week 74

This week went well especially with even more "Light the World" activities and opportunities to share them. In a lesson with two of our friends (Damian and Karina), we were teaching about tithing and the topic of temples came up towards the end. We invited them to see the lights at temple Square in D. C. and they both got really excited about the fact that it was free and said they would go. They even promised us that if they went they would send us pictures:) I really hope this helps give them (especially Damian) a desire to be married for eternity a temple. Even though all of it is through video calls, I feel like we have become great friends. It was hard for them to say goodbye to Elder Logan (He's going back to his original assignment woo-hoo!) and he's only been in this area for 3 weeks. I can't imagine how hard it will be to say goodbye now that I've been here for nearly 4 months! But little by little we are helping them grow their appreciation of the Book of Mormon and they are reading it every week so far!

Another miracle was the new friend we made through Facebook last week (Carlos) We had multiple appointments this week and finally a member was able to drop him off a Book of Mormon, and he texted us stating he already read the introduction like we asked and liked it. We told him if he wants "extra credit" he can review the topic that we will talk about later that day in the lesson by reading 2 Nephi 2. An hour or so later he sent us a text saying he had finished reading and marking the Chapter and had written down all his questions! Very few times in my mission have I seen someone so prepared to learn as Carlos, and I am grateful that the Lord has prepared him. I love this work and the opportunity to be a missionary, it's amazing!

Recently I've been able to find time to read a little bit of "Jesus The Christ" and it is so amazing. I thought I might try it out not really expecting much, but the truth is that each chapter I become more engaged in it as my testimony of Christ grows stronger. I'm grateful for the time I have in the morning to study the scriptures and Preach My Gospel and LEARN NEW THINGS! Finding out something I didn't know before it the best thing ever and it amazes me that even the apostles learn every day. Scripture of the day: Isaiah 28:10!!! 

Also I started up my "Quote of the day" in my Journal again, so get ready from some funny quotes from my companions next week 😄

An apple pie I made

The package from the ward! Thanks guys! It was so creative! 

week 73

This week was a great start to this transfer! It went by quicker than the last few have and we have enjoyed a harmonious companionship and as well as several member visits, however sometimes I get a little discouraged at the lack of people we have to call (at least of those that actually answer us)  Last week Karina accepted and committed to living the Word of Wisdom and this week with Karina we taught the divine mission and gospel / doctrine of Jesus Christ and asked her which of the 5 principles she and her husband would like to learn more about and they both agreed on Endure to the end. They promised us they would read 2 Nefi 31 and come to the next videocall with questions! It is amazing to see their progression and I pray for opportunities to find more people like them who are ready to receive the gospel. 

Thanksgiving was so fun and although we weren't allowed to proselyte (aka make calls) that day we still made 2 lessons and a HUGE dinner with turkey and potatoes and stuffing and green beans and pumpkin pie! We also got to call our families and I saw the amazing Thanksgiving dinner that my parents made too! 

We received two referrals this week and they turned out to be the exact same guy asking for bibles. It turns out that he is going on a trip to Honduras and he wants to give Bibles to the poor people who can't afford them. We tried talking to him a bit, but he didn't seem interested in anything but the Bible he had asked for... If only he could realize the true value of the Book of Mormon! We would have TONS of those to give him 😂

Our district is completely different. When we went to district council on Wednesday I realized that every single missionary that had been in the district has now moved to a different one (this is my fourth transfer here) and that I know the people they teach better then they do! I was able to help and give lots of good advice in that meeting and it felt great to be able to help in that way. It is so strange going so quickly from the guy who knows nothing to someone that others look up to. I'm sure that being a parent might give someone that same feeling. I look up to my parents and my brother for their fearless attitudes towards life even if on the inside they have feelings of being the "new guy" I love you! 

Anyways, thank you to anyone reading this email and I hope you now enjoy all the amaaaaazing Christmas music season!!! 🎅🎵🎶

Elder Hilton

week 72

Tuesday

We made a fun little video for our zone Facebook page about the fifth commandment and it turned out great! I will see if I can attach it at the bottom. 

