5-27-13

Dear friends and family, 

Well really not to much to write about this week. It honestly was a very slow week and we only taught a few lessons. All the families around here are out of town because of the long weekend. We were able to get in with Johanna and Brother Sembrano and that was about it. We had a few less active lessons, but we are really just trying to get hooked up with all the members and to get to know them and to gain their trust! We have been trying to get some referrals, and that is not going to happen if we don't know the members. Our ward mission leader is AMAZING though!  He is so willing to help us and to get us ready to work! 

Zone conference was out of this world!!!! President Meredith has been really focusing on the scripture in D&C 88 about hastening the work! He talked to us about sanctifying ourselves and working to make sure that we are prepared for the call when it comes to hasten the work. We ate pizza for lunch, which didn't make Sister Meredith very happy. She had just given us this HUGE training on how we need to eat better and more healthy. haha she was very nice and thanked them, but mom she would have been so much more happy with your lunch and for your efforts! We as missionaries were pleased, but honestly probably wasn't very healthy! As of June 1st actually President is making it a rule that we are to run for a half hour 3 times a week! He and Sister Meredith have been talking to the other missions in California, and that is what they do. They actually run every day,and there is a huge difference in the health and the doctor bills in those missions! So I am sooo excited to be able to tell the district that they have to run with me in the mornings! I have been running inside the gym of the church while they play basketball, but now we can run outside and up the hills and stuff. My back hasn't been doing to well though. I should be getting an MRI this week and know by next Monday what is going to happen. The other day I couldn't even bend over to tie my shoes... I had to wear my slip ons for the past few days just so that I don't have to bend to tie them. Everything is going to be good though. I told them that I want to try everything to fix it before we even think about surgery if there is something actually wrong with it. The doctor told me that he would try cortisone first and see how that will help if needed. I had that in my feet, and don't even want to think about how bad it would hurt in the back. Grandpa knows and I am sure dad does too.. As long as it takes the pain away for a while I would be fine with it!!! Just keep praying for me. I am so sick of having things wrong with my body! I am now not allowed to eat with members cause of how bad my stomach is, and now have this back problem. I know that it is all for my good, and that its just one of my trials I have to deal with, so we shall see how it all turns out! Love you all so much.

  

Honestly I am about to go destroy in some ping pong and so this is going to be super short.. I love this Gospel with all my heart! I have been fighting trunkiness, but it has gotten soooo much better. I don't deserve to be trunky! I have still got a long time. I took what dad said about retirement to heart and applied it to my mission! I just had to stop thinking about it! Once I threw myself into the work and just refocused and did what was expected and more, it all was so much easier! I love to do missionary work, and the last thing I want is to waste time and to not work as hard as I can! I would regret it if I didn't work hard to the end and so I along with President have changed my mindset, and am ready to help the Lord hasten the work! I challenge all of you all there who read this email to call the missionaries and to ask them what they need you to do to help them hasten the work in your area! I look at the Sudweeks and the Mosers and think how close we were with working with them. They helped us out so much, and I know that I didn't do nearly enough to help the missionary force back at home. Honestly I only remember like two of the sisters names that even served in our area. That is sad! Get close to them! Honestly you will be blessed and feel the spirit a lot more often in your lives if you surround yourself with the missionaries! We love what we do, but we can't do anything without the members! We need people to go on splits with, we need referrals! WE NEED HELP!!!!!! The Lord is hastening the work, and don't allow yourselves to be left behind! The band wagon is leaving, and if you don't hurry and jump on, you are going to be held accountable for that at the last days! Every member a missionary! Remember that and live it! Read D&C 88 again and look at the things that are expected of us, and then look at the blessings that are promised! I promise that it will be a great life style change as we all become more missionary minded! You all out there who are over 18, GO ON SPLITS WITH THE ELDERS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! They shouldn't have to call for members, you should call them and they should have to tell you next time cause they already have people out with them that day! We need to help Heavenly Father hasten the work NOW! come on! Jump on board and join us missionaries in what is going to be one of the greatest few years of our lives as you witness the beginning of the end! These are the final days! If we don't become converted to the Gospel, we will be one of the Noble and Great ones that it talks about falling at the final day! PLEASE don't be one of those people who fall! We need you, and we need each other! Like President Meredith always says, all of us are smarter then any of us! I love you all so much! I expect to hear responses from everyone on how their missionary work is going! If I don't there will be more emails sent out and more personal invitations! Don't make the Lord call you! Stand up now and call yourself! I love you all so much and love this work! I didn't plan on writing a word of this! I just realized how long this got! I guess it was inspired and someone needed to hear it! Please whoever that is, maybe all of us, stand up and except the call! It is worth it! You will never regret that decision! Love you all so much! This is the true Gospel! It is the only one that has the fullness and will always be the only one! We have the opportunity of a life time here to share what we know to be true! Don't miss it!

