March 17, 2014

We will be hearing from Elder Andersen (Quorum of 12) & His wife, Gerald Causse (Presiding Bishopric) & His Wife, Elder Donald L. Hallstrom (First Quorum of 70), and Elder David Homer (Our area 70) ... and all 200 missionaries and 4 stake presidents will be there as well. It is going to be sweeeeeeeeeeeeet. I will try my best to set apart as much time as I can to my letter to you all next week to update you on its intensity :)

This week had a lot of crazy experiences but I'm still alive and going!

have a great week!

pic: Caleb's baptism (Had the blessing of interviewing him as well)

--
Elder Castrejon

February 24, 2014

Elder Hardy is hilarious. We're probably the shortest companionship in the mission. So sorry I forgot my pictures! I left my camera at home.

The District had another baptism and everything is going well :)

I don't have much time, but I hope all of you have a great week!

I'll send some good pictures next week!

Elder Castrejon

February 3, 2014

Julia was baptized and confirmed this weekend, in our district. I had the pleasure of teaching her on splits.

She is amazing and she is learning English.

But, her testimony is one I will never forget.

Two people in two weeks who grew up knowing nothing about their Father in Heaven who loves them. Amazing to see them and their happiness :)

Elder Castrejon

January 27, 2014

Hello everyone!

This week has been a faith testing week.

8 of our lessons got canceled in a row on us between 2 days.

Our investigator with a baptismal date for Feb, 1, 2014 blocked our phone number and is now hiding from us (let me tell you, this guy is totally sane, and has a huge testimony of the restored gospel) and we dont know whats going on!!!

My companion lost one of his tags... ugh.

Ok, I'll stop naming off all the negative things that happened this week.

POSITIVES! YAYYY.

Our district is having another baptism this Saturday!She is Chinese and awesomeeeeeee.

We went out knocking doors with a member named Paul and basically, we got into a apartment with 2 young girls from Africa and he testified to them of his conversion and how the book of Mormon is true and made one cry! Of this experience the girl said: "I'm so sorry... everything was just going wrong today, and all my plans were failing... and I was having a really rough day... UNTIL YOU CAME AND KNOCKED ON MY DOOR" ... (ahh... the old fashioned favorite words of a missionary)

have a great week!

ps. in case you're wondering why my emails are getting shorter... its because I now have to write to the mission president every monday about the district... and it takes long haha sorry fam!

LOVE YOU!

Elder Castrejon

January 20, 2014

Yayyyyyyyyyyyy my district had a baptism!

Taylor! I was able to be apart of her confirmation. She is awesome :)

So last week was not very cold. Everyone is freaking out because they are like: "Why aren't we freezing????" ... BUT, the coldness has come back as of today... with a vengeance might I add.

Our investigator came to church for the first time and he loved it!!!!!!

His name is BLESSING. Yes.... like what we get from Heavenly Father. lol

He is awesome.

What else to add?

I'm eating at IKEA today. yeah like the furniture... apparently they have food there and its really popular in Canada? weird. but we're eating meatballs with The Adams (senior couple) today :)

Running out of time as always, but I love you! have a great one!

Elder Castrejon

August 5, 2013

Bounjor Tous!!! Cava bien?

2 weeks ago, my companion and I were privileged to be the witnesses at little Lorenzas baptism. She was baptized by her father and at her baptism there were 33 non members. The stake president told us to call in an extra team of missionaries. So we had help from the Drummondville Elders to contact each non member at that baptism. It was a spiritual event. The family has 4 beautiful little children and they sang ``families can be together forever`` before the baptism and the spirit was so powerful. All the non members were there to witness it. In fact, there was more non members than members. After the baptism, we contacted everyone and I met the Grandfather and Uncle of little lorenza, and they spoke Italian, English, Spanish, and French so I got to speak with them in 3 of the languages I know. It was an awesome conversation. I told them I would visit them when I move to Montreal because they live there and its 2 hours away. I will soon send the Elders over to them because the Uncle really enjoyed the unity in our church and told me they don't have that in his catholic church. Anyways... the baptism was great. We got some potentials but all in different cities. We sure have the trust of the members here in Victoriaville, they really do rely on us for things. Its nice.

We met a man a week back who was an ex-jehova witness. We had a pretty heated conversation about religion and while we had him read the intro to the Book Of Mormon he closed it like it was blasphemy before his very eyes. (he was a very kind guy though) ... as he closed the book as if though he was going to be sick, we testified to him but everything bounced right off. Later that night, I thought to myself, wow... how.... just how. Its like I`m ``throwing my pears before swines.`` ... Anyways, that experience taught me a good lesson.

So in correlation meeting with the branch president (because we have no ward mission leader) My companion and I have began to start the tradition of FATHERS AND SONS here in Victoriaville. We are making preparations to have a camp-out at the end of this month, and I am stressing this activity to the members so they can bring their friends and sons plus fathers. We are starting up great activities for the members, such as movie night, culture night and etc. Its going well so far!

Its my 2nd transfer already and by the end of this month it will be my 3rd. Time is going so fast. But my companion and I are staying in VICTO! :)

The biggest miracle we have had here thus far is CLAIRE.

CLAIRE is what you