If anyone is feeling sad, stop. Forget about yourself. The only times we really are sad are when we're thinking about ourselves.
When we focus on others, that's when happiness comes. Everything is a choice. Literally. Everything.

Tuesday, May 26, 2015

Same area, new district

Hello to all of you! I hope yall have been having a fantastic week, it's been an interesting one for me, that's for sure.
I can't really remember too much before Friday because everything has just been super chaotic! On Friday we had a meeting with our ward mission leader and then one with the ward clerk to reorganize the ward list so that all of the people that don't live at the address it says they're at could be moved to a different location...so that took a long time, and then after that we went to help the sisters with a blitz and give a lady a blessing, but she had fallen and couldn't get up so we ended up calling an ambulance and she was sent to the Beeville hospital and then up to San Antonio...so that was interesting. And then During the blitz we contacted a bunch of referals, and one of them lead us to a door where when we knocked, a guy pointed a gun at us, shot at both of us, and then closed the door....it was only a nerf gun, but it was a pretty weird experience haha.

Then Saturday we had to do weekly planning and that took a long time because we had to reorganize all of our stuff with the new ward list and everything,and we went out to work for a little bit, and during that little bit we found a part member family who has a mom who is very less active and actually goes to the catholic church down the road, but their daughters had a pretty good interest in learning more, especially about the book of Mormon. But because of the lesson we had with them we were late to the ward fish fry, and didn't get to sing the song we had planned because we showed up right at the very end.
Then Sunday was very strange...a random guy who we later found out was a less active member ran to the church about an hour before any meetings started, wearing a superman tanktop and basketball shorts...we went and talked to him, found out he was a member, and he went into the chapel and asked for a Book of Mormon so he could bear his testimony...before any of the chairs were set up or anything...so as we set up the chairs he read some random verses from 3 Nephi while kinda banging on the pulpit, and at the very end he yelled at the top of his lungs "WILL BE CHANGED FROM MORTALITY TO IMMORTALITY!!!"  and slammed the Book of Mormon down on the pulpit and walked off. It scared the people having PEC so they came out to see what happened, and no one knew who he was, but he stayed for the majority of Sacrament meeting, where he tried interrupting the meeting a couple times, but the bishopric handled it well, and he ended up leaving just about halfway through the meeting. It was definitely the weirdest sacrament meeting I've been too so far, but there are a few that come pretty close...

So after that we had some meetings, and when we finally started working, one of our first things we did was try going to this new part of Mathis that we hadn't been to yet, and there were a bunch of people having a Memorial Day party, so we went to try and contact them and see if they'd be interested in a message about Jesus Christ, and they invited us to eat with them, even though the majority of them were pretty far from sober...but it was cool, and we got some decent referals from it, so it was worth it.
That's really about it, I did get a couple of cool letters this week, one from my mom and two from my Dad, the first being a quote about Less Active work and the other containing guitar tabs, so that was pretty awesome. Thanks parents! Love you! Haha anyways, that was my week! I hope you all have a fantastic one this week, and I love you all!
Elder Packer

 1: Me wearing a hat next to the cornfield we basically live in
2: Picture of FHE last Monday



Monday, May 18, 2015

Que pasa mufasa?

Hello!

How is everyone, good? I'm glad! It's been a strange and tiring week for Elder Packer as he has been in Sinton for 4 of the last 7 days, Robstown for one night, and then going hard in George west the next couple days in order to catch up from not being able to work from Monday to Thursday. But strange weeks always lead to fun experiences, so it's all good. 

This week I got to spend some time with Luther in Sinton again, which was awesome because he's such a cool dude, he had us try on a bunch of his old 80s stuff, and I do have pictures for those that are curious. Just think...ABC...I think...anyways, that was cool, and I also got to meet the famous Gutierrez family that have been friends with the missionaries ever since they got baptized last year, and they take them out to eat and are just really cool people. It was a lot of fun. But don't worry, we did a lot of work in Sinton as well, there are a bunch of people there that have potential to be baptized. 

