Week 11: The Ramirez kids got baptized!

This week was slow until Saturday.

The Ramirez kids got baptized! Oscar and Migueli got baptized and confirmed on Saturday! It was really neat! They wanted me to give the opening prayer and a talk. It went great! Luckily the service was in English so it wasn't too difficult to speak in. Oscar got baptized by His Grandpa. Migueli got baptized by her cousin, Joey, who was only 17. I made a note to explain to him how to baptize before the meeting started, but I spent the entire afternoon trying to find a print shop that was open so that I could print out the programs. We have like 5 of them here and every one of them is apparently closed on Saturdays. Anyway, I forgot to teach him how to baptize, but he did pretty good anyway!

Friday afternoon I did an exchange with the zone leaders. I went with Elder Riddle. He's from Utah. He is great! We had a blast! We went and taught a couple that was awesome. She had hot Pink hair and he had Sky Blue hair! It was great! They accepted a Book of Mormon and commit to read and pray about it. We went to visit a less active member that is working on overcoming smoking. He used to be a pack a day smoker but is now down to 3 per day and he doesn't finish them when he does smoke, so he is doing great! Apparently the church has a program like Alcoholics Anonymous with support groups and things like that, so we are trying to get him involved in that. I would imagine that quitting the last few is probably the most difficult, so if any of you have been through that and have any advice or tips that I can pass along, please let me know.

On Thursday, I thought it would be fun to make snicker doodles to give to people when we go tracting. Nobody has had snicker doodles here and most people had never even heard of them. We went down to the church to use the kitchen. I wasn't sure how many a batch would make, so I did a batch with triple the recipe. That made just over 200 cookies. I put them on plates so they would look nice.

Feel free to send me letters!

Elder Hendrix

1008 W Sanetta

Nampa, ID 83651

I'm sending photos with all of the cookies... One with Oscar and Migueli! I am standing next to Elder Ledacis. I think he taught their father a few months prior when he was in the area. The next one has two of the awesome Spanish speaking Sisters, Hermana Stadler and Hermana Vujich. They are awesome! Then, also awesome, is Elder Summers. He is an English speaking missionary that played the piano at our baptism.

Until next week...

Elder Hendrix

Week 10

This week was good.

We really only have two investigators. The Ramirez kids! The parents are members. Sister Ramirez speaks English fluently and Spanish as well. Brother Ramirez is a recent convert. He is from Mexico and speaks okay English. Anyway, They signed up to feed us a few weeks ago and their 8 year old daughter, Miguela, and 10 year old son, Oscar, said they wanted to get baptized. So, we started teaching them. They are both doing really great! Oscar reads the book of Mormon every day. Their baptism is scheduled for this saturday, So I will report on it next week

A lot of the families here will feed us, so we get to know some of the families. Because we are Spanish, we cover 6 wards. It's basically the entire north half of the stake. One of them is of course the Spanish ward, but the area covered by that ward is like 3 stakes. So our portion of that is 5 English wards. That means we get fed by one of the 5 english wards or the spanish ward. We haven't had anything to exciting... We did get fed spam wrapped in rice and seaweed, kind of like a California roll. it was weird.

On a slightly more exciting note, I started wearing suspenders yesterday!... to church. It was funny because one of the English elders that is over the ward that we went to was wearing them too! His name is Elder Richardson, we call him Elder Richie, and him and his companion live in the apartment above us. I wan't actually surprised because I was wearing his other suspenders...

But, It was funny because I don't know how many people have come up and told me that those suspender really "work" for me, or something to that extent. So, I may have to wear them more often. Our president is really great about them and doesn't care if we wear them.

Anyway, I always appreciate mail!

Elder Hendrix

1008 W Sanetta

Nampa, ID 83651

Thank you for all your continued love and support!

Elder Hendrix

Week 9

This week was okay, but not a lot happened. 

I learned that the post-office has international stamps. So one international stamp will send your letter basically anywhere in the world outside the US. That was exciting.

I got to do a very brief exchange with another missionary and teach a lesson in English. My temporary Companion, Elder Rhoton, is from Mesa, Arizona. He was really great. He let me teach the lesson! It was awesome! 

That's basically all that happened...

