The Office and David's Baptism

Dear Family,

It was awesome to talk to some of you on Christmas.  It was really fun to talk to Ryker, even though his Spanish had me dying laughing.  

I am not sure if I have mentioned this before but usually the hardest part about having a good baptismal service is whether or not any members show up to support. That was not the case yesterday.

I really haven't written a lot about David, he started investigating 6 months ago and was kind of on and off in some things good and church but then he disappeared. In october we found him again but he said he was busy, this entire time they have been teaching Myrta, his cousin. About 3 weeks ago we go to teach Myrta and David is there too. Of course the focus is baptism because Myrta is ready and she knows it she just doesn't accept it or something Idk its weird. And we had been planning a baptism for yesterday, the 28th of December and David just shoots up, "so can anyone be baptized?" And it didn't take too much time to think about our answer for us to say "um yes" and he responds "yeah I want to get baptized on the 28th of December." He completely changed his life, big changes easier to notice and smaller changes you had to look for like him being more helpful, comes to the chapel and asks if he can help clean and stuff like that.

Elder Kirby thought it would be a good idea to help the investigators have a more spiritual experience is if we say a prayer way before the service starts where they can thank Heavenly Father for the chance to be here, and that was a really good prayer. I remember a part in particular where David promised God that he would be one of his strongest soldiers.

I love Christmas.

Another tidbit about David is he somehow always always finds us in his little motor taxi when we are on our way home and he gives us a ride. Last week we left a lesson at around 9:45 and Elder Kirby goes "Now would be a really good time for David to show up" and wouldn't you know it we got someone honking at us telling us to hop in. Its like a Bat Signal but the Spirit.

Here are some words from Elder Kirby (my comp). Yes, I got my shout out.

"So the highlight of the week was definitely the baptism of David. He showed up that night looking like a different person, I had never seen him so happy. Before the baptism we went to another room with him and congratulated him for the changes that he had made in his life and told him that he was entering through the gate to the covenant path and then there was still more to be done. We then invited him to pray and thank the Lord for giving him another opportunity and for helping him get to that point in his life. He offered a prayer that I will never forget and he promised the Lord that he would be one of his strongest soldiers. The rest of the baptismal service went perfectly and the spirit was super strong and we sure hope that all of our investigators were able to recognize it. I sure love seeing the Atonement of Jesus Christ take action in the lives of these people that we love and I know without a doubt that this path of the gospel is the only path that brings true joy and peace to our lives. David has made a 180 degree turn and has now experimented a change of heart and is truly converted to the Lord and it definitely has strengthened my testimony as I have played a small part in his conversion with my companion Elder Craythorne!"

Tuesday was really fun and good, we were able to meet with the zone, something we don't do often. And it was actually super good I remember laughing a lot (and making other people laugh).

The mission is so good.

I love and pray for all of you, like always.

Elder Craythorne

The Office and Transfers

Dear Family and Friends,

Being in the office I am blessed with being able to listen to a lot of General Conference talks and BYU speeches. So this week in particular I watched and listened to a BYU speech by David A Bednar about Joy and saw a familiar face leading the music. It scared me out of my seat it's been so long since I have seen anyone I know haha. Hi Bianca!

Week 1 of every transfer will always be on top of the most stressful days. In the middle of doing all the trainings to the new missionaries and their trainers and the 6 weekers I got a call from my boss and had a huge task that usually takes me 2 weeks and he gave me 2 hours. "woo hoo" -Boog.

No way, Tad ran into Elder Halliday?  Elder Halliday is the best I love that guy, one of the most consecrated missionaries we've had. He trained my trainer and he was my zone leader while I was in Ica so yes we have been on a couple divisions. That is crazy he was here a month and a half ago and now he is framing a house in West Point?  He was also in the office. Grandpa Health Secretary, Dad AP and me Finances. Super small world but I knew he lived close to me. Went to Ogden High. There are like 4 missionaries here from Layton High School so I think they are the closest.

For Christmas this Friday we are going to have a traditional turkey dinner with mashed potatoes and gravy and that’ll be about it.

ANDERSON

Remember Liberjhon, well Anderson is his brother from another mother. They consider themselves brothers but I'm pretty sure they're just super homies. Anyway, so we had taught him before but he is harder to get a hold of. Last time we taught the plan of salvation but it was not one of my proudest lessons, he wasn't really sure what his question was but he was really confused. He was saying "these people say this, science says that and you guys say God created everything." So we left him with 2 Nephi 2 and that was like 3 weeks ago. One thing we really want to focus on is that our investigators really read the Book of Mormon and if they don't read we say they can't go on if they don't progress personally and we read with them.

Short email. I'm trying to be better haha.

This weeks shout out goes to West Point 4th ward YM for sending me a letter haha.

Love all you guys.

