Smart Phones, Smart Missionaries

Hey fam (And friends)!

This week was absolutely insane! Sorry I couldn't even write a blog post either, last p-day was interesting. I guess the first and most important thing to happen is SMARTPHONES. 

Relearning the technologies

The church is allowing us to have phones sent from home for missionary use, or if we can't get one they will provide one for us. Now that we have phones, paper planners, DVD players, emailing, car GPSs are a thing of the past. We are now allowed to teach lessons over Skype and Facebook, and we've received many trainings on how to do online proselyting. We can even do district meeting over Skype if we live super far away. We've already used them in to show videos in lessons. 

This is going to be a super useful tool for missionary work. My companion and I have already gotten our phones and learned a bit about them, but we're handing out smartphones to the rest of the Zone tomorrow. On Tuesday at 10 am, the Texas McAllen Mission will officially be a part of the future.

Peace out

Elder Gray

Phones

This week we are still helping people movie into new apartments. We moved a companionship today and we're looking to move another companionship and then we'll be done! It's all part of a new initiative by Presidente to move everyone out into lonely single companionship apartments. When there's four or 6 missionaries in one apartment, things tend to get really crazy. So, by separating us we should be able to work more diligently. 

They probably sell flowers here.

Speaking of being unable to work diligently: we're about to get smartphones. We are required to do a ton of training in order to prepare ourselves to be fully ready. A lot of missionaries are unsure or even afraid of the new technology, for a number of reasons; ranging from not trusting themselves to fear of change. After the training, I think it will be a pretty useful tool in missionary work and will help us develop more self-discipline. 

Me and model-lookin companion.

Things are still crazy hectic here, but its a lot of fun. We're doing a lot of family history with the ward. 

Gotta go!

Elder Gray

ZL Life in Edinburg

So this week has been absolutely crazy. Since 3 new areas in our Zone opened up, we were asked to go out and look for apartments and move them in. I didn't work quite as much as I would have liked but now that we got most of it done, I think I can look forward to a regular schedule.

Being a missionary is hard work.

I'm working in a city called Edinburg, its really close to McAllen. It's more of a suburb than a city. Our Zone covers the city of McAllen, Edinburg, Pharr, Mercedes, Weslaco and Donna and contains 30 missionaries. I love everyone in our Zone right now. There's a lot of new people but I met a few in my days in Zapata. 

I found out that at Wal-Mart they have these caffinated energy drink mixes for like 10 for 1.50. I've learned that this is the greatest mission hack of all time. It's like bottled enerygy, we call it jugo de animo (happy juice). It's probably not healthy long-term but it has to be done.

My new companion is Elder Melo! He came out with me, but from the inferior Provo MTC. He's brasilian but moved to Utah a while ago and converted there (kinda like me!). He's a really good musician. We got a bunch of instruments and we have a jam session every day. Sometimes we wake up early to work out and we record some music with the extra time. I can tell that we are gonna be friends. 

Pretty good so far. Love you all!

Elder Gray

Hidalgo to McAllen

Today marks the end of one of the best periods of my mission. After 6 months of enjoying every part of Hidalgo, I'm being sent to McAllen as a zone leader.

The past 6 months were full of highs and lows. Some of the most exhilarating and joyful days of my life were spent here, as well as some of the lowest, most painful days. At one point I believed my faith couldn't be stronger and I couldn't be closer to God than at that time. I also experienced complete and utter loneliness. Looking back I can say that everything worked out for my good, and it was during the hard times I learned the most about myself and about God. I can leave with no regrets, having poured out my heart to my companion, the people, and to the Lord.

I'll never forget my time here. I'm looking forward to whatever comes in McAllen, and I've heard many good things about it.

Love you all,

Elder Gray

21 Years Later and I'm Still Alive

So I had a birthday, and everyone wanted in on it.

I went to the Church where the sisters in my district surprised me with my first party of the day. They made me a shirt, a comic and gave me a cake! Elder Grannis smashed my face into the cake but we all ate it anyway. There was a Church clean up happening at the same time and some dope members took ALL of us to a Chinese buffet.

A cool girl with the same birthday as me got baptized!

It was probably one of the best birthdays ever, thanks to everyone who remembered! My family sent me a bunch of cards and presents as well. if you're reading, thank ya'll! It was a really good way to end the year. Holy cats I go home next year.

Elder Gray

The Last Christmas

Merry Christmas!

Merry Christmas from Grannis and Gray

This past week we had a Christmas conference. It was really good to see all my old companion friends. We watched a recap of videos and pictures the mission had taken that year and opened a couple presents. Since it was also his anniversary, Presidente gave a training about how great his wife is and how amazing marriage is. Basically what I took away from it was that I need to get married as soon as possible.

