This work is the BEST!

 

The Marquez Family

Monday January, 28, 2013

ALLLRIIIIIIIIIGHHHT!!!!!

 Como estan mis hijitos? (How are my children?)

 Man this week was soooo good. We had Multi-Zones on Monday and so P-Day was on Tuesday and it was the best. The Pena family (there's a tilde over the n) will be baptized this Sunday and soo will Eric. The Pena family consists of Silvia (mom) and Vianca (17yrold hija, sister) and we taught them the Law of Chastity and WoW this week along with other stuff. But, while we were teaching Chastity, We were like, "Will you live the law of chastity?" Silvia was like, "Well she's definitely not going to say no in front of me!" it was funny. Then we talked about it more and then Silvia was like, "Man, good thing you guys taught me this now that I'm married, cuz if you were to teach me this when I was younger it would have been impossible!" Not only was it super funny because this lady is like 250 lbs and super old, but the reaction of Vianca's face was priceless! She was soo embarrassed the whole lesson. They came to church and then left after the 2nd hour. We called them later that day to invite them to a baptism that the other Elders had, and both answered the phone at the same time. "So do you think you'll be able to make it?" Silvia was like, "No I don't think we will..." Vianca interrupted, "Why not mom?" then Silvia said, "Alright then! Looks like we'll make it there!" Haha gotcha. So ya. Then Eric is like 13 and the rest of his family is reactivated and he hasn't been baptized yet. It's pretty much a gift from God.

 So another story, Our WML (Ward Mission leader) Nefi Valsco,  went out with us and we talked about the Harvesting Blessing. He was like alll against inviting people to be baptized so quick. He was like on my mission we didn't invite to baptism till the 4th charla (discussion) and this and that.................garbage. So we took him to the Pena and taught them and he was like, "How did you find them?"

"Through the Harvesting Blessing...."

"That's a good technique Elders..." Pwah!! In your face.

18 Month Ceremonial Pant Burning

 

We talked to a guy dressed like a girl this week too. He totally fooled me till he told me his name. I contacted him and gave him the schpeil (no idea how to spell that). He was like, "stranger danger!" and I was like, "We represent Christ." he was like, "Oh." I was like, "Can we come and leave his peace and blessing on your home?" He was like, "Sure here's my address" I was like, "What's your name?" he was like, "Anthony."..............long pause...........I looked him up and down and saw a huge adams apple, man hands, 5 oclock shadow, and lack of breasts. He was like, "I just gave you my address...that's soo weird." I was like, "Here's a card. Bye." Gays.....

This work is the best. I can't wait to dunk some people hardcore. btw you all suck at replying to mail, except for my family. Time to go ball it up. Love you all. Pray that Rafael can get Sundays off so we can go swimming in the baptismal font together!!

-Elder Matt Dial

Matt's Son (Greenie)

 Elders Spencer and Ete

This is His work and His Glory!

Hey skids,

Man I love being a missionary. It's the greatest. I love being the tool in the Lord's hands bringing people more align with His Gospel and His teachings. It's the greatest.

Our Zone is great. We have 8 companionships in our zone including senior missionaries. We live in a four man apartment. Our area is flourishing. All that we need are some white jumpsuits and everything would be perfect. This week was good. great. awesome. amazing. perfect. Every wie3ek is like that. We're soooooo busy. I can't believe that we just started week 3 of this transfer.

 We have been trying to contact Yoland forever. Her family is like soooo against us teaching her. We went to one of her the appointments and her daughter (we call her pimple cause she has terrible acne), comes to the door, and straight up lies and tells us she's not home and doesn't want us to come back. Like the night before she told us she was reading 1 Nephi 8 and had the word, "No te preocupes por tu familia." "DON'T WORRY ABOUT YOUR FAMILY!" So we have been trying to maintain contact with her but it's way hard. We're working with her.

We'll have a baptism from Eric Alvarez soon. He is 13, his mom and brother are both members. They all came to stake conference on Sunday. We're working a lot with the Peña family. Pray for them. They need to recognize that the answer they've received needs to translate into action.

We had a great week up until Sunday. We had 8 people say YES I'M COMING TO CHURCH! And one showed up. It's irritating. just come to church! tell me where that's from fellow missionaries. Ya I'm sick of people not coming to church. I want to kill Satan.

I love my Savior. He's the man. This is God's work. I'm sooo excited for all you deciding to serve missions. Our mission went from a 200 missionary cap to 250. So get out and you might get the opportunity to work with your buddy Elder Dial. Wouldn't that be sooo much fun? But, wherever you're called, that's where God wants you. This is the only time in life where you can know that this is exactly where God wants you. I'm scared for it to end, but until then I'm gonna fetchin work more holes in these shoes, and rip more holes in the crotch of my pants helping His children, know how to return to Him.

