President Russell M. Nelson...

Family,

Shaking hands with the President of the Quorum of the 12 Apostles is awesome! If you haven’t tried it yet. Do it. It’s well worth the time, haha.

Ya peeps, this week we got to go down to the temple in San Salvador and have a meeting with President Nelson and the members of the Area 70. It was the coolest thing ever. The three missions here got together and we had a 3 hour meeting in the church by the temple with President Nelson. His talk was so awesome and I loved how calm and kind he was with us. For being more than 90 years old I thought he would be super fragile and stuff but he was like jumping up the stairs to get on the stand up front and he would just throw his arms around the missionaries and everything. Talk about example. In his talk he talked about the importance of our relationship with the bishop and our ward mission leader, why it’s so important to always have a member with us while we teach and then left us with different topics in the scripture guide to study. The topics he selected were so different but so profound it was awesome. Just hearing his testimony and listening to him say, I KNOW that Jesus Christ lives right in front of you is one heck of a spiritual experience! I left the meeting feeling such peace and happiness in my heart and with an even stronger testimony of the organization of the Church. Which includes 12 Apostles that are special witnesses to the world that Christ lives.

While leaving the meeting I was looking for Dallen Howell because I knew he had come to the Mission El Salvador East but I didn’t know if he was in a place too far away to come or what. So I was looking like crazy for him and couldn’t find him, went one last time to look and ran into him! He had no idea what hit him when I gave him the biggest hug ever and had no idea who it was, haha. But he’s doing great and loving the mission. It was just so surreal to see him here in El Salvador! He is gonna send me the pic so you’ll get it next week.

The miracle for the week, I’m still alive!

Haha JK, stress hasn’t killed me quite yet!

So what happened this week was we were able to put a date with a lady named Esmeralda.  All of her family are Evangelicos, which are the worst of the worst when it comes to Bible bashing, and all they do is come when we are teaching her so they can tell her stuff about the Church to make her confused. So what we did is take a recent convert that we found out she knows and went to visit her. The sweet thing is that they are two single ladies that both have kids that still live with their moms. So they are like the exact same people and relate a ton. So we took Evalin to visit Esmeralda and it was so sweet to hear her talk about receiving forgiveness after having sinned and how great she feels now since she has received a remission of her sins. It was such a simple testimony but she did it with such conviction that it really impacted Esmeralda. So right after that I invite her with a date because the Spirit was so strong and we just sit there waiting for an answer, and I’m just saying in my mind, ‘Please Heavenly Father, PLEASE!’ and so she tells us, ‘You know what, yes. I think I will do it!’ It was such a blessing. I know the power of having a third testimony with us as missionaries and know that there is always somebody out there that needs to hear the members’ testimony!

That’s all for the week, I can’t get myself to write anymore, sorry haha, love you guys so much!

Elder Crump

With his comp :0)

Life Long Preparation

Yikes! I hate how fast time goes by. So family, things are doing fabulous here in Aldea. I’m happy, safe, working hard and getting along great with my companion. Pretty much three cool things happened this week I’ll tell you about.

First is that we went to the San Salvador Temple. As always it’s the best thing in the world. I always enter the session really stressed and my mind just going nuts. But then slowly but surely, as things progress, I calm down and by the time I get to the Celestial Room, I just feel so at peace and know that God is happy with the work I am doing here in Santa Ana. It’s hard with so many people saying you have to improve and have to change this or that, so when you can feel the happiness knowing that the most important person is satisfied with what you are doing, it’s the most relaxing feeling ever.

