Week 27: The Highs are Worth the Lows, Part 2

 

Maria's Baptism!! 

What is up party peeps?

This was a really good week. It only snowed a couple days of the week at the beginning, but it has been really nice since then. Thank you to those who have been praying for warmer weather!

Last Friday we had a mission-wide Zoom meeting and we got to hear from a bunch of Church leaders and it was super dope. It was just for the UOM, and we got to hear from Elder Carl B. Cook of the 70, Sister Bonnie H. Cordon, President Craig C. Christensen, and Elder Quentin L. Cook from the Quorum of the 12! It was super cool and there were some really awesome things said. Elder Quentin L. Cook said that going on a mission will bless the lives of everyone we love. The mission is such a grinddd but there are so many benefits from it that aren't just for the missionaries either. As hard as it is, I'm grateful to be a missionary now. 

We met Maria for the first time in person this week 2 days before her baptism to give her a quick tour of the Church building. We thought it would be good for her to see the baptismal font and stuff before the actual day. She seriously is such a baller and her testimony is so strong. She loves the restored gospel so much. Turns out, she's also Filipino! I thought it was really cool that I'm still getting to work with Filipino people before I even get to go to the Philippines. Once she said she was Filipino I was like, "Bruh I should've known," because there are a bunch of things about her that are very Filipino: she works really really hard (in health care too (lots of Filipinos work in health care)), she's short (see attached pic), she's really funny, and she was so ready to accept the gospel. 

As for Maria's actual baptism, it was amazing. She doesn't have any family that lives here in Utah because she moved here about a year ago, but as a caretaker she has a lot of clients who are old people that she says have basically become her family. It actually was one of her clients that she took care of that was the first person to really talk to her about the church, and eventually helped her want to meet with missionaries. We got to meet this friend of Maria's at the baptism, and it was her son that did the baptizing which was really special. All of the talks were so good and the Spirit was so strong. 

This was one of the most special moments of my mission so far because it really showed me how there are so many parts to someone's conversion story. Some missionaries are just the ones to knock a door a million times, other missionaries are the ones when the door finally opens, other missionaries are the ones that may get to teach them, and other missionaries are the ones that get to be there when they get baptized. There are so many more missionaries involved with a baptism than just the two that get to be there. I feel this way about the people I was teaching in Eagle Mountain, and Maria is just the same. I feel so blessed that I got to be here for this very special part of Maria's story. 

That's basically all for the week! I love you all!!

Elder Snyder

Getting ready for Maria's Baptism

Elder Dieker made chicken parm

New decorations for the apartment

Week 26: The Highs are worth the Lows

What is up peepz?

This week was a good one. Some good weather days and some not so good weather days. If you live in the Utah area, and if you ever find yourself praying for snow or praying that you are grateful for snow, I would invite you to stop doing so. As great as it is to have "moisture" or "beautiful snow" around here, those are only perceived as blessings for people with cars. So in consideration of your favorite 2-wheeled missionary, I would invite you to begin praying for no snow. 

All jokes aside, this actually was a great week. We walked into the area a couple times this week, and people always honk at us or pull over to say hi or pull over to give us money. Not even joking. Walking is kinda the move low key. Even the Elders we live with who have a car have taken to biking into their area because then they just get to see people more. 

There was a time this week when Elder Dieker and I were in the driveway seeing off Elder Thomas and Elder Carlin on their bikes and I saw this girl looking at us from her car so I waved at her, and then she pulled over and got out and walked over to us and said "Hey I wanna start going back to church." It was super cool and she was super nice too! Our mission president is pretty strict though on the fact that we aren't supposed to do reactivation with people, but we know exactly who we can refer her to. She gave us her address and her phone number, so she'll get the help she wants in no time! 

Food places this week: Buffalo Wild Wings, El Mexiquenze, Waffle Love, Zupas, The Habit, Chick-fil-a (twice hehe)

The dopest thing that happened this week is that not only did we FINALLY get to meet with Maria again, but SHE IS GETTING BAPTIZED ON FRIDAY! She's already been taught everything and she really wants to get baptized, and the only thing really holding her back was that she was living with her boyfriend. But now that they are married, we were like "Okay, what day?" and she was like, "How about Friday?" She works so much and all the time (like on Friday she's literally getting baptized between shifts) but things are really lining up for Friday now. 

