Feeling the Holy Ghost and really Listening

I love his emails each week and look forward to seeing the progress and growth of our missionary.  Stetson teaches mission prep and asked Caleb for an experience to share with the perspective missionaries.  At the end of the post, I have included his story.  It's amazing and so worth sharing.  Enjoy...

Monday- Normal P-day stuff but after we had a family home evening with the 2nd councilor in our ward, he is really nice and a really strong member of the church, he was baptized about 12 years ago and is just so nice and first to help everyone. We had a lesson on how we are never alone because we have god and our savior always and the spirit was super strong and he thanked us so much for coming! 

Tuesday- Today it was raining on and off all day, its really crazy it comes out of nowhere and just downpours for like 30 minutes, than it stops and the sun comes out automatically its cool, and the Thunder is so wild, it rains a lot here right now. which I really like. 

Wednesday- Past two days my comp has not felt very good, he says to have a really bad headache and it really shows because it our lessons I have had to talk a lot more which I can do but it takes me forever to talk jaja. But I think it is helping me, I also went to the place for my Bolivian ID today that was really sweet cause I got to meet up with all my buds from the MTC again and have a English Conversation. 

Thursday- One of the towns in our area is really difficult to get to it takes two different trufis one on a main road and the other on a dirt road, its about a 30 minutes from our house to our investigators, as we took the first trufi we sat there waiting for another one to arrive after about 10 minutes we decided to start walking up this dirt road... we walked all the way to the top! took us about 40 minutes but there was no cars to take us! We finally made it to the top where we had lesson with these two teenage girls and a member in a dirt soccer field. They were really nice and we dropped a Book of Mormon on them too. 

Friday- We taught a few lessons today and at around 6 we had a family home evening with this new family in the ward we went to their house and when we got there they were all dressed up to go to a party with the Stake, we didn´t even know about this so we said its ok and we went to check on other people but everyone was going to the party haha. We decided to take it in early where we then just did some more Spanish and scripture study 

Saturday- We had a lesson for this one chick that I have not met before but my comp has taught her once she called us up and said she needed to meet with us so we met in the chapill and we started to teacher her about the plan of Salvation and she was really nice, lots of questions and the spirit was really strong with her, I then asked her to be baptized and she didn’t know what to say, about 3 minutes of silence goes by and I ask if she could pray and ask God, if she should? she thought I meant later but I was like no right here now. But she was all for it. We knelt down and she offered a really good prayer on what she should do.. I than started to ask her again and before I could finish she said yes! jaja, super awesome and the spirit was nuts! 

Sunday- I love Sundays because its kinda a break from teaching and we just have to listen, This Sunday was really sweet because our goal for people who attend church was 6, but come Sunday we had 13 people come to Sacrament meeting! It was so awesome to see everyone there and bonus it was the Primary Program JAJA super dope! Spanish primary hymns are really cool. 

So far really loving it in Cochabamba, Something that is really hard here is when I try to contact with people I usually mention something about their clothing and a lot of people have New York Yankees and Chicago Bulls stuff whenever I mention something about it like, Oh man you like Michael Jordan? they are always so baffled, I´ll point out the name Jordan that is on the shirt and they have no idea who he is! They just like the logo, or name haha, We also teach a lot of lessons with Older folks and we will leave them to read our pamphlet or a scripture and we will come back and ask if they read it and they say no, and we ask why and it’s because They can’t read! Its so hard but we always just read it with them and they are extremely grateful. 

The mission life is rough, but it’s really rewarding too,  All is well down here in Bolivia love you all!

 Elder Clayton with some mighty fine tacos 

In a place called Sivingani

-- 

- Elder Clayton 

His email to me this week:  When ever I write a letter to you I start typing "madre" because that's what it was in my phone, and that doesn't work so I try mom, still nothing haha only Tammy  pops up, I do this every week! 

