5/23/11

NO MANCHES!!!! ya tengo siete meses aqui en la mision!! Es increible las cosas que he aprendido y todos los milagros que han pasado desde el principio. Espero que me vaya a tener mas antes que me salga. Ok, since probably like 10 of you know what i just said, ill just go in english now and you can have fun translating that! :)

Well, everything here is going great. THe weather is nice, rains like every other day, the work is moving forward like no other here, and we are getting ready to have some more baptisms! If i stay here, which is not looking very possible since i have 6 months here already in 2 weeks, i will not be around for them. But, it is totally ok with me. I am so grateful for the work that i have been able to accomplish here in this area. I will never forget it, the people i have met, the experiencias  that i have been able to imprint in my mind will never leave. It is so crazy how much a mision can change someones life so fast!! I wouldnt have it any other way!!

The family of Angelica y Vicente are doing great! We had a split this friday night, and elder bingham was in the church doing service with helping mahonry set up for his wedding recepcion, and i went with Angel, one of the recent converts. We had a great lesson with Angelica, Vicente, Alex and Oscar. It was incredible, they all read!!!!  I was so happy, and we got to go over some of the things that they right. Vicente wanted to know why in the world Nefi cutt off the head of laban, so i explained that it is better than one man die, than a whole nacion and he understood that pretty well. They all accepted the commitment to read and pray every day as a family and personally to know when they should set a baptismal date! It was such a great spirit, a lesson that i will never forget!!

This week, we also had some really sweet FHE with like half the branch! It was really fun, last monday we played futbol and had a carne asada and elder bingham and i shared a message about how important it is to do service to others, but not only with things like landscaping or worldly things. The most important act of service that we can do is open our mouths and share what we know with others. DOnt be afraid to be told no. Trust me. If you never ask, the answer is already no. You cant be afraid to talk to friends, neighbors, family members, and just ask. I testify that that is how it is done. People need what we have, and if we deny them that chance of having it because we are too scared to be told no, then something has got to change! Us as missionaries need you!!

We also had a great FHE last night with our branch mission leader, and the other 3 families that live in his house! We went through the plan de salvacion pamphlets and we talked about the importance of our life here on earth. We not only need to be baptized and recieve the holy spirit to live in the presencia de our father in heaven, but we have to Endure to the end. The hardest part. I know that if we do though, that we will recieve the blessings that our father in heaven has is store for us. We have to show him how much we want it! We need to remember that the power that we have to do what we do, comes not from us, but from Him. So why not go to him in times of need? I have seen that out here, the people, they need that direction. They need someone to tell them what is best, and that is what my job is. I know that in the end, it will be their decision whether or not to accept it, but that is what we are here for. To use our agency and get back to live with him by choosing the bien.

SOmething else that i also realized this week, is that it is impossible for us to conquer a sin or a threat unless we recognize it. We need others help to do that. THat is when charity comes in. Charity is something that has truly been hard to show sometimes out here, when people dont accept the best thing this life has to offer, but i realized that we cant expect to pull charity from out of ourselves. It doesnt come from us. The only person that has it is Jesucristo. We get it from him, and through that gift that many people in this world have recieved, we are able to show the pure love of christ to others! I love having the opportunity to do that as a missionary! We were able to bless a home yesterday, give a man, who isnt even a member, a blessing of comfort, and this morning to comfort a dominican lady, Maria del Carmen, as she is trying to make it through a prgnancy at like 50 years old. I love having opportunities like these to show that pure love of christ. What a blessing it is!!

This sunday, we had a stake conference, but it was alive broadcast from salt lake, and we were able to hear from elder nelson and eyring and a few others. It was a really good experience, and there were a good amount of members in both church buildings and at the stake center in dover. I was really impressed by elder Eyring, he talked a lot about the spirit and how we need to be worthy to have it. Brought me to Ether 2:15 when the lord explains to the brother of jared that his spirit will not always strive with the children of men. How sad a truth that is, but that just makes it even harder to maintain it! DO all you can to be worthy to have that spirit as a guide in your life.

