Semana 19

Hi everyone. This has been a pretty fast week. I really like my new area in Pelileo. This area is huge! There are parts of our sector that take over an hour to get to. There`s very few members so we`re in a Branch here. My companion said that just before I got here they stopped teaching a ton of their investigators because they weren`t progressing, so we don`t have much investigators and we`ve mainly just been finding new investigators. We found a family that is really good, who the dad said that the day before we found them he was praying for someone to visit him to teach him the Gospel. We had a good experience with them. We just need to help them all come to church now.

I was able to go to Quito yesterday and go to the Christmas dinner at President Ghent`s house. It was a lot of fun, and we got to play ping pong with the other missionaries and the President`s Assistants before dinner. 

Well this Christmas I hope you all can think about the true meaning of Christmas. Even though it`s fun to get gifts we should always think what the best gift of all is which is salvation and eternal life through Jesus Christ.

Hope you all have a very merry Christmas and have a great time this week. Hope to hear from you all soon!

-Elder Gomez

Transfer Week-Semana 18

Hey everyone!

Transfers were today and I got moved to a new area; Ambato! I had to take a three hour bus drive to get there. I´m going to be a District Leader here so that´s pretty exciting too. My companion Elder Church is staying in Conocoto and a Peruano is coming there to finish his training and Elder Moreano is in the same zone still just moving to a different district. My new companion is Elder Morones who has been here for one transfer so I will be finishing his training (which means I´m his step-father ja ja ja). This area is more in the Andes mountains so it´s a bit more rural and a lot more hills. It sounds like it´s a really nice area and I´m excited to start working. I was pretty sad to leave Conocoto since after being there for four months, it´s felt like home to me and all the members and investigadores have been like family to me. I know though that this is where the Lord needs me to be at this time.

 Elder Morones told me that they´ve had some difficulty here finding investigadores that progress and go to church so this is going to be a bit different from Conocoto where we had a lot of people that progressed. I´m looking forward to working hard though because if we work hard and have the faith the Lord will give us success. 

We had the baptism for the Gomez family this Saturday. It was really great but the older daughter didn´t show up so she couldn´t get baptized. She has some bad friends and influences that it seems like she´s with a lot and her parents and worrying and upset over this. We talked to her yesterday and set goals for her to stop hanging out with these bad influences and find better friends and won´t get into trouble so that she´ll eventually be able to be well prepared for a baptism date.

Well I´m really really excited to start working here and being a DL. We had a lot of success in Conocoto and I know we´re going to have success here. 

Hope to hear from you all soon!

-Elder Gómez

Transfer week

We got an email from Alex today.  He is being transferred to Ambato which is about 3 hours South of Quito and they are making him a District Leader.  Hopefully he will be able to email when he gets there.

Semana 17

Hi everyone!

We`re already coming to the end of another transfer, and this has been the fastest transfer ever. I feel like every week seems to just go by faster and faster. I`m feeling like after 4 months of being here in Conocoto I`ll probably be transfered to another area. It`s kind of sad thinking that because this area has become home to me and I love all the people here, but I feel good about the work we`ve done here.

So I said last week that we had emergency transfers. Elder Collantes was sent to another zone. In place of him we got Elder Moreano. He is from Peru, has 6 months in the mission and is 25 years old. I`ve learned a lot from him about teaching by the spirit and following lesson plans.

We didn`t have the baptism for the family Gomez this Sunday because they had an interview with the mission president`s counselor and he said they need a little more time to work out some family matters. But he talked with them on Sunday after church and everything`s working out. He said that they are all ready to be baptized on the 14th. So we will have 4 baptisms this Saturday; a great way to end this transfer. We visited them yesterday and the mom E told us how over many years they have been trying to find a church and they just hadn`t found what they were looking for. Then once we started coming and teaching them the beginning of October, we and them have seen many changes and miracles in their lives. She was never sure about being baptized in any of the other churches but now she says she is for sure wants to be baptized in this church. It`s so amazing to see these kinds of experiences happen. It makes me really happy that I chose to serve a mission because I`d never have these experiences if I never went. These experiences have been a real testimony and faith builder for me. I know that this church is true and and Jesus Christ lives and this Gospel does change lives. 

Well next week when I write I`ll find out if I`m staying here or going to another area. Until then, hope you all have a great week and stay safe. Hope to hear from you all soon!

-Elder Gómez

Semana 16

Hi everybody!

Today marks five months since I left home, and it`s been the fastest five months of my life. November was the fastest month ever. We only have two more weeks in this transfer as well. The time just keeps getting faster and faster here. When you enjoy the work and your companions and work as hard as you can every day, it goes by super fast. You don`t think about the time and you`re not homesick or ´´trunky.´´ 

In December, the mission president invites all the missionaries over for a Christmas dinner, and we should be finding out the schedule soon for when each companionship gets their turn to go. Also we get to skype the family this Christmas! I`m probably going to have to practice my english! 

We`re seeing the fruits of our labors come forth. The Gomez family has their baptism this Sunday the 8th before church and their daughter has her baptism the 14th. We also have a lot of investigators that are progressing and coming to church. 

I just found out today that we are going to have emergency transfers and Elder Collantes will be leaving tomorrow to Santo Domingo. So now it will just be me and Elder Church for the rest of the transfer. I`m not sure why they did emergency transfers, but it`s kind of sad, because I really love Elder Collantes and he`s such a great missionary. 

It`s been going great here, and with transfers coming in two weeks, I feel like I might be staying here for a fourth transfer. But we`ll just have to wait and see. Hope all is well with all of you back home. Hope to hear from you all very soon! 

-Elder Gómez