6 MONTH OUT  

Jan. 5 2015

I´m not going to lie its hard to think that I'm already through 1/4 the mission and I don't know how to feel, if the mission is going by fast or if it feels like I've been out for a while! It's like both at the same time. I feel sooooooo different from how I did when I first got here! 

The work is good, Javier and Diana are still working on the marriage stuff but are loving the church! I really hope i get the honor to see him get baptized and then in a year or so I would have the chance to see their family enter the temple! That would be amazing!

Edison is keeping up the good work with staying away from alcohol and says he is doing well with the reading and praying. He finally came to church with us but after sacrament meeting he said he was hungry and told us he was going to go home to grab something to eat and then come back. We tried to get him to stay but he ran out too fast and he never came back... So we´ll keep working with him a little more. 

But I survived the new year and made it without getting blown up! These people do so many fireworks, but more popular are just these super loud bombs things! We were going to get some rest before 12 but it was useless cuz it was so loud here! We went to the top of our building at 12 and saw the fireworks.  it was cool because we could see all of Duran and over in Guayaquil off in the distance.(Baylee, I hope you didn't kiss more than one guy for New Years, that's the limit) Then it was like a miracle because about ten minutes after midnight it was like Ecuador went dead, and we got our sleep in. Then on the 1st we had a Pday and the streets were EMPTY. Which is weird because so many people live here! (It was a good day)  But yeah nothing too much more. just about to head to Guayaquil with Andres Clavijo, a sick member. He´s gonna show us around and whats good here.

Chao!!!

Love, Elder Rawson

  

We helped the bishop move houses

I'm the ref:)

New Comp 

 Jan. 12, 2015

So just got done with transfers today and my comp Elder Cook se fue,  joining me now in Panorama is Elder Maynor Josue Guzman from Honduras. I love him already, he´s a hard worker with so much love for the Lord. He is also now the district leader too. He is Latino but lived in Timpanogas for 6 years and went to Lone Peak. I´m excited because with a Latino comp that knows English will be the best to help me perfect mi español:) We´ll do some great work together here! 

This week on Saturday was Elder Cook´s birthday and the ward did a cool little get together at the church with cake after the stake conference. Which stake conference was awesome as well! President Riggins spoke and I swear he´s like a celebrity here because he is so powerful when he talks. We also had Elder Alarcón from the seventy come and he was great as well. Speaks with a soft voice but also powerful as well. This week was a little slow on the work but I think Elder Guzman and I can turn that around. 

But one thing I got out of conference was something pretty cool. One sister was talking about love and the spirit told me a little lesson. I thought of the scripture in James 2, Faith without works is dead. And I thought why should that apply to Love? And that´s when the spirit told me and Love with out Service is dead. Its kind of true. Charity is the pure love of Christ and Charity work is basically lending service. So I hope that all sticks with you this week. (and yes, to me, hugs are service:) so go hug everyone you see!)

Old Companion->New Companion

 My convert junior and Pres Riggins at Stake conference (blurry, sorry)

Iguana Park with Andres Clavijo last week

The iguanas let you touch them and stuff:)

Nada mas

El Élder Rawson:)

Leave it to Dillon to climb trees in his nice clothes...UHG!!  I guess he'll learn to sew when he rips his pants maybe!!!

Looks like he's enjoying the rain!!!

HAHAHA...Im pretty sure that's what Dillon was doing or saying since it hit his comps face instead of his!!

The church house has been taken over by huge crickets, I think he said his house also...YUCK!!! He sent a video of inside and in closets and they are everywhere!!

                                                                   Dillon hard at work...

Or Hardly working???

FIRST TRANSFER

Jan. 26, 2015

Sad to say goodbye to Panorama and the members and sad for me (his mom) too!  They have all been so sweet and done so much for both of us!   