We didn't get to work too much this week in George West because we were gone until Friday, and the majority of Friday ended up being planning to take in what my comp learned in 3-day and put it into effect for our area. So that was that, and then on Sunday i got to speak in church with a member of the stake high council.That was pretty fun, he was an awesome man, going to retire from the navy in 2 years. 

I Don't really have much else to say, except that this morning in Personal Study I was studying chapter 6 in PMG, (Christlike Attributes) and i got an overwhelming feeling of just plain comfort and peace. It was really awesome, and I wanted to suggest to you all that you do the attribute activity at the end of the chapter to see where yall are at. Then pick one of them to really focus on this week, and I can promise you that you will feel something special as you study that attribute and work to develop it more. 

Anyways, that's about it! I hope yall have a great week!Love Yall!

Elder Packer

#ABC
#bubblewatch
#frontyardafteritrainedfor2hours

 



Monday, May 11, 2015

Semana de 3-DAY!

Como les va? Espero que bien!

Haha how goes it? I hope everyone is having a good week, my week has been pretty good, and this next one will be different haha. This week was MOTHERS DAY!! So I got to talk to my mom on Skype, and even though the connection wasn't too good and it kept cutting out it was great to hear from home:) 

Outside of that, it's been a good week! We've found a bunch of people to teach, we took two consecutive spanish days where my comp and I talked to each other only in Spanish unless talking to a non Spanish speaker, and we went to an 8yr old's baptism on Saturday, where we filled the font, set up the chairs, made the program, gave talks, were the witnesses, and participated in the confirmation! It was a pretty hectic two hours, but it was super fun, I loved every second. And we got cake afterwards so that made it even better. 

So this week is 3-Day training for all leadership in the mission. And since my comp is a District Leader, he'll be going down to McAllen for the next 3 days, and I'll be in Sinton with Elder Anderson. A couple weeks ago they had called an emergency meeting that was the same thing as this but it only took 1 day, so I've already worked with Elder Anderson and spent the night in the Sinton apartment, so it shouldn't be too bad. I'm excited, he's younger than me in the mission, but an excellent missionary. It'll be fun. 

Along with that, this is the last week of the Transfer! So a week from today I will hopefully know if I'm staying (which I probably am) or if my comp's leaving (which he probably is) but we'll see! Nothing is ever consistent here, the Lord does what he wants how he wants it. 

That's about it for this week. Here are some pictures, the first of which are of this creepy house we got referred to that looks completely haunted, super cool, then of the car we drive (Chevy Cruze) and big red! And then here's a random selfie of my comp and I right now haha. Love you all! 

Elder Packer







Monday, May 4, 2015

Los demas

Buenas days to everyone!

This week has been pretty quick, I'm not really sure about too many things that happened. Mostly we did a lot of work. This week we had something called the Sinton Games (we're sinton zone) which was a bunch of zone competitions about referals received and lessons taught with a member present and that kind of thing. My comp and I ended up winning the whole thing and as a prize we got a big brass peanut. As well as a bunch of new investigators and we talked to a lot of really cool people, some of whom are so prepared! It was great. 

Saturday we had a Zone Meeting and a big Zone Exchange/Blitz, and I ended up working with a greenie in Banquete (the ZL's area) and so I got to drive the truck around. It was super fun. (oh, I've also been driving a 2015 Chevy Cruze around because my comp doesn't have a license in case I forgot to mention that...but the truck was way more fun:)) So that was basically the events of this week. We also met a super cute puppy that I couldn't resist taking a picture with, and found out that Elder Green (one of my ZLs) is my mission uncle, so had to take a picture with him because he goes home to Logan in 10 days. Super weird. 

Anyways, sorry this email was so short, but I love you all and pray that you have a good week! Thank you so much for your support and for your prayers! 

Elder Packer