The Adventures of My Life

We are at kinkos writing email, more $$$ using computer, don’t have time to write!

Elder Hardy

It was a pretty sweet week!!  First off, got to talk to the family last Sunday and then we had a super effecient week, work-wise.  On Tuesday, we had exchanges with the Assistants…that went awesome.  They really motivated us to work with the members and other things.  I’ve gotten to be pretty good friends with one of the Elder Jackson..of the 4 AP exchanges I’ve had, I’ve been with him 3 of them.  He has taught me so much on how to become better in the missionary work.  One of the main things we took from that exchange is that we need to be working better with the members…we have been trying to do all of it by ourselves.  But ever since then, I have been calling tons of members, getting to know them and setting up appointments and exchanges.  I have never been so focused on the people and the work then this last week.  For example, I just called this last active guy (who used to be really active) and set up an appointment with him and his family on Tuesday and they all came to church yesterday!  It was sweet..he was one of the lost sheep and everyone was freakin’ excited to see him.  I don’t know if my little call had anything to do with it, but it was really good feeling that I might have made the difference.  But he is going to be moving soon to the other missionaries side of the branch..grrr.  I’m so greatfull to be a missionary right now serving in this branch.  It’s the biggest best spanish branch in the mission, so it’s a pressure spot (there is lot of pressure to accomplish alot here), so i have been a little stressed out lately, but it has been a learning experience and helped me realized how I can be more successful.  Becoming a missionary is definately a huge learning experience.  When I first came out, I didn’t know anything about being successful.  But I feel like I am beoming a lot more effective lately.  We taught 29 lessons…more than I’ve ever taught in one week.

One of the highlights of the week was that we FINALLY set up a baptismal date for Esther.   I hadn’t been able to contact her for about a week and a half and she hadn’t been to church in about 3 weeks.  Well, we finally got the chance to teach her and set the goal of June 24th.  It’s been a struggle to get anything going with her and finally she did it!  We don’t have too many promising progressing investigators, just a whole bunch of new ones.  We find a couple ladys from Mexico named Magali and Arcenia.  They seem pretty interested, we taught them like 4 times in 5 days last week.  The only thing about them is that they work Sundays….like everyone else!  I know that if they come to church they will be able to see how awesome the branch is and want to get baptized immediately!  But we also see how instable the Hispanics are here.  We met a member, Lorenzo, in the street last week who recently came from Mexico.  Like I said last week, he brought a friend to church who said he wanted to be baptized.  We taught him last Wednesday and set an appointment for the next Saturday.  Well, when I called to confirm the appointment, a lady answered the phone and told me that they had left the same day because they found work somewhere else.  And they also left the cellphone where they lived…so they was no way to contact them…

Well, things are going great…Zone Conference is this next Wednesday..the last of President Mabey.  The next one, President Wallis will be here.  We are also going to the Raleigh Temple this next week…it’s going to be sweet.  It’s going to be said to see the Mabey’s leave, they have done a whole lot for this mission.

The weather is going to continue to get hotter and more humid.

Elder Hardy

Hey Y’all, I’ll be sure to keep this sure since I had the grand priviledge yesterday to speak to some of you (or speak to mom and hear the voices of a few of you).  That was pretty sweet doing that call..although it was only about 40 minutes.  Then right after, we headed off to church.  During the week, we had met this one member, Lorenzo, who is from Mexico that had only been lived here for about 1 month and was looking for the church.  Well, we hooked him up with a ride and he ended up bring a friend named Samuel!  When Samuel was introducing himself, he kept saying he wanted to be baptized and it seems like he liked the church…so, we are pretty pumped up about him.  He seems pretty humble and the fact he already has a friend in the church and that the members were very nice…welcoming to both of them.  Church was very good, they talked about missionary work and the general consensis of the members is that they keep on talking about doing missionary work but don’t do it.  So, hopefully, they are getting a little more concerned about sharing the gospel with everyone.  Then in sacrament, there were a lot of great testimonies about Mothers and the gospel.  I would like to take this opportunity in this e-mail to give thanks to my mother…Really, I am so grateful for the oportunity to have grown up in this family with parents who care about us.  I have always looked up to the example of Mom, her deep concern for all of us.  I have a lot of inspiring memories of when I was sad or lonely and she comforted me…even when I wasn’t very nice.  I am thankful for her and for my family…the best in the world!

Well, it was a good week…alot and alot and alot of walking, because we didn’t have car.  I guess that the car dealership couldn’t find anything wrong with it…we’ll see what happens.  Like I said last week, we have completely scraped all of the old investigators and started over.  We have lots of new investigators that we are going to start working with.  One is named Mario and he seems pretty cool, in his mid 20’s, he was pumped up about the gospel.  When we asked him how he felt, he said there was such a great feeling, he couldn’t explain it.  Then we watched the Restoration and he seemed to like that…we’ll see what happens with him.

The gospel is true, the Church has been restored to the Earth again.  Christ lives.

