It Ain't Easy

Change is hard. Everyone knows it but wow it seems to always be harder than I hope. Leaving Pueblo Nuevo was one of the hardest things ever. The ward members and Investigators were some of the best people I have ever met and I miss them so much. But with change comes new and exciting things!

Out here in Nagua is A LOT different than in the city. A lot more quiet at times, the beach, and a 4 elder apartment. It is for sure a place I'm still adjusting to. Speaking of my apartment it is Elder Spangler (My comp), Elder Yee, and Elder Villanueva. My comp and I are very very different people but still here for the same purpose to serve others. Elder Yee and I are a little more alike so that is nice, and Elder Villanueva is from Mexico so he only speaks Spanish which is fun. 

Now for the area. The beach is beautiful. Not gonna lie if there wasn't the beach in this area it would kinda suck. I remember my first day walking through the area and I was like oh boy but then we walked down the street for 5 mins and there was the ocean and it just made it all better. Scenery here is beautiful, work is hard. 

We are teaching a solid like 5 people. 3 of them have baptism dates. One of them is named Maria and she is a legend. She LOVES the Book of Mormon and coming to church. The first time she met me she was so excited and yesterday she told us she wants me to baptize her but we will see what happens haha. When I was having personal study on Friday I read about the feelings of the spirit. One of them was Joy. Later in the day we went to Marias house and read from Alma with her. The amount of Joy she was feeling and I felt was amazing. I knew for a fact it was the Spirit there confirming the truthfulness of the Book of Mormon. 

Overall pretty good week. Long long week for sure but all is well just gotta keep grinding. My Pday is cut short today because we have a mission activity tomorrow so sorry if I don't get to respond to everyone today. 

Love you all! Read the Book of Mormon so you too can feel the joy it has to offer. I have about 80 pages left so I need to grind it this week to finish for the new year. I know that Book is true. have a great week! 

 

-Elder Wilde 

Peace out Pueblo Nuevo

Growing up I always thought that being the youngest sucked. People always told me that I get whatever i want or that my parents were harder on my siblings then they were me and what not. Those were things I hated hearing but turns out they are 100% true haha. One other thing that I got to benefit from is having 3 siblings and now 2 In-laws that have served missions before me. Without them my mission would be looking a lot different. 

One way that my siblings have helped me is by giving me weekly advice on how to adapt or better my missionary service. My brother Carter last week helped explain to me why it is important to extend baptismal dates and that it is something you can do as early as the first lesson with someone. With the help of his advice we put 2 of our friends on date! Renaldo being one of them! We made sure to make it clear that this date was a goal for them to prepare for and they loved the idea of it. 

But now the sad/good news. I won't be here for either of the baptisms because I'm getting transferred! These last 3 months in Pueblo Nuevo have changed my life and the way I look at missionary work more than I ever thought it could. The members in this ward helped me to feel welcomed even when I didn't understand anything that was going on. The investigators and the comps I had helped me to find a real love for this country that I honestly didn't think was there at first. I am so grateful for the time I had in Pueblo Nuevo. 

Hope. This is a topic I chose to study a lot his week in my personal study. One quote from Preach My Gospel that really stuck out to me is "When you have hope, you work through trials and difficulties with the confidence and assurance that all things will work together for your good." My new area is called Soldado A or better known as Nagua. I'm beyond excited for a new chance to meet and teach people in a new area of the DR. I truly have hope that God has children prepared in this area of the DR for me to go and meet and teach.

If there is one thing that I have learned throughout my first 2 transfers in the field, it is that Jesus Christ lives. He loves each and everyone of us. He died for me and for you. Because of him we can change for the better and we can live forever. I love him and I know that he loves me. 

i took a lot more pictures this week. I hope you all enjoy them! Love you all! Have a great week and... read the Book of Mormon! 

-Elder Wilde 

Angelica's siblings

Pedro is GOATED! He speaks English and we love him!

This is Enoc and he is such a good kid. He has his mission call to Guatemala.

The priests from our ward

Me and Jasiel

My comp and I had to travel to Bellavista to do an interview and these kids that we met were killing me with how they were riding and playing on this horse. No joke they had a cord/cable tied in its mouth and the boy basically owned the place on his horse. He would just run up and jump on the horse bare back and ride so fast everywhere! He would chase the other kids and they all just loved it! It was so much fun watching these kids all run around and ride this horse. I am telling you they just know how to have fun and play. They don't need ipads and electronics to have fun, they get outside and make their fun. It was awesome to watch!

There are geckos everywhere! 

Another One

What's up everyone!? To be honest this week was pretty normal and just not that eventful. We worked hard but still had a hard time having much success in the streets. I remember hearing all those talks about how much you get rejected and wow it isn't a joke. Almost everyone we talk to says they don't have time for our lessons or that they just aren't interested right now. Makes it hard but the work a lot more interesting. 

But the good news is we still have a few people we are teaching and slowly progressing. One of them is a guy with the last name Cevelino. It is so hard to remember first names let alone know how to spell them haha. But, he is so cool and really interested in our message. He has a hard time understanding and having time for us but he makes an effort to let us come over which is a good sign. Pray for him to be able to get a week off of work so he can make it to church. 

