Last of the Mohicans!

  

Well still in Los Angeles California, and as the title of the email says I am the last of the Mohicans. It's a nick name all the missionaries in my zone have affectionately given me. 

  Not much happened this week to tell you the truth, but some pretty good stories. First of I fell of my bike the other day. In my defense I'm pretty sure that this city is booby trapped... my tire got stuck in a small grate on the side of the rode. I'm a bit scraped but other than that I'm doing great. 

   Also I went on splits with Elder Cisneros on Saturday and we had a way cool experience. We visited a less active that they had not seen in a long time. When we knocked at the door he was very happy to see us, as most of the L.A people are when we come. He invited us in and we talked for a bit. He asked if we wanted to eat with him. Us not having a dinner set up for the night accepted. As he cooked he told us that the food that he was cooking he had bought for some work friends the other day but he forgot to take it with him. Later that day he thought why would I think to buy all of this food and then just for get it. He then told us now he knows it was so that he could feed the missionaries. If he wouldn't have forgotten the food the other morning he wouldn't have anything to offer. We had a great time with him and it gave us the opportunity to find him. He was going to go to the store that night but thought I have food already. Wow.

  We had a great experience at the Visitors Center with a family a 5 that we are teaching. They had a hard time believing in one true church and said that they would make their judgment afterwards. We watched a Family video and asked them if they wanted to live together forever. They said yes and we said this is the way, the only way. They understood. I was so relieved. 

  So far no progress on our marriage licenses with our investigators but we are working our butts off. At the Visitors Center last night as well we had a great musical production by a missionary that served here.  Mom I love the songs.  If you could send more Disney and the sound track to Prince of Egypt. Also the song Libertad mean Freedom!!! It just sounds cool in any language FREEDOM!!! LIBERTAD!!! haha. Best of the week was The Visitors Center and the worst was my bike accident. Well I love you all and I hope to hear from you all soon. 

Hasta luego

Con Amor

Elder Chriss

It looks like Elder Chriss has not lost his sense of humor!  Happy Birthday Elder Jensen!

Elder's Chriss and Abbott with their cute investigator family at the LA Temple Visitors Center.

Last the Best of all the Rest!

Well the big news for Visas waiters is that they all got their visas... Unfortunately I didn't get mine this time around. I'm not going to lie, I'm pretty dang bummed out. I got several calls from the other two visa waiting elders in our mission asking if I got mine and on email today it looks like both Elder Hankins and Williams got their visas. I am super happy for them, and excited for the opportunities they will experience. Maybe next week right?

Well this was a great week! The funny thing is as a missionary you come out and you baptize, but me and my Companion are here getting people hitched! That's right we are working our buts off in the attempt to get 2 marriage licenses for our investigators. We are teaching Rocky and Aida, a great family in a pretty tough situation. They love the church and want to be baptized but all they need to do is get married. 

 

Freddy and Esmerelda are a part-member family and to get Esmereld baptized all she needs to do is get married! We have three baptism dates all waiting on a marriage license haha. They are great families and I'm so lucky to be teaching them. 

 

When it comes to miracles I haven't had one (that i have seen) this week. One crazy thing this week was that we needed to be in our house by 6 o'clock this past Wednesday. Supposedly there is some rioting going around the city so we all had to be indoors... just in case. But I can promise you that every thing is fine and dandy.(mom) 

 

I am really enjoying my area, there are a lot more Latinos in this area so I can use my Spanish alot more and almost all the people we talk to speaks Spanish. I love my comp, he is super fun and very positive. 

 

It's cool to seen Hermana Warner all the time for things. I see here quite a bit since she is in my branch. She seems to be loving her native comp. No weird foods to report as of this transfer but I'm keeping my fingers crossed. 

 

We still run every morning but it is no longer a rule to do so.  As far as music, I would love some Disney music and one song in particular from Andrea Bocelli. its called Libertad! Its my favorite. 

 

I'm so grateful for this opportunity of serving a mission and to bring the gospel to peoples lives. I pray for all of you and I miss you dearly.

 

Hopefully a visa will be my next news for you. 

 

Con Amor

Elder Chriss

 

 

 

There and back again, an Elders tale!

