La navidad es buena

 Saludos mis queridos hermanas y hermanos. Aquí estoy con otro correo electrónico. 

Exchanges beard

This week I was out on exchanges for like 3 days straight. But by the end of the three days, I was looking like a wild man. I haven’t gone that long without shaving for like 18 months so it was intense. Our neighbor Daury saw me when I got back and told me (in his broken English) that I “look like a man”. We street contacted this lady who was kinda mean to us. She also had a bit of a mustache. As we walked away my green companion said to me, “her mustache is better than yours”. Not sure if that statement was roasting me or her more, but it was kinda funny. Also it caught me off guard because this elder is like the sweetest guy but then out of nowhere just totally wrecked me and that random dominican lady. It was pretty funny though. 

Ewe

During a lesson we were teaching, and this 3 year old kid just walked in the middle of the room and puked everywhere. It was kinda funny. Then the next day we were street contacting someone and a guy walked in between us and the investigator and tripped while doing so. It was awkward. But before I had the chance to help the guy out he popped right up and said “gloria a Dios” and went on his way. 

Reverse Mosquito Net…?

In my first area here in the DR (Navarrete) I needed a mosquito net super bad. They were insane. My second area here (El Dorado) they weren’t bad at all because we were like 5 floors off the ground. But here in Puerto Plata they have been bad again. However I was secretly kind of happy because I get to use my zapper more and watch them die. I hate mosquitos so much. I feel like the third of the hosts of heaven that rebelled are actually just mosquitos. Sent to earth to torment man. 

So right when I got here I put up my mosquito net. Except it has been more of a curse than a blessing lately. During the day I haven’t done a good job of tying it up to keep the mosquitos from going in, so during the day the mosquitos sneak in. Then at night, I get in my mosquito net and tie it up to keep any from coming in. Genius, except when the mosquitos are already in the net. Instead of keeping them from coming in, it keeps them from going out, giving me like 10 times more mosquitos bites. There were two nights in a row where I literally woke up because of mosquito bite pain. 

Umbrella

Long story short, I really like umbrellas. But I didn’t know I did until like two weeks ago. I’ve had a super nice umbrella my whole mission but I’ve never used it. If it rains I just use my raincoat. But a couple weeks ago I decided to try the umbrella and just totally loved it. It looks super cool and when you press the button and it shoots out it feels like pulling out a lightsaber. So I had a great time using my umbrella because it’s been raining so much lately. But last week I accidentally left it on a bus, and have been really depressed about it since. One of the elders gave me an umbrella replacement, but it just isn’t the same. It doesn’t have the button that just shoots it open so it’s kind of pointless. And I broke the handle of it while trying to open it like a lightsaber. Instead of popping out, the umbrella part flew off. So it’s been tough. This week it rained so much. It was insane. We walked to a lesson and by the time we got there my waterproof shoes were soaked on the inside because of all the puddles I had stepped in. The guy we were teaching saw my situation and let me try to dry my shoes on his stove. It kind of worked. But then after the visit we had to go back out, and I was still umbrellaless. So our friend Ramon gave me a giant plastic bag that I used to protect myself the rest of the night. It was pretty cool. But I looked dumb.

Soul and Sax

We were supposed to prepare a christmas presentation with our zone for our mission christmas activity, so I ended up playing the saxophone which was a ton of fun. It’s been a while since I played it. We borrowed the horn from a member who is really into it as well. After the zone performances we watched the movie “Soul” in spanish by pixar and it was actually super good. Maybe it’s just because I haven’t seen a movie in 18 months, but I was kinda hypnotized the whole time. But it was such a good movie. It had a ton of gospel parallels too. 

Feliz Navidad

Christmas was a normal proselyting day for us which was fun. But in the morning we cooked crepes which was pretty fun.

We also slept the night before under our little christmas tree that my grandma sent me because me and my siblings always slept under the tree christmas eve growing up. 

La Fwance

There’s a lot of people here who are haitian so they speak hatian-creole. That’s also pretty similar to french, so we talk to french speakers occasionally. I talked to one this week and wanted to communicate with them. I have the song ´´Le Festin´´ from Ratatouille memorized, so I sang it to her thinking that she would understand. She didn’t understand anything. 

