Transfer to Lancaster

So I am getting transferred out of Bakersfield! SO STOKED, im excited to breath clean air for a while. I was way bummed about the ward though, a few of them made me promise to come back and bring my future wife to the ward. Seriously this was a great ward! Im heading down to Lancaster in the Summerset ward with an Elder Hernandez. He has been out as long as Elder Myers so he is still pretty green! I guess I wasnt a very good District leader because they released me. They said there is already one so they wont worry about it. So that kinda confirms my belief that they only called me because i was the only one left who could do it. Im pretty bummed, I really enjoyed serving everyone in the District! They all are super fantastic missionaries!

Im making it fast because the internet keeps going in and out. Sorry for the short update but in short. Im dope, church is still true, Bakersfield still has a funky smell that I have never gotten used to.

Love you all

Elder Carper

 

Here is one of my favorite families here! Brother Hosking is a goofball!

Real Quick!

Shoot this has to be super quick cause Elder Myers and I are going golfing with a member today! 

This week has been solid! We went on exchanges with some elders in the District, it was a blast. I went with my buddy Elder Easter, we are both pretty much the same age in the mission so we had a blast reminiscing about Palmdale. We had a ton of fun down there! We had ZTM this past friday, I gave a training on finding while teaching. Nobody booed me so I am assuming it went well! Everything else is fine, this is the last week of transfers so anything you send me be sure to send it to the mission office!

This is a picture of my cousins Cesar, Jamie, Isabelle (5) and Ryan (2). They are so flippin cool! 

Elder Carper

We may be tools, but we're tools for the Lord!

This week has been CRAZY! On tuesday we went on exchanges with some Elders in the district  because one of them is being trained. It was a lot of fun, I went with the new missionary and had a lot of fun! We both had red hair so hooray for the jokes! I didnt care because they all got a good conversation going...usually about family history actually! Him and I had quite a solid heart to heart, his trainer isnt really being exactly obedient and its been hurting the companionship. They arent doing anything inherently bad, its just very little things like music or waking up on time and being diligent. So we just talked about how obedience is really a state of mind instead of just actions. We need to strive to be obedient and desire to have the spirit with us, not just do obedient things because he have to. It was a good exchange, the next day on Wednesday we had interviews with President and Sister Wilson. President just thanked me for everything I was doing...it was weird cause I dont like it when people compliment me. Makes me uncomfortable and do awkward things like run away and hide and make weird faces...

Since Elder Myers is still in training we had to go on another exchange with the Zone Leaders on friday. It was absolutely a blast! i went with Elder Allen who is a super good buddy and a brand new Zone Leader, pretty much the main topic of conversation was him asking me how to be a good leader. Again...super weird...I basically just told him is that the key to getting people to like you is to treat everybody like they are your best friend that you havent seen in years. So lets see if he takes my advice!

Super fun fact of the week:
Elder Myers (my comp) used to have a banjo. He broke it. 

I asked if there was more to the story and I guess not, he literally had it and then broke it. That is pretty much the flow of the conversations between my companion and I. We dont talk much...at all actually but I still love the kid! He has a strong testimony and he likes to work so no complaints over here! The picture is of me being bored on the way to a District Activity, your welcome.

Love you all! 

Elder Carper

 

 

His Work, His Way

I was humbled quite a bit this week. Our whole District was struggling really bad with success. Everyone is doing everything that they are supposed to and the results just havent been showing it at all. It pretty much broke my heart to see everyone struggling when i know that they are doing everything they can. So as I was praying really hard for things to be able to help I got the idea that we should all have a huge fast on one day, have a super short and very spiritual meeting before hand, bring a goal that the Lord inspired them to have, and then just hit it super hard to get the Lord on our side. Everyone added diligence to their covenant list and was working really hard to try and get blessings for Saturday (the day we actually did the fast). So everyone hit it really hard this week, I was so proud and excited for everyone on Saturday when they all came to that short meeting with a burning desire to have the Lords help. The goals everybody brought were about finding people and having hearts changed in their areas. Our goal was to find a specific family that was put into both Elder Myers and My head. It was a cool revalatory experience to find that out. So Saturday we hit it hard, the meeting was super spirit filled, so much you could almost see it. We hit it as hard as we possibly could to find this family, worked every second of the day, skipped lunch and dinner and....nothing. Absolutely nothing. I was pretty upset that night and just went to bed as soon as I got home because I just felt like the Lord let me down. The next day was obviously fast and testimony meeting and there was a lot of testimonies talking about why God sometimes doesnt answer our prayers. It was one of those face slapper moments that I knew I needed to hear that specific thing at that time. I pretty much realized that I had become pretty prideful in my missionary work, that I felt like I could just talk to anyone and convert them all by myself instead of relying solely upon the Lord for that help. I felt like I was a really good missionary up until yesterday haha. It was a hard lesson to learn but the Lord taught me that it is His work, and therefore it needs to be done His way. 