 

Elder Chriss and his new District! Including his friend from Oly Hermana Warner and his new companion Elder Abbott!

Well I am back to the area that I came to for my first day in the mission. If you remember I came out with a one day trainer for a day until President decided who I was do be with. So Elder Chriss is back in Lynwood Southgate 1st branch! 

Well to start things off I have a new comp, Elder Abbot. So far I love the crap out of him! He is fun and he is not... trunky! He has been in this area for 2 transfers so he knows his stuff. This new area is pretty big and again I am in a bike area. We have quite a few members and a ton of less actives. We will definitely be busy this transfer. 

Our apartment is nice and roomy. Luckily Elder Abbott killed all the roaches before I came with traps. So I'm going 3 for 3 on buggless apartments. so that is some positive news. The Branch that I am in is small and it needs some lovin!  It is still a branch and not a ward just because we don't have enough active members. 

Also some pretty cool news Hermana Warner and her companion is in the branch as well, they are white washing their area. Funny thing is that yesterday both Hermana. Warner and I spoke in church.... Man they chose the 2 whitest people in the building to speak in the Spanish branch which I thought pretty funny. I can definitely work on my Spanish, but wow I don't know where the words came from (God obviously). 

 

We have been doing quite a bit of service in this area its great. 

 

One thing that I have noticed is that missionaries are no longer tracting in LA as much. After the broadcast we as missionaries are focusing on member work. With all the changes you can't help think "Wow the work is moving along".

 

We haven't heard anything about recent changes to the mission we just hear things from our President when ever he decides what is best for the mission and we still have our back packs here. 

 

Mom I love all the care packages that you have been sending to me. If you could send me some Andrea Bocelli that would be fantastic. Also more pictures of family and friends would be great.

 

For this week my best is my new Comp! I am so lucky to have him as a companion. As for my worst it;s just being away from my family. 

 

Before I leave y'all, I want to bear my testimony of this Gospel.

 

Yo se que este iglesia es la iglesia de Dios, Se que Jesucristo es me salvador y la Roca de nuestro Salvacion. Mediente El, podemos vivir con nuestro familias para siempre. "Recodad hijos mios quien es la Roca de nuestro Redentor" El es Cristo. en quien lo debo todo lo.

 

I love you all and hope to hear from you soon!

Love Elder Chriss

 

A member from his old area

Some graffiti from his area

 

3rd Transfer, 3rd Area, 3rd Companion!

The sweet family that treated the Elders to "The Boiling Crab"!  Thanks for taking good care of my son!

Hey everybody how's it going? 

Well its that time again... Transfers, I will be moving again to an new area. My new area will be North Lynwood with Elder Abbot. I am excited for all the things and experiences that I will have in my new area. I wish that I was staying in Cimarron, just because I want to get to know the families in an area better than I have so far. But we will have to see. It will be interesting to see if I leave for Argentina at the end of this transfer. No more news of coarse about my visa but that's alright I'm needed here for a reason. 

It was weird saying good bye to Elder Winterrose, although I am excited for him to leave and to start his life. He is going to school at BYU Hawaii. 

All I have to say is that a mission is the hardest thing that I have ever done, and all of your love and support really keeps me going. Going from place to place is really hard because I don't have that ward family connection  with any one yet, mainly because I'm moving so much. But I am staying strong and working hard. 

 

This was a long week. Elder Winterrose had a bigilion things that he had to do before he left so I was just a tag along for most of the week.  This Sunday was great though because we had a Departing Missionary Fireside. This Is a fireside where all the leaving missionaries go up sing and bare there testimonies. It was cool to see all of the missionaries that have given two years of their lives to the Lord. It was also super cool when President Weidman asked the people in the audience who were baptized by one of the missionaries up front to stand. Nearly 20 stood up. It was so cool to see the work of the Lord done by these Elders.

 

Next week I will tell you all about all of my new stuff (Companion and Area) haven't met him yet....  

 

For the 4th of July we watched a super big firework show over the USC Coliseum, which is right next to our apartment. It was so cool to watch them from our apartment. The rule for the mission was to be back home by seven 'o clock so we got to watch all of those. 

 

The members in the ward are fantastic, they feed us mostly every night and I rarely have to cook.  When I do have to cook I usually boil water and cook frozen Ravioli. So my cooking skills aren't needed to bad.