Elder Craythorne

Pictures

Assembly line to help new missionaries with their luggage

Meeting new Missionaries (Elder Lopez, pro boxer)

Joy, brought to you by the WP 4th activity days

The Office and the Return of the King

Family,

LAZARO

As some of you may remember our Cuban investigators went back to their homeland so they could get married and they were gone for 3 weeks so we were pretty worried to find out if the flame of their faith had gone down a bit. On Monday we went over without having called them because their phones didn't work and it was holy a good lesson. The spirit was so strong and they can feel it. When we got out in the street I gave Elder Kirby a chest bump, it was that good. I described as being that part in Narnia when Aslan comes back and its awesome and he just goes ham (sorry for my slang) it was like that.

One thing I like in particular about Lazaro is he is already trying to do missionary work. As soon as we said the prayer in his house it was like we were have correlation with our ward mission leader, he was asking us about other investigators and if they were going to church or if they had decided to be baptized it was just amazing. He already loves this gospel.

He shared with us that 20 years ago someone tried to give him a Book of Mormon and he only read the last verse to try to see if there were any spoilers. He said that throughout his life he has met Mor---members of the church of Jesus Christ of latter day saints who have lead him to where he his now.

He is incredible.

MIRACLE

On Monday (I don´t know why all my miracles happen on Monday) we were looking through the ward directory and found the name of a less active family felt impressed to go so we went, passed by but they weren't there. But not 2 seconds after we walked away a sister we didn't know walks up to us and says "are you the new elders in this ward?" and we said surely and she goes "there is a family over here and I said I would take someone from the church to go give them blessings". That was pretty cool. Set return appointments.

OTHER MIRACLE

Last week we ran into a crazy member, ok only a little crazy but he was with his friend, Alvaro, and he says "yeah you need to baptize him" so we set an appointment and it fell through and then he said he would go to church and he did! So we set an appointment for that night and it fell through, and the next, and the next and the next BUT ON THURSDAY OUR MOMENT CAME. We taught him and I walked out of that lesson and mentioned to Elder Kirby "I think that guy has a better testimony than I do" of course joking but he was SO prepared.

Time is hard here in the office but it is not impossible, I think with more sacrifice we could be proselyting a whole hour more.

My apartment is really nice. We have to wash our own clothes though, also we don’t have the luxury of a pensionista so during the week we eat at restaurants and Sundays believe it or not we have to cook for ourselves. I was actually gonna ask mom for some ideas on what to cook because let's just say last week was ham and cheese sandwiches.  I guess it is a trade off because other than the office the apartments are not as nice but we get our laundry and all our cooking done for us.

I love all you guys. Forgive me for no pictures.

Happy Dutch Christmas,

Elder Craythorne

The Office

Dear Family,

Yes one of my investigator's names is actually Liberjohn he was super proud to tell us it was an American name, maybe you guys know better than I but let me know the next time you see a gringo walking around with that name, take a picture of him and send it to me.

All jokes aside Liberjohn is amazing and last night we had a really good lesson. He is Venezuelan so his conditions are super rough because his family all lives in Venezuela and he is working here and sending money back there. One time a Venezuelan told me that to buy a kilo gram of meat you had to work for a month, so obviously the economy is suffering over there. Liberjohn is a very sincere guy and he just tells us up front instead of trying to lie he just goes, "look I will not go to church because i work" we haven't taught super doctrinally the Day of Rest yet but we will get there don't worry.

The Plan of Salvation

Last night Elder Kirby and I had a really good lesson with Liberjohn about the Plan of Salvation. It wasn't even good because he had some recent death in the family and he needed to know that families are eternal but we taught in more in the sense centered around the Atonement (which we taught him how to say it in English) about the Fall and why we needed redemption. He was paying so much attention and asking such good questions I felt on fire. We explained every point so well, after the lesson I couldn't help but give a bro hug to my companion, it just felt so good especially after not teaching for awhile. You could just see how it was making so much sense in his eyes just the "oh yeah God loves us, gave us bodies, oh shoot we sin, THANK GOODNESS FOR THE ATONEMENT, (and we even went above and beyond with the) now what? what do we do because of the Atonement? Faith, Repentance, Baptism, Receive the Holy Ghost and Endure/Progress to the End. Alley Oop slam dunk.

Like I said, normally people connect super well with this plan because of its promise of Eternal Families and see loved ones again, but for Liberjohn he really connected and dove (not the bird) into the idea of repentance and forgiveness and progression after sins.

That was a real tender blessing from the Lord no doubt, after working in the office so long, time is so much more valuable being of the street contacting the right people, serving in the right time. There are so many things to get done during a day I just pray asking the Lord that I do his Will during that particular day.

I love all you guys thanks so much for all your prayers and support.

Elder Craythorne

The Office, Thanksgiving and Happy Birthday to Easton

Dear Family,

Like I mentioned last week, turkey and mashed potatoes and gravy and stuffing are not at all popular here in Peru, but it was celebrated with a lot of stressful breakdowns as we had the entire mission come up to Lima again for another devotional with Elder Falabela. That is 186 missionaries who all need reimbursements and money to go back home. And I(the mission) paid for all their lunches.