We went to the farmer's market, there wasn't a whole lot there. We also helped a guy bury a tree in his yard at his trailer home. He plans to plant a garden on top of it and the tree will compost and help his garden grow. I don't get it because we were burrying branches that were like 8 inches in diameter. I think those take a while to break down into compost... but whatever, he was very excited about the whole concept.

That's all that happened. You can send me a letter at the following address.

Elder Hendrix

1008 W Sanetta

Nampa, ID 83651

Thank you.

Elder Hendrix

Week 8: First Week in the Field

This week was good.

I made it safely to Idaho. I left the MTC at 6 am. Elders Hendrickson and Wallin woke up early to see me off.

I was with Hermana Daniels, a sister from my district, all the way to the airport (1 bus and 2 different trains) and on to security where we lost each other. We did not get a chance to say goodbye, but we definitely considered it a tender mercy that we got to travel together so far.

I got to the field. I was the only spanish missionary. My Companion is Elder Muniz from Utah. He's great. He's pretty layed back. We get along pretty well. he is also the district leader so I get to help with some stuff because of that.

I am in an area called Caldwell. It is a very small town. It is laid out pretty strange. For example, it is not uncommon for there to be a gas station in the middle of a neighborhood. The houses are all older and there are no HOA's, so there aren't any parks and the houses tend to get a little messy.

because we are spanish missionaries, we are supposed to teach exclusively in Spanish, so we aren't able to just tract, though sometimes we will go find an apartment complex or trailer park to tract through. I did, however, get to go on an exchange with Elder Daniels and Elder jeans, an English pair. Elder Jeans and I went tracting almost the entire day. It was great. We stopped at a gas station briefly to get gatorades and the owner gave us a bunch and didn't charge us.

Elder Jeans and I stopped to visit an investigator named Steven. He has a few acres and he talked about how many times through his life, the missionaries showed up at just the ruight time to help them with moving or other service at EXACTLY the right time because they were giving up on doing whatever it was themselves.

I will send the picture next week, but he taught me how to drive a tractor! It was a John Deere with a Plow on the back and a loader on the front.

It was a great week! Feel free to send me mail or letters!

Elder Hendrix

Out of the MTC

is my first week in the field!

But, because several people have asked for more information on what the MTC is like, I'd like to talk about the MTC so that you have some idea as to what I had to deal with there.

The first week in the MTC was a little rough. I had two sisters as a companion, there were no other elders to talk to in my district, The only other district was preparing to leave. I finally got my companion, but it was still a little overwhelming. 

My second week, I was asked to help welcome the new district that would be coming in that week (they were reporting just a week after me). I was given a list of who all would be coming and where they were serving. I began planning with some of the other leaders but was invited to "take control" of it. 

I welcomed these other missionaries and saw miracle after miracle from the moment I met them.

I knew from the list that there would be an Elder Hendrickson coming. Naturally, there were lots of jokes about how my son was coming to the MTC. I was really hoping that he would be cool and that he would have a sense of humor so as to continue the joke, or at least that we would laugh when I told him about it. I ended up deciding not to tell him because I didn't want him to think I was weird.

We picked them up in their classroom Wednesday night. I introduced myself to each of them and shook their hands. as I met Elder Hendrickson, he said "so.... are you my dad then?" The Lord answers prayers! That joke continued during throughout the course of the MTC.

Their district leader was Elder Wallin. He went out of his way to help me fix issues in the zone on a regular basis. He is so patient that it was easy and natural for him to help people along side me. His zone had the most amazing unity I ever seen in any group of people. As I got to know Elder Wallin, I came to understand why that was. 

Elder Wallin and Elder Hendrickson ended up functioning a lot like a first and second councilor to me as a zone leader. They jumped in to help without being asked at any time that they could. I grew close too these two awesome missionaries over the course of the MTC.

Elder Nicol (pronounced nickel, like the coin). I think we were taking a picture one time and I was holding him up, I let him go and expressed my apologies to everyone for dropping a nickel (nicol). He had an amazing spirit of optimism in everything he did. He always had a smile on his face. His companion was Elder Lybbert. Elder Lybbert has an incredible voice! He also has an amazing ability to sing just the right song at just the right time. I'd ask someone if they were doing okay, and from across the building, having no connection to me or the question, he's start belting because of you! I'd asked someone if they liked the MTC food and he was singing What doesn't kill you makes you stronger from the next room over! I dropped my roll into my bowl of soup and he started singing that song from titanic even though he was clear across the cafeteria. That guy can listen to the spirit like no other!