 

With the new president, he has pretty much thrown out all of the rules that President Baker made. He says that we use our judgment if what we are doing is best for the mission. He told us to just follow the Missionary Handbook. So not to much change. 

 

Elder Winterrose and Elder Chriss.  Their last dinner before Elder Winterrose heads home!  Good luck Elder! (I think they both went to the same barber where my Marine son-in-law gets his hair cut!)

Best part of the week was one of our families took us to an amazing seafood place last night, I'm not the biggest fan of seafood, but man that was great.. It was called the Boiling Crab. 

 

The worst part was finding out that I'm moving.... I hate to pack all of my stuff up and leave.  I swear that I leave stuff each time. 

 

Well I have to go and finish packing I love you all SOOO much especially my MOM.

I will send you a email next week.

LOVE  ELDER CHRISS!!!!

New President, No Visa!!!

   

 

New and Old!  President and Sister Weidman and President and Sister Baker!

    Well the title tells it no visa yet. So I will be here probably until August. This is a little bit of a disappointment but I'm staying cool about all of it. 

    The big news of the week is that we got a new Mission President!!! His name is president Weidman and he is fantastic. He is such a cool man, and he is the 83rd most powerful man in the world so... pretty legit. The real cool thing about this fact is that he gave it all up for 3 years to come and do the things which the Lord asked of him. We got to have a meeting as a zone with him this past Saturday. The first thing as I come up to say hi was, that he gave me a big hug. Now I've had some hugs in my life time but there is something special about getting a hug from your mission President. His wife is also super awesome. She is very sweet and kind. You can just tell that they are excited to be here in LA serving as a Mission President.

    Cool thing Number 2 was in our ward yesterday we had a special missionary meeting.  In the meeting all of us missionaries got up and bore our testimonies/gave a talk about missionary work. We also as a group sang Joseph Smith's First Vision to the tune of Come thou Fount. It was such a cool thing to do for the ward and I loved being able to sing for them. There are ten Elders in that ward so we had quite the group.

    Man the weather is about to kill me.... It is sooooo hot here in Los Angeles, and there is no relief from said hotness. Nobody in this part of town has air conditioning and neither does our apartment. This is a minor complaint that only bothers us when we stop to think about it. So just one more of many motivations to keep busy. 

    We haven't had any new investigators this week which is pretty disappointing, but we are still knockin those doors and helping out our less actives.

    Funny thing with president Baker leaving was one day he was here and the next day he was gone It wasn't a very sad deal because we didn't notice that he left. Just a text saying hey this is President Weidman! Pretty funny. 

    Didn't have the opportunity of doing service this week, I love doing service because it is one of the best ways to spread the gospel. I would rather do service for an investigator for 2 hours than tract for 4 hours. true story....

    Dad I'm so happy every time I get your letters, I miss you so much and just getting those letters lifts my spirit. I hope that you will get a letter soon I wrote one last Monday and finally had the chance to send it this Friday (Darn Busy). I really appreciate all the love you send my way. I promise I will work on getting better at sending letters. keep on sending them.

    And to all my good friends I would love to be able to send you some letters so if you want you can send me and email with you home mailing address and I will try and write you all.

   For my Best and worst of the week. The Best was meeting President Weidman and his wonderful wife. They are great people and I'm excited to get to know them more. And the worst is that my Comp is leaving this transfer so he has hit Trunkey (the want to go home) Fever pretty dang bad and so not much has been going on. One more week of the transfer. But all is good here in the hood.

    Before I leave I want to share a thought. I was reading in the new Conference Ensign, the talk by President Uchtdorf. and It made me think of this City. Where we need to accept that there is darkness in our lives and in the world- but not dwell there.  But also remember that light exists and that is where we choose to dwell. Even though things in this City aren't the brightest doesn't mean we need to dwell there. As missionaries we are to lift the light that is Christ and be the beacon to all that we come in contact. Though we live in a world where darkness is abounding every where we choose to stay positive and dwell in the light. Hope that was good I'm not the most poetic person.

  

   Well until next week, your missionary in the Los Angeles California mission

Elder Chriss

PS. MOM I LOVE YOU SO MUCH