Elder Hardy

We’ve already had an interesting day…but this should be another shorter than usual e-mail, cause this dude is in here waiting to use the computer…geeez, I’m always stuck in this sitiuations. We had some more car problems…Last Monday, the CD player stopped working…it was looking for a CD and making noise even after the car was turned off…the same exact problem that I experienced in Cary. Well, I prophesied to everyone that the car would be dead soon (or the battery) and I was right, on the next Saturday, car was dead. So, we had to get that taken care of this morning, take it up to the chevrolet dealer. I really hate care troubles, but maybe it’s just the 2005 Malibu isn’t that reliable.

This week has been pretty good, found a lot of new people to teach and I basically started dropping our old investigators because I was tired of them not progressing. There comes a point as a missionary when the investigators are doing anything, it’s basically a waste of time visiting them. So, I have arrived to that point…we have found a whole bunch of new investigators, so we still have some work to do. We had our stake conference yesterday, it was pretty sweet. I don’t know if the Church is starting this in most other parts of the world, but it was a little different. They started with all of the stake business which lasted about 10 minutes and they switched over to a transmision from Salt Lake City. Bishop Edgely, Elder Ballard and President Monson spoke to about 50 stakes, I heard, out here in the south. It was pretty sweet, but I guess they are going to start doing this more because of the size of the church? I watched the whole thing in Spanish, but I kind of feel bad because I dragged Elder Banks in there and he didn’t understand anything.

Well, the Mother’s Day call is coming up here pretty soon…in fact, this next Sunday…and sorry to dissapoint everyone, but we recieved strict instructions from the Mission President that it is only 30 minutes and I am only allowed to talk to my mom….I was thinking we could have a speaker phone or something going on, but we won’t be able to do a conference call or anything. Right now, my tentative time to do the call is 10:30 eastern time, which is 8:30 in the morning in Utah. that is the latest I can do in the morning and then after church from 3 to 7 pm Utah time. So…sorry everyone…

But things are going great, it’s a little chilly here today, but lately, it’s started to get pretty hot. With the humedity, it really beats on ya. Alot and alot and alot of walking. It’s pretty cool, I’m not gaining any weight here in Raleigh, most Elders do…so I am pleased for now. Well….GO PISTONS

Elder Hardy

Hey, what’s up!  It’s May 1st!!!!  Can’t believe it’s May already, next month, I’ll be have 1 year in the mission…pretty crazy.   Also, today is pretty significant to all the Hispanics here in the US.  It’s the “day of the worker”, and to celebrate it, noone is going to work!   Yup, with the new law being reviewed, they want to show how big of influence they have on the econony here.  They are not going to work and they are not going to buy anything in the stores.  And here in Raleigh, they are having a big march/protest in downtown.  I was invited to participate, but I figure, being a missionary, I shouldn’t get involved in things like that…right?

Well, Mother’s Day is only 2 weeks away right??  That means a call from the missionary!  I don’t have any details right now, but I assume that you all will be calling me at an assigned time.   And I’m not sure how much time we will have…President will tell us this next week.  I’ve heard that we only have 30 minutes compared to the 1 hour we had for Christmas.  But again, we will see.  Is anyone planning on being in the house on Mother’s Day or are we going to do that call conference again?  I don’t think I’ll be able to talk with 10 people again…that would be like 3 minutes per person!

Training is going sweet.  My “son” is Elder Banks and he is from Ellensburg, Washington.  He’s the only member in his family and was baptized 3 years ago, so he’s a little bit different that he’s not from Utah and wasn’t born in the church…but my last 2 companions were from Ecuador and Mexico..so I guess I shouldn’t be complaining..haha.  He’s pretty cool though, speaks decent Spanish…it reminds me of me when I first came out.  He should learn pretty fast because I made a constant effort of speaking only Spanish when we are alone.  I have already seen a huge improvement in my Spanish, as I have to make all of the calls and be the leader in lessions and our daily activities.  The Lord has certainly blessed me with the ability to communicate with these great people.  The last few week has been awesome, we’ve talked with almost everyone.  Elder Banks is like my conscious…he tells me, “let’s go talk to that guy”, and I’m like, “okay, let’s do it”.  Then I make the contact.  Before, I have always been a little scared about street contacting, but now it’s actually started to be a little fun.  We even talk with the crazy guys.

Well, we are having trouble with investigators right now.  We are working super hard..the area was kind of dieing before, but we are rejuvinating it.  Esther is going okay..she’s our best right now, but she wasn’t at church and she told us that she really isn’t praying about a date but she wants to continue.  But, that’s alright, we’ll continue to work with her.  The Umanzor Family, our recent convert family, after 2 weeks of not being at church, they came back this last week and also went to the baptism of the other elders.  So, that’s pretty sweet.  I was kind of worried about them a little bit.

So, how is everyone else.  We are going to have our stake conference this next week, and I’ve heard it is going to be a little different.  I guess they are going to trasmition from Salt Lake City to like 100 different stakes here in the South…it’s kind of odd, but I guess that is how the church works now.

Adios Amginos.  Dios les bendiga
Elder Hardy