Sean McAlister Called to Serve: P-Day in Lenga.

I’m a little late getting this update from Sean posted. I had knee surgery Thursday, and I’m not 100% with it yet.

Elder McAlister has passed his year mark, things are going well in the area, investigators are progressing, and it sounds (and looks) like they had a great p-day yesterday.

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Hey Everyone,

Glad to hear that all went well with dad’s surgery and I hope that he is recovering. It’s still crazy to hear that Brooke and Todd are leaving and I wish them the best and I hope that you guys can move without any trouble to Oklahoma! I will pray for you! I hope that Brooke had a good birthday also. I hope that Sabrina is doing better and having fun. I am guessing that school is starting soon which should be fun for her.

This last week we had a pretty good and we worked really hard. We had an investigator come to church with us and they have a date for baptism this 6 of September. His name is Bastian! He is ten years old and we are reactivating the family which is awesome. The dad has come to church the last 3 weeks and we are hoping that he will be ready to baptize his son. We also have been working with Mirtha, and she ended up going to the hospital this last week and stayed in there until today which made it hard for her to come to church. But we had a really good day on Sunday because we found two new families and one of the family's has a date for baptism on the 13 of September. So we really had a great week. Also time is flying by so fast!!! This next week we have cambios and it is crazy how fast it is coming up.

I HAVE HIT MY YEAR MARK!!! I now have over a year but I still haven't burned a shirt yet. Elder Hoopes and Elder McAllister had a mini cambio and one of the zone leaders came and stayed at our house that night and we had to talk about our sector and what are our plans for our sectors and how we can have a better sector. I had no time to really burn a shirt! I will probably do that tonight or some night this week.

Our zone had a conference with the president this last week. There was a new announcement in our mission. All Latinos need to pray in English to learn the language and that's for everything for zone meetings and district meetings. The President of the area or the seventy are really wanting everyone to learn English which is interesting. So I have been helping my companion learn how to say prayers in English now. Also we now have to explain how a baptism can help someone in the first lesson and before first prayer. So it is a little bit harder but we can find the need a lot faster and they now know our purpose as missionary's.

On Sunday about 8:30 the 1st councilor came by our house and said that they didn't have anyone to talk this week in church. So they asked us to talk and this was my first time in my whole mission to give a talk! I was kind of nervous! I decided to talk about patience and so we had about 40 minutes to prepare for our talks. We each had about ten minutes to talk. The McAlister´s went first and then Elder Hoopes and then Elder Letelier. I accidentally took about 15 minutes and I wasn't ready to end, but I had no choice. The talk went really well and I believe that everyone needs to practice patience!

Today we had a zone activity and we ended up going to Lenga! Which I have been there 3 times now but it’s still fun to go. The zone leaders didn't really think through how we were going to get there and we ended up walking a ton and taking 3 buses and hitch hiking. But we walked forever and it kind of sucked. I ended up stepping in mud and then I tried to wipe it off and then I stepped in another and then another!!! I thought I was going to go crazy and now I have so much mud in my shoes and they smell bad too. We were walking back and we ended up hitch hiking and we got this guy to give us a ride in the back of his truck/semi and then he closed the door and there was no light. (HaHa) it was so funny but pretty scary at the same time! We couldn't see anything or we didn’t know where we were going and we were stuck in the back (HaHa). But there are pictures of us in the back of this truck and there was no light in the truck. But he turned out to be a good guy and he didn't kill us (HaHa)!!!

I love you guys and I hope you have a great week and I want you to know that I am okay and loving my mission. Thank you for all your support and all your love for me. Thank you guys for everything and I can’t wait to hear from you! Love you guys!!!

Stay classy McAlister family!!!

Love you guys!

Elder McAlister

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I was drugged up due to surgery this week, and didn’t write too much to Sean, but his mother shared the following with him: ”My thought for the week is limited, but what has been on my mind is "enduring to the end". What it takes to endure to the end in this lifetime. We go through so many different challenges and trials. Some try us to the bitter ends of what we can handle and some maybe don't seem as bad but can last a very long time. They come in all shapes and circumstances. But when we are in those trials if we take the time to ponder and really pay attention to what our Father in Heaven is wanting us to learn or if we look back on the trial months, years later, we will be amazed by how our very caring Father in Heaven has given us so much love and support through spiritual experiences, through the animals we might encounter, through the people around us. He truly does not leave us to endure on our own. His purpose is our joy and eternal life with Him. He wants us to truly be happy.”

Until next week, enjoy these pictures from Sean’s p-day yesterday…