Wednesday, May 25, 2016

Well today we went to the temple and it was just amazing!!! 

So Satan is really going hard on our investigators. Fabricio is still
in Barcelona but we've been checking in in him and stuff. Adela got a
job in the south for three weeks so she's gone, right after she got
her baptismal date too hahah, Satans just going off. But we had a
couple lessons with her and she came to church again and she loves it!
She's super excited to be baptized when she gets back. We had some
crazy lessons with her this last week. Sunday night was unreal. We
knew we would have a problem with one of the commandments and we're
gonna teach it when she got back from her job. But Sunday I gave a
talk as well as a member about missionary work and the spirit was just
super strong and it went from irreverent to reverent real quick. Like
0-100 real quick if I do say. So I get done and the member finishes
and this Spanish EFY singer is in our ward and sang a song from the
Efy album and everyone was just silent for the first time in three
months, then this big ole gyps of a high councilman starts his
talk...about the law of chastity...like idk how things roll but you
probably shouldn't give a talk like that when there are multiple non
members in the chapel. It was super super fuerte too. Like borderline
inappropriate and not completely doctrinally correct. So we had to
teach that lesson unexpectedly. Luckily we had good member support.
There was a moment of silence of a few minutes without anyone saying
anything and I almost passed out from the spirit being so strong. We
looked up and she was just bawling and said she knows she has to fix
some things. I gave her a blessing of strength and comfort after and
we finished with a selfie. She was super happy after that so we left
on a super good note. She's called and texted us like 100 times since
then telling us about her life away from Toledo lol. She's so awesome
and we're super excited for her.
With her and Fabricio, I've been super humbled. They're both so
willing to drop old habits cold turkey and change their lives to
follow Christ. It's been amazing and my heart has been so full of love
and happiness for them lately. Except for the fact that Satan keeps
dragging them away hahah. But it'll be good for them to have an
absence from us for a little bit.

Yesterday we had exchanges with the ZLs. I went with elder esquen from
Peru so I was stoked to get back to my 100% Spanish for a day. Elder
Wright and I try to talk Spanish.....We ate with this member and she just loved me right
from the get go and kept saying she feels like she knows me. Then she
started telling me how handsome I was lol. I got emberassed of course
and she thought it was adorable. She's awesome. She asked me to give
her a blessing afterwards as well which I thought was interesting
because the other two ZLs know her for like three months but she asked
me to give it...like I just met you girl but yeah sure. Also her
daughter leaves for Utah tomorrow for vacations.
Last night we visited another family. We taught s lesson about the BoM
and I've never felt e spirit like that in a member lesson before.
They're not super active but it was so cool anyways. They told their
stories of the first time they knew the Bo

M was true and the spirit
just overwhelmed us. Invitation: bear your testimony about the BoM to
somebody! Then they ordered pizza in the middle of the lesson and fed
us after. They gave me their number and address and told me I had to
come visit them some day. I think I'll be transferred there
eventually. It's like polar opposite of Toledo hahah.

Well that's how I'll end it! Actually no, one more quick story.
Yesterday we were passing by old investigators and we got to this one
apartment building and this address didn't exist. So I was like
"well..we might as well knock a door and ask the people of they know
anything." So I knocked a random door, SIKS! The Spirit knocked it!
Because this guy opened up and was so accepting of what we taught him
through the door! It just felt so natural and the spirit was just
slapping this guy I'm sure of it! He said he'd come to church this
Sunday and that the elders can come back Saturday. So we were happy
about that. Miracle!

Okay, well have a good week and we'll talk to ya on Monday!

Skyle2k16,
Elder Gearig

A Family had a bunny

Pictures of our Piso (apartment) 

An apostle, roller coasters, Spanish Bullfight ring, and other things

Elder Gearig & Elder Wright
2 Miners (Bingham)

Elder Gearig & Elder Reese
Bingham vs. Lone Peak

Hey y'all. This one should be somewhat short ...Also I'll hit 9 months Wednesday so if I was an Hermana (Sister) I would
definitely be 1/2 over. That's super scary actually.