I got a phone call this week from a Elder with the last name Bishop? I don´t know who he is but he is from Utah and he says his mom knows you? not surprised but I'm still not sure?

Can you put me on Walkers email list? I don´t get his. When is Joe coming down to Cochabamba? I don´t think that is really fair if dad goes to him Joe needs to come here? or Kristy, 

How is spanks?  Chris still work everyday? 

Love you ma thanks for everything sorry this letter is short.

Elder Clayton's story that he shares with Stetson:

We had a meeting with this 25 year old girl who has only met with the missionaries a couple of times and somehow she feel through the cracks and she hasn’t been meeting with us for like a month, she called us Saturday, which never happens and we she asked if she could meet with us today we found time that night around 9.00 in the capilla when she finally showed up we asked her why she wanted to meet with us and her eyes just started to water and she was really timido and she said she just missed the feeling of the church, we then started to teaching her the Plan of Salvation and we got the first two points and she was really accepting and I feel like she really got it when, I then started to asker her to be baptized but she didn´t answer, about 4 minutes went by and I asked her what she felt. With no reply she continuted to sit there in complete silence for another couple minutes. My comp than asked, for the second time, to be baptized, again no reply. I was sitting there and I knew what to say but I just couldn’t say it.. I knew what to say I knew how to say it but I couldn’t, I don.t know how to explain but I literally couldn’t say it, I needed to wait and let the holy ghost work with her in this time of silence. After maybe another 3 minutes goes by. 

This is when I than asked her if she would be willing to ask God what is right? She said yes and we got on our knees to ask her right then and there. In the softest Spanish voice I have ever heard she asked God what to do.. 

She ended her prayer and with tears in her eyes for the third time, "Segura el ejemplo de Jesucristo..." and she smiled and said yes!  

This spirit was super strong and I learned that you should not be afraid of silence; silence is when the Holy Ghost is speaking.

yeah that’s what i got love you bud thanks for everything! Check my Drive I put stuff in there like every week.

Gringo!

I love how his personality comes out as you read his emails.  I can hear him talking as I read.  He is doing so well, and we are so proud of him. Grateful for the pictures; because I miss that face of his.  Enjoy...

Hey fam another week has gone by down her in the Cochabamba! A lot of different things happened this week that was not like the normal weeks. I have been called gringo more the past few days than the past three weeks haha, if you ever wanna feel like an outcast and just total culture shock try getting into a bus that is packed full with maybe 40 Bolivians on it and the ceiling is to short to stand so you are bent over with the song Funky Town blasting in the back ground hahaha! Its a different world down here in Bolivia and I love it.

Monday- Last Monday was pretty chill we went to the cancha again where I bought a rubix cube and some dope crocs haha, crocs are just like the thing down here everyone has them and they where them to everything.. I don't know.. Also another thing to try have someone explain to you how a rubix cube works in another language. Frekin confusing but I can almost do it.

Tuesday- We have this new family that we are teaching and they are those gringos with blond hair, anyways they live super far away from our house and it takes us like 25 minutes to get there and back in a trufi, Anyways its a family of three boys and a single mom, they were super nice to us as we shared our lesson when we were getting ready to leave the one boy around 12 was really interested in our message and asked us when we could come back! (Never happens) We have another meeting with them this week, its hard because they live so far away we can only share a short part of our lesson with them.

Wednesday- In our ward we have this really nice kid named Brian who is about 20 years old and he just turned in his papers to serve a mission, he leaves with his mom and a cousin who is not a member we asked her if we could come by and talk with her about our message and she said yes, in our first lesson we asked her to be baptized and she just kinda stud there super quite, and that's when the Holy Ghost just goes to work, and like a minute later she said yes! We have 4 baptismal dates in less than two months, lets just say the Lindo ward is cooking!