Now for Yudi. This girl is awesome! She is probably mid 30's and has 2 kids and a "husband" but she is so cool. We found her when we were calling a bunch of random people in our area book trying to clean it. She said we could come over so we did. Turns out she has a Book of Mormon from when she last met with the missionaries in 2019!! CRAZY! Testament that there are always people searching for the truth. We went over the restoration with her cause she didn't remember much but she seems like she has a lot of potential. 

Good week overall. Nothing really funny happened other then the fact that everyone in the street thinks we are the CIA and my comp tells them we are and they all freak out, but like why would the CIA be in this part of the DR lol. 

Love you all! Hope you are reading the good book (Book of Mormon) and remembering the real reason for Christmas. Also happy early birthday to my brother Carter. Love ya dawg! 

Love, 

Elder Wilde

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Exchanges

Hey everybody I hope you all had an amazing Thanksgiving and a great week. This week was a good one and a pretty fast one. We had 2 exchanges this week so I feel like that sped things up. 

First things first exchanges. For those of you who don't know what an exchange is, it is when I go with another missionary and his comp goes with my comp. We had 2 this week and for both of them I was the one who stayed and led my area. It was a good experience and I grew a ton as you could imagine. For one of the Exchanges it was me and Elder Lofthouse. He has the same amount of time as me on the mission so it was a great experience to grow. I truly felt the gift of tongues and interpretation of tongues too. We were able to teach a couple lessons and find a few people and it was so fun. My Spanish grew so much from just that one day. 

One of our investigators name is Renaldo. He is a super cool dude and is progressing but never comes to church. Guess what.. HE CAME! We were sitting in 2nd hour and he still wasn't there and so I said a quick little prayer that he would be able to make it and a few minutes later nothing. I had basically given up and came to the conclusion he wouldn't come. But with about 15 mins left he walked in the door. This was a testament to me to not give up so fast on your prayers. God will always answer your prayers even though it my take a little longer than you'd like. 

We also have a family we are teaching but it is kinda a tough situation for a weird kinda funny reason. 2 of the people are interested and want to come to church and hear the gospel. The other girl just wants to talk to us and flirt cause we are white. We are about to break her heart this week when we tell her our purpose is to bring others to Christ not to the states. 

Overall the work is slowly moving. Angelica still comes to church so this week we are gonna invite her to baptism again and talk with her parents praying that they will accept it for her. Only 2 weeks left in this transfer and I really want to see her get baptized. Pray for her please and that her parents hearts can be softened. 

I say it every week but read the Book of Mormon. If you read my emails and have been seeing that but aren't reading it, Read it. This is for you. I know that book is true. I know that it WILL bring more peace into your life. It WILL make you feel happier. All you have to do is open it and start reading. Love you all so much! Have a great week!

-Elder Wilde 

 

Miracle

Hey everyone! Hope you all had a great week! This week was all over the place for me, but it made it go by really fast which is great haha. 

First things first, last week I had the 2 hottest nights of my life. Since this country is SO hot and we don't have AC we sleep with fans which is great, but it's only great when the power doesn't go out. Well unfortunately last week the power was out for 2 straight nights. So hot and brutal but good times. 

I went to Santo Domingo last week for my residency and it was actually so fun. It is close to a 3 hour ride and the ride is so pretty. The scenery outside of the city where I'm at is beautiful! Makes me excited to see  new areas in the mission. While in Santo Domingo we had to get our blood drawn and that was honestly the worst. I hated it, but I didn't pass out. Only some other missionary did lol. 

We had Zone Conference this week which was amazing. President Breton is such a cool guy and is a spiritual GOAT. We talked about my favorite thing the whole time which is the Book of Mormon. It made me realize that I could be using the Book of Mormon in my teaching way more and way more effectively. It was so good being able to get advice from President on the Book of Mormon.

Lastly I want to talk about a cool miracle we had this week. We are teaching a man named Renaldo. He is so cool and very stubborn. He won't come to church nor will he keep commitments but he wants to keep learning and he is starting to develop a testimony. Before I get into the miracle, no he didn't come to church yesterday which was sad. But anyway we decided to visit him with a member from the ward. The member we chose was Hermano Reyes and he is a goat. He is so intelligent and loves the scriptures. We show up and him and Renaldo awkwardly look at each other for 10 seconds and then boom a huge laugh goes off and they are good friends. Who would have thought. The Lord was for sure in on that whole process of picking who we should take to him. The lesson we had was great and I know the Spirit was there. This was a huge testament to me that the Lord is in every little part of our lives. 

We are teaching a few others right now but honestly we are having little to no success. People are either "Working" or "Catholic" so it makes it really hard to find people to teach. Please pray for us this week to find some success in the street. Also please pray for Renaldo to gain the desire to act in faith. 

