The most epic picture of my life on a cool bridge in my sector. Ha Ha it is so cheesy, but I love it!

Why hello there! How are you all doing this fine day? It has been a great week here in Villas del Bosque. Things here are going really well and we have having lots of success. My companions elder Llanes and Elder Menchaca are great and I am just having a blast here with them. It is a lot of fun to be in trio. Seeing as I have quite a long time in it I have become pretty used to it. It is quite great honestly. 

This week has been really fun and interesting. I did some more comp exchanges and helped train some other elders. A really cool part of the week was saturday when were asked by the stake presidency to teach all of the youth of the stake on how to share the gospel. So we were able to teach 4 little workshops with about 50 youth in each one about how to share the gospel and well it was great. We were able to recieve a referral from every person there. Honestly, that just shows me that every person knows somebody that can be benefited from the Gospel. Many times we are just too afraid to open our mouths and share it with people. So basically we are training the members on how to get over that fear and also how they can share the gospel in different ways so that they can feel more comfortable doing it.

We also had a really cool meeting with Presidente Carreon and the stake presidency here the other day to speak about how the stake is doing in the work of Salvation. There are some really good things going on here but we came up with some really good ideas and plans of how we are gonna get better here. The nice thing is that the stake president here is incredible. He is very very very good and really does everything he can to make the changes here so I am super excited to be able to work here with him.

In our area we have some good stuff going on. We have 4 investigators with baptismal dates for this week; Diana, Viviana, Mary, and Elena. We are working hard with each of them so that they feel prepared for this day. Each of them have their individual challenges and things that are pulling them back a bit, but they are on a good path and it should be a really good week here. It was just a little sad yesterday to see at Church that not many came. It is incredible to see how satan really is real and does everything he can to keep people from going to church. He just does simple things to hold us back from going. I just love the promises of God, that if we keep his commandments, satan will have no power over us. As long as we do what we are asked to do and hold strong to the iron rod we will be protected.

I believe that I had one of the most interesting lessons I have ever had of my life the other day. We went to visit a family of members and I met there their 16 year old son who has not been baptized. So as usual when I find a situation like that, I started talking and was seeing what has held him back from being baptized. He goes to Church, reads the Scriptures, says his prayers, and knows that the Church is true, but there is just something that holds him back. So we were just trying to follow the Spirit and honestly, it was just hard. We were running out of ideas until the thought of the Virgin Guadalupe came into my mind. So I asked him and come to find out it apears that he has had some experiences with the virgins and saints that he doesnt want to deny or I guess leave behind. So we are working a lot with him to help him make the decision to be baptized and well I know that God can soften his heart enough so that he will feel that desire. 

My Sons, Pokemons, or Trainees as some would call them. Elder Lundberg & Elder Menchaca.
(By the way Elder Lundberg is an Assistant now.)

Well honestly, things are so great here. I am loving it I just want to end with a little something that President Monson said during this conference which I love referring to Missionary work. "It has scarcely been one year since I announced the lowering of the age of missionary service. Since that time the number of full-time missionaries serving has increased from 58,500 in October 2012 to 80,333 today. What a tremendous and inspiring response we have witnessed! 

The holy scriptures contain no proclamation more relevant, no responsibility more binding, no instruction more direct than the injunction given by the resurrected Lord as He appeared in Galilee to the eleven disciples. Said He, “Go ye therefore, and teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost.”2The Prophet Joseph Smith declared, “After all that has been said, the greatest and most important duty is to preach the Gospel.”3 Some of you here today will yet remember the words of President David O. McKay, who phrased the familiar “Every member a missionary!”4

To their words I add my own. Now is the time for members and missionaries to come together, to work together, to labor in the Lord’s vineyard to bring souls unto Him. He has prepared the means for us to share the gospel in a multitude of ways, and He will assist us in our labors if we will act in faith to fulfill His work.

To his words I add my own, that God lives and that this work is true. Missionary work is the only way that our brothers and sisters will ever find happiness and this life and salvation in the life to come. So, work with the missionaries, share the gospel, and see miracles in the lives of those you know. 

Well I love you all just soooo much! Have a great week and remember who you are!

Love, Elder Tommy Anderson

I went to got get some tacos the other night and I thought you might want to see a picture of what a taco shop looks like here in Tijuana.

