May 13th - Fresno!

Dear Fam!

This was my first week in Fresno. We were hosting a missionary who is going to be training this transfer for several days at the beginning of the week, so we were a tri-panionship for a little while. Thursday we did this thing called Open Your Mouth where, when you first come in the mission, you go out with a more experienced missionary and you contact as many people as you can. I went out with an Elder Chase from Colorado so we contacted a bunch of college students at Fresno City. It is a good way to get new missionaries out and to see what missionary work is like in the first few days.

It is weird being a Zone Leader especially since I am in the heart of Everything. Our church building currently is the mission office so I have been there more times in the last week then I have in my whole mission...pretty crazy. It's also a lot of added responsibility because I have to come up with a whole bunch of goals and plans with different leaders in our Zone and all kinds of other business type things.

We had a Mother's Day activity this week so I got to meet some of the Ward which was good. We had our friend and his wife come which was awesome because it motivated them to go to church the next day. 

It has rained a ton here in Fresno in the last week so we were pretty wet.

Sunday I got to meet the ward and we had a Hispanic outreach program meeting so we got to talk about new store front churches that will be opening up here in Fresno soon.  

That was my week in a nutshell I will call you later!

Love,

Elder Murray

May 6th - Seeing in White

Dear Family,

This week was an epic week and definitely one for the history books. I have a lot of pictures so I will attach those, also I will hit the highlights of the week.

We went to the Zoo again this week and I fed an angry snuffly piggy. It was good. We cleaned a lot of bird poop.

We played soccer again. I am getting better the more I play but I am still not very good compared to the guys I play with and I have no left foot.

We had Zone conference this week which was good. We drove up to Modesto and stopped to take a picture in some tiny town called Le Grange or something.

We had a mission conference with Elder Cook from the 12 apostles and it was super cool to shake his hand and for him to speak to us about some different things. He truly is a personal witness of the Savior Jesus Christ.

The same day as the mission Conference I headed down to Visalia because a couple I taught down there got married and baptised this week. That was super cool to see and since we had some extra time down there we were able to visit a bunch of people we taught.

Sunday was another awesome day because Angela got baptized! She is probably like my best friend here in Merced and super cool. She will be a senior in high school next year and we are super excited that she is finally on the gospel path! 

That was the highlights of my week. Hope you all had an awesome week too. Love you!

Love,

Elder Murray

April 29nd - Planada and Snelling

Dear Family,

I figured I should probably write a big email so that you all know what I did this week.

Tuesday was a pretty regular day. We had a district Council and we visited some people that day. We started around 9 am because we had an early appointment so we ended up biking like 25 miles.

Wednesday was more bikes and more appointments. We tried some people on the north side of Merced and then went down south that night.

Thursday was the third day of bikes. We decided we would do weekly planning on Thursday from now on so that we can make better use of the car. We visited people that day for the rest of the day, nothing special.

Righteous raccoon wants to accept the gospel. 

Friday we did our regular sports night and we were able to go to Planada, which is a little city like 10 miles from where we live in Merced. We talked to one of our less active friends out there for around 2 hours (the only one that came to church). We also talked to two other members while we were out there. It is a super Hispanic town so we love it there.

Saturday we had lunch at this Mexican place with another less active which was awesome! It was super tasty. I ordered some carne asada quesadillas. Then we went to visit some people including the man with like 10 cats. Then we had dinner with some members that night and the food was super good.

Sunday we had church and it was pretty disappointing. Almost all those that told us they would come to church this week were not able to make it for one thing or another so we were pretty down. I don't understand why people always put the Lord behind other things on their priority list. He is my first priority 100% of the time. That night we had no dinner so I cooked some chicken and noodles with some lemon and parsley garlic salt. Then we went to a town like 15 miles to the north called Snelling. We visited a part member family out there and met a man named Joe who was super nice and we were able to teach him the Plan of Salvation.The scenery was beautiful there and there were many, many cows. I will attach some pictures.

That was my week this week. Today we are planning on playing basketball, big surprise, and that should be it because the guy didn't go to Yosemite with us again. I love you all and have a great week.

Love,

Elder Murray

April 22nd - David's 20th birthday!

Now that we get to talk to Elder Murray on the phone each week, we don't get as many letters. He does make sure we have some pictures for the blog though!

Here is David with his companion and Brother Sanchez, who seems to be a good pal to the missionaries!

David got to go to two dinners on Easter, and one house had this tasty treat - roasted crickets! Apparently a lot of Mexican people eat these for a snack. 

For his 20th birthday, David asked for a Mexico soccer jersey. 

April 8th - Transfers

David called this week, so most of our news was received in the oral tradition. I did get some pictures of the transfer online, so I will post those today. 

