We are Disciples of Christ

Hi Family!!!

Man, another email where time is just NOT on my side. Thank you for the letters and pictures that I received. I surely love you guys. And even a year into the mission... letters still make my week every time. I’m glad to hear that everyone is enjoying the summer. Can’t believe that August is almost here! Wow, didn’t that fly by!

"He aqui, soy discipulo de Jesucristo, el Hijo de Dios. He sido llamado por el para declarar su palabra entre los de su pueblo a fin de que alcancen la vida eterna." 3 Nefi 5:13 

This scripture was the theme of my week. Its the theme of our mission. And it sure gave me energy during those times where I felt like I had none left. I am a disciple. THINGS ARE NOT ALWAYS SUPPOSED TO BE EASY. Thinking back over my week... it was a hard one. Hard, missionary work wise. Hard because Satan knows that every time we see miracles, he has to enter with his wrecking ball and cause all sorts of disappointments. That’s his goal and purpose.. and I don’t like that. But what gives me strength is knowing MY goal and purpose, and that if I am on the Lord’s team, I can’t fail. Spiritually, this week, I was so strengthened and supported, which makes all the hard easier to bear. Easier to see it with faith.

First of all, we were out of our sector A LOT this week. Almost every single day we had to travel to Quito for some sort of meeting. I think it was every single day but one. Which means we barely got any studies this week... Sad, sad because they’re my favorite part of each day. But we did have lots of reunions and uplifting messages. 

One thing I have to say.... I love my new president. He is one of the most inspired men that I have ever seen. Every time he stands up to speak, we all pay attention to every single word, and we learn so much. He doesn’t use notes, he doesn’t have a designed outline, he just says what the spirit tells him to, which means that its exactly what we need to hear. This week he talked a lot about 2 main things. Discipleship and trust. Our goal as a mission is to become disciples, not just servants or missionaries, but DISCIPLES who serve and teach about the Lord because we LOVE him. He focuses a lot on the SPIRIT of the law and that first and foremost, we should always teach the PRINCIPLE before we say the what. The principle of obeying because we want to follow Christ. He’s also told us this week that he has lots of trust and confidence in us. He has changed a few of the rules because he wants to help us to become agents of ourselves. Responsible. Obedient. Something that he said was.... One can’t choose to become consecrated if he’s never given the chance. So he’s giving us the chance.. And we as missionaries respect him so much.

Hermanas

I still am LOVING my time with Hermana Herman. She is one of my best friends that I’ve had on my mission. Together we had lots of disappointments... The sister that I talked about last week who accepted baptism and attended church, we found out Saturday morning that she moved to the other side of the country. There were also many people who never answered their phones or don’t want to listen to us anymore. Lots of appointments fell through, some of our busses got lost and took a two hour detour. But..... luckily, we know that the Lord is a God of Miracles. Luckily we’ve read this scripture in 3 Nephi 5 almost 50 times this week so we know that we are the Saviors disciples. Luckily we know that Heavenly Father is ALWAYS on the other side of our prayers. I have learned a lot from her and her happiness and faith.

We’re excited to see the blessings that the Lord gives us this week. To quote Luke... as long as were worthy and obedient, the Lord will help us with the rest :) (Thanks Elder Yorgason for your wise and encouraging words) I’m praying for you lots and lots. Thank you for your support and love.

Hermana Yorgason

Great First Week

Hi FAMILY!!!!!

Parece que todo esta muy bien!!! Me hace feliz :) Another great week with LOTS going on it sounds like. Man, I think the Highlight of MY week was getting to read Luke’s letter. He is so great :) Also it’s so weird to hear that all of my friends are getting home from their missions. Wow, time is sure flying. It’s a weird thing here on the mission.

Well, here in Calderon it was a big and long week. It felt longer than most have. Probably because we did soo many things and its always a little more stressful the first few days of a change... especially when you’re the one showing around the sector. But I feel like this week was like 3 combined. I have LOVED working with Hermana Herman. If I didn’t tell you last week, she’s from Texas and has been out a little longer than I have. She reminds me a ton of Heather Adams. Super sweet, super fun. And man, we have worked HARD. I’m pretty sure every night I hit the pillow and then 5 minutes later the alarm is ringing. We have had absolutely zero extra time... (phone calls with the Hermanas, zone leaders, planning, organizing our sector) My journal has kind of suffered :/ I’m hoping to get caught back up on that. 