Much Love!

Elder Mackay Dale Shelley

5-20-13

Dear Family and Friends,

Well we got back a little earlier than we had planned, and so we decided to email today rather then tomorrow so that we can spend tomorrow getting Elder Santiago up to speed and get him all settled in and feeling comfortable. Just a quick update for those that don't know, Elder Suing went home this past Friday of his on choice... We had been fighting to keep him to stay basically since we got here but he just didn't have a desire to serve. So after about three days of phone calls home and his parents not agreeing to pay for his ticket home, they decided to just let him do what he wanted and bring him home. We were really sad to see him go, but honestly if he wasn't going to work hard and bring the spirit into the area, then there was no need for him to keep going. So after he had gotten his plane ticket and we were packing him up, I got a phone call from President Meredith. He told me that he had gotten a call from the MTC and that they had a missionary that was called Tagalog and went to the MTC to learn English but already could speak it. They told President that they were going to send him out early and asked if he was prepared with a trainer for him. He had a feeling that even though I don't speak Tagalog that I was to be his trainer! Haha So we just got back from picking him up and I am training for my third time. I guess after the last two elders I trained went home, the Lord was determined to keep one here for the whole two transfers. The crazy part is, president told me in private today that he has another Filipino coming in in 4 weeks and he thinks that he is going to want me to train that one too. Elder Peralta will finish Elder Santiago's training and I will take the new one and go and open a new area of the Tagalog program! I am so humbled by the trust and respect that President has in me. I honestly don't know how I am going to accomplish a task like this, but I know that the Lord is going to make things work out the way that they are supposed to! I just hope that he will be patient with my language issues, and that the gift of tongues will be given to me in a quick time frame! The members are so kind though. They understand that this is by no means my first language and they are helping me! I am doing what Brother Zufelt told me almost two years ago, I am having the young kids that speak Tagalog teach me! They laugh at the way that I pronounce things, but they are such a help to me! I love these people and am so blessed to be able to serve with them!

Our investigators are doing soooo well! We are teaching Ken, an African American man who is so spiritual and so prepared. He comes from a very christian back ground and so he has a great understanding of the bible. I have been working on my bible knowledge lately, because I have found that you need that just as much as you do the Book of Mormon if not more here in this area. He has a few issues with things like God, Christ and the Holy Ghost being separate beings, and things like the apostasy. Honestly those are standard concerns, and we know that with time it is all going to be worked out. He loves to be in the scriptures with us and to look at things the way we do. He says that he feels the spirit when he studies with us! He told me that he just feels a connection with me that he hasn't with many "preachers!'' Haha I never thought that I would be considered a preacher. haha But it was so awesome to be told that he feels the spirit when I teach him things and that he doesn't understand why, but that I can just explain things to him that puts it in words that he can understand! Honestly I have done nothing but quote the scriptures and Jesus the Christ! I have been breaking that book down from cover to cover, and have been learning soooo much!!! Elder Talmage just puts the most deep doctrines into the most simple words. I have been working on speaking like he does and explaining things in that way so that all audiences could grasp it. It has made teaching the deeper doctrines so much easier! We are hoping to set a baptismal date with Ken here in the next week or so! 