LA OBRA DEL SEÑOR

I have been so hecka busy and I need to wrap this email up like right now but the work here has been absolutely amazing. Sometimes I feel like I could just live in this little sketch town for a long time. It’s super great. We have a lot of friends coming to church. This week we had 8 that came which was a miracle because when I first got to this area we didn’t have anyone. Next month hopefully a good number of them will choose to be baptized. I wish I had time to write you about each of them individually, but I don’t. Next week I’ll make sure to give you an overview of all of them and their story though. But overall, things are great with la obra. Me encanta la República Dominicana.

Spiritual Thought

Quick thought because I don't have time. We talked to an inactive member and invited her to come back to church. She said yes, and that since she stopped coming life has been harder for her. I feel like we think that life with God makes it harder, but we need to remember that God isn't just there to help us spiritually, but with every aspect of our lives. Remember that. And please read the Book of Mormon every day

Love you guys! Gotta go

• Elder Wride

  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  

Creo que la playa es divertida

 Hey guys!

I wanted to give you guys a lot more deets this week but we played spikeball and frisbee at the beach and ran out of time. So this will also be pretty brief again. We've been really busy here which has been fun but it's harder to keep track of stuff to share with you guys. So sorry about that. Also I did this email in one draft so sorry about any weird stuff in here. Also feliz navidad

Trio Life part. 4

I’m in a trio again which is alright. It’s another new missionary so he’s learning spanish. It’s kind of a struggle though sometimes. During a lesson while talking about Joseph Smith he asked the investigador, ´´how old do you think you are?＂. It was funny. I think he meant to ask how old she thought Joseph Smith was or something but she just looked super confused. 

Dog Attack

We went to throw frisbee at the beach one morning and a giant dog came out of nowhere and tried to eat me. I kept trying to hit him in the face with my foot but he’d dodge and strike. This went on for like a minute and both my companions just watched completely unphased. I was pretty freaked out though. But eventually the dog just ran away so that was nice. 

Dream Stuff

I had a dream last night that my mission was over again. In my dream I was in my room back home feeling sad that it was over and just wishing I could be back and do more. The hardest part of the mission for me is feeling like I’m not doing a good job. And I just want to stay out here as long as I need to do what I am supposed to do. So the dream was really hard for me. But then I woke up and it was P/beach - day so I was doing good.

Spiritual Thought

My amazing mother sent me a quote this week from C.S. Lewis’ ＂the Screwtape Letters＂. If you don’t know what it is, basically it’s about this devil named Screwtape who is writing letters to his nephew Wormwood teaching him how to be a good devil and how to deceive us humans. The quote she sent me was really powerful and gave me a ton more motivation to keep working at my hardest. Here’s the quote. When it refers to ＂the Enemy＂ it is referring to God.

＂The Enemy wants a world full of beings united to Him but still distinct.

And that is where the troughs come in. You must have often wondered why the Enemy does not make more use of His power to be sensibly present to human souls in any degree He chooses and at any moment. But you now see that the Irresistible and the Indisputable are the two weapons which the very nature of His scheme forbids Him to use. Merely to over-ride a human will (as His felt presence in any but the faintest and most mitigated degree would certainly do) would be for Him useless. He cannot ravish. He can only woo. 

He is prepared to do a little overriding at the beginning. He will set them off with communications of His presence which, though faint, seem great to them, with emotional sweetness, and easy conquest over temptation. But He never allows this state of affairs to last long. Sooner or later He withdraws, if not in fact, at least from their conscious experience, all those supports and incentives. He leaves the creature to stand up on its own legs—to carry out from the will alone duties which have lost all relish. It is during such trough periods, much more than during the peak periods, that it is growing into the sort of creature He wants it to be. Hence the prayers offered in the state of dryness are those which please Him best. We can drag our patients along by continual tempting, because we design them only for the table, and the more their will is interfered with the better. He cannot “tempt” to virtue as we do to vice. He wants them to learn to walk and must therefore take away His hand; and if only the will to walk is really there He is pleased even with their stumbles. Do not be deceived, Wormwood. Our cause is never more in danger, than when a human, no longer desiring, but intending, to do our Enemy’s will, looks round upon a universe from which every trace of Him seems to have vanished, and asks why he has been forsaken, and still obeys.＂

That hit me really hard. Not gonna lie, sometimes I feel like the Lord really lets me down. Like I’ve done all I thought I was supposed to do and somehow it doesn’t turn out the way that I thought it would. But all of these experiences I’m having will help turn me into every good thing I’m capable of becoming, if I let them do so. 

