Week 86 - March 23, 2020 "Wild Week!"

Hey! This week took a wild turn! So the corona virus is starting to get here to my mission (I think there are like 8 people with it) and it happened like all this last week pretty much. Things got switched up and I'm going to finish my mission on my 15th transfer because they're sending the missionaries who are almost done early so I have 5 weeks left in my mission. So we've been inside all day just making lots of phone calls and trying to have video lessons with our people and marking book of Mormons for the future to use and give to people that we teach. That family that we were teaching - the Sotos are progressing and they actually accepted a baptismal date for the 6th of April! We have been messaging with them and we sent them a video of us singing a hymn and they sent us one back of them singing and it was so sick!! They went online and found a church song and sung it all for us. So cute haha. We got special permission from our mission president to leave the apartment and teach them yesterday with a member and it was great! The member made and brought carne asada to the lesson so we were down. Being inside all the time has most definitely not been easy but we are trying to make the most of it. I think like 30 missionaries from my mission got sent home today. Because of that some areas closed and Elder Lyman is going to be here in a trio with us. It's kinda nice though because he was a here in this area like 6 months ago and knows a lot of formers and members and stuff so it will be a nice opportunity to have him with us. We have basically been living off of like the same food every day which has been cereal because the stores have been straight empty but we went to the store super early this morning and made a line outside the store and got so blessed to get eggs and milk and bread!! Such a blessing! Hope you guys are good! Send me an email!

Elder Freedman

Making marked book of Mormons outside our door ahahaha my companion decided to go photo shoot mode 

Week 85 - March 16, 2020

Hey! First off. Before anything, shoutout to the boy Nic Cliff for turing 21. Love you forever man. I hope it was a special birthday. Transfers were last night and I found out that I'm going to be staying in this area! I honestly truly thought I was going to be leaving and when I found out it was quite the surprise. I know that everything happens for a reason though and I know that all we can do is work and pray and leave the rest up to God. This week was a little different. Just like every other mission email the corona virus is switching things up a little bit with the work. It was a little interesting to not have church at the chapel on Sunday - instead we had it outside a members house underneath a tree. It was honestly so cool and it made me want to move out to the middle of nowhere where there is a tiny branch on an island or something. Little settings like that are so cool and in some aspects allow the meeting to be so much more personal! As this last week was the last week of the transfer me and my companion hit the streets hard and were able to see some cool blessings from God - one of those blessings being the Soto family! They're so cool and very prepared to listen to the gospel. Every time we come by they have chairs all ready and set up outside for us. We weren't able to have a service at the chapel so we brought it to their home and brought one of our favorite members - Bibiana with us to the devotional. It was great! We are excited for what lies ahead. We also had a few exchanges this week - I went with Elder Openshaw on Tuesday and Elder Johanson on Thursday. 

I found a quote similar to this on gospel library and I really liked it. Obviously it's super common but too applicable to our lives! 

"stick to your task till it sticks to you

beginners are many, enders are few

happiness, blessings, peace and praise

will always come to the one who stays

stick to your task till it sticks to you

bend at it, sweat at it, smile at it, too;

for our of the bend and the sweat and the smile

will come life's victories after a while"

love you guys!

Elder Freedman

Week 84 - March 9, 2020 "Great Week!"

Well, were nearing the end of this transfer and time is flying! I cant believe there are 3 months left in my mission. I really have enjoyed this last week. Sadly, a lot of the people that we were teaching who had come to church the week before didnt like church too much because so many people kept bearing their testimonies about joseph smith and they were expecting a sacrament meeting full of messages about Jesus.. Because of that our teaching pool has gotten a little bit smaller but i think thats a good reminder to all of us that we really remember why we go to church and why we are part of this restored gospel. Its because God and Jesus Christ love us so much that they brought the restored gospel back to the earth. Other than that I believe this is going to be my last week in this area but we will see what God has in store! For pday today we went to these places called Bodegas and got 200 pounds of ties and threw them in the back of our truck.. HAhah. Other than that the work goes forward and we keep on going! Shoutout to timpview lax BEAT EAST. 

Here are some pictures! for those of you who know Maude Call, she is in my same ward right now serving! La vida es loca! two tbirds in the same ward! 

have a great week! 

Elder Freedman

Elder Freedman and Sister Maude Call  - Friends from before the mission

 An Entire Bail of Ties

Week 83 - March 1, 2020 "Good Week :)"

Hey! This week went by so fast. It was insane. We had a great week working and really saw some blessing from Heavenly Father this week. My companion is an awesome guy honestly. This week we had an exchange with the Assistants and it was pretty fun. Lots of office work hahah. We went and picked up a new missionary from Oaxaca and that was fun. We found two new cool families this week - the Rochas and the Gonzales fam. They both came to church and it was a huge blessing to have them there! We will see how it progresses! I'm super sad this transfer has gone by so fast - we're already on the second to last week! We also had MLC which was fun last week. To be honest I am loving my personal studies. If I could give any advice, I think that something I have learned is to study deeply the simple things about the gospel. I don't really know how much knowing all of the deep doctrine in the world can really help us.. We need to be careful how deep we get before we get so lost in unimportant things that don't pertain to our salvation.  but if we have a strong testimony of the simple things, I think that's what will carry us through the hardest times. I have loved reading the Book of Mormon and I know that its true. Here are some scriptures that I loved from this week: 

will ye not now return unto me, and repent of your sins, and be converted, that I may ^cheal you?

