Week 78 - Becoming a Zone Leader

Good morning!!

I've been trying really hard to put myself in the shoes of the members and investigators more and making sure that the commitments I'm extending are ones that I would do outside of the mission as well. It definitely helps me extend more powerful commitments as I make sure that I am converted to the commitment and principle that I'm extending. It's so true that steadfast faith is so much stronger and reality necessary in comparison to the one large act of faith. While the large act of faith can spark something it's the steadfastness that really makes a large flame of conversion and righteous living.

[Matt had to get emergency dental surgery.] So first, I'll update y'all on the whole thing with the teeth. So... the surgery went well and everything was smooth. I didn't actually act that crazy after the anesthesia which was a bummer. Plus my companion didn't record me anyways so it wouldn't have even mattered.. he blew it! haha. The recovery, however, was much harder. It was just pretty miserable. There's nothing to do in the apartment and we don't have couches so I was stuck on the bed. It was rough to say the least. Plus I had to cook all my own food and everything. Let's just say it was a rough 4 days.

I got the package y'all sent two days after my surgery which was actually awesome! I felt kind of ticked with everything since I didn't feel good and opening the package made me feel a lot better! Plus the Ice pack thing was amazing. I used it a ton. So thank you for that! I know I just complained a lot and I'm sorry!! It probably wasn't that bad. It was just a little rough but I'm out of the woods now. Everything's healing well and I'm getting back to normal so no worries! It'll be nice in about a week when everything's done with. Thanks for all y'all did to help me through it! It's gonna be a huge blessing.

Second, MIRACLE BAPTISM!!!!!!! So we baptized this last Sunday. We baptized 3 kids of a member who has been waiting on permission to baptize her kids forever. Elder Rearte and I have been working really hard to be able to see success and it just wasn't coming. We headed into our last week full of faith that the Lord was going to help us have a baptism that week, we just didn't know who. Throughout the week it unfolded that it was going to be Alma's kids, Jordan, Stephanie, and America. It was a beautiful service and they all bore the most amazing testimonies after they were baptized! It was awesome. I know that the Lord rewards us for hard work and especially for being exactly obedient. I've gained a huge testimony of obedience on my mission. It really is the only way to live. Any other way just brings sadness, doubt, and laziness. It was an amazing miracle and since I'm getting transferred it was an amazing way to leave the area!!

Third, transfers. So I'm getting transferred tomorrow. President is doing something new where we actually won't know where we're going until tomorrow. We have a "transfer meeting" where we will get assigned to our new companions. So Elder Rearte and I are going to be driving up there tomorrow and are going to have to part ways. It'll be sad cause he's awesome but good to have some change. This area's been super hard... haha. With everything that's gone on with the mission leader and with the surgery. It's been an interesting area. But the branch mission leader gave me an awesome good bye yesterday and we're on good terms. It's amazing how the Lord has helped that relationship. But another thing about transfers. I'm becoming a zone leader! Woo. It'll be cool to be able to be a zone leader and work with all the missionaries. I bet it'll bring some challenges but I'm excited for them. The thing I'm focused most on is to continue to be an example of obedience and hard work. I know that I fall short in so many areas as a missionary but the one that I never want to be accused of is not giving it my all to be obedient and to work hard. I'll let y'all know next week where I'm going though.

I love y'all so much and get to talk to y'all in 25 days!! TYLER I"M SO PROUD THAT YOU STARTED YOUR MISSION PAPERS!!! The mission is the best thing ever and I thank Heavenly Father every day for it. I hope that y'all have a great week!!

Love,

Elder Robertson

The baptism

Our District

I'm going to miss being in the District with these Elders

Elder Quintana and I saying bye to people. We aren't actually companions but are like brothers haha. So we went and said bye to everyone together since we're both leaving.

Sweet Christmas Lights

My sore mouth after surgery

Swollen cheeks after surgery

Saying goodbye to everyone in this area

Week 77 - Thanksgiving

Hello again!!!

Family, I appreciated your thoughts on gratitude. I am going to strive to give God thanks now and from now on. I know that he really does give us more than we can imagine and that all we have to do is open our eyes to start seeing the blessings.

I loved the scripture verses that you sent me last week as well and I'm still delving into them. I have grown very fond of the Doctrine and Covenants as of late. There's a lot of really neat Doctrine in those pages. Well, I mean I guess that's true for all scripture.