Jan. 26, 2015

So last night we got the big phone call saying that I'm getting transferred! It was pretty tough this morning saying by to all the members of Panorama. They were like my family. They really babied me through my times of adjusting to the mission life with the good food, air conditioning, cars to take us around. But we went to the terminal where I found out I'm going to Quevedo.  A city like 4 hours from Guayaquil. Basically I'm going from one end of the mission to the other! I'm going to the ward of San Comilo, i think its spelled.. Its actually the exact same area that elder Cook, my trainer, was in when he started the mission! All the missionaries talk about how great Quevedo is so I'm stoked to see how it is! I had a good time with Elder Guzman from San Pedro Sula, Honduras with the 2 weeks we had together. He was a goof, I swear we were never bored together! 

Right now I'm in Guayaquil. I had to go to the office to wait for a missionary that is running late,  he needs somebody to travel to Quevedo with so I´m waiting for him. Some other Elders and I walked from the office to the mall to grab something to eat and I didn't know we would have time to write so i left my camera at the office so no pics this week! Which is a shame cuz me and Elder Guzman snapped some sick ones together!   

I don´t have too much more on my mind so I guess I will just share a little thought.

¨By small and simple things are great things come to pass¨ I think that's what it says in English..

Well until next week! chao!!!

El Élder Rawson

(He ended up finding some time to get back on after he got his camera so there is pictures for this week, YEA for me)!

North and South mission offices right next door

MERRY CHRISTMAS AND A HAPPY NEW YEAR!!! DEC. 22, 2014 AND DEC.29, 2014

His Trunky blanket (as he called it) that I had made for him for Christmas!

Dec. 29, 2014

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year! Oh boy, I have had a great P week! haha. Just kidding, we've been doing some good work out here! We had a way sweet day on Tuesday the 23rd. We took the whole mission and went through the temple and after we cleaned a bunch of church buildings as a mission and then we had an amazing dinner and Christmas program together as a mission with the president. (I have the greatest mission president in the world!) There was a bunch of missionaries that sang and played music and there is some good talent here in the Guayaquil north mission!

But as for the work, Junior is going strong and will be joining with the youth of the ward and go to the temple to do baptisms this Tuesday which he is really excited for! We also started to teach his mom and his sisters which is so cool, Awesome family, They also came to our ward party this last week and had a ton of fun! Javier is still making a ton of progress and will be an awesome leader in the church. As for Edison, we saw him drunk on the streets and we visited him Saturday and he was very drunk and super emotional. Its sad to see what alcohol can do to ones mind like that. But we visited him again yesterday and he was a ton better and we helped him understand the sabbath day so he can attend church with us! I'm really excited for him, He will turn his life around one of these days!

Talking to the fam was great of course and it looks like not much as changed! everyone is still their goofy selves! haha

But that's all for now folks! love you!

-Elder Rawson:)

WE ARE A HAPPY FAMIILLYYY!!!!

HAPPY SISTERS :) :)

HOHOHO!!!

Dec. 22, 2014 
First off, I wanna wish you a merry Christmas from the bottom of my heaaaarrrrtttt!! 

  Yet another good week down as I approach my 1/4 mark (wowzers)!! But it is so hard to think that Christmas is coming and there is snow back home! I can hardly even remember that snow exists at times. The sun is blazing at this time of the year and its only going to get worse! ...Full fuerte ese sol! (haha me encanta la jerga aqui!) But other than that I love Ecuador! 

We baptized and confirmed Junior this week and I can already tell that he has so much potential to be a very strong member of the church. In one year he can be an awesome missionary himself! He always was super good at keeping commitments and has basically read through the gospel principles book already! After being baptized he bore his testimony and shared an amazing story. 

His mom is a super nice woman but had been getting upset a little for his decision to be baptized. One night he went in his room and began to pray and ask God that his mom would be comforted so he could follow through with his baptism in peace. Shortly after his prayer his mom came in and told him that she had been thinking and that she would be supportive to him in whichever decision he makes!
That was such a huge testimony builder to me! I know that being baptized and having the gift of the holy ghost he will be a great example to his sisters and his parents and perhaps one day they will follow his example into the waters of baptism!