Let me tell you a little more how Thanksgiving was super stressful. We bought chicken for everyone but the place showed up an hour late and everyone was getting antsy, even Elder Falabela. So we kept calling and calling and they didn't answer and then in the midst of all the chaos a guy from our apartment rides by on a bike and shouts, "Hey the floor above you flooded, and your floor flooded, and the floor below you flooded".. That was pretty fun. We couldn't do anything about it because we were waiting for the pollo but eventually we got back to look at the damage and there was hardly any damage or sign of a flood, but the girl next door got hit slightly hard so she stuck her head in to look at our room and she goes "wow nothing happened to you guys" and we said "its because we go to church" and left.

BLESSINGS OF THE OFFICE

On Thursday after the first training with Elder Falabela he had another meeting that we were in charge of with all the recent converts in Lima! It was so cool. Of course not everyone came but it was so good to see the Mateo Family again after a year, we also saw members from Pamplona and Las Lomas. So cool and really only a privilege from being in the office so it has its perks haha.

HELPING HANDS

Today for service we cleaned garbage at the beach with those yellow jerseys so the picture is from us returning.

Quote for this week 

We should not feel we need to be perfect to be ‘all in’ Latter-day Saints.

Time is flying it is so weird.

Elder Craythorne

The Office and Thanksgiving

Family,

I hope everyone is doing well.  I am on the downside of fighting off a man cold and I was losing that battle for a long time haha.  Don't tell my mom though because she doesn't believe in "man colds". Everytime I get sick in my mission doing normal things are just so much harder but as soon as I leave to proselyte or teach I can't feel anything its awesome, like Airborne but on steroids jacked on the spirit. Then we get home and I feel like I got ran over by a bus again.  This coming week is sure to be a huge blessing, we are having the area president Falabela come to our mission on Thursday and Friday to speak with the whole mission. So for my Thanksgiving I will be eating a Pollo a la Brasa instead of the traditional American Turkey. Either way I am blessed.

My studies this week have lead me back again and again to being grateful for all things. I am pretty sure lds.org is doing that on purpose and not just because this Thursday is where we stuff ourselves so much we can't walk up the stairs but also because I really want to exert myself to be more grateful. I have watched probably 30 times that one video "think to thank" and also "in the spirit of thanksgiving" where that one guy says "donuts and muffins" #throwback to young mens. I also had these good quotes I wanted to share.

 

President Gordon B. Hinckley taught that the more often a person says thank you, the happier he will be

An excellent way to express gratitude is by giving sincere praise. Praise lifts both the giver and the receiver. Mark Twain said, “I can live for two months on a good compliment,” and most of us feel the same way.

This week Lazaro and Lieti are in Cuba getting married so we can get them baptized.

I hope you all have a wonderful week and an awesome Thanksgiving.

Last quote I want to end on. God trusts us to do our part, and live our lives.

God left the world unfinished for man to work his skill upon. He left the electricity in the cloud, the oil in the earth. He left the rivers unbridged and the forests unfelled and the cities unbuilt. God gives to man the challenge of raw materials, not the ease of finished things. He leaves the pictures unpainted and the music unsung and the problems unsolved, that man might know the joys and glories of creation.

Love you all,

I love my mission,

Elder Craythorne

The Office

Family

Just in case you are reading through this quickly only to look at my pictures the one I have attached is of today (Saturday) this morning when we had to wake up early and run to the office for something. On our way a Venezuelan lady called us over asking for some help she said she just wanted us to stand guard at her little Tamale Cart while she went and took something to her daughter. She said she wouldn't be long so we said yes. Thus lead to me yelling "RICO TAMALE 2 SOLES" to everyone who passed by. Elder Peregrino thought that was pretty funny so he stole a picture for me.

The other picture is from all the people that were originally in the office and the people they were training.

MIRACLES

This week we really wanted to get to know the ward well. We went to visit a family Negrete and they gave us a reference to Cecilia and as we were walking out we ran into her on the street not knowing it was her we contacted her. She is really awesome and super prepared so we decided to start praying for her everyday. She actually called the Negrete Family and confirmed the appointment for today at 5. Sad news is we learned she is in the other area... But we are on the same team so no harm no foul.

SHOUT OUT

Tomorrow is my mom's birthday and those who know her know what a blessing she is. A literal superhero in my eyes. I don't want to say too much because I know she will start crying but I want you to know mom that I really love you so much.

Thanks for everything, I am not sure if I should include our office shenanigans in these emails because other than that not a ton happens around here.

Love you all,

Elder Craythorne

The Office and the first time dealing with transfers

Family,

Shout out to Ryker and his 18th Birthday!  He is so lucky to be a future missionary.

To start off explaining the picture and the subject, this week was transfers which means no sleep as a secretary. It was a cool/wierd experience to see the elders who were ending their missions (but that is hard not to be homesick with them) and then on the other side of things to see the brand new missionaries from the MTC. It was so cool to see their faces like "what have I gotten myself into" when they found out their trainers. They have this huge map of the mission and they take their picture by their new area so Elder Kirby and I thought it would be funny to take a picture next to us pointing to the office so thats what that is and boy does it look like the camera filled my cheeks with marshmallows but whatever

Also! We just barely got back from the temple so that was fun as always but you aren't going to see any different pictures from the last 5 times going haha. Always a blessing.