The very first day she was here, last Monday, we saw a huge miracle as we started work after emailing. We returned to a family that we had contacted (they wanted help with English) and we ended up sharing something short with them and they all accepted a baptismal date. Then, later throughout the week we found like 6 more people who accepted fecha. BLESSINGS. That doesn’t mean that it’s going to be smooth sailing from here on out because there were a lot of them that weren’t able to attend church for one reason or another, but it means that we at least have potential. Lots of people to work with.

On Saturday we had the baptism of Xochi! I think I talked about them last week... we’ve been teaching the family for about a month now. The parents have been less active for many years... So we’ve been able to see a big change in them these last few weeks and now their next goal is the temple. Such a happy day! She looked like a little princess :)

Baptism of Xochi!

Yesterday I got the opportunity to give a talk in church. I think it was more like.... they forgot that there was an open slot and no one to do it, so as sacrament meeting was starting they asked me if I could do it. I give lots of credit to all my morning studies and the spirit. I talked a lot about trials and prayer and the atonement... and somehow was able to get out pretty much everything I was wanting to say. And in Spanish. I’m a big believer that the Lord sends lots of help to those who pray hard and need it :)

One of the families that we found this week were some evangelicos that really wanted to listen. But... as we talked to the mom, she told us that she’s living with her boyfriend, and has been for 7 years, but doesn’t really feel much love or anything for him. We didn’t really want to tell her our opinion straight out that she should leave him.... Plus we knew that living like that, she wasn’t going to be able to be baptized. Well, we went back the next day to read the Book of Mormon with them, and she said that he had just decided to leave and said that he was not coming back the night before. She didn’t even seem sad about it... more relieved. We knew it was just a blessing from Heavenly Father that things are going to fall into place so that she can be baptized :)

We found another new investigator this week that I LOVE: And she was one of them who came to church. Like one change ago, she was a reference that one of the members gave us. We’ve passed by her house, called her many times, but we’ve just never been able to find her and have a lesson. Well FINALLY after about a month of trying, we had a lesson with her on Saturday. At the end of the lesson, she looked at me and said... I can’t believe how persistent and loving you have been with me. You don’t even know me, but go out of your way to make me feel good every time we talk. Because of that... I decided to listen to you guys. She accepted a baptismal date and loved church yesterday. I am so so grateful for the different ways that the Lord uses us to help investigators.

I have more things that I wanted to say... but that’s how limited email time goes for ya. Hope you have a fantastic week!! Remember that the Lord loves you. And that his plan is absolutely perfect!

Love Hermana Yorgason

CAMBIOS

Hi my WONDERFUL family!!!

I love you guys. I’m so glad to hear that you’ve survived this week and are feeling the Lord’s help and comfort. I can’t tell you how much you were in my prayers. Especially Tuesday morning when I knew you were going to the airport. You guys are strong... and I’m soo so excited to hear how Luke has been doing these last few days. I can only imagine how powerful he is :) It is such an honor to be able to be a missionary at the same time as he is. Thank you mom and dad for teaching and preparing us our whole lives for this. As hard as I can imagine that it is for you guys, know that we are doing great. We’re happy, we’re growing, and we’re learning about our divine nature... why we are really here in this life. There’s no better place to be. The Lord is looking over us. All of us.

So... first of all, sorry I couldn’t send out a big letter last week. I’m gonna try and write extra today if I can. We’ve had a great two weeks. Week 5 and 6 of our change, so I feel like we were seeing all of the blessings and miracles. 

We’ve been visiting a family that is AMAZING.. familia Cordova, and this next week their little daughter is getting baptized. The two parents were less actives and hadn’t attended church for over 13 years. Well, we found them, we’ve been visiting them, and they have turned around so much. They’re visiting church every Sunday and Xochi (their little daughter) is so excited to get baptized. They’re starting to be really excited about the fact that one day, one day soon, they’re gonna get to go to the temple to be sealed as a family. What makes it even cooler is that they’re probably going to move to Utah for a year to study soon, so they’re going to try and get sealed in the Salt Lake temple. That ALSO means that when I’m back in Utah, I’ll be able to visit them. Wahoo!!!

