I almost feel like I'm losing my personality around him because I can't be myself! I try to have normal conversations with him, talking about something I learned in psychology or med anatomy, or something I like to do, just a normal conversation, and he acts so uninterested! Doesn't say anything, doesn't show any sign that he's listening, so I just don't say anything anymore. He only talks about 5 things. 1. Girls (not in a good way) 2. poop/farts 3. getting huge and the way his pants fit him 4. his last area and the food they ate there 5. the disobedient things he's done. It's RIDICULOUS. Mom, you'll probably laugh that I said he talks about poop too much. You can say it, you were right (YES!  I LOVE it when they recognize that parents may have been right). But it's gross, and that's all he talks about!!! So really, our relationship is pretty much he talks about that stuff, and I try to act uninterested and tell him I don't want to hear it if it's not mission appropriate, and he usually says it anyways. And I thought having a native comp would help with my spanish, but really, the only spanish he's taught me are buried spanish slang words, that you shouldn't say even if you weren't a missionary. Honestly, even though E Diaz helped jump our numbers up, and we have the highest numbers in the zone right now, I would consider him a disobedient missionary. He's played call of duty on his mish, he's done all sorts of stuff. So that's been tough. If the rest of my mission is like this, it's gonna be the longest two years of my life.

With that being said, sorry about the complaining and whining. But the good news is, Obdeli is progressing!!! Last week or two weeks ago we gave him the baptismal date of Feb2, this sunday!!! We met with him twice last week, the first time E Diaz led the lesson and really it was just rote presentation of the first half of the plan of salvation. The second time, I had us role play his lesson in comp study and we thought of some questions that we could ask him to help him feel the spirit, and the lesson was AMAZING!!!! We taught the plan of salvation from the atonement, and the spirit was so strong the whole time!! He definitely felt it, and we kept him involved, it was a great lesson! At the end of the lesson, we asked him how he was feeling about baptism. He said he's been praying, but doesn't feel like he's received an answer. I pulled out Moroni 10:4-7 to talk about the Holy Ghost and how we could feel that good things are an answer, and then E Diaz pulled out Alma 32:15-19 and talked about how sometimes God asks us to act out of faith, and that was really powerful. Probably the most powerful part in the whole lesson. Obdeli definitely felt the spirit. We encouraged him to keep praying, and yesterday at church we talked to his dad to see how he's doing, and he told us that Obdeli was fasting yesterday about it!!!!! And we haven't even taught him about fasting!!! It's insane! I don't think he'll get baptized this week, but we're hopeful about in the next two weeks!!!!! That was the highlight of the week!!

I'm sorry that I really bagged on E Diaz, there are some moments when I really do appreciate him. He has a lot of scriptures memorized, and he has baptized alot of people, so sometimes he has really helpful input.

So as for all the branch changes, really not much changed haha! The branch mission leader and the first counselor in the branch presidency got switched, so now we work with hno Carvajal. He's really cool too!!! Also the relief society pres got released, and they brought two families from the english ward into the branch, the Verdus from spain, and the Gomez from Columbia.

Yesterday at church there were all the stake representatives there, and only two of them spoke spanish, so they asked me to translate for everyone in sacrament meeting!!! I sat in the back corner of the chapel, and everyone else had on a headset, and I spoke into a mic and translated into english!! Translating is so much harder than just speaking and understanding because you have to use both languages simultaneously. It's like talking to someone and texting at the same time(rubbing your head, patting your stomach…:), just in two different languages :) But that was really cool, and I'm grateful for the gift of tongues!!!

I finished the Book of Mormon for the first time on my mish this week!! It's crazy to me how much I learned every time I finish, and then I start again, and I'm only in 1 nephi, and I have already learned so much agaiN!!!!! E Hughes, from the MTC, said that one time he read the book of mormon and just put a little red x next to every time it mentioned Christ, and he said it was amazing how many x's were on each page. I think i'd like to do that sometime. I know the Book of Mormon is true, and I know that because I've read it and felt the power that comes from applying it in my life!!!

I found two new investigators this week! I was on exchange with E Jester, my zone leader, and we went to teach a former, Norbia, and a contact, Jackie. They both invited us back! Jackie is actually friends of the Morales in our ward, so we're gonna bring hno morales on a team up with us soon, convert everyone! :)

Other than that, not much happened this week. Like you said, lots of snow, and the temperature has been ice cold, except for today. Today it's hot. The weather in New Jersey changes way way way more than the weather in Utah, don't even complain about anything there! ;)

Love you all, good luck with the house!! It makes me sad too that you're moving, but everything will be alright because God has a perfect plan for each of us, and he knows where he wants us to be and what he wants us to do and who he wants us to become! Just walk by faith and put your trust in him, everything will turn out perfect!!  Love you all!! Have a great week!! :)

Love,

Elder Tanner Nelson :)

Teaching English, and a tough companion

Jan. 21 2014

Dear Family,

 

No there wasn't a cardigan in the Christmas package (um….a little weird.  We put TWO cardigans in his package.).  Also, could you send my soccer shoes too? You can just throw it in with the cardigan. Thank you!