This week was good. We had a baptism in our branch again! Elder Quintana baptized. It was super awesome. It was a beautiful service. Elder Rearte and I are working super hard to have a baptism this next week. I know that we will have one. There's some people who are dang ready they just need to take that final step. We had a great Thanksgiving party for the branch. It was super awesome and the food was great. It was nice to get a Turkey dinner early since I won't be able to have one on the actual Thanksgiving. Other than that there really wasn't a ton that happened. It's only been a weekend since we've talked. We had 5 investigators at church so that was awesome. We had someone finally come back from her trip to Mexico, Alejandra, who is super prepared. We have an appointment with her tonight!!! It's gonna be awesome.

Today we're going to Hanford to have a Turkey Bowl with 5 zones..... it's gonna be huge!! it's gonna be tons of fun! It is crazy though that I run every morning but I'm still out of shape. It's all the delicious Mexican food I'm given. Those enchiladas and tortillas really do me in! haha

We find out if one of us is getting Transfered this saturday! I really hope I stay. Although this area has been kind of hard, I've really grown to love these people and I just want to keep helping them. Luckily, everywhere I go it will be like that! What a blessing of the mission.

Sorry the letter is kind of short. There just really wasn't that much that went on this week.

Love,

Elder Robertson

us at a lesson.. they gave us blankets cause it was so cold and we'd forgotten our coats!

us at a lesson.. they gave us blankets cause it was so cold and we'd forgotten our coats!

We went to a part member family's son's soccer games! It was fun. They tied 4-4. We got to know the family really well so there's a lot of potential there!

Week 76 - The temple was wonderful

The temple was wonderful. I really do love that place. It is such a blessing that even though the world gets crazier and crazier.... the temple never changes. You can ALWAYS go and feel the spirit of the Lord and feel at peace. What a blessing that we so desperately need in these days. One of my recent converts Charlie is going through the temple to take out his endowments in a couple of days! How exciting! However, he moved to Utah so I won't be able to accompany him.. But I'm still so happy that he's staying strong in the gospel and taking that wonderful  step.

We got to go to a Veteran's day thing and it was awesome!! It was awesome to just salute our veterans and thank them.

Mom, I love Joseph Smith as well and will read those as soon as I get a chance! It's so amazing that we get to just know all of the gospel. We get to have the full comfort.. Not just part of it. I really liked that picture you sent of Jesus saying "trust me".. It's so true and probably one of the most frustrating parts of being a missionary. You offer these people so much and so many blessings and they just sometimes don't have the faith to seek them. But it makes the ones who are all the more precious. Opposition in all things right?

Everythings going pretty well. I baked cookies for the WML to help improve our relationship. I told him that I made him some cookies and all the other elders in the meeting told him that I was really trying to work with him the best that I could. I think we are starting to get on the same page. What an incredible blessing!! I have such a strong testimony that serving/loving people and just being as humble as you can brings the most precious blessings ever!!

We had a good amount of people come to church on Sunday! A family of 8! It was super cool. It was a mom and her 6 kids and her little sister. They're doing pretty well and we have high hopes for them. Her name is Isabel. She's really awesome. Besides that we're just making small progress with everyone. We really are focusing on trying to find more prepared people so that we can help them come to know the gospel! Hopefully we'll be able to find more this week. I'm excited for the holiday season though. Everyone seems to just be a little more friendly! Love y'all so much and hope y'all have a great week!

Love,

Elder Robertson

We did a challenge called the "McCoy's Challenge" You have to eat all that food... yeah we all died. It's a Selma tradition. I was one pancake away from finishing.. Food v. Elder Robertson: Winner - Food

The death by pancake group

A sweet painting that "Miss Dinuba" did in like 4 minutes at the Veterans day celebration

the 21 gun salute on Veterans Day

Us at a members house being weird.. haha

Temple Trip

Temple Trip

Week 75 - I know that this mission is changing me forever

[We asked Matt if he had heard about the recent lds policy changes on same gender marriage.] So yes I did hear all about the new policies. It's been quite a controversy here, being California and all. We get asked about it a lot. Luckily when we describe that ultimately this is something to help the kids from having to go against what's in their homes and give them double standards they are pretty understanding. I'm glad that they were able to clarify all of this before it became a huge problem. Thank goodness for revelation. It's amazing how much the world pushes back on it though. It's amazing to me how something this small can really put people in such an uproar.

Thanks for the packages again mom and dad! It's always super fun to get them! We had some great Halloween decorations. Sorry for the late giving of gratitude! It's weird that all the holidays are here already. I feel like I just had them on my mission. It's seriously crazy how fast all of this goes. It's awesome to hear that LT is undefeated and BYU isn't doing too bad either! It sounds like y'all are having a fun time and everything is still busy as ever!