Wednesday

We had our district council! Its always great to see other fellow missionaries

Thursday

We did service again! We went to a big warehouse, but this one was owned by a Catholic Charity. I took a few pictures and it was such a surprised when we noticed that the majority of the hundreds of boxes on the pallets were from the latter day saint distribution center!

I'm going to skip to Saturday because it was the best day (and second to last day) of the transfer. First off it was amazing because during daily planning a text came through from our district leaders with a Zoom link. I couldn't believe my eyes as I read the description (translated to English) "Oruro Station Ward is inviting you to a scheduled Zoom meeting. Topic: Baptism of Virginia Cámara Hora 9:00 am 21 nov. 2020. A person I taught in my last area was being baptized! Her story is amazing and we taught her with Zoom for months even though she lives in Bolivia. I remember the night I invited her to be baptized and she said yes, but didn't know how to get to church or who her local missionaries were, and since church attendence was paused at the time she was never able to find the church. We found the sister missionaries and told them about the situation and gave them the best description of where our friend Virginia lives. They said they would do their best to find her and it wasn't until last week that they did (I had no idea) and they did a baptismal interview and scheduled her baptism for today. I thought that after I had transfers I would never see her again. I had faith that she would eventually get baptized when the missionaries found her, however I wasn't expecting it so soon, and I was so honored to be invited from her to watch it live. It was an unforgettable experience watching a baptism happening so far away of someone who's heart I touched from so great a distance. I personally congratulated her afterwards and then had to get back to the work with my companions. 

Another very exciting thing that happened tonight was that the transfer board was posted! I was the first one to see it in our companionship and I couldn't have been happier with what happened. I will be staying here in Sudley E for Thanksgiving and Christmas and so will Elder Smith! We will be recieving Elder Logan (who is a reassigned missionary who served in Trinidad) who will be replacing Elder Hart. Then, as we were talking about Christmas our mission president called us and had news for Elder Logan: he will be going back to Trinidad on December 17th! I guess we will only be with him for three weeks or so. (I really hope I will be able to go back to Costa Rica too.) But speaking of Christmas, now that I know that I will be here for Christmas, all the decorations have gone up! (there's not that many but hey)

I am excited for Thanksgiving and am loving the challenge that President Nelson gave us to make our social medias into a personal grateful diary and thanks God through daily prayer. I am especially grateful for missionary work and the joy it brings us when we get to help people.

week 71

Hello everyone! This week was crazy here in D.C.! Even without the added hecticness of the elections, this week was very loaded with appointments with friends and members. We also got to do a service project on Friday that was very fun and kinda gross. We were moving and spreading compost around trees, and we got to drive a cool but slow rover thing to move around the buckets of compost. I did not get very many pictures this week, but I got one of us in front of the compost pile.

Also on Friday, we had another Book of Mormon Institute class which was amazing! The topic was on the "final outcome" and how we know it! We know that the end game is that Jesus wins. We read in Nephi's vision and how he saw his end game which was his entire posterity falling in apostasy and getting destroyed. We talked about how hard it must have been for him to the the "sad ending" but we read further and saw how Nephi rejoiced in the real ending with the restoration and eventually the second coming of Christ. It was a great reminder for me to always keep in mind that as long as we stay on Christ's side WE HAVE ALREADY WON! I hope that little message helps someone and have a great week!

Week 69 and Week 70

WEEK 69

Hello everyone! This week has been quite an eventful onefor my companions and I. First and most exciting is that Elder Smith finally got to got to the temple! They had to drive all the way to the Philadelphia one which is four hours away from the offices of the mission (which are an hour away from our house, so he was gone all Saturday.) When he came back he had so much energy and light in his face and it was amazing! 

The second most exciting thing was the new training we recieved that has to do with Facebook. We were encouraged to make accounts if we didn't have one and to use it as much as possible as a missionary tool. We should be friends with all the members in our wards and and use our profiles to share awesome content from our Zone Facebook pages with other members and people we are teaching. It is quite the change because beforehand in this mission, being on Facebook was almost seen as being disobedient, however pretty soon almost all our work will be through it. 