We’ve been working a lot lately with less actives. We’ve seen many miracles in finding new ones and helping them progress. One this last week.... We were walking down the street to an appointment we had and passed a store where a lady was just sitting there reading a magazine. I had a feeling that we should introduce ourselves to her, so we stopped, talked to her for a second, asked about her family, what she desires for her life... and we found out that she got baptized over 25 years ago in our church, but then never went again. Apparently she didn’t really realize what she was doing and now she’s listening to the Jehovahs Witnesses and is so confused about what she should do. We explained a little bit to her about the restoration and later this week we returned and were able to teach her and all of her kids (who aren’t members). There was also a less active who contacted US and said she’s been living in sadness and wants our help to return to church. It’s so amazing to see how the Lord puts the right people in our path. I LOVE working with less actives.

Some of my favorite ward members

We also had a super cool experience this week with one of our investigators named Veronica. Basically, she’s prayed about the church and knows it’s true, loves to listen to us and is reading the Book of Mormon. The only problem is that her husband has wanted nothing to with the church and because of that, she hasn’t been able to attend. Well this week, the husband started opening up to us and he sat with us during one of our lessons! That was SUCH big progress :) Even though he didn’t fully admit it, I could SEE that he was really touched by the spirit and is going to progress little by little. Cool little miracle.

Two weeks ago we also got to say goodbye to President and Sister Richardson and get to know our new president and his family, President Murphy. Man, such a bitter sweet time. First of all, family... I am soooo happy that you got to go the homecoming of Pres. and his wife. It means a lot to me. And I’m so glad that you got to taste a little bit of their goodness :) The last Friday we had a get to know you reunion with our new president. I think the number one thing that touched me... was LOVE. I was so amazed at the Love that he and his wife already have for us. They knew us by name, they asked about us personally and President Murphy got pretty emotional as he talked about how much he cares about us already. They’ve known that they were going to come to this mission for about 9 months and finally they were able to SEE all the missionaries they’ve been praying about. I instantly felt love for them also. President Murphy is such a spiritual man. Hermana Murphy has such a good attitude (especially about trying to learn a language that she doesn’t know), and I was able to talk to her for a good while about her, her family, and how much our faith can change us. 

Last week I sent a picture of a poster that we made with the Familia Altamiranda. It’s ALSO a family that has some less actives and some investigators. We had a really cool lesson about OLA Orar. Leer. Asistir (pray, read, attend) and we made a poster so that they could hang it up on their wall to always remember. The little girls were pretty excited about that :)

Yesterday we had a baptism in our ward. I love attending those and seeing how much support the ward gives and how much HAPPINESS people are able to feel as they choose to be baptized.

Ward Baptism

Waiting for changes....

And today.... were changes! I feel like they were JUST here, but here we are again. And... I’m staying!!!! Wahoo. And both of my companions are leaving. We did not expect that at all! Especially because they’ve both only been here for one change. Yesterday at church I was kind of saying my backup goodbyes and my companions didn’t say anything. And then... we got the call. Man, I guess you never know what’s gonna happen. My new companions name is Hermana Herman from Texas. She is sooo great. Already just in like 4 hours we’ve already become best friends. She’s been out one change longer than me and is just as sweet as sweet can be. I am soo excited to work with her and learn from all that she does :)

This week I’ve really grown from something that Hermana Richardson left with us. The last day that she was here, she talked about the importance of prayer and how we NEED to use it everyday to receive the blessings that we need. So I’ve put into practice what she said. 1. Visualize before the prayer... yourself with the Lord, in his presence. 2. Thinking about and writing down the things you want to pray about before you begin. 3. Saying your prayer out loud and really TALKING with the Lord. I have seen sooo many blessings from the past few weeks from making my prayers a set aside special time and SPIRITUAL experience. Anyone who is struggling... or anyone at all... if you feel like you need a little boost in the effectiveness of your prayers, I invite you to try this. It makes all the difference! I know without a doubt that our Father in Heaven is listening to us as we talk to him. He WILL send the help that we need if we show him that HE is important to us.

