Hola family!
So the subject line sounds a little boring this week, but in reality
it was actually a pretty cool/groundbreaking (literally) week! On
Saturday we had the opportunity as missionaries, with the American
couple Garrett and Brooklyn to sing ‘How Firm a Foundation’ for the
groundbreaking ceremony for the first real chapel here in Valencia! It
was a big deal, several hundred showed up and the building is supposed
to be a full sized chapel, just like the American ones as the members
say here, so that a big deal. We rent out the building we have
now, so it's a big deal. But it does show too how much the church has
grown here, there were zero members here in 1970, and now there is a
full stake with wards just in this city, crazy! There's also going to
be a new building in the north part of the city too, which will be
crazy as well since it possibly means a new ward! Overall, big
progress with the work in Valencia!
We also had some great progress with our investigators this week. We
gave baptismal dates to both Lola, the Spaniard slightly crazy but
cool lady, and Blessing, the Nigerian wife of Rafael, our other
investigator with a baptismal date. Great progress there, couldn't get
them to church Sunday though which was a bummer, but we still have
faith that we'll have a baptism this weekend before I'm most likely
leaving Valencia (I've been here almost 4 months, what?!).
We also had the first worldwide missionary devotional this week that
they've had in 10 years, and it was a pretty big deal! David a Bednar,
Dallin H Oaks, and Neil L Anderson, with some of the new apostles all
spoke and gave lessons on how to bring the spirit to lessons, and also
about how we need to focus on Christ more in our lessons, pretty
fuerte stuff, but definitely a cool meeting! It's online too so if you
want to watch it it's pretty sweet!
The miracle of the week wasn't as crazy as our story of Eugene this
last week, but it made a pretty big impact on me. I've been working on
making my study time more applicable to those I teach, so I've been
working hard on studying Preach my Gospel alongside the Book of
Mormon and the New Testament, which have both been great. But on
Sunday I was studying in chapter six on the Christlike attribute
Knowledge, which I thought was interesting and good, but didn't think
too much about it. After companion study we headed out and passed by
the member Eugene and his wife to see how they're doing. The miracle
was when Eugene randomly brought up his testimony about how gospel
knowledge has made a huge difference in his life, just like I had
studied that morning! So it was definitely cool to testify alongside
him about how scriptural and gospel knowledge has made an impact in my
life! I now know that study times can make a difference in our lessons
with whoever we teach!
We also got a reference from the other elders of an investigator who
works in a kabob shop, but who's super nice and loves to give free
kabobs! We spent the evening with him and the other elders on Friday
in his shop, and hopefully we'll meet with him this week at his home!
For my probably last preparation day here, we spent the day eating at
The good Burger, where I ate a double BBQ burger filled with fried
onions and bacon and beef, and followed that up with playing an epic
game of soccer with the other elders (totally had an awesome save with
a chest bump while yelling "got 'im!", so I felt pretty good about myself
after haha.So the subject line sounds a little boring this week, but in reality
it was actually a pretty cool/groundbreaking (literally) week! On
Saturday we had the opportunity as missionaries, with the American
couple Garrett and Brooklyn to sing ‘How Firm a Foundation’ for the
groundbreaking ceremony for the first real chapel here in Valencia! It
was a big deal, several hundred showed up and the building is supposed
to be a full sized chapel, just like the American ones as the members
say here, so that a big deal. We rent out the building we have
now, so it's a big deal. But it does show too how much the church has
grown here, there were zero members here in 1970, and now there is a
full stake with wards just in this city, crazy! There's also going to
be a new building in the north part of the city too, which will be
crazy as well since it possibly means a new ward! Overall, big
progress with the work in Valencia!
We also had some great progress with our investigators this week. We
gave baptismal dates to both Lola, the Spaniard slightly crazy but
cool lady, and Blessing, the Nigerian wife of Rafael, our other
investigator with a baptismal date. Great progress there, couldn't get
them to church Sunday though which was a bummer, but we still have
faith that we'll have a baptism this weekend before I'm most likely
leaving Valencia (I've been here almost 4 months, what?!).
We also had the first worldwide missionary devotional this week that
they've had in 10 years, and it was a pretty big deal! David a Bednar,
Dallin H Oaks, and Neil L Anderson, with some of the new apostles all
spoke and gave lessons on how to bring the spirit to lessons, and also
about how we need to focus on Christ more in our lessons, pretty
fuerte stuff, but definitely a cool meeting! It's online too so if you
want to watch it it's pretty sweet!
The miracle of the week wasn't as crazy as our story of Eugene this
last week, but it made a pretty big impact on me. I've been working on
making my study time more applicable to those I teach, so I've been
working hard on studying Preach my Gospel alongside the Book of
Mormon and the New Testament, which have both been great. But on
Sunday I was studying in chapter six on the Christlike attribute
Knowledge, which I thought was interesting and good, but didn't think
too much about it. After companion study we headed out and passed by
the member Eugene and his wife to see how they're doing. The miracle
was when Eugene randomly brought up his testimony about how gospel
knowledge has made a huge difference in his life, just like I had
studied that morning! So it was definitely cool to testify alongside
him about how scriptural and gospel knowledge has made an impact in my
life! I now know that study times can make a difference in our lessons
with whoever we teach!
We also got a reference from the other elders of an investigator who
works in a kabob shop, but who's super nice and loves to give free
kabobs! We spent the evening with him and the other elders on Friday
in his shop, and hopefully we'll meet with him this week at his home!
For my probably last preparation day here, we spent the day eating at
The good Burger, where I ate a double BBQ burger filled with fried
onions and bacon and beef, and followed that up with playing an epic
game of soccer with the other elders (totally had an awesome save with
a chest bump while yelling "got 'im!", so I felt pretty good about myself
Overall, lots of things to check off my list before leaving presumably
next week, so it should be a fun week! I love this area, but I'm also
excited to see where I'll spend the next 4 to 6 months!
Love and miss you all!
Elder Taylor Moulton
Selfie the Knight away! Dumb caption but cool graffiti!
Giant nepolitana with Nutella inside (75 cents what!!!???)
Found a nice car for Brian!
Groundbreaking of new church building - what an awesome experience!!
Selfie at the groundbreaking with Garrett the coolest guy ever!
On our way to the center
I'm guessing this is Vincent? They helped decorate his Christmas tree last month!
Walking through The Sciences for lunch today - this place is amazing!
Got a great deal on a Valencia scarf too! (not to wear but to hang)
A bar down the street with the name of our mission on it, oh yeah!
Average winter sunsets here in Valencia!
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