Week 55 - Another Week in Cuatro Vientos

Hey y'all! 

Here I am again, same area - Cuatro Vientos - and I am doing the same thing: training! My second son is named Elder Strunk. He is from Taylorsville, Utah and is going to SUU after the mish to study to become a pilot. He loves comedy and entertains me at night in the house with comedy routines haha. 

We had a semi stressful week. I can't explain it right now causeeeeee it is a crazy long story and I am lazy when it comes to writing today. BUT I will have quite the story next week so don't worry and stay tuned for the next part of this adventure.

I WILL say I will probably throw a swimming pool party this week. It will be crowded, but it will be sick. So keep them in your prayers!

I have to go, but I love you. I can't wait to see ya. Have a fantastic week!

Go read Elder Hollands talk about forgiveness!

Elder Quist

Week 54 - Conference & Training Again!

Hello everyone! 

So this week was General Conference! Duh. Haha It was awesome! I watched it in ENGLISH at the mission offices with the assistants. It was so great! 

I don't feel like summarizing a conference talk or telling you my favorite quote. I just want to tell you that I know without a doubt that President Nelson is a prophet of God. I know that Jesus Christ directs this incredible work through him, and I know that if we listen to the prophet and apostles, we can really come to know the will of our Father in Heaven and become more devoted followers of Christ. I do not know this because I read it in a book or because someone told me. I know these things because I have prayed and asked and I have received this knowledge from God. I invite all of you to make an extra effort this week to read one conference talk, pray to God, and then go and do the things that you need to do to become closer to the person you want to be.

Other update: Elder Speirs will no longer be my companion, just one week together. Starting tomorrow, I will start training my SECOND son. This one will be a white guy. My first son has a brother from another mother. I'm excited! I will be staying here in Cuatro Vientos. 

I love y'all! I miss ya! Have a good week!

Elder Quist 

Week 53 - The Work Must Go On!

Ok so this week was crazy! And very sad. I am still very sad. Let me explain. 

At the beginning of the training of Elder Solorzano, he said his ear kinda hurt, but it wasn't too bad. So he dealt with it and the pain kind of went away. A couple of weeks ago it got worse and it was hurting him all day every day. I gave him a blessing and we went to the doctor, but nothing helped. This last week he has been getting super nauseous and sick and threw up almost everything he ate, 3 or 4 times a day. SO we went to the doctor again, a better one, and he told us that the problem is not his ears, it is his nose. As long as Solorzano can remember he cannot breathe through his nose and that makes his ears hurt (?) which shouldn't make sense, but it did when he explained it. So we told President Zapata and he called the family of Elder Solorzano and the General Authorities. Everyone decided that he needs to get surgery. Now, the rule is that if you need surgery and it'll take more than 2 weeks to recover, you have to go home to do it :( THEREFORE on Friday in the morning I went with Elder Solorzano and the AP's to the airport to drop my lil child off so he can go home to Guatemala. Tears were shed, pictures were taken, we also ate donuts, but that is beside the point... My son will be in Guatemala for about a month and a half and then he will come back :) My son was and is one of my best friends. But the work must go on. 

Until this cycle ends (next week), I will be with Elder Spiers. He is super cool, I love him. Right now he is learning how to be secretary because the secretaries of the mission are going home soon. I am still in Cuatro Vientos for now. All those baptisms I talked about last week fell through :( I am also very sad because of that. 

The other day, I don't remember which one cause there have been so many, I was reading in Helaman chapter 5. It is a very good chapter. I never have realized how good it is actually! Go read it :)) 

That was the major news of this week. Please keep Elder Solorzano in your prayers so that his surgery goes well.

I love you ALL. God loves you more. If you love God (and me) you will all remember to watch General Conference this weekend! There will be a bunch of cool announcements, (so they say). One of them will include China (just a guess though, haha). ;) 

Have a great week! Love you all!

