Aloha mi amigos! These past 2 weeks were awesome!
If you are struggling with negativity or negative judgment of others then instead replace that with gratitude and charity and your mindset will completely change and you will be happier. I can testify of that as I have seen it happen in my life over these past couple weeks! Alma 7:24 "And see that ye have faith, hope, and charity, and then ye will always abound in good works."
We've been very busy and the work is SO GOOD! I also hit my 4 month mark so that's nuts!
2 weeks ago on Thursday I was able to confer the Aaronic Priesthood upon Jocinto and that was a very memorable and special experience. On Saturday, Jocinto was able to take family names to the Temple with the ward! Everything we do points toward the Temple and the sacred covenants that are made there! Last Tuesday I was able to go to the Temple with my Zone and let's just say the temple is the best! And I immediately felt the spirit so strong and I'll admit that I've become a cry baby on the mission and I shed a couple tears in the temple, haha. These past couple of weeks my heart has been so full of gratitude for the Restoration of the Gospel of Jesus Christ, for Joseph Smith and above all for Jesus Christ and His atoning sacrifice!
It was a shorter week this past week because my pday was on Tuesday last week. On Wednesday we setup a Turkey Bowl with all of the Marshallese kids for Thanksgiving morning. The next day on Thanksgiving we went to the park but of course it was pouring rain. Elder Becker and I still threw the football around for a bit and waited for anyone to show up but nobody came; however on Saturday we figured out that they all went earlier at 7 so they could play longer but it was just pouring rain so we missed each other, haha. We got to talk to our families on Thanksgiving and that was awesome! I also decorated our pad with Christmas decorations while we were waiting to go to dinner, haha. We went to a members house and some other members joined us and we had a feast. So I just went all out and had a cheat day but I ate a little to much and felt terrible afterward, lol. Thanksgiving was awesome all around though.
On Friday we passed out a ton of flyers for a Marshallese devotional on Saturday and we invited almost every Marshallese person at these Green Apartments and there are a ton! We played some Pros Volleyball with all of these Marshallese teenagers and we're really trying to grow our relationship with them and teach them because these kids need the gospel more than anything in their lives. Afterward, we told them all about the devotional on Saturday and Elder Becker had some pure revelation come to him to tell these kids that we would play basketball in the gym after the devotional. And once we told them that we were going to play basketball after they were all down to come. So we set it up and got rides arranged and we were expecting like 15+ kids. So the next day we showed up and the kids got all flaky and weren't going to come, all but 2 younger kids; an 11 year old and 6 year old. We had our Bishop and some other members come to give rides because of how many we thought were going to come but we told them we didn't know how many would come. I was trying to round up as many as I could and the ring leader of this group of kids originally said he couldn't come which influenced all of the other kids to not come. But the Spirit worked on this leader and he totally switched his mind. So out of nowhere we had 8 more kids want to come. It was a miracle! We watched the Marshallese devotional and then we played some basketball with these kids and all I can say is that as long as the Lord continues to pour out His spirit upon these kids then only good things will happen!
Love you all,
Elder Alec Shockley
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