Paintball and skinny ties!

Short email this week because of a zone activity, which sound like a lot of fun.  Also a lesson on how to make you ties skinny (I personally like skinny ties).  Elder McAlister sounds in much better spirits this week.


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Hey everyone,

I am glad that everyone is doing well and I want to wish Derek a Happy Birthday, and you are so old! I hope all is well in the house and that's pretty cool that Makenzie came over to visit you guys. Where are Brooke and Todd thinking about moving to? 

Well this last week was good! Elder Ponce and I are really doing great as a companionship. We have lost our investigators, but we really have helped each other grow through this trial. Now we are back into finding new investigators. Right now we are working with some less active members and they are doing really good! This week we have really strengthened our relation with the members here and we are progressing with them! 

Well we have been making some ties skinny! Which means we will cut them open and iron it flat and then we would cut the white part in the tie and then we iron it again and then you sew it up and it’s a new skinny tie. I have done it to some of my ties and they look a lot better than before! But now there is a lot of Elders that want their ties to be skinny! 

This week we have seen a ton of new people arriving here for the university, and they have been doing pranks or traditions to all the new students. So there is a ton of people walking around with paint and ripped clothes begging for money for party's that they will do. It’s been annoying because they are always asking for money and they smell really bad! 

We ended up playing some PAINTBALL today and it was so much fun. I haven't played a game like that for so much time. We got to play in a forest area, and we all got suits to blend in and we all got a hundred bullets. We made teams and we went out and started up and we destroyed right off the bat. We did another round and we pretty much started in a valley and I thought we were done for! I was with Elder Mitton on a hill and we destroyed the other team and it was so fun. I really want to do it again but it’s really expensive. 

Hey sorry for the short email, but I really don’t have time today because of paintball. I love you guys and I can’t wait to hear from you next week. Stay safe and classy! Love you guys!

Elder McAlister 

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Spiritual thought time! A friend of mine posted this quote by President Dieter F Uchtdorf ("Receiving a Testimony of Light and Truth," GC, October 2014), and I really liked it.
 

The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints is a place for people with all kinds of testimonies. There are some members of the Church whose testimony is sure and burns brightly within them. Others are still striving to know for themselves. The Church is a home for all to come together, regardless of the depth or the height of our testimony. I know of no sign on the doors of our meetinghouses that says, “Your testimony must be this tall to enter.”
 

The Church is not just for perfect people, but it is for all to “come unto Christ, and be perfected in him.” The Church is for people like you and me. The Church is a place of welcoming and nurturing, not of separating or criticizing. It is a place where we reach out to encourage, uplift, and sustain one another as we pursue our individual search for divine truth.

I think we often look at all the things we need to learn and should be doing, and it becomes a bit overwhelming, but that is not what the gospel is all about.  We are all at different levels of testimony strength, understanding of the gospel, and living righteously, but we really need to remember the church is for all people, no matter what stage we are in.  We can all improve and do better, so we shouldn't be judging others, or judging ourselves against others.  We just need to be doing the best we can at whatever stage we are in.

Well that is it for this week, here are a few pictures Sean sent from paintball and steps on how to "skinny" a tie....enjoy.

 

The 10 modern Stripling Warriors of the Concepcion District on p-day

Step #1: Give the double thumbs up!

Step #2: Cut the white lining to the desired width.

Step #3: Iron the tie to the new width.

Step #4: Watch your companion sew the tie back together.