Ok, you do it greenie

Beck Family!

Hey, so whats up everybody? This aint gonna be that long, cause you know, ill be talking to yall in like 5 seconds on christmas. But still, last week was super good. We have just been biking all over and tearing it up. We had members out teaching with us every day last week, which was super good, and it helped out our investigators a lot. Me greenie elder L is holding up good to the work. I make him do lots of stuff. People are walking down the street, i just whisper 'you contact him.' Middle of a lesson i whishper 'you teach this and ask her questions about it.' Nightly planning 'ok, you plan for the 7 oclock hour'. I am making him do  lots of stuff, and its making him learn quick, cant baby em. But life is going really good. I am finding it really good for me and really rewarding to just keep working hard. I tried last week to re-study how to contact people. You might think that after all this time i would have contacting down, but the truth is it is something we can always get better at, and so i studied it to learn how i could do it better even now. And the more i make those efforts to continuously improve, the more rewarding every day of this experience is. And so that is what i just keep trying to do, to work, to learn, and to never let off the gas. I have noticed in this last week how i can truly feel like a successful missionary every day. I feel that as i continually give it my all, and work as hard as when i was a zone leader, as hard as i did a year ago, as hard as when i was with elder stone. As i keep trying, and dont let myself get content with where i am, i constantly feel like i am doing what God needs of me. We have a great night ahead of us today of teaching, and great things set up later in the week. Im excited to missionary work, i honestly love being a missionary. Cant wait to talk to yall in a couple days, see ya soon, love yall.

 

Beck out,

Elder Beck

LA temple, bad puking moments, investigators dropped, then the week turned around :)

Beck Family!

So this morning was temple morning, so i am running on 4 hours of sleep and doing great. Man the 530 session is so good, best session of the whole day. The LA temple is so great, for real, gonna be one of my favorite temples. Its a in yo face type of temple. Cause its just in the middle of Babylon, and the church decided to build like the biggest prettiest building possible. Thats just like 'what up LA, do something bout it.' The church dont play, and i think the LA temple is proof of that.

But it was awesome, and so was most of our weeek. Well our week acutally started terrible. Like we had 3 days of life just blowing up in our faces. All the lessons fell apart, our very best investigators dropped us out of nowhere, which was a huge shock and just terrible, and we had to drop a lot of our other invetstigators, brining us down to 3. We reduced our teaching pool by 4 times in a matter of days. Also i got sick, and was throwing up all tuesday night. But i didnt take any proselyting off, or really any time at all, i just got up the next day and worked through feeling super sick. I havent taken a single sick day or hour on my whole mission, and i sure aint gonna start now. So that made it look like this week would be less than memorable. But then things changed around. We started finding, we found new investigators, and we had an old former come out of the wood work to be a great investigator now. We have people progressing, and we are having lots of success with our less active familys as well. We had lots of less actives come to church and the christmas choir activity this last week, so we are seeing good things happened. We ended up teaching a lot in the last couple of days, it serisousl all happened right at the end.

Also, really cool moment. We took a member out with us to go to a lesson. When we were done we asked themember if there was anything we could do for them. One of the members said she would like  a blessing of comfort and counsel. We went to their home, and she asked me to give her the blessing. I said a little prayer, and then started. 2 amazing things happened. 1. my spanish became flawless, absolutely perfect for the next couple of minutes, as i was able to fluidly and fluently express even the most complex thoughts i had. But the 2nd thing was even more amazing. I was speaking, then took a short break and paused, and i had such a clear and suprisingly distinct spiritual impression. In almost audible words i head 'she is struggling with self worth.' I then started the blessing again, and i realized that the spirit in the room changed as the blessing started adressing her needs that were whispered to me. I felt her begin to cry, and i knew that God put that idea into my head, because He knew one of his daughters was hurting, and she needed help. It was an incredible experience, and i also realized that much of the things that i said were also meant for me and i should apply them to myself as well. It was a really cool moment of spirutal revelation.
Also, this last week we had elder Baxter of the first quorum on the 70 come visit us. We had a zone conference with him yesterday. IT was good, i liked it, andi feel blessed that this is the 3rd GA to visit our mission during my time here. But in all honesty, my favorite part of the conference was when our mission president got up and talked, he just conveys the spirit in such a strong way. It was another thing that made this last week so good.

