Elder Judd in California

Transfers happened and I'm back with one of my trainers Elder Burrows! We served together my second transfer in Newport Beach! Now I'm serving in the Laguna Beach ward and I'm super super excited about it. I was pretty sad to leave the Talega Wards In San Clemente, but I know the Elders there will take good care of the wards. San Clemente has become my home these last 6 months but I'm ready for something new! Not much else to report this week, I had to say bye to my Brazilian friends which was super hard, I love them so much they will forever be apart of my heart. But now Elder Martins (from Brazil) will get to teach them! I feel like I've taught and learned all that I needed to from them and now someone else needs to be a part of their journey. I'm almost done with the Book of Mormon again and this is a scripture that stuck it to me this week: 3 Nephi 18 19 Therefore ye must always pray unto the Father in my name; 20 And whatsoever ye shall ask the ...

It's been one of those weeks - rough. I could write about all the hard things that happened this week, but that's not fun, so instead I will share a super cool miracle that happened. On Saturday I went to Marblehead are with Elder Martins for an exchange. We both love finding so we decided to dedicate the entire day to it. On one our first doors we got bashed hard. This guy said some nasty things to us and the church. As I have said before in my emails, I used to be terrified of bashers, but now as I have had experiences with them, that fear has been replaced with frustration. Elder Martins and I decided to take the highroad and leave as peacefully as we could. That was frontier #1. We could have gone back and quit, but we said a prayer and went forward. After about an hour of no one being home or interested Elder Martins asked if I wanted to go to another area to find, in my heart I wanted to but I knew that in order to see miracles, we must push forward, so we did. That...

Aloha! Today, for our p-day activity we played quidditch! it was super fun, but I can only imagine what the people in the park thought of us running around with brooms and volleyballs.  This week has been amazing, last week Elder Esplin and I set a goal to pass out 25 copies of The Book of Mormon, which is a pretty lofty goal for this area. we didn't quite reach our goal, but we definitely pushed ourselves. The goal wasn't really about the number of Books of Mormon passed out, but stretching ourselves to bring the gospel to everyone we see. I learned a lot about the area and about myself. It was amazing to see what could be accomplished when we just push ourselves a little further. As I approach my year mark, I have thought a lot about who I want to be for the second half of my mission. This week we got to go to the temple and I had time to ponder this question. In the Celestial room I was given much guidance as to what God expects of me. During my meditation, I receive...

Man, it has been a crazy good week in San Clemente! Elder Esplin and I went on a super cool hike this morning right next to our apartment and saw the sun rise. Good vibes. We had a ton of amazing experiences this week. Here are a couple: 1. I gave my Brazilian friend a blessing. We hasn't been able to meet with them for a while so we just decided to stop by. When we came over, he told us how much he appreciates us and how they wish they could meet with us all the time. I could see how stressed he had been for a while now and I offered him a blessing and he accepted. I felt God's love for him as my hands were on his head. I have gained a strong testimony of the power of priesthood blessings. The spirit was very strong and afterwards I could see that he felt it. It was amazing giving blessings is one of my favorite parts of missionary work. I love this Family. 2. This week I have tried to give Elder Esplin more opportunities to contact and lead out. So I did what my t...

Spectacular first week of the transfer! I love this area! I recently found out that the translation of "Talega" (The area of San Clemente I serve in) translates to "Money Bags". Not surprised.The weather is finally getting back to normal and it has stopped raining. It has been super fun to be in the same zone as my trainer Elder Kema! We have had some good times already. This week has been super booked with endless meetings and other boring first week business but we have still been able to see some awesome things.  Every Thursday us and a couple other elders hold a soccer night for some of the youth and seekers of truth. This week only one boy and his dad showed up, we were pretty disappointed, but we stuck around hoping some other kids showed up. After it was over, we went to the chapel for a second to here one of the elders practice the piano. After a couple minutes a man we met briefly earlier that day came and listened to him play. After he played a few s...

I am staying in San Clemente! I love it here and like I said when I first got here, I could serve the rest of my mission in these wards. It's the promised land. We had the opportunity to hear from more general authorities this week! This makes 5 in a transfer! We heard from Elder Tad R. Callister and Elder Owen. It was amazing. Elder Callister has given some of my favorite talks like  The Blueprint of Christ's Church  and  Becoming a Consecrated Missionary . He and his wife talked about the importance of the Plan of Salvation and how to plan for lessons. My favorite quote from him was "Do not lose faith in the things you do know because of the things you don't" Elder Owen talked about "Being a Happy Camper" and that we should be grateful for the things we have. I love when he said "Don't ever let this, the gospel, become so common that you don't appreciate it.". Both of them gave incredible talks to us. I am so grateful that we have...

We are approaching our last week of the transfer, I can't believe how fast the time can go by! I really hope I get to stay in San Clemente.  Nothing too spectacular has happened this week, just normal missionary stuff. We have had the chance to teach a lot this week. Ever since Elder Holzapel came to our mission, we have been trying to teach a lesson everyday whether or not it is an investigator. Teaching members has helped us become much better teachers. This week we stopped by a man we met when I first got to San Clemente a couple of months ago. This time he let us in and I pulled a classic "My companion is new, can we practice one of the lessons on you" and he was totally down. It was super cool, he got kind of emotional through out and he invited us back when he has more time. It was pretty cool to see that stopping by people pays off. The Brazilians are great! This week we taught them the 13 articles of faith. The coolest part was when the dad asked where we ...