Mahonry and Deicy got sealed this saturday! And we were able to go to the recepcion at the capilla and it was cool, because i was able to say a few words of ohh what are they called, uhh like encouragement i guess?? I cant remember the word in english...anyways, so yeah that was cool, edgar did all his sweet dancing with his wife karen. He is totally going to be the DJ at my wedding thats for sure. Spanish music is so legit! Well, thats about all for this week. Sorry if my emails are too long, nyal says theyre novels, so i guess ill try to not write so much :) Hey thanks for the letter Nyal, and Tyler, i hope you got mine, i sent it like a month ago...and Jade, MY address is 806 North Harrison Apt #1 Wilmington, DE 19806- so hope that helps you get in touch with me. I cant write emails to anyone other than my family. Well, family and friends, i love you all hope you have a great week!! Just remember, always eat your vegetables, moms know what they are talking about!! (more to that after the mission :)

Elder Gallego

5/16/11

Allllllrighty then!! This week, was well, slower than normal, but we definately were super busy! Its a little wierd how that works out, but it just does! I got to learn so much again this week! I love how out on the mission, i have just been able to have those days that are a feast of the spirit!! I am loving it right now, my companion and i have really caught stride together, and through a lot of hard work and diligence, he has been able to finally get it! I am so grateful for this, because now i have noticed that we have the spirit with us more and that we have really been able to have some very effective in depth lessons, especially with a lot of the recent converts and less actives here. Our church attendance has dropped under 100 for the past 3 weeks now, but that is what happens. Mexicans here have to work basically all day long. They all have 2 some 3 jobs, so they havent been able to really be as "on" as they were earlier. We are still making great progress though!!

I want to give a little rundown of a couple cool things that happened this week- i have a portugese book of mormon now and am learning rapidamente, we were able to get DIRTY!!!!- yeah 5 hours of landscaping!!!! Totally made my week, basketball on saturday was a great turnout, and was a great workout, i have lost 15 pounds this week somehow...i was able to eat at DAIRY QUEEN!!! yeah that was awesome, and we left our keys in the church one day, so the next morning there was a window open somehow, and my companion hoisted me in and it was awesome!! also, yesterday, some of the members let their kids have a waterballoon fight outside, and so i go out just to see, and i get lit up!! Also about 2 cups, no i think 3 cups of water poured on me. Yeah it was pretty intense, and i wasnt even playing!! :( haha cant care! it was so humid, i never did dry hahaaha so i felt really good the rest of the day!

Ok so there is some of the crazier stuff that has happend this week, but i wanna get to some really SWEET stuff!! Well, we did make contact with Elia again, said her phone was broken and that she would be at church this week, wasnt there, so we are going to give her some time for a bit, let her get things situated with moving out and all that. We found una familia nueva and....oh man i cant even remember their names....one of them was like nacho libre when he is introducing encarnacion..."aqui ninos, we have a new teacher, who hails from the wajaca montanas of the southern de mexico de san joses...brothers sisters cousin de.....guadalupe." hahaha something crazy that made me think of that! it was great, but her and her 2 daughters and son are referalls de erika, fani and isaak! SO we already have the fellowshipping going great and they look to be very promising!!

We have also been working very closely with Angelica and Vicente and almost set a date with them, but will wait until this next week! Their son that has 15 years, when i asked him what he would like to learn more about so that i could give him a good chapter to read en el libro de mormon, he told me everything...i was totally speechless, and i had to like get myself back into the zone! haha it was so strong, i cant descibe the spirit. I was reading nyals letter of the experience that he had with the two woment that were crying together and how they bore powerful testimony of the book de mormon and how he explained the spirit as tangible, well i have yet to have one of those experiences!! It is so cool to learn from other missionaries, especially my best friend, and to hear how the spirit feels to others. For me, its just always there, sometimes stronger, sometimes not as strong. But for me, i really notice it when it leaves. That is what really catches my attention. So Nyal, keep doing what your doing companero, youre going to hit some really good pockets of people out there if you keep doing that! I pray and hope that one day i can have an experience with the spirit being tangible! But, back to the story, alex, the one who has 15 years, he really is into it, and same with his little brother oscar. Angelina and Vicente are progressing well, they just need to all come to church now!! when we were teaching them about the introduction of the book of mormon this friday pasado, i noticed something that i had never noticed before. And that is that it is so hard to explain el libro de mormon if you havent read it! I am so greateful for the testimony i have gained of the veracidad of el libro de mormon and how much it has helped me understand the lamanitas y nefitas! It is such an incredible story , and it is like Nyal has mentioned, it would be so much easier if people would just read it!! Man I LOVE IT!!