Also, we had a christmas conference, and i watched the christmas devotional, which was great, liked that. Prophets just get it.

this is what happens when missionaries get busy

sunset over Long Beach

don't even know if you are supposed to eat this

Best Sunday ever!!! UNCLE AARON dropped by!

making some Salvadorian food

LA temple visitor center

visitor center

Anyways, great week. I know that as i focus on feeling the spirit, that i feel sucessful about my mission. Way to much of the time i feel self critical and self defeating about everything, i hold myself to a nearly impossible standard. And that gets me down lots of times, like really down. But i know when i focus on feeling the spirit, i can connect the feeling of the spirit to a feeling that God is happy with me, and even though im not perfect, if im still trying as hard as I can, then he is happy with my progress. Its just true, i know it is. Love yall, take care.

Beck out,
Elder Beck

Overall crazy...making that greenie tired!

Beck Family!

So this week has been crazy good, and just overall crazy.

So first off, its been raining. Say whaaat?! It doesnt rain in california, like hardly ever. But this week is has poured, for days, and it finally stopped on Friday. But that was super weird, the last time i saw the rain was in February. Its literally only rained like 3 times, including this week, in my whole mission. But this week it rained a lot, and that was a great way to introduce my greenie to the mission.

My greenies name is elder L. He is from  Utah, he is half samoan, and fresh out of highschool and 18 years old. He went to the mexico mtc, so he has way better spanish than i did when i got to the field, so ive been using him since day one.

Cool story. Get ready for this. On tuesday, the day that elder L got here, we began teaching. The very first house we went to was G house. She was home and let us in. We then taught her and her son angel, and it became a very spirutal lesson. We ended up teaching about the plan of salvation and espescially how they can know it is true. After about 30 minutes of talking, i looked over to my greenie and said 'invite them to be baptized.' He looked at me with the 'you sure bout that' look, but then looked back at them and invited them to be baptized. They both nearly in unison said said without hesitation. They accepted baptismal dates for the 28th of this month. It was incredible. When we left there i told me greenie "when we have faith and we show it, it equals miracles like that." It was the very first house and person he visited in his mission, and they set a really firm baptismal goal. How cool is that? Just in case you were wondering, that is not how my first day went, i do remember where i ate, i remember that i ate something incredibly spicy at the salsedo home, and i remember just feeling so tired. I asked him how he felt the next day when he woke up. He said 'good but im pretty sure we were only asleep for 2 hours, cause im still exhuasted'. That means we are doing something right if he feels exhausted for these whole 6 weeks. We did lots of walking in the rain, talking to everybody, so that was pretty fun to.

Also, yesterday at church i got to confirm J Q. He is the 13 year old kid that we baptized last week. I got to confirm him yesterday, and it was a great experience. It was so cool, to recognize the spirit just say what was specific for him. and the coolest thing that i think happened was in the confirmation i felt the distinct impression to tell him to prepare to serve a mission, because there would be more people like him prepared to recieve the gospel from his testimony. It was super cool, and i know that if he does what he needs to,he will grow up to be a missionay and change other peoples lives.

puddle jumping in the rain!

We got it all in one trip!

yea, we have never seen this sign before!
 

Thanks for everything family, love all of you, have a great Christmas! Try and share the spirit of christmas with as many people as possible. We can do so much good in the world, it just takes a little effort from us to make a big difference!

Beck out,
Elder Beck

He is the gift

Beck Family!

This week has been straight crazy. So busy. So crazy. Full of miracles. Let me break it down.

To start, we have been teaching la familia q for a while. They have been coming to church, and were introduced to church by a friend taking them to the LA temple visitors center(great first impression). We have been teaching them consistently, and this week, the 2 young boys got baptized. They father/boyfriend is actually the member that introcuded the family to the gospel. The 2 youngest kids are below 8, and the mom is going to be baptized on the 14th of december. They are so cool. The mom, L owns a zumba studio and is a zumba instructor. So we often teach her at her zumba studio in downtown Compton. Zumba is a very foreign culture to me, its crazy. The women that attend these zumba classes worship those zumba instructors like goddeses its crazy. But they had 2 thanksgiving dinners at the zumba studio before thanksgiving that we went to, so we got to meet a lot of people there while we taught L and her family. This family is just awesome. The kids are super funny. We got J 13, nl 9, d 7, j 6. So cute, and these kids say the funniest things. This was a conversaition that d had with his mom.

'i say the toothfairy when i lost my tooth.'

'what did he look like?'

'it was a girl.'

'What color was her skin?'

'She was mexican.'

'Was she short or tall?'

'Short.'

"was she skinny or fat?'

'Fat"

Lupe then looks at him with that mothers glare.

'Uhh... i mean skinny, she was skinny."

So funny. great family. Anyways, they passed their bapsitmal interviews, and they kids got baptized yesterday, and that was awesome. It turned out to be a great baptism. Elders S and C baptized them and Me and another elder are going to confirm them next sunday. And the mom is gonna be baptized in 2 weeks, keep praying for her!