14 Yea, verily I say unto you, if ye will ^acome unto me ye shall have ^beternal life. Behold, mine ^carm of mercy is extended towards you, and whosoever will come, him will I receive; and blessed are those who come unto me.

15 Behold, I am Jesus Christ the Son of God. I ^acreated the heavens and the earth, and all things that in them are. I was with the Father from the beginning. ^bI am in the Father, and the Father in me; and in me hath the Father glorified his name.

21 Behold, I have come unto the world to bring ^aredemption unto the world, to save the world from sin.

22 Therefore, whoso ^arepenteth and cometh unto me ^bas a ^clittle child, him will I receive, for of such is the kingdom of God. Behold, for such I have ^dlaid down my life, and have taken it up again; therefore repent, and come unto me ye ends of the earth, and be saved.

Have a wonderful week! Love you guys so much!!!!

Elder Freedman

Week 82 - February 24, 2020 "Back To The Drawing Board"

Hey! This week was pretty good to be honest! Me and my companion are having a good time but we most definitely we're expecting a good amount of people at church last week and no one came! We had a list of 20 families who had told us they were going to come but we honestly still had a good week. 

It's time to go back to the drawing board for sure but we have hope and faith that things will turn around! One super special thing was before stake conference Elder Faupula called me and said that some people I had the opportunity to teach we're receiving their patriarchal blessings last Sunday and I got to sit in during their blessings! It was super special! Shout out to Andrew and the rest of my family sure love you guys. and Charlie for throwing a double backflip on skis. Pretty cool man hahaha. Love you guys. I'm super bad at taking pictures but we had stake conference just barely and there was a 70 who came and he asked me to help draw a 15 person bike. it was kinda hard but a member took a pic of me with the board. Sorry hahaha that's one of the only pics I have. Time flies too fast to think! 

Elder Freedman 

1. 15 Person Bike

2. me and elder Hathaway 

Week 81 - Feb 10, 2019 "FELIZ CUMPLEAÑOS CARLITOS !"

Hey! First off happy birthday to my boy Chuck! LOVE YOU SO MUCH! Be careful man. No crashing cars. This week was quite the change going from Laredo to Hidalgo Zone but it's been a great first week! I was pretty used to my last area which is like suuuper compact and narrow streets etc. and here in Mission (my area now) it's a lot of houses that are spread out over a long distance. The cool thing though is that there are a lot of huge families here in this area. My companion is a beast  - his name is Elder Theel and he is from Washington. We get along good. At first this week we really weren't finding anyone who was interested at all.. By the end though we started to see some changes and I'm really hoping that we can have the chance to teach some of the people that we've met recently. We will see what happens and pray for the best! The mission is going good. It has been and still is a big learning experience... Something I have been thinking about is how high of a standard people hold Joseph Smith to. I was thinking about it and if I was in his position, I think I would've made a TON of mistakes.. I think a lot of people put him on a pedestal having expected him to be a perfectly celestial being, when really he was also just as us, an imperfect human. I read a quote from him that I thought was funny but that I really liked.

“I am like a huge, rough stone rolling down from a high mountain; and the only polishing I get is when some corner gets rubbed off by coming in contact with something else, striking with accelerated force, … all hell knocking off a corner here and a corner there. Thus I will become a smooth and polished shaft in the quiver of the Almighty”

Life most definitely wrecks us sometimes but the only way to have it, is to have it. When we accept it and change we are refined.

Have a great week!

Elder Freedman 

Week 80 - January 27, 2019 - "Great Week"

Hey everyone! I hope everything is going well back home!

This week was great - maybe a little bit less wild from last week but still a super fun time. This week we met some cool new people. I'm excited to see what happens with them. Sadly, I think there could be a chance that I could be moved from Laredo because transfers are next week. Anna is still progressing super well and honestly she is a super big example of someone with faith. Even with a lot of opposition, something I think is super cool is her ability to hold fast to the things that God has witnessed to her, testifying to her that these things are true. Something super fun happened this week - I got to go on exchanges with our mission presidents son, David. My companion stayed with President Ocampo to go to a stake training and David and I went out to visit some people. I wish I had more to write about this week. Everything is turning into a blur out here! Was reading the scriptures and I loved this verse in proverbs: 

11 My son, despise not the chastening of the Lord; neither be weary of his correction:

12 For whom the Lord loveth he correcteth; even as a father the son in whom he delighteth.

13 Happy is the man that findeth wisdom, and the man that getteth understanding.

14 For the merchandise of it is better than the merchandise of silver, and the gain thereof than fine gold.

Pics: 

1. Birthday dinner at the Villareals

2. The beast Hermano Villareal. They feed us so well. Carne Asada for days <3