Ive been thinking this week, and since i have really been focusing on how to become more like the savior in everything i do, insted of most of it, i have come to really start to understand the differencia de pride and humility. A humble person doesnt say things to make himself seem less, and a prideful person just doesnt talk about anything else other than himself. I have really come to recognize when i am being prideful, and it has really helped me! A lot of times, i honestly just cant give myself credit or accept a compliment, and i just say algo like how much better i could be doing or no thats not true, and im not being humble!! So, i am working on that, and i know that the lord will be there to help me along the way! How grateful i am for the lord, and for all that he does for me personally! I love being a minister to his children!! We have to constantly develop our talents, and look for other ways to keep using what the lord has given us, and make it better. Dont be like the man in the parable of the talents, when jesus gave him money, and when he came back, to find it burried in the earth because he was afraid to lose it all. Be lilke the others who invested in their money and gained more!

How many times have we wasted some of the oportunidades to crecer our talents? I know i have! But i also know that we all have one talent at the minimum, and we need to consistently strive to develop more! OK??  Be like nefi when the lord gave him the liahona, and after breeaking his bow, and his own father and brothers murmurring against the lord, he tood a stick and a piece of wood and went to his father and asked him "Father where should i go to find food?" What a humbling time for lehi, caught in the act of murmurring against the lord, he had to humble himself, and pray, while getting chastised by the lord and the lord then reminded him of the liahona, and they realized that the needles only functioned according to the faith, diligencia, and attencion that they put to the liahona. I know and testify that each one of us have a liahona in our lives, it is called the spirit. It only functions according to our faith, diligencia and attencion que pongamos en ella. What an incredible story, one that i really got a lot out of and hope that you do as well! Its so amazing the book of mormon!!

We had a ZOne conference this week, one of the members of the 6th quorum of the seventy came and spoke to us, Elder Smith. It was really cool! We learned about how when the lord asked peter if he loved him, and 3 times peter said yes, and then the lord said then feed my sheep forever! Being a missionary is a lifetime calling the way i look at it! Same as being a member! We all have to reamember that we can do it together, and that it is a commandment from the lord to be an example to the unbelievers. What a great great man out savior is. It is so much easier to do this when we do as DyC 27:13-18 says and put on the whole armor of God! I have a coin that i have kept with me every day of my mission in my pocket that helps me remember to put on the whole armor of god and pray always! I love you dad thank you for that!! It is so much better, you feel much happier when you have the whole armor of god on. Dont be like the lamanites when in the time of battle, were naked of armor. They were destroyed so many times because of their nakedness, and the nefitas had that armor on, they ended up all dying in the end, but i hope you get my point. When we are armed completamente, the fiery darts of the adversary will not be able to penetrate!

I was able to speak in sacrament yesterday, and i chose to speak on Desires. Everything we do starts with a desire. Our desires show us our priorities, our priorities control our decisions, and and those decisions lead to our actions. How are you with all those? I hope and pray that we can really look deep down and find out how are our desires. In the book of mormon it teaches us that our desires are most recognized by the things that we search for. So i challenge all of you to look down deep, and find out what you can change, and how you can change it. It all starts with a desire to change! I love you all, i know that the book of mormon is true, it truly is the word of god. Read it , and pray about it and i testify that you will recieve an answer that it is true!

Elder Gallego

5/9/11

Well, i wont lie at all, that was really hard hearing all my family yesterday! I definately needed that good boost of encouragement and love and just the great support my famiily is! I know that families are so important and that they are the only way that we can learn the correct principles that we need to know in this life! Heavenly father has sure blessed me with a perfect family! Thank you all so much for that yesterday! I didnt want to hang up, but you gotta do what you gotta do!! I cant wait until i get to call back again in 7 months! Chandler and alec both sound older than i do, especially alec, he sounds like dad!! Alyssa, you sound like mom. Dad, you sound a little different, i dont know why, tanner...well you still have your same high squeeky voice :) And Grandma, i loved hearing your voice again!! It has been so long!! Trevor, you sound like trevor!! Just the little goofball you are!! :) I sure do love all of you and am so grateful for all of your love and support that you constantly give me and all of the great things that we tallked about yesterday! It was definately something that will hopefully carry me over for the next 7 months!!

Ok so to the rest of the world who reads this, i am doing great!! well, i am now! So i ended up in the hospital on friday morning at about 4:30, had some crazy allergic reaction to something, and i left the hospital worse than i came in! But i am not going to get into details, i am still alive and breathing so that is good! :) I do testify of the power of the priesthood and the power of healing that those blessings are! I am so grateful to have that blessing in my life and for the opportunity i have to be a witness of its healing power! Definately the most pain i have ever been in my entire life, and i am so glad that it is over!! ALso i did hear about osama bin laden, that was pretty cool, lets hope that we dont get bombed again or something because i am over here on the east coast, a lot closer than all you out west!!