Elder Quist :)

My birthday celebration 

Sending off my son

 Me and my new comp

Week 52 - ONE YEAR IN MÉXICO

Wow I haven't been in the USA for a year now and BOY do I miss it! Now when someone asks me what I was doing a year ago, my memory will be about Mexico. Weird. 

This week was good. I am not gonna go into a ton of detail cause typing a lot makes me sleepy. 

I am loving my area. Cuatro Vientos is super cool! It is not too big so we don't have to walk so far for everything. It is a little city situated on a hill so we get a good leg work out in every day. Our house is at the bottom of the hill which means the first thing we have to do every day is go uphill. 

We got good news this week! We have an investigator that has been an investigator for awhile. All four of her kids are members (she has two kids on the mission), but she has not been able to get baptized cause she doesn't want to get married to her boyfriend. But just the other day she told us that she had talked with him and they decided (she decided) that he can't live there anymore... so we will probably baptize her soon :)

The other family we are teaching is awesome! We are just waiting for the divorce papers to get back and then we are goin' swimmin ;)

I encourage you to go read "For Times of Trouble" by Jeffrey R. Holland this week. I have listened to that talk 4 or 5 times this week. Apply it to your life in the most personal way possible :)

Love you all!

Elder Quist

 Celebrating Elder Solorzano's birthday

Just a handsome guy in the middle of México

a trip to the temple!

Week 51 - Small and Simple Things

Hey y'all! 

Very busy week! 

We had interviews with President Zapata this week. My son asked him if we can stay together until Christmas, which would be another two cycles together hahaha. 

On Wednesday I taught my first disrict meeting. It was pretty fun. Right now we are teaching a family of 5. They are awesome! They come to church almost every week, they read the Book of Mormon - super cool people. Baptism in a couple weeks, it's gonna be a party.

I have been thinking a lot lately about what makes us different from the rest of the people in the world, as members of the Church of Jesus Christ. Visiting so many people on my mission, those that accept the gospel and those that don't, has shown me just how important this message is that I get to share everyday. It really changes lives! I gave a talk in church this past Sunday about the small and simple things in life. Taking the sacrament every week, reading the Book of Mormon everyday, or, even better, really STUDYING the Book of Mormon everyday, personal and family prayer, family home evening, putting a little extra effort to serve someone, to show someone love, to be grateful, etc etc... All of these things are small, relatively speaking, but they are hard though. What is easier: studying the scriptures or not studying? Answer: not studying. The gospel is not easy. Keeping all the commandments is not easy. The easy things in life come from Satan. Everyday we make tiny decisions that will either bring us closer to Christ or take us farther away.

 

It is hard being here sometimes and we are teaching people and telling them exactly what they need to do to make their life better, how to get closer to Christ, and they don't do it! As we walk in the streets, we see a bunch of worldy distractions, and I'm not gonna lie, sometimes they really are distracting. As members of His church here on earth we have to be examples for everyone. We are different because we know how to find that happiness that can't be described. We know how important the little things are. I can't remember which apostle said it, but I remember a quote that said something like: "I have never met someone that went inactive that was reading the Book of Mormon every day and praying." The small and simple things take care of all the things big and complicated. I know that to be true with every part of my body. Being a missionary is hard, we have so many rules we need to keep, so many things we need to think about, study, ponder, and pray about, we need to develop the characteristics of Christ, and so on and so forth. Sometimes (actually many many times) I have small mental breakdowns when I think about that. haha My companions really appreciate them. BUT. I know that perfection does not come all at once - let alone in this life - so we need to focus on the small and simple things. :)

I love y'all. I miss America. Someone eat In-N-Out for me this week.

Elder Quist

Week 50 - A Week in Pictures

Moving day!

a pic of the volcano

Week 49 - Tender Mercies

Hello family and friends! 

It will be a lil smaller this week I apologize.  

