Today, I am in Valladolid. I caught a train this afternoon and now I'm here helping the zone leader of León to plan a zone conference, which we have tomorrow. I am on my way to Gijón, which I found out on Monday is where I will be serving. We also went to the temple this morning. That's all the biggest news, now I'll start back at the start and work back to all of that...
Last Thursday was Elder Wride's birthday. He has been missin on his family a lot lately and I didn't want his day to be crappy, so I used my cake mix that I got for my own birthday to sneak out of weekly planning and bake him a cake and bring it out and surprise him. I think he really liked it and appreciated it. So that was good.
Our miracle of the week came on Saturday. We left the piso and saw this little sweet Filipina trying to lug like tons of groceries and had her son on a little plastic motor bike and was basically just struggling. We offered to help her and she accepted, which is the first miracle. Nobody in Spain will ever let us help them with groceries even though we constantly offer! So we walked back with her and she speaks perfect English. Has lived in like Russia, Canada, New York, her islands, and now Spain. Crazy fun adventures. But her husband lives back in the Filipinos. I am purposely avoiding spelling that word in English. We finally got to her piso, and we were like "how in the world did she plan on doing that alone?" She let us in and we sat down and quickly explained to her what we did and why we were here and just invited her to church. Offered to go pick her up, and she said yes! So we did. And she came to all 3 hours with her son. She loved it. Her son even offered to say the prayer in Primary. Her name is Marieta and he's Albert. She then asked her dad(she lives with her parents and sister here in Spain) if we could come have "bible study" with her and he said no. So she told us she was looking for a new piso....Hahahah Marieta! That's not necessary. We'll teach you in our church! So that's our prepared person miracle for this week.
Also, Natalia. She's a Dominican that is daughter of some less active members. We taught her last week and she came to church for the second time, but left crying. And we didn't know why. She sent us a text that said she didn't want us to try and teach her anymore or talk to her. So of course we called. Haha. She didn't answer, but ended up calling us back later. She just told us how she felt guilty or bad in church or something and how she is too much of a sinner, so we taught her about repentance and the Atonement. It was a really good lesson and I really felt the spirit testify through me of repentance and it was just a good lesson.
Monday, I got the call. "Hey Elder Jeppson, you're gonna be going to Gijón to replace an élder. And he'll be taking your place in Madrid." So my second time taking somebody elses place in an emergency transfer. I don't know how much missionary work has been done in my new area lately. So it'll be interesting to find out. But so they told me I would be coming up to Valladolid today, Wednesday, and being the the zone leader Elder Hodges for a bit, and then we continue up to León for a zone conference tomorrow (the same one I just saw in Madrid) and then after that, I'll keep heading north to Gijón with my new companion, Elder Rigtrup. He's from Virginia. That's about all I know. I'll let you know more if I ever find out more. I'm guessing I will.
And that's my week in a nutshell. Today we went to the temple and I had a pretty cool experience. I really wanted to leave the office/Alcobendas in a real transfer instead of just filling in whatever hole in the mission like happens a lot with trios, just to feel like it was more of an inspired decision, so I kind of felt like I might just being filling a hole, so I prayed about it. After going through the session I was in the Celestial Room and I grabbed a book of Mormon and opened right up to Alma 53:12 and I replaced Zarahemla with Gijón and I just knew it was for a reason. So I guess I'll have to figure out what it is.
So I am now in the León Zone. I started in Madrid, went to Santiago, hit the Canary Islands, returned to Madrid, and now I'm in León. So that's pretty much the whole mission covered. I guess I am just the viajero of the mission. The León zone is known as the apostate zone. Last transfer was the first transfer in a while that someone didn't get sent home early for doing something stupid. So I guess I'm just gonna have to be the old school guy that I am in the mission and keep up the obedience. That's one thing I've learned throughout the mission, obedience matters. It's not always easy, pero por sacrificios se dan bendiciones. I'm not perfect, but I just plan on trying to be a good example I guess and do my best up here. I'm gonna miss Elder Gonzalez and Elder Wride. That was a really fun trio. I forgot to mention also that the Stake President's return missionary son bailed on me and so I just worked with them the whole time. So yeah....
I know this work is true. Sharing it is something we have been commanded to do and when the Lord commands, he also lifts and provides the way. The most important part of what we can do is just invite others. Invite invite invite invite. I love you all. I'm grateful to be on my 3rd beach area of my mission. I think it's a sign I'm supposed to be moving to a beach-front property someday.... Just sayin....
Con Cariño,
élder Tanton Sil Jeppson
The pictures are of goodbyes. The Lanzaroteños, the Alcobendenses. The Ovards/office. The Morales.
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