Alicante

Oh my gosh it is soooo HOT!!! 

Hi everyone :)

So I am now in alicante and it only took 8 hours to get here in bus! My companion is Elder Merchán and he only knows how to speak spanish. My dream come true! :D Alicante is one of the best areas I´ve been to so far haha. But really, there ward is so strong and the members are helping us a ton. We are always finding new people to teach and this ward is on fire. We set two fechas on the first day I got here and we found two more who we are setting fechas with next week. It is the best to finally be rolling in the work!!

Fun fact. So I have been with the same missionary since I got to the MTC. His name is Elder Medina. We were both in the MTC together, then we both got reassigned to Texas, then we both went to Malaga to be in the same zone, then we took the same bus and now we live in the same apartment in Alicante :P .

Anyway. There isn´t really alot to tell. It was kind of a weird week haha. Monday and Tuesday we went by all the members, recent converts and investigators that we were teaching. (Mom and dad you are going to love the people in Malaga. :))

It was hard to say goodbye to them :(

Wednesday. Said goodbye to my first born son in the mission and then travelled all day to get to alicante. We got a warm welcome with police dogs who sniffed out the bus for a guy who was carrying marijuana! That was crazy! The rest of the week was back to good ´ol work :)

Oh just kidding!

STORY!:   So it was the end of the night and we were planning when we heard this huge crash. Yep. Car accident right infront of our piso. Elder Medina and I ran out and started helping this guy who was laying on the ground. He was riding a moto and slammed into the car and then flew over the car and was now on the ground. Sooo... he was pretty much in a lot of pain. We held his head and direct everyone around us to call the police, get water, you know, the normal stuff. So about three police cars come speeding up and they took control and started helping the guy. Yay :)

Then they started talking and said that this wasn´t their call. they all got back into their cars and raced off! What!

So while we were waiting, this crazy guy stretches out his hand and says he has been called of god and does all this whispering stuff to heal him. In the mean time there were these two ladies freaking out.

Anyway, in the end the abulance came and we went back to our piso :)

Other than the police dogs and ambulances it was pretty good.

 

Christ is one of my favorite topics to study. Obviously he should be everyones focus all the time but I have been focusing and working on the Attributes of christ for quite some time and I´m noticing a difference in myself as a missionary.

Christ asks us to follow Him and a way to do that is to learn and take upon ourselves his attributes.

As I´ve studied them and applied them I have more.... everything; energy to work, animo to serve, love for the people, patience with our investigators, faith in god, Power to teach, Spirit to guide, and knowledge in all aspects.

The blessings are infinite. I love this work. I love the mercy of the lord. And..... I love being a missionary. :)

 

Follow christ in all aspects! I promise you that you will receive exactly the things you need as you do so.

 

Love ya,

Elder Powell

 

Ope, and New Address:

Plaza Del Altozano 3, Primero D

03010 Alicante, España

Transfers :)

Woo!! My first REAL transfer :)

News of the week: Ok more like news of the mission experience. It never slows down!! Ever!

I went from provo, to texas, to spain, to training a missionary, to being district leader and now I´m being transferred to Alicante to be Zone leader! I´m not going to lie, I´m kind of a little bit nervous. But I´m super excited to go to a new area! I´ve been here in Malaga for 6 months! Thats a fourth of the mission! It was hard to say bye to everyone on sunday. :( It´s like saying goodbye to your family. I will always remember Malaga.

Ok, other awesome news. One of our recent converts just told us the news that she is getting engaged! But even better is that she is getting engaged to the guy that helped us teach her, and they are getting sealed in the temple in a year!  And! They want me to be one of the witnesses! :D I just about passed out it when I heard it :) It was like pure joy! Ahh it was the best. It´s so good to see her progress! :)

We are having three baptisms this week but I won´t be here for it :( It´s kind of strange because we are having a ton of baptisms in the ward but our church attendance is dropping. In the past 6 months we had a church attendance of 150 and 0 baptisms. Now we have about 20 baptisms but attendance of 100 :( We think it is because of the summer vacations. But we are splitting the ward here next month!! 4 wards in Malaga!! Craziness.

Someone broke into the church.... It´s kind of funny because I kind of broke into this house last week. I just kicked open a door A little because I heard them inside and we actually got a new investigator out of it. :) But this was a little worse.

So the zone leaders got a call that someone broke into the church. They headed over expecting a broken window or something. Nope. Someone had broken through the door of an apartment building next door. They then slammed a hole into the wall connecting the apartment building to the church. From the church building they broke a hole into the Apple Store and took all the equipment and then carried it all out through the holes in the church. :P There were detectives and police and it was pretty exciting! But no pictures :( It´s illegal here to take picture of police.

Oh another police story. We were walking up the street and therte was this road block of police vans and about ten police guys. (The police guys here look like SWAT) They were holding machine guns and stopping cars that were trying to get through. Soooo.....   We just went the other way and taught our investigator :) Don´t know what happened.