 

This week was challenging for me, adjusting to a new companion. E Diaz is so much different than E Jellen. So much different. The natives of spanish countries are so much different, just in pretty much everything they do. E Diaz is totally cool with just walking around the apartment naked, pooping with the door open, being wild and free, and he makes alot of crude jokes. And he was a bad kid before his mission, he tells me some of the stories, and it's really bad!! I believe he's truly repented, but he still talks about some of the stuff he did and he makes jokes about it and laughs about it, and it's really bad stuff! Just as a hispanic, he's really open, and not that being open is bad, but he's too open. He's suggested we shower together on several occasions, just like he's done with past companions/roommates. The hispanic culture is very very very different than the american one. (um….not even sure what to put here?…..wasn't even sure I should include that…….but, so as to keep all his letters complete, there it stays).

 

Don't get me wrong, I still like him!! I'm just having a hard time learning how to live with him. Another thing with him, he's really big on getting the best numbers. Which isn't bad, it's really important to get good numbers!! but I feel like he almost disregards the spirit to get the biggest numbers. Last week was a really successful week, we had some of the best numbers I've ever had! But I feel like the spirit was missing from alot of those lessons and everything we did. So I'm trying to figure out how to bring the spirit more strongly into our companionship and still get those huge numbers that he wants.

 

Anyways, let me tell you about my week! Last sunday, we were talking with Laura, and she said that Obdeli, her friend, the Eq's son, and a former of E jellen's and I, wanted the lessons again. So we called him up, and set up an appointment for last tuesday. That lesson went really well, and then we taught him again on last friday and committed him to a baptismal date of Feb 2. E Diaz thought that lesson went really well, but he pretty much just lectured Obdeli about the Restoration haha...they give us these pamphlets to use, and we talked about their importance in zone conference, but I feel like we just read it, and it wasn't a very spiritual lesson at all. Nevertheless, God, in his infinite mercy, has prepared Obdeli, and so Obdeli is letting us come back today! He's told us several times that he is doing this for him, nobody else is pressuring him into this, so we are working as hard as we can with him! He's our most promising prospect right now, and I feel really good about him!! Hopefully we'll get him dunked this transfer ;)

 

We've started playing soccer again on tuesdays, so we brought a sign up sheet so we could somehow "trick" people into meeting with us ;) (Maybe I should try to 'trick' my kids that doing chores really is fun?) out of the 10 ish potentials there, we got two names and phone numbers....both of whom I don't think are interested at all. But we start each week with a spiritual thought and a prayer, and tonight we're going to ask them to sign up if they would like to hear a message about Jesus Christ. We are also going to try to focus our spiritual thoughts out of the B.O.M. so that they can see its a good book haha!

 

We had to go to the hospital twice this week to give blessings, one of which to a potential named Nestor. Also a former of mine. He asked us for a "prayer or something" so we gave him a blessing! He was released from the hospital like two minutes before we gave him the blessing, so we're not sure exaclty what was wrong haha! But we were able to get a lesson with him last week, and we're going back to teach him again tomorrow! He wasn't very steady when E Jellen and I taught him, so I have my doubts, but who knows, maybe he will be there! E Diaz has high hopes for that, and so maybe I just need some more faith haha!

 

We had zone conference on thursday, which is crazy because I feel like we just barely had the last one!!! It was really really good!! I love listening to Pres Jeppson speak! This month's monthly focus is repentance, so we talked alot about the role repentance plays in our lives as missionaries and how we need to share that with our investigators and help them understand it. With that, our zone goal has been focused on repentance as well. We have something to study everyday on repentance to help us learn and apply it. We also make sure to include daily repentance and accountability in our prayers. It's been really interesting to see how big of a role repentance really does play in our lives! Repentance is the process that we repair our relationship with God, and it is how we become more like Him. Repentance is a change, but just repentance with real intent is not enough. We need to repent for what we've done, and then TAKE ACTION for how to correct it. I am realizing more and more what I need to work on and trying to take those actions that I need to to become better!!

 

One issue that I really need to work on is pride. I have a lot of pride haha! Especially with learning to deal with a new companion. He is used to a very different style of missionary work than I am, and so its frustrating to me sometimes when he tries to have us do something out of the ordinary for me. It got so bad one night haha, I kinda laid down the law, and it was about something really dumb!! It had been a rough day, still adjusting to E Diaz, and so in nightly planning I had enough haha! He wanted to start assigning investigators B.O.M. chapters to read, and I pretty much told him we weren't going to do that, I made up a pretty lame argument, but I held to it, my pride and stubbornness would win!! He was still adamant that that's the way we should do it, and so in my frustration and pride, I just gave up, told him to do it his way then. We ended with a prayer, and I went to get ready for bed, my ego still shot. After about 5-10 minutes, E Diaz came up and apologized, and I apologized too. I was in the wrong, I apologized for my pride, and he forgave me. That's one thing I really appreciate about E Diaz, he is very forgiving, becuase he has to deal with all of my imperfections! We worked it out, and I knew that I had just been prideful, and then we were good!! We assign our investigators to read chapters out of the B.O.M now, and I think that by giving an investigator an inspired chapter for them to read can really help in the conversion process!  Still workin on my pride, patience, and humility though ;)

 

We've started helping the Maughans, our senior couple, teach an english class on fridays and saturdays. last week was the first lesson, and we were expecting a lot of potentials to show up because we had advertized it all around town and gotten several calls asking about it. On friday, just a few branch members showed up, and on saturday, only one person showed up haha! Sis Maughan is the main teacher, but I think she's going to have me take a bigger role in helping teach, which is weird, I've never taught english before ;) we'll continue to do that for a little while, and see how it goes!!

