Border Walls And Basketball

Quiubole vatos!

Last P-day, we drove down to the mall at Calexico, which is right on the border. So I got to take some pics at the border wall which was awesome! On Thursday we drove to San Diego for Zone Conference! We saw a bunch of other missionaries from other zones there, learned some good stuff, and got some food! I'll send some pictures from that. We also drove by a park and saw a kid and his dad playing basketball, so we stopped and played them for a bit in our proselytizing clothes. Luckily it was a really cool day, only about 90 degrees and cloudy, so we didn't absolutely die haha. I'll send a highlight from that ;) We gave them a mini lesson after and I think the kid, Rudy, seems pretty interested! We are trying to get him to the youth activity (basketball) tonight!

This last week was another bit of a tough one, at one point we were 0/9 on scheduled lessons actually happening! It's demoralizing to prepare lessons for people only to have them cancel, not answer the door/phone, or just dodge us completely - nine times in a row! We've had to remind ourselves that our purpose is, literally stated, to "Invite others to Come unto Christ..."

Key word - "invite", not "force". So when people cancel on us or dodge us, we just have to keep going and keep pushing to find that person whose heart is ready to receive the gospel!

Here's a couple of verses from the Book of Mormon that are super applicable to missionary work. This is in Alma chapter 26. 

27 Now when our hearts were depressed, and we were about to ^aturn back, behold, the Lord ^bcomforted us, and said: Go amongst thy brethren, the Lamanites, and bear with ^cpatience thine ^dafflictions, and I will give unto you success.

28 And now behold, we have come, and been forth amongst them; and we have been patient in our sufferings, and we have suffered every privation; yea, we have traveled from house to house, relying upon the mercies of the world—not upon the mercies of the world alone but upon the mercies of God.

29 And we have entered into their houses and taught them, and we have taught them in their streets; yea, and we have taught them upon their hills; and we have also entered into their temples and their ^asynagogues and taught them; and we have been cast out, and mocked, and spit upon, and smote upon our cheeks; and we have been ^bstoned, and taken and bound with ^cstrong cords, and cast into prison; and through the power and wisdom of God we have been delivered again.

30 And we have suffered all manner of afflictions, and all this, that perhaps we might be the means of saving some soul; and we supposed that our ^ajoy would be full if perhaps we could be the means of saving some.

 

 

These verses are so true and so relatable to missionaries (except the parts about being smitten, stoned, bound with ropes, cast into prison. It happens in other countries but not so much to missionaries in the states). These verses, and this chapter as a whole, really add to my testimony of the Book of Mormon as a whole. How could a 14 year old farm boy so accurately describe what is it like to be a missionary, the highs and lows, in a time when missionary work was non-existent? 

 

 

I hope everyone is doing well! Let me know if there's anything exciting going on in the world, or in your lives! I don't hear too much out here haha!

Elder Pettit

Ps: I took a picture I took with an elder wearing the same tie as me! He's in my zone, his name is Elder Poulsen and he's a total stud, he's huge too, super strong. He would have been fun to play football with haha! We noticed we had the same tie so we had to wear it to zone conference.

Hijole!

Hello!

This week was pretty good, the hardest thing that I've encountered so far is that nobody wants to talk to us! We've called and shown up at the doors of less-actives, interested-people, and other people who were interested at some point recently. A lot of them say one of four things: they are busy, they are in Mexicali, they are working, or they are eating. It's been hard to have a lot of success because of these reasons haha. Also, we've set up so many lessons, but a lot of them have fallen through because the person will not answer the phone, or because they will say they are busy and want to reschedule. However, we have had some success in talking to people. 

A few days ago, we went to the park that's right across the street from our church building and tried talking to some people there. We gave a Book of Mormon to this guy with 3 skateboards and a bunch of tats who said he loved reading. This guy spoke English. He showed us this book he was reading, and he said he reads about 4 books a month.  We started out by asking him about where he thinks we go after this life, and that got the conversation directed towards religion. So we slapped down a copy of the BoM on him! He got really excited and said, "No way bro, you got a free copy for me bro? That's f'n cool, for sure, I'll check it out!" We gave him a rundown on what it's about, gave him our number! We also spoke to this nice, older Mexican couple in the park that were super receptive and open-minded. We asked them what their first impression of us was, and they said, "I think you're doing the Lord's work." How cool that someone who isn't even a member of the church can recognize what missionary work is. So we will probably be meeting with him on Sunday! The wife didn't seem too interested until the other junior companion, Elder Bullock, and I started to bear our testimony of the book. Then she perked up and started listening haha.

I've learned some fun slang from a member family's kids. Chido means sick, or dope pretty much. Quiubole means What's Up, Vato is dude, Neta means For Real, hijole means Dang, and Ah, Te Creas is something you'd say in place of "just kidding", as the punchline of a joke. The older Mexicans also chuckle when we say Hijole, because apparently it's like an outdated term from a few decades out. 

My companions and I have had some fire companion studies, and gotten into some really good discussions about things. That's definitely something that's awesome about the mission. You just dive into scriptures for an hour or two every day and just go hard. Also, planning out your whole day and being busy all day is super nice too. Hopefully these are some good habits I can keep after the mission lol.

Well, everything is going pretty well, we've just been grinding every day and mostly getting rejected left and right. It makes the successes that much better!