Why Hello There

Why hello there! How are you all doing this fine day? Things are doing really well here in the area. I am loving being back here in Villas del Bosque. We are having a lot of success and honestly just some really cool things happening. 

We had some incredible miracles yesterday at Church. Normally, it is pretty hard to get people to Church since it is at 8 am, but yesterday we had 5 investigators come. That is honestly a big miracle. We currently have 7 investigators that are progressing really well and all have baptismal dates. It is kinda funny though because with this new rule that the people have to come 5 times before there baptism, we have already finished all of the lessons and still have like 2 or 3 weeks with a few investigators before their baptism.   We are starting to focus on family history and reviewing all of the lessons. I think that this will help a lot for the investigators so that they can be more fully converted before their baptisms. 

Well on Tuesday we went to the office for a zone leader meeting and it was quite the surprise because when we got there they told us we were gonna be taking a new missionary home with us! That is pretty exciting. We are training Elder Menchaca from Dallas Texas. His parents are from Mexico and so he already understands Spanish really well, just has a good little accent still. But we are working on that. He is a great elder and is gonna do real well. He is pretty shy right now, but I am pretty sure that him being with my companion and I, it won’t take that long for him to come out of his shell. 

This week we had quite the rain storm and since then, it has been quite chilly here. It is nice to have a bit of weather change and not just be sweating all day long. I have even had to put my sweater on a few times lately. It has been great though because with the cold I have been able to have the best snack combinations in the world, negritos and hot chocolate. (by the way mom, if you send anything at some point, throw in there a bunch of those little swiss miss packets)

He even has an "Elder Tommy" name tag!  

All of our investigators are all progressing really well right now. We found two less active families that have kids that aren’t baptized and we have been working with them. Both families came to church yesterday. We had a really cool lesson the other day with an investigator named Elena. We were teaching about tithing and basically she was just understanding everything really well. At the end, we asked her about how she felt for her baptismal date that was coming up, and she told us that she had a dream and saw her grandmother that had passed away and well she didn’t really tell us details, but told us that she knew she needed to get baptized. So we are preparing here baptismal service for the 26th. We have 5 investigators that are preparing for that date and 2 so far for November. 

I was able to do intercambios in las fuentes the other day and it was awesome. Las Fuentes is were I started my mission. It was cool to see all of the people that I knew and help the elders find old investigators and less actives. Things are going really well over there. I just need to go back over and have some good talks with some of the people that I taught that have stopped going to church. Seeing a bit of that there in Las Fuentes is helping me realize right now how great the new rule of 5 weeks is because now the people will be so much more converted before they even get baptized. I believe that this will be a great blessing in their lives. 

The church is true. We need to do all that we can to strengthen our testimonies and build our faith. Everything depends on the three basics; read the scriptures, say your prayers, and go to Church. I hope you all strive to work really hard in each of those areas. 

Take care and be good love you all.  Remember who you are and act accordingly.

Elder Tommy Anderson

Welcome Back To Florido!

Why hello there! 

How are you all doing? Didn't you all just love General Conference?!? It was just the best thing ever! I loved it so much and well I feel like I learned a ton. Really, you can tell that each speaker was so in tune with the Spirit in what he was teaching. I am so excited to study over each of the talks again so that I can learn more and find more things to put into my life. I felt like there were a few major topics of the conference; the roles of women, trials and tribulations, not loosing your faith, and obedience in all things. I hope that each of you guys can each study all of the talks also when they come out. 

Well as I said last week, I was transferred to Villas del Bosque back here in Florido. I love being here! It is just the best place in the whole wide world! We currently have 6 progressing investigators. Each are progressing, but the hardest thing here is that church is at 8 am and so that is just pretty early for lots of people. But this week we still had 4. Honestly, my companion is great and we are just working our behinds off. I love it! It is a lot of fun to be back here in the field all day long again. 

We are teaching a family that was recently activated about a month ago and are teaching

the father and boyfriend of the daughter now. On Saturday the parents got in a fight and the dad kinda threw it all onto the church and says he doesn't want anything to do with it. We showed up Saturday night after the Priesthood session to see why they hadn't come to any of the sessions. Well anyway, we got there and the dad left angrily and didn't want to talk with us and the daughter was crying and said she was done with the Church. Well, we were able to talk a bit about trials and how God allows us to have trials so that we can progress. Well we animated her and she got excited again to go to conference for the Sunday morning session, and well President Monson’s talk was just perfect for her. It is incredible to see how God knows each of our needs and teaches us in the precise moment that we need help. 