Another highlight this week was our district activity that we had today! We went to the Bull run national park and saw the Stonewall Jackson monument and lots of other historical things, however my favorite part was the socializing with other missionaries and taking pictures :). 

Finally our friends Damian and Karina answered us last night and we had an amazing lesson with them! Even though it went pretty long, they were very open and they loved meeting Elder Smith despite his newness to Spanish. They even offered to help him learn it (they speak English as well)

Uh oh, I gotta go! I will write a more thourogh email next week!

Elder Hilton

WEEK 70

Hello Hola Buenas tardes como están bendiciones mis queridos amigitos :)))

This week was crazy and went by pretty quickly but with the little time I have left to write this email, here's what happened:

Tuesday: 

We had to cancel our service because of the Zone Conference which was AWESOME! It was all about finding JOY in the work. 

Later that day we had interviews with President Duckworth and they were great. It is nice to sit down and just be completely honest with someone and get absolutely everything off your chest, especially knowing that how he resonds will be in a loving way. I let him know what he needed to, and he told me that both of my companions had expressed the same things to a lesser degree and then gave me special advice on how to better lead the companionship. Later that night we recieved an urgent referal from Roni Pimentel - a person that we have been sending scriptures to. He told us that his mother and brother had both passed away in the same week and that although he is fine now, his family in Guatemala is strugglling a lot and he wants our friends (aka other missionaries) to visit them to "comfort them with the word of God". Of course we agreed right away.

Wednesday: District Council! Our realplays went alright (albeit very long) and we got to take a hilarious picture of all of us out next to our 2020 Chevy Equinoxes in a row :) We also found the Elders serving in Guatemala and sent them all the info we knew about Roni's family. 

Today we had a lesson with someone who I found on Facebook and slowly became buddies with! The lesson turned out alright, and in the end it turned very political, but to be brief let's just say he has a lot of faith in Christ but not in this country.

Thursday: All I remember was that we carved our pumpkins that night! I made mine an Adidas symbol with the nike slogan :)

Well, I ran out of time again! Quickly some other highlights were going to church on Sunday (Karina went to church!!!!!) and bearing my testimony loud and clear for all to hear in Spanish! Also today I got an expensive haircut and the little Asian lady cutting my hair was hilarious. She kept saying in her barely understandable accent "You look moviestar!" But after it all my hair got CHOPPED and I am rocking a Q-tip head - I remember why I cut my own hair now - But the experience was definitley worth it :)

Have a great week everyone!

- Elder Hilton

week 68

Hello friends and family! 

Today was transfer day! Elder Montoya went and got switched out to the English Program, and we recieved a relatively new Elder named Elder Smith who is coming from the English Program. His original assignment was to Mexico, but he went through the online MTC experience and is now reassigned here! Apart from his time in the online MTC, he hasn't spoken much Spanish, and so we are going to have fun learning it in this trio! Elder Smith is from Star Idaho and knows exactly where Caldwell is! The transfer went pretty smoothly and I didn't want to have to say goodbye to Elder Montoya because he guy I have gotten along with probably the best out of all my companions (from the United States) however Elder Smith is  very energetic and I know we'll get along great. 

This week I have focused a lot in reading the Book of Mormon and every morning I lose track of time reading in it. I have been paying attention to every reference to Christ and marking it. There has been something on every page so far, and it really shows that the Book of Mormon is another testament of Jesus Christ and it's purpose is to bring people to him more that anything else. I am so grateful for it. I'm grateful for every single prophet who sacrificed their lives and endured so much suffering to protect and preserve the plates in ancient America and for all the sacrifices the early saints had to make to bring the Book of Mormon to the world. I invite anyone who is reading this who has not sincerely read the Book of Mormon to consider on the the amazing fact it is that we have writings translated to English from nearly 3 thousand years ago available to us that contain truths of God and Jesus Christ! Who wouldn't want to read that even if it is just out of curiosity? I know it is true because I have read it many times now, and I have learned so much about the Savior from each time. However much it means to you, my testimony is that it is REAL. Compiled by Mormon, buried by Moroni, translated by Joseph Smith, the plates are real and nothing on this earth can dissuade me from it because I have READ from it's pages in Spanish and English and I cannot deny that what it teaches is true. 

