November 23, 2015

I got a new Comanion this week we is Elder Hernandez de Mexico city!

he is pretty chill i like him its a big change cause Elder martinez always was just so jumpy and sometimes was a spaz like he would get up at 430 am and practice typing and a keyboard while i was tring to sleep haha but i miss him alot actually when we said the last prayer like a companionship we both ended pretty much in tears but its all good he was a good guy.  Ya so its a big change now cause Elder Hernandez is alot more calm and stuff like the first morning with Hernandez i accitently slept till 635 cause i usually didnt need an alarm with martinez cause i was up with him at 430 so i woke up and looked at Hernandez and then the clock and i was like Shoot Get boy he got to get to work!!! haha but i have an alarm now.

I thought this week was going to be bad cause im basically the senior comanion because he doesn't know the Sector so i just felt like i was doing everything and Elder hernandez has this face thing when he has paralisis and the right side of his mouth so it is difficult to understand him not just for me but for other people too so a few lessons i was litterally saying everything but its fine  cause president said that it will heel with time and he will be back up and running.  and its just more practice for me

The great news is we have a babtism this week his name is Jipson and his this big black guy that really has a testimony of the power of repentence and truely wants to take advanage of this power in his life so im super pumped for him.  Actually so pumped that while he was in his babtism interview i literally have never been so nervous in my entire life for anything.  i had to wait outside while he was in there and i was just praying to God that he is all good to be babtised and he was so ya hes getting babtised this Saturday and reiciving the gift of the holy ghost on sunday which is actually his birthday too so he getting a pretty dang good bday present from God!!

Well that was pretty much the most exciting part of this week and a super good testimony builder to see some one like him want so badly to be for given of what he has done and wants a clean slate that really only knows the basics of this church he is just going to take a leep of faith and trust Gods got him.  Well i can testify that he does and with the gift of the holy ghost he will always have him.

Elder Blackhurst

 

Extra parts to our conversation that day:

 

Its so wierd what i think is luxurious now.  Like to day i went grocery shoping and i bought ice cream and i was like yes!!! im so happy now all i have to do is not buy water for the rest of the week its fine its a good sacrifice lol

 

(Talking about why his companion's temporary paralysis)

I talked to president and he said its cause the viens broke in the back of his neck and so he cant move any muscle on his cheek so he is just waiting to have the viens grow back.  he said he just woke up on morning in a ton of pain

(Cammie asked if his new comp Elder Hernandez speaks any English)

no he doesnt no one does haha actually somtimes you just hello mister how are you 12345 good aftrnoon

(A reply to Rob's letter regarding a conference talk)

Wow thats really cool i think i forgot about that talk.  it reminded me of something i read this morning in Jesus the Christ. also by the way you should read cause it is really cool and chuck full of doctrina.  so first of all alot of people think that Heavenly father can litterally see the future i dont think that is true cause i was reading the part that talkes about why we nee a savior and i read the heavenly father is just so ridiculously smart that he can see you and what you are doing and your mind set of it and he makes a pertiction of either torment and pain and regreat and all things bad or he makes one of many many many blessings and pure clean happiness that can only be attained thru Jesus Christ! And then he motivates us to make changes or to keep on the path and that is pretty much how it works.

But he has given us such a big gift in fact the gift of all gifts and that is agency so we have choose what we are going to do this gift actually limits the power of God because now he cant just control us to return in his presence. Which sometimes i think would be better sometimes cause we would be gaurenteed to return but we also would never ever feel happiness and the good things in like would just be nothing.  And that was the plan of Satanas.  Satanas was an extreamly important charictar in the preexistance and pretty dang smart you can tell that he put a ton of thought into this plan just the only differenc is that he did it selfishly he wanted all the glory and no happiness to anyone else but him he honestly did not care one bit about the Father.  So ya that is part of what if studied this morning and ya you should buy that Jesus the Christ book cause it is really cool

Love Elder Blackhurst

 

 

November 16, 2015

Cambios!!! ahah well the Lord called Elder Martinez to another place. So i have a new compaion now his name is Elder Herdandez from Mexico City Mexico.  Ive literally only been with him for like an hour now so i really dont know much about him.  

Well i would be liying if i said i wasnt a little nervous cause right now im the only one that knows like sector and all the people that we teach and im kinda scared ill forget where people live and stuff but i think im fine ill figure it out.  It was kinda hard to see Martinez go i dont even know what Ecuador is without him so i feel like im going to a new Country.  

Plus it was way hard for the ward to let him go too cause he has been here for so long.  There was a ton a tears when we were stoping by houses to say good bye and stuff.  Im actually pretty scared that some of the people wont want for us to visit cause they were so atached to martinez but i hope they can love the Gospel and not the missionary.  Well not much else happened last week.  One of our Investigadors is going to be babtised the 28 of november.  I know for sure he will be babtised because he set his own day and also we taught him about fasting and asked him to fast but we taught him to fast for a purpose and we asked him what question he really wants to know to ask God and he was like i want to know if the 28th is the right day.  We we were like heck ya bro then i promised that if he fasts with real intent he will recieve an answer and i promised him in the name of Jesus Christ so pretty much i know hes gunna get the right answer.   Well that is pretty much all for this week 

Choa

Elder Blackhurst

Elder Martinez (Caleb's Trainer)

Caleb took Elder Martinez around the ward to say goodbye

Carmen Murillo and her three boys with Elder Martinez (AWESOME lady)

November 9, 2015

This week was actually really funny.  Apperently we have not been paying our water bill for 3 months but i honestly didnt even know we had a water bill i thought the church just took care of it so anyway one night we get home from a tired and sweaty day to find a paper on our door notifing that they have cut our water because we havnt paid the bill and at this point im like i dont want to try and figure out what this stupid paper says all i want to do is take a shower.  so im getting ready and and turn on the water but there wasnt any so i asked martinez hey why wont the shower work he like this paper says they cut our water so i went to be sweaty and really stink for that night and the next until they turned it back on so it was a really funny experience that i probably wont every forget haha.

