Lows Don't Last Forever

Hey guys hope everyone is staying safe with the fires and the hurricane. And I guess if you're really bored you can go ahead and read this. This week was actually really fun and was just about as opposite as last week as you can get. Now most trials don't disappear quite so suddenly but I thank Heavenly Father for showing me just how fast he can do it. 

This week our investigator Lisa invited her husband to join the call with us because meeting with us has helped her so much. Well he loves us as well now and we had some amazing lessons with them this week. They are working on getting their daughter and son in the call as well! 

Also thank you to my mom for the clutch by sending me Bang! (for those who don't know it is an old west game involving shooting everyone) over Amazon. We have immensely enjoyed a new game here and just to spice it up we all talk in western accents to give us some amazing laughs. In fact most days we will just talk in the accent for random stuff. Then on Friday we had zone conference which was awesome but also Elder C got a package he was supposed to have gotten for his birthday last week but didn't. Inside held a variety of gifts but the one that had the most impact was the balloons that his mom placed inside. So yes that night we spent an hour and half making balloon animals and jokes and it truly was one of the best nights of my mission. 

I loved this week because it shows that when you're working hard and everything seems to just be going wrong, sometimes you just need to keep going until it starts going right. But in those times we also need to be looking for little ways to improve. Something I loved this week was about the people of Ammon. The courage for them to willingly surrender their sins to the Lord was incredible but the fact that they would rather die than pick up those sins again is so cool. Sometimes we have things we want and we know it isn't what God wants but when we are willing to surrender those things to the Lord, he will bless us. Remember Mosiah 2:22 "And behold, all that he requires of you is to keep his commandments; and he has promised you that if ye would keep his commandments ye should prosper in the land; and he never doth vary from that which he hath said; therefore, if ye do keep his commandments he doth bless you and prosper you." God wants us to keep his commandments so he can bless us. And if we are willing to show our commitment like the people of Ammon amazing blessings will follow. As always I'm praying for Y'all and I hope you're doing well

-Elder Pettingill

Pics

-my flower I made out of balloons (sorry it's the only pic I got)

This Week Just Kinda Sucked

 Well guys not much happened honestly. I hope y'all are doing well. As y'all can tell, this week wasn't the best but that is ok because in life sometimes you've got some low points but as you keep a positive outlook everything will go ok. But some major down points this week were that our "golden" investigator who was super awesome disappeared off the face of the Earth. We've tried texting, we've tried calling, we've tried knocking on his door. Nothing. So that was probably the biggest low point. Other than that we just haven't been able to teach as often this week so it was just really slow. However, today we had a fun time as a district where we played kickball and ultimate frisbee so that was a nice way to get this hopefully better week started. 

Also something from the Book of Mormon that I really liked was in 2 Nephi 8: 9 "Awake, awake! Put on strength, O arm of the Lord; awake as in the ancient days. Art thou not he that hath cut Rahab, and wounded the dragon?" I really like this because sometimes we forget where we came from and so it's easy to think about this time on Earth as everything. But what I realized reading this was we fought a war in heaven man. We backed up Jesus when so many of our brothers and sisters wanted to take the easy way out but we aren't here for the easy way and nothing can stop us here either. So if you're worried about sharing the gospel or this life ain't going too hot, remember that you backed the Lord and he's gonna back you. Thanks y'all hopefully see ya next week. But honestly who knows the world could end by then.

-Elder Pettingill

The "How to get a missionary from another church" book

Alright fellas this week was pretty uneventful other than we picked up Elder H. For the pranks that happened, yes he believed I was Brazilian for the first few days until I finally decided to tell him I wasn't; yes we gave him the backing vest and yes he is still wearing it thinking that he needs to until he gets "certified" which isn't a thing. To all my friends currently serving a mission, if your trainer has you doing something that doesn't make sense, it's probably because you don't have to actually do that. We also convinced him that certain words in Spanish meant other things and got him to say some pretty funny things. (I will not repeat the things that he said so don't ask). Elder H is from Montana which is sweet because that's where Sister H (friend from home) is and he lived super close to her (about an hour away from where she is currently at).