I hope that this little email was helpful in some way to someone and now it's time for me to go make friends with my new companion! Until next week!

Elder Hilton

 We did a service project with the ward this Saturday and I got to see some of the members in our ward for the first time! Some of them were a lot smaller than I thought 😅

week 67

Hello friends and family! My week overall has been great, and we have been able to find a couple of new people in our area even though it was our third time going through area book and calling all the numbers. Somehow, even with the same numbers we are always able to find new people!

I bet you all already know what the highlight of my week was... General Conference! I enjoyed every second of it and I took notes on a shared Google doc with my family. I loved the themes of preparedness, culture, and striving to be like Christ. I especially loved the talk about the Christlike attribute of patience and I felt like it was just for me. One little miracle that we expeienced yesterday was the impression my companion had to call a certain person that we are teaching. We were currently listening to the Sunday Afternoon session and we were about halfway through it. We could have waited until after to call her, but we decided to do it right then, and it so happened that she has juuust gotten home and had some free time! We sent her the link to watch the rest of conference live in Spanish, and she did it! Now, tomorrow we are going to talk with her about what she liked and questions she now has. 

There are a couple of other cool little stories I would like to tell, but my time is limited because we decided to be more adventurous today and so we went on a couple-hour hike and had a blast! 

I hope all of you also had a great week (and especially weekend) and that's it for me! Love you!

Elder Hilton

week 66

This week went very well and we all worked very hard on our contacting skills, revising EdApp as a reference and making achievable goals to better our contacts. Through that effort we were able to find two new families (one of 3 and the other of 4) to teach in one day! That morning we had prayed for God to help us find the families that were waiting to hear the message of the restored Gospel, and he answered our prayer! It strengthened our faith and motivated us to work even harder to find even more new friends. 

There was amazing devotional on Sunday. The conversion of the Nail family was shared and it was amazing. It all started with Elder Nail - my age - had entered the MTC and they met President and Sister Caplin who at the time were being trained as mission presidents. When they were introducing themselves, Elder Nail said his name and that he was from Texas and President Caplin asked if he was related to another man (I forgot his first name) and it was his Elder Nail's grandfather. It turns out that 39 years ago when President Caplin was 19 on his mission, he had baptized Elder Nail's grandfather and introduced the gospel to their family! 

In that devotional Elder Nail and his dad and President Caplin were all present, and Elder Nail's dad shared his conversion story - he was 17 at the time - and the spirit was so strong. The rest of the devotional we talked about the effects we will have on other people, even if we don't see it now. And I know that everything my companions and I do will have a ripple effect. Even if we don't think so, we have to remember that God works in mysterious ways and the smallest things can be the means of bringing about the greatest changes in the lives of other people. 

A little thought:

"Consider upon the blessed and happy state of those that keep the commandments of God"  

What else make you happy? I love music and yummy food and organizing, but nothing makes me happier than making others happy which I can do as a missioanry by teaching commandments that allow people to live happy lives!

Have a great week everyone! 

- Elder Hilton

week 65

Last week on P-day we had a district activity that took the whole day and it was very fun! It was the BEST because we played PICKLEBALL!!! Then later we made paper airplanes and had a thowing competition off Signal Hill and that was a blast even though there was a strong wind coming up the hill. The wind was impossible to beat, until I made the record plane which I called the "flying potato" which was just 5 dense layers of brown constrution paper. After that we went on a walk around the park and I got to talk with some old companions and overall it went very well. It was an hour-long bike ride to get there and so we got our excercise in for the day as well :) 

On Tuesday we got to do another service at a place called the "House of Mercy", this time taking apart refridgerators and making bags of food for three hours. We ended up making around sixty big bags. It was a great change of pace.

On Wednesday we did ANOTHER service but this time at the Hunger Resource center. It was another 3 hours service checking expiration dates on bread. We ended up throwing away mountains of bread, and I mean MOUNTAINS. I didn't take a picture of it unfortunately... On our way home I heard a bang behind me and looked back and saw Elder Montoya rolling; he had jumped off his bike! He accidentally crashed into a sign somehow, but fortunately left unscathed except for a sore wrist, until we noticed his tire had gone completely flat. It was a long bike ride from home and a huge walk, so we called the district leaders to tell them that we weren't going to be able to make the district counsel.