Honestly, the whole week was just full of experiences like that. On Friday I went and did interchanges with the elders in Las Villas and was able to visit some old investigators as well as some converts. It was great to see them. But I think the best thing that made my week was the Sunday afternoon session when Ricardo and Venica and their little girls sat behind me during the session. I was able to talk with them for a little while and they are just doing so great! Ricardo is now the stake secretary and Venica is in the Relief Society Presidency. And guess what, they are taking temple prep classes right now so they can go be sealed in San Diego in the beginning of February! I was soooo happy when they told me that! They are the best family in the world, and it has just made incredible changes in their lives. 

As always, I love being a missionary and seeing these incredible changes in people. I love this work, this ward, this mission. Really I am just so happy to be here! There is no greater happiness that you can find than through doing missionary work. 

Well, I love you all!!! Take care and please remember who you are and what you stand for!

Love you all!

Elder Tommy Anderson

TRANSFERS!!!

Carne Asada De Sonora with Hmo. Huerta

Why hello there! This week has just been great. Nothing else to describe it. As I mentioned last week, today is transfer day and well I am already here in my new area with my companion Elder Llanes. We are  both from the same generation and both go home in December, so my guess is that we will be together for just a transfer. We are back here in Florido as zone leaders. It will be a lot of fun and well there is a lot of work to be done here. This is the stake with the most potential in the whole mission, but it is a little down right now so that means I am super excited to lift it back up. My companion Elder Llanes is pretty great. I already knew him from before and he will be a ton of fun to be with. He is definitely a jokester so we will have lots of fun as we work! 

Last P-day in the office. Bowling (I have gotten so good!!!)

This last week in the sector was a good one. Yesterday at Church we ended up with 6 investigators there, so we are quite happy with that bit of work. Both Elder Bryce and I left the sector today and so we were able to have a few extra little pieces of cake and deserts this week :) 

Even though it is always sad leaving a ward, I am very excited for the new chance to be up here in Villas del Bosque. That is what this new ward is called. The missionaries that have been here have been working good and they left some good things going here. We have a good set of investigators I have been told who are preparing right now for baptism. I am super excited for all that this week will bring! Here as a zone leader I will also be able to do companionship exchanges with both Las Villas and Las Fuentes (the two other sectors I have been in here in Florido), and so I am pretty excited about that. This ward is right next to my old ward Las Villas and we meet in the same building, so that means that I will hopefully be able to see some converts that I baptized and taught. 

I came and took the place of Elder Lundberg, my trainee who today subbed up to be the new assistant. I am super happy for him. He will do great. We were able to have a nice talk last night and well he was pretty nervous, but I know he is going to do a great job. 

Awesome pants that the Stake High Councilman was wearing to church yesterday.

The mission as always, is just an incredible experience. I am learning and progressing so much and in so many aspects. I feel so blessed to have had the experiences that I have had. They are just all incredible. Well I hope that you all have just a great week. Remember who you all are! Hopefully next week I will have a little bit more time and a little bit more stories to tell! Can’t wait to talk to you all again. 

Elder Tommy Anderson

Crazy Light Up Balloons of Elder Bryce

Why hello there family dear, how are you doing this fine morning? It has been another exciting week here in Tijuana. Lots happening. Lots of miracles. Lots of blessings. I love this area here in Central, I am gonna miss it. This next week we have transfers and well it looks like I am heading out. I have been talking to the assistants and well they tell me that I am going back to Florido again. That should be fun! This week is going to be a little crazy, transfer week always is. We are receiving 25 new missionaries and 16 of them are Americans (I was looking at recommendations of the new elders that are coming and there are like 2 or 3 from Riverton and Herriman, I didn’t really remember who they were though). That is the most we have ever received at one time. With that we are going to have to open up 7 new areas. It is really cool to see how the work of God is progressing so much. 

So this week has been pretty exciting. I think I had one of the most interesting and funny lessons of my whole mission. We have recently been trying to help out an 18 year old less active kid who has been having some drug problems since he was 12. It is a pretty tough situation but he finally opened up to us. It is great that he opened up and all, but I think the only reason that he did was because he was still a little “under the influence”. He was just doing really funny things the whole time and wasn’t making much sense. Elder Bryce and I were laughing a bit, but even through the whole funniness of the thing we were able to teach him and help him set some new goals. He even came to church this Sunday for the first time in over a year. We are going over there quite often to verify his goals so that he can get out of the problems that he is in.