Another one leaves us and heads to Utah!! :(

Then... this week as I was reading in the scriptures, I found a verse that caught my attention...

"And by day have I waxed bold in mighty prayer before him; yea my voice have I sent up on high and angels came down and ministered unto me." 2 Ne 4:24

I KNOW that the Lord will surround us with angels as we ask for it. He will lift us in our trials. He will give us hope for the future and allow us to have more faith. Like a quote I love from Pres. Holland...

"Faith is for the future. Faith builds on the past but never longs to stay there. Faith trusts that God has great things in store for each of us and that Christ truly is the high priest of good things to come." 

Love you all!!! Thanks for the support!!!

Hermana Yorgason

Letter to Luke

Elder Yorgason! (Oh, how weird it is to type that)

Well you’re finally there. You’re in the MTC. You’re a missionary. HOW COOL. Just think about how long we’ve been waiting for this… practically all our life. We’ve sung “I hope they Call Me on a Mission”, we’ve studied, prepared, prayed. I can’t tell you how EXCITED I am to be a missionary at the same time as you. I know we’re going to be able to help each other as we share our experiences and keep each other in our prayers.

So I’m not sure how you’re feeling right now. Maybe super excited, maybe nervous, maybe alone, maybe calm. But if you’re anything like me, the mission is an adjustment! It is, and I hope that you know you are NOT alone.

Luke, I am soo excited for you. Right now I’m thinking about all of the experiences I’ve been through, and man, I have grown so much… spiritually and emotionally. You are going to become refined. The Lord is going to shape you even more into the person that he knows that you can become. He’s going to help you see even more the reason that we are here on this earth. You’re going to learn to rely and trust in Him, because some days, He’s really the only help you’re going to have. You are going to learn, you are going to change. But as we know with all growth, there comes difficulties. Gold can’t be shaped into a beautiful ring without heat and a lot of pressure and molding.

A mission is so so good. I’m sure you’ve seen that already. It’s one of the best things that will ever happen to us. A mission is also hard. I know we’ve all heard that before and it’s the truth. It’s a stretch out of your comfort zone in every way possible. Satan will try and make you feel like you’re not good enough, spiritual enough, cool enough, a good enough teacher, etc. If you’re anything like me, you’ll have your good time of homesickness and aching to be with the family. The language takes lots of patience, the schedule is an adjustment, sometimes companions just don’t have the same ideas as you do. The food is weird. The culture is different. It’s just super hard some days… especially at the beginning. But the thing is… its ok to feel that way. The Lord doesn’t expect it to all be smooth sailing for us. In fact, it never was for some of the greatest missionaries there were in the Book of Mormon. I love Alma 26 when the Lord told those missionaries to be patient in THEIR afflictions. I can’t imagine how hard it would be for Ammon, Alma and Aaron. They were thrown in prison, didn’t have much food, I’m sure they were made fun of many times and felt discouraged about the missionary work. But the Lord doesn’t tell them that they’re being whimps or having bad attitudes… he tells them that he understands that that was the plan and that he will never leave their side, no matter how hard it gets. Always remember that on your mission. In those times of discouragement or sadness, know that it is OK. It’s ok that its hard and its definitely ok that you’re not perfect. Its not a bad thing to struggle a bit. I sure did. I remember nights where I literally didn’t know if I was going to make it. I remember just laying on my MTC bed with tears running down my cheeks wondering how I got so far from home, wondering why I felt so weak. But it’s interesting to see what happened as I got to that point. I started praying like I’d never prayed before. I started TALKING to my Heavenly Father and expressing how it was for me. I started putting more trust and confidence in Him than I ever had in my life because that was my only option. Ever day that’s hard, every time you feel alone, know that it’s a blessing in disguise. It’s a blessing because its at THIS point in your life where your relationship with your Father in Heaven is going to grow the most. Just remember that you can always talk to Him.

