July 30, 2012 - Family Email

Okay how are things?? 

 

This week has been super crazy and so good.  We had specialized training at the beginning of the week and that was great.  It was a little different only seeing President Deere there with his wife but the AP´s were there too.  I got to hang out with Manning for a little and talk to him.  Haha yes he called me and told me everything I am so EXCITED.  It is really impossible for me to get trunkie training a new missionary.  Plus I get too  pissed when I feel like I don´t get to work enough.  Plus you know me and my attitude I worry too much what the President would think looking at my weekly numbers and the Lord himself.  So I am doing great.  He remembered that crazy miracle story that President Clegg shared about the dream??  Well he is one of the travelling ap´s and they are here with us in Jaén right now.  I went with him on Friday and Saturday.  His name is Elder Pedersen his trainer was Elder Solari the kid you saw in J-Dawgs.  Elder Pedersen is the father of Elder Peterson haha.  Pedersen is such a funny man I had a lot of funny stories with him this last weekend.  We found this Muslem kid and we go teach him and we find he is a freaking porn star and he is only 20 years old.  Here in Europe I have taught some interesting people..so well we teach a little lesson and tell him that he needs to repent.  Also with Elder Pedersen we found an old investigator family that isn´t married and we knock on the door and the first thing a little kid says is hey I am 8 years old now haha.  We are going to continue working with them.  The mom is Romanian and she has a little son named Lolo.  So we will be working with them.

 

So a miracle happened to me this last week.  So before the traveling ap´s get here this last Wednesday we are like running to a lesson; not even contacting in the street because we are in a hurry. I see a mom and a little kid walking and they are practically right next to me.  I literally get stopped dead in my tracks and I talk to the lady.  Some how or something stopped me dead in my tracks and I knew the Lord made me stop; I didn´t even think to stop.  So the lady is smiling all happy and I talk to her and she tells me that she had talked to the missionaries two years ago and I get her number and address and ask if I can come back tonight and she says yes.  Okay so we pass by her house and she lets us in and right as we sit down she tells us she needs to tell us something.  She tells us that she is a member and starts just crying.  I start crying because I know the Lord made me stop her because she needs us.  So it turns out that her son is 9 years old and is going to get baptized on the 12th with Nereya.  Miracle, man, I love the family.  I sat there in her house with her crying for like 20 minutes while she was telling me her history and all.  She is from Peru and her parents are active members.  Her husband isn´t a member and we are going to work with him.  The mom and the son Sebastian came to church too!  SOLID.  

 

SO, this week was a week of miracles and the Ap´s helped us a lot.  We found 7 new people without them and we ended the week with 19 new people.  I will inform you more next week about investigators.

 

Last little funny story.  Last night I am with Elder White and we talk to some black African guy that is Muslim and it´s 10:10 at night and invites us into a party with like 30 black guys in a one room apartment and they give us food.  The Muslims are doing a month fast and they only eat at night.  So every night they have a party and we walk in the house and they just start yelling all happy because we are Americans.  They invited us to come back today and we are going to get pictures haha.  

 

Well I love you ALL!!!

 

CODY

July 23, 2012 - Family Email

Hey Family how are all of ya´ll??

So we had a really good week and I am loving Jaén.  Things are going great and we really are working so hard.  My legs have never been so tired in my mission as they were the end of this week.  I don´t think you understand how hilly it is here in Jaén .  Haha it makes me laugh sometimes when we are walking and I walk really fast my companion has to do little jogs to keep up with me.  He is super new and thinks that his arm needs to be touching mine.  Ha I remember I was like that with Elder Shaver for awhile and I think I remember making him mad because I wanted to be right next to him.  We really had a great week and I
can´t complain at all.  Jaén has a lot of people here and yeah they are a little more closed people but you just have to work hard and be obedient and the Lord provides.

