WELL IT WAS TRANSFER WEEK AND FOR THE FIRST TIME NO CHANGES. I WAS A LITLLE SHOCKED BUT HAPPY. I HAVE GROWN TO LOVE THIS AREA AND THE PEOPLE HERE. SO WE HAVE ONE MORE TRANSFER TO WORK BUT IT ALSO MEANS THAT I WILL PROBABLY BE TRANSFERED RIGHT BEFORE CHRISTMAS WHICH WILL BE A LITTLE ROUGH. BUT I AM GREATFULL FOR ONE MORE TRANSFER IN THIS AREA.
WE HAD A GOOD WEEK WE HAD 10 PEOPLE IN CHURCH THIS WEEK WHICH WAS GREAT SOME OF OUR INVESTIGATORS THAT WERE FALLING CAME AND SO THEY STILL HAVE A LITTLE DESIRE IN THEM WHICH IS GREAT TO SEE. WE HAVE TWO BAPTISMAL DATES SET FOR THIS MONTH BUT THE MISSION IS CHANGING AND THEY ARE WANTING US TO SPEND A LOT MORE TIME WITH OUR INVSTIGATORS AND REALLY PREPARE THEM WELL SO THERE IS MORE RETENSION. WHICH IS GREAT ACTUALLY, SO OUR DATES MIGHT BE PUSHED BACK A FEW WEEKS FOR MORE PREP TIME.
THIS WEEK WE MET A MAN THAT WE CONTACTED AND HE REALLY RESPECTS US. HE HAD A REVELATION ABOUT US TALKING TO HIM SO HE REALLY KNOWS THAT WE ARE REPRESENTATIVES OF JESUS CHRIST. IT REALLY BUT THE WEIGHT OF BEING A MISSIONARY ON MY SHOULDERS AND HOW IMPORTANT MY CALLING REALLY IS. IT WAS A GREAT SPIRITUAL EXPERIENCE.HE SAID HE IS WILLING TO TAKE WHATEVER STEPS NECESSARY TO GET CLOSER TO GOD.
THE BRANCH IS DOING BETTER IT SEEMS THAT WE ARE WORKING BETTERTOGETHER AND REALLY TRYING TO STRENGTHEN THE BRANCH. THERE HAVE BEEN A LOT OF INACTIVES COMING BACK TO CHURCH WHICH IS GREAT. MOSTLY PRIESTHOOD TOO. WHICH IS WHAT WE NEED IN THIS BRANCH.
OTHER THEN THAT THINGS ARE ABOUT THE SAME. WORKING HARD AND TRYING TO BECOME MORE EFFICIENT WITH EACH DAY. I HOPE ALL IS WELL WITH ALL OF YOU AND THAT YOU ARE COUNTING YOUR MANY BLESSINGS EACH DAY. GIVE THANKS FOR ALL THAT WE HAVE AND REALLY WORK ON HAVING SINCERE PRAYERS WITH OUR FATHER IN HEAVEN. THE MORE WE PRAY THE MORE WE REALIZE THE INFLUENCE HE HAS IN OUR LIVES.
LOVE YOU ALL SO MUCH.
CON AMOR,
ELDER HOLMES
Tuesday, February 14, 2012
October 31st Happy Halloween!
That is weird that it is halloween. They dont really celebrate halloween in this country so it isnt any different. There was a haunted house in the big mall that is here but that is about all I have seen of halloween.
Things here are going well. We finally got jose to come to church. The boyfriend of the less active and he really liked it. We are now going to work on getting them married for baptism hopefully this month we just have to find a new job for him. We also talked to one of the couples that we just started teaching and they are already married which never happens. It is truly a miracle. We found that out yesterday and so it gave us some more animo to work harder. Working with families is hard work and kind of stressfull but i know that it will be worth it in the end.
The weather has been a lot more cool lately which is way nice and I think hurricane season is coming to an end which means I only have one more season to get hit by one. We still have random rain storms but usually no longer then 30 minutes.