Second thing is the miracle that happened when we were teaching the kid in our area that has a date for two weeks from now. He likes to play on his phone a lot and doesn’t always put a lot of attention in what we teach. He understands he needs to be baptized and wants to do it, but just sometimes doesn’t have the desire from the heart to go out and do things. So we decided to watch the movie of Joseph Smith, but the longer version. His house is like on top of a mountain and so at night it was perfectly silent. We invited the spirit before watching the movie and I told him I was gonna take his phone.  He didn’t want to but I just did it so he could pay attention. Well it worked. When we finished watching the video, the three of us just sat there for a while and enjoyed the immense spirit that was in the house. It was beautiful. Bryan even told me afterward, ‘Thanks for helping me pay attention, I really needed that.’ It was sweet to help him have a truly spiritual experience and recognize the importance of staying spiritually in tune to what we need to hear.

Third, I was reading in Alma 16 verse 16 where it talks about how the spirit prepares the minds of the people we are going to teach and how they will be ready to receive our message when we find them. I thought a lot about it and was thinking a lot about why there aren’t people that actually want to know about their life after death. And what they need to do in this life. Pretty much because I had been studying the Plan of Salvation. So I had been thinking about that and then this week we had the perfect lesson with a lady that went to church last week. She has literally had a life long preparation to be able to hear the message of the Gospel at this point in her life. She at one point in time had no house or anything, had an immense debt and had to go to live with her mom because she didn’t even have a bed for her three kids. Slowly but surely she has been getting better but has felt that she’s been missing something in her life. Well that’s when we come in.  The night before she had been talking to her daughter about life and the daughter asks her,  ‘Mom, will I live with you after I die? What’s it going to be like?’ The girl is 9 so this made Tania, the mom, think a lot about life. The next day we get there and she’s like, ‘My daughter asked me something yesterday, and I didn’t know what to say, maybe you guys have the answer?’ My comp says...’Well Tania, as a matter of fact, we do!!’ I know the spirit prepared Tania and her daughter to be able to receive our message and even though she needs to get married first, I know she will be baptized!

That’s it for the week. We did another fast with Jose and Mary and they are doing great. Comp is still baggy but we are working hard! Life’s good, folks. Ain’t no doubt about it! Love ya~

Elder Crump 

Multi Zone Conference

San Salvador Temple with Elder Rivera

With Elders Dunshee and Jepson -
MTC companions

Overlooking his area.

Temple gardens

Two Tickets to Paradise

Familia Crump. Good to chat once again this beautiful Monday. First things first, Happy B-Day to my Papa!! Wow does time go by fast! I can’t believe it’s already passed August 16th once again! I hope yesterday was a great day and you were able to enjoy the fact that nobody is home right now, haha. That’s gotta be real weird. But just know I love you so much, Dad. You are the best example in the entire world and have always given your all for the family. On the mission I see examples of a million different types of dads and I can honestly say that I have been blessed with the best dad there is. Everything you do is for the welfare of us all and I’m slowly starting to understand the magnitude of what you have done while here in El Salvador. Love you Pops. You’re the best.

Alrighty, so here is the scoop here in Paraiso. Every time I get on the bus to go to the stake center I think of the song, “I’ve got, two tickets to Paradise, pack your bags and ya ya ya” haha because they give me two bus tickets that say ‘Paraiso’. So that always makes me laugh haha. But everything is going great for my comp and I here. There are always a million things to do and I have never been so stressed in my life but I’ve been able to find things to help me relax some and slowly but surely I’m adapting to things here.

This week we get to go to the temple as a mission which is gonna be so amazing. We went a few weeks ago but it was just for all of our investigators. I’m pumped to get some major time revelation!

As a mission we are focusing a ton on taking care of our converts and what we can do to help people stay in church. The problem we are having is that more than half of the converts some times go inactive 6 months after being baptized. So President has helped us focus a ton on that as of recent. So anyway, Elder Bonilla has been here a good while and baptized a lot so we have our work cut out for us in taking care of all his converts. Last Wednesday we were planning out the day and we both decided we needed to go visit a lady that is inactive after having been baptized like 4 months ago. She wasn’t very nice to my comp in the past so he didn’t really want to go but we put that aside and decided to do what Pres says. So we went and on the way we decided to contact a bunch of people we saw. We ended up finding a family while we were walking and they ended up being super positive. We visited them Friday and ended up bringing 5 of them to church yesterday. It was so amazing. The Lord promises us blessings when we are obedient and because we listened to President we were able to be guided to Hno Luis and his family.

