THINGS I'M THANKFUL FOR

Letter from Nov 27, 2014

We asked Elder Sierra what he was grateful for this year and this was his reply:

 1.) I am grateful for my freedom. Freedom is God-given and it allows us to choose for ourselves what path to take. As we obey His commandments, we can achieve the peak of spiritual freedom. We were never created to be bound or enslaved by anyone, or anything. 2.) I am grateful for my family. For the bonds I have with not only my parents, brother, cousins, aunts, uncles, grandma, etc., but also with my friends that I consider my family as well. I am grateful that My Father in Heaven placed them in my path so that I could truly enjoy my life and share it with all of them. They enrich my life with happiness. 3.) I am grateful for the Atonement. I don't and will never understand the sacrifice of our Savior fully in my mortal life, but I can appreciate and apply it as much as possible. There is nothing more comforting than to know that my guilt can and will be swept away from my past mistakes. I can scratch it all away and move on. This to me will always be the most important part of the restored gospel that I share. The Restoration of Prophets, Apostles, Temples, and all the other little blessings are wonderful, but they are merely just icing on the cake. None of those things could exist without the Atonement. That is how Jesus Christ saved the world. 

D&C 46:7-8 

We must always remember to be thankful. Honestly, I do not believe the Lord really cares so much of receiving thanks, as much as he cares about us being able to see His acts of love and charity in our life. As we are thankful, not only do we show gratitude, but we notice the worth of what we have and it implies a greater meaning. It armors us against the adversary. We need never feel that we are alone, unloved, or forsaken. We should always be grateful that we are never alone. As long as we live in a state of Thanksgiving daily, Hell has no power over you. As a special servant of the Lord Jesus Christ, I testify that we will always be protected by the Armor of Righteousness as we clad ourselves with love, gratitude, and purity. May we celebrate Thanksgiving daily. In the name of Jesus Christ, Amen.

His letter:

Hey Mom,

Sorry for not mentioning that last monday was not gonna be P-Day. Hope you weren't too upset lol. Las familias Garcia y Villianueva estan haciendo muy bien. No sentiamos que estan listos para aceptar una invitacion por bautismo pero vamos a tener una actividad la proxima semana con todas de las iglesias en la comunidad. Se llama "Guardando Cristo en Navidad". Voy a cantar por el evento y invitabamos las familias para venir. Ojala que sienten el espiritu muchissimo que pueden reconocer que estan en el camino correcto. (The Garcia and Villanueva families doing very well. We don't feel they are ready to accept a baptismal invitation, however, we are having an activity next week with all the churches in our community. It's called Keeping Christ in Christmas. I will be singing at the event and we invited our families to come. Hopefully, they will feel the Spirit and can recognize that they are in the correct path.) 

Anyway, so work is going great. We are moving everything along. What is cool that we have noticed about our teaching pool is that all of our investigators found us, instead of us finding them. We are LOVIN it! We just need to keep the momentum rollin. I received one of the packages two days ago. I didn't get the other one yet, but the pink camo stocking sounds legit haha. Speaking of camo-style Christmas, I have begun an operation here in El Dorado, an operation that has been a family tradition for as long as I can remember. It will be a stake-wide activity with members and missionaries alike, bringing good cheer and hope to the poor in heart and spirit of El Dorado. Operation SECRET SANTA is BACK!! We will be donning the santa camo hats once again. We are already beginning to find homes and families that could use some serious Christmas joy. The phase one: "Mark Your Targets" has already begun. I will update you on that operation next coming P-Day. So the zone here would like to say, "THANKS FOR THAT PECAN PIE!!!!!" (I shared). It was AWESOME (as always)! We appreciate the treats you send us, thanks. Also, for today we are eating with some members. We've got like 4 families that invited us over. We feel ill-prepared to eat 4 Thanksgiving meals, but we will see what happens with the upcoming match on Elders vs. Food! Other than that, we just had a turkey bowl that was setup by yours truly (that's just tradition!) and it was a blast. We got some good hits and I had some pretty good runs. Caught the ball on the 50 yard line, then I ran it down to the end zone (got by 7 people). It was legit. I got hit pretty hard as well (totally blindsided), knocked all the wind out of me, but I'm all right. It was a lot of fun. I'll send you a picture of my team (we won). We played against some guys we found on the field already. So much fun (cuz we WON). We are having a great time right now. It's a full-day p-day. So about the tree, we will be working with some members on a Christmas tree farm this Saturday and they said we can buy a nice size one for cheap. We are gonna have all the elders at our place opening presents at our tree, so we are gonna get a good sized one. It'll be pretty sick! I wouldn't send any ornaments until I get the actual size of the tree. I'll send you a pic on my next p-day. So touching on the new baby, she is ADORABLE!! I hope I get to meet her someday. There is not much else to talk about right now. Love you Mom! Happy Thanksgiving!!