This week I was shown this great scripture in alma chapter 26.

 22 Yea, he that ^arepenteth and exerciseth faith, and bringeth forth good ^bworks, and prayeth continually without ceasing—unto such it is given to know the ^cmysteries of God; yea, unto such it shall be ^dgiven to ^ereveal things which never have been revealed; yea, and it shall be given unto such to bring thousands of souls to repentance, even as it has been given unto us to bring these our brethren to repentance.

I was reading it again and it is just so awesome. First we need to repent. Everyone knows the things they are doing wrong, so if they can excersize their faith unto repentance they can "change" and they will bring forth good works. While we are bringing forth good works we should pray continually. This is my favorite part; As we pray continually and focus our thoughts on God, our thoughts and intentions will literally be those of gods. He will reveal things to us that have never been revealed. It makes sense. As we focus in that we will be filled with the spirit of god. As we are filled with the spirit of god we will bring thousands unto repentance!

I was also reading in jacob and it was directed right to those who need to repent. It was like a perfect precursor! Jacob widens the wound of those who have sinned to call them unto repentance. Thats in jacob 2 and 3. It talks of the pure and the filthy of heart. And what they need to do and are promised.

That was kind of scrambled. Anyway, I´ll be in Alicante next week! I´ll take a ton of pictures. Love You All.

The mission is the best. :)

Love Elder Powell

Hi :)

Hello Everyone! :)

First. Dad, your email was perfect. You knew exactly what you were talking about and it was exactly what I needed. Thank you:) I love you.

Second. Mom, I´m pretty sure you are the greatest example and mother I could have. When I read about the mothers of the 2000 strippling warriors I think of you. Keep the strength of the lord and keep serving. Love You:)

Third. I´m pretty sure the mission is the greatest thing ever. :) Yep. definitely the greatest thing ever!

This week we saw the hand of the lord. Coolest story ever. So we were teaching this lady in a cafeteria that is part of her apartment complex like we always do. It was really good. She is keeping the law of chastity so that is definitely good :) But! While we were teaching her this guy across the room gets a call and starts talking in ENGLISH. He starts looking at us and we here him say "Yeah I think there are two people from your church here right now." Wait what. Yeah you heard me.

So he walks over to us and says, "do you speak english? There is someone who wants to talk to you." It was a sister missionary from another part of the city. they had contacted this guy a few days ago but they didn´t have his address. So they "happened" to call him. When we "happened"to be in the same complex at the same time. Coincidence, I think not! :) Hasan was muslum. But his friend that he lives with is christian. So we are now teaching him. It´s kind of hard though because he only speaks arabic and a little english..... Good thing we have an Arabic book of mormon. :)

Ok another cool story! We tore about our area book and put a list of EVERYONE we could go by in our area that were futures or old investigators. We did that about four weeks ago and had gone by everyone! No luck for new investigators. Welp on thursday we literally went by our second to last person on the list and...... the person wasn´t home. :( So we went to the last person on the list and..... she had moved :( But! The person who lived there asked us where we were from. And then she said she loves asking LDS missionaries where there are from :) Yeah, she knows who the missionaries are and was receiving the lessons in puerto rico! She is from new york originally so she also speaks english perfectly :) It was just cool to see that the Lord had already planned to reward us for all the work we had prepared and our last option turned out to be a perfectly prepared! We are setting her with a baptismal date tonight!!!

Today I read the the first pages of the book of mormon before first nephi and I felt the spirit so strongly! The restoration is so Powerful and the Book of mormon is proof that it occurred. That Joseph smith saw the Father and His son Jesus Christ. There isn´t a doubt in my mind! Not one doubt. The book of Mormon IS true. As I read the testimonies of the witnesses,the Spirit testified that it was true. It has been confirmed once again to another boy in this world that the Book of Mormon is true. It gives me strength every day to read out of that book.

I love all of you!!!

Until next week, Elder Powell

P.s   I think I am being transferred next week....

Success!! :)

Well before I talk about all the success :) ...... Manuel still isn´t baptized. How annoying is that. We have had super powerful lessons with them and he knows everything is true. He even knows that tithing is a commandment of God! The only thing he is waiting for is to gain the desire to pay it. He came to church fasting the other day and that was sweet. We fasted for him as well and it was awesome to see what happened. First we call him one day just to see how he was doing. (this was thursday after we had just finished our fast) He said he was doing great and was continuing to read and pray and he came across moroni 7!! Moroni 7 pretty much talks about any promptings or decisions that are contrary to god are of the devil. He pretty much applied it exactly to what he was feeling the day before he was SUPPOSED to be baptized. All night he described it as thoughts of paying tithing for the rest of his life was impossible to do. He literally was engulfed with fear and nervousness. So he read in Moroni 7 and recognized what those feelings had been. How perfect is that.