Going over the baptismal interview questions with her was seriously one of the highlights of my mission so far. Hearing each of her faith-filled and honest answers to each question strengthened my own testimony so much. She seriously was so prepared to hear the gospel. She grew up Catholic and became dissatisfied with it because she was seeing a lot of hypocrisy with other people, so she started looking for other churches. Then she started dating this guy (her now husband) and they moved out to Utah together, and through meeting a lot of members of the church through her job, she found that The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints was exactly what she was looking for. She has been reading the Book of Mormon and going to church and she is so ready to become a member herself now. She even bore her testimony in her friend's ward yesterday!

What I realized from meeting Maria and seeing her finally being able to get baptized is that if I had never gone on a mission, I would have never been able to be a part of this amazing story of her's. What I realized from all of this is truly that the highs are worth the lows. There are a lot of lows as a missionary. People that don't want to talk to you, biking up hills (in snow), getting up early, and it really just feels like a grinddddd sometimes. But this past week with meeting with Maria made it all worth it pretty much. This small part of it all was such a meaningful experience that I would have never had otherwise, which is what makes the mission so special. 

I love you all so much! 

Elder Snyder

Elder Dieker and I have a lot of photo shoots... hehe

Valentine's day lunch with Boo

The Door Dash that Elder Dieker's mom sent us

Haircuts today/Album cover

All of us trying to fix the dryer. haha!

Livin' the dream!

Week 25: Transfers...but like not!

Me in front of the sign of our neighbor's "Ranch"

Kamusta kamo?!?

Hope everyone has been having an excellent week. The weather this week has really picked up; I did my language study outside on our balcony a couple times this week, and today on pday we just threw a football around for a while in short-sleeve shirts! 

The four of us Elders have been playing basketball a lot lately. It's been pretty fun because none of us are that good honestly haha. I don't have the best shoes for it, but it's been fun to do something different to exercise in the morning. There was one afternoon where none of us were that hungry for some reason so we decided to just go shoot a little bit at a nearby church building during our dinner hour. While we were there, this random guy also showed up to also ball out, and he ended up challenging us to a game of Pig, and if we won he would buy us dessert. Thankfully, Elder Dieker won so we went to a bakery on Main St. in Lehi to get some donuts. Upon arrival though, we found out that missionaries eat there free, so the guy didn't end up having to buy us anything haha. 

Now, speaking of food, we had a lot of good grub this week too. Not just eating out though! Elder Dieker made a really good soup for lunch one day, and needless to say it was delicious because I ate three bowls of it. There's also this bomb Mexican place called El Mexiquenze we went to, and then we went to Waffle Love too (which requires no description, because Waffle Love is truly exceptional food), and for pday today we went to Cafe Rio. We also went to this Hawaiian food place called Rumbi, which was honestly kind of a let down. If you wanna get Hawaiian food in the Utah Valley area, I would recommend Mo Bettah's or Aloha Plate (on BYU campus hehe). We also ended the week on Saturday with Pizza Pie Cafe over in Highland, and then with Crumbl that night, where it turns out missionaries get 50% off!

For those of you who may be concerned, I'm not really gaining weight or having to get new pants. Big Donna and all of our balling out are taking care of that. Elder Dieker and I like to say though that if we did have a car, that may become an issue because we both love food so much haha. 

No updates really on any of the homies we're working with though. We didn't get to meet with Maria the other day, but we hopefully are going to meet with her again tomorrow. Other than that, it's just a lot of member messages and knocking the few doors where we know there are nonmembers haha. 

As for transfers, everyone out of the 4 of us that live together are staying, so a pretty uneventful night of transfer calls last night. I'm glad I'm staying with Elder Dieker because he's awesome and he's really made serving in this area a lot more fun. He's originally assigned to Vina del Mar in Chile, and there are people from this mission that have left to go back to that mission in the last few weeks, and someone from his online MTC district is leaving for Chile in a couple weeks too. So he very well could get a call from President this transfer about that and then get YEETed to Chile soon!