Other cool things that happened. We were teaching this guy P (he's literally the best) and as a fun introduction for lessons with Elder H, we helped P to decide to be baptized, so he's now working towards baptism on the 30th! Also, as Elder H's first lesson he had the wonderful encounter with a woman from another church seeking advice about how she can be a good missionary. Honestly the first time I've come across this but we taught a short lesson about faith and had a prayer but we've planned for the next time we meet with her to introduce Preach my Gospel which is like everything that we as missionaries teach. So we are about 95% sure that if she looks into that and starts reading it she will definitely make a better missionary and who knows maybe get baptized. Last thing is that I had the wonderful opportunity to teach M (friend from home) today which was super fun. I love this Gospel and I love being able to teach and help so many people, especially ones I care about. Love you all!

-Elder Pettingill

Me? A Father?

Sup guys, as my title refers to i am now training. For those who don't understand in the mission when you first enter the mission field you pretty much don't know a lot so you have to be trained by another missionary or two. Your trainer(s) are considered your dad(s) and if you're the trainer then you get a son. Well it finally happened, Elder F and I get to train a new guy which means we lost Elder D but I think I need to mention that my child has no idea what he's getting into. Pranks will be pulled and I will update you all on what we get him on. Currently he thinks I'm Brazilian so we will see how long I can pull that off for.

This week was another great week. We got to do a ton of service which included one day where we did 8 hours of service where we literally got rid of a jungle(a literal jungle) in her backyard. Then afterwards we got to check out the member's guns (mom please don't post any pictures of us with guns on FB) not much else happened though.

However I was talking with my mom this week about a mindset shift I've been trying to work on. That's the idea that we aren't in "quarantine" but that this is the new normal. Because a lot of the time we use quarantine as an excuse, an excuse to not work as hard or not do the things we know we should be doing. But when we realize this is the new normal it gives us the ability to use the time that we have to improve ourselves more. I feel like this time is one we can improve ourselves so much if we look for it. Thanks everyone and I'm praying for y'all.

-Elder Pettingill

$2 Shirts and a Hurricane

 Sup peeps, hope y'all are chillin still. This week was pretty legit. Let's start off with the fact that we went to Walmart and found some XXL $2 shirts so now my district all chills around in these shirts (peep the pic below) also y'all remember the refrigerator filled with sodas? Yeah so we didn't finished but we bough 150 more cans but I started to feel bad about all the sodas I was drinking so I've slowly gone from drinking 3 to only drinking 1 which I think is pretty good. And as the title states we had a hurricane here. Now as exciting as that sounds it actually only meant that we didn't get our excercise time and had to cancel some services. And we didn't even get to see any storms.

Now my friends from BYU can attest that if you spend enough time with me I will probably try and teach you a backflip. And if you spend enough time with me you probably will learn one. So I'm now helping about half my district learn backflips which has been fun. Also Elder Jones got golf clubs from his parents so we went golfing which was super fun. 

Not much else to add but this week I started reading the Book of Mormon in Portuguese, Spanish, and Italian. So I read the chapter first in Portuguese so I know what it says then I reread it in Spanish so I understand most of it. And then I reread it Italian where I don't understand it but because I've read it twice already I understand a lot of it. So by the time I'm done I will probably be fluent in all of those languages. We also had zone conference in person which was so great!

Not much else to add other than that our investigators are doing great and we had a goal this week of a new investigator and found this awesome lady that we are working with now.

Love y'all and I'm praying for you all.

-Elder Pettingill

Pics

-our big shirts

-us at the golfing range

-us at zone conference

Jack of All Trades

Well I'm pretty sure I'm going to come back being a pro at everything. This week we had the opportunity to do lots of service but let's start off with the beginning of the week. So on Tuesday we went to a gynecologist's office for Elder D where he found out he has shingles. (Just another proof that he's old enough to be my grandpa.) Then we had exchanges with our district leader (who is always over here) so I got to go hang out with Elder J and Elder F on Thursday while the Conway boys went and did service and got sweet food. Was I jealous, very much so. Did we do anything? No. Then Friday we did service again for that same family where we built a fence. We haven't finished it but we got to use a bunch of power tools which was awesome. I could probably build my own house now.