Elder Sierra

p.s. tell all the Family that I love them.

RECENT PICTURES FROM THE SACRAMENTO MISSION

My whole zone on our hike.

 

Some of my district elders. My companion, Elder Osorio, is with the dog, Elder Bancroft is wearing the cowboy hat and Elder Yi is the Korean Elder. the member is Brother Swarbrick. He is awesome and takes care of me for ya! lol

Glorious Miracle! We got steak!!

THINGS ARE GREAT HERE IN THE HILLS OF GOLD!
Letter from Nov. 18, 2014

Dear Mom,

I am staying here in the hills (SO HAPPY) and I keep my current companion (even HAPPIER). Yeah, Osorio and I are stoked. We wanted to stay another transfer together so we could continue to see the work progress. We have added 2 new families, the Perez family and the Garduno family. They are all open to receiving the gospel and we are very excited that we finally have an actual TEACHING POOL!! On top of all that, the stake president (great guy) has granted us permission to go and work with all the ward mission leaders in the entire stake so that we can try to find more (Spanish) work and coordinate with them accordingly. President Jardine has mentioned to us many times on how much he appreciates our desire to get things rolling. He understands that work here is very difficult, but that we have been pressing forward and trying to be creative in coming up with ways to make the work here effective. We have had to work very closely with the wards, individually, as well as on a stake level. It's pretty funny. We meet more with the stake president than the zone leaders do, haha. I gotta say this has been one of my greatest challenges yet, but Elder Osorio and I just love it here. We love the work here, the members, the people we are blessed to teach, and we wouldn't trade it for anything else. Things are great here in the Hills of Gold. 

How is everything going for Thanksgiving and Christmas preparation? I hope that you guys aren't stacked with a long list of stuff again. Please don't kill yourselves by over volunteering again! Well, anyhow, I have been asked to sing for a multi-faith event on Dec. 5th. It's an event that is titled, "Keeping Christ in Christmas". I will be singing "O Holy Night" and also "I Wonder as I Wander". I am humbled to have been asked to sing. The Stake President had asked me to sing, so it will be a great experience. That is all that is happening as of right now. I will keep you posted if anything new comes up. Love you all!

Elder Sierra

A MIRACLE AND LA FAMILIA VILLANUEVA. LOOKS LIKE THINGS ARE PICKING UP IN EL DORADO

Letter from 11/10/14

Hey Mom,

Sorry that I am responding to you so late. Our zone just got back from an AWESOME hike in the mountains along a beautiful lake. We had a lot of fun. 

So, this week we did have a miracle. We got a referral from President Weston (Stake prez) and it went wonderfully. We have just added a family of 5 and we are very excited. They are the Garcia family and they have been very open to the gospel, especially the father, Juan. He has a very solemn and profound love for his family and he has had the opportunity to visit the temple in Salt Lake and the one here in Sacramento. He actually likes the missionaries and respects what we teach. In fact, after we gave the lesson he came up to us, gave us his number, then told us that Thursday and Saturday nights are the best way to go. I love it when they give us a schedule to come back haha. He is very humble and we are very excited. 