 

The Acunas came back from vacation!!!!!!!!!!! We went by to see them and share a message with them on saturday, and it was really good to see them!! It really helped me to see that the branch members didn't just love E Jellen, but they actually cared a little bit about me too!! They still call me el guapo ;) and we had a good time talking! Hna Acuna lost her copy of the bible, so I gave her the free copy that I carried around, and she had me write a note and sign my name in it haha!! I love the Acunas!!

 

Meeting with the Acunas also provided for a nice opportunity that E Diaz prayed he would never get on his mission. Hna Acuna fed us something, something that I've only heard myths about. It's called  "Mundungo". Any guesses on what it is? Yep, that's right, cow intestines.(blech.)  I ate cow intestines. I guess normally it's in like a soup dish, but she mixed it with this chicken, so I thought it tasted fine, it was just weird knowing what it was haha! But E Diaz suffered that day haha! It trashed his stomach haha!! But theres my big adventure for the week!!

 

 Glad to hear all is well at home!! YOu are all in my prayers!! Love you, have a great week!! :)

 

Love,

Elder Tanner Nelson :)

 

Fruit NInja……for reals.

Dear Mom and Family,

Haven't got the package yet, but I'm doing better haha ;) I think I had an initial freakout, but I still am getting a little fat and losing basically all my muscle...;) so I'm slowly but surely working on that!!  (He keeps sort of freaking out that he's getting fat. …..if he is, he seriously hides it much better than I can!)

Yep....it's finally come...the end of E Jellen....today is my last full day with him, and then we have transfer conference tomorrow....I would be lying if I said I haven't cried, maybe on mutliple occasions...but hey, gotta keep them tear ducts working right!! ;) Last week was crazy, he had his departing statue of liberty trip on monday, departing temple trip on thursday, along with his departing interview right after that. Ever since his departing interview, he's defintely been different. He says that Pres. Jeppson made hime trunky because he wants him to go on a date within 31 days of being home haha! But he's been stressed. I've been grateful for how he's handled it though! He's still very much the amazing missionary I keep telling you about, even though he doesn't want to go and he's sad about leaving everyone! It's just so weird that it's finally here….(We went to Elder Jellens homecoming, and I have to say - he is awesome!  I'm so grateful Tanner had such a fabulous trainer!)

I think I know who my new companion will be though! Technically I don't find out till tomorrow at transfer conference, but E Jellen and I are about 95% sure that it's Elder Carballo, one of the AP's. He's a native of Mallorka, Spain, and I'm not sure what to think about this ;) He is getting released tomorrow, and they're calling my old ZL, E Jones to be the new AP!!! We're pretty sure he's coming with me because he's going to a spanish walking area, and he didn't get to go exactly where he wanted, which was union city. That's what he's told us. And the rest of the info just makes sense. The AP's cover the same area as we do, so he's familiar with the area. My particular area hasn't had a baptism in 2+ years, so they're looking to fire it up with some exAP power, he's fluent in spanish, and he'd be able to take over as district leader very easily because of his experience as a leader. We asked him and he just said "I dunno, you'll just have to wait and see!" So we pretty much know it's him ;) it'll be interesting. I really like him, but he's alot different than E Jellen or me. He's very...official. So it'll be interesting, I'm interested to see how it turns out haha!

(Remember a few weeks ago….Alex Boye???  Seriously so awesome!) 

This week we have somehow managed to hit almost all of our goals, despite all of E Jellen's departing trips and the freezing cold. So that's great!! This week has been an amazing week of change for me. I think it's probably been the week that I have changed the most as a missionary. We watched a mormon message with a member the other day about New Years, and I read Pres. Uchtdorf's talk about starting fresh in the ensign. Both very powerful messages about learning from the past, not living it, and moving forward with faith and hope, and the future can be better than the past, if you make it that way. I was really grateful for those messages, especially in this huge time of change. I've been really anxious about the New Year, and you know how I get when I'm anxious haha ;) my worries just kinda take over. I asked E Jellen for a blessing of health to help with my anxiety on New Years morning, and it was amazing. It brought such a feeling of peace and comfort to me, I wrote down everything in my journal! At the end, I remember very specifically I was healed from anxiety, blessed that these fears and anxieties I was having would be softened, and blessed with a keen knowledge that Jesus Christ, my brother, did all that he did for me. It was really amazing, and ever since then, it's been a TON easier to control my thoughts and feelings. That, coupled with those inspired messages about looking to the future with faith, have really helped me this week. I really want to be out here, not that I didn't before, but I have a new perspective on the Lord's work. There has been a spirit brought into my life this week that I never want to go!