This week we saw a lot of little miracles, a lot of blessings and just so many good things happened. I bore my testimony this Sunday about the love of God and how there are not any coincidences in this life. God intimately knows each and every one of us and what happens in our lives. I read a talk by Elder David A. Bednar the other day about the tender mercies of the Lord in our lives. Many many many MANY times in our lives we just live without realizing the hand of god. 

Something funny (kinda): we were knocking on the door of a contact and her husband came out and was really rude and more or less cussed us out and kinda got in our faces so I said "thank you" and "have a good day!" and we were OUT of there. My comp was fine but I was a little startled (11 months in Mexico and that is the first time that has happened haha). More than anything I was kinda sad there are people like that.

Sunday was the bomb, we had 7 investigators in church! A lot of people came to church and we all could feel the spirit. We currently do not have a Young Men's president, so my comp and I taught the class and we killed it. 

1 Nephi 1:20: But behold, I, Nephi, will show unto you that the tender mercies of the Lord are over all those whom he hath chosen, because of their faith, to make them mighty even unto the power of deliverance. 

I love you all! I miss ya a ton.

Elder Quist

Elder Bednar's visit to the mission

 See him? Top right corner :) 

Week 48 - ELDER BEDNAR

Hi all!

OK SO... 

Friday we went to Chalco to sleep in the house of Elder Bistline and Elder Reyes because at 3 am there is not any public transport... Saturday we woke up at 3am, got ready, took a taxi to the mission offices, got in some large vans and went to the temple! We showed up to the temple at 6 am and we waited for basically 3 hours doin nothin. You might be asking why? Well, Elder Bednar is visiting Mexico and his first stop is with us! Mexico City Chalco and Mexico City South missions. We were blessed to listen to an apostle speak and teach us for 3 hours. It was crazy! The spirit was insane! He is also really funny. He kinda just roasts everyone.

NOTES:

-Faith is not a feeling, it is an action.

-Teach one thing: Spiritual self-reliance.

-Repentance does not come when we are baptized in the font, it comes when we receive the Holy Ghost through a baptism of fire.

-You don't find happiness, you create it.

-We are the conduit, not the reason.

The work is good, tough, hard, but also really fun. I don't remember if I invited y'all, but I encourage everyone to study the diference between a prayer and a prayer of faith :)

Have a great week!

Elder Quist 

Another pic from Sports Day last week - Elders Solorzano and Quist

Week 47 - The Art of Street Contacting

Hello everyone! 

Let's get right too it.

So Tuesday we had a district meeting in Chalco. I love district meetings! I always learn something useful or remember something I need to improve. After the district meeting, we talked with the mission secretary about changing houses and we figured out (without saying too much) that there are a ton of problems with the contract we have for this house. That whole process took FOREVER and we didn't get back to Cuatro Vientos until 2ish. We went to lunch, visited some people, then I got a call that we had to go BACK to Chalco to pay for something. There was a ton of traffic and yaaaaa, it was a slow day.

Wednesday was also a slow day. Since I am training we had to go to a special trainers meeting in Chalco (again). It was cool to talk with all the missionaries and we learned a lil bit as well. For some reason, it lasted like 8 hours. We left the house at 8:30 am and got back to our area at 6 pm... so we tried to visit a bunch of people really fast, but besides that, as far as the mission work, it was a slow day.

Thursday I was feeling a lil sad that we hadn't had time to work a lot so I decided we would dedicate the entire morning to contacting in the street. My son doesn't exactly love contacting, but I taught him a little about the keys to contacting and he likes it (kinda) now: don't talk to people like they are strangers (without love), smile, get to know them a little if there is time, and don't get down on yourself. It was fun and we killed it. In the afternoon, our investigators surprised us with this cake thing that is called (basically) the Impossible cake. It is flan with chocolate cake on the bottom. It is the bomb! We visited a bunch of other people but not too many were home or had time so :/

Friday we had a fun lil experience. So our area is just a huge planned community and all the streets have gates so we have to call the people and wait for them to open it. While we were waiting, it started to rain so I called our investigators like 8 times and THEN it started to HAIL. Elder Solorzano and I looked at each other and read each others mind. We just flat out sprinted like 10 minutes to a members house while hail the size of a nickel came at us from every direction. I just remember running and hearing my comp yell "ow" like every 2 seconds hahaha!