Elder Smith my comp slipped on tuesday and cut his had pretty bad so we had to go in early and get it all fixed up. It is healing well now so that is good. We are not sure what cut his hand but he really fell hard. His feet came up and kicked me in the shoulder. It was a little funny, especially that all is healed now.
well I really don't know what else to write. The weeks go by faster and faster, and in now time I am going to hit a year. Next week is transfers so we will see if I stay with my comp for another transfer and have my first comp for 2. I expect to stay but you never know. Well thank you all for everything. I hope all is well. I pray for you guys daily.
love ya.
con amor,
Elder Holmes
Halloween "pumkin carving" this is as close as they could come!
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Things here are going well. We finally got jose to come to church. The boyfriend of the less active and he really liked it. We are now going to work on getting them married for baptism hopefully this month we just have to find a new job for him. We also talked to one of the couples that we just started teaching and they are already married which never happens. It is truly a miracle. We found that out yesterday and so it gave us some more animo to work harder. Working with families is hard work and kind of stressfull but i know that it will be worth it in the end.
The weather has been a lot more cool lately which is way nice and I think hurricane season is coming to an end which means I only have one more season to get hit by one. We still have random rain storms but usually no longer then 30 minutes.
Elder Smith my comp slipped on tuesday and cut his had pretty bad so we had to go in early and get it all fixed up. It is healing well now so that is good. We are not sure what cut his hand but he really fell hard. His feet came up and kicked me in the shoulder. It was a little funny, especially that all is healed now.
well I really don't know what else to write. The weeks go by faster and faster, and in now time I am going to hit a year. Next week is transfers so we will see if I stay with my comp for another transfer and have my first comp for 2. I expect to stay but you never know. Well thank you all for everything. I hope all is well. I pray for you guys daily.
love ya.
con amor,
Elder Holmes
Halloween "pumkin carving" this is as close as they could come!
NOTICE: This email message is for the sole use of the intended recipient(s) and may contain confidential and privileged information. Any unauthorized review, use, disclosure or distribution is prohibited. If you are not the intended recipient, please contact the sender by reply email and destroy all copies of the original message.
October 24th
Here goes another letter. I think this was the fastest week yet. I feel like I was just here writing a letter. We had an alright week but yesterday was happy but kind of dissapointing too. We had 3 new people come to church but none of our other investigators came. We are working hard but it seems like everything is going wrong. We are working with a lot of families and there are a ton of problems. Because I have seen the blessings in my family I do my best to help them accept this message, but everyone has their agency that we must respect.
Right now we have one investigator who has a strong testimony of the book of mormon and is ready to be baptized but his wife who is a member is not ready to return to the church. She had some problems with some members so now she isnt 'ready' to come back. He talks about how he just has a stronger and stronger desire to read in the book of mormon and loves it. He is a way cool guy. He also talks english so it is nice for my comp to talk to him.
Other then that we are trying to work more with the members and build thier trust. There are a lot of stuff to do in this branch and we do our best to help it out with not taking over. They rely too much on the missionaries and need to learn how to be independent. The peolple in this area are great people and all really respect us.
Well that is about it from the republica but I hope all is well with all of you. remember our savior Jesus Christ and all that he did for us the stronger testimony that we have of him the easier it is to make the right choice. love you all.
con amor,
Elder Holmes
Right now we have one investigator who has a strong testimony of the book of mormon and is ready to be baptized but his wife who is a member is not ready to return to the church. She had some problems with some members so now she isnt 'ready' to come back. He talks about how he just has a stronger and stronger desire to read in the book of mormon and loves it. He is a way cool guy. He also talks english so it is nice for my comp to talk to him.
Other then that we are trying to work more with the members and build thier trust. There are a lot of stuff to do in this branch and we do our best to help it out with not taking over. They rely too much on the missionaries and need to learn how to be independent. The peolple in this area are great people and all really respect us.