The work here is kind of like a roller coaster, its up and down, but the downs are just normal from what i have been told. My whole mission so far has been just crazy busy, that i havent known what its like to not be packed every day all day! We are making a lot of efforts with trying to find new people and get done what we can with the ones that we had progressing. Elia has not been returning our calls since her baptismal date fell through, so that has been a really hard hump for me personally to get over. It is so hard to see someone progress so fast, and read the whole libro de mormon and then not be able to get baptized, and then have no contact at all. It has been something that i will have to keep working on, i have to keep reminding myself that it isnt what i want to happen, but what the lord already has planned. His ways are always bettter than ours! I know and testify of that to be true!!

Adelphy and her daughters are also being a little ohh whats the word in english, well its floja in spanish, whatever that means in english. They havent been keeping our appointments and her daughters want to be baptized, but it just seems like now it is adelphy who has got some concerns, which is great, i just wish that she would tell us! It makes us more sad when people just dont tell us why they dont want to see us, instead of them just telling us! Just tell us so we can know! But, its all a matter of time, and patience. Remember change isnt easy, and it cant happen over night!! I surely am blessed as a missionary thoguh, and i am trying to make sure that every day i am giving thanks to the lord for all of the many blessings that i have! We are also still making some slow but little progress with Victor Perez, the eternal investigator, and now his sister, Maria! She asked for a blessing this past week for her shoulder, and it was a really cool experience! They didnt show up to church, but we will keep them in our sights! I feel like the lord has some plans for them real soon!!

We have been making some really great progress with the new family, Angelica and Vicente. They have 2 sons also, Alexis and Oscar! They are very interested, and are actually a referral from a brand new recent convert and her two children that are alexis' age! So we had a great lesson with them about the restoration and i asked them to set a baptismal goal, i have figured that the word "goal" works better from the start than a date. But they said that they didnt want to commit just yet, and that they would pray and read the book of mormon as a family and have an answer for us this coming friday! So i am super excited to see them again! They are so ready to recieve the blessings of this gospel and all of the great things that come from following and Living the commandments of god!

Yesterday, our lesson in Gospel priciples was about Lucas 15- and how in that story, it gives two great parables! The lost sheep and the prodigal son. It is so important to always remember that nobody is ever lost. They have to just be led back to the path. There is no such thing as someone who is just "hopeless" or just not worth talking to! This is eternal life that we are talking about here!! It is always worth trying to help someone come back to what they had before. I know that i am so grateful for those that helped me find the path again, because i was one of those wandering sheep, that needed a little help to come back to reallity. And i am so grateful for the support that i recieved and most importantly, just the love of those around me. If we show people how much we really do love them, then they will have a desire to change. But if we just tell them they have to change or have to do this or that, they have no reason. I have really found it a great finding tool as a missionary to ask for those that might need a little bit of help in their life! The simple acts of Charity, love and service have been so helpful for  me, though i wish i could do more service, i have really enjoyed being able to see the light of christ in those people, and see their desire to do better! It is our job as members to be those that help bring everyone back to the fold. To gather all of the sheep that have gone astray.

I hope and pray that each one of us can find those that might need just a little more love, and give it to them. Show them that you really want to be a part of their life and see their happiness, and i promise that you will be able to see the sucess! I am so grateful for the many blessings that i have been given as a missionary and as a member of this church! I hope and pray that all of you are doing great,a nd know how grateful i am for all that you have done to help me! Thank you for everything! Mom, Happy Birthday on Wednesday, and i love you!!

Elder Gallego

5/2/11

Ooook!! Well, i hope everyone is all buckled up and ready to go, because this has been not only a very difficult week, but a spiritual feast for sure! Definately what i needed, and i can testify that the lord truly does answer prayers, and that if we do all that we can and take the advice from the scriptures of Ask, seek, and knock, then we will find. And we will then have the blessings of recieving personal revelation, something that makes being a missionary possible! I am so grateful for personal revelation, and the ability and trust that i have in my savior and father in heaven to go to them at any time, and ask for the things that i need. This is truly one of the many, yet very simple blessings that i have seen on my mission, and one of the major strengths to the testimony that i have of this Gospel!