Elder Pettit

Pics:

1. Elder Montague with the Ibarra's super energetic dog Gunther

2. A cool mural outside of a church in El Centro

3. A huge spider

4. A thumbs down because we were getting turned away all day

5. We did a cool musical number for our morning devotional that the whole mission watched

First Week In Imperial!

A lot has happened in the last week!

Last tuesday, I flew to San Diego. I wasn't very nervous the whole day, right up until we took pictures with family. Right before I was about to walk through TSA. Then it really hit me that I'll be gone for the next two years, and that is a long time to be doing something strenuously haha. I've heard a lot of people say in their first week or so that they want to go home. But I haven't felt that at all! I think I was well prepared for this by going to a semester at BYU first.

Anyway, there were 12 missionaries on the same flight as me to San Diego. It was good to talk with 11 other people going to the same place for the same purpose, it also got all of us pretty fired up about getting to San Diego haha! All of the other missionaries were grouped together on the plane, but for some reason, I was assigned to a seat away from everyone. So I just had some good conversations with some of the people around me which was cool.

When we got to the airport, I met the mission president and my companions. My companions are awesome (I'm in a trio), and President Gimenez is awesome too, he's a member of the quorum of the seventy too which is really cool. 

After landing in the cool 70 degree weather of San Diego, my trio and another trio went to the Mormon Battalion. We then got a "Cali Burrito", basically just a really good burrito every place sells down here. Even though our area was in Imperial, over two hours away, we had to stay in San Diego for the night because we had training the next morning in San Diego. We stayed with the other trio, meaning the first night was basically just a 6-man sleepover. 

We got to Imperial the next day, after the training. It's so so hot here. 100 degrees is considered a nice cool day. It's been pretty much constantly in the 105-118 range. Every time we step outside, it's literally the only thing we talk about, it's just so hot haha.

Twice a week, we teach an English class at the church. Obviously the English parts are really easy, and the parts where I have to explain how English works in Spanish is good practice. 

We taught a lesson to this one lady named Basilia, she made us some really good tacos. Elder Montague, the district leader who has been out for ten months and speaks really good Spanish, taught most of the lesson because Elder Bullock (he has been out for six weeks) and I have a limited repertoire of Spanish haha. 

It's been hard to find people to teach because everyone is out of town for the summer, or they're in Mexicali (just south of the border) with their family, especially on weekends. This makes it hard to invite people to church.

There aren't enough members here for a whole ward, so it's just a branch with about 25-30 people that come to church. The branch president (basically the bishop) has three sons, Danny, Diego, and Dael. Danny is the only one old enough to bless the sacrament each week, so Elder Bullock and I will take turns helping with blessing the sacrament in Spanish. Elder Montague plays the piano for sacrament meeting as well. I've been trying to find some time to brush up on my piano as well so I can help play too!

There's a lot more that's happened, but I don't want to make this one too long. Already one week in and my testimony of the gospel has grown so much. Christ is real, he lives, and there is so much truth and power in the gospel. It's real, it just is. I thought I'd have more FOMO (fear of missing out) in terms of things that I've given up to go on a mission. I thought I'd care more about politics, the NBA finals, and whatever else is going on in the world. But I haven't.  I look forward to coming home in two years and being able to enjoy everything, but for now, I feel I'm being blessed with an ability to be focused on this great work. It's so important. 

Anyways, hope everyone is doing well!

Bueno!

Elder Pettit

P.S. Wow, lot of pictures. I'm not sure if they come through in order or not. My apologies if they don't haha

1. All 12 of us new missionaries at the airport

2-4. Mormon Battalion tour

5. Meeting my companions

6. Picture of a palm tree in imperial that I took for my sister Allie 

7. Meeting President Gimenez

8-11. Sweet pics

12. A picture we took in front of some dog food. Someone gave us the dog food, so we decided to post it in a local Facebook group to see if anyone was in need of it. Someone from Calexico drove up and got it for her friend who is struggling right now, and we put her in contact with the missionaries down there. So that was a cool experience!

Last Day Of The MTC!

Hey y'all, 

I fly out to San Diego from Salt Lake tomorrow! The last six weeks of doing the MTC online have been interesting. I got a lot out of it and learned a lot of Spanish, but spending all day in the apartment on zoom has not been preferred haha. The best part about high school to me was being in class with other students, and being able to socialize with them in a way that’s just not the same when you’re not in person. We made the best of it though, and had a lot of fun! My teachers and my district have been super awesome, or as we like to say, Super Bien! I'm super excited, albeit a bit nervous, to finally get to San Diego!

I got an email from my mission with some more details about my first transfer. I will be starting off in a place about two hours inland from the coast of San Diego, in a place called Imperial. I'll start out with *two* companions! One of them is a district leader, his name is Elder Montague, and the other is Elder Bullock. So I think when I land tomorrow in San Diego, my companions and I will drive straight to Imperial. 

Imperial is right by the Mexican border, so I will definitely be using Spanish from day one haha. I was also looking forward to the constant 70 degree weather of coastal San Diego, but that's going to have to wait! The weather in Imperial is going to be in the 110's all week... gonna be brutal out here! ;)

Exciting emails coming soon!

Elder Jaxon Pettit

Some pics from the last few weeks:

Pics 1-2: Father’s Day get-together with family!

Pics 3-4: Funny Zoom pics

Pic 5: Final picture with my MTC district!

Pic 6: Me and my companion, Elder Hellewell!