We also have an investigator named Johanna that is really doing well also. She reminds me a lot of Colby cause she takes notes during our lessons and while she reads her scriptures! She is really fresh from the Philippines, I think she said she has only been here for about three weeks. Her family finally earned enough money to send her and her little sister over to the states. She is fifteen and is now living with her aunt that lives in our ward. I cried the night after we taught her on the way home, cause when she told me that her parents had saved their entire lives, and when they finally had enough money to get someone here they sent her so that she could have an education and a good life!!! All of my memories of the such humble people flooded my memory as I could seriously still picture teaching the Bourlaus family in their little hut and seeing the joy and happiness on their faces! Then to look at all these multi million dollar homes here in cali just blows my mind! We don't realize how blessed we truly are to have what we have! Here I am still complaining that my cameras screen is a tad scratched and that my suit is a tad big and there are people out there that would give anything to have what we have! I was so upset with myself at how quick I was to forget all of those experiences and to become so prideful again! I looked through all of my pictures of the Philippines the other day with Elder Peralta and had a few laughs and had a few tears, but all in all it helped me remember why I am out in the field. That it is the least we can do to be able to help all of Gods children be able to make it back to him. I love what I do and I love being a missionary! It is such a blessing in my life to be able to serve the Lord and to be his servant! 

Me and Elder Peralta were able to go to a really cool place called cliff house out on the coast of San Fransisco. The tide wasn't going as hard as they say it usually does, but I still thought it was really cool. We also ran out to Golden Gate Bridge and were able to take a few pictures out there. I am not used to doing anything but play sports on p-day, but there are sooo many cool places to visit out here on the bay! We had so much fun today! I got super lost trying to find Golden Gate, cause we were so afraid to cross the bridge. If you cross it, President gets a text that you left the mission, and he will be calling you to have an interview with him!!! hahaha So we made like 6 circles, but finally found where we were supposed to go. There were some really cool pictures that we got of the beaches around the coast as we drove up! We ran into a few LDS bikers that had come all the way from Canada and were doing a big coast to coast trip on motorcycles. I don't remember all the places they had been, but they had been gone for like a week and a half already and this was one of their final stops. You would be amazed at all the people that were there! There were even surfers in the water surfing under the bridge! I didn't even know that that was possible. People said that they travel from all over the world to surf under that bridge! It was sooo cool. You could barely see Alcatraz out on the water because of the fog. It's crazy how even just a little bit of fog can make it impossible to see a thing.

  

We are preparing to get a ton of work done this coming up week. We have zone conference on Thursday and so that should be a blast like always! I am also looking forward to all the lessons that we have with our investigators. It's been a while since we have had some really solid progressing investigators to work with and so we are excited about the way that the Lord is blessing this area! I wish that we could take some of the credit, but honestly it has been all him. We just go where he tells us to. haha The teaching is the easy part. The finding is the hard. We have been working with the members to try to get some referrals, but they haven't really given us any lately which is uncommon. We are going to really try to get them going and get this ward to start taking off. We have been brain storming some new ideas about getting new investigators. There are so many Filipinos out here it should be easy! haha We think that we are just going to head over the Jollibees (Filipino McDonalds) and just start talking to people. It's really funny to have gone to Jolibees in the Philippines and then to walk down the street and see one here in Daly City. Guess that tells you how many Filipinos there are here. Its like little Manilla here! I love it!

Well I better get going. We have got to go and shop. President has asked me to stop eating with the members, cause my stomach just can't handle it. I was doing really good there for a few weeks and now it has been hurting as bad as ever! All the grease and Lumpia is great in portions, but when they feed you lunch and dinner every day I just can't do it. President is going to talk to Salt Lake and see if they well give me some extra money each transfer so that I can buy and fix my own dinner daily too. That will be good cause everything out here is sooo expensive. Me and Elder Peralta were laughing and saying that we were going to have to eat like Elder Makaya with raman and hot dogs every day for the rest of the transfer. We hadn't planned on getting sent out here and so we ate out a few times in Brentwood. Thankfully the members are so willing to help and I swear bring us food like every day! They are such humble people! 