 (Tanner in NYC eating his first 'city' hot dog)

It was a good week, although nothing super amazingly crazy happened with our lessons or anything haha! Like I told you last week, I spent monday with the AP's, and that was fun. While E Jellen was at the temple on thursday, I spent the day with my Zone Leaders, and that was fun too haha! Thursday is weekly planning day, so I did that by myself, then I made a cake while the ZL's finished theirs. After that, we took a 10 minute break, and E Jester and I may or may not have played fruit ninja. He has several knives that a member gave him in his last area, including this huge hunting knife. So he took that, and we found an old apple and pear in their fridge, and I threw the fruit to him, and he cut it. It was pretty awesome!!! (Apple's influence is reaching farther than just electronics, it's affecting our very way of living ;)  (We were all seriously laughing out loud at the mental picture of real live fruit ninja!) And then after that we had TAC, which is a once a transfer, heavy duty apartment cleaing. So I helped clean the ZL's apartment. And then we went and picked up E Jellen!

Yesterday I got the opportunity to sit in on a District Leader Council with E Jellen, the two other DL's in the zone, and the ZL's. It was a really really cool experience to be able to see the influence of prayer and council in planning for the needs of the zone. I hope that I'm able to be apart of that soon!

There have been several funny instances in the past two days...yesterday E Jellen and I were walking to our first appointment, and we both slipped, charlie brown style, several times! It's so icy here haha!! This morning I was dancing because a really cool version of "give said the little stream" came on, and I ran into a door....E Jellen and I have really really funny late night (10:15) conversations....Life is great!! I'm grateful to be out here with an amazing companion and an amazing calling! Thank you for all that you do at home, be safe, enjoy every minute of every day, don't procrastinate, and live life with no regrets! Love you! :)

Love,

Tanner :)

Lots of walking, drunk guys, and miracles….oh my!

Dear Family,   (And FINALLY some pictures - …..Did my heart good!)

 

 I have the R.M. soundtrack already, I only listen to the hymn renditions (I hope they call me on a mission, abide with me tis eventide, give said the little stream) and that stuff is my favorite haha! I have 4ordained and EFY 2012 and 2013, so more EFY would be great, it's all approved. Anything else like that you can find is great too haha! Like I said, the Lower Lights are really good and also approved....so...;)

 

 What a week! My companion was not E. Carballo like I thought it would be!! My new companion is Elder Walter Diaz, a native of El Salvador via Texas. Born in E.S. but moved to texas when he was like 10. He still has a little bit of an accent though, and his spanish is definitely native. I think that was the language they spoke in his home. He's been out for about 10 months now, he's starting his 8 transfer. I'm still weirded out that I'm starting my 3rd transfer haha! But he's cool, I really like him! He's a lot different than E Jellen...He's not quite as firm as E Jellen I don't think. Like he has a testimony, and he's committed to work, but he's not quite as...missionary like maybe? To me he doesn't seem quite as converted, more out here to have a good time. But he's really cool! Pres. Jeppson calls him the man of steel, so I'm gonna get yoked this transfer!! ;)

 

This week has been really weird. I dunno if it's just because Elder Diaz is here now or what, but it's been weird. On Tuesday the only thing we had time for was soccer, which we've started playing again! We are going to be starting each session with a prayer and a spiritual thought and get everyone's info so they are all potentials, so that'll be really good!! Elder Diaz and I were so sore after that though haha!! It was a lot of fun!

 

Wednesday we taught four lessons, which is really high for us!! We picked up a former named Pricila. I have only taught her once, like my third week in the mish, until E Jellen and I dropped her. So we just did How To Begin Teaching and tried to start teaching the Restoration. Towards the end, we established her beliefs, and the one thing she absolutely does not believe is that there is a living prophet today. It's weird though, she wants to be baptized...so...we have work to do haha!! But we had a really good lesson with her!

Funny story, on wednesday when we were walking around at like 4, a black guy pulled up next to us and gave us fliers to this Bethel AME church dinner that night. He double checked that we were going to be there like 5 times. The time was right when we had planned on having dinner, so we figured we might stop by for some free food :) we finished up our plans before dinner and headed over. So we get there, and walk in, and sign as the elders so we can get our food. We walk in and sit down, and realize it's like a charity event. It was too late to get up and walk out, but too weird for us to fit in with the other hobos....So we ended up eating a quick meal with the hobos, and we got two potentials out of it! We both felt really bad about taking that food, but we figured there was a reason for it, otherwise that black guy wouldn't have triple checked that we were coming. I still feel bad, but oh well...I can check eating a meal with hobos off the bucket list ;)

Another Funny story, on wednesday night, we were walking home at the end of the night, and a drunk man stopped us. He was Enrique, a former that I have never taught, but who Elder Jellen and I dropped. We saw him on the streets sometimes, but he was always just looking for money. So he stopped us and recognized me, so made a big deal out of that, and starting talking to us about the word of God and how good we were and the importance of God, crazy stuff!! He was very flamboyant with his arms and motions, I was surprised he was still standing!!! It was hilarious!!! What made it funnier was that E Diaz couldnt stop laughing. And it was contagious, so I started laughing too!!!! It was probably quite a sight to see, a stoned man acting out a scene and two young men cracking up right in front of him haha!! Then E Diaz leaned over to me and said, "Elder Nelson, I peed my pants!" Hahahahahahahahaha!!!!! It was so funny!!!!!!!!!!!!!