Last Spiritual Thought

This is something my dad sent me a while ago that I thought was great. It’s from a BYU devotional with a guy named Mitch Davis and John Groberg. The guy from the movie ＂the other side of heaven＂

Mitch Davis: It is so good to be here with my lovely bride, who I also met and courted on this hallowed campus.

Several years ago I had a very dramatic experience regarding trusting the Lord. I was backpacking with my 10-year-old son, two of his friends, and our faithful dog, Pluto, when we were hit by lightning.

We were hiking above timberline when a sudden storm blew in. We pitched our tent, and I put the boys inside their sleeping bags to keep them warm. I started fixing dinner on our little camp stove. Then, suddenly, I was gone.

Although I have no recollection of the lightning hitting me, the boys tell me that it blasted through our tent’s roof and hit me square in the chest and that I flew backward and landed on the floor unconscious with my eyes open but rolled back into my head.

The bulk of the strike passed through my chest and into the dog sitting behind me, killing him. The rest of the lightning curled down my right arm and struck the boy seated next to me, then danced wickedly about the tent, burning holes in sleeping bags and striking the two other boys.

But I knew nothing about this. In my mind, at least, I ceased to exist.

After some time I became aware of myself again. I began to be able to hear, although I could not see or move any part of my body. As if from a great distance I could hear the three boys screaming. I heard my son cry out, “Dad, please don’t die!” One of the boys leaned over and gave me a single puff of artificial respiration. The other promised God he would never do another bad thing in his entire life if Brother Davis would just wake up.

But I couldn’t wake up. I could only lie there, helpless, wondering what in the world had happened to me.

Then I became aware of something else—a dark presence I can only describe as impending death. I felt myself starting to leave mortality and realized my only hope was divine intervention. I fought with every fiber of my being to call on Heavenly Father.

Then a most interesting thing happened. Before I could call on Father, He called on me. Through the unmistakably clear voice of the Spirit, He encouraged me with these simple words: “You served a valiant mission. Ask in confidence.”

Heavenly Father knew I needed extra faith at that moment. He knew I had faith in Him but lacked faith in myself as a worthy recipient of the miracle I so desperately needed. So he sent me that encouraging message: “You served a valiant mission. Ask in confidence.”

I exerted every ounce of faith I had in a fervent, frenzied prayer. Heavenly Father responded by immediately freeing me from death’s grip. I regained consciousness and the strength, several hours later, to hike off the mountain with my boy, his friends, and the body of our dog.

I do not tell you this story for the sake of mere drama, nor to boast about my personal missionary prowess. I assure you I was no more valiant than most missionaries. I tell you this story because of the significance of the Lord’s choice of words to me: When my life literally hung in the balance, all that mattered were my two years of obscure service in the villages of Argentina.

How grateful I was I had decided to go on a mission and that I had worked hard once I got there! I remembered the words of my great BYU stake president, Robert K. Thomas: “If you’re almost worthy, almost willing to make the sacrifice, you’ll almost get the blessing.” I wondered what the Lord would have said to me on that mountain had I almost decided to serve a mission.

I am so grateful the Lord Jesus Christ didn’t “almost” atone for our sins. I am grateful Elder John Groberg didn’t “almost” serve a valiant mission, and I know that he is grateful that Jean didn’t “almost” wait for him.

Today, especially, I am grateful for you: the blessed, beloved students of this, “the Lord’s university.” You each have your own missions—past, present, and future. May you fulfill them valiantly, faithfully, fearlessly.

And during the dark times, may you hear the voice of the Lord whispering encouragement to you. In the name of Jesus Christ, amen.

I love you all so much. I have a testimony of the gospel. That testimony has been tested out here a lot actually, but it’s also grown in ways I didn’t think it would. Also reading the Book of Mormon has changed my life. I hope you are all studying that. It’s God’s book. 