Man I love this Gospel! I love this church. It has blessed my life more then I can even start to explain! I have just loved doing what I do. Heavenly Father has blessed me so much with the strength and stamina that it has taken to do this great work. When I think about all the blessings that I have received in the past I just am so amazed and humble by the joy that has come into my life because of this work. I am so excited to hear about all the young missionaries going into the field. It is the best choice that you will ever make. It will be hard, but it will be sooo worth it! Don't be afraid. The Lord protects his missionaries I am a living witness of that! I wasn't supposed to live through my experience in the Philippines, but I did. I was able to even come back into the field when doctors and others told me that that would never happen. And because of that I was able to meet people that have changed my life. I was able to see one of the members from Brentwood today at the mission home as we picked up our new comp and man were those some good memories! I loved that area and I loved those members. The missionaries said that the work out there is just going crazy! That they have a baptismal date and that they are hoping to set a few more! It is such a blessing to be able to enjoy this experience with so many people! I have a testimony of this gospel I hope you all can see and feel that! I love the book or Mormon. It has changed my life for the better and I hate to even put it down every morning after studies. I love to be able to look someone in the eye and tell them that I KNOW that Joseph Smith was a prophet of god. To be able to bear a strong and heartfelt testimony of what the prophets have taught us! I get to put my testimony right next to Moroni's each day as we go into lessons that all you have to do is ask! Just ask with a sincere heart and I can promise that your answers WILL come! Weather your a member or not the answers that you are seeking will come through constant study of the greatest book that has ever been written! I love being a missionary! I love being a trainer! I get to be there from the beginning again! I get to remember all the struggles and the trials that come. But I also get to see all the miracles and the blessings that come from being fresh out of the MTC! The Lord blesses those that are trying to learn this work with people to teach and so we are prepared to find them! Thank you all so much for your love and your prayers! I love this work so much and I love you all too!

With all my love,

Elder Mackay Shelley

Pictures: 1. Golden Gate Bridge State Park
               2. Golden Gate with Elder Peralta
               3. Panaramic view of Golden Gate
               4. Cliff House State Park
               5. Elder Suing and Mackay flexing (Elder Suing has a picture like this from the MTC with his companion, and promised to take a similar picture with each companion!)

5-13-13

Dear Family and Friends,

This is going to be a real quick email because I have got to go take care of a few things in the ward. Then we are going to try to go bowling if we have some extra time. We were going to try to head out to Golden Gate to take a few pictures, but it is so foggy out here that you could stand at the base of the bridge and probably not even see it haha! Hopefully while I am out here we will have a clear Monday so that we can travel around and get some cool pictures to send home. This is a really neat place to serve and we have already had some really interesting experiences. I love it though!

