"So Man, Do You Like, Believe That God Is The Eternal Father?"

Another transfer in the can!

My new companion, Elder Udall, is from Arizona, and he's been out for about 18 months. We're excited to get to work! We will be picking up some new missionaries from the airport soon as well. 

We had some great lessons with non-members and recent converts this last week. We also went to the temple with 3 recent converts and some other ward members. The guy we took the selfie with, Jordan, is 24 years old. After listening listening to General Conference and getting his patriachal blessing, he is preparing to serve a mission. We got him a copy of Preach My Gospel, and lately our lessons have been us role-playing with him. He will teach us and we'll help him learn how to teach. The first time we did this, he started the lesson by asking out of nowhere, "So man, do you like, believe that God is the Eternal Father?" It's always a lot of fun to meet with him.

He told me that he really appreciates the time we spend with him, and that when it comes time for him to go on a mission, he will look back to what we taught him as his base or foundation. He's a super cool guy.

For the past couple of Sundays at the MCRD, I've been teaching a recruit whose girlfriend is a member of the church. When I saw him again this past Sunday, I asked if he had any questions, and he said "Yeah, so how do you join?" He wants to be baptized, but he wants to read more of the Book of Mormon first too. It's a super cool opportunity to talk with these marines.

I got to return to El Cajon because Angel, the brother of Alejandro, got baptized on Saturday! 

 I shared this in a Facebook post, but I thought I'd share it here too. It's some verses from the Bible that talk about how we lived with God and Jesus Christ before this life, and we knew them pretty well. 

From,

Elder Pettit

Proverbs 8:22 The Lord possessed me in the beginning of his way, before his works of old.

 23 I was set up from everlasting, from the beginning, or ever the earth was.

 24 When there were no depths, I was brought forth; when there were no fountains abounding with water.

 25 Before the mountains were settled, before the hills was I brought forth:

 26 While as yet he had not made the earth, nor the fields, nor the highest part of the dust of the world.

 27 When he prepared the heavens, I was there: when he set a compass upon the face of the depth:

 28 When he established the clouds above: when he strengthened the fountains of the deep:

 29 When he gave to the sea his decree, that the waters should not pass his commandment: when he appointed the foundations of the earth:

 30 Then I was by him, as one brought up with him: and I was daily his delight, rejoicing always before him;

 31 Rejoicing in the habitable part of his earth; and my delights were with the sons of men.

Holy Week

Hey everyone,

I don't have a ton of time to write today, but it was a good week. We finished up all of our exchanges and are now working on transfer planning with the sisters and President and Sister Giménez. We just had dinner with them and are now going to hash out the transfer document! Sorry for a short email, hope yall have a good week!

Elder Pettit

Easter Devotional

This was a great week! 

With Easter coming up, we've recently been practicing for a special Easter Devotional -with a choir of missionaries, kind of like the one we did around Christmas time. We performed on Sunday night. President and Sister Giménez spoke during it, and we even had some primary kids join us for a song. It was a super cool experience. 

I had a few more exchanges this week. One of them was with Elder Olson, one of the previous APs. I had two more with new missionaries as well. The taller one is Elder Oldroyd, and he's the brother of Jake Oldroyd, the kicker at BYU. I felt like I was doing an exchange with a celebrity haha. He is here temporarily, he's waiting on his visa to go through so he can serve in the Czech Republic. I also had the best hot dog I've ever had in my life at a place called "Chicago Pizza Company" on that exchange.

I included some more pictures from Zone Conference last week that were posted to Facebook. We took a picture today at the end of the Potato Chip Boulder hike in Ramona. Pretty cool! 

We had interviews with President the other day. He told Elder Alonso that he's done being an assistant in two weeks, so that means I'll be training a new AP. Pretty wild! 

We will start planning for transfers this week. Elder Alonso and I have talked a little bit about it, about where we thinks missionaries should go, who should become new leaders, etc etc. It feels kinda like fantasy football or something, I'm excited for it! 

We are pretty much done with exchanges, we've hit all the zones, except for the Valley, my first area. It's a two hour drive from San Diego, and we have two exchanges to do, so we will make a day of it. I'm excited for that, I'm ready to get cooked in the El Centro heat again haha. 

Ok pues, siga adelante!

Elder Pettit 

Conference Week!

We had Zone Conferences and we watched General Conference this week!

The first day of zone conference was crazy, so many things went wrong as we were preparing. The craziest part was when all the fire alarms went off right as President Giménez was beginning his opening remarks. Some of the senior missionaries went too hard in the kitchen and smoked the place out. The alarms were blaring for about 20 minutes while we waited for the fire department to come and shut it off.

 The rest of the conference went well. Elder Alonso and I gave a training presentation to the mission about how we can better find people to teach, and how we can diversify our finding efforts. We based it on the movie Finding Nemo haha!

There were a lot of good talks from General Conference this weekend! President Nelson gave a great talk about Spiritual Momentum. 

Sorry for sending so many pictures this week, there were a ton from Zone Conference. Since this is a short email, here's a great scripture from Romans chapter 8:

38 For I am persuaded, that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor powers, nor things present, nor things to come,

39 Nor height, nor depth, nor any other creature, shall be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.

We use these verses a lot, especially when I talk to someone who seems beaten down by their circumstances, people who feel lost. I talk to a lot of people who don't know God loves them, and this scripture is always powerful for them. Even for those of us who do know, sometimes it's good to know it again. :) 

Have a great week everyone, ciao!

-Elder Pettit