This week was really awesome! But weird as well. So as the district leader with 6 other elders in my district I have a bajillion exchanges. This last week I wasn't in my area for 3 days straight. Luckily I have an awesome companion who did some awesome work and was able to really help the work progress those three days. But it was still super weird. I had an exchange on Tuesday, then a meeting in Fresno all day on Wednesday and then we had MCM that night as well so didn't get back to our area till late. Then another exchange on Thursday! Oh yeah exchanges!!

In our meeting in Fresno the Assistants really hit hard on obedience. We have a TON of new missionaries (50% of the mission has been out less than 6 months) so obedience is a focuse. It was a very inspiring meeting and made me just want to be the most obedient extremist I could!! In a righteous way of course. I came home and had a great talk with my companion where we set goals where we thought we could be more obedient and plans on how we could reach the goals. We had the best week that we've had together as a result of our efforts and I know that as we continue to strive for exact obedience that we will see miracles on miracles! It's amazing how much the little things really do matter!!

We've got some awesome investigators and we are really starting to work really well together as companions. I know that this is the true church and I'm so grateful to be here to find those who want to know the same. It's amazing to me how much the Lord trusts me to be able to be here to work with his precious children whom I know that he loves so much. I love my Savior and am so grateful to Him for everything that He's done for me and continues to do. I know that this mission is changing me forever and is helping me become the man and soldier that God needs me to be in these last days which are looking more and more perilous. I love y'all and am so grateful to have the amazing support of such a wonderful family! I hope that y'all have a great week!

Love,

Elder Robertson

Breakfast with my zone

We did a challenge called the "McCoy's Challenge" You have to eat all that food... yeah we all died. It's a Selma tradition. I was one pancake away from finishing.. Food v. Elder Robertson: Winner - Food

a hole one of the elders put in the wall

this was in our apartment.. hope there's not more!

yeah we saw a guy just riding a horse down the street.

Week 74 - The time change is the worst!

This week was kind of a slow one with Halloween parties, actual halloween, and the time change. Y'all.. the time change is the worst. It gets dark at like 5 or 6 now! It makes doing missionary work so much harder haha. But we'll just have to adjust to it. It's just weird to think about.

No one came to church this week... again. It's been getting harder and harder to get people to church. I never thought 20 minutes away would be hard but for some people it's just too far. But we're working hard to get it done! The weirdest thing happened in church. Randomly a third of the way through sacrament in the Spanish branch, like half of the branch just got up and left. For no recognizable reason.. it was so weird! The Branch is struggling right now and we're trying to figure out how we can best help it. We're praying and waiting on those miracles as we work our hardest!!

[We got the paperwork from Matt's mission in preparation for his coming home in June. One of the questions was whether we wanted to come pick him up from the mission instead of his flying home to Austin to meet us. We asked Matt his preference and this is his response.]  So about picking me up... I've thought a lot about it actually and here are my thoughts and y'all can tell me what y'all think. So I really want to have y'all here and be able to tour the mission with y'all. I really think that would be super awesome and fun to introduce y'all to all these people who I've grown so close to. However, I think I'd rather do it after I get home. There are a couple of reasons. One, because the whole way back home to Texas I won't have been released. So we won't be able to do a whole lot and I feel like that would be weird for me haha. Also when we tour the mission after y'all picking me up I'd still have to act like a missionary in the sense of the rules and such. Not that I'm planning a whole ton different than now. Just I've told a bunch of people when I come back I'll play fifa with them or do something little like that cause I won't be a missionary. Also I kind of like the idea of the plane ride home. I feel like it'll give me some good final pondering moments as I'm returning home. I don't know. those are kind of my thoughts. I don't know if those make sense or not!

Everything's going well in the district. We're having a super good time having the new elders in the same apartment complex as us. It's pretty fun. We get to hang out a lot. It's fun having a lot of missionaries close. It makes the down hours seem fun.

Bedsides all of that there really isn't a ton of stuff that happened. But it was a good week. We found some really awesome new families that we're working with! Families are the best! Good work with the missionary work by the way!! Love y'all and hope y'all have a good week!

Love,

Elder Robertson

Our "trunk" at Trunk-or-Treat. My costume is that I'm Elder Quintana and he was me. Very original. haha

my "pumpkin" i carved at the family's house

Ward Trunk or Treat

Ward Halloween Party

Us shopping for halloween

Us on halloween night with the family who took us to their house to play games and stuff. and the district after a district meeting. It's the last district. It's changed since then.

My exchange with Elder Perkins

Longhorns

Elder Perkins. He's a good missionary