All the sisters that have ever been in my district!

After being a district leader over sisters for 7 dang transfers quite a few have passed through my district, including three who have already finished their missions. Seeing all of them in one place brought back like a year and a half of memories. 

Papa Anderson and I, one year ago.

Speaking of memories, this is what I was going a year ago. Zapata seems so far away. So much has happened since then that the person is that picture is different from the person I am today. 

Today I'm going to call my family!

Love you all,

Elder Gray

Christmas Eve

We asked him for people that would listen to us.

This week we had our ward Christmas party! So much posole, menudo, tamales, and tostadas were eaten. Santa Clause came and gave all the little kids presents and then posed for some pictures. I've always wanted to meet the guy but he's pretty busy this time of year.

Just chillin

This past week my companion and I did a switch, with him becoming the senior companion and making the final decision, starting lessons etc. It was pretty fun and went pretty well. He's going to stay in charge until I leave in January. 

Cant' wait to call my family.

Love you all,

Elder Gray

Signs of the Times and Apostles

Last Monday the weather was really nice, so as a Zone we played volleyball at a Sonic. A few days later it snowed.

South Texan Blasphemy

I guess the East Coast was hit by a snowstorm, so we were lucky to get a little bit. Man, the people down here were freaking out, taking selfies and making little snowmen. For a lot of them, it was the first time ever seeing snow in their life. The last time it snowed down here was 2004 I think. I've been in South Texas the past three winters and I kinda missed snow... 

Proselyting in sleet

Elder Cook of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles came to our mission accompanied by Elder Uceda of the Presidency of the Seventy. Their talks were literally perfect. They mostly talked about missionary work and gave us tips. My favorite part by far was when Elder Cook testified of Christ. We were all spiritually numb immediately after the talks, and I barely spoke for a few hours. It was awesome.

Love ya'll.

Elder Gray 

Bureaucracy

Hello!

So a quick update:

About a year ago, I started to get some back pain. I wasn't sure what it was but it became unbearable in Corpus, causing me to see the chiropractor. It helped a little bit, but continued until recently when I went to see a family doctor about it. He ordered x-rays (which got lost for 20 days) and the radiologist deemed my back to be normal and recommended physical therapy.

Well, I knew he was wrong because 'nothing' doesn't cause this much pain.

On my own, I found a member who is also a radiologist and got an MRI, and he found a lot more than 'nothing'.

My spine is degenerating and my disks are bulging in multiple levels, messing with the nerve and causing numbness and weakness in my legs. He recommended I do a therapy to decompress my spine so we sent a request to Salt Lake City.

Which was promptly denied. 

So now we're going BACK to the original doctor (who said I was fine) to get a referral to a back specialist and I start the process over again. I've been waiting for the referral for five days.

In the meantime, since they can't/won't treat the actual problem, they keep giving me drugs to help the pain. One makes me depressed and high, the other does nothing, and the last one prevents me from sleeping. I slept 3 hours last night.

I'm a LITTLE frustrated this is taking so long. God give me patience with these people (and my back). It hurts to sit or stand too long, so I occasionally have to lay down in the car for like 10 minutes to ease my back.

The All-New Hidalgo District

In other news, they completely moved out all my sisters and replaced them. The two on the outside are brand new, straight from the MTC! Everyone in this district is straight fire, and I'm excited for this month.

The city of Hidalgo does a lights festival every year for Christmas in which the entire main street is absolutely covered in festive lights and decorations. Our chapel which sits on the main street couldn't be left out, and lights were put on our roof! I didn't know we could decorate our churches like that, but I'm happy they did.

Overall, things are going really well. I'm excited about this week, we have a Seventy and an Apostle coming to visit us, and we don't know why. Mysterious right?

Love you all,

Elder Gray

Transfer 10 (double digits)

This final week was fantastic.

Earlier in the week we were working in a certain neighborhood and as we drove out on our way to out next appointment, we both felt the Spirit super strong as we drove down a particular street. We both told ourselves we would come back and figure out why, and find who was waiting for us. A day or two later we came back intending to knock all the doors, determined to find out why the Spirit was felt on this street. 

We began to tract and the very first door we knocked let us in, and we had a lesson with the family. It was a very good lesson, the mom was in tears.

When the Spirit speaks, LISTEN. It always works out. 

Good luck in your next district sisters!

Transfers were announced, and the changes will happen tomorrow. Elder Grannis and I will be staying in Hidalgo for another 6 weeks. I've never stayed with a companion for 3 transfers before. The bigger surprise was they are taking out every one of my sisters. The new companionship will each have one brand-new greenie! I'm pretty excited for this next month.