Make sure you all remember the reason why we celebrate Christmas! Because Christ was born, and Christ was born in order to carry out the atonement and allow us to receive redemption from our sins and weaknesses in order to be clean and spend eternity with our families and father in heaven!

Love you all so much!
Elder Rawson:-)

HOT ELECTRIC SHOWER, Chontacuro worms for dinner, Baptism by Spiderman aka Elder Rawson (Week of Dec. 8th and !5th)

Why does this look super scary and dangerous to me??? YIKES!!!!

Dec. 15, 2014 

So I´m feeling pretty fancy and spoiled right now because we got an electric shower put in and now I take showers with hot water:) (Lo siento a todos mis amigos que están bañándose en agua fría todavía) but this would have helped me a ton when I first got here cuz the showers were terrible!! 

Anyways so this week we finally got to start teaching Edison. He's an awesome guy and is super humble. When he prays with us, he asks God to help him with his life because it is a disaster. I don´t know everything that is going on but he is married with a family but they all live somewhere else and he lives alone and we see him drinking a lot. He has been trying to stop drinking and really wants to reach out for God´s help in his life. I'm excited to teach him but he didn´t make it to church this Sunday even after we tried hard to get him there.

All I can say is DISGUSTING...YUCK!  I won't torture you all with the video!  He did tell me (his Mom) that he and his companion had the runs for several days after this episode!  Eww...I hope he learned his lesson!

So yeah in the title i wrote, (chontacuro) which is a giant worm type thing from down here. A member had some for us to try because Elder Cook asked for some. We went over and I wasn't going to do it at first but then I thought it would make for a funny video to look back on someday so I did it...... Sorry mom, im nuts! Then after the member looked up videos of everybody else eating them and in all the videos they actually cooked them! but oh well, im still alive so thats good! 

UGH!!!

 And yesterday one of the kids of the ward got baptized and he asked me to baptize him. I felt bad because Im sure his dad might have wanted to but I guess the kid jsut wanted to get baptized by spider man, Haha! Then this week junior is getting baptized and he is going to be an awesome member. He is already way active in the elders quorum. 

The mission is great. Love you all and Feliz Navidad!!

Spiderman (AKA) Elder Rawson workin hard

Dec. 8, 2014

Hey y'all

So this week Elder Useda the area president came to our mission to do some conferences in Guayaquil. The first was with the ward council of like 8 different stakes so there was a ton of people there! The topic was pretty much on how we need to focus on strengthening the wards before we can go out baptizing. Just like in our ward, Elder Cook and I have been working our butts off with the finding, teaching and baptizing and have been doing well for how hard of an area this is. But it hasn't had to big of an impact on our attendance so we are going to be searching out the less actives and get them to church. 

The next day we had another conference with just us missionaries with Elder Useda and man that guy is powerful! He is from Peru and he pretty much "macheteó" (corrected with sharpness) to all the Latino Elders that don't want to learn English and how God chose English to be the language of the restoration. So looks like if I ever get a Latino comp, he wont be hearing too much Spanish from me while we are in the house:) Even though I should work on it as well! 

But the work is going great! Love seeing the change in the people I´ve taught as they have accepted the gospel into their lives!

I think by that smile, he likes receiving mail!

                                                                                                            So I just wanted to send out how grateful I am for how much God as blessed my family at home! I must say it´s kind of freaky that I could have lost my sister but thanks to God´s hands she is alright! Thanks for the prayers of you that have offered! Please keep them coming especially for the other girls in the car because apparently Bay was one of the better ones off! 

Well at least he saved one of the 3 presents I sent him to open on Christmas!

Luv ya all, merry CHRISTmas:)

                                     Elder Rawson

Hey he actually put up his Christmas tree I made and sent him!

Coke and Pizza (Just like home)