FAMILY SEARCH

So I was messing around on Family search and decided to see how far back I could go (Adam and Eve) but I realized that in the 13th century the last name Crathorn just comes from a town and the Duke who was in charge of it was called William de Crathorn and his dad's name was Le Teuler so Elder Plada the AP has been calling me Elder Le Teuler this whole week. I need to do more work.

Love you guys so much, sorry this letter is so short P Day ran long.

Elder Craythorne

The Office and Prophet

Family and Friends,

Since last week I wrote on Thursday a lot has happened since then, let me recap.

BAPTISMS

That's right plural. On Friday we baptized Doris and Spencer and it was such a good experience. Doris started listening to the missionaries 3 weeks before her baptism, 3 weeks! She was so prepared, she was giddy with excitement on her baptism it was so cool to see her face light up. Elders Thompson, Putt, and Marcucci sang a really good song for the baptism and that brought in the spirit super well. They each take a part like the melody, harmony and bass and it sounds so good those guys are legends. I will attach pictures of those. I really didn't do much for their conversions but I was able to teach them quite a bit.

PRESIDENT NELSON

On Saturday, like I mentioned we were blessed to be able to hear the prophet not once but twice. In the afternoon with all the missionaries and at night with all the members. So cool.

Before it started while we were waiting Elder Sanchez asked me what my favorite chapter in the Book of Mormon was and I said Chapters 11-29 in 3rd Nephi and then when the prophet stood up he started speaking about the chapters one after another talking about the importance of this being Joseph's land of inheritance.

At night he surprised the country when he dismissed his translator and spoke in Spanish about the importance of keeping the commandments, going to the temple, and paying your tithing.

If you haven't seen the picture yet I will just explain that I had a very unfortunate seat where I could not see the prophet at all while he was speaking I could only hear him, which I could not have been bummed about but I was just thinking "who cares, I am in the same room as the prophet" and then it was so cool to see him standing 10 feet in front of me as he was exiting the building. It was only for a short minute but boy was I on cloud 9. 

We also gave a ticket to Doris so she could go see him that Saturday night, that was a blessing in its self.

HISTORICAL MISSION NEWS

Because I am in the office I get to know exciting things sooner than I would otherwise. So, president walked out of his office and announced that this next transfer (next week) we are going to open up a new zone! The cool part is, Elder Thompson and Elder Marcucci (both of my really good friends) are going to open it and be the zone leaders.

I am so blessed to be a missionary.

I pray for all you guys every day.

Talks to listen/read this week "it is not good that man be alone" BYU speech.

Love you all,

Elder Craythorne

La Angostura and General Conference

Family,

GOOD NEWS last week I said that President Nelson is coming to Lima on the 20th of this month but sadly we were not going to be able to go, well that changed!! For this conference with the prophet there will be 5 missions in total, if your mission says the word "Lima" you're invited. North, East, South, West and Central. Needless to say we were ecstatic to receive the news. Also, this means I will be in the same room as the prophet and Elder Sprehn! Whether I will be able to talk to either of those 2 men is another story that we will yet to find out.

OTHER GOOD NEWS I also mentioned that we would not be able to watch all of general conference if any, that also changed and we watched the 2 general sessions on Saturday. I am sure everyone is anxiously waiting for January 2019 for 2 hour church. I really like the principle emphasized about the gospel being centered on living it in the home and backed up by the resources and classes in the church buildings and organizations. Both the Saturday sessions were amazing. If there were any other changes on Sunday, I am just know figuring out in this time to email.

But no matter how cool general conference is as a missionary I will never be able to adequately explain to my investigators how amazing of an experience it really is. This whole week we really wanted to focus on the importance of living day prophets explaining principles like "if we lived at the time of Moses and he was going to give a talk, surely we would all do everything in our part to go listen. We testify that today there is someone who holds the same office that Moses held" stuff like that. Yet, I still don't even know how many of our investigators saw it because we won't be able to verify until we have a lesson.

That German Shepherd joke was a classic.

Another setback to watching general conference was that this weekend was elections here in Peru. That wasn't too fun. Yesterday we spent all day in our house, we couldn't leave.

NEWS As far as the work goes we had a pretty good week this week. A few weeks ago we found a girl named Carolina, she is 20 years old and her dad just barely died a week before we had taught her so she was really sad. She has basically no family or friends here in Ica so our first priority was to get her connected with the YSA. Here in Ica I am noticing we have the difficulty of finding a lot of news but very rarely do they ever progress or do we ever have a second lesson with them. Carolina on the other hand has been a little more receptive and she even brought her 10 year old niece to listen to our message. I'll keep you posted next week on if we are able to get her to go to church. That and this month there are a lot of different conferences like general conference, this week is stake conference, next week they are going to retransmit the Sunday session of general conference. So in total, we will have one sacrament meeting in all of October.