So cool little story I finally taught my first Mexican WOOH!!  Go Gus!  Man I really miss that little guy, ha family remember Gus?  Well so this one morning we had just prayed to help us find some one to teach
and we went out contacting.  So these two Spaniards were sitting on a bench doing nothing as they always do and yelled at us to come over.  So we go talk to them and a big old religion and conversation starts up.
 So we are there for like 10 minutes talking to these Spanish men and a little short Latino approaches us and talks to us so I had Elder Rojas talk to him and I stayed with the dudes on the bench.  So my companion got all the information and he said he would come to church and turns out he is a student here from Mexico.  So Sunday comes along and we had called him prior to church and he said he was coming to church but never showed up.  So we set a lesson with him for the afternoon and we went and taught him with Sara who is the Branch missionary who happens to be a 19 year old girl from Mexico.  So we went and taught him and it was great and is so interested in our message.  It also turns out he came to the church and walked in the doors and saw a girl out in the foyer coloring and thought he was at the wrong place and left!!!  We sat out waiting for him for a long time but he never showed and right as we went into class he showed up and
didn´t call us.  So this guys name is Jorge from Mexico first good investigator in Jaén and I got no other investigators to talk about yet! haha.  We taught 12 lessons and found 3 new people and 28 futures and that´s not too bad here in Jaén.  I don´t think anyone here in Jaén was finding 28 futures before.  So this week looks really good.  I also got a call from Elder Lignell and he found a guy in Málaga that lives in the Jaén area that listened to the missionaries 10 years ago and was going to get baptized and the missionaries disappeared.  We are going out to teach him this Wednesday I think.  Really good guy he even has read Jesus the Christ.  I don´t know why an investigator would ever read that book but good for him.  Oh also on the 12th of August we are having a baptism.  Our little Nereya we are teaching took off to Jerez for 3 weeks so she is getting the rest of the lessons from the missionaries there and she comes back the 5th of August and we will teach her the rest and she is getting baptized on the 12th!!!  So cool a baptism here in Jaén.  We  have been trying to find a lot of families out here in Jaén with kids that aren´t baptized and I think we have found like 3 families with kids that are like 12 and not baptized so that will be our focus this next week.  I have to go out to Granada and interview 5 people so they can get baptized.  Elder Shaver is having 5 baptisms next week and I am his District Leader so I have to go waste my whole afternoon out there tomorrow.  Oh so tomorrow is Zone Conference as well here in Granada.  So President Deere came to our ward yesterday and it was awesome.  He gave a great talk about the members working with the missionaries.  Everyone loved him and told me that he is called of God.  I love President  Deere.  He embarrassed us in front of all the members.  HE started with Elder Rojas saying that he is the only member in his family and all that.  Then about me he said I was the best of the best and told everyone that every area I have served in has raised.  The crappy thing is I have to translate that into English to a lady that is from England in the ward and I had to say all that in English about myself it was embarrassing because he completely talked me up and Elder Rojas.

So I am doing great and happy.  I am learning a lot of patience here with Elder Rojas and I need not say more.  He is a great kid and I love speaking Spanish all the time he is just a new missionary and was raised A LOT different than I was.  I love my parents.  I also love my companion.  That is sad to here about Andrew go give him a kiss on the cheek for me and tell him to write me back I never got a letter back from him.  Haha I love Manning he is my best friend I love that kid forever!!  Yeah I always dream in Spanish I have just been so tired I don´t even dream as much so I don´t remember them.

I LOVE YOU.
CODY

July 16, 2012 - Family Email

Hey,

 

Elder Rojas and Elder Cody opening back up Jaen

Hahahahaha no way!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!  I am dying here!  I can´t believe he did that!  At the same time that is something he would totally do haha. Man that is so funny I miss that man.  I am so glad you all finally got to meet them, they are incredible huh?  President Clegg definently had a great impact on my mission and I can´t wait to see them again!  Hermana Clegg is like a mother to me she is great as well.  She knows all of the missionaries so well!  Yeah I hope you give here a call sometime that will be really cool because I want to stay in touch with them so that they come to my Home Coming and my wedding. 

 

So one more little thing that I forgot to mention is that I am the District Leader here in Jaén.  I have Elder Shaver and sister missionaries in my district.  I would much rather be a Zone Leader than a District Leader because the District Leaders have to teach every week and the ZL´s only have to like once a month.  However being a DL will make me teach more and I have to study more so that I am looking forward to.  So me, being my personality, I have to make sure I don´t look like a fool so I have studied really hard and I will run my first District meeting tomorrow in Granada.  

 

All the new trainers and new missionaries

 So I am guessing you probably want to hear a little about Jaén.  I feel like I am out in the middle of no where and there is no one that surrounds us.  It is the prettiest area I have seen in the mission so far.  It is a city built on a mountain so it is super hilly but there are trees everywhere and it's so green.  I got here Friday night because I had to go back to Sevilla to do residency.  That made me super mad because I missed out on Día de Diamante but we got to contact 3 hours in Jaén and we got 40 futures so not too bad!!  So my companion is from Paraguay and his name is Luis Guillermo Rojas. Asunción, Ñemby, Ytororo Paragauy.  Haha that is where he is from good luck!  So he is 24 years old and the only member in his family.  He doesn´t have a lot of money but he is a good kid.  He has a really weird personality and he loves kids.  I love him to death haha it´s super funny he asks me for permission to do anything.  He has never left Paragauy and he randomly got his Visa and had to leave the next day so he doesn´t have a lot of his stuff.  He is alright though we just need to shop for some short sleeved shirts and he should be set.  It is really weird speaking Spanish all the time but it´s a lot of fun.  So the Elders before us (here in Jaén) literally left us with nothing so we are starting from ground zero.  We will have a baptism in August though.  A 12 year old girl who´s mom is a less active member named Neyera.  We will start teaching her tomorrow.