I love you all so much and miss you tons! One thing I learned this week is I need to put more trust in the Lord and have a better hope for things. I caught myself getting down this week but every time I would I said a prayer of hope and things got better. I know Heavenly Father loves you all and that Jesus Christ is His beloved Son who died for me and YOU. Read the Book of Mormon :)

-Elder Wilde

Charity

Hey everyone! I hope you had a great week! Life out here in the DR is literally different everyday but I love it. This week was a good one full of many ups and many downs. 

First off I have already heard all the talks about rejection and how you can't let it get to you, but sometimes it is hard. I have been rejected in life before but never in this way ;) It almost feels like everyone we talk to says "No I'm not interested" or "I believe in God but I don't need your religion"  Just super annoying things we have to deal with I guess. But one thing that I talked about with my family last week and has helped me overcome this is Charity. 

If you know me personally you know that I am a straight up, say it how it is kind of guy. Which can be good OR it can be bad. If we're being honest it is probably more bad. Therefore I have a hard time having a lot of Charity for others because I always pick out the bad first. But this last week I was changing my perspective and it helped me a ton. Every time I would start to have a negative thought about someone I would say "What would Jesus think?" Sounds like a dumb simple answer but I promise you it works. Jesus Christ was the perfect example to us. He loved everyone. John 13 talks about Jesus Christ washing his disciples feet and how we should LOVE one another not just put up with one another. I promise as we try to be more like him we will find more joy and light in others. 

Here's a funny story from this week. We were sitting in the apartment one day during lunch and got a phone call from a random number. We answered and the guy says "I have a question" and we said what is the question he then goes "God is god and Jesus is Jesus right?" we then say yes and he goes "Is Jesus Christ Jehovah?" we say yes and then he hangs up. That was literally it. One of the funniest yet most pointless calls of my life haha. Good times. 

We listened to a talk this week by David A. Bednar. Man is a GOAT. In this talk he explains what it means to fear God. He says "Godly fear is loving and trusting in him" I love this. I think too many times we think that fearing God means to literally have fear of God and what he will do to us, but in reality it is a positive thing. When we fear God we put away out fears, and trust in him. I love this concept!

Overall I'm doing great! Don't get me wrong the mission is so hard but wow it's so worth it. I have already grown more than I ever thought I could. I say it every week and I probably will for the rest of my mission, read the Book of Mormon. I know it is true and I know for a fact when you are in times of trouble or need, the Book of Mormon WILL help you. It is true. I love you all so much and miss you tons! Stay safe and eat Taco Amigo for me ;) 

-Elder Wilde 

Do You Speak English?

So a lot of people in this country think that they speak English. So literally any time anyone who knows how to say hello, when they see us they say hello and we respond in English and they are dead lost. Pretty funny. Also apparently being white and speaking english still confuses people about where we are from. They ask and we say the united state and they all make a face as if they saw pigs flying. Pretty good. This country is insane. 

First off this week was the first week of the Transfer and honestly the longest week of the mission thus far. It just felt so so so slow. I said bye to Elder Fuhriman and that was a lot weirder and harder than I thought. I met my new comp Elder Grimmett and he's cool. It's just weird switching things up. Definitely will have to get used to this whole change every 6 weeks thing. 

We are teaching a lot! We have a lot of people semi interested and 4 people on date for baptism. It's just a little hard because they hate doing productive things in this country so going to church is a big big step for them. My comp and I joke about how they are professional sitters. Like literally from 8 AM to 12 PM  they just sit in a chair in front of their house or colmado. Yet they all "work" and don't have time for the gospel. But it's okay they'll hear it one day even if it's not from me in my broken Spanish. 

Speaking of Spanish the bishop in our ward is amazing and so nice. We had dinner with him and his family on Thursday and he has been my bishop obviously the whole time I've been here and he complimented my Spanish and said I am learning really fast and that sometimes missionaries who have 6 months in the mission don't learn that fast. Also I hit 3 months as a missionary tomorrow wahoo! 

Now for some investigators. We are teaching a guy named Renaldo and his son. They are awesome and have a date. Renaldo likes to argue about a topic and then when we back it up with a scripture from the bible he instantly believes us. He has a strong testimony of the things we teach but he has a very hard time waking up and coming to church.. in fact he hasn't come yet. Please pray for him to gain the desire to come to church. It is so important and we know he will love it once he comes.

We are also teaching this lady named Merlin. Her "husband" Jason is an inactive member who served a mission in Chile. He is pretty cool. I said "married" because everyone in this country is married but none of them actually are married by law cause it's too expensive. But Merlin wants to hear our messages and Jason is open to it and they have been coming back to church. They are planning on getting married so she can be baptized and then waiting a year and going to the temple to be sealed. They have meetings with Bishop frequently. Pray fo them. I am worried because this whole situation is almost too good to be true. 

I love you all so much and miss you daily! But this is the Lords work and I never thought I could find this much joy in sharing this gospel with others. I say it every week but read the Book of Mormon. I know this book is true and it WILL make you feel more peace and give you more guidance in your lives. Pray daily with real intent. Have the best week ever!! 

(Happy Wedding week Kaden and Emily love you guys!!) 

-Elder Wilde