 

The next couple days passed without incident. Very tranquilo, very regular. Nothing to report. We taught a couple lessons, but nothing more than we have done before. I'm sorry!

 

But Saturday was another good day. We had correlation with Hno Morales, and that was really effective. E Diaz and I rewrote the branch mission plan ( with a few notes from E Jellen) and we brought that to correlation. We discussed alot about what needed to change and what we could do, and we got some really good ideas! We also had P.E.C. on sunday where we discussed all of that with the Branch Presidency. We are having branch conference on the 26, and I've heard the branch is doing a 100%turnover change sorta  dealio! So that's hopefully when we can start encouraging people to work together and start back at the basics of daily prayer and scripture study. The next two weeks can't go fast enough!

 

Also on saturday, we taught Ana, a former that E Jellen and I picked up again last week. We taught her with Hno. Morales, and had a lesson. I don't know that it was good or bad, but we learned alot and know what we need to do now. Hno morales kinda took over the lesson and didn't go where we wanted to and didn't let anyone else talk...but after that, I said to her "You know the B.O.M. is true, you've been to church tons of times, you pray daily and received an answer through prayer, so how would you like to be baptized?" She responded that she doesn't feel prepared, yada yada yada, so we're going back on wednesday, and we prayed about it this morning, and we feel like we should commit her to a baptismal date of Feb. 2!!! So that'll be great!!

 

Yesterday we had a really good lesson with Laura, a member. And after the lesson she told us that Obdeli, a former, the Elders Quorum President's son, and her friend, wanted to take the lessons again. So we called him up right then and are going to go teach him tomorrow!! I really feel like these two incidences with Ana and Obdeli weren't coincidences, and that they really will be baptized soon. I think we're going to commit him to the same date as Ana!!

 

That's mostly all for this week. We've been contacting like crazy, had lessons and discussions with several drunk guys, seen miracles, taught lessons, and walked for miles. Welcome to Morris-Hood!!

 

Glad to hear all is well, tell Grandpa Berry I love him, and I love all of you as well!! have a great week! :)

 

Love, Tanner :)

'Nothing much', and an awesome Christmas message….

When I say Skype is truly just about the best invention ever, I'm not kidding!  Nothing does a mothers heart so good as talking to her missionary son and hear him so happy!  What a blessing to be able to spend time talking with him -  the whole family plus 2 gathered around for nearly an hour and a half and had a great visit.  The time went far too quickly, but we truly loved every last minute of it.  

Dear Mom and Family,

It was really good to talk to all of you too!! Yes, I felt really homesick after haha! But I'm alright now! It took a few days but it was really good to see all of you, even though it doesn't feel like it's been almost 4 months! It's great to hear everyone is doing well! :)

Not much happened last week...We had our zone christmas party last P Day, and at the end, we did a white elephant gift exchange. I got a duck dynasty christmas hat haha! It's pretty awesome! Christmas eve, we had District Meeting, and then later that night we had dinner at a members house. Christmas, we went to the Morales' house in the morning for breakfast tomales and "caliente", a really good hot fruit drink thats kinda like apple cider, but I like it better! After that we just went back to the apartment and played basketball on the little hoop you sent and made cookies to take to a few members, rather than interrupt family parties on the holidays. The Morales' invited us back for an early dinner at about 3:30, and that was really good!! It was meat, rice, and veggies. They made this salsa out of chiltepe peppers, you can only get them from guatemala, they are waaayyyy hotter than jabaneros!!! It was really good! But never eat the peppers alone, they're so hot!!! After that, we made our way over to the Chiviliu's for our skype call. And the rest is history. ;) Carlos, the member I've told you about, got us christmas presents! E Jellen is his favorite, and because he's leaving, he bought him some really expensive usher cologne and body wash. He bought me a towel. hahahaha!! I don't really care, I just thought it was funny ;)

But after christmas it was just a regular slow week...I had an exchange with E Guijarro, from Mexico City, on friday and saturday, that was fun! We got to go give another blessing of health to Judith on friday night, she was in the hospital for a heart problem I think she said, and she felt better after the blessing.

I'm sorry, but this week really wasn't that interesting...we didn't have any super spectacular events going on or anything ;) The thing that has stuck out to me this week was just the realization of how much Jesus Christ has done for all of us and how much He love us. This has been a weird Christmas, I didn't expect to be here last year, but that is something that has come to me as I've studied Christ's life and listened to talks and all sorts of stuff this month. I know that Jesus loves all of us, and that is why I am out here as a missionary, to share that love :)

Love you guys!! Have a great week!! :)

So…..I have to preface this next one with some background….