This week we were able to find many more new investigators. Unfortunately not many of them were able accompany us to church. Other than that, they are really cool and have a lot of potential to progress and to accept the Gospel. One cool thing that Presidente Carreón taught us this week was about the role that the Holy Ghost has in the conversion. We read in the Book of Mormon that the Holy Ghost works when it can penetrate the heart of someone, but how many “hard of heart”. The ways that people can overcome that is by acting and following the counsels of God such as to ready, pray, and attend church.  We ourselves need to act also so that the Holy Ghost can reach us.

I would like you all to pray for Martha (the elderly woman that we baptized a few weeks ago in the wheel chair). She has been going to physical therapy lately trying to be able to walk again. Well the other day the grandkids were over and she wanted to show them that she could walk and stood up and ended up falling and got banged up pretty good. So if you could, please pray for her and her family so that everything can turn out alright.

Honestly, everything is going pretty good here. Still we are in this ever long struggle or well training I guess you could call it of helping this ward understand how to work more efficiently. I can most definitely say that I am learning a lot from this ward on the importance of callings, and completing with our responsibilities in everything. As I have talked about in older letters, the Church is organized in such a way that is incredible, but the only way that the organization works, is if everyone completes with their assignments and responsibilities. So for that, I invite you to complete with your responsibilities in everything; in work, school, church, family, callings, and anything else that could give you responsibilities. If you want things to run right, to run smoothly, complete with your assignments.

This is just like when after Jesus died, his Apostles didn’t know what to do, so what did they end up doing? Fishing. Seems like fun, but that is not what God needed of them, that is not how the Church of Christ would prosper, so Christ appeared to his disciples and talked to Peter, asking him “Peter, lovest thou me?”, Peter answers, “Lord thou knowest that I love thee”. So than in a loving way Christ reminded his chosen disciples of their responsibilities by saying, “Then feed my sheep.” If we really love God, if we love the things that we are doing than we must remember to complete with our responsibilities. I love the mission for the many things that it has taught me and I know I will learn much more as I continue living my responsibilities. Love you all soooo much! Have a great week!

Love Tommy

A matter of A Few Degrees

Why hello there dearest family of mine! How in the world are you all doing this fine loverly day? It has been yet again another wondrous week here in Tijuana. We had the celebration of the independence of Mexico on Sunday night. It is pretty fun what they do, it is called “el grito” which is translate to “the yell”. So they all just get together and have a littler ceremony deal and yell. Seeing as they do it in the middle of the night we were not able to attend, but the whole epicenter of the thing was like 5 minutes walking from our house and you could hear it all and see a few fireworks and stuff. That was sure fun. So happy independence Mexico!

So this week has been great. We got a new companion, Elder Chappel. He will be taking the spot of Elder Bryce as the secretary of President. I am training Elder Guzman to be the financial secretary. So I will be heading out of here in 2 weeks. I am excited to go out and be able to work 100% out in the field again. It is gonna be a blast! We are doing well here in the ward still. We are struggling a little bit in finding new investigators, but God is blessing us with miracles so that the work can progress here.

In the ward there is a hermana that has been a member all of her life who split up with her husband a few years ago, she has been trying to get a divorce for many years so that she can be married to her new husband. After lots of prayer, fasting, and a lot of hard work she got her divorce a couple of weeks ago, but there was still a problem. Without going into the whole story, the way has been placed that they will now be able to be married this next week and her new husband that has been going to church for over a year will finally be able to be baptized! Isn’t it incredible to see how God works to help each of his children reach their goals?

This week we have been working a lot with less active members. We are starting to see a lot of progress in them. I have realized that all though everyone says that for some reason or another they can’t come back, all can come back to God. There is nothing that cannot be healed by the power and Atonement of Jesus Christ. I found an incredible talk this week that talks of this very subject. In April 2008, right after President Uchtdorf was sustained into the First Presidency of the Church, he gave a talk entitles A Matter of a Few Degrees.