Well that is about it from the republica but I hope all is well with all of you. remember our savior Jesus Christ and all that he did for us the stronger testimony that we have of him the easier it is to make the right choice. love you all.
con amor,
Elder Holmes
October 17th
Here goes another letter and I now have 11 months in the mission and 13 more to go. It is crazy how fast the time goes and how it picks up with each week. My comp is now well adjusted and doing well. He has great spanish but just gets a little nervous in the lessons which is understandable. We had a good week worked hard and found some more good people to teach.
Wilfrido and Heridania are doing well but we found out that she has to be divorced then married so it will be a long process cause you have to wait 3 months after the divorce to get married. So we are working with the ward on this one to be a big support cause I probably wont be here when they get baptized. Their animo is still high so that is good. He loves reading the book of mormon and that is really all you need in an investigator is to have a desire to read the book and you have them converted from the word of God. We had a new couple come to church this sunday and it was good they seem interested and they are young and have a little boy and another on the way. We will work hard with them to let them see the blessings of the gospel. william and adela are still progressing and are willing to get married and baptized we are just working on a stronger testimony for them so that they will be more sure of their decision and desire.
Other then that things are going good it is starting to cool down a little bit and it rained the last few days which makes it more cool at night. interviews with pres. went well.
We have a great pres. He loves the work and is a very personable guy. The area leaders really love him and are getting more excited about the work. Well that is all from the Rep. I hope all is well in zion and that you are all staying strong in the gospel that has blessed our lives. remember to do the small things and all the big things will come after.
love you all.
con amor,
Elder Holmes
Wilfrido and Heridania are doing well but we found out that she has to be divorced then married so it will be a long process cause you have to wait 3 months after the divorce to get married. So we are working with the ward on this one to be a big support cause I probably wont be here when they get baptized. Their animo is still high so that is good. He loves reading the book of mormon and that is really all you need in an investigator is to have a desire to read the book and you have them converted from the word of God. We had a new couple come to church this sunday and it was good they seem interested and they are young and have a little boy and another on the way. We will work hard with them to let them see the blessings of the gospel. william and adela are still progressing and are willing to get married and baptized we are just working on a stronger testimony for them so that they will be more sure of their decision and desire.
Other then that things are going good it is starting to cool down a little bit and it rained the last few days which makes it more cool at night. interviews with pres. went well.
We have a great pres. He loves the work and is a very personable guy. The area leaders really love him and are getting more excited about the work. Well that is all from the Rep. I hope all is well in zion and that you are all staying strong in the gospel that has blessed our lives. remember to do the small things and all the big things will come after.
love you all.
con amor,
Elder Holmes
October 3, 2011 Another week past!
Well this week wasn't as fast as the others because of the big change of having a new missionary. It helps me realize how much I have grown spiritually and how much I am used to this culture. His name is Elder Smith from Utah from pleasntgrove or something like that. He is a good missionary and wants to work hard so that is all I need. He is very hesitant, I dont know how to spell in english anymore. He reminds me of myself in the beginging of my mission but he is a little more. We are working hard to get him to participate in the lessons but it is hard. The church has a new training program for the new missionaries which is great so now we have 2 hours of comp study each day for the first 12 weeks of his mission and we have certain things we focus on each week. It is an inspired program for sure, this will get the missionaries up and ready a lot faster than before. We had a baptism on friday of alejandro the 15 year old who has been going to church for 4 months the service wasnt the best but it was a good baptism. he was excited and his friend was able to do it so that was cool.
We had a family come to conference with us which is good. The father went with us on saturday the the mother and on of the kids on sunday. The saturday session in the afternoon was good we didnt go to the morning one and also the priesthood session was really good. the sun morning went well too but in the afternoon it was horrible so we didnt get to watch hardly any of it because of the internet. Only the stake centers have satellites so we watched it by internet and the connection was bad in the afternoon but all is good we will be able to read them later anyway. So that is about it from the republic we are working hard and hoping to find some more people and bring more people into the truth. I hope all is well with all of you. Thank you for everything.