What we did instead was stop in a park and joined though a zoom call, however, halfway through Elder Hart's phone died - and he has the hotspot - and we were left without options. We went home and arrived just in time for a lesson with a new person named Joel and it was a fabulous get-to-know-you lesson!

Thursday was probably my favorite day here so far. We had our interviews with President Caplin IN PERSON for the first time!

 I will save you from the details of that interview, but it's worth mentioning that it turns out that he lives in the exact same ward as my grandpa in St. George, and I know exactly where his house is! He also told me that he had no idea about when he thinks I could get sent back to Costa Rica, but he wouldn't be surprised if I stay here for the rest of my mission. When I went home, it had started raining and both my companions had brought rain jackets, but not me. President saw that I didn't have on and offered to give me his spare one in his car. I declined about four times until he said "Well what I supposed to tell your Grandpa about the last time I saw you? That I left you bike home in the dark rain withouot a jacket when I had one in my car?" I then agreed and he gave he his jacket from his car, and we said bye. Later that night he showed up at our apartment for his jacket, and as I returned it to him, Sister Caplinn came up from behind him with a big fresh pizza saying "I hope you are all still hungry!" It was so nice of them!

On Friday afternoon we recieved a call from one of the senior couples asking where our car was parked, so they could do a car switch. We explained to them that we don't have one and we are biking Elders. They asked "Is this Suudley E?" "Yes..." "Oh well I guess this is your new car! I'll have to call and arrange a ride for myself!" When he arrived, we saw that it was a brand new Chevy Equinox 2020 and we were blown out of our minds! So now we have a car! Groceries will be so much easier!!! Also Friday was my 15 month mark! 

On Sunday we had an amazing devotional with Elder Christofferson and Elder John McCune and it was fantastic! I want to write more but I'm out of time! Next time I won't procrastinate :) I love you all and hope you have a good week!

Elder Hilton

week 63

! I hope you all have been great this last week. Here in Virginia we have been doing good even though the progress of this area is very slow. I was left disappointed again on Sunday, however I wasn't sad because I knew we did our best and only our best is sufficient. Elder Montoya has been an amazing addition to this area, and I know that it was inspired revelation that sent him here. We work great together even though it's been only a week, and I've learned so many things from Elder Montoya, especially when I ask for advice. (If I don't ask for it, he preferrs to stay quiet, but that's ok. He is very honest and has great things to say). I also know that Elder Hart will learn many things from us as we all three work together in our companionship. We have made several companionship goals focusing on language and scripture mastery that will help us teach with unity. My family is doing good and this week it hit me pretty hard that my sister is going to her senior dance and now drives and has a job. My little sister! Time really is something precious and it goes fast. I remember reading a document that was posted on the wall in my last area (I think it was the "time creed") and that explained it so well. After having read that document, I left the experience today with my sister feeling more motivated to work even harder and use my time even better, instead of feeling like time was going on without me at home. 

This week we had an Elders-Only devotional with Presidents Caplin, Barker and Bush and boy was it powerful. President Barker is a therapist by profession and he talked about uniting our body and spirit. He taught that Satan's strongest attacks are when he makes us put our bodies and spirits against each other. For example, many very important commandments are unfortunatley some of the most-broken in this world today like the Law of Chastity and the Word of Wisdom. Overall it was an amazing, inspiring devotional where we recieved so much great advice. Some of my favorite counsel that I heard was something that I know applies to all of us: When you feel tempted, think of the Savior. Think of your family. Think of NOW; what can you do now that will help your family. Remember that justification can be a temporary gain and an eternal loss, while obedience can be a temporary sacrifice and an eternal gain. If we live the commandments, we will have no fear. 

Well, I'm out of time and ready to work again! I love you all and I'll talk to you next week!

