Year 2, Week 42: She Knows Everything

Hello! Yesterday was officially 2 months until the mission comes to an end. I'm not ready for that day to come! It's been an amazing experience and I have learned a lot from being out here. Let's see what happened this week??

We had our Zone Conference with Elder Randall K. Bennett and his wife. He is the area President and has come to our mission 3 times since September 2018. Our conversation ranged from Gifts of the Spirit to who is Elect to following all mission rules with exactness to any other missionary topic under the sun! It was really good and I was really excited to get out and work in the field!

In Cambridge, we have an interesting situation with some members. Before the Waltham Spanish Group was created all members attended Cambridge. When the group was created most members stayed in Cambridge and some broke off to Waltham. So the Waltham missionaries don't visit our members from Cambridge, and we never had permission to go to Waltham to visit members, so those members were never fellowship pedo by missionaries. There are several recent converts who went inactive when that happened and so Elder Skordas and I received permission so we could go out there. Is was really good! We met a lot of the people who aren't active and were able to set up some appointments to visit with them. We are also hoping to be able to teach a lot of there family who aren't members!

This week was great but we didn't have many lessons with the people we are teaching. E. and I. canceled 2 appointments but we will be seeing them tonight. They didn't make it to church again so we will have to spend some time helping resolve those concerns. We are hoping for that to work out. We will be talking with them about what's keeping them back and how we can help them. 

We did have a really good lesson with a lady named R. She was baptized in the Dominican Republic years ago and was even a temple worker in the Santa Domingo Temple. When she moved out here she got a job and wasn't able to go to church. The sisters met her and they we came in and have been working to help her come back to church. It's incredible how much information she has retained. Most people can't remember a whole lot about the church but she knows everything. A member with us offered to bring the Sacrament to her house but she said, "no. I need to be worthy and get to church. If I can't do that. I'm not worthy for it." She has a very deep understanding of how serious the Sacrament actually is and not a lot of Hispanics make that connection! It was awesome!

We did teach E.R. this week! Her son, A., was baptized back in November but then left for the Dominican Republic. He got back but never came to church. We have been working to get an appointment with him and we finally did. He was really excited to meet with us and told us all about him and his family. He said he wants us to teach his friend and he is going to be getting back to church which was really cool! E. said she would come to church but didn't. Again, we aren't sure what is keeping these people back from Church. That's the trouble we face out her. Nobody wants to go to church.

During my personal studies this week, I was reading in Preach My Gospel about learning to recognize the promptings of the Spirit. In this section, it lists scriptures and gives descriptions for all the things the Spirit does. I realized that I feel the Holy Ghost allllll the time but I rarely give the credit to the Spirit. For example, in Mosiah 5:2-5 it talks about the Spirit strengthening our desire to avoid evil and obey the commandments. This happens to me a lot! Through studies and instruction given to our mission from the mission President, I frequently feel this desire but I have never contributed it to the Spirit. I've always thought this was my own thoughts or desires. So one of the biggest things I've realized, is that I need to give more credit to God for the righteous things I experience. Through thoughts or feelings or desires, if they are good, it is God! It was a cool realization!

I know Jesus Christ is my Savior. He lives. I love being a missionary!! 

Love, 

Elder Bushman

Year 2, Week 20: Worcester for a 5th Transfer

Hello Family!

So! Biggest news...... Ready?? Elder Fragoso and I are staying together for a 4th transfer. I am going to be in Worcester for a 5th transfer. Other than Assistants, I only know of 1 other companionship who has ever been together for 4 transfers! So, we are legends! Haha jk:) 

The coolest experience this week happened on Friday night! A boy, named B, said he would come out teaching with us around 1:30 pm. We picked him up and left to go to our appointments! We had some missed appointments, stop bys, street contacts, etc. It was great! He loved being with us that he even bought Elder Fragoso a pizza! Haha:) that same day, we tried to teach an English Class to a Brazilian man. He spoke Portuguese and no English. We speak English and Spanish and some random Portuguese phrases. Anyway, most stressful English Class ever. He said that he wants to bring some of his friends and things so we are going to have to invite the Portuguese Elders in Marlborough to teach! We had a lesson that night with R and A but R wasn't there. We taught A about the Law of Chastity and Tithing! While teaching Tithing, B shared several wonderful stories and said that he wanted to come out with us more often! 

I love A&R. A is 11 and she heard it was my birthday soon. She went over to her money jar and gave me $10. I tried to tell her that she could keep it but she insisted. Such a sweet girl!

The court date has been moved back for another 3 months so if anything is going to change, they need to figure out another arrangement. But for now, we are praying! 

S had work off this Sunday and should for every Sunday now! He slept in so he didn't come. But next week! We are excited! We will be teaching them on Tuesday! 

We were expecting several people at church again. Around 4-8. Nobody came... Again. But! We now know more things that we can do as missionaries to help them get there which is exciting. We have some cool people to work with, they just need to come to church! We are continually working on that though! 

I don't know if you remember G and M? Well we taught them but they had some problems with the Word of Wisdom. Well G just turned 14 and they invited us over for his party. We spent about 45 minutes there talking to all their friends. People from Brazil, Columbia, Venezuela, Mexico, Dominican Republic, etc. It was super fun! They had tons of meats and things so I had some awesome food. Sadly... We didn't take a picture. Bummer.

We had our Christmas Zone Conference this past week! The Assistants talked about the need and importance of role playing our teaching skills to become better and better! President Mavromatis talked about what we want to become and how it's up to us! It was exciting!! Then we had tons of musical numbers! So much fun! 