 

Okay so super cool story.  The Elders from El Puerto talked to me (and they are natives keep that in mind), but anyways they told me they ran into Sonya and she told them that she wants me to baptize her in broken Spanish.  So I got permission from Elder Manning to call her and I did.  When I told her I was Hafen she started yelling and she told me she wants me to baptize her before I leave and she will travel where ever I may be at.  So that will be awesome!!  She told me she will call me when she gets back from Barcelona.  So the ward here is so good and they are so loving.  They really missed the missionaries.  So we really don´t have any other investigators so there is no one to talk about haha.  Well I love you and keep praying for me.  All I know is that I have to be obedient so that the Lord will bless this area and he already has with this little girl. 

 

Haha I can´t believe he kissed Heather, that is great.

 

Love you all!!

 

Here is my address:

Nuestra Señora Del Perpetuo Socorro 40, 1

23009, Jaén, (Jaén)

España

 

Love,

Elder Cody

President and Sister Clegg's Homecoming

 
So Brad and I went to Cody's Mission President's Welcome home to meet them on Sunday the15th of July. We took pictures with his mission president and wife. They are from Bountiful, Utah. We also took Heather - Cody's good friend. So, after we took the group picture.

President Clegg said now send this to Elder Hafen and he kissed Heather while they took a picture of it. In the next posting you can see that Cody loved it!  He has a great relationship with his Former Mission President, and they seem to love him!

It's Always a Good Time to Play Fútbol

Nice Picture!!!  Great Form

Elder Estrada

Elder Estrada

Elder Vosters (Elder Seely's kid)

July 9, 2012 - Family Email

Hello Family,

Well wow I am super stoked for my new assignment!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I am going to Jaén.  I am going to open up Jaén because it´s closed and I will also be training a new little missionary!!  So Jaén is really close to a big city called Granada kinda on the other side of the mission.  So apparently President Clegg chose me to go there and and then President Deere prayed and felt like I should go there as well.  Jaén is a really hilly place that is a little old city.  I go to the mission home tomorrow for Trainer training and then Wednesday I will go to my new area that me nor my new companion has been in.  So apparently all the new missionaries are natives so I am going to be speaking Spanish non stop for the next little while, yes!!  So the next little bit of my mission is going to be hard.  I will be training, opening up a new area and speaking only Spanish.  I was kinda wondering when my mission was going to get really hard again I have felt kinda normal for awhile.  So I am excited for the opportunity the Lord has given me.  Oh so Elder Peterson is training as well so we will get a cool photo tomorrow.  Elder Shaver will be my Zone Leader as well so we can get a Grandpa, Dad and son photo.
(So yes all of your Sunday school boys are on a mission except Tyler Young, apparently he went out but came home.  I was pretty sad hearing that.)

Kohs Family

So Hermana Koh tells me I am her favorite missionary.  She told me yesterday that she used to be a tour guide here in Sevilla because she is fluent in English so she will take us everywhere here in Sevilla.  She is super excited to get to know you she says.  She is meeting me today to go yell at the people fixing my camera because I leave tomorrow haha.  So I have been taking pictures this whole time with Elder Estrada so here is some!  Elder Estrada is from Holladay, same place and school as Elder Lignell.  I don´t have the address of my new house yet I will tell you tomorrow or I will have Elder Manning email you it.  Yeah I got the CD of Mercy River I love it!  It was the one I wanted. 