Well this week has been another crazy one! Elder Suing tried to go home mid week on us. He has been struggling a bit with his desire to serve. He is the first 18 year old missionary that has entered the field and so he has been struggling a bit. He said that he felt like he was forced to come out here by his bishop and parents and that it was never his choice to come and so he had already text president without us knowing and had told him that he had made a decision and was going home... He had already had an interview with president about how he was feeling and we thought that he was going to be fine. Out of no where one night though he text president and called it quits. He was on the phone the next day with his parents and they were not to happy to hear that he had made that decision. He talked to them and his bishop and his stake president that morning during our personal study. Since the day we picked him up, I could tell that there was something wrong. He opened up to us after he had already talked to president. We had been praying and praying for him for the past few days, and as he was on the phone with his family, I got a very strong feeling that I was NOT to let him go home. If he needs to find a desire then I will help him enjoy the work and we will make it so fun and spirit filled that he will never want to go home again. As I was thinking about how I would bring it up to him though I was super nervous. All of a sudden I started having a ton of scriptures and personal experiences come to mind that he needed to hear. I started writing down the thoughts that were coming, and as I finished up I had over a page of notes taken down. I have never had this type of revelation before and it honestly kinda scared me haha. He was making another call, and so I took the other phone that we have into the bathroom and called President. I told him that I had a feeling that we were not to allow him to go home. I asked for permission to share with him the things that I had written down, and that I really felt strongly about it. He gave me permission, but told me not to push him. He told me that Elder Suing had told him that I was someone that he felt comfortable talking to and president told me that he wanted to keep it that way!  I told him that I would be loving about it but that I needed to follow the impression. It was really neat to hear president tell me that he trusted me and to let him know how it went when we were at a place that I could step out of ear shot for a sec. Well as me and Elder Peralta talked to him I told him how I felt. I told him that if he went home, that it would be the biggest mistake of his life and that he would regret it for the rest of his life! He was a little closed minded about it until I started to share a few things out of the book Our Search for Happiness and a few scriptures. We started to see a light change in his eyes and he started to smile. We talked for over an hour and by the end of the conversation he was walking out of the room to call president to tell him that he was staying! It was such a powerful experience for me to be able to be such a tool in the hands of the lord. It's the first time on the mission that I actually feel like every word that came out of my mouth was exactly what the lord wanted me to say and that was an AMAZING experience. President apologized to me the other day about how I have been with all of these companions who have either not been nice to me, not been obedient, went home, struggled with wanting to be out, or just someone that wasn't working up to the speed that he should have been. I just kinda laughed and told him that I never thought of any of them in that way. ElderMakaya was the hardest comp that I've had, but even that only lasted for 6 out of our 18 weeks together! I have loved all of my companions and told him that he can put anyone he needs with me. I love being able to feel presidents love and the support that he has. He is an amazing man!

Well everyone this turned out longer then I had planned and I need to get going, I love you all! Happy mothers day to all of you amazing mothers out there! My mom and grandma, and Momma Herrera have been there for me through thick and thin and I love them so much! I am so blessed to have a family and support group that I do! Thanks so much for all of your love and your prayers. I love this gospel. I feel like my testimony is the same every week, but I hope that you can feel more and more spirit come from them each week! Brother Zufelt I wish that I could bear this in Tagalog for you, but English na long para caron! The book of Mormon has come to be such a blessing to me in my life. I love it more then I have loved anything in this entire world! It has blessed me and my companions more then we could ever have asked for! Joseph Smith truly is a prophet of God and he did so much even gave his life so that we can have what we have! I hope that we will all take advantage of this perfect gospel and that we will look for others to share it with!

Pictures: Saying goodbye to Brentwood after 9 months!

              1. Tyler

              2. Brother Moser & Sudweeks

              3. Colby
              4. Brother & Sister Sudweeks

              5. New companions: Elder Peralta and Elder Suing-Daly City, Ca

5-6-13

Dear Family!

Well we might as well start off with the biggest news of the week. I have been called to transfer out across the bay to Daily City in San Fran to train and speak Tagalog!!!! I don't speak a lick of Tagalog remember! hahaha So President called me the other day as I was on my way out Hayward for a doctors appointment. He asked to speak in private and for me to step into the other room. I just kinda laughed and told him that that may be a tad hard judging by the fact that we were sitting in a car. He laughed and just asked me to call him back when I get a free chance and we could talk out of ear shot. When I called him back he told me that he had a special assignment that he needed me to take on. He told me that I would be transferring out to San Fran and that I would be in the Tagalog ward out there. I will still be a district leader (in the same district as elder Makaya!!!!) and that Elder Peralta would actually be coming with me! President told me that the reason that he was sending him out there with me, was that he has a ton of Filipinos coming in that will not be able to speak English very well. So my job, is to train this one missionary and to basically train Elder Peralta on how to be a good missionary, and more importantly to be able to train by next transfer or no later then the next! That is going to be a lot of work. Elder Peralta could train this transfer, but he lacks confidence in himself. He is such a great missionary he just needs to be able to see that. So I will be training this new guy and helping him to learn to train and also Elder Peralta to learn to train, and then hopefully if I do it well enough they could both train in the next 6 weeks! It is crazy to think that I am going to need to do all this in a brand new area especially when I don't even speak the language! It is soooo different then Cebuano!.. Elder Peralta has been speaking to me the last few days, and I am more confused then when I was in the Philippines! haha It has been so crazy! I have been praying for the gift of tongues for the past three days and hope that it will be given to me!