This is His Work and His Glory. "I know that I am nothing, as to my strength, I am weak. Therefore, I boast not of myself. But, I boast in my God, for in His strength I can do all things." God is good.

-Elder Matt Dial

Amazing things happening in this HUGE, NEW area!

Hola mis weyes!(Hello my dudes)

This week was amazing!!!! I love my new area and companion. My comp is Elder Tyler Johnson, from Michigan.....He's lived all over the place but he's basically from michigan/utah. I lived with him in Jurupa for 2 transfers and now we're comps. He's a loving, diligent, faithful, hard-working missionary so I'm super excited to work with him. We have tons of work to do. There used to be 6 missionaries in this ward, We covered Indio, Coachella, Mecca, Thermal, Salton City and Borrego Springs with 6 missionaries. If you look at a map, you'll see that it's a HUGE area. So, what they did, is, they pulled out the two missionaries from Mecca/Thermal/Salton City/Borrego Springs, and gave all that to us. We now cover all that including, Coachella. It's a HUUUUUGE area that probably covers about a 1/4 of our mission. Soo, we took over all the investigators and stuff from all them. We are also the only companionship in the mission who covers an English and Spanish unit; Borrego Springs is a branch of about 20 regularly attending members. I had the opportunity to go down to Borrego Springs to translate for the four Mexicans in the Branch. The chapel had 4 full size pews and 3 half size ones and that was it. It was an awesome experience to see the faithfulness of the Saints in that area. The branch covers an area of 1,000 square miles. Those members sacrifice sooo much to get to church and take the sacrament to fulfill their duty as disciples of Christ. It was great. I loved it. We only go down to work there on Sundays, and only one of us goes to translate/work with the Branch President because it's a 3-4 hr drive from where we live.

The investigators we have now are great. We are working with a woman named Yolanda. She is a Mexican, has a family, and is the only one who listens to us. She is being torn from both ends to where she needs to go. From one end, her family wants her to keep going to the Christian church; and from the other end, God wants her to go to his church. She's having a hard time rejecting her family. We received a solid commitment that she was going to come to church with us this Sunday, but she ended up going with her family to the "great and abominable church." So we went over that night and planned to throw down hardcore. I very sneakily asked her the baptismal interview questions, and asked her if she had received her answer. She wasn't sure.

I said, "Why don't we kneel down right now, you say a prayer and ask God what you should do?"

She said, "Esta bien." (OK)  We did it and she said the most sincere prayer I've ever heard on my mission. We then had a LOOOONG moment of silence. We paused for like 2 minutes no lie. Pure silence. I broke it saying, "Como se siente?"  (How does it feel?)

"Tranquila." (Peaceful)

"Piensa que ha recibido su respuesta?"  (Do you think you have your answer?)

"Yo pienso que si."   (I think so)

For those who don't speak Spanish, translate it. It was great. She's now on date for the third of Feb. She's super solid. I love this area. I love my mission. It's the greatest thing ever. DO IT!!!!

Love,

Elder Matt Dial

Transferring to Indio!

This week was a little bit slow, but it was good. First things, I got transferred!! I'm going back to the Thermal Ward in Indio CA. I was there about 18 months ago (fetch im old), being trained. I'm pretty sure this will be my last area. I will be with Elder Johnson from Michigan. I lived with Elder Johnson in Jurupa for 2 transfers, and we got along great. He's super jacked soo we'll work out hard, and we'll baptize. Oh, and we'll also be the Zone Leaders of the Palm Desert Zone. I'm super excited for the area and companion however, I'm not so excited for being ZL. That means I just have to worry and take care of more people. Oh well, I gotta step up to the plate.

 Well this week, we had some really cool experiences. I'll start with the Preciado family. They are a family of four, who we had on date for the 30th of December. They're super prepared, ready, elect, however you want to say it. A couple things happened, they went out of town for like 2-3 weeks and didn't come to church, couldn't get a hold of them, so we were super worried. On the edge of dropping them. We finally had a strong feeling to go visit them Thursday night, found Alma (mom), and Javier (hijo), at home eating. Alma answered the door and said, "Hey! Man we just barely got home, and we're super tired, eating, do you want to come back tomorrow night at 7?"  "Absolutely!" we said.

"I've got something to tell you guys tomorrow." she said with a smile. The thing was, is we didn't know if that was a good smile or a bad one or like a shameful one, but we were trippin hardcore on what she was going to tell us.