The Sunday before Christmas, in our church meeting - it's typically inspired music and messages related to Christ and Christmas.  This year, unbeknownst to any of us, our sweet choir director had contacted all the missionaries serving from our ward and had them jot down their thoughts - a short little message about Christmas.  Then, in between the musical numbers, those messages were read from the pulpit.  It truly was a powerful meeting.  Emotions were close to the surface for many that day - not just the families of those missionaries, but the whole ward.  In a way I can't really explain, it brought a feeling of unity, and a powerful reminder of the real reason we celebrate Christmas.  There were more tear filled eyes than dry that day.  It was beautiful.   Here is the letter from Tanner…

November 18, 2013

The birth of our Savior was the most amazing thing that our God could have given us. A lot of times I think we take that for granted; that on that Holy Night, a child was born. A child who would lead a PERFECT life, a child who would teach us to return to our Heavenly Father, a child who would suffer for our sins, suffer for our temptations, and suffer for our afflictions, all so that He would know how to best help us. That night, a Savior was born, and I think it was no coincidence that a new star shined in the heavens, because a new light was born on earth; a light to lead us, guide us, and show us the way. How amazing it would have been to have been a shepherd and heard the angel and seen the Christ child!! What an amazing gift, and what an amazing night.

I know that Christ was put here to lead us back to our Heavenly Father and to help us find peace in this troubled world and there was none other who could have qualified for that same responsibility.  Jesus Christ is our older brother, our Savior, our Advocate, and our best friend. We can never understand Him perfectly, but He understands us, and that is a gift that we should cherish more than anything else.

Elder Nelson

Haircuts, 100 days, Batman, and M&M's

Dear Mom and Family,

 

Yes I got asmonex last wednesday, and we do have the advent calendars! It's safe to send stuff to the apartment!

 

As for the Book of Mormons....I dunno...haha! You could send your testimonies and I could translate them and write them in? or you could translate them? A lot of the people out hear can't read very well, if at all, and most don't speak but very little english...

 

Also, is my Social Security Card at home? I'm not sure if I brought it or not....and I can't find my passport…(um…..that's not good) I'm going to keep looking, but I'm not sure where I put it, so I'll keep you posted there too!

 

I need your guys' skype username and whatever other info I need to call you. We are going to a members house, I'm not sure what time yet, but I will know for sure by next monday. But I need your skype on monday so that I can call you!

 

As for things I need, just a USB cord in the next envelope/package to charge my ipod...and I think that's it...

 

My haircut went awesome!!! I couldn't get the back, so I gave myself a mullet ;) unintentionally, but it looked just like I remembered it ;) Then I had elder Jellen come in and cut the back. It was surprisingly easy, E Jellen has some clippers, so you just set the size and go! He's giving them to me when he leaves! But it looks like a pro cut it ;)

 

Last week was really good! It snowed pretty hard last Tuesday, so they canceled District Meeting and took away driving priviledges. But the driving thing didn't affect us - So we just walked around in the snow on tuesday, but we got 6 lessons, which was awesome!! One of the lessons we taught was to Selena. She is going to get baptized this Sunday if we can meet with her enough and finish teaching everything!!!!!!! So that's way exciting!!!!!!

Wednesday was a big day, I celebrated my 100th day away from home! Holy Cow has it REALLY been that long??? It was a good day, other than the fact that we didn't teach a single lesson haha ;).  We had District meeting with the rest of the zone, which was really good. We did a round robin thing where all 3 district leaders in the zone prepared a 30 min training, and then everyone went to each one in their districts, and we just rotated. E Jellen talked about 1 Nephi 4, and how Nephi was made a promise that he would be guided by God and how he would know that it was God guiding him. Then he made the comparison of our daily planners to the liahona, and that if we are following our plans, we are being led by God because nightly planning should be a spiritual experience. It was really cool!! Elder Taylor, another DL, talked about how our purpose is to share the message of how families can be happy together, and his commitment for us was to take a picture of our families to a lesson and use it to share how families can be together forever. So that's what Elder Jellen and I did on thursday, and we had a few really powerful lessons on why it's important to follow the prophets and have family scripture study and prayer, so that familes can be eternal! The other DL was in charge of role plays, so we just practiced, it was good!

 

 Thursday was a bugger though!  The first place we walked, my coat got snagged on a fence, so now I have a little hole in the sleeve. Things just didn't go right on thursday. Just little things like that were happening all day, but we still got in four lessons! At the end of the day, I realized it wasnt quite as bad as I had thought, but I don't want it to happen again haha!

 

Okay, wanna know something awesome?! The Mars candy factory, the M&M factory is in my zone!!!! It's in Hackettstown NJ, I've been in Hackettstown!!!! I guess the English elders there live right next to it!!!! Is that crazy?! Here's another fun fact, Batman was filmed in Newark. Newark is Gotham City. Elder Jellen showed me a picture of the town hall that's on batman, but it was a picture he took because he served in Newark! Craziness all around!!!!!!  

