What's up family!!! It's so good to be back home in Illinois and to be here in Peoria. I gots lots to say but will send presidents letter now.........
Dear President Jergensen
I love it here in Peoria, it's like a homecoming being back here in Illinois. I love the people here and I know that Elder Manwaring and I will do all that we can to help this zone/stake progress towards 400 baptims.
Elder Pope is in good hands as he serves with Elder Larsen and that makes my happy to know that he is going to get some wonderful follow up training from him.
Elder Manwaring and I have been working with Delores, and she is progressing nicely although she may be in for the wrong reasons and my want some assistance from the church soon after baptism. We will work with her to help her progress towards a true conversion.
Our focus in the Zone will be to increase the spirituality and find by the spirit and watch the Lord do his work in these areas. A concern is with the Normal and Bloomington areas. We will focus on getting them on track and teaching investigators as it looks like they are struggling in those areas.
I'm learning so much that it's hard to keep up at times, but excited to be back where it all started for me.
Elder Pope is in good hands as he serves with Elder Larsen and that makes my happy to know that he is going to get some wonderful follow up training from him.
Elder Manwaring and I have been working with Delores, and she is progressing nicely although she may be in for the wrong reasons and my want some assistance from the church soon after baptism. We will work with her to help her progress towards a true conversion.
Our focus in the Zone will be to increase the spirituality and find by the spirit and watch the Lord do his work in these areas. A concern is with the Normal and Bloomington areas. We will focus on getting them on track and teaching investigators as it looks like they are struggling in those areas.
I'm learning so much that it's hard to keep up at times, but excited to be back where it all started for me.
Elder Gonzalez Peoria Illinois
So there's only so much to say since I've only been here for 4 days and that included putting together a stake coordination and attending some district meetings.
My companion is Elder Manwaring from Vernal Utah.. He's legit and super funny hahaha we get along just fine... he reminds me of Aaron and that's kinda cool
He loves music and is a freak with the piano. He is the middle of 5 boys and both his parents served missions as well. His mom served in Cicily Italy or however you spell it and his Dad served in Argentina.
He's been out for 19 months and only has 4 transfers left including this one so it is likly that we will only be together for this one transfer. What President Jergensen has been doing is taking his ex zone leaders and breaking for 1 and training for their last 2 transfers which is likly what will happen to Elder Manwaring. He's been a zone leader for the past 5 transfers and has plenty of experience to help me out with and that is much needed.
So Elder Larsen (big Josh) is breaking my boy pope back in Des Moines and that's so cool and he's such a good missionary I'm so happy for pope and for that ward to have such a hard worker. He goes home in November and so I may never see him again for the rest of my mission since I'm clear over here in Illinois and that's about 5 hours away from him. I'm so glad that I was able to leave Des Moines with 3 baptismal dates and that they have a good teaching pool to work from. I was there for 3 transfers and that makes me happy to know that after 2 years with no baptisms they can have 3 within the next couple months.
Transfers was awesome and I've been going a 100mph since I've been here. On Wednesday we went and helped with a move and then got our numbers for stake coordination ready for Sunday ( ask Tony about what all that consists of) Friday we had to drive to Washington ( you can look on a map and see where all these locations are so you know what I'm talking about) to train Elder Purcell on how to be a District Leader. He came out in my group and he's the biggest guy in the mission. We then helped with another move and then got to teach our investigator with a baptismal date. Delores is really nice and is prob about 30 and she is interested because her dad is a member in the Pekin ward and that's how we got to start teaching her. I hope that we can get her to start with a true conversion and not just for the financial benefit.
Saturday we get to do some service at the Methodist church downtown and that is called Loaves and fish and it's a food give out that they do on Saturday mornings and it goes to all thehomeless and the more needy. It's good to work with those of other faiths and truely put Mosiah 2:19 to work. We spent some time at the library getting all the papers typed up for the coordination meeting and that was so much fun.
Later that night we taught a lady named Dedra and she is getting very interested in the church and was able to attend for all 3 hours yesterday as well as Delores which was great.
Sunday we only went to half of sacrament because we had to bail out and go to Bloomington and have the coordination meeting with the Stake President and with President Jergensen. It went well and it was so nice to see all the members of that ward and have them say that they miss me and that the elders there now aren't doing as well. That I'm disappointed about, Bloomington is the deffinition of white and already to harvest and we've got 4 missionaries in town that are piling out and not getting much done. President Cummings in the stake is a great man who is very missionary motivated and i miss his family and that ward so much.
So as far as the questions go......the shoes are just wear and tear but are the best for tracting the streets of Peoria and nice shiny shoes aren't a fav of these folks. Star street in town here is in our area and it has more homocides then any street in the hood of Chicago and that just to show you how ghetto the south side is here in Peoria. It's a big town in them mission but it only has one ward with 6 missionaries in it and that's going to change here. We did teach a big black brotha named pickle who we are going to be working with, he's awesome.
I love you all and I'll try to get a letter in the mail; this week ps we have 3 districts to cover and 10 ares
Elder Gonzalez Peoria Illinois
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