The last 10 minutes of the transfer on Sunday night we got food poisoning, and we both threw up. It was a great way to end the transfer.

 We have been adopted into the Balboa family

I love you all!

Elder Gray

Spiritual Riches

This last week our sisters' car was in the shop and were unable to make it out to Hidalgo, so we came to them and had District meeting in a park! I brought a uke for some hymns and we discussed our notes from Elder Pearsons visit. It was one of the most chill meetings I've been a part of.

I've been collecting change I find on the ground for the past few months and finally filled up a bottle. I cashed it in today and got like 30 bucks.

In the serious side of things, this past week was one of the best I've had. The theme was change. I believe in the past I've written about the personal change I've seen in myself, but it keeps going. This week I've seen change in other people. I watched people cry and tell us we are an answer to their prayers. While with a family that hadn't attended church in many months, we sang a hymn and asked them to say a prayer, asking if it was time for them to go again. They came to church the next day.

Watching other people change and realize who they really are is what it's all about. Seeing their testimonies grow into conversion has strengthened my own. This past transfer was likely the most difficult so far, but I learned more than in any other. This next week is the last and I know there's still something for me to learn.

Much love,

Elder Gray

The General Authority Visit

Last Monday after we were done preparing for the week, we left at 6 as normal and went to our first appointment. As I went to knock the door, my companion says "Hold on."

"What's up?" I asked right after knocking.

Right as they open up the door, my companion proceeds to vomit three times.

I turned and politely told the members we would not be able to attend the appointment, but instead we would return home.

So for three days after the incident, we stayed inside, as per the orders of the doctor. Guess who didn't listen to the mission nurse and get a flu shot? We didn't. Unfortunately, Elder Grannis suffered the consequences. I guess I'm immune or something because I was completely fine. I studied and wrote a couple songs while Grannis slept. 

South Texan Glory

We had Elder Pearson of the Seventy come visit us yesterday. He spoke a lot about faith, how to grow it, what destroys it. He also talked about our divine identity, who we really are. He helped me a lot honestly, and I learned a ton. I learned that we will never find our limits unless we push them, that the only way to receive more faith is to obey. He talked for 3 hours so I'm not sure I can fully relate what he talked about. The rest of the conference was really good, I saw a lot of old friends I'd been missing recently.

Pretty good week.

Elder Gray

Paintball

This past Monday we had a two-day leadership conference in McAllen. Missionaries from all over the mission came and stayed with the locals in the valley. We housed about 8 missionaries in our apartment, and 4 of them were all previous companions! Every past companion I've had that haven't gone home was there, and they shared my most embarrassing moments among themselves. It was surreal having nearly a year of memories flood my mind that night.

Good group of people.

We did actually play paintball. A week later I still have welts and bruises from where I got hit, but it was a lot of fun. I think President killed the most people. I wore a hot pink shirt, the least camouflageable color ever. I didn't get pictures, sorry! I forgot my camera. 

Bye!

Elder Gray

Hey everyone, 

With the month of October coming to a close the weather has changed quite a bit. It dropped like 40 degrees, now averaging in the 50's most mornings. Because my body has completely adjusted to Texas summers, 50 degrees feels like it's about to freeze. I'll probably have a rough time when I get back home.

Everything in moderation.

Nothing much has happened this past week. Last P-day we picked up a compressed bundle of ties weighing 100 pounds! And it was free! The majority was trash but it was still fun to open up my first bundle like that.

Today I'm about to go up to McAllen for a 2-day leadership conference. I heard we are playing paintball, I'll be sure to get some pics.

Love you all!

The Spanish Week

Hi everyone,

This week my companion and I completed one week of speaking only Spanish among ourselves. After hearing how there is a sister in our mission speaking Spanish 24/7 with her companion we thought that would be a good idea and gave it a shot. We've both learned a ton, the constant practice helps us to speak a lot more fluently. Our goal now is to do the entire transfer in Spanish. Only 5 more weeks to go!

100% safe method of moving fridges

I also finished my read-through of the Book of Mormon this week. When I finished, I prayed and asked if it was true. The prayer I had was one of the best I've ever experienced. The answer I received was the same as all the other times I prayed. It's true. All of it.

Much love,

Elder Gray

Flooded With Blessings

Hi family and friends!

Early this week it was raining... HARD. We had a tropical storm that brought in the rain for several days, and unfortunately for Texas most that water has nowhere to go. The rocky ground doesn't absorb the water. A large part of Hidalgo flooded for a day or two but no major damage. During the flooding and storms, we were preparing for a baptism and we arrived to find dirty rainwater coming up through the drain in the font! All the drainage in the city was so backed up it was pushing water back out the drains. We plugged, scooped out the rainwater, cleaned it, and the rest of the baptismal service went without a hitch.