I have been reading a lot of the Book of Mormon and also in PMG lately and have found a better correlation between the two by studying PMG and reading the Book of Mormon verses that it references! It's fun to see both books complement each other! 

I want to say thank you for all of your examples and testimonies! You are all in my prayers and in my heart! 

I love you

Elder Bushman 

Year 2, Week 19: Talked with 70+ People in the Day

Hello Family, 

Wow! What a week this has been! We had 3 exchanges this week so time really flew! Like always!

We started out with an exchange with the Assistants. I was with Elder Jowers here in Worcester. Elder Fragoso was with Elder Benson also in Worcester. Elder Jowers and Elder Benson both came out with me and Elder Fragoso so we all go home at the same time! It was fun working with them. We didn't have very many appointments planned for the day so we just went out and did some stop bys and added people into our Area Book through street contacting. We talked with around 70+ people in the day! It was super fun! At the end of an exchange, we do an exchange inventory and we talk about the strengths of the person and extend invitations to them. I invited Elder Jowers to 1. Thank the people he is teaching to help build a relationship of love and 2. To focus on his own conversion to see how he can help others become as deeply converted as him.

He invited me to keep using Preach My Gospel in my daily missionary work and to ask more questions when I contact people such as, "why are you interested in our message?" or "how can we help you come to church?" stuff like that! It was really fun to learn from him and spend the day working with him. That night, we had a lesson with O, R & S. We talked about how we can have faith in the Lord and how we can help them come to church. S. said that he just needs to confirm with his boss and he will have every Sunday, starting the 16th off! So we are praying that works out! We are really hoping that they will be able to come to church soon.

We had 2 other exchanges this week! Nothing too crazy happened but it was good working with those Elders. We made a lot of plans with people to help them come to church. When we finished exchanges Saturday morning, we had 10 people confirm that they would be at church.

Sunday morning, we still had those 10 people say they would come to church and even made phone calls to ask how we could help!! We were super excited for church! The time finally came for Sacrament Meeting to start and! Haha nobody came. We called people later in the day and they said that they didn't come because they slept in, or they couldn't get a ride last minute, etc. We were disappointed but! We now know what we can do to help people come. 

Those who slept in, we can help them by calling or stopping by! Those without a car can be helped by having a member ride etc. So even though it was sad, we will know how to help them in the future! 

Just to let you know mom! I got both packages! Thanks so much for all you do! I love you:) 

I am loving every minute I have on the mission. It's been such a good week full of action even though people didn't come to church! I know that God is real and loves me. I know Jesus Christ is my Savior! I had a powerful witness to that while I listened to This Is the Christ by the TABCATS! ;) I love you all very much! 

Love, 

Elder Bushman 

 

 

Year 1, Week 28: I Love Teaching the Restoration

The week started with some media referrals and some New Investigators! We met a woman from Jamaica who wanted a free Bible. When we met her she said she has been meeting with all kinds of missionaries and pastors. She has met with the JWS, Protestants, Mormons, Catholics, and Baptists to see which Church she wants to join. We gave her a Book of Mormon and the Bible and shared how they work together. She is super interested in finding out more, but we haven't had the chance to go back.

On Friday we had our all Spanish Missionary meeting. President basically roasted all of us saying we aren't good enough and how we need to do better. He obviously did this in a kind, loving, positive way, but that's pretty much a sentence summary. We talked a lot about how and where the Spanish program is going and what we need to do to become better missionaries. He shared the statistic that in the last 4 months, there has only been 8 baptisms in the Spanish group. That is very sad.. But it has given a lot of direction that will be very good! I am super excited for where we are heading!

Saturday was exchanges with the ZL. I went on an Exchange with Elder Warner who has been out for 18 months. We did a lot of knocking and taught some awesome Restorations. I love teaching the Restoration! I feel like it has the most power with the story of Joseph Smith.
One of the biggest things I learned from him is how to be super Bold. I am always a little nervous to be bold. If someone rejects me or my message I usually just say, alright, have a nice day. Elder Warner says, "What we are telling you is that Christs church is literally on the Earth today and you need to become a part of it." I also realized that if they reject us, they have now completely put not joining on there heads and not on ours. I have really enjoyed going out with older, experienced missionaries!!

On Thursday its service day!! We volunteer at a soup kitchen in Waterbury. We make bags that consist of soup, canned beans or corn, rice, pasta, meat, etc. to hand out to people who get on a list. We usually spend about 2 hours at service and have had some awesome conversations with people. We have met people who took lessons back in Puerto Rico and are interested in lessons again. We have conversations about the Gospel with the people who volunteer with us. 

Mom, you asked about what we do for church services.  Elder Tirado and I lead the music and do the piano. We have a piano that plays by itself. Last week we passed the Sacrament, Blessed the Sacrament, Gave the Talks, led the music and played the piano!

 

This week I have been reading Preach my Gospel and marking all the principles and promises! Most of the promises I have noticed are about gaining eternal life. Do these things and you can either help yourself or others reach eternal life! Very interesting. Preach my Gospel is not just a guide for full time missionaries but for EVERYONE!!! Its awesome. Definitely recommended reading

We went over to a members house on Tuesday for dinner. Because the members here are SOO nice they usually make something Keto for me. I was made, Tuna Salad!

This tuna salad was, tuna, raw onion, and green bell peppers!! Literally SOOO GOOD. I love onions and I am also a BIG fan of peppers now! I know dad is going to literally be so excited!! There is now only 1 thing I cannot handle.

Tomato.

Tomatoes literally make me sick. I HATE tomato.. Anyway,

Love you all!!

Elder Bushman