Saturday was full of walking. We looked for a ton of people, but hardly anyone was home.

Sunday was good. None of our investigators came to church though :/

Monday! Ok so about 6 months ago we had this activity in our mission called Sports Day (original right?). Today was sports day! We compete against all the other zones in the mission. And we wonnnnn! Two in a row baby let´s gooooo! It was exhausting though.

Love y'all! 

Quist

(so thankful for the mission fb page so we can see our boy's face... since he lost his camera)

Week 46 - The Gospel is Simple

Hi All! 

Sorry this one is gonna be lil' bit shorter - 

This week I really focused on making my studies better - using the scriptures more and teaching more simply. I have always taught that when we receive blessings it is because we are obedient to some commandment. I have always known that to be true, but I had no idea where it talked about that doctrinally until I found D&C 130:20-21 (if I remember right...). It is a good read; highly recommended!

Throughout this week, well, throughout my whole mission, I have learned just how simple this gospel is. Keep the commandments. Really, if we just keep all the commandments we will be fine, we will be happy, we will have the Holy Ghost with us, we can return to the presence of our Heavenly Father and live with our families forever. :) 

It was a good week, a lot of work here in Cuatro Vientos (that means '4 winds' in English, just FYI).

Love y'all! Stay tuned for a more detailed, fun, longer, interesting email next week! :)

Elder Quist

Week 45 - Finally a Fridge

Hey there! 

Finally got a fridge. 

So for three weeks we have been living without a fridge in our house so basically we don't eat breakfast or dinner. POR FIN we got a fridge! Our district leader brought it to us Friday so now we eat lots of cereal. Corn Pops is the only cereal that tastes like it does in America sooo I eat those babies a ton... Other thing, our house has a weird water heater thingy and it doesn't really work so I am back to showering in freezing cold water. Wish me luck.

This week wasn't the best week ever because we had to go to Chalco almost everyday for some reason or another. Tuesday we had our district meeting there. Wednesday we had a meeting with president in the morning and then after we had our interviews with President Zapata. Thursday we had to go to the hospital in Chalco because my comp had some weird rash. SO we couldn´t meet this week with a couple of our investigators who only are available in the morning :/

SUNDAY. BEST DAY! SO our ward has struggled a lot recently with church attendance. Ever since Elder Solorzano and I have gotten here, every week the attendance has gone up by about 10 people, and this Sunday we had more people than they have seen in the last 6 months! It was a super spiritual testimony meeting because a bunch of the youth went to an EFY thing and (found boyfriends and girlfriends but that is besides the point) Sunday they bore their testimonies and they all cried. Our ward doesn't have a Gospel Principles teacher right now, so I am the teacher right now soooooo that is kinda stressful but it was fun! We had a bunch of people go. After church, like 20 members plus us took a combi from the church to our houses and it was the most cheerful public transport experience I have had on the mission. hahaha All the members started singing happy birthday to someone and I felt kinda embarrased because there was like 3 people in the combi that were not members and WOW it must've been awkward for them. But it was cool.

It was a good week. We saw a lot of people in church that we have not seen in awhile. Just ask my comp how happy I was when we got home after church...

I love y'all! 

Elder Quist

Note: In Gospel Principles we talked about being the reason others have miracles in their lives. This week I challenge you all to take a little extra time in your prayers and ask God to help you be the reason someone has a miracle in their life! :)

(We are so grateful for the wonderful Garcia family who keeps track of our boy! Davis is in an area that is close to them again and they had a p-day outing together!)