I swear something goes wrong every time we baptize someone, though I didn't know Satan could control municipal drainage.

We're probably allowed to do this. We'll find out later.

I also received a package from my family largely containing Halloween decorations and candy. After eating too much sugar I went to work filling the apartment with Halloween terror and completely driving away the Spirit. We have spiders, autumn leaves, zombies, caution tape and vampires. I'm pretty excited, I've always loved Halloween. Maybe we'll dress up as missionaries and get candy, or perhaps we'll stay home and let other people knock OUR door for a change. 

We got our transfer calls last night. Me and Elder Grannis will be staying together another six weeks!

I'm pretty pumped, we've gotten a lot of good things done together. Now that I've passed my halfway point, everything seems like it's slipping away too quickly. I'm still going to love every day I have left.

Elder Gray

Still Here

Fully ready to play some volleyball.

Hola ya'll,

We had the missionary leadership conference on Thursday of last week. I've always like going to those, it's like getting two Zone Conferences in one month. And who can say no to listening to President talk for 3 hours?

Much of the Conference was about the Book of Mormon again, but also he taught us about personal revelation and how to receive answers to your questions. At the end of the Conference, President ended with a prayer so powerful that when he ended, we stayed seated in stunned silence for about 30 seconds before shuffling out quietly. Probably one of the most spiritually shocking moments on my mission. 

Elder Grannis and I officially hit our year mark last Wednesday so we burned a shirt, as is the tradition.

I feel like its going by too fast. Someone slow down this crazy train.

I love you all, no matter from where you're reading this.

Elder Gray

Halfway There

Hi everyone!

This past week was awesome, stupendous, fabulous. Rained a bit, too.

During Zone Conference, President told us that as a mission, we are all going to read the Book of Mormon in 30 days. That's about 18 pages a day. The Book of Mormon is key in our teaching and conversion of investigators, so we need to properly know it and be converted ourselves. It was interesting to see all the General Conference talks about the Book of Mormon, pretty much confirming to us the importance of reading it this month. My study is going pretty well so far, I'm taking notes on things that pop out to me or new things I learn.

The Conference set up for my district!

General Conference was really good. Like always, many of the talks hit me deep and felt written just for me. I left on a mission the Tuesday after Conference, so every Conference is a personal 6-month milestone for me. This being my second Conference, I will hit my year mark on Wednesday! Hence the title. 

So much has happened in just one year, I can't recount it all. Luckily I have a year's worth of blog posts that will help. I cannot image double everything. Double the experiences. Double the knowledge. Double the conversion. I am going to be an entirely new person in a year, I can already see it. 

Here's to another great year.

Much love,

Elder Gray

Getting Real

Hi everyone!

This week was pretty regular honestly, not much has happened event-wise. I suppose I could write about what I'm learning and experiencing. 

I didn't grow up singing 'I Hope They Call Me On a Mission' in Primary, nor was it on the front of my mind during my teen years. Beforehand, my perception of a mission was that you left for some foreign country and baptized people. I knew that people could leave and come back a different person, but I didn't think much about it. 

Being out on a mission I now know that is half-true. Aside from the general missionary purpose of invited everyone to Christ, I've found is that everyone has their own 'purpose' for being there. For example, one missionary may be sent to a mission in order to find and baptized one specific person or family that no one else could have. Some are placed on a specific mission to help out their companions, other missionaries or the Mission President. Others are on missions and don't baptize a single person, but become life-long converts themselves. I think my purpose for being here at this time is largely personal.

I probably won't recognize the full effects of my mission until long after I'm home, but I know one thing: my relationship with the Savior has grown, and my personal conversion has become deep, meaningful and lasting. Although I've been able to help other people throughout my mission, there's no equal to the things I've learned through personal study and the development of my character.

I wouldn't trade this experience for anything. 

Love you all,

Elder Gray

 A tie almost as big as my heart.

A Year and a Day

Life is so crazy. This picture above is a perfect representation of my own life. I didn't even have plans on serving a mission two years ago, and now look where I am! I'm hesitant to make long-term plans because I know things will likely change. But that's part of life right?? My theory is just to relax and let it happen, like a lazy river. Thanks to my Mom for the great card. 

Sister Dahl is the new addition to our district(2nd from right). We actually share the same birthday

Mexican Independence day was a few days ago, everyone was out in the streets partying and grilling! There was mariachi music blasting in the streets and a Mexican flag flying from every lowrider. 

I feel like this is a foreign mission sometimes.

Elder Gray