 

(This was selfie Jason took the day his call came - just to send to Tanner and rub it in while he was still at school)

Friday was awesome, we had this thing called the Jingle with the Jeppsons, where we went to Pres. Jeppson's house and they made us a huge breakfast, and then afterwards we sung some songs, rang some bells, and he talked alittle bit about Christmas. It was really interesting, he focused on the personal worthiness of Mary and Joseph to be able to have the Christ child. It was really cool! We had another lesson with Selena that day, she is remembering lots - IT's awesome!!!

 

Saturday brought us another snow storm that we were supposed to get up to 10 inches before sunday morning. It snowed all day. I like the days it snows here, because it's so much warmer than any other day!! When it's not snowing, it's icy cold, so I prefer the snow haha! But right as we walked out of our apartment on saturday, I totally slipped, just like Charlie Brown, and landed flat on my back. I just laid there for a minute because I realized how funny that probably looked. I now have a bruise on my left bum cheek. But it snowed all day, and we got probably 6 inches of snow. It was enough, and it froze overnight, so they canceled church yesterday.

 

But yesterday was still amazing! We didn't go to chruch, we just stayed home and studied. But all the spanish missionaries were suppposed to put on a choirside last night for members and investigators in all of NJ. The Maughans, our senior couple,, was giving us a ride, and they told us they'd be here way early. So they picked us up with the sisters in our area, and then they realized how early they were. So they took us back to their apartment and fed us so much food! It was awesome, I love the Maughans!!The Maughans are also my favorite because they gave us some almond roca. E Jellen doesn't like almond rocas, so he gave his to me :) happy day :)

 Then we went to the choirside. It was really cooL!!! We sung lots of songs in spanish, and they had several elders and sisters participate in musical numbers! My favorite one was a guitar and ukelele duet, it was so cool haha! But the spirit was strong there, and I could really feel how much God loves everybody there. The choirside was in Union City, which is right next to New York! So I got my first glimpse of the Empire State building and all sorts of skyscrapers! IT was soo cooL!!!

 

We get to actually go to New York for our temple trip on thursday! We're going to the Manhattan temple as a zone, and I'm way excited! We're taking the train to new york, and then the subway from the train station to the temple! It's going to be so awesome!!!  (Seriously. so. Awesome.)

 

But that's all for this week! It felt like it went by way too quickly to be a week!  I hope all continues to go well at home! Love you guys! You're in my prayers!!

 

Love,

Tanner

Snow, personal revelation, and drunk people!

Dear mom and family,

 

Thank you for the asmonex! Haven't got it yet, but I've been out for a week haha ;) I think it should come today! And when I run out, how do I get it from the pharmacy?

 

Christmas, I'm not sure exactly what the plan is...we have to find somewhere so that we can skype, so I'll keep you posted as soon as I know! And it's totally fine with mission rules if Ally comes, so that would be great!

 

Well, sounds like a fantastic week for you guys! Things are going well here! Elder Jellen goes home at the next transfer conference, so my last day with him is January 7, and he flies home on the 8. Less than a month now, and he's freaking out haha!!  He doesn't want to go, and I don't want him to go either! I love him, and the members do too! I think if I was half the missionary Elder Jellen is, I would be satisfied with my lot in life.  And also...I'm scared for when he leaves because the members are so attached, and no one is as good as elder Jellen, so I'm terrified they won't help out at all. ;)  But it'll be a good learning experience for me! ;)

 

So for pictures, I still haven't figured out how I can do that....last time I tried it at the library, it didn't work...I'll bring my camera next week and we'll see if we can get something through :)

 

WInter, We had our first real snow last night!!!!!!!!!!!!!   It snowed and it stuck!!!! I  t started snowing right after we got home from church, and then all the time we were walking in it too!!! It was awesome! But then we woke up today and as soon as we left our apartment to walk to the library, we saw that it was all ice....it's like that big ice storm we had last year in Utah. It's so slick, and everyone here uses buckets of salt on the smallest spots of ice. I think it's ridiculous, kinda insane, but whatever floats their boats. Nobody here likes winter, I think I'm the only one. It's getting cold though! I wear a hat almost everywhere now, and we always have on our gloves, and I have a pair of thermal bottoms that I wear daily too. We're warm as long as we do that!

 

So every month Pres. Jeppson picks a monthly focus topic for all the missionaries. October was faith, November was prayer, and December is Always remember him (Jesus). Our zone and district training meetings branch off of these focuses, and we are encouraged to apply them daily. Zone training meeting is the first tuesday of every month, and the whole zone gets together, and the ZL's give us a training. I LOVE ZONE AND DISTRICT MEETINGS SO MUCH! I always find lots of things that stick out to me!!  And I'm sorry I don't remember everything now, but I wrote it all down, so maybe I'll write a real letter with some stuff in it.  But I remember one part they were talking about receiving personal revelation. We do that by praying about what we need revelation on, right? But we need to do more on our part to receive revelation from God. It is our job to ask God inspired questions, (inspired questions like we ask to our investigators) to find out inspired revelation. We are God's eternigators. So there's a spiritual thought, if you want revelation, come up with a specific, inspired question, then ponder the question in your heart, study it out, and you will receive. "Ask and ye shall receive, seek, and ye shall find, knock and it shall be opened up to you.  D&C 4.