MORE GOOD NEWS We have a lot of fun Elder Jennings and I, we are always laughing about something. I'm not gonna lie gringos are pretty cool.

I still have yet to find the way of working efficiently in this huge area. We have an investigator (well I have never met her) but she lives 45 minutes away so we would have to set aside like 2 hours alone just to go teach her. I had the idea of maybe choosing specific days that we can go proselyte and teach in each of our zones.

GREAT NEWS One of the highlights this week was that Familia Leon way back from Pamplona sent me letters, it was super fun to hear from them not gonna lie made me tear up a little bit ha ha. Nikson is still a beast going to church all the time, Ericka is also going every now and then but the others were brutally honest saying that have deactivated I think they mean gone inactive but whatever ha ha.

I hope you all understand and cherish how blessed we are to be in such a time where we can listen to such classy men like a prophet. I have no doubt he is called of God. And hey, who can complain about 2 hour church.

Next week sí o sí I will send pictures. I have seen a lot of things picture worthy but I never have my camera. I'll make the effort this week.

CON MUCHO AMOR

Elder Kreyton

La Angostura and the one with the monkey

Dear Family,

I don't know how but I have always forgotten to mention two major things that will take place in the month of October. As everyone knows this week is general conference, so I am going to have to ask that you don't send any spoilers because it just so happens this weekend are the Peruvian Elections and since there are rumors of those getting kind of crazy we are not allowed to leave our apartments at all on Sunday, neither will they have meetings on Saturday or Sunday to watch General Conference.

Also, I was just kidding about the spoilers, our president told us to "buckle up" for more changes.

The other news is that on the 20th of this month the prophet is going to come to Peru!! AND all the missionaries in Lima are invited... as of 2 weeks ago I am no longer in Lima.  So that is kind of a bummer.

We had a cool experience on my first week here. So the transfers were crazy and in order to make sure everyone gets where they need to be on time they sometimes get phones to be able to communicate. While all that was going down one of my programs in my district was left without a phone. And we didn't know what day we were going to have district meeting and they only way to tell them was by going over and knocking on their door. So the zone leaders call us like a half hour before the meeting to tell us to go and find where they live and bring them to the meeting, but we had no clue where they lived. We had to leave immediately, said a prayer to somehow get us there and started heading in the right direction. Made some phone calls to see if anyone knew where they lived but they only told us street names that we didn't know and things like "3 blocks to the left 2 blocks up cross the street there's a black dog in front of a white house with 2 stories and half a block up" and by some miracle we actually got there, A TRUE MIRACLE, only to realize they had assumed that the district meeting was that day and they were already on their way out.

We had our multi zone conference on Thursday and it was good like always. We watched that one "Life vest" video that explains what goes around comes around as all these people do random acts of kindness in the street. I really like that video. We also talked about really being grateful for the small blessings we receive. Then on Friday some members had bought us breakfast and we stopped by a gas station where one of our investigators works and she gave us a free drink and snacks. I said to Elder Jennings "wow everyone has been so nice today" and I realized that it was now our turn to go out and do something nice. I imagined a secret camera that was filming us waiting for us to do an act of kindness like "hey when these white guys gonna do their part?"

Yes, we met another pet monkey.

We also had interviews on Friday with President Richey which was also the same old same old, he is really calm and fun to talk to. He makes you feel like no matter what the numbers say that you are doing a good job.

Like I said before, I cannot wait for general conference!! We are so blessed to live with prophets. I hope you all tune in this weekend.

Love you all,

Elder Craythorne

Pictures from La Huacachina

Los Lomas to Ica

Dear Family,

Let me start off with an apology, I was planning on doing a voice recording because of the mass content of things I wanted to go over but I left it back at the house. (cara palma)

For those of you who have it marked on your calendars you will know that this week was transfers, that's why I'm writing on Tuesday. Sad to say I am no longer in Las Lomas Pachacamac. I have left Elder Bustillo and the ward and the elders and all my friends and the entire Lima zone and am now in the south. My new area is La Angostura in Ica. After traveling from 6 am to 4.30 pm I was greeted by my new companion, Elder Jennings from Phoenix Arizona. If you look on google for Ica (which I already know my mom is) you will see a lot of sand dunes and little towns in the midst of them and the most touristy spot is the Huacachina which is a literal guess of how you spell that, but the Huacachina is an Oasis in the middle of this blubbery sweaty blistering hot desert. The air here is dryer but not like it is in Utah but not near as humid as Lima. Good to get a change of scenery. On the long bus ride here I was with a Sister Legaspi from the Philippines (never did learn how to spell that) and she is going to Nazca, which is still 3 to 4 hours south of where I am. Still technically in my zone just because Nazca doesn't have enough missionaries to be a zone of its own. I will be here as district leader.

AND even crazier news is that the new assistant to the president is Elder Limao, my trainer! I was so excited to hear that he will do such a good job.