Elder Hilton

some service activities

week 62

Hello everyone! This was the last week of the transfer and as they always do, it zoomed by very fast. We have had three more lessons with Karina and her husband Damian. She is a very committed person, and loves to talk about faith. She would get along with Ether and Alma, and I told her that. She asked who they were, and I explaied that they were Prophets from the Book of Mormon who have a very good understanding of faith. I gave her the page number of Ether Ch. 12 and she promised that she would read it with lots of enthusiasm :)

A highlight of this week was a training that Brother and Sister Wilson gave, and it was all about using the Book of Mormon more effectively.. There was lots of focus on the importance of being "reading mentors" on the harder but doctrine-filled chapters.

Another highlight of the week was when we got caught in a terrible and spontaneous rain while we were on our bikes. We were soaked but it was still so fun and refreshing.

This week as well we made a stop-motion video (also about the Book of Mormon) for a Facebook post and I even made an english version so you all can understand it. I'll see if there's a way to put that on this blog...

Saturday was very eventful because we had multiple lessons, a correlation meeting, we burned cookies, and we got a call from President Caplin saying that we would recieve a new companion on Monday (today)! As of now, he is unpacking his things, and he's from Utah, but his parents speak spanish which is fantastic because I will be able to learn so much frorm him! He seems like a very level-headed guy and I'm excited to work with him.

Sunday was sad. Not a single friend showed up to our meetings we had prepared with the members, but the good news is that Sunday morning we were able to attend church IN THE ACTUAL BULDING!! This was the first time since we stopped going in March, and it was so nice to hear the organ and a hymn after so much time.

Today was very satisfying becasue we did our monthly cleaning, and BOY did we deep clean the house. I don't think the past missionaries have done it in a long while, and now it feels like we are in an entirely new house. Even though there is now a third companion, it still seems like there is more space. Sometimes I underestimate how great it feels to have a clean house, and it made me think of how often many can underestimate how great it feels to be spiritually clean. It's amazing, and if we make the necesary changes in our lives we will feel like and entirely new person! And through continuous repentence and reliance on the atonement of Jesus Christ, we can stay like that forever. How do we know what we need to change? You'll have to watch that video we made, because it talks about exactly that :)

We cooked a lot this week. Here is some of it

week 61

This week has been a long one, and somedays were eventful, but most were not. My patience has also been put to the test many times this week, but I'll try to only include the good experiences this week :)

Tuesday

The highlight of Tuesday was the missionwide zoom call where President Caplin talked about his childhood and his love for water. He shared his experiences with scuba diving and applied it very well to the Gospel. 

Wednesday

The highlight of Today was the IN-PERSON district meeting! It's only my second one, and it's such a relief to see and be with other missionaries for a change. It went nearly an hour long, and afterwards I talked to my district leader (and old companion) privately about the challenges of my new area and he was able to help out a lot with his support and advice.

Thursday

We had another mission-wide zoom call today and this time the missionaries gave all the trainings and/or spiritual thoughts. My favorite quote from a missionary was this: "The Holy Ghost is like the sun on a good beach day. When you firsts get to the beach, it is the first thing you notice; the heat, the brightness and the mild burn. But then you notice the cool sea breeze, the water, the sand, etc. With all the new stimulus, you no longer notice the sun. But the questions to ask are 'Did the sun leave? Was is less bright or powerful?' The answer is no."

Friday

My favorite part of the week is always the Book of Mormon institute class, and this week it was given by Bishop Gauss who is fantastic. He served his mission in San Jose California and he shared a miraclulous story of someone he found in the street. As they talked and got to know each other, Bishop (at the time, Elder) Gauss found out that he had the same last name as a counselor in the ward's bishopric, and so he curiously asked if he might be related to him. The guy in the street slowly nodded his head and said "They are my parents". It turns out that he had ran away from them 9 years ago and never had the courage to talk to them again, despite the fact that he only lived a few blocks away. Elder Gauss and his companion were able to help him over the course of a few weeks, all while keeping it a secret from the ward counselor. The day finally arrived when Elder Gauss and his companion knocked on the ward counselor's door, and when it opened the said, "Brother (I don't know his name), we have someone here we'd like you to meet." Then they separated and there was their son after 9 YEARS of knowing nothing about him.