Thursday- Nothing really big and spiritual happened this day but I will say one thing is you know that trick where you point at someone’s chest and say like they spilled our have something wrong and then they look down and you flick there nose with your finger? ya you know! best thing ever! hahah We get every kid we see with it haha its the best, this one nino we got 9 times in a row haha! Its the best.

Friday- This was my First day with a companion split! I went over to this area called via Mexico with an Elder Sanabria from San Pedro Sula, he is really dope and super funny, This day was really nice because even thou we did the same thing in my area it was completely different, I liked it alot. And I really just thought about all my friends serving missions and how no matter where they are we are all doing the same thing everywhere we go, just a few miner different things really.

Saturday- I actually had back to back splits this week, the zone leaders came to our area and we split up and took half of each others appointments, I had a Peruvian comp named Elder Ferranan, he was way cool, and I really learned alot this day because, I know these streets a lot better than I thought I did, which helped a lot, we contacted and got 6 investigators in one day! our goal this week was 6 haha!

Sunday- This week has been really different also because we had alot of lessons that were in the morning around 8 or 9 so we had our study time, just like whenever we could fit it in our day haha. It is nice to change our schedule around every now and then. We had a lesson today with this new member maybe 2 months in the church and we had a lesson about the commandments, after we were done and we felt good, we had a closing prayer and we were just kinda talking, when Rosario, the recent member sneezes.. and she says oh JESUS! haha me and my comp looked at each other and just busted up laughing, we told her what’s up and she felt really foolish it was so funny!

Yeah pretty much it all is well from me down here, Love you all and hope you have a good week!

Photo in a trufi with the Honduras comp 

yo en el calle 

--
- Elder Clayton
Bolivia Cochabamba

Wayne was in Spokane doing work on the temple and was able to meet up with  Elder Feller at Church as a surprise.  Then planned to take  him and his companion to dinner on Monday night.  Here are some emails from his dad and communicating with him:

Hi Pal,

It is Sunday night and I am in Spokane Washington.  I talked to the Fellers and told them I would find Jace on Sunday if they could tell me where and what time his church was.  So they did and this morning I got up and drove 55 miles to Priest River Idaho.  I walked into the chapel and Jace looked at me the same time I looked at him and his eyes were as big as fried eggs!!  I went and sat by him and told him was working on the temple.  Then I went to gospel ensencels with them.  It was fun to talk to him, he asked all about you and I showed him your pictures.  If I get done in good time Monday I will take him and his comp. to dinner, so I will let you know.

 The rest of my week was good, Just thinking about my boy Caleb.

Elder Clayton:  Yeah our new member is way awesome she comes and even stays the whole time, we still meet with her quite often too.
My ward is super beast, they help us out a lot for new people and they are really friendly too. Our house is actually really close I can see it from my window and its maybe a 2 minute walk haha, not bad, I probably walk 2 or 3 miles a day, no se, I only really eat lunch, its all rice, chicken and potatoes, but they have like 20 different forms of chicken so its not bad. I actually really like it.
Yeah I got my card the day after I took out my money, that's why I didn't take out any this week because I don't need any for a while. thanks for all you do love you pal, HOW THE HECK DID YOU FIND JACE AND EVEN GO TO CHURCH WITH HIM!

Dad:  I am going to try to hook up with him for dinner tonight.

How are you pal?  You sound great.

Elder Clayton:  WHAT! WHAT! Doing good down here, hard work and livin life.
Tell Jace i love him and his red hair! Sense you met with Jace does this mean that Dr. Feller is gonna come down to Cochabamba and meet me at church too! If so I´m super excited!  That is awesome send me some more pics if you can? I write him almost every week, hope he is doing good up there! In the big Spokane, love that guy!

Understanding and Appreciating the Importance of Families and First Baptism

What's up fam! Pretty busy week down here in Cochabamba, I´m still trying to make the adjustment but i´m almost there!
Monday- Last p-day we went to this really dope place called the Cancha, they sell like everything you could think of and it just streets and streets of diffrent stuff and its super cheap! I got some really cool stuff that has the same type of texture as my car seats so I really liked it, later we went to lunch at Burger King. Like the only american resturant down here haha, and ended with a FHE with some of the youth in our ward.

