Back to Columbia

A lot happening in Jackson’s e-mail this week.  It helps to know that whitewashing means when a companionship is transferred out of an area and a new companionship comes in.  It can be nerve-wracking because neither of them know the ward or the area.  On top of that, Jackson will be training someone completely new.  He is quite nervous about it, but he should feel good about the president having so much confidence in him.  

We asked him a little more about the transfer and this is what he wrote:

"So I transfer on Thursday. All the new missionaries get here on Wednesday. There's actually two Spanish Elders coming in one is fluent in Spanish. But President asked the other elder who is training who he wanted and he requested the Spanish elder. Then in my email today I requested the non native because I feel like it will help me out the most.  So I'm going to the Columbia Spanish branch, and I will cover the entire Columbia stake. I actually talked to the missionaries there now and they said that the members are awesome and that they have some pretty solid investigators that they are teaching now so I guess i don't have too much to worry about over there as I thought.

Thanks for all the words of encouragement I've gotten quite a few these past couple of days and now I feel ready to face the challenge head on. I'm super excited now to train and make some new memories in this new area.

Luvz 💙💚💛💜 

Elder Bertoch

Monday started off pretty normal, we had a fun district pday where we went bowling and later played basketball. Then after that we had two appointments, one of which fell through. But the other was with Gustavo and Abigail. It was a super cool lesson. We talked about the organization of the church and later about tithing. They seemed super excited about tithing and how no one in the church is paid, that way it is just full service to God. They also seemed super interested in the idea of temples but we didn't have enough time to go over that though. 

Tuesday we had district meeting in the morning where we started by watching President Nelson get appointed as prophet and listened to that for a bit. Then we continued with the rest of the district meeting and after that we went home and had lunch. After lunch we were on our way to the old folks home but got a call from our recent convert that he needed help with some translation, so we went over there to help him with that. We first were fed lunch by him and his wife, which was super good. Then we did the service and started knocking some trailers up.  At one of the parks that we went to we had a pretty inspirational knock. We felt like we had to go to one trailer in particular of a lot of different trailers and we found a woman that had apparently talked with the missionaries before and was just recently wondering why they hadn't passed by for a while. So we set up an appointment with her and felt pretty good after that. Then we visited a member and talked with her a bit about the temple and such. After that we had English class which was super lit yet again. We had about 18 people there and had about 10 in the spiritual thought after it. So it was pretty cool. Plus that day the hermanas put there investigators on date for Saturday the 27th of this month, so I guess you could say it was a pretty cool day.

Wednesday we first took one of the elders down here to the doctor early in the morning to see what was messed up with his knee. It turns out that he has a torn minniscus and is ending up needing to have surgery on it, but luckily the recovery time is only 2-3 days so he can still stay out here. Then after that we went down to Charleston to the family history center to learn how to do family history. That was pretty fun.  The people teaching it were pretty cool plus they fed us so that was a bonus as well. After that we went down to visit a less active that lives in Charleston then we went back up to north Charleston. By the time we did it was pretty late and we had a couple of appointments though. So we went to our Portuguese investigators house, that we feel super awkward in because the daughter of our investigators wants to marry one of us for a green card, but it has taken us a long time to figure this out because neither of us can understand her. But luckily no one answered the door so everything was alright there. Then after that we had another lesson with Gustavo and Abigail. This time we were finally able to take a member with us and we took our recent convert. It was a super good time with everybody, the members shared their favorite scriptures with them and testified of the book of mormon a lot which was super good thing for Gustavo and Abigail. Besides that, though, it was just kinda a friendship building lesson which was super good because it will help them come to church.

Thursday morning we had a meeting with the hermana to plan some different activities for the group these upcoming months, we now have a tamale night/family home evening set up plus a taco judging contest in the works. So it was pretty effective and gave us some things to look forward to. Then after that not much else happened. We didn't have any lessons for that day so we went knocking for a little bit but didn't really have any success. Then we had English class again which was again super lit. A lot of people came both to the class and the spiritual lesson after, plus we now have regulars in the spiritual message as well which is super cool too.

Friday was the day that we thought that my companion was going to get the call that he was leaving. It was the day that President called and let everyone who was going to be a leader or a trainer to let them know that they are going to be those things. My companion started his mission here and has been here for a total of 7.5 months, so we knew that he was the one being transferred. Especially since I had only been here for one transfer. So we waited all day for the call. In the morning on Friday we had exchanged with some English elders so we could introduce one of them to someone that we had found a little while before that seemed super interested, but she spoke English. So I was with the other elder in his area for the morning. We took a bus to a shopping center so we could do some finding there. It was super effective, we made a friend with a guy named Jacob and got an appointment with him which was super cool. Then when we received word that the other elders were coming home we went to get on the bus. But we got on the bus going the wrong direction, and we figured that it only went 3 or 4 more stops and then would turn around, so we stayed on it. But we not so quickly realized that mistakes were made when we realized that the bus goes all the way down to Charleston. By the time that we realized that, however, it was too late and we decided it would be faster to just stay on the bus then press our luck with getting on another bus. So long story short we were on a bus for about 2.5 hours. But we did talk to people so I guess it was slightly worth it. 