Jaquelin and her husband that is a member

Less Active Member that gave him aftershave

So this last week we worked really hard and taught a lot of lessons even though we couldn´t work for two days.  This last transfer Elder Estrada and I found 32 new investigators.  I think I have found around that same number all my transfers.  Manolo kinda dropped us and I am not sure why.  He said he is super busy this week and that is about all.  However we are seeing another miracle with a girl named Lesly.  She came to church again and she is going to get baptized soon.  I haven´t really taught her a lot and she really likes me.  (she told a member we use to go teach her with that she loves me, super scary good thing I am leaving Sevilla.)  I have seen a really big change in her and she is reading and really has found faith in God again.  It will be really good for when her kids come here to live with her.  The family from Ecuador is doing great.  We set a baptismal date with Meryan and she is excited.  They came to church yesterday, well the mom, Meryan and the little boy Juan that is 8.  Alba is good and they are talking to the parents of her to sign a form to let her go to EFY.  She is so excited and she still comes to church every Sunday.  So overall I love Sevilla it is amazing.  There is a lot of prepared people here and I am going to a place that I have been waiting for for a long time.  I am ready for a challenge and for something hard!  I know I am going to be very humbled there because it is a hard area that is why is was closed for 6 weeks.  So I will have an interesting email next week  Pray for me please.  This Friday we are doing another day of diamonds  "Día de Diamante" so pray to help me and my companion find people in Jaén.  I love you all so much.  It was a pleasure to be a Zone Leader and I had so much fun and now I am ready to pick up my mission even more and push myself to be more like the Savior. 

She has done the new blog spot here apparently, is it the same???
spainmalagamission.blogspot.com.es

Love,

Elder Cody

July 2, 2012 - Family Email

Hey what´s up?

Elder Estrada

Well I just got done with Zone Leader Training and it was awesome.  President Deere is amazing.  He is the most humble man on earth and he is going to work wonders here in the mission.  I am super excited for the work we are going to do with him.  I am in Fuengirola right now and there are three ladies sitting around me and they are like 30 to 40 years old and they are saying a lot of bad words.  I feel like they should be with their families and children but they probably don´t have any.  They are acting like they are in junior high talking about stupid and worldly things.  Ha, it´s funny to see the difference in people that live the gospel and don´t.  I feel like I am more mature than these ladies but anyway I am doing great.  We had another really good week in the field and it´s really hot here.  So this is week six here in Sevilla and I am pretty sure I am taking off this transfer because it´s my fourth here.  I have to be leaving because more than four doesn´t happen often so we will see this Saturday where I am going.  The mom LOVED the photo she says thank you so much and is very grateful.  Thank you mother!

Having some good eats

It's Party Time!

So I got your package and it did make more than one person happy.  I got the letter and pictures from Heather and the note from you mom.  That was my favorite part; the part when I get to read stuff!  The picture of Donny Osmond was great.  We ate over at The Kohs house this Sunday, and we did a Family Home Evening with a less active family that we are working with.  So this less active family has an 11 year old and  an 8 that aren´t baptized yet.  We took the two kids to an activity with the Stake this last week and they loved it.  They are progressing a lot and the parents want them to get baptized.  So we took the parents and the two kids to The Kohs house and we had lunch and a lesson.  It was really good and opened up the eyes of the family a lot.  The 11 year is named Meryan. She is the most beautiful 11 year old that I have seen in Spain and just a sweet girl.  This family is from Ecuador and they have been sealed in the temple and the father was a High Priest.  They dropped the church like 9 years ago and it breaks my heart because they have 3 older sons that are now atheist that hate the missionaries. 

Just trying to keep it real?!

So a cool little story for ya´ll.  I think it was Thursday afternoon and we got completely failed lesson after lesson so we contacted in the street while passing by our back up plans.  We were about to ring the door of a person that was less active and a Spanish man  stops us and tells us that he had just tried to get into the church because he wants to know more about it.  We talked to him for like 10 minutes and he was just asking us tons of questions and wanted to be a member of the church.  So I get his number and invite him to the baptism that was going to be held on Friday afternoon.  So Friday comes a long and I call him to remind him and tell him to come a little early because we wanted to talk to him about the church.  So he shows up a little early and we show him the church and he loved it.  Sorry I forgot to mention this man is named Manolo and he is in his late 50´s.  He is super smart and is so prepared and open to accept everything.  He loved the baptism and loved that we baptize by immersion and felt really good there in the church.  After we went and taught him a lesson 0 which introduces the Book of Mormon and explains what we do as missionaries.  So he loved it and then stayed for the activity we had there in the Stake Center and we had 4 investigators go and watch it.  The activity was a talent show and in the middle Manolo wanted to go and read the Book of Mormon instead, so I said of course.  After the activity there was a lot of food and drinks and he was out there like handing out drinks and food to people it was hilarious.  The next day we taught him and and it was a great lesson because  we brought a member and they were friendly with each other.  So he is off on the right foot step.  Then Sunday he came to church he loved it.  