So the next day she texts us and cancels and we're like, "Can we just know what you were going to tell us?!" No reply till next day saying,

"Hi Allen & Dial!!! Sorry my ph died! 4got my ph charger @ hm had purchase a new 1! Jst got ur txt! Well what i want say is NOT GOOD? Over d holidays i relapsed! I was doing sooo gd, but I'm Human i mk mistakes! I apoligize! Hope u will understand! Don't thnk I can do this BIG CHANGE??? I hv 2 tk it 1 day @ a time!!! W/NO PRESSURE!!!"   (got a headache yet? Ya I got one too.)

Well,  we ended up calling her and she didn't even really relapse. She was a drunk and smoker before, and at the family festivities she said she did two toasts, and two puffs of a cigarette. When she smoked the cigarette she said she felt sick. Her family said she's different, she used to be the life of the party, and all that garbage, now she was sitting on the couch READING THE BOOK OF MORMON!!!!! She put a magazine on the outside hiding the Book of Mormon so her family wouldn't see. She is suuuuuper solid and I'm super excited to return for her baptism. She broke down into tears and said she was living a double life and hated turning her back on her family and all that garbage, and I said basically if your family doesn't support you in what your doing, then fear God more than men. Told her to go pray and it was super cool.

Then, on Sunday I contacted these two girls on the street, and gave them the whole rundown about the gospel and one said, "We're not interested because you think being gay is wrong."

I said,  "Actually God says being gay is wrong. We follow God not man."

She then proceeded to cuss me out in Spanish to her girlfriend, not knowing I spoke spanish as well. So I said, "Que les vaya bien, y que Dios les bendiga y abra sus ojos!"  translated…”Go in peace and may God open your eyes.”)

 I crossed the street and contacted another family without saying anything else to her. She was in complete shock and walked away :)

I love being a missionary. I'm soo sick of trying to sugar coat things for people.

The Gospel is true. Accept it, and live it. 

I love you!

Elder Matt Dial

Oops...email didn't go...12/31/2012

Apparently, he sent this, but it didn't go...so he sent it to us again, today...sounds like a great week!

Happy New Year!! So these past two weeks we haven't emailed. Lots happened. Elder Allen and I had two baptisms on the 29th. They are the Mosqueda's. They are an old couple who's son has been a member for a while. The missionaries have been visiting them for a while, then Elder Allen and I came in and we started teaching them. They were baptized and are super solid and can't wait for their year mark so they can go to the temple. The baptism was a very spiritual experience. Their son, has been less active for a long time, and gained his testimony back and has been faithful for the past 6 months or so. When we started teaching his parents, we told him he should baptize them. We talked to the bishop, he had an interview, and he was set. I guess there was some lack of communication, because Raul showed up without a change of clothes and thought we were going to do it. I said, "Neither Elder Allen or I am going to do the baptism. Go home and get clothes." He happily ran home and got a change, came back and baptized his parents. Although the baptism started half an hour later than it was supposed to, it was super spiritual.

Rewind, I got a call on Sunday the 23rd from the missionaries in Jurupa saying, "Elder Dial, remember Guadalupe?"

"Ya."

"She's getting baptized today and wants you to come back for it and talk on baptism."

"Ok"

So I went back and talked on baptism and saw my favorite ward members in de anza ward. It was great.

I get another call on the 30th, "Elder Dial, remember Kaylee and Michelle, Guadalupe's daughters?"

"Ya."

"They're both getting baptized today and want you to come back to see it and talk on the Holy Ghost."

"Ok."

So I got to go back AGAIN and see another two baptisms in that area. I've gone back to see 5 baptisms in that area. I love De Anza ward. I love my mission. I got to see a white Christmas and I was sooooo happy (baptismal gown).

My family is the best. I got so many things that I needed(apart from the candy and other junk food.....)!!! I love my mission. I don't want it to come to an end. I think I'm gonna get transferred so send all mail to the mission office please. I've been here for six months and LOOOOVE Moreno Valley. It's soooo ghetto and I smell tons of weed everyday. Everytime we pull into the appartment complex, we're welcomed with a loud bass beat and a brick wall aroma of weed.

This is the greatest time of my life!

Love,

Elder Matt Dial

Elder Dial spotted at a baptism!

Received this last evening...not sure if this means we won't get an email again this week too...so decided to post this quick message and a couple of photos she included...so, he is still alive!  : )

"Saw your son at a baptism tonight.  He's a character....He bore a very nice testimony.  We are sad to see him transfer this week. " 

Cherie and Russ Hardy