April 15th - When you are in the dark too long, you start to see in the dark

Dear Family,

This week was a good week. I won't write a ton but I like to keep you all updated at least every other week so that I have something to remember the mission afterward and so that those that aren't my immediate family will know what is going on as well.

I will hit this weeks highlights as I go through. To start off this week, we had interviews with President Mackay. It was good. I talked to him about my area and my companion and he helped me out with some things that have been on my mind lately.

Then we had exchanges with the Zone leaders. The first exchange we went on was with Elder Smith. I know I told my family that I hurt my ankle last Monday so we ended up calling the nurse and she told me to go get it x-rayed after seeing how it looked. So we went to go get an x-ray and apparently some lady broke her hip and they found out that she had done so on the table right before me, which meant they couldn't move her and they had to call an ambulance so it took a very long time before I got in there. After the x-ray, and finding that nothing was broken, they let me go so I am on my way to recovery. After that we were able to visit some people and went to have an exchange interview.

Another thing that happened this week was we went on a surprise exchange with the other elders again so I went with Elder Dabney up to that mountain town I talked about before - Mariposa. Up there we had a crazy adventure. We talked to this man right off that bat that had some mental problems. He told us that Korihor and Alma were powerful names and explained a strange meaning to them. He also told us that he has been in the dark so long that he has begun to see in the dark. We told him we were messengers from Jesus Christ sent to bring light to the world and that we would help him become a light for others. Also, while we were up there, we went to visit and have dinner with a part member family that lived way out in the mountains. They had some sweet property and we sword fought their 7 year old with some foam swords which is always fun. They had some great food and then we shared a message on the importance of prophets and how General Conference had blessed our lives. The drive back was long and fun. All together it was a great day.

Yesterday was fast Sunday so we broke the fast by going to a member's home and eating with her and another family from an English ward it was really good food. Afterwards we went to go teach people and Mexicans often have barbeque and parties outside on the weekends. We ended up crashing two party/barbeques that night so we ate good on Fast Sunday.

Next week is Easter Sunday and I look forward to commemorating the life and Resurrection of our Savior Jesus Christ by doing what He did while He was on the earth. I love the gospel and I am so blessed to be serving a mission for God's restored church on the earth. I love you all and have a great week!

Love,

Elder Murray

April 1st - Transfers and Spanish Test

Dear Family,

The laundry mat is packed this week, so I figured it would probably be best to just write an email while I am here and then call home later so my mission documentation will continue through email.

This week was a super exciting week. I will hit the highlights so that I can skip the boring, regular days, not that any days are boring and regular as a missionary.

This week we had a member of the Quorum of the 70 come and speak to us. His name is Elder Steven R. Bangerter. It was very cool. His approach was different than the last 70 that came. I liked his approach a lot more. He talked about the sacred ordinance of baptism and how we, as missionaries, can teach the Gospel of Jesus Christ lesson in order to emphasize the importance of baptism and help our friends to get there. The process of repentance is very key in that teaching and should not be skipped.

I had the opportunity to go to the zoo again this week which is always fun. It was my last time with Elder Lavatai as he is getting transferred to a new place. I got to do the bobcats for the first time.

We played soccer on Friday night which is always cool. We found a family and we have taught 7 of them so far. We were able to get two of their boys to come and play soccer with us which was super cool because they enjoyed it and had a good time. We will keep working with them and hopefully get them to the waters of baptism soon. 

Saturday was a good day as well. We went to McDonalds that day with Hermano Sanchez. The pictures are on Facebook. Our dinner that night was in Planada with our friend Luis Flores. His wife is about to have a baby so it was her baby shower. We never stay very long at these things as we are only allowed an hour for dinner but it was good to go and talk with the family.

We visited a man that lived out in the country alone which was sad. His wife passed away from an illness a year back so he seemed to us to be super lonely. He is a member and was sealed to his wife in the temple so he will see her again after this life. It was good to visit him and give him some company though.

Sunday was Merced Stake conference and we got a new stake president. He doesn't speak Spanish so we will have to see how that goes to help the Spanish people to grow. We had two 70's at the conference which was cool. My companion translated and I sat next to him with the headset on to back him up if he needed it. He was fine so I didn't really do anything.

Well, as I said in the subject line this week is transfers and so my companion Elder Hernandez got transferred. It is weird because this will now be my third transfer in Merced with three separate companions. I have already had a high number of companions for the amount of time I have on the mission, and now I will have even more. I keep racking them up.

Also, I said Spanish test in my subject line. I took that Spanish test that the missionaries were required to take this week. I will send my scores.

This week was a good week, I love you all and wish you the best on your week.

Love,

Elder Murray