Adios bacanos 

• Elder Wride

Hola

Sorry this email is going to be super bad! I decided to take a nap this P-day and was out for longer than I should have been so I don't have a lot of time. 

This week was kind of a pain because we've been working super hard but nobody is really doing anything. We had so many people committed to church and hardly anybody came. So that's been hard but we're still working at it.

The Book of Mormon is my best friend. I literally could not survive without it. I have been reading a ton more lately and it's brought mucho paz a mi alma. I would encourage you all to study it too. It's a good read. 

Next week I promise I'll do better with the email. And feel free to email me if you can! I'd love to know how y'all are doing. 

Also the phone was being weird so I had to send the photos in a different email. Enjoy

Adios

- Elder Wride

Diggin' the New Digs

If you guys have seen Incredibles 2, you should go look up the soundtrack and listen to the song “Diggin the New Digs” for me. That’s the vibe I’m feeling right now. I remember in high school I would listen to that all the time, especially at the start of a new phase of life. And everything here is pretty new and exciting. New comp, new area, new people, etc. Anyways, that song is stuck in my head and it’s pretty good. I’m diggin the new digs out here. 

Vamos a La Playa

Last week I sent an email out, but my phone is super wack and it didn’t send. It wasn’t a very good email anyways though so it’s fine. But last week I got a call that I was getting transferred to Puerto Plata! THE BEACH. When he told me, I tried not to be too excited over the phone but when he hung up I went crazy. Super sweet!

Pretty Embarrassing

Yesterday we were in a meeting with President, so I was on my best behavior haha. He asked one of us to read D&C 78:18. I thought he said D&C 68, not D&C 78. They sound pretty similar in spanish. So instead of reading the cool scripture about “[being] of good cheer”, I read the following:

“No man has a legal right to this office, to hold the keys of this priesthood, except he be a literal descendant and the firstborn of Aaron.”

After I read it, I paused and thought “fetch, that doesn’t sound right”. But Presidente Breton is a loving soul and was just like “gracias Elder Wride” and then had someone else read the right one.

It took a couple minutes for me to process what had happened, but I’m still cringing super hard at myself. 

Comp

My new comp is great. Especially during the first couple days, you always try to be on your best behavior. It had just rained and he was shaking the water off his umbrella and was like “isn’t this cool?”. I thought that was weird but was like “dang Elder that’s sweet”. But apparently he wasn’t talking about the umbrella, he was talking about some tourist thing that we had walked by that looked cool. He had just happened to be shaking the water off of his umbrella at the same time. But I was just so committed to agreeing with everything that I told him the way he shaked the water off of his umbrella was cool. It was funny. 

Puerto Plata!

This is probably the coolest place I have ever been in my life. I can’t even describe it. Like you guys don’t even know. There’s this whole world over here and I wish you could experience it like I am. 

It’s a concrete jungle. It’s SO cool! We live like a 2 minute walk from where the craziness starts. You walk down the street, into a little alley way, and the whole world changes. It looks like it’s from Dr. Suess. Just insane hills everywhere with crazy buildings. It’s a maze. And then if you walk down another alleyway it opens up another whole new world with tons more houses and buildings. Ahhh I wish I could explain it better. But it is absolutely the coolest thing ever. 

My area is right by the beach. We live like a 5 minute walk from it. So in the mornings we have been going running on the beach. It is so sweet. I literally cannot even describe how much I love the area. But what makes it really good, as always, is the people. Because all of the houses are super close together it’s really easy to find people to teach. And the ward is so awesome. There’s a lot of members so we get fed a lot. Which I need big time because I’m getting too skinny. I want you all to see me when I’m fat.

El Apartamento

Puerto Plata is super touristy and cool, but we’re still in a third world country. A lot of these things I’m used to, but it’s still funny. When I first got here we didn’t have water for the first couple of days. It was rough. Water is so essential to our survival haha. So we had to take buckets over to this emergency water supply and fill it up. We used all of that to shower and clean for a few days. As I stood there in my broken little bathroom showering with my little bucket of water I had the thought, “wait, this isn’t normal”. But it is now! I would never have done anything like that before the mission. 