Tuesday- We have these two people that we are teaching that have been living together for 16 years! They have two kids, a house and they just don´t see the point of marriage, we had a lesson with the ¨wife" while the "husband" was gone and we challenged her to babtizm and she said yes but we dont have a date yet, and then after that we talked about marriage, and her only concern was Divorce, which is hard but, after 23 years and she is almost 70 I think she will be ok...

Thursday- We had this full lesson plan for today and it was at the top of our area so we took a trufi that takes like 20 minutes on bummpy dirt roads and when we got there no one was home! we stud around for a while and then just started contacting, we came to this one gate and these two kids with BLOND HAIR came out! haha the only kid with blond hair around here is me, they were really funny around 8,12 and we gave a short lesson in the street and we have another one planned this week with there mom.

Friday- We had a FHE type thing with this family tonight and they are just like us! Three boys haha! They were super funny and the dad is trying to learn English so he likes me, we shared a video about, "what is most important in our lives" and the spirt was super strong, they were all babtized as a family almost two years ago. way awesome.

Saturday- Babtizim day, pretty much this whole day was prepare for the babtizm we woke up studied and then 11, cleaned the church, 12 lesson, 2 fill the fount, 4 another lesson. The baptizm was supposed to be at 6:00 so me and Elder Azolas showed up around 5:30 and we were getting ready after about 45 minutes have gone by, like no one is here and we are getting worried then people start to show up and finally Silvilla.. The one being baptized shows up at 7:15! We didn´t start until 7:30! haha frekin Bolivians. But it was super awesome and she barred her testimony at the end and it was way sweet and you could feel the spirit super strong!

Sunday- This was the First Sunday where I was in the ward and it was a busy one, Sacrament meeting my comp and I had two baby blessing and one confirming the holy Ghost! super crazy, after that we had a Gospel principals glass where we had 5 of our investigators show up to and that was awesome to see them!
The best part of this week was Sunday night when we had this lesson plan with this young family with two kids lived together for maybe 3 years and they were really nice we shared part of the first lesson with them and they were super interested, they had tons of questions and they were on the edge of there seats the whole time it was so awesome, in the closing prayer our investigator, Alex said thank you for sending your servants to us, it was so dope! I´m excited to meet with them again this week!

The days are really long but then all of a sudden its p-day again, We teach like 3 or 4 lessons a day usually and the one on Sunday is the only one where a father was there, This place has really built my testimony on the importance of families and how everyone has a roll in them, Love you all and hope you have a good week! All is well down here!

--
- Elder Clayton
Bolivia Cochabamba

Wanted to add this short note he sent to me:  Dang that is alot of weddings! I am happy for all of them! Yeah i´m excited to read everyones letters about what happend this week end! Thanks for the prayers they have really worked last week I was always so frekin tired but now I am doing alot better and I know that is why! I will tell stetson to drop by somore and say whats up, Love you mom and thanks for all you do, I think of you guys alot because all I teach are single moms and its so sad, there lifes are so hard doing this alone but they are all so happy, I´m glad to be lucky enough to have both! Love you mom!

Broken Spanish, but with Conviction; will you be "babtized?"

It was so awesome getting his email this week as it was really the first one as a missionary in Bolivia.  You will see how he is already learning, growing and learning Spanish as he is immersed in it.  We continue to pray for the gift of tongues he was promised, and as you will witness, prayers are answered.

Enjoy...