Also, i dont know if you heard anthing about the protest/riots that have been going on, but they have been going on in compton. something about a police officer killing a young black kid. Anways, when we were teaching the quintero family on tuesday night i think, we got a call from the APs saying that we and every other missionary had to evacuation Compton immmediatley cause things were getting out of hand with the protest. So we all left and worked in paramount for the rest of the night. Compton is crazy.

Also, i have more crazy news. So i am entering my last transfer of my misison, meaning my finaly 6 weeks. And i have been called to be a trainer of a brand new missionary. Normally the training program is 12 weeks long for a new misisonary, but the APs called me on thursday night and told me that i would be training and that i would need to finisht the training program with him before i go home. So it is gonna be crazy. I am so excited though, we are going to work so hard, and i am just gonna kill him and love him. Its gonna be a blast, i am so excited to end my mission like this. I have never heard of another elder training in their last 6 weeks, so its pretty unique, but its gonna be great. I pick him up on tuesday, and then we get right to work.

Thanksgiving was great, we had 6 dinners, 3 of those with investigator familiys. I didnts want to eat after the first 2. But i pushed through, and made everybody happy. I felt terrible, but happy at the same time. Great holiday, and now its time for the chrismas music.

Anyways, love all of you, take care, have a great week, and look up HE IS THE GIFT and share the video.

Beck out,

sweet hawk

looking cool on Thanksgiving

pitbulls run this town

baptism is the way back

Elder Beck

I'm in a tri again

Beck Family!

Family, with no lie, this has been one of the craziest weeks of my mission, filled with so many ups and downs.

I am just gonna lead off with this. On Thursday, at 6 in the morning, my companion elder C had to go home. He needed to go home to seek medical attention, for something he had been struggling with his whole mission. It was one of the hardest things I have had to go through, seeing him go home. It happend to fast. on tuesday we met with the president, he told us to come back the next day. on wednesday he told my componion that he was going home the very next day at 6 in the morning. so we literally had less that 24 hours notice. The only reason that i am telling you all this is because elder C was an example i think we can all learn from. In no way did he want to go home, that is why he had gutted it out for 13 months here in the field. He loved his mission, and he loved the chance to serve. I can not tell you the amount of times that he said how much her loved our investigators, how nearly every member was 'his favorite member.' He loved his mission, and he had such a testimony of the Atonement and how it strengthened him, and that is what kept him going all of this time. He didnt take his mission for granted, and he gave it everything he had. But in the end, God plan was for him to get better. It was very hard to swallow, he didnt want to leave. But we went and talked for a good while, and he began to see that our missions dont just end when we go home, that in reality they last out whole lives. He realized that just cause he was going home didnt mean that he still didnt have a responsibitly to serve others or help others or invite others to come unto Christ. In reality, our missions arent just a set apart 2 years that come and go, but rathers its a kickstart foor how we should live the rest of our lives. For the rest of our lives we should live and apply the things that we take from the misison, we should be different people forever becaseu of it. And with that calm reassurance, he went home, not want to do it, but understnading that the Lord had a plan and that this really was part of it. He was one of my favorite componions, and good friends. I know that it was the right thing for him.

Since that happened on thursday, i have been put in a trio with the zone leaders elders S and C. And we are working both areas, which is huge for us. And so i feel like i am basically a zone leader again for 2 weeks until transfers. I did not want to get called back into zone leader life, i was loving so much just being a regular ol senior componion. But its all good, its been super fun being with them, they are some of my favorite elders. We had a crazy successsfully 4 days together. In those 4 days we reached what our mision calls the weekly stnadard of excellence. that is 12 member present lessons, 3 new investigatrors, 2 at church, and 20 total lesosns. We achieved more than all of those numbers in just the last 4 days, so we work really good together, and we should be seeing more good things coming up soon. The work keeps moving along. thanks family for all you have done, love you all so much, good luck on your talks, leave me something to talk about later! kidding, luv you.

Beck out,
Elder Beck

mission pranks

good one elders!

Missionaries at work

Unique week

Beck Family!

So this week has been unique.

but also pretty crazy.

