september 29, 2014 letter

Well you said that I don't send very much information in my letters so I tried to write some stuff down so that I can send you a little more information! there is definitely way more that goes on then I write in my letters, but I never remember what happens, so its kind of hard for me! haha so I tried to write down a little bit of what happened this week!

Well first off on Tuesday we went to the temple with one of our families who are the sweetest people in the world and I love them to death! (by the way we are going bowling with them today for p day) (: but we ended up taking them to the temple and they were in love with it. the whole time the two little girls were talking about how it was a castle and how it reminded them of Disneyland and that one day they wanted to go inside too. it was so cute and precious to see them so excited about the temple, which I feel we take for granted way to much in Utah! but we went there and went through the visitors center and two sweet hermanas helped us though the tour and we talked about eternal families and what goes on in the temple, and at the end we watched a video called "because of him" and it was so good! at the end of the video I talked to them about mark 5: 36 and how the things that we were asking them to do might be a little scary, because its new to them, but that they just needed to take a couple steps into the darkness and take hold of the Lords hand and let him guide you. FEAR NOT, ONLY BELIEVE. we actually got to take them into a garden that is inside the temple and let them feel the spirit of the temple, and they loved it so so much and said that they wanted to go some day! the whole trip was so awesome and it helped me appreciate the temple even that much more!

yesterday we got chewed out by a jehovas witness, which definitely wasn't very fun.  we've been chewed out by lots of people, Baptists, catholics, 7th day advenests, jewish people, Christians, and some just have wacky beliefs! haha but out on my mission I've learned that the jehovas witness is probably the closest church to having the truth, so when you talk to them about stuff you agree on a lot, but there are certain things that are in our church, that are true, that you can't explain and you just have to go by faith. like the 7th day advenests and believing that church should be on Saturday. in the bible it says that it is, but Jesus was resurrected on Sunday, and that's why we have church on Sunday. but when we were talking to this jehovas witness he told us that we didn't have the holy ghost because if we really did, we would preach for our whole lives and not just for two years, like the other prophets and so on. and then he got into why we didn't baptize or give the priesthood to black people for a while and how that if this was the true church we wouldn't have done that, because in the bible there were black people that had that opportunity for this. keep in mind this whole time he is talking in Spanish, I can understand Spanish almost perfectly when we are talking about the gospel, but when it comes to talking I cant say everything that I want yet. so it's frustrating sitting there getting bashed on and I can't really say much back. finally at the end I was like "podriamos hablar sobre este y este, pero solomente tengo una pregunta para usted... esta feliz?" which means "we could talk about this and this but I only have one question, are you happy?" and he replied to me that he was, and so I told him, "than I guess your not ready for this message". he looked at me kind of puzzled and confused, and so I said "just keep believing in Jesus Christ, and that's the most important thing you can do." and then we went on our way.

oh and also this same day that I got chewed out by the jehovas witness we ate 4 dinner in 4 hours... literally one of the hardest things ever. I would have rather eaten 5 salads than do that. the food was so good, but by the second one I was already full, so you can imagine what it was like for the other 2... haha by the last house elder Solano and I were so full that the lady, the lady we took to the temple, asked, are you guys okay? you look like you're going to throw up? well, she was right, I was about to explode out of my ears! but you'll be happy of me, because I finished all of everything anybody gave me(: and I'm proud to say that when I got home I weighed 175 pounds!! haha luckily this morning I was back to my normal weight!

this week we are on the bikes, so we had to bike 10 miles to gervais which was awful in the baking heat! haha just to give you a little backround on my bike, who knows how old my bike is because it's been passed down for so long, and the other day I was riding and the seat like fell off, so I had to ride standing up the whole time! haha it's a very very pitiful bike... but it's a bike non the less and I'm super thankful (: that night we ended up at the highschool football game because one of our investigators was there and we talked to her about the word of wisdom. we both were too cheap to pay to get into the game, so we just ended up watching from the fence and talking to her the whole time. it was fun(: by the way I miss football like crazy, and this crisp fall air is killing me because it reminds me of football season!!! but anyway, at half time, all the cheerleaders ran up to us and were like "MISSIONARIES!!" haha it was the funniest thing ever, and so we ended up talking to them for a while too and found out that some of them are members too (: but by the time it was 8:30 we were ready to bike home, but one of our investigators offered to give us a ride home in his truck, which was super nice that we didn't have to bike another 10 miles(:

oh and as a little side note, every person we walk, or drive or bike by we wave at them and sometimes they wave back, sometimes they cus at us, and sometimes they just look at us. haha and in the case that they just look at us, I just whisper under my breathe "oh hey how are you doing? oh great, what about you? oh so good!" haha its a little joke that elder Solano and I always do! so either way it's like they are saying hi to me when I say hi to them(:

October is going to be so fun! we get to watch the meet the Mormons movie, go bowling, it's my birthday, go on our temple trips, have interviews, Halloween, transfers, and conference. and hopefully a lot of baptisms! ahh i'm so excited for this month!! but its been really good out here and the work is going well! had 7 people at church again and we are hoping for more soon!! love you guys!!

Love, Elder Romney

Just messing around at the temple

One of our families and us at the temple.  It was such an awesome experience!!!!

Elder Solano and me chilling at an investigators house, waiting for her to get home.  Haha, this was a little after we had biked all day, so we were exhausted!

This is my district! The pictures behind us are some pictures that Hermana Kitchen (Cocina) drew of us and we are lined up in order underneath them :)

september 22, 2014 letter

We got 10 people to church this week!! it was so cool! that is the second most that anyone has ever gotten on this mission and we are hoping to break the record in the next couple of weeks with 17! they were two families and they are some of my favorite people ever!

So this week we met this girl, and funny side note, she is actually here in the library with me right now..., haha but she is a super sweet 17 year old girl who just has so many questions and couldn't wrap her brain around the fact that there were other poepl in the Americas who knew Christ. i literally had to do hand gestures for her to kind of understand that what was going on. haha it was the funniest thing ever and she just kept asking such random questions about like noah and abraham and moses and stuff that were completely irrelevant. she was a tough cookie to get through to her, so after an hour and a half of trying to explain to her what the book of Mormon was, we finally just decided to reschedule an appointment! haha but shell get the hang of it!

oh and one of our goals to do before elder Solano leaves is to go to a high school football game. and in order for us to do that, we have to have a reason to go, an "investigator". haha so we've been on a mad hunt tracting for a high school football player who will listen to our message and we finally found one! I'm not sure how much he plays, but we will come cheer him on for the sideline (; haha

The work is going great out here and i cant wait to get all of these people baptized!!
Love you guys!

This guy used to play professional soccer in mexico and he is our second counselor. he is probably one of my favorite people ever and we became really good friends from the first day. he is probably my favorite person in the ward and is super nice and humble!

september 15, 2014 letter

Well this week has just pretty much been all about investigators! We have a huge pool of people now and all of them are pretty solid people that we are planning to baptize in the next couple months! But this week has been good! 

We saw a guy almost rob a Burger King but it was already closed so he never got to, haha, And then saw him later doing a drug trade. And we taught some really drunk people that are hilarious, 

We met a family that we call Ada Football. We call her that because the way we got talking to her was because we asked her where she was going, just street contacting, and she said that she was going with her son to football practice. So I told her that I wanted to come over and talk to her son about football sometime and she said that that would be great.  We went over about a week later and it turns out that she lives with her two sisters and they are all single moms and have like 3 kids per mom. so whenever we go over there we are teaching all of them. And then there are their friends, too, so its about 17 people there every time we teach! I've clicked with them really well and we are hoping to get them to church next week! 

We have also became really close to a family. She's single right now with 3 kids and is just the nicest person ever and it's crazy! We ended up helping her out by taking stuff to the dump for her and power washing her house, and we might start coaching her little girls soccer team... if the AP's let us... haha 

Things are going great here and I'm super excited. The work is picking up and we think we are going to have a ton of baptisms soon!

 Love you guys!

 Love, Elder Romney!

p.s.  I found out that Elder Ashcraft is getting transferred, and I am staying here with Elder Solano.

This was a huge fiesta that we had!  Haha, we have so many parties here!!

This is the one we are planning to baptize here soon!!

Next to a super old car!

september 8, 2014 letter

So this week has been pretty good! we finally got R on date and we are going to baptize him a day after my birthday!! Here is a little entry from my journal about the experience.