To start off with a quick runndown of what happened this week so that my emails can be un poco mas entendible, i want to make sure i focus! :) So, my companion and i have started to play basketball every morning at 5, and that has really helped us both have a great boost of energy during the middle of the day! Also, we had just about the funniest tracting experience the other day. So we are outside talking to some people, and a black girl comes up to the door next to me, i say hi and stuff, and then she opens up the door and in her amazing black accent yells (which is normal for them, they dont know how to just talk theyre always yelling) anyways she yells "OH BABY DAT FISH STANK!!" hahahahahaah i didnt understand it at first, but then my comp just starts dying laughing, and i was of course so that i could act like i knew what she said and be cool- then he looks at me and says, "Did you  hear what she said?" im like uhhh kinda, but i didnt understand what she said right after OH BABY! So he told me and i laughed so hard that i almost hurled! It was so hilarious, one of those ones that you just have to be there!! ALso, i ate macorroni and cheese, i figured that could definately make it into the weekly highlight reel of Elder Gallego, seeing as how i havent ate american food in like ohh 6 months! OH!! SO i weighed myself last night at edgars....actually moroni.....and i am 173.6!! That is like 20 pounds up!! DAHHHH!!!!! I dont know where it is all going!! I seriously am not fat!! Im sure it is going somewhere, but i thought youd all like to know, that if yougo spanish speaking, BUCKLE UP!! THey love to feed the missionaries!! Also, this week we had a really cool activity with some recent converts at the park, just some sports, and a waterballoon fight, and then the heavens decided to open up on us as we were eating pizza and getting ready to teach the restauracion to some of their nonmember friends that they brought and we got soaked. When it rains here, they dont mess around. It pours!!!! Also, jonny got the priesthood yesterday!

Ok so that was a long parafo, so i thought i would start a new one! Also, thursday morning our car got broken into! They shattered the drivers side window with what looks like a car antenna...or some massive black mans fist! ANd they stole my comps GPS. So that was a pain, but idk, we were pretty calm about it! I guess thats what happens when you turn into a missionary. At home, i wouldve flipped!! But, juct cant care! We had Zone training that day as well, and so it was really annoying! But i got a lot out of zone training and it was definately something i needed to hear! They talked about the 6 D's of life, and how these 6 D's ultimately lead to a falling away. Doubt, Discouragement, Distraction, Lack of Diligence, Disobediencia, and Disbelief. I have felt like this week i have had too much doubt, i really have been letting it get to me. I am now seeing that its not always easy. We are still making progress here, but it also seems like were not. Elia, and adelphy havent answered one of our phone calls since last saturday, didnt come to church, and it has just been frustrating! I have been forgetting about how important it is to always have hope, because if we dont have hope, then we cant have faith. ANd if we have no faith, well we have nothing going for us! It is so important to always have hope, and faith. I have a lot of faith, and i know that only through trials can our faith grow, but i guess i just got so caught up in all the success that i have been having that i just sort of gave up a little when the people that we have been teaching seem to have done. It is a great lesson learned. Dont Give up. Talk to others about the problems that you have. If you keep it in, it will all just explode at once, and then it will just be a big mess. I finally got some tears out because i have been a bit frustrated with my companion and the things that havent been happening that should be happening. I am learning though and that is where the key is.

We have to realize that faith that is exercised and the answer is recieved, might not always be what we want it to be! What we want wont always match what he has planned for us. It is important to remember that the lords will is always better than ours! For that, we need to always be ready to recieve revelacion! The atonement makes this possible, and through the atonement, we can be made clean and be able to recieve those answers that we need. We have to remember to do our part if we want him to do his! Repentance is such a wonderful blessing. I wouldnt be here without it! I am so gratful for the opportunity that i have had to learn of the atonement and what it entails. I know and testify that it is real, that you can and will be cleansed of those things that burden your life every day if you just humble yourself before the lord, and ask for his help. Consider repentance like tears that fall on the outside, but wash the inside clean. It is amazing to see what happens when we truly repent! Listen to the spirit and realize that the lords ways are higher than our ways. He will never lead us astray!

ALso, i want to stress the importance of family prayer, and how it is such an essential habit to get in to. I know that i am grateful for the opportunity that i had to grow up having that opportunity. THis helps the family to grow together and understand how everyone is doing, by the things that they ask for in their prayers. That way, we can all help eachother out! That is what it is all about! Servie, love and Charity! We are nothing without those! I know and testify of the importance of these things, and know that if we rise up to our callings, and stive to fulfill them, he will give us strength to do so! I love you all and give thanks for your love and support!

Elder Gallego