Oh man so much has happened in these past 10 days its so nuts! I woke up Monday morning in Provo at 3:00 and then I arrived in Cochabamba Tuesday afternoon haha I met with the Mission president and he seems like a really nice guy, he was really nice and I had to have a translator in our meeting together, after that we stayed in the AP´s house and ordered some pizza that had corn on it haha it was actually really good.  It was fun to talk to them and they were really nice.   One was from Columbia and the other from California.  After that night we woke up Wednesday morning and headed to the church where I met my new Companion his name is Elder Azolas, straight from Chile he speaks very little English.. lets just say these past few days have been really confusing. But its dope because he is teaching me Spanish and I am teaching him English! Also the CCM has taught me nothing, I have learned more Spanish in 6 days here than six weeks in the CCM! haha our area is in Cochabamba and we are in the Lindo Ward, the members are really nice and they help us out a ton. I live only a block away and it’s a really nice building. I don´t have any pics but I will try next week. So after our Zone meeting we head to our area and we walk inside I don´t even open my bags and we are out the door to teach a lesson.. She is a 20 year old gal who has had 1 or 2 lessons with missionaries and my comp wanted me to ask her to be babtized!! MY FIRST LESSONS, FIRST REAL INVESTIGATOR so I probably said like two words this whole time and at the end of the lesson he looks at me and I knew it was my time to shine so in my broken Spanish ¨ will you follow the example of Jesus Christ and be babtized with someone holding the authority of the priesthood?¨with a tear in her eye she said yes!!! hahaha I was freaking out! Her babtizim is this Saturday and I´m frekin pumped, she came to all of conference general too so she is awesome! 

The streets in this place make no sense it honestly a maze the addresses we have for investigadors are frekin maps! hand drawn! haha, the taxis that we take are called trufis and its like a van that fits 8 in America but they can fit 15 here. now imagine driving down a road packed full of people going 50 and there are speed bumps every 100 feet its narly. 

Dogs, fetching perros, I hate perros so much, I knew there was gonna be alot of dogs here but holy freak! so many dogs and they are all mean and gross and just the worst I started counting how many I saw yesterday and I stopped counting after 40. But I learned this trick where you bend down to grab a rock just faking it and they will run away.. every time its really useful. we had this appointment last night where we were gonna go teach a less active family and we started knocking on their door when like 5 dogs came out of nowhere and we just barking and growling at us! me and my comp were really nervous because it was dark and they were big dogs, I closed my eyes and just said a prayer that this family will open the door and before I even ended they opened it and the dogs ran, awesome experience. 

Saw the statue of Christ that was really dope did you know it’s actually larger than the one in Brazil? true story. 

Hey that’s about it from me, I have lots more to share but I don´t have much time love you all thanks for your prayers! all is well down here

What Cochabamba looks like and feels like in five words.

A Really Poor Saint George.

​

- Elder Clayton 

Bolivia Cochabamba 

​- Elder Azolas, our Savior and me

- Frekin Perros 

Letter to Stetson as they communicated back and forth:

This was today we had burger king in a really nice mall, the kid on the left is from San Pedro, middle is my comp and right he is from peru they are all in my zone. 

 This is over seeing Cochabamba at the statue of Christ, its so big 

Hola!!!

Que bacan!! (how cool on Chili) that is How Elder Azolas would say it. 

What a cool letter bud. Love it. I told you about the perros !! You can always fake them out by picking up a rock. 

They say you don’t have to be scared of the barking dog but of the silent dog. So watch out! And stay safe. I kicked a few dogs, and I am sure you will too. Hey congrats on the baptism!! You are there to find those people that are simply waiting for the invitation to be baptized. 

Love you man, you sound great. 

To me as he replied to my email:

I liked all those pictures hope you enjoyed General Conference, I watched it in Spanish and have the sesions I understood everyword and I got alot out of it but then others the translaters were from like cuba and they spoke so fast I couldn´t understand a word haha. Love you and thanks for everything! Try to not to get cold up there, its pretty warm right now and It feels really nice! talk to you soon. 

-- 

- Elder Clayton 

Bolivia Cochabamba

Stetson Google'd his apartment address;  this is what it came up with.