Here's my last thing: throughout this last transfer Elder Dieker and I have been joking that whenever somebody asks us, "What is your favorite thing about being a missionary?" we'll say "Oh it's gotta be living at the church building." We thought we were so funny whenever we would say that, but then we got thinking. Maybe that joke wasn't just super funny, maybe it's also super GENIUS!!! Hear me out, but what if 1 church building in every missionary area had a built-in basement apartment?? Then no one would live outside their area, because every area has at least 1 church building (hopefully hehe). The church would also save TONS of money because there'd be no more rent to pay for every missionary apartment. And with all the missionaries living in the exact same kind of apartments, there'd be a greater sense of unity amongst the missionaries because they all have the same living arrangements. Cuz here in the UOM, there are some pretty boujee missionary apartments. If you want details, ask me about the Lehi Zone Leaders' apartment in Draper Suncrest...... Anyway, thank you for coming to my TED talk. 

If you read all of that, you're pretty awesome. The mission is such a learning experience, and I've really learned in the last couple weeks that it's okay to have absolutely no idea what you're doing haha. The Lord appreciates the sacrifices we make for Him, big or small. Sometimes I've thought about how other missions have most definitely been/are harder than mine, but that doesn't mean mine still isn't hard. The Lord gives us challenges in our lives that will be hard for us individually. Those things may be easy for other people, but the Lord knows what's going to push you and how you are going to grow from it. That's how we know that His love for us is personalized to each of His children because our trials will end up being exactly what we need. 

If you read all of THAT, you're even more awesome. 

I promise that I read every email that is sent to me, and I realize that sometimes I'm trash and don't always respond but I will work on that! 

I love you all so much!

Elder Snyder 

Secret view in our area (undisclosed location)

My outdoor language study set up

Elder Dieker got pit vipers but I'm wearing them in this pic

Fam really whipped out their lizard on us during a member visit

Shnowy!!

Homies really had one-way glass for a door, so they know when to not answer it. So we made the most of it. 

Me with Lebron James

Week 24: The Week of Chicken

Hey everyone!!

This week was a real grindddd let me tell you. Our area has some great people, and it has been really awesome getting to meet a lot of them over the last few weeks. Sometimes I think about how if I hadn't gone on my mission at the time I did and never got reassigned to the Utah Orem mission, I would've never met some of these amazing people that are so deeply converted to the restored gospel of Jesus Christ.  

The work here in the Lehi Cedar Hollow stake is difficult, so we have to find ways to stay positive and have little things to look forward to. Maria has been ghosting us pretty hard, so we have not talked to her since like our 2nd week. And since we can't accept any food from anyone or ever do member meals, we have been doing a lot of our own food-related ways to motivate ourselves. Basically, we ended up eating chicken like pretty much every day this week. We went to Buffalo Wild Wings, Chick-fil-a, Popeyes, and we cooked our own chicken too! Elder Dieker made some awesome chicken parm, and Elder Thomas made a really delicious Mexican soup with a whole Costco rotisserie chicken in it! Elder Dieker's mom also sent us Crumbl cookies too (not chicken, but still delicious). 

We also got to attend the baptism of one of the kids Elder Dieker taught in this last area. That's one of the plusses of having a really small mission, is that going back for a baptism after you've been transferred is never more than like a 20 minute drive away. That was really cool and we got to hang out with Elder Dieker's last companion and this guy's new companion, who came in with Elder Dieker with I and is a homie. Before the baptism though they invited us to go to Chick-fil-a with them, to which we of course said yes even though we had already gone to Chick-fil-a like 2 days earlier haha. 

We also gave talks yesterday in church which was pretty fun. I was asked to speak on gaining a testimony of Joseph Smith, which I really enjoyed putting together. I sent the Zoom link to my mom and so her and Matt got to watch me give my talk too. 

Anyway, that was kind of the week. Not a whole lot honestly haha. Feel free to write me though! I can check my email anytime during the week (not just on pday) so you could send me an email anytime you want! I think this month has been a serious grind for everyone, but now it's already February! And it's the last week of the transfer which is crazy to think about. Elder Dieker and I are both pretty likely to stay because we've been whitewashing, but at the same time, when transfers are coming, no one is safe...... 

I love you all! Have an amazing week! 

Elder Snyder

The light of the moon behind the mountain

Me with our neighbor's car