"So today I was able to invite R to be baptized. It was so powerful. It's kind of funny because everything had fallen through and we couldn't teach him at the church, you couldn't feel the spirit in his house, and you have a 5 little girls that run around his house every day and night, and you definitely couldn't teach outside his house. So we asked him if we could just go for a walk and I was praying we'd find a place in this trailer park that we could feel the spirit! We finally found a place that was kind of set back in the trailer park and you could see a forest of trees in the distance. It was getting later and the sun was about to set and it was cold. We started out by singing a hymn in Spanish, Come Come Ye Saints, and that was able to help bring in the spirit. We talked to him about how much he's changed and how much of a light he will be for his family and friends, and ended up promising him a lot of other things like that, that people would flock to him just to partake of his light, that he would change other people's lives and that he would be the light in his family and be so happy. After saying all those things, reading a couple of scriptures, and talking, the sun had set and it was dark and I got the impression to invite him to be baptized. I looked at him and said "R, will you follow the example of Jesus Christ and be baptized by someone holding the proper authority of God?" It was silent for a couple seconds and then he looked at me and said " Yes I will". It was one of the most spiritual moments ever and I loved every second of it. We set him on date for the 5th of Octoberand I'm so happy for him! The falling through of our plans ended up being a blessing and we had an awesome experience with him." 

Oh and p.s. that day we had been fasting for him and we fasted for 24 hours and so by the time dinner came around I was starving, you know how I am. We were all just trying to make it through the day and were so happy it was finally dinner time! but when I got to the persons house guess what they had to eat... only a SALAD literally only a salad and a piece of bread.... and I'm proud to say that I ate every bit of that salad (: haha so I ate my first salad too!! 

We are also teaching a Russian guy. There are colonies of Russian people here!! haha He is able to speak broken English and told us about how he escaped from China, and lived in a jungle in Brazil and made a Russian colony there! haha It was crazy! but I love talking to him! 

This week was good and I had so much fun, I haven't gotten the package yet, but I'm super excited! Love you Guys

Love, Elder Romney

Elder Solano pretending that he is hurt! haha the lady in the background is actually the lady that I told you about in my first letter where I knocked her door and she started chewing me out. luckily it wasn't real! they are some of my favorite people now, and I always sit next to them at church!

this is a mural for all the field workers! this place is like a little mexico because almost everything is in Spanish over here and there is a bigger Spanish population than white!

haha never seen a dog drinking fountain before in a park, but I saw it and had to try it out!!

this one looks like monty! a little bigger though! I was a little nervous at first, because the last time I held a python, it bit me!! haha but it was way fun!

this is the hedge hog! they are pretty spikey!!!

, there was a guy who had a million animals

september 2, 2014 letter

Well I must confess in this email that I am not doing very well with writing in my journal anymore because when we have to get home as the zone leaders we have to make a bunch of calls and see how things are going, and then by the time that is done and planning for the day is done, I am way too tired to write anything! so everything kind of just blurs together and I occasionally try to write things down so I can remember some good stories and things like that. 

But something that was really cool was that this week I was able to bless the sacrament In Spanish, and I was surprisingly not too nervous! I guess because i'm used to saying in in front of 250 people, and we only have 70 people in our branch! and then I was also able to give two blessings in less then 24 hours! one was to a sister who was sick and I gave that one to her in English and then the second one was to a Hispanic guy who asked me if I could give him a blessing for a continued desire to stay in the church and attend church and things like that! haha mind you I got the Melchizedek priesthood just a couple months ago, I've only given 2 blessing (in English) before and then this guy wanted me to give one to him in Spanish?? hahaha! its hard enough in English! we were on exchanges with elder gessel, so it was me him and elder ashcraft, and I looked at ashcraft and I was like, "I don't know how to do it, let alone do it in Spanish?" and he was like you've got this, and recited the words to me in Spanish of how I need to start it out.  I guess that's the miracle for the week is that the lord helped me give that blessing because I was able to give him a complete blessing in almost fluent Spanish! I didn't really remember what I said, but I know the Lord was guiding me to what I needed to say! 

oh and as a side not, I've been to a quincenera a carnival and a party... never thought I would have done any of those! but its been fun! While I've been out here I've found that people are very defensive about their religions and they will chew you out if you think otherwise... so that has happened to me quite a bit and it's not too fun!! but i'm growing and learning so much out here and I can't thank the Lord enough for that!! things are looking good and i'm super excited for the future!!

 Love you guys!! 

Love Elder Romney!!

my apartment! I don't know the exact address... but if you look at woodburn on google maps, you should find a walmart and then there should be a big field and then an apartment complex right next to that, and that is where I am!!

Us in the car!!  Haha

Chilling at an arcade while Elder Ashcraft gets his hair cut!  It's actually at a Walmart...