So now, we are working with him and also with a part-member family, la familia Villanueva. The wife is not a member and has been a little hesitant on being baptized simply because she is afraid of what her parents would think. Well, as luck would have it, her parents now live with them and we have actually begun the discussions with them......and they LOVE IT hahaha. So freakin' hilarious. I looked at Hermana Villanueva y le dije que, "No tienes ninguna excusa ahora." ( I told her that "you don't have any excuse now) So we are gonna see where that goes. It's not pitch perfect here in El Dorado, but things are getting better little by little and President called me and my companion and commented on the fact that things were looking like they were getting better. It's nice to hear support from your President. So anyway, things here are on the rise. 

I am happy that Benjamin and you have been having a fun time with genealogy work. I need to get on that when I return home. Right now, my work is for the living, not the dead, but once my mission here is completed I will get into the habit of doing that. That is pretty cool that we are related to Danish Kings. Well, mom, I don't have too much to talk about today, other than the fact that Osorio and I ARE SO HAPPY with the package you sent me. It is the best. We love the cd's. Thank you so much.

Elder Sierra

HEAVEN FORBID I QUESTION IT TWICE!

This week's letter

Hey Mom, 

This week hasn't been the best, as far as lessons are concerned. We haven't been having the best of luck in our area with lessons. It's been scarce as of late. Something that will change this week. We will try harder to contact more people and to get a lesson in. 

Something that has been nice, though, was that we have been doing a lot of service and have had many opportunities to work with members lately which has aided us in receiving referrals to find people to teach. We have also been strengthening the less actives and have found an investigator through working with them, as well. In short, we have seen some sparks happen and we are hoping to continue to fan the flames. 

There was one cool experience that I had. Last Friday, we were heading over to an area to contact a referral, Then, I received an impression to go and see Hermano Juarez. I'm all like, "We saw him yesterday, Why do we need to see him again?" Then the impression came to me again that we go to Hermano Juarez and Heaven forbid that I question it twice!! I turned to my companion and told him, "I feel like we need to go see Hermano Juarez," to which he responds, "I've been feeling the same." With that, we did an about-face and went to his home. We got there and saw that there was an ambulance there and I saw that they were carrying Hermano Juarez into the van. His sister came over to me and told me to follow her to the hospital. We got back into the truck and we booked it to the hospital. We got there before the ambulance did. He had fainted, due to pneumonia and water in his lungs, and now he is being prepped for open-heart surgery. We were able to see him real fast (he was not looking good) and offer a quick prayer for his health. The next day, we received a call from his sister telling us that he got moved to a hospital near downtown Sacramento and asked us to come over Sunday to give him a blessing before the operation. It was WAYYYY out of our area, but I wanted to be there to help, so I called President Jardine. I explained the situation to him and he agreed saying, "I believe it is a necessary and vital need to have the missionaries always be on call to help their members in their respective areas." He went on to add, "Usually, I wouldn't let missionaries go so far out of their area and I would get other missionaries to go there, but I trust you, Elder Sierra, and I know you love those you serve, so you have my permission to go and give him a blessing." That meant a lot to me. I really love my Prez. He is a great man and is very in tune with the Spirit. I wouldn't have any other leader. We went over yesterday to administer the blessing and the Spirit was there and it was a comforting feeling to everyone in the room. Ricardo Juarez feels happy and ready for his operation. We are expecting to hear how it went very soon. 

That's all the major news that has been going on lately. We will be throwing a surprise party for a cool Elder in our zone named Elder Bancroft. He is newer in the mission, but is a great guy. I had the chance to perform with him as we jammed on the guitar and the uke. It was pretty freakin cool. Elder Osorio and I have been planning this since yesterday and we've got everything prepped. We have a pretty unified zone (I really love it here). Mom I love you as always and I will hear from you soon.

Elder Sierra


Pics from a member's house in El Dorado Hills and from a concert Elder Sierra played in.

On a mission from God!