Anyways lets hit the good stuff.

Monday-Wednesday was spent preparing Fabricio for baptism! He had his
interview and we were planning the services and we were all just
stoked! We were so excited for him and he was even more excited! It's
been such a humbling experience seeing this guy go through the
process. I'm gonna share a story about him real fast.
So we taught him the WoW last week, remember? So the night after he
was put through the first test. He went to a party with his wife, kid,
and friends. Around 1 am the drinks come out and his friends are
passing them all around and he keeps saying no. His friends got super
mad but let him be. Around 2 everyone is hammered except him and his
family. His friends get super mad again that he wouldn't drink and he
set down a drink they handed and said "look, I used to drink. I don't
anymore. Respect it and leave me alone." Then said to his wife "let's
go, we have to go to church tomorrow." And they left! He was telling
us the story and I just had tears in my eyes the whole time. This guy
is something else. It's been so humbling to see his willingness to
change his life and stick to it! He's awesome.
Our phone broke that night so we were out of contact for a few days.
Got the new phone, called him up, and he was in Barcelona.... Uhh
what?? Yeah he finally got a job offer there so he left asap. We were
stunned. Like he's being baptized the 22nd and he won't be here. He
kept thanking me for all we've done to help him change his life and
find the gospel over and over...then after the conversation we ended
the call. He doesn't know when he will be back...but I know 100% that
he will be baptized and finish his journey, just to start the next
one. I'm fully confident and know we have done our part to help him!
The next missionaries will have an easy baptism lol. I'm gonna miss
him though.

So the other part of the roller coaster was when it was my turn to do
a baptismal interview. Hopped on the bus and took off to the other
elders area. Of course Satan had to do his job, so there was a big
wild fire next to this guys house and he was evacuated so we got there
for no reason. We'll have to go back again next week.

Saturday was so awesome. Elder Bednar came to our mission!! He
addressed us for three hours Saturday and the whole mission was there
so I got to see Elder Holt and Ferro from Vigo! Saw a bunch of others
as well and it was just awesome. We had an awesome conversation with
Elder Bednar and Elder Kearon (British guy who spoke in conference in
April) and the spirit was absolutely unreal. To be in a room where
EVERY person was called by God was something I'll never forget. 150
missionaries, 1 apostle, 1 member of the 70, mission president... It
was awesome. I learned so much that I don't even know what to write.
But I know that I am called of God to preach this gospel, and I know
that we have living prophets on the earth today. It was an unreal
experience.

Adela is ready for baptism as well! Taught her last night and had an
amazing lesson. We have yet to set an official date but we'll get the
date set tomorrow. But she is completely ready and has more ganas (motivation) to
learn and be a member than everyone I've ever met. We are super
excited for her and I've been even more humbled by teaching her. She's
awesome so stay tuned for next week with her(:

I said this would be short but I guess I lied. Sorry
In preparation for Elder Bednar, we were given four of his talks to
study. I really liked "ask in faith" from 2008. He talked about how to
make prayers more meaningful and how we need to surrender our Will for
Gods. At times we know what Gods will is, but we are too scared to
take the step of faith, or don't know where to start, or are too
afraid or stubborn to accept it. But when we have enough faith to give
him everything we have and ask him in faith, we become who he wants us
to be. But how do we know his Will if we don't ask him? We have to ask
for his will for us and be willing to act on the answer, no matter
what it might be. It's a lifelong process and I know it will bless the
life of every person. I know it's changed mine...

Love you all and have a gr8 week!

Buckled up for the ride,
Elder Gearig

I saw a Lambo (and elder Reese). And my first lesson with a Spaniard‏

Well last night was awesome. Got to skype the fam and most importantly
my wonderful mother(: fastest 41 minutes of my life. Happy Mother's
Day to all!(:

Say hi to Momma Tonna everyone!

Howdy y'all. I couldn't think of what we did this week so my subject
line is what happened today. 'Twas a fun PDay. Went to downtown Madrid
and hung out with my man Elder Reese whom I haven't seen in 3 months
so that was a good time. We also turned the corner and saw a
Lamborghini Hurricane just chillin. Matte Black and I almost died,
photos to be attached, oh Madrid...