 

 On a side note, I was reading a GC talk from April 2012 by Elder Evans of the 70 about missionary work. It was a really good talk!! It talked alot about how sharing this gospel can bring us and others much joy! Something random about that talk, it said you should send missionaries hand written letters haha! I thought that was funny ;)  (Hint taken…..we mailed letters)  (And I'm sure he wouldn't complain if any of you wanted to send a letter either) :)

 

 So this past week, our main focuses have been our investigators, Selena, the 8 year old girl who is getting baptized soon, and Bessie, our new investigator.  Selena has autism, so we've had to find new ways to teach her. I bought a picture book in the MTC, so we've been teaching her very simply with pictures, and we gave her a Book of Mormon Reader to help her read the scriptures. We also made a calendar of things for her to do that we're  giving to her tomorrow, it has daily prayer, her baptism date (Dec. 22), her confirmation date (Dec 29), and other assignments can be wrritten in that we ask her to do. She has a very short attention span, but the picture lessons have really helped her focus and understand. I can't wait til she gets baptized!!

 

Another exciting thing about her making the choice to be baptized is the impact it's having on her mom. Her mom has said before that she has plans of being baptized, just no idea when. She only isn't baptized now because of her husband. They are technically not married, but they live together and he's the father of her kids, it's a pretty common situation here. But after our 2nd meeting with Selena, this is what she said, "You know, the parents are supposed to be good examples for the kids, not the kids for the parents." She told us that she's coming to the point where she has to decide if she will move out, or if she will convince her husband to get married. So she is closer to baptism than we ever thought!!

 

With Bessie, we had our 2nd lesson with her last week. We were going to talk about the plan that Heavenly Father has for us, that we choice to come to earth even though we knew it would be hard, and how we can find peace and happiness in the Atonement if we have faith, repent, and are baptized. We brought Hno Carvajal with us, our branch 2nd counselor. He's a convert of about 12 year's, very rooted in the gospel, and very knowleadgable. But...he likes to talk...which having a member that talks is really good, but he got very off topic alot, and he talked way more than anyone else who was there with us haha! The lesson was still good, I think Bessie got the point of the lesson and she invited us back on thursday for dinner and a lesson, woooo!!! ;) Hno Carvajal at one point talked about the sacrifice that we make as missionaries, leaving our homes, families, and friends for two years. We don't get paid, we do it of our own free will, and we can't talk to home more than once a week through email. They were really impressed by that. I am convinced that Bessie will get baptized within two months, no doubt in my mind. But her mom, Kenia, has sat in on both lessons and participated. She's not really looking for anything out of us, other than to learn with her daughter, but I think when she learned that, it kinda opened up her eyes to see, "you know what, maybe this is something really important." So that was awesome!!!!!

 

 Here's a weird/cool experience! Last night, we were walking to Selena's house to give her a lesson, and we passed a man on the street. We greeted him in spanish, and he was caught off guard and started talking to us. At first he thought we were JW's (Jehovah Witnesses), which unfortunately, is a really common mistake out here...but we established who we are and we went up on his porch to talk with him. His name in Nelson and he's from Honduras. He was a little drunk, but not drunk enough to be completely out of it, and he had a bunch of questions. We talked to him for like 40 mins, in spanglish, and at the end, he gave us hugs, and he accepted a B.O.M. We asked him if he'd read it because it was another testament of JEsus Christ, and he said "Por que no?" why not haha!!! It was really cool! One part where he showed his drunkeness though, he established that because my last name was Nelson, I have roots somewhere in Europe. He 'foretold' that an aunt that I have in Europe will soon communicate with me and change my view on Jesus Christ forever. Kinda spooky. I love drunk people ;)  

 

So the Morristown stake for the past 2 or 3 years has done this thing called the Christmas Creche. They take the gym and set up tons and tons of nativities and stories of Jesus and they open up the church for Fri, Sat, and Sun for anyone to come see. We've been passing out invitations for like a month, it's huge!!! So we went yesterday right after church, and it was so amazing!!!!!!! I wish I would have had my camera with me, but I hadn't realized we were going before we left home. There were hundreds, if not thousands, of different collectors nativities friom all around the world, and it was so beautiful, and they had soft christmas music in the background. I could feel the spirit of Christ there really strongly! We were asked to help for a little while after we went through, and I talked to a few people who weren't members. They said it was the most beautiful, amazing thing they've ever seen. Everyone that went, member and nonmember, investigator and person from the street, felt the spirit there. We weren't allowed to proselyte there, but I think this Creche opened up many many many opportuinites for conversions. I want to come back after my mission and see it again, it was so amazing!!!!

 

 Well, that's about all for this week. Keep on keepin on, dad I can't believe you would grow your hair back!!  (no….he hasn't grown his hair back yet……we have sort of a bet thing going on…..If I win, he grows his hair back!)

;) Love you guys, have a great week!! :)

 

Love,

Elder Nelson