Missionary work wise, it felt like we were getting kicked in the face a lot. Not much good happened, we got dropped by some of our best investigators who have come to church and had really cool spiritual experiences. So that was no fun. We werent able to find a lot of our investigators, or make contact with them, so that made teaching harder, didnt have as many lessons as we like. And it was just generally not the best week in that aspect.
But in the aspect of a companionship, it was a great week. Me and elder C have been getting along super good, and its been cool to see that as we get along and are more open with communication, that it really does change the atmosphere with our investigators. For real, things are going great.
And I have done something pretty interesting family that i would like to share. Back in the beginning of october, i heard of something really interesting. It was refered to as a 40 day fast. It is meant to be a thing that helps in the process of santification. This is what i did. I first made a vision of what i want to become, related to my personal progression. I made the vision 'To Burn all The Ships in The Harbor.' That is refering to i want to burn everything behind me, everything holding me back, that can take me back to the way i was before the mission. I then set specific goals. The main goal was to do a 40 day fast of the things that are holding me back. I then set specific plans. Those plans including making a detailed and honest list of things that i do that i know i shouldnt, or things that i dont do that i know i should. This list included i should not even glance at the tv when we eat at a restaurant, i should not even hum music that isnt mission approved, i should not ask younger missionaries about movies that have come out. Just simple things like that. I then made this list and then prayed that i would be able to give up every thing on it for the next 40 days. That started on october 5th. Since  then i have noticed how those things seemed like even more of a temptaition than before. I realize that none of them are very large bad things, but they were just little things that i needed to change if i wanted to enjoy the company of the spirit always. I had to fight like a lion in this sanctification process, and do everything possible to be constantly focused in on the missionary work. Around day 30 i started to notice that it wasnt that hard to give up those things, that i didnt really even want to. I finisehd the 40 days this last week, and i can honestly say that i have seen a change in my nature from doing this. I seem to notice even the smallest things that drive away the sprit, every little thing seems to have an effect on me. I feel much more sensitive to the spirit and to its promptings. And i have seen that help me in my personal life and with helping other people. It has been incredible. I feel like it changed some of my most basic desires and habits. I know that change is possible. I know that we can become who God expects of us. I know that we can have confidence to be in front of Him if we are doing our very best. Cause if we are doing our very best, then we are doing enough.

Thanks so much family, love all of you, take CAre!

Beck out,
Elder Beck

 

Ok that is what fell out of the toaster!!! 

Us

Exterminator = most of them dead!

Beck Family!

Pretty average week.

Since when would you believe that? Not, it was crazy and awesome. So im gonna get started here. We celebrated elder C b-day this last week. I threw him a suprise b-day party. I had called up various ward members and given them assignments of stuff to bring and told them all where to meet up at. Then after ward correlation, we went to the partk, everything was already there waiting for us, elder C was actually suprised, and it was legit. I did all of the planning when we were on exchanges, or else it would be pretty hard to throw a suprise party for someone that you are constantly with. And we smashed his face into the cake, pictures to come of that great moment.

This last week we also did a big service project at a methodist church. The church really wants us to be doing more service, to be getting out into the community and doing more stuff like that. Adn this was a cool opportunity we had to do that. We broke down furniture, sweeped and mopped and cleaned their 'sunday school,' And we destroyed lots of stuff to fit it into the dumpsters. It was a methodist church, but definitly it is mostly and islander church, all of the church members there that were helping us were tongan and samoan. And those people are so big and so strong, its just intimidating. Then they fed us lunch, cause islanders, like mexicans, dont get together for any reason and not have food. I literally saw a tongan eat an entire pizza in minutes, and it didnt even slow him down. this guy probably weighed over 330 pounds of just man. big human. Really fun, fun to do service and to get together with the whole zone.

Also, incase i havent mentioned it, our apartment is infested with roached, like pretty dang bad. Everytime you turn on the lights when we come in at night you just see them start to scurry and try to hide. They are everywhere in the kitchen and bathroom, and then they made their way into our dresser. So when they started nesting in my running clothes, that is when i had to put my foot down and say something had to change. We had an exterminator come in on friday and poison and fumigate our apartment. It worked. I know it worked cause when we came back to our apartment that night we saw dozens, literally dozens of dead big o'l roaches all over the floors and counters, the poison is supposodley gonnna kill them for the next 3 months. Hey, thats long enough for me. But now hopefully we are the only living things in our apartment. WE had to  empty our cubbords and put all our food in bags, but now, there are no more. Except i did kill one in the shower this morning. For real, nothing freaks me out more than seeing a roach mid shower, cause i feel like its really hard to run away, so you just have to hold your ground, stop screaming like a girl, and kill that little varmint with whatever you can get your hands on. In the case of this morning, i ended up using my comps shampoo bottle. He has no idea that i killed a roach with it this morning, and im not gonna tell him. Its sometimes better when we dont know.

Anways, thanks for everything family, love you all so much, take care.

Beck out,
Elder Beck

Service project days

Surprise b-day party

Teaching in the hood