Jammin' on the uke with Elder Bancroft

THE YOUTH ARE WHERE IT'S AT!
More pics 
Letter from Oct. 20, 2014

Hey Mom,

Things are beginning to roll here in El Dorado. Elder Osorio and I are determined to get things moving here with Spanish work. We are still working with our prominent investigator named Margartia Mendoza and we have been talking with the members around the stake and several ward mission leaders about some ideas we are starting to implement here in the mission. We have also been getting a very positive response from members all around the stake. We have received several referrals last week. A couple of them, surprisingly, were from the youth here. Pretty awesome, right! I gotta say, referrals from the members are wonderful, but I have found that when youth reach out to their friends and invite them to learn about what we share, it is usually a much better turn out. They, for some reason, seem more intrigued, they aren't set in their ways and are more open-minded. Best of all, they are usually more curious. It's wonderful to see the youth try to help us in our work. I love the stake here. Work here is hard, and after about two weeks, we have deduced that tracting just straight up doesn't work here (most ineffective way to find people). EVERYONE is spread out and the Spanish people themselves are hidden all over. I was a little worried because I wanted to keep my teaching in Spanish up, but I have been translating sacrament a whole lot lately. I'm actually pretty good, when people aren't talking at lightning speed!! My Spanish has seriously come along. I understand 90% of everything. There are words here and there that I don't know, but vocabulary comes with time. Also, my grammar is coming along nicely, as well. It was TERRIBLE in the beginning of my mission, but now it's much better. Many people have asked me if I had learned my Spanish from my parents and I'm like, "No. Aprendi todo que yo se aqui en la mision." And they are like, "MANDE!!!!!" They thought I just grew up speaking it, which makes me feel happy. I have been working hard on my Spanish. It's an honor to be able to have finally gotten the language down. I can proudly say that I am proficient in the language and that if you stuck me in a random city with nothing but Spanish speakers, I would get around just fine. So anyway, everything in El Dorado is great. Its a very rural place, but I love it....What's also awesome is that we have dinner EVERY NIGHT! It's real cool. They all love it when we come by.

Us in the diner with some members of our district and the Roberts Family (the family we live with)

Golden Sunsets of El Dorado

OPERATION IGNITE!
 
Letter from Oct. 13, 2014

Hey Mom,

About my new area, the place is literally bursting with energy. The members here are ON FIRE! I've realized that this area is definitely hard. The area is huge and it's widespread, not to mention, the concentration of Latinos are all over the place and practically hidden. However, Elder Osorio and I have identified the problem: one, we have not explored other areas, two, the stake is unaware of our circumstances, and three, we have been contacting the same people over and over again. To combat the problems that we have here, we created a plan of action. Because my companion and I both have plans for the military in the future, we came up with, "Operation Ignite!". Like the name, we want to ignite the Spanish work here in El Dorado. We have 3 objectives that we are going to meet. We want to start growing a pool of progressing investigators, we want to have firm STAKE member support, and we want to reactivate the very small group of members and recent converts that we have to solidify our current group. We have the details all planned out and we have met with a few of the ward mission leaders from around the stake, our bishop, and our stake president. They are all behind us 100%. We have received 4 referrals after implementing this operation two days ago. We have an investigator already, named Margarita Mendoza, who is progressing towards baptism. We are going to set a date with her for this month. We are very stoked. We can feel the energy and the urgency of the work here. We can't wait to see the fruits of it all. El Dorado is definitely going to ignite. The area has so much potential. The real problem that this area has had is the fact that the missionaries that worked here were not that experienced and also weren't very creative. 

Elder Osorio is the perfect companion for me to have here. He has been out for 8 months and is still figuring it all out, but he will be just fine. He is a fast learner. The guy is also very organized. I have done what I can to help him, but he has done 80% of the work in organizing the area books, the registries, dividing the area maps accordingly, and he has been making files for the members in El Dorado that speak Spanish, so we can use them to help aid our work here. The guys is really on top of things. He is also a native from Mexico. His Spanish is fluent, which is a bonus! I didn't want to help another missionary work on his language while we were here. In short, work is progressing here and we are very excited to make it all explode in the City of Gold. 

I am happy to hear things are going [good] at home...I also hope that Benjamin will be able to continue to excel in martial arts. He is pretty good at being basically great at everything he does. And from what Dad has been telling me, he has been a very busy boy and also a great help to you. That does me good to see that he really has magnified his callings, especially as a son, above and beyond the call of duty. I keep him and, of course, all of you in my prayers. Not much more to mention. I love you all. 

Elder Sierra