Another crazy thing that has been happening this week is that we have been teaching José, a 25 year old guy that lives with his wife and little boy. The wife, Mary, got baptized like a month ago and we are trying to complete the family now. The thing is that the family has a huge debt from when the dad had back surgery and the mom had no money to live on. They recently sold literally everything in their house to pay the last payment and now have nothing but their beds, a tiny stove, a few chairs and dishes in their house. It’s crazy. But on Saturday we promised José a lot of the blessings he needs in his life if he accepted a baptism date and did a fast with us over the weekend. He accepted and on Saturday we did a fast with the two of them. It was the easiest fast I have done. Having started it with them and listening to the prayer of the Hno José helped me a ton to finish the fast strong. It was sweet to see them be humble enough to fast and realize that God is now committed to bless them as long as they keep being obedient. The Hna Mary now has to have surgery next week, how they are going to pay for it I have no idea, we are gonna try and help them and see what happens. But I have no doubt everything will end up fine if they keep doing everything they need to to live the commandments and be worthy!

That’s everything for the week family. Love you. Zacho, good luck out there in the field. You’re gonna do great. Hope you had a good bday Dad. Love you lots. Have a great week! SALU!!!

Elder Crump

These pictures are from saying goodbye in Matthew's last area of Buena Vista.

Familia Reyes in Buena Vista.

A family in Buena Vista.

Familia Zuniga.

With Alfredo in Buena Vista.

Elder Bonilla with Elder Lieva

Pablo, Oscar, Luis & Diego
from Buena Vista.

No time...

For those of you who read today's blog earlier, here is Matthew's actual letter that he sent later in the day;

Well Fam, I don’t have much time to write this week, I was thinking that I wouldn’t be able to write at all but I have a few minutes so I just wanted to tell you about a miracle that happened Saturday night..

So I’m now in Aldea in Zona Paraiso.  This will be my first change that I’m actually in Santa Ana so that’s sweet! My companion is Elder Bonilla from Honduras. He is going to die this change so that will make things interesting! He is super animated though and is easily one of the best missionaries in the entire mission. He teaches extremely well and I’m stoked to be with him this change.

The miracle that happened, so I got here and had to do an interview in another area.  The thing is that my comp couldn’t do it because I couldn’t stay in the area because I’m new here. So mom, I WAS sick this day but I’m totally better now so don’t even worry. Anyways, this lady was going to be baptized Sunday and hadn’t been interviewed yet, so we had to do the interview Saturday night, without exception. Anyways, I went to this area to do the interview, we get there and of course, a down pour starts and the bus that takes us there never came. Sooo we got to walk. I ended up walking like 30 minutes in the rain, being super sick and about to die, but at least we got to the house. I was able to do the interview, the hermana past her interview and ended up getting baptized yesterday. But anyways, after the interview we are leaving and I just felt totally miserable. So we start walking and I’m like ‘Elder, there is no way I’m gonna make it all the way back to the house. We are gonna have to sleep with a member or something because I’m dying.’ We just continued walking a little and in my heart I said a little prayer and said, ‘Heavenly Father, this lady needed her interview, and it’s done now, but I’m not gonna be able to get back to the house on my own, please just help me...’ About 30 seconds after, a little micro bus passes by, passes us, then suddenly stop and asks us if we want a ride. It was so amazing! It was such a blessing knowing that God is always watching over us especially in times of need.

That’s all I really have time for, but everything is perfect here in El Salvador. The mission is the best thing in the world. I’m so proud of my brother that now wears the same name tag as me. What a blessing.

Love ya fam!!

These two pictures were taken on transfer day at the mission home.

With Elder Bonilla

I have no idea who these other elders are :0)