It is going to be so hard to leave this area though!!! I have come to love this area so much and the people that I have met here are going to be life long friends! I hope to be able to pass through soon after I get home so that I can come back and spend some quality time with those people that I have come to love so much. Tyler Heath bore his testimony for the first time Sunday and it was so special. He thanked me for the things we taught him and for making him a better person. He is bipolar, and so it has been hard for him to control his sadness. He has been crying from the time I told him till literally an hour ago when we went to taco bell with him. He is going to do so well though! He has so many friends and is even thinking about maybe serving a service mission for the church. He doesn't think that he could leave his family, but he thinks that he would like to serve a service mission. I hope that he does. It would be good for him! Colby did pretty well too. She is worried that now both of her original missionaries are gone, but she is going to do so well too. She has her mom and Travis is still going to be around, so he will keep her active and supported. Haha we told the new missionary that is coming in that all he had to do was call Travis and tell him to get to work and just watch what he does and follow. He is going to be such a great missionary because he is basically already one in this area. He knows it as well if not better then me. I still miss turns or get lost a time or two a week so he is going to be such a great help to these missionaries. It was tough to say good bye to him also. We are going to stay in touch as you can see that he is on the email list! We are going to set up a hunting trip when he gets back from his mish. It will all be a good time.

I am so thankful for all of you who support me in what I do. The mission has not been easy, but it has been so worth it. It has been weird the last few days to think that the time that I have left, is the same amount of time that I spent here in Brentwood. That time has just flown by for me too so that is what is so scary. Before I know it we are going to be skyping for Christmas and then I'll blink from there too and be home. I am excited to be able to come and see everyone, but I am not going to be ready to call it quits being a full time missionary. I love it to much! Good thing there is a ward mission cause I am going to have to get very involved with that!

We had a little get together last night with the Sudweeks, Mosers, Kurtz, Travis, and Heaths. It was such a blast to have everyone that has been such a great influence in my life in one place to enjoy each other and to share our thoughts and feelings. Tyler's less active dad, and Colby's dad and brother were there and I think that they really enjoyed it. It's going to take some time and some patience but I see all of those guys becoming active and getting baptized. They are all such great people and its going to just be a matter of time. We were able to take some great pictures that I wish I could send, but this computer at the library is terrible. Maybe the computers in the city will be better and I can have some better pictures sent over!

I love you all so much! It is such a blessing to be able to send these emails to everyone even though we are not all "family". I love the new rule because it keeps us all close and we can enjoy this time together. I hope everyone gets them. I just keep sending them because it hasn't sent them back to me. I just want to leave you with my testimony again, that I know that this is the true gospel of Christ! I love being a missionary so much! Being able to see the fruits of your work is such a blessing. I honestly had no idea the impact that we had on this ward until last night. there were a few youth at church that thanked me for what I had done for them, and honestly it's sad to say but I didn't even remember some of their first names... Last night at the little get together, Brother Moser has a son who has a few mental problems, but he is the sweetest little guy I have ever met! His name is Mason and he asked if he could say something. He thanked me personally for the way that I made him feel when he was around me. He said that he had felt things that he had never felt before and that he knew that others felt it also. As he was talking I couldn't keep the tears back. Ha there weren't many of us that could. It was the neatest thing that had ever been said to me and it made my entire mission worth it right there to be able to feel his spirit and listen to his words! I love being able to do what I do. It is going to be so hard to have to stop, but I am not stopping until the Lord tells me that it is time and that my work is done! I Know the Book of Mormon is the word of God and it has been such a strength in my life! Thanks again for all that you all do and I am so thankful for all of the great friends and family that I have to share my experiences with! I love you all so much and wish all the mothers out there a very happy mothers day Sunday and to remember that that is the day that all the boys get to do the dishes!!! Love you Guys!

 

Love,

Elder Mackay Dale Shelley