Language. I’m sure by now you’re starting to learn Spanish and you’re starting to realize that there’s a ton you don’t understand. Man, Luke, Spanish was hard for me. I remember thinking that I was probably going to be the only missionary to never learn Spanish. It was so hard for me to remember everything. But know that it DOES come. Don’t expect yourself to be perfect at first, and count your blessings that you’re gonna be in the US where there will still be lots of English around you.  Pray for the gift of tongues, study hard, and then just trust in the Lords help.

Homesickness. Oh man, this is so real. The blessing of having such a great family does come with a price… It’s hard to leave. Sometimes it physically hurts, I know.  But something that helped me is to always keep the perspective in my mind of how short a few years really is compared to being with them FOREVER. Also remember the “normal-ness” of their every day schedule. Being away, we feel like we’re missing so many big things (at least I did), but I always had to remind myself that normal life includes jobs, homework, getting up early, cleaning, etc. We’re getting to have more fun on the mission anyway… ;)

Teaching… It all comes. Teaching will come. Just remember to study, practice, ask questions, and always bear your testimony of Jesus Christ. That will ALWAYS invite the spirit and help the investigators feel your love.

Companions. All my companions have been girls (obviously), so I’m not exactly sure what its like to be companions with an Elder, but I can guess there are a lot of similarities. Really, companions can be so great. We always have a partner, someone to laugh with and someone to learn from. But… certain companionships can also be super tough. I’m hoping that there in the CCM there are enough people to talk to that your companionship isn’t hard. When you’re in the field and you have a tough transfer, remember that every companion is preparing us to be better spouses, parents and friends. You will learn patience, but like dad has told me… every single hard companion we go through… it will be sooo so worth it in our future life.  Just always remember which way you’re facing. The most important thing is not how much we are liked by our companions, but how the Lord sees us. Disobedience will always be disobedience no matter what kind of exception other people want to make. Never be afraid to stand up for what you know is right (yes, even sometimes on the mission). I promise you, you will never regret being obedient. Just decide now to keep being the Luke Yorgason you’ve always been and be exactly obedient… and you will be in good hands.

Negative an discouraging thoughts. They will come. They’ll come because satan knows that what we’re doing is so important. He will try to get us down through our thoughts… but something important is to recognize where they’re coming from. If it’s a thought that makes you feel bad about yourself or discouraged, it is from satan. Ask the Lord to help you, hum a hymn or read your patriarchal blessing. Satan would have you think that there is no hope for the future. God will always remind us that our future is as bright as we want to make it. Living with our Heavenly Father is our destination.. our potential.

Luke, I love you. I wish you could see through my eyes how much potential I see in you. You are honestly one of my heroes, one of my role models. One of the things that I love most about you is your pure desire to do what’s right. I really don’t know if you have a rebellious bone in you. You know what’s right and you strive to always follow the spirt. You are someone who really is “conquering the natural man” and I sure do admire that. I also know that you have a gift of making people feel loved and important. People feel this way around you because you put yourself last and put the needs of others first. I can’t tell you how often that it was that people would find out that you were my brother and tell me how lucky I was. People love you Luke. I also love that you are so so selfless… whether it’s with your friends or our family, you always want to help make other people happy. I love that habit that you have of reading your scriptures and I can see by the way you live that your testimony is so strong. I could go on and on, but Luke, these qualities are exactly what are going to help you be a successful and powerful missionary. They will help you serve the Lord and be such a helpful instrument in his hands. Don’t ever let Satan tell you any differently.

You are starting the greatest ride of your life. We are disciples of Jesus Christ and are here to proclaim the truth to the world. Every morning look at your name tag and remember that Christ is on your side. He is your teammate, your friend, your brother, your Savior. I know without a doubt that what we are doing is of eternal significance. This church is true. We have a living prophet, we have the spirit, the book of Mormon, and the knowledge of the plan of salvation. We are here to become more like Christ and this is our time to focus completely on that. I love you Luke. I am praying for you and know that the Lord will fulfill his promise and send angels round about you. Have a fantastic day.

Love your sis.. Hermana Yorgason 

Families we love

Nails for P-day