Lamborghini mercy....

Also it's my neither birthday today, and Austin Halls on Thursday I
believe so make sure to shoot him an email.

Well this last week was super slow at first because we weren't able to
meet with any of our actual investigators until Friday.
But Thursday we had a lesson with this Spanish guy. After the lesson I
realized that was my first lesson with somebody from Spain on my
mission. I'm pushing 9 months and just had my first lesson with a
Spaniard. I'm not even joking. But,
He actually showed up! So that alone was the miracle of the night. We
taught him the restoration of course and he loved it! Elder Wright
stopped this guy in the street actually and gave him a BoM on the spot
hahah. How greenies do it...I have no idea. But he did! Anyways, the
lesson was awesome and he wants to meet again so we didn't reject that
offer. We had him read the first vision and he couldn't see super well
so he read really slow and the Spirit was SO strong. I love the first
lesson.

Friday we met with our investigator finally. His names Fabricio if I
didn't say that last week and this guy is so prepared! We sat down and
he just went off about how happy he is and how much he needs this
change! Then he asked me this question "drinking is allowed right?"
Uhh.... This is the third time we've met with this guy and he's
begging for the Word of Wisdom lesson. Side note: you prooooooobably
shouldn't teach the WoW in your third visit. But I felt super good
about it so we did it. And he loved it! He was like "yeah yeah it
really isn't good for you..it'll be hard but I feel like I need to
drop this habit. Can you give me a blessing?" Hahah uhhhhhh yeah okay!
It was awesome to see this guys love for his family and for Christ.
Completely willing to do whatever it takes to follow Christ! It's been
a humbling experience and he asked to be baptized this Sunday. But we
can't make that happen so the 22nd it should! We're super excited for
him! As long as he stays from the beer lol. His wife told us "yeah he
asks me to bring him a beer from the store and I reply 'no! You have
legs! I am not supporting this.'" Yeah preach it girl! They'll be in
track to be sealed in the temple this time next year(: super excited.

Took him back to the CCM(MTC in Spanish, also a bank here)

Other than that, not much as happened! Just another awesome week with
Elder Wright out here in Spain(: loving life and preaching at good
Gospel to the unbelievers. Couldn't think of a better way to be
spending my time! Have a gr& week!

#TeamHallz,
Elder Gearig

The Family Tree

The Family Tree (from left) My little brother (Elder Muller), my dad,(Elder Jones) the oldest brother (Elder 'Me'), my son (Elder Wright)

Just a couple Miners looking for Gold (Elder Wright from Bingham High=Miners)

Sister Warner from our home ward in Utah (in white) going to Vigo!

Saw my 'Papa' 

Goooooood morning everybody!


So guess who I am training?! CODY WRIGHT (friends from Bingham High) . Like am I joking? Absolutely
not! It's happening! It was insane when it all happened! We freaked
out and like tackled each other and wow...it was epic. President
talked to me after and was like "we had no idea you guys were friends
until five minutes before. I gave it a thought and I'm not changing
it. It was the revelation I received so that's how it's supposed to
be." Boo ya!! It was such a cool thing. We are happy and loving
serving together(: it's been a blast!

So Jaquelyn Warner went to Bingham as well and was in my ward back
home and just came out of the MTC here as well. Guess where she's going??
VIGO!!!! 3rd Ward is representing Vigo strong! I freaked out just as
much when that happened. Best place on earth.