BUT no matter how crazy and exciting the transfers were it still has no where near the joy of baptizing Javier on Saturday. The baptismal service was probably one of the best and most attended. The YSA put it all together and invited everyone and it was very spiritual.

Love you all,

Elder Craythorne

Transfer Day

Dear Dad,

So I am sure you want to know everything I can tell you about my new transfer. My new companion is Elder Jennings from Phoenix, he is 20, just barely got out of training doesn't know that much Español but we will work out that. I didn't think I would ever get a gringo comp again because of something President Richey said about learning Spanish so there should always be a gringo with a Latino, (bee movie) "but that's life".

My new area is in Ica, far far away from Lima, it was a 6 hour transit. From 6:00 to 10:00 am  I was going through all of Lima picking up and dropping off Elders to different areas. Ica is hot. Super hot. And summer hasn't even started yet... We are surrounded by sand dunes which is pretty sick actually. I will try to learn a little bit more about it for next week because this is only my second day. Just Google it and you'll get a pretty good idea, it was pretty weird to see a few more gringos down here as tourists.

One thing I am excited about is to meet the Bishop, someone told me his son is serving a mission in Ogden, today after P Day I will go talk to him and find out a little more.

I didn't spend a lot of time writing on the keyboard this week for transfers but I do have a lot of pictures

Love you,

Elder Craythorne

Las Lomas and Happy 94th Birthday to Pres. Nelson

Dear Family,

As you will see from the pictures, we went to the temple again. It was really good as always, we are leaving the cold season so it was getting a little warmer. And of course we had to go to Subway after and you can bet your best dollar I got that chicken bacon ranch melt, AND I remembered to take a picture.

The day before while we were walking in the street I found 10 soles, so I decided to buy my companion his first Subway. No regrets there.

Something funny happened this week, well I thought it was funny but there are two parts to the back story. The Elders in my district had 5 baptism interviews I needed to do this week. The other part is that it is really common here when I am in the street we can pass by a group of people and they can be drunk or sober but the girls in the group will start calling "gringo!" they might whistle or whatever but I just have to keep walking. They say this because people aren't used to blonde and blue eyes guys. Anyways, so I am in the interview with the 11 year old of the family and in the middle of no where she blurts out "can you baptize me?" caught me off guard and I said that whoever she wanted could baptize her, so she said "yeah I want you to do it". Then I am talking with the 18 year old daughter and at the end of it all she asks "When do I decided who baptizes me?" I said whenever but soon and she goes "I think I want you to baptize me". Then we get to the mom and I asked her "who do you want to baptize you?" and she says "well I guess whoever baptizes my daughters". So I could have 3 baptisms this week but we won't have time because the baptism for Javier is at the exact same time. Ha ha just because I'm gringo. 

On Friday we had intercambios with the zone leaders in their area which was super green might I add, but at night we had planned another Family Home Evening with the youth, not a ton of people came but it was well populated and we had good participation. We taught about the affects of becoming used to sin. We used to thing where you have to put your hands in freezing cold water for a minute and then try to pick up rice, because of the numbness of their hands it made it very difficult. The same goes with people who are so used to their sinful lives that even if they are baptized it makes it hard for them to feel the spirit. Then to top it all off we played the charades app on their smart phones.

This week will be good as we will be able to baptize Javier, his progression has been unbelievable and he is so ready.

I love and pray for all of you thanks for everything.

Elder Craythorne

Las Lomas

Dear Family,

This week went by really fast and we worked really hard, all that work will pay off in a couple weeks with some baptisms and this week we will be able to go to the temple again. Always a good experience.

For those who may have forgotten I am still district leader and this week we had exchanges with the elders from Floresta, those are always fun. We have really good companionship's in our district nothing to worry me too much. I also got the idea to minister a little bit so I bought stuff to make pancakes and we woke up at 5:30 to go wake them up early and make pancakes.

I will probably have another overload of pictures next week from the trip to the temple on Thursday. 

This week I listened to the BYU Speech from Liz Wizeman called "The Power of Not Knowing" and it is so good. I have noticed that people with a lot of knowledge are not necessarily wise. Actually in most cases if someone has a lot of knowledge and they don't know how to use it they just end up sounding arrogant. Don't forget to pray and read the scriptures.

Love you all,

Elder Craythorne

Las Lomas and Long Walks on the Beach

Dear Family,

Today we went and ran on the beach, so I'm hating myself right about now.

To start off let me tell you about the nightmare we had on Thursday morning. We had to be in the Office in Surco at 8, without traffic it takes 40 minutes to get there with traffic don't even try. We planned on leaving here at 6.30 to beat the traffic. I told the bus driver "puente benavides" which is a huge "puente" which is a bridge. And it is easy to know when to get off because the walls are all yellow. So at about 7.30 we hit traffic but we were still going to be able to make it because we were close. I was waiting, and waiting and waiting. We never passed the bridge. And all of a sudden we passed exit that takes us to the temple.. after mumbling some bad words between Spanish and Kechua we decided now would be a good time to get off the bus. So now we were stuck in the middle of Lima in the middle of rush hour and wayyy late to our meeting. Lets just say it took us 45 minute to get a taxi, and that was the best thing that happened to us. We then waited in immense traffic until we got to the office. I was not an happy elder.