In the talk, President Uchtdorf talks about how small deviations from the path can have large outcomes. In our life it is the same, God has given us the path and has told us to follow it. Most of the people that I talk to that don’t want to come back to the Church have had some past sin or something that has deviated their path. The majority of them even do not recognize that they have left the path or that their deviation will not make much difference.  President Uchtdorf used this example to show how a matter of a few degrees really can make a difference;

“Suppose you were to take off from an airport at the equator, intending to circumnavigate the globe, but your course was off by just one degree. By the time you returned to the same longitude, how far off course would you be? A few miles? A hundred miles? The answer might surprise you. An error of only one degree would put you almost 500 miles (800 km) off course, or one hour of flight for a jet.”

In this life we will make mistakes and we will deviate from the path, but what is important is to recognize our mistakes and put ourselves back onto the path as soon as possible so that we may reach the final destination that we want. All of this is only possible through Jesus Christ and the power of the Atonement. He is our compass; if we follow him we will stay on path and if we leave the path, He will teach and show us exactly how to get back. So as always, I leave you with an invitation; find that compass and look at where you are at. Make sure you are on the right path.

I wish you all an incredible week! Remember who you are and act accordingly, and I will talk to you next week.

Love ya,

Elder Anderson

Martha, Panda Express, Training, Choices, Good Week.

Why hello there dear family and friends of mine! What´s up? This has been another great week. We spent a lot of this week again on training all of the ward leaders on how to be better missionaries and how they can lead their organizations to have success in their missionary efforts.

As a district leader, some of my responsibilities is to do companionship exchanges with the elder´s in my district. This week the companionship in the district was in need of lots of help, so I went and did some exchanges with them and spent the day with them training them and helping them work better in their area. It was pretty cool some of the miracles that we saw. We did a bit of the same that we are doing in my ward right now which is the working more with the leaders and helping to train them. We had lots of success honestly. All of the leaders are all committed to having a family home evening and inviting someone this week. They are also committed to helping out their organizations. The interchanges were a big success.

This week we made a fun little trip over to San Diego with President. There was an elder here who was having an issue with his visa so we had to take him to the Mexican Consulate in San Diego. Well we went and dropped him and Elder Bryce there and then President and I went to go shopping. It was quite fun to just spend a while with him. He is an incredible man that has an incredible power to teach by the Spirit. He was just teaching me for like 2 hours straight. It was quite a great experience. Not gonna lie, it was kind of strange driving on I-15 for a little while…

"It's been FOREVER since I've driven"

Here is a little funny story for ya! Between my companions and I, we have been trying to scare each other all week. It is normally just like hiding around the corner and grabbing them when they walk by, but I got my companion elder Bryce, the big guy, really good this week. Every morning him and I get up a little early to go play Frisbee. And so he was trying to wake me up, but I was already awake just laying down. And so I just jolted at him and screamed and he flew back onto his bed. It was quite hilarious. Hopefully they dont get me too bad this week…

Well over the last couple of months we have been teaching an elderly couple. They have been coming to church now for quite some time but the brother has had a hard time with one of the commandments. Their son was actually baptized about 2 years ago but kinda took a dive for the deep end. He is coming back now and has been a great help for helping his parents. Well the husband decided that he couldn’t do it, but his wife just had a huge desire to get baptized. She is partially paralyzed and not 100% there, but after an interview it was determined that she could be baptized. It was a really cool baptism. She was just so happy and her son also. We are hoping that the father will turn around soon and make the changes necessary.
 

This morning I was studying the last couple chapters of Moroni as I finish up the Book of Mormon again. There were a few parts that just really stood out to me today that I think are quite opportune for some events at home. Making the right choices in life is quite important seeing as that our choices create our destiny. For that reason it is so important that we can make right choices now. In Moroni 7 it talks a lot about how to choose between what is right and what is wrong. It teaches about how the good will invite us to do things that will uplift and help, but my favorite verse is verse 19; “Wherefore, I beseech of you, brethren, that ye should search diligently in the light of Christ that ye may know good from evil”.  I am particularly fond of the par that says, “Search diligently in the light of Christ”. In this verse Mormon invites us to search for the “light” of Christ for that will be the right choice. In this life it is so important that we can constantly search for that light and always try to do what it is that we are supposed to. I invite you all to diligently search in the light while making choices and decisions because God will always lead you in the path that we must go.

I love you all soo much! You guys are all just the best! I wish you the best in all that you do and in all that this week has ready for you each. Remember who you are and act accordingly!

Elder Tommy Anderson