We had a family come to conference with us which is good. The father went with us on saturday the the mother and on of the kids on sunday. The saturday session in the afternoon was good we didnt go to the morning one and also the priesthood session was really good. the sun morning went well too but in the afternoon it was horrible so we didnt get to watch hardly any of it because of the internet. Only the stake centers have satellites so we watched it by internet and the connection was bad in the afternoon but all is good we will be able to read them later anyway. So that is about it from the republic we are working hard and hoping to find some more people and bring more people into the truth. I hope all is well with all of you. Thank you for everything.
Love you all. take care.
con amor,
Elder Holmes
con amor,
Elder Holmes
New Elder Smith with Alejando at his baptism
Current Apartment
September 26th
Well, the transfers came and right now I am with the zone leader cause his comp went home too. I had a great transfer with Elder Moreno and learned a lot, and now I am going to have to apply those things this next transfer cause I will bve training a greenie. I dont know who it is yet or if it will be an american or latino. There are a ton of americans so most likely it is going to be a latino. Everything is going good so far and I am excited to train. It is going to be hard but I will learn a lot.
We had two new families come to church yesterday and they loved it so I am excited to begin to teach them and hope that they work towards baptism to receive all the blessings that come with it. One of them has 3 kids and the other dont have kids that live with them. we have a baptism on friday of a young man who is 15 named alejandro. he is a great young man and he came to the church by himself for the first time about 4 months ago and has been coming ever since. he will be a good thing for the branch. they need mor young men and women to help strengthen each other. this country has a huge problem with teen pregnancies. it is sad to see such young people having children that they cant take care of. the commandments of god are for a reason and we need to remember to follow them even if we dont quite understand them. they all have a reason.
As general conference is this week I hope that all of you will have the opportuniy to watch the leaders of the world give us guidance directly from our lord. Pay close attention to their words and your feelings we are all able to receive personal revalation if we listen with real intent. I dont have a lot to write about today I am sure I will have more next week but I hope that all is going well with all of you. I pray for you all daily. Thank you for all your support.
Love you guys.
con amor
elder holmes
We had two new families come to church yesterday and they loved it so I am excited to begin to teach them and hope that they work towards baptism to receive all the blessings that come with it. One of them has 3 kids and the other dont have kids that live with them. we have a baptism on friday of a young man who is 15 named alejandro. he is a great young man and he came to the church by himself for the first time about 4 months ago and has been coming ever since. he will be a good thing for the branch. they need mor young men and women to help strengthen each other. this country has a huge problem with teen pregnancies. it is sad to see such young people having children that they cant take care of. the commandments of god are for a reason and we need to remember to follow them even if we dont quite understand them. they all have a reason.
As general conference is this week I hope that all of you will have the opportuniy to watch the leaders of the world give us guidance directly from our lord. Pay close attention to their words and your feelings we are all able to receive personal revalation if we listen with real intent. I dont have a lot to write about today I am sure I will have more next week but I hope that all is going well with all of you. I pray for you all daily. Thank you for all your support.
Love you guys.
con amor
elder holmes
September 12th & 19th
September 12th
Thank you all for the happy birthday wishes i really appreciate it.
Being on the mission is a great birthday present so i am happy.
Tonight my comp is going to make me mexican hotdogs so we will see how
that is. Today we went and played football at a park with most of the
mission so that was fun it was good to play some football.
The week went by way fast we have been working really hard and things
dont seem to be going our way but Espinal was baptized so that was
good it was what we needed to boost our animo to work harder. It was a
good baptismal service except that I had to lead the music and was
the only one singing, I am a worse singer in spanish so it was pretty
bad. But I forgot to bring my chord to download pictures but next week
I will try to get some up of the baptism.
We had 2 new people in church this week which was great and we hope
that they show some promise so we will begin teaching them more this
week. but next week is stake conference the people have to pay to go
to church 50 pesos so our investigators will probably not come cause
people here dont like spending money on travel.The good thing is that
the stake center has air conditioning so that will be nice for a
change.
This week we had a 70 come talk to us Elder Cornish, and he did a
great job in helping us. He told us when we understand the doctrine
behind the reason why we do things we will be more likely to do them.