After the Book of Mormon class, we stayed on the call for another half an hour because President had an important announcement. I thought for sure it would be another COVID stage update, but with the serious tone I could tell it was something worse. Both President an Sister Caplin became very emotional as they announced that becasue of the threat that COVID is to President's life (he has terrible asthma) they had to go home. The mission department had given them the option back in March, and he chose to stay saying "I would proudly die for my missionaries in the service of the Lord" however this time, he doesn't have a choice. It was incredibly sad as they explained all this to us, and even I cried a lot. They will be leaving October 1st, so I made a goal to finish the Book of Mormon by then just for them.

Here is a fun little thought that I would like to share about Christ:

He told us to "Come, follow me." He didn't say "Come unto me" because that would imply that all we have to do is go over to him and stop. He said "Come, follow me" because he is MOVING! We need to continuously follow him, because if we don't Christ keeps moving and we can fall away. 

I hope you enjoyed this little email and that all of your weeks have gone well!

With love,

Elder Hilton

i got asked to prepare a song for the zoom meeting so I was able to finally go in the church and play the piano to practice!  It was so much fun!

week 59

Hello everyone! Thank you for all who were so kind and sent me emails or letters these last few weeks, because they have many ups and downs. I am doing my best to help guide Elder Hart in speaking better spanish / teaching with understandable, and the progress is slow and steady. This week we got to participate in community service and it was a really great change of pace in our week! We help load up a bunch of cars with food that volunteers were taking to other non-profit organizations, and while we waited for the next car, we put together hundreds of boxes! I'll attach some pictures :)

Here is a lesson that I learned through a hard experience: 

This week has been very similar to the last, however it ended pretty roughly on Sunday. We had worked diligently the whole week on preparing every one of our 10 spiritual meetings, and each and every member was prepared with their topics. Each one was spaced out by half an hour, however one by one, each friend we called failed to answer, even the ones who had confirmed with us in the morning or the day before! After we explained to ninth member for the ninth time that "our friend did not answer, but thanks for being prepared and willing"  I was on the verge of tears and after we hung up, I said that I need to walk outside and breathe a bit. Then as we were walking outside and I was hanging onto the hope of the last call we had left at 8:30, a text came through from that exact friend informing us that they can't participate tonight. Our last appointment had fallen 15 minutes before it started and that's when the tears finally left my face. I don't know what we could have possibly done during the week that would have changed the outcome of Sunday, but if I have learned one thing this week, it would be that thinking about the past or future too much negatively affects the thing we should be focused on - now. Last week my dad told me that the reason that the Hawaiians are some of the happiest, stress-free people is because their language is derived from one that has no past or future tense. They understood the true significance of the Savior's statement when he said not to worry about the future in Matthew 6:25. And there is a reason that both verbs are in present tense in 2 Nephi 2:25 when it says "Men *are* that they might *have* joy." This is something that I have been trying to apply more in my life, because I know it's true; what more reliable source of truth is there than the scriptures?? 

I love the scriptures even when they "are not plain unto me" because I have the help of modern prophets and apostles who "delight in plainness unto [their] people that they may learn" - 2 Nephi 25:4 Recently I have been studying the Old Testament and the covenants God made with his children and the insane amount of symbolism and foreshadowing to events that will happen many centuries ahead (in the New Testament and Book of Mormon) never ceases to amaze me. Our Heaveny Father is an artist, and his paintings are perfect. 

Something I thought about is that we are all like little pencil artists when we create our families. Every choice we make and action we take is another stroke on the canvas of our very selves, and sometimes it's messy! But thanks to Heavenly Father's plan, through the Atonement of Christ we can erase those mistakes and re-try. The truth is that by the end of our lives we will have countless erase marks, but they don't matter because Christ is the person who lifts us up to the person we were trying to draw. He paints over the pencil according to the corrections we made and we will be PERFECT with his help. I think that made sense :) 

Thank you for reading this short email! I hope you are all doing well and if you have free time, I would love to hear from you! Until next week,

Elder Hilton

I made my grandma Teresa's Tallerine!  It was SOOOOOO good!