After we got back home we wondered why we hadn't received a call yet from President, but yet carried on our day. We had one lesson planned but before that we went and knocked some trailers where we got a return appointment from one of them. So that was a good thing. Then we went off to our lesson only to find that there was no one home. So we visited a member instead and had a good time with her. Then we started to head back home to change for soccer night. As we were parking our car in our complex we got a call from President. He called super late, at like 7 at night after we were no longer expecting a call. But we answered and he told us the most shocking news I will ever hear on my mission. He told me that I was leaving charleston. He told me that I was whitewash training in Columbia. He also told us that my companion would not be leaving this area.  I do not want to leave this area. I love the people here way too much to be done with this area in one transfer. The work down here is way too good, the members are way too awesome, and we have so much fun down here with all the missionaries and everything. It's everything you can ask for as a missionary. Anyways, I changed and made it down to soccer night. There we shared what was happening to me with all the other missionaries in my district. Everyone was super shocked since everybody was so set on elder Powell being transferred. 

Saturday morning was pretty hard. I couldn't stop thinking about the fact that I was leaving. So the English elders took me out to get ice cream to cheer me up a bit. It worked and I was okay to do work the rest of the day. We did some studies in the afternoon and planned and stuff. And after that we went to a members house and set plans in stone to get her to the temple. After that lesson we were driving to our next appointment when the Hermanas called us and told me that where I was going, there wasn't going to be any hermanas there anymore. Which means that I will have no support in the Spanish branch and that the entire zone would be my area.  

Our lesson that night was with Gustavo and Abigail.  I didn’t feel like going, but my companion convinced me to, and boy was I glad that I did. We started teaching the gospel of Jesus Christ and had made it through the faith in Jesus Christ and repentance before we noticed that Gustavo was being strangely quiet. We asked him what he was thinking and he told us that the spirit was strongly testifying to him that this church is the true church. He realized that he needs to act more in faith and attend church and read the scriptures more and everything.  Then he was looking at the picture of Jesus being baptized and realized that he needed to ask God if he should be baptized. After all this happened he thanked us for a solid 20 minutes, he thanked us for knocking on his door and teaching him all the different lessons and being patient with him and befriending him. We then made sure that he would pray about getting baptized and he said he definitely would. Then the last thing he said to me was that I can leave this area knowing that I lifted a broken soul that had fallen. My mood instantly went from sad to having exceeding joy, like it says in the scriptures. This day was definitely the most spiritual experience I have had yet. It all started with being extremely humbled with being called to whitewash train and leaving and such, to have an experience like that with the man that we taught about Jesus Christ and his plan specifically for each one of us. This experience in particular has strengthened my testimony more than anything else has ever. I left happy from that house that night, extremely happy. 

Then when we got in the car we joined in on a conference call that all the Spanish elders were having to speculate about who elder Powell was getting as a companion since there was some pieces missing from the puzzle. While on the call, however, one of the Columbia Spanish missionaries that is there now and going home this transfer casually mentioned to me that the Columbia branch is collapsing and will definitely dissolve if I don't win the hearts of the members and start baptizing nations. Which is all put on me since there will be no Spanish sisters with me to help me out and since I will have a trainee as well. So that instantly added on to my stress and most of the joy that I had received that night dispersed. So that was fun. 

Sunday we woke up and went to church since we have 9 o clock church now. There we had to translate again for ward conference. I translated most of it and everyone told me that I did a good job so I guess that's a good sign for my Spanish. After sacrament meeting we had a normal rest of the schedule where we had Sunday school and the Hermanas did a good job of teaching. After that we had a meeting with the bishop and our recent convert about getting him the Aaronic priesthood which went well. After church we then went to have lunch with the hermanas and their investigators which are getting baptized this Saturday. It was a super fun time, especially since they're Brazilian and make some super bomb food. We also taught them about the priesthood while we were there and they both got super excited about it. Then we went over to our group leader's house with some of the group members to surprise them and have a talk with them since they are moving this week as well. We had a good time over there, although it did make me pretty sad again that I would be leaving all these members and everybody again. After that we came home and that was that.

Today we will be having another district pday since a lot of the district is getting moved around again.

Elder Bertoch