Transfers: Gandía, here I come!

Hey everybody, another week here in Cornellà and it is the last! Yup, I am being transferred! All the way down south to the last city in the mission, Gandía. It is a little weird, people don´t usually stay for one transfer in an area, and I have to say I was devastated when I heard I was leaving… I had made many new friends in a short amount of time and I had so much I wanted to do, but President Pace knows best and I am needed in Gandía now.

This week has been a busy week. I went on an intercambio with Elder Dailey, our district leader, and we found SO many Spaniards who were ready for the Gospel. The only thing was they either lived in the Madrid Mission or the Málaga Mission! Aww man! But it is alright, we saw tons of miracles, and we know that these people are in capable hands.

So this weekend was rushing from one house to another. My companion Elder Noovao is going up to Pamplona (my second city), Elder Dailey, our District Leader is going to Vic (my first city), and Elder Olaso is staying. So Elder Noovao and I are leaving the area to be white washed! We were getting all the information ready for the new elders who are coming in and visiting so many families! Everyone was shocked that I was leaving... there were a lot of tears, for all of us, and those who I became especially close to cried, as they were saying 6 weeks is too short. It is true... I am still a little bit sad, but I know the Lord needs me in Gandía.

So we visited a lot of people, a lot of families. It was all good. We shared our testimonies, favorite scriptures and took pictures (no pictures this week because everything is packed away). I am writing from Cornellà because I should be in Gandía around 8 at night.

But next time I see you I will be in the south of the mission! Best of luck to you all! I love you!

Elder Sadler

Crazy week and ward talent show!

Hey everybody, crazy week, there is not a lot of time to explain it all, but I will just brush past the details since we are in a little rush today!

We went to Parque Güell last preparation day and it was so cool! It was like visiting my childhood all over again since I had already been there back in 2007! We saw a lot of people and a lot of people came up and talked to us to see who we were and what we did, we handed out a lot of cards that day!

This week, there was a Talent show in the ward and the ward signed us up to do a Haka, since my companion is Mauri by blood, they wanted to see it. So we practiced and practiced and practiced, and we got some members involved in it, and we wanted to show a message that we as the missionaries want to work more with the ward and that we were sorry about anything that we did to offend them in the past. We got the message across and people said they felt the Spirit really strongly there. And the next day we had so many members invite us out to eat jaja! 

Talent show in the ward

A member invited us out to eat. Here I have a plate of shellfish. It was delicious!

But hey, we are slowly progressing here. Please pray for us that we may find somebody soon, and we are all praying for you back home! Love you all!


Elder Sadler

Photos from Parque Güell

With my companion

With the district

 And finally, Christmas has arrived in Spain!!!

 

Love everything!

Hey everybody, welcome back to another week in Cornellà! Things are starting to pick up here, after contacting for the past few weeks. We have some people that are slowly progressing which is good, and our relationship with the members is improving as well.

We had a baptism this past weekend from the other Elders in our area, BUT we found out too late that the investigator lives in our area...sigh, oh well...we decided to take care of him after the baptism so that it would be easier for everybody...but moral of the story…Respect your boundaries!

Well, right when I am writing this, we just had our interviews with President Pace! They are always a great experience, and I learned a lot! He told me that we need to continue working on our relationship with the ward and that we have to keep finding people.

The area is hard, but it just needs love. And that is what we are trying to do. Just love everything, everyone and every moment you can because you will regret that times when you didn´t love. Hopefully next week I will have more things to tell you guys! Have a great week!

Elder Sadler

General Conference again!

Well, this week was a crazy week! Firstly, for preparation day last week, we went to a place called Tibidabo, a cathedral that is on the highest point of Barcelona and from where you can see everything! There was an elevator that you had to pay to go up, but the priest that was there let us go up for free, buen hombre (good man).

 

  

The views of Barcelona from the top (click on pictures for better view)

This week the work was a little bit slow because we had a zone conference in which we learned how to work better with members AND General conference. Before the zone conference however, one of my two aunts in Barcelona (non-members) saw that the church was open and was in the mercado (market) shopping so she came up, asked some other missionaries where I was and I was able to see her really quick! But then, at General Conference, she (tita/aunt Rosario) came with tita/aunt Paqui for the first session and they said they loved it! They invited us out to eat after at a bar and we were able to show them a little bit about the Plan of Salvation. 

With my two beautiful aunts after spending with me General Conference

My MTC teacher was also there, hermano Rodriguez, so it was a good thing to see him. 

My MTC teacher at the General Conference session

 But that is all really. We are contacting a lot since we are trying to grow the area here so things are picking up. Thanks for everything everybody! Hope you enjoyed conference and we will see you next week!

Elder Sadler