The bathrooms have some problems, and water is hard to get. When we do have a water supply it comes from the tank behind the apartment. And if we ever want to use the sink or anything, we have to flip a light switch or it doesn’t work. Weird stuff like that. 

The mosquitos are interesting here. I was happy to get mine set back up. Makes me feel like a jungle man. My comp hasn’t been using the mosquito net and his ankles are bleeding from bites haha. 

We have this kid named Daury who lives in the apartment next to us. He’s a member and he’s super cool and also super annoying. He basically lives with us and speaks broken english so it’s a lot of fun. He made us jello last night that was super nasty. 

Also my shower is pretty funny. There’s just a PVC pipe sticking out of the bottom of the wall and when I turn the water on, instead of coming from the top it shoots from the bottom. Not sure how to fix that.

Motor Bikes

I haven’t been good at getting all the insane stuff that happens here in my weekly’s. My bad. Some of it just seems normal. Like I didn’t think to tell you guys last week about when we were walking and a motorcycle flew at like 60mph through the air in front of us and into a ditch. We probably would have been decapitated if we had been closer haha. It was nuts though. I saw the bike fly and crash, so me and my comp sprinted over there. I was totally ready to see a dead guy, but by some miracle he was alive. In the air he had landed in the different side of the ditch. When he came out, he was covered in mud. I though it was blood at first and was ready to whip out my oil vile and bless him haha, but yea it was just mud. He did have a dislocated shoulder though (at least). And the car that hit him just drove away which was pretty messed up. 

Motor Bike #2

This is a cool story! So a few days ago we saw another motorcycle accident. We heard a crash and turned around just in time to see the guy face-plant on the cement. So we sprinted over there to help him out. He was okay. His bike was kinda broken though. We helped him up and helped him move his bike. We didn’t really know what else to say and had to go to another lesson so I handed him our number and told him to text us if he needed anything. A couple hours later we got a text from a lady who told us that her husband was the one from the accident and she wanted to thank us for being there for him. 

My companion has been in this area longer than me and saw the lady’s whatsapp picture and said that he’s met her before. He said a few weeks ago she was driving by and pulled over and told them that she is looking for a church and asked where the church is. They told her, but haven’t seen her since. 

So we talked more to her over whatsapp and invited her to church and she said she would come because her and her husband have been looking for one. Pretty sweet! Basically we lost contact with an elect lady until her husband face-planted in the cement and now we’re gonna teach the family! I’m super hyped about it. 

Sax Guy

We met with a member this week who has a tenor saxophone. I told him that I play and he let me go at it for a few minutes. It was magical. I totally forgot that I even did that with my life before. So I let out a lot of stress I was feeling through the horn and it was pretty sweet. I also played some hymns like “praise to the man”. It was cool. 

The Book of Mormon

This week I grew a lot spiritually. I’ve been feeling empty lately and it was driving me nuts. So I decided to start the Book of Mormon over again but in english, and decided that I would mark every time it refers to Christ. I had been reading the Book of Mormon every day, but in spanish. I was also in the war chapters so I feel like I wasn’t getting spiritually filled like I could have been. 

After just a few minutes of reading, the light came back and I felt such peace in my heart. The days since that have been amazing. 

It’s Probably Going to Happen

Me and my comp were having a spiritual discussion about the last days. He told me about how he was reading in Jacob 5, the coolest chapter ever. Basically it runs through the whole world history in a really cool way. It goes over the apostasy, restoration, and so forth. Then the last part of the chapter talks about the servants going to prune the vineyard one last time. In other words, the missionary force going out to preach the gospel one last time before the Savior comes again. And then, the last verse of the chapter - 

“And then cometh the season and the end; and my vineyard will I cause to be burned with fire”

Super intense. My companion then said, “you know, everything else it talks about in this chapter has already happened. So this is probably going to happen too. 

And it’s true! I’m seeing it first hand out here. The Lord is coming soon. 

We went to the beach today so I don’t have time to write everything that I wanted to. Sorry. But I love you guys! Hopefully next week I’ll have more time because I have a lot of cool things on my mind. I also had a couple times this week where I would read a scripture about Christ and just get major chills. I feel like I am getting to know Him a lot better out here. I hope I can remember all of these feelings I’m getting. 

Love you guys

- Elder Wride