So the other investigators are doing well.  Alba has to bring her parents to the church to sign the permission for her to go to EFY and we are just praying for a miracle that her parents let her get baptized.  We are still teaching her and it is going well.  Jaquelin is doing well but she was sick and didn´t come to church.  We taught her Sunday and we had a really amazing lesson on the Spirit World.  The spirit was way strong and she had the question about people dying with out knowing the gospel or Christ.  So we taught a good lesson about temples and the Spirit World.  Alfredo is still traveling so when he is in town he lets us know and we call him.  The family with the DVD´s we practically dropped because the mom acts like her life is too busy and her daughter has to take care of her baby.  

So that was about it this week and we have Zone Conference tomorrow with President Deere and his family.  His family is amazing the kids are great.  The daughter is really cute but super shy so I didn´t talk to her.  The older son is a champ and the little one is super funny.  Haha we all slept in the same room with the sons last night.

Thanks Family love you!!!!!!!!

June 25th, 2012 - Family Email

Hey family,

This was a lot better work wise.  We had really good numbers and we worked our hardest.  Sorry but no special or secret baptisms happened.  Loana has continued to not want anything and we don´t even talk to her anymore.  This week we approached the work here a little different and it was super successful and I will tell you about it a little later.  So I am excited to see all of the pictures of the wedding and all.  Yes I received your package it was awesome I loved it! Thank you so much!!  That is all I wanted to see was those wedding announcements.  Haha it was super good to see Devin and Brooke, I can´t believe I set those two up.  I need to email Devin and see how he is doing.  

 

So this last week I got the sweetest letter from Mama Stratton.  She is an awesome lady let her know that I love her and really appreciate that letter.    How are things going?  Oh hey, tell Jaycee if Brady isn´t around to write me for heavens sake, she can!  She is my little sister and I don´t even know her hardly!  So Ryan Mullen married Elder Seely´s dentist´s daughter.  Haha when Elder Seely saw that photo he was really shocked.  So this week we finally moved out all the old crap from the piso that was awesome and now we have space and can study in two different rooms.  The person that lived in the piso before us was an old lady, we call them "Marías" because everyone here in Spain is called María because of the virgin Mary.  So this lady left thousands of decorations and all the crap was old and falling apart but it´s all good now and they are coming today to fix all of the other small stuff.  Today we are playing futból again and it should be fun if the travelling trainers show up in enough time.  Yes I did buy new shoes and I love them.  I would take a picture of stuff but my camera is in the repair shop because it won't charge for some reason.  Also another sad note, I dropped my ring and it broke.  I will be sending it to you and I almost started crying I was so sad and I felt horrible and mad.  Hopefully they can repair it.  I am sorry.
 

This Friday the Cleggs are out of here and in a week I get to go and meet the new President because we have Zone Leader training again.  I am super excited!! Today we have to write a miracle to President Clegg that happened to us here in the mission.  I think I am going to write about José Luis and Carmen. 

 

So this week was good as I said earlier.  We did work with less active families and we found like two or three kids that are 8, 8 and 11 not baptized.  I think the 8 year olds turn 9 soon so by the time the families get active and we teach them all the lessons they should be convert baptisms.  The families are awesome and one of them the parents were sealed and everything and fell away for 9 years!!!!  That literally broke my heart everything they said they did for the church and they have dropped everything and have forgotten everything.  I literally have never felt so bad in a home listening to a fallen family!  The dad is a HIGH PRIEST.  So we are working with them and they actually have the desires to come back.  They mom really wants to come back and her daughter that is 11 wants to get baptized.  So we will help with that!  We found some other people just from contacting as well.  A really good guy from Bolivia and his name is Alfredo and he is a truck driver.  So he works a lot but when he is in town he calls us to talk to him haha.  He is a really good investigator and went to our church when he was little and he loves the church here in Sevilla.  We are still working with Alba the little 13 year old girl.  Her parents won't let her get baptized and the church is going to pay for her to go to EFY and she was so excited.  She is the cutest little girl in the world.  One of the counselors is going to talk with her parents and tell them we will pay for her to go to EFY if they let her get baptized.  The girls cousins are all recent converts with in like 9 months and Alba loves church.  We have a really good Young Women's and Young Men's here in Sevilla.  We are also teaching now a wife of a member.  Her name is Jaqalin and she came to church!!!  The members know her and she is progressing well.  The missionaries haven´t worked with her in a really long time and she really likes me and Estrada so hopefully that will all go well.  So that is about all for the work week.  I will have a lot more details on the names of people we are teaching and their progress because they are all very recent and I don´t even remember all of the names.  We had a really good week and we taught 21 lessons which is pretty good!

 

I love you all so much!!

Elder Cody