We have a babtism this saturday will a kind of youger black kid that 19 but he looks like hes like 28 and taller than me which is extremly odd for ecuador haha but ya he has just been eating up what ever we tell him and it is really cool to watch him grow!!  he even takes notes while we are teaching him!!  Well i guess thats because we told him to fill out these questions that we gave him at the end of the lesson!!

Today we had a really fun pday cause it is the last pday for my companion!! he started his mission here in this sector and has been here for like 6 months so we are almost positive that hes leaving this next transfer so we made today really fun for him.  First we went to this really old plantitarium and watched like a constilation show in a big dome theater.  i couldnt understand anything they were saying because it was just a bunch of big sciency spanish words but it was really dope cause martinez loves this kind of stuff!! he studied it before his mission.  We went with our ward mission leader and we left in his little Fiat.  The planitarium is like way out of our mission too it is into the guayquil south mission but president said it was chill.  i think it was just cause martinez is taking off soon so he was being a cool president.  on our way back we stopped at this park were the pigeon and iguanas eat out of your hands it was so sick!!

Must have been a service project with the community.

At the planetarium in Guayaquil
 

Elder Ashman and Caleb at the planetarium (Elder A is from Spanish Fork and his dad is a dentist too!)

Is it safe to be THIS close to an Iguana!?!  Ugh!

 

November 2, 2015

We had ourselves a little halloween this week!!!!

haha no its not a mango actually i like pretty much all the fruit here except mango i dont really like it.  That was a mariquya fruit they have seed in the middle that you eat that are super sour so pretty much it is my favorite fruit here i send a picture of one full a few weeks ago i thing but ya after i ate it i was about to thro it away but then i realized i could turn it in to a jack o lantern so i did and the other elder that is from the us liked it alot to cause they dont do the whole pumpkin thing here or the trick or treating but they do celebrate the day of the dead yesterday and today is another holiday but i forgot what it is called but this one is bigger and everyone is off work and stuff so the mall today was packed!!

This week wasnt that exciting just normal.  one of the assistants went out with us this week to make sure we are doing everything goodand stuff.  and that was probaly the biggest learning experience ive ever had.  we set 5 bautismal dates in like one hour!! it was so cool!!  But just cause we set it doesnt me they will be batised but it does improve our odds to do it!! 

It was really cool the way he did it.  first he just explained babtism and then asked if they want to have the blessing of all of their mistakes taken away and usually they say yes and then we ask if they want to be babtised and prepare for this date and if they come to know that these things are true it was really cool and really spiritual.

also this week we did service for our ward mission leader and we had to chop a tree down with a machety cause thats all he had!! it was realy hard but then we burt all the branched and basically the way they clean yards here is just set a huge fire so that was pretty fun!!!

October 26, 2015

i didnt send one this week haha because nothing really new happened excet my compain bought a rugby ball and he is in love with it!! at so we all played as a zone today and it was super fun

I asked if he got the BYU football we sent for his birthday and if he could reinflate it.

ya there is a member that owns a bike shop so he pumped it up for me thank you by the way that was super nice im wearing one of the byu shirts right now lol

i didnt say nothing happened.  nothing new happened all we do is teach and walk teach and walk and look for people to teach its not a bad thing even tho i just made it sound bad i love it here and i know that im serving

 

we are teach a really cool family of three they went to church the first 2 hours then bolted.  i hope they didnt get scared off because the lesson in the class for the investigadors was the law of chastity and maybe that was awkward for them cause they are not married and here in ecuador it is kinda awful with that.  they just think if it is nature that man wants this stuff that is all good ugh i hate it!!  the world can really be messed up sometimes but i loved the lesson i just hope they were actually trying to get some thing out of it

ya also another kid is super cool and honestly i almost know for certain that he will be babtised!! he only has 19 years but he is super mature and stuff and just soaks up everything we teach him and he is like as tall as me and black which is really cool cause almost no body is tall here 

ya its pretty cool today we are going to a family home evening and this guy is ttying to learn english for buisness and stuff so me and elder ashman and gunna teach him a little sumthing

Conner just emailed me he said he gets to drive a 2015 nissian truck i was pretty tict when i heard that haha

 

I asked if he could teach English to people (like in a class).  A sweet lady named Carmen told me that he helps her learn English.  She loves the missionaries. She threw Caleb his surprise party and sent tons of pictures to me.  We messaged each other for an hour.  We love her!  And she loves to take care of the missionaries.

 

i dont know maybe i feel like i do any way it is really fun to teach english!! ya carmen told me all about your little chat she really really loves you!!