So, my comp and I have completely changed our teaching style and have
a different aproach and it is still a work in progress but it is
working. After the meeting when we were eating he had a open
discussion when we could ask whatever question we wanted and that was
way cool. He shared a lot of great scriptures about Jesucristo and the
spirit was strong. We need to always have a strong testimony of Jesus
and be greatfull for everything he did for us. Study his life and his
teachings and your love for him and others will grow.
Being on the mission is a great birthday present so i am happy.
Tonight my comp is going to make me mexican hotdogs so we will see how
that is. Today we went and played football at a park with most of the
mission so that was fun it was good to play some football.
The week went by way fast we have been working really hard and things
dont seem to be going our way but Espinal was baptized so that was
good it was what we needed to boost our animo to work harder. It was a
good baptismal service except that I had to lead the music and was
the only one singing, I am a worse singer in spanish so it was pretty
bad. But I forgot to bring my chord to download pictures but next week
I will try to get some up of the baptism.
We had 2 new people in church this week which was great and we hope
that they show some promise so we will begin teaching them more this
week. but next week is stake conference the people have to pay to go
to church 50 pesos so our investigators will probably not come cause
people here dont like spending money on travel.The good thing is that
the stake center has air conditioning so that will be nice for a
change.
This week we had a 70 come talk to us Elder Cornish, and he did a
great job in helping us. He told us when we understand the doctrine
behind the reason why we do things we will be more likely to do them.
So, my comp and I have completely changed our teaching style and have
a different aproach and it is still a work in progress but it is
working. After the meeting when we were eating he had a open
discussion when we could ask whatever question we wanted and that was
way cool. He shared a lot of great scriptures about Jesucristo and the
spirit was strong. We need to always have a strong testimony of Jesus
and be greatfull for everything he did for us. Study his life and his
teachings and your love for him and others will grow.
that is it from the DR.
Love you all and hope all is well. tengan buena semana!
con amor,
Elder Holmes
con amor,
Elder Holmes
Well, the last week of the transfer is coming up and so this time next
week i will know who my comp will be. It is going to be different
cause there arent many elders better then elder Moreno. he works hard
and knows how to teach. i learned a lot from him this transfer. Not
much is new this week we have quite a few progressing but not very
fast so i dont think that we will have any baptisms this week but it
is possible. yesterday was stake conference and there was a change in
the stake presidency so Elder Viñas from the 70 was here doing all the
changes. so it was cool to hear from a 70 this sunday. other then that
not a lot is new but we did eat at pizza hut today and it was really
good. it is like a fancy restaurant here it is way funny. people come
dressed really nice and everything, good thing we are always dressed
nice in formal clothing, there were about 16 missionaries there
eating.
Well i dont have a lot of time but i encourage all of you to be
diligent in studying the scriptures and diligent in all that you do.
the ensign of october about the BOM is great. i would recomend
studying it and your testimony will grow of the power of the book.
love you all and hope everyone is well.
Con Amor,
Elder Holmes
week i will know who my comp will be. It is going to be different
cause there arent many elders better then elder Moreno. he works hard
and knows how to teach. i learned a lot from him this transfer. Not
much is new this week we have quite a few progressing but not very
fast so i dont think that we will have any baptisms this week but it
is possible. yesterday was stake conference and there was a change in
the stake presidency so Elder Viñas from the 70 was here doing all the
changes. so it was cool to hear from a 70 this sunday. other then that
not a lot is new but we did eat at pizza hut today and it was really
good. it is like a fancy restaurant here it is way funny. people come
dressed really nice and everything, good thing we are always dressed
nice in formal clothing, there were about 16 missionaries there
eating.
Well i dont have a lot of time but i encourage all of you to be
diligent in studying the scriptures and diligent in all that you do.
the ensign of october about the BOM is great. i would recomend
studying it and your testimony will grow of the power of the book.
love you all and hope everyone is well.
Con Amor,
Elder Holmes
Buenas de la Republica,
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