Elder Mendenhall was Elder Hendrickson's companion. He would go out of his way to make sure that everyone felt included. He would grab the people at gym that didn't want to play volleyball and go run with them so that they wouldn't have to be alone. Elder Mendenhall had a huge heart and tried to make everyone around him feel loved. 

Elder Lakey struggled with some health challenges while in the MTC but he always kept a positive attitude! He knew the scriptures frontwards, backwards and sideways. He was there with a perfectly applicable scripture for any issue you could possibly be thinking about. 

Sister Jones had to put up with some tough things that were completely beyond her control. Sister Gneiting also had some struggles. It took me a while to realize how similar these two are. they were perhaps the happiest, sisters I have ever met! They never let anything cause them to have a bad day! They would take their trials and instead of turning inward and feeling bad for themselves, they would go around and make sure that everyone else was having an okay day. It was funny to watch how far they came as a companionship from the beginning! They were great and I enjoyed being able to work with both of them

Anyway, this was just one of the three districts that I had so that you have an idea of what I had the privilege of working with. Elders Hendrickson and Mendenhall were called as the new zone leaders. Apparently we're keeping it in the family! They are both great leaders and will do an awesome job.

It was difficult saying goodbye to the group I was in at the MTC with, but they will all be amazing missionaries. I know that with this group, I was standing with the army of The Lord. I witnessed tender mercies again and again within this group. I watched them grow spiritually and become even more amazing people than they were before they arrived. It was such a blessing to be a witness to that!

We already have our reunion planned for two years from now :D

Several of the Elders got up early to see me off yesterday. I am now in Caldwell, Idaho. My companion is great. We went tracting for the first time last night. We gave away two copies of the Book of Mormon and had two doors slammed on us. It was great!

As always, you can send me letters:

Elder Hendrix

1008 W Sanetta

Nampa, ID 83651

More details from the field to come next week!

Elder Hendrix

Week 7: Last week at the MTC

This week was good.

We moved all of the hundreds or thousands of sister missionaries into
a brand new building that construction was just finished on. The next
day we moved them back out because there are apparently bats living in
the building.

The quorum of the 12 and the first presidency were both here this
week, but we didn't get to see any of them. We did get to have 2 brief
lessons in Spanish by a couple from Venezuela that will be serving as
mission presidents somewhere. We had a member of one of the quorums of
the 70 sit in during one of our lessons.

They were using our cafeteria for their training, so we are eating in
the gym. Unfortunately, there is no way to cook food in the gym.
Therefore, we had catering by Taco Bell, chicfila, subway, and costa
vida. You read that right...

I'm the zone leader for one more week until I leave for Idaho on
Tuesday. I go directly from SLC to Boise then somehow I get to Nampa
from there... I haven't received that instruction yet.

A lot of people have told me that the mission gets much better when
you get to the field. I'm unsure of how to feel about this. In the
MTC, I get to work with a zone of 11 fantastic elders that each have
burning testimonies. I have come to love each of them dearly and am
not at all excited about leaving the wonderful missionary family I
have found here in the MTC. The unity we have is amazing. My district
leaders are awesome, loving and filled with the spirit. They do an
amazing job of pushing their districts, and me, to be better and more
Christlike. I cannot even begin to fathom how the field could be any
better than what I have here.

But, I am grateful for the privilege I had to be here in the MTC. I am
grateful for the spirit I have felt and that I have come to carry
because of the amazing people around me. It has truly been a blessing
and a joy.

This is your last opportunity to send me a letter or dearelder in the MTC.

Te Amo

Elder Hendrix

Week 6: Passed halfway in the MTC

All,

This week a sister in my zone, Sister Jones, gave me an awesome bag that holds socks in the washer because the washer keeps eating one sock from each of my pairs of socks.

I passed half way in the MTC.

Attached is a photo of the leaders. Me (zone leader) and Hermana Walborn our zone sister training leader. In the back is Elder Baxter (right), our district leader and my companion, and Elders Wallin (middle) and Taylor (left). 

Elder Hendrix