I did get good news though, I found out that 3 of the people we started teaching in Pamplona got baptized. Remember Luis? The 13 year old whose parents wouldn't give permission for his baptism yeah he got baptized WITH his mom! I'm going to have to write him a letter.

An outstanding highlight this week, I listened to a BYU speech from Brad Wilcox called "His Grace is Sufficient" it isn't really recent and some of you may have already listened to it but holy it was soo good. I loved every analogy he used, I cannot explain how good it is. If you have listened to it, listen to it again and then maybe once more just incase you forgot a part.

With my old companion, Elder Streber, we found Juan. We taught a really good lesson about the Restoration and he was really interested in the Book of Mormon and Joseph Smith. But much to our surprise at the end of the lesson he asked what we thought about families as he very quietly explained that his wife had passed away 2 and a half years ago. Obviously we were aching to be able to teach him about the Plan of Salvation but we never found him until yesterday. We talked about agency and trials and finally eternal progression which is centered on families.

The only picture I have this week is of our exchanges we had with the elders from the ward Pachacamac and we played Risk. No the gringo didn't win.

I love all you guys, thanks for the prayers and the support.

Elder Craythorne

Las Lomas and I should have enjoyed hot showers more when I had them

Family,

So our water heater stopped working yesterday.

Just in case anyone was wondering we had another really really good week. The Family Home Evening with the youth was a success. In total 22 kids came! I want to do another one but I am not sure if that family wants us to do it at their house again haha 22 kids is a lot to keep under control. After we played Hot Potato and the loser had to search for a tiny M / M in a bowl of flour, I was the first loser. Kevin also lost but he didn't really understand what he was supposed to do so he just launched his head into the bowl and quickly regretted it, it didn't help that he was super sweaty because more flour stuck to his face.

I am writing a little later because we just barely got done going to the beach which is always a party. It isn't usually a temptation to swim because we can only go to the beach in the winter when its cold and we are the only ones out there. But today the sun came out and it started heating up a little bit..

Other than that it was a pretty normal week. We had exchanges with the Elders from Floresta and it was pretty fun. Yesterday I was contacting with my companion and while I was talking to a sister who was relating to us her problems a drunk guy sees us from like 4 blocks away and he starts yelling "ELDERS" anyway he came over and starting talking to my comp and I think he was trying to kiss my companion's hand but he wouldn't let him. He kind of looked like that one judge from America's Got Talent not Howie but the other one.

In my District Meeting I just did something really simple that turned out to be really good and spiritual. I gave them 3 minutes to draw a self portrait which was immediately followed by complaints a groans saying "but I can't draw". So after that it was pretty funny to see the pictures and then I asked them to draw a picture of Christ. I noticed that the attitude changed and they focused a little harder. Although the quality of the pictures didn't improve that much I told them that the same way we see Christ should not differ from how we see ourselves.

I love you all so much. Thanks for all the support and extra love for those of you who have stuck this long.

Elder Craythorne

Las Lomas and the Best Time Of My Life

Dear Family,

I can't tell you how good I feel about this week. It was so good. If you can believe it not only did we reach our goals but we (I can't think of the right word) overcame? our goals for chapel and new investigators. I feel on fire right now.  The ward has changed a ton since I got here, for the better. It actually feels like a ward now. When I first got here I think I complained about the low attendance but yesterday we had over 100. Wish I could take credit for it but I don't know what changed. I also used to complain about how all my recent converts were all young men and young women, then I realized that these are the future missionaries.

You know you are going to have a good companionship when you ask your companion what he likes to do and he says "clean" (fist pump) its incredible how much he can find to clean. So I am proud to announce that we have passed our first week together without any fights. "Chill" feels like an informal word that a missionary probably shouldn't use too much but my companion is just really chill. But not everything is all rainbows and butterflies turns out he doesn't like pizza... and even worse Star Wars. Pray for me.

This week we had a really good district meeting, don't tell the Elders but it was a repeat from a district meeting I lead in Pamplona. I wanted to explain the difficulty of teaching how to recognize the spirit. To jog your memory I gave a sweet snack to the elders and asked them to describe how it tasted without using the word "sweet". It turned out better than the first time as we made the connection to feeling and describing the spirit without using words "well its the spirit" and tasting an Oreo without saying "its sweet".

I don't know how many times I have mentioned that I have wanted to a Family Home Evening with the youth in the ward or maybe this is the first time but this Wednesday that dream will become a reality. I really wanted to focus really hard on the significance and worth of a testimony. I figured that if there was an age that was more prone to hearing negative comments about the church it would be the youth, and most of them are recent converts of a year or so. One thing our Elder's Quorum President always says when he accompanies us to visit the youth is "make sure that whatever doubt you have right now, just ask one of your leaders or the elders just to get it out of the way so it doesn't fester or canker into a cause for inactivity and give yourself more time to feel the love that comes from pure true doctrine." Roughly translated and adding some of my own words ha ha. I will let you know how it goes I think it'll be a good turn out.