So the week ended super good!!! I learned something new that I needed to be taught the hard way, and so hopefully I can actually apply the lesson learned! Everyone else in the District was excited and understood that the Lord is just testing us, they are huge examples to me! Every one of them is a spiritual giant! 

Hope you all have a good week!

Elder Carper

Third Time's a Charm

So....Im moving again. The third time in 9 weeks that I am taking over someones area. Super fun....Anyways Ill keep it short cause I dont have lots of time. Most of this week has been coordinating and helping missionaries get settled in their areas. The Zone Leaders and I have been running around all week answering questions and helping things move along. I am now in the Berkshire ward, and am actually in the same area I was in 6 months ago when I was in Fairview ward. So it will be fun, I get to go to all the people I was teaching and be like "What happened??" So im stoked! 

 

Here is the best district EVER!!!!

 Love you all!

Elder Carper

 

 

Good Week

This week has been an interesting one for sure! Some pretty cool miracles happened and some frustrations as well! The frusterating stuff was that we are moving....again! They were supposed to tell us last week but they forgot I guess. So we packed everything up and have been cleaning and cleaning and cleaning! It wasnt until we were all packed that they told us that we were both staying in our area but are moving across the complex. I lost my mind I was so frustrated. Its algood though, but if you are going to send me anything make sure you send it to the new address! 

 

The super cool part about this week was that I got to confer the Aaronic Priesthood on Theodore! It was insane and I was really scared that I would screw it up but I didnt...probably! Nobody said anything so I would assume it wasnt a disaster! Anyways, thats all for this week! We had the dopest District EVER! As well as "Cuts by Carper" is officially running! 

 

Elder Carper

Why are the mountains green?

 

First off. JAMIE CAME THE WARD PARTY!!!!! (my cousin) First official interaction with the church in almost 20 years! That was literally the coolest thing ever I was jumping around everywhere like a 4 year old. They said they enjoyed it, even though they got swarmed with the members! Everyone wanted to meet them cause I talk about them so much, they didnt get overwhelmed though so that is a good thing! They didnt come to church unfortunately but I told he that she has a an eternal spot saved on the bench next to us! 

Other cool stuff that happened was Elder Myers got to skype in for his older brothers baptism. That was a really cool experience, we were 2000 miles away and we could feel the same spirit that was there in that room. It was a huge testimony builder for me seeing who is Brother is after hearing all these crazy stories about him. The gospel truly changes people, and its such a blessing to see it first hand! 

We were playing janitor for a long time this week making sure our last apartment was in ready condition to sell, it worked out well though! We got an A from the housing coordinators whose Brother, wait for it, is the President of Pixar and Disney animationl....WTHECK? The guy wrote Toy Story...so I love him.

Thats pretty much the super cool miracles of the week, Im looking forward to not having any distractions this week so we can find as many people as possible. Im giving a baptisimal interview tonight and am teaching the Book of Mormon class tomorrow so we will be busy!

The picture is from last week for our Zone Activity. We went down into the mountains of Bakersfield, and everything was green. It was really weird...the first thing the member said when they drove us down there was "What the? Why are the mountains green?" So I am going to guess that we were pretty lucky to go there at that time. I dont know why Im frowning in the picture...cause I was super happy to be up there! Love you all, have a solid week!

Elder Carper