Also I found out I was having a brother as well! Elder Jones is
training at the same time as me! Only in a Mormon family do you have a
dad and a son having children at the same time(;

Holy cow it's been a craaaaaaazy week. But like I said, we've been
loving it. We picked up a few investigators this last week and invited
a couple to be baptized so stay tuned for more of this next week. Ones
name is Fabricio and he took the lessons about six years back but
decided he wanted nothing to do with the church even though his wife
is a member. They just had a baby two months ago and started coming to
church after. He talked to me and asked if we could visit him so of
course we said yes. So we taught him for the first time this past
Thursday and it was UNREAL PEOPLE. This guy had.completely.changed. He
wants everything to do with the church now and when we returned to see
him on Friday he was telling all out the BoM and everything he had
read and wanted to know more. Buckle up! It was unreal. This guys love
for his child and wife is spectacular. He wants everything this church
has to offer for his little baby and elder wright bore a testimony in
his broken Spanish and we all started crying. It didn't make much
sense, but it brought the spirit and it was awesome. Loving this guy.
🏼

Yesterday we had a cool experience. We were heading to this lesson
with another family. *pause, rewind two week* we ran into this
Dominican, Willie in the streets and this guy was legit. Wanted to
talk to us and we hit it off real good. Got his number, called him one
time, then lost his number. I was heartbroken because like I said,
this guy is legit! For two weeks I've been constantly praying to find
him again. We walked up and down the same place where we saw him first
over, and over, and over. Nothing. *fast forward to yesterday* so
yeah, going to this lesson. Turn the corner and BAM! Willie! I was
stoked, he was stoked, Elder Wright was confused, it was a special
moment. Embraced each other and got talking about God right away. Got
a lesson with him this week and I'm stoked! He's teaching me how to
make Dominican food as well. It's a win win situation. If we would
have been 30 seconds off on our timing we wouldn't have ran into him.
Prayer=answered. The lesson failed us so there was no point to go
there, but God put us there to find Willie, not teach that lesson. It
was surreal.

Well that's what I got for this week. I actually have a lot lot more
but not much more time. Quote of the week comes from President Monson,
"may we ever choose the harder right, instead of the easier wrong."
As well as...️
"God is more pleased with repentant sinners who are trying to draw
closer to Him than with self-righteous, faultfinding individuals who,
like the Pharisees and scribes of old, do not realize how badly they
need to repent."
God really cares about who we are trying to become! It's never too late
to make the turn and head back to the right path. There is no "point
of no return" with the Atonement. We are all sinners and all need to
repent. Make like Nike and Just Do It.


Telling Wright from wrong,
Elder Gearig

First of all thank you for the birthday wishes! It was definitely a
birthweek and birthday to remember. 

The Hermanas made him a birthday cheesecake!!!

Had some crazy experiences but
I'll explain those in a sec. People getting engaged, people getting
mission calls, life is crazy!

 Well had exchanges with my man Elder Smith on Wednesday! We've been
talking for this moment for like two months and it finally happened!
Taught a couple less active lessons and a lesson with our Chinese
investigator. Won't explain too much more for lack of time and space.
But he's a stud and I love him(: 

 Saturday is where the fun starts. Got a call Saturday about 5 from the
AP's and I'll be training this transfer! Finally I'll have a son! Also
my father, Elder Jones, is training so I'll also have a brother! Elder
Reese was transferred to the heart of Madrid and will be a DL there so
we can spend Pdays together now(: our dreams are coming true lol. I'm
super excited for the challenge. I'm also sad because my companion and
I were doing so so well together. 7 weeks was a short transfer but
it's okay(: so we taught a lesson to an investigator late Saturday
night, right when we got transfer calls. So we didn't know what was
going on until about 11. They're taking the Hermanas from Toledo):
they had to clean their piso all day to prep it. They're also taking
the car away from us. Idk why but we'll have to drop some people we
are teaching now. We're pretty mad but hey, the work will go on. As of
right now I'm here in Madrid with the ZLs until tomorrow when I pick
up my greenie! Maybe it'll be Cody Wright.. How cool would that be? 

 We found this Romanian Family the other night. Four of them and only
two speak Spanish. We taught them and the language barrier caused some
problems but the Spirit was undeniable. They are super super poor and
are in a good position to accept the gospel, but we shall see. We were
able to give the grandfather a blessing because his health is causing
them heavy financial debts. He speaks zero Spanish but we did it
anyways. It was hard for me to stay standing during the blessing
because the Spirit was so strong. He may not of understood anything,
but they were so so grateful for it. He mumbled out a "muchas gracias"
and then we left after. Good family.

 I'm sorry if I don't have time to reply to personally emails from
anybody but we're super busy with things here right now so until the
next week! Thanks again for the birthday wishes(: 

 Teach me how to Father, 

Elder Gearig 

The last Toledo selfie

"In the hood." Lol. Literally.

Deuces  to my Spanish brother

The Spain-guin still going strong

The District Pt. 3

Hi
Hope today has been good so far


Well this week was super great! I'll just cut straight to the chase
starting with Wednesday! Had exchanges with another elder here in the
good ole district of Toledo. We found two great people! The firsts
name is Luis. The second is a 17 year old Colombian who's bringing me
chocolate back from Germany and we'll meet with her in a couple weeks.
'Twas a good day

Thursday we got a message from our only investigators here. He said
this, "hey elder. I've decided to not continue my studies with you
guys, my Catholic roots are deep and I don't want to change. Good luck
with your mission!" My companion and I sat there for like five minutes
in silence. Felt like a solid punch to the gut. We've been working so
so hard to find people and we finally had potential with somebody!
Then bam, he's gone. But we talked him into letting us Coke (come) by that
night to talk things over. We went in and his whole family was there.
We had one of the most spiritually guided lessons I've been apart of.
The spirit was intense and they felt it so strongly! In the end they
still decided to not continue the discussions but we left on a super
good note with them and they're more prepared for future lessons to
fully accept the gospel! That night and all day Friday were super
tough, but we kept working as hard as we could and being as obedient
as we could trying to find more people. It sucked but such is the
life.

So back to Luis! At first he didn't want anything to do with us but I
sweet talked him into giving us his number. Called him Friday and he
was super excited that we called! He was like this "hey hey when can
we meet?! Can I come to the church and we can talk more?! Can I bring
my friend?!?!" It was so weird hahah that's never happened to me
before. So we met with him Saturday! It was so legit! He was really
interested and speaks perfect English but my companion doesn't, so we
spoke in English and they spoke in Valenciano lol. We taught him in
Spanish though so we each knew what was going on. He is really
interested and asked if we could meet again so of course we said yes!
Afterwards I was super happy because God definitely let us be broken
down Thursday to rebuild us on Saturday if we showed him our faith,
which we definitely did. That's not all!!️️

Later that night we went to visit my good friend Elder Howard's (from
Vigo) convert from a year ago. She's..interesting.. Lol. She makes us
tip-toe two floors up in complete darkness and we have to talk in
whiskers (whispers I'm guessing, I'm leaving because it's kind of cute to this mom)to not wake anybody up. Lol it's like 9 o'clock at night,
nobody's asleep. But anyways. We walk in her kitchen and there's
another girl in there. Her niece! She's been here for a week and her
best friend is a Mormon back in Niceragua! She doesn't know anything
though so we took that as a "go ahead and teach me and then in two
weeks baptize me" answer. The restoration, bam! It was unreal. The
no-lights and low-voices really added some spice to the lesson. By
spice I definitely mean spirit. It was incredible. We got back home
and hit our knees and thanked God for His miracles He gave us.
We lost two investigators, but after the trials of our faith, we
persevered and out our trust in Him, and he gave us two more right
back; better and more prepared. It was a good week(: keep the faith!!

So these weeks Conference talks consisted of numbers 2&3. I really
loved them both! I like the story of the father swimming in the lake
and almost drowning, but he kicked off his shoes with a last effort of
desperation and was able to make it through. We must use all our
strength to drop the things if the world holding us down so we can
make it through to Safety! Trials and tribulations are only there to
help us through!
The second talk was about who we are: Children of God. This should be
our first source of identity. This doesn't meant if somebody asks us
who we are we respond "a child of God" but we can not forget that. It
should give us power and motivation through trials and life. "We live
in a world that can cause us to forget who we really are. The more
distractions that surround us, the easier it is to treat casually,
then ignore, and then forget our connection with God." We cant forget
it!

Quote of the week, "If you're on the right path, it will always be
uphill. God is eager to get you to the safety of higher ground."
President Eyring

Faith keepin',
Elder Gearig