Our family we are teaching is still doing awesome and so is our other investigator. This week actually passed super quickly because we were pretty busy.

Honestly I don't have a lot else but something I loved from a talk by Elder Uchtdorf "remember that discipleship is not about doing things perfectly; it’s about doing things intentionally." Often times we feel like we should have been able to do things better but when we try our best God will make up the rest.

I'm praying for y'all 

--Elder Pettingill

-the fence

-The whole fence

-a blister I got from handstand walking

-the soda I drank this week. (In a fun little pattern for y'all)

I don't even know what to call these anymore

Hello my wonderful fans! I hope you aren't looking to read anything super interesting or fun because my week was pretty much the opposite of those. Except of course to note that if I watch a church movie I will cry. Period. Every. time. Thanks Dad.
This week was actually pretty good regardless of what I might say. We are still teaching our wonderful family C and W and actually had a lunch at the church with them where we played kickball with them and their 3 children. So yeah we are pretty much in with them. We are also teaching another guy who loves talking with us which is awesome.
Then we also had a couple of services which on one I wish we had a picture because with only 3 missionaries and 3 weed whackers you'd be impressed what we can get done. We also had a division with the APs this week which meant we got to hang out with Elder L who I love. He is pretty awesome. Lots of sports as well and not much else happening. I guess the last noteworthy thing is that I just completed my first transfer which is low key crazy because it feels like I haven't been here long. I love you guys and I'm always praying for y'all.

-Elder Pettingill

I figured I'd make up for the lack of stuff in the email with pictures

Pictures
-and yet it's still less soda than I drank in Brazil
-that's right I'm an English Elder now bois
-I cant explain what happened just now I'm fine
-when my parents bought all of us Chipotle for my birthday a couple weeks ago
-After exercises with Elder L
-That one time we bought a ton of pizza a while ago

 

Independence Week

Alrighty folks, hope you all had a fantastic week. If you're still reading these I'm impressed because not much has happened these past weeks I feel like.

This week was actually really good. Starting off we got our new companion Elder F who is super legit. Crazy good at every sport so it's been a good time. We were also in the CTM together which is fun. As well as a welcome gift we helped this lady in our ward move. I wont go into detail about her but she definitely hoards things and it was an insane move for sure. Then we did service with another non-member family who dropped food off for us and we totally thought they were members! But when we found they weren't we immediately set up a time to come fix up their yard and started teaching them. They are a super awesome family and five pizzas is way too much for 8 missionaries but a welcome challenge.

Then along with the arrival of Elder F we added pickleball to this weeks games and began playing Secret Hitler. We are running out of games to play it's kind of ridiculous. Pickleball may be a grandpa sport(meaning its perfect for Elder D) but it's actually still really fun. Highly suggested but paddles are not worth the big bucks. (Simply mooch off someone who already owns them) Not really sure what else happened this week, the days have begun to blur together into an endless cycle and I've lost track of what day is which. (Literally I thought it was Wednesday on Friday this last week.)

Hope y'all are doing great. This time in quarantine, I've realized, is probably the best time I've had in coming closer to my Savior. The struggles and trials of pushed me closer to God in a way I didn't imagine. Use this time for the opportunity that it is. God knows how difficult this is and will bless us for our efforts.

-Elder Pettingill

Baptisms and Transfers

Hey everyone! Hope y'all are doing well back home. I'm still chillin in quarantine but this week was one to remember.

First off not sure if I mentioned it but our AC broke last Sunday which made Florida feel a lot like Brazil. Then as luck would have it, it took them 5 days to fix it so we had the wonderful opportunity to appreciate AC for what it truly is: a miracle.

Also we had our baptism this past Wednesday, was super awesome. There weren't a lot of people there but I felt the same spirit. We had wonderful talks given by the girl's parents on baptism and the Holy Ghost and because most of the people there were non-members who of course don't know the hymns and we had no pianist and we were all wearing masks. Let's just say the hymns were definitely interesting and pretty much just consisted of me singing terribly to try cover the embarrassment of those non-members and bring some spirit to the baptism. Not (my favorite part for sure).