Then on Sunday we had our testimony meeting and three people bore their testimonies on tithing and it was awesome! Super strong spirit. It was funny because he asked if it was planned after the meeting jokingly because of how perfectly it was directed to him. He said it must be a sign :) But he also said he has never felt the spirit so strongly. We are going to meet again this wednesday and then we are praying he will be baptized this Friday. Patience is probably the hardest thing to have in the mission because you can´t force anyone to do anything. It is the worst!! But, that´s ok. I´m feeling good and know he will be baptized :) eventually

The rest of this week we just saw miracles! We found a ton of new investigators, taught more than enough lessons and we just feel great. We went on splits with the Zone leaders and they are the coolest guys ever. I felt like I was with spiritual giants. I now know there is still so much to learn! I thought I knew a lot but.....I was wrong :P

This week I have felt so much love from my heavenly father. The work is tough and sometimes I don´t know how we will do it. But every week it works out. I have been taught specifically on certain things I need to learn. I have faced challenges that are flippin sweet because after you feel so much stronger after. :D And I feel like I´m being prepared by a personal spiritual trainer so that I will be prepared for the rest of my life. It´s like I´m stretched to the very limit every day and then the next day I learn and grow even more. It´s pretty sweet and I am going to be a pretty tall spiritual guy haha ;)

But really this mission is the best. I feel so blessed and know that the Lord knows me personally. It´s good to have the testimony strengthened every once and a while.

I´d Highly recommend the mission :) It´s the best.

Alright, so I only have time to write a list of funny stories because I was looking at a lot of family pictures. Which, by the way, are awesome!!

- Our investigator grows marijuana

- I´ve now been kissed by a spaniard

- sister missionaries can get very emotional sometimes

- Horses can fly

- Beach houses are the best!

- I love the misison :D

 

Love Elder Powell

 

* Alma 37: 36-37

The Mission :)

Hi family! :D

This week was awesome!! It was just like any other week but it was awesome :)

First things first! We had 3 baptisms this week in our ward! None of them were Elder buckways and mine but it was still a great experience. We were trying to have 4 all on the same day but one of our investigators didn´t come to church so he is getting baptized this thursday since he just came to church yesterday! Which I am also stoked about!! :D But it was the greatest. Last week I had an interview for pepe. The spanish guy in the middle of the photo who looks like he just saw santa with how big his smile is. I watched him progress so much these past months and he didn´t pass his interview for a few things. but then I interviewed him again this week and it was amazing how firmly the spirit confirmed that he should be baptized :) The Nigerian, Emmanuel, was a guy Elder Jones and I found 4 months ago! and then the area split so the other Elders started teaching him..... but it was great to do his final interview. :) He only speaks English but he is pretty confident that he will have the gift of tongues since he received the gift of the Holy Ghost. It was so hillarious because I told him he needed to be there sunday to receive the Holy ghost. He said, "Of course I will be there! How Else am I going to learn this language if I don´t have the spirit. :)The cuban lady, Lilia, is just the sweetest lady ever. Not much more to say.

Anyway it was one of the strongest spiritual services I have been in for a long time. It was so powerful. Elder Cortés baptized all three of them and he said he felt like john the baptist. :D Ahh baptisms are the greatest.

This past week I learned a lot about following and recognizing the spirit! I really don´t know how to teach about or share my experiences but I know that everyone should learn how to follow the Spirit. :P I have just been experimenting through prayer and asking our Heavenly father to give me experiences so I can better understand the spirit. Then experiences come! :D It´s almost like god answers prayers or something :P Really though, I have never been so close to the lord, so close to the Spirit, and...... had so many trials. We still aren´t having a lot of success as far as the work goes but this past week has been a huge success in my personal growth. There is a reason for everything! For these past few weeks it turned out that the challenges strengthened me spiritually :)

And Now we have a baptism this week!!!! :) Joy, is the best word to describe my feelings for it :)

Ok so right now we are in a locutorio and this guy is going crazy next to us. I don´t know what is wrong with him but he is jammin out hard core with his headphones on and he is moaning really loudly. You find some crazy people in the locutorios :D

 

Now its time for some missionary experiences that happen in the mission. I am just going to mention them briefly.

We were playing futbol on P day and Elder Skousen who lives with us was tripped, flew into a wall, and it turns out he cracked and chipped all the bones in his wrist! Oops :P

We were with a recent convert family and the wife ended the prayer in the name of the father and then the husband did the closing prayer and ended in the name of the holy ghost. I think we know what we will be teaching them next time :)

My companion played basketball against an investigator..... but he was in church shoes. So he rolled his ankle and it is now completely black, purple and swollen. He is fine though :)

We had two birds fly into our piso. The first one we found in our kitchen. So we caught it and then through it out our window. About three hours later a similar looking bird flew in through the window. That was chaos!

There were some other cool things but I got to go.

 

I love you all. The mission is the best for the spiritual experiences, hard experiences, joyous experiences, and especially the memorable crazy experiences. :D I love It!

 Love Elder Powell