Again, Ï am super happy and super content about what we were able to do this week. But I am afraid we might not be able to keep it up. We found 7 new investigators last week and most were just miracle references we got from members.

I have a strong testimony and a love for the truthfulness of this gospel. I am so humbled to be out here and so grateful God has given me this time.

Love you all,

Que tengan una buena semana.

Elder Kreyton

Transfers

Dear Family,

TRANSFERS

I am writing on Tuesday so that means that we are at the start of a new transfer. My companion Elder Streber went to Brillantes in the stake from my last area, San Gabriel and my new companion is Elder Bustillo from Honduras. Again, this is our second day together so I can't say too much. He is 23 years old, a convert to the church for 4 years. Other than that not a lot of news as far as transfers go. I'm still district leader. A lot of good elders that I knew ended their missions but that also means a lot of new ones came. In some ways the mission feels different than it was 3 months ago but in a lot of ways it is the same.

BAPTISM

This Saturday Angely got baptized, it was up in the air whether or not it would be this week because we had yet to talk about when her parents could come. On Wednesday we went and talked with her mom and we decided to do it early at 10 in the morning. 10.40 the parents never showed up which was rough for Angely but she had a lot of support from the young men and young women so it turned out to be a good experience. She decided that her friend's dad, the second counselor in the bishopric, would baptize her.

FAMILY HOME EVENING

Yesterday was the FHE again and my companion and I taught the Atonement. My companion used a visual aid that was pretty cool and super simple. He put water on a plate and said it represented sin then he ripped a little piece of a banana in the middle of it and said it was us then he explained that we need the 5 principles of the gospel and put 5 matches in the banana and then lit them. He then said that as we live the gospel we accept the Savior and put a glass cup over it which represented Jesus. The lack of oxygen for the fire caused the cup to suck all the water from the plate. Maybe I wasn't too goo at explaining it but it was simple. Then we had everyone share their testimonies about the 5 principles faith, repentance, baptism, Holy Ghost and endure to the end.

I love my mission and every opportunity I have to learn and adapt and be better. It is so fun and it is the best decision of my life.

I know this church is true. Read your Book of Mormon.

Love you all,

Elder Craythorne

Los Lomas

Dear Family,

We had a good week this week. Finally got to have our first interviews with President Richey and his wife. One thing I noticed is that they are trying super hard to learn the language. One thing president is focusing on right now is the principle of refining. So we talked a little bit about me as a district leader or as a missionary in general, he asked how I feel about the mission right now and I said "well, there are always things we can work on" to which he responded "I know what you mean by that. I've only been here 4 weeks and I already have a big stack of 'wish I had done that better's but that is the idea". I think we get caught up a lot of the time in trying to do everything perfect the first time when in reality it would take 2 or 3 or 4 or 20 tries.

We also did a TON of service this week. Helped the elder's quorum president move and re did the roof on a sister's house.

I love my mission, I know I always say that and it might sound redundant but I really do. I know every day I can wake up and work for the Lord.

Love you all,

Elder Craythorne

Los Lomas and the one with the monkey

Dear Family and Friends,

To quickly explain my subject there is a recent convert here and she found a monkey and was keeping it as a pet but then she returned it to its owner..

To celebrate the 24th of July a little bit I went outside and cleaned the windows of our apartment. Only a few of you will understand that reference.

I mentioned a while ago about Angely who is the sister of a recent convert. It is basically like teaching a member she is super good and already has a really good testimony. We are going to try and get her baptized the next week, it was going to be this week but there is a huge ward activity so we had to push it back.  

Something changed this week. You probably won't understand because it was so small but I think it changed the whole course of my mission maybe even my life. I said in my group email last week that now we have to have 10 names in the back of our planner at the end of every day. I can say that 5 days in a row I have completed it but holy cow is it difficult. I think we have talked to 60 or 70 people maybe 80. I can feel I am on the brink of something big here in this area, I think this was the change we needed, but certainly one that I needed personally. I can't say we found an extraordinary number of new people this week because when you plant a tree the fruits don't come immediately but I feel really good. I found a new definition to "giving it my all" this week.

This week I got sun burnt! For the first time in months where I have seen the sun and it just so happens that it happened on the day to do service. Every other day is cold and cloudy. I have only got one picture today and it is nothing special but it is a good representation of the average street here in Peru, well at least where I am serving and have served.

I am learning a lot out here and I can't believe time has gone by as fast as it actually has. I still have a lot to learn before I become the missionary I know I can be. In a lot of ways I am improving but mainly my testimony is one that has been solidified and pounded into what it is now.

I love being a missionary, you have no idea how happy it makes me nor how blessed it makes me feel neither how humbled I am by my calling. I feel like I have a lot of expectations for myself that still are unattended but I like feeling like I can be better.

I love all you guys and I can assure you I am happy.

Elder Craythorne

The outside world

Ceviche de Pollo