Lastly of note Elder M, one of my companions, was unfortunately transferred this week so we will be sorely missing him because he is the only one with formal tennis training and the rest of do not know what we are doing (and of course because he is super awesome). We've also added in sand volleyball to our daily exercises to switch it up a bit. Might add pickle ball soon though so I'll keep you updated.

Few photos this week
-Elder Pettingill

-View from our apartment
-got bored and built a card fortress(totally didn't fall 5 or 6 times before I was able to complete it)
-Baptism!!
-my zone leader and I watching the others play tennis

Miracles Happen

Not sure if this week was good or not. I think it was more good than bad though so let's go with that. This week we had a lot of success! Actually we didn't but we worked a lot harder so we felt better. We were always trying to find people and trying new techniques to help people. We focused a lot on serving people so we made a bunch of cookies and have been giving them to members that have helped us out or things like that. Then on top of that we've been praying super hard to have a baptism this month. Which meant that pretty much unless some miracle happened wasn't going to happen. But guess what God loves giving miracles when things seem impossible because we brought cookies to the Bishop here and we mentioned baptism in a prayer and he brought up a part member family who had a little girl who hadn't been baptized. We called them up and now we are baptizing her this Wednesday! They actually already wanted to baptize her but thought because of the Covid-19 they couldn't. We had called them on Saturday night and they even wanted to baptize her yesterday but they decided it wasn't enough time to let people know so we are doing it on Wednesday. I loved the wonderful way God answered our prayer. Another goal I made was to finish Jesus the Christ in 3 weeks which is very hard. Each chapter (there are 42 chapters) takes about 45 minutes to read but I love it. I've already learned so many things that I never even realized I didn't know. If you haven't read it and want to, I highly suggest it. Other than that not too much happened this week. We still played a lot of games and watched a couple of church movies. I hope you are all doing well. I'm always praying for you guys!
-Elder Pettingill

Season 3 Episode 1 The Beginner's Guide to Munchkins

Hey guys it's been awhile so let me give you a rundown. Corona hit, really messed everything, I came home, didn't do much for 10 weeks, was reassigned to serve in the Orlando, Florida mission until Brazil opens back up and then I might be able to go back but since Brazil is even more messed up because of Corona that could be a while.

So I'm here in Florida in a trio although most of the time it feels like we are actually in a group of 7 because our zone leaders and district leaders spend a lot of time in our house. I don't mind I love them all so much already. My 2 companions are Elder D, who we all call gramps because he's 27, and Elder M who's from Texas and has nice way a sayin y'all that gets me every time. All three of us served in Brazil before all this and we have the honor of being over all Portuguese investigators in our zone so it's super fun to speak in Portuguese together.

Thing is though there isn't a whole lot to do. We spend most of our time searching for people by either going through our records of who the missionaries have taught in the past to see if they would like to meet with us over zoom, trying to meet with members and get to know them, or playing games. And let me tell you we play a lot of games because those first 2 don't take a lot of time before you run out. So we've mainly played, if y'all know them: Hearts the card game, Munchkins (this game gets crazy) and Villainous (imagine Descendants but you're not the children and you're not good so maybe not actually like that all) but we've been having a good time. Luckily we also get 2 hours of sports everyday as well so Elder D and I crushed Spikeball for the first few days until everyone was sick of losing and we played some basketball and some tennis.

Now I know y'all are probably thinking you missionaries do nothing and you're almost correct but not completely. We did find two awesome people to teach, 1 Brazilian lady whose phone died in the middle of a lesson, and another lady who was super excited to start talking with us again. And we have had some awesome lessons with members this week, so yes we don't do much but the stuff we do is darn good quality.

One scripture I love from this week's Come, Follow Me is in Alma 10: 6-12. These verses talk about Amulek, who was a very well known man in the city, and his story. I love his courage and I especially love in verse 12 where it was his testimony that really helped the people understand and believe. Because the wonderful thing is when two people testify of the same story it makes it a lot harder to disbelieve so I challenge all of you to read that little bit if you haven't and share what you believe with someone else. You never know how you might affect someone. Don't be called many times and still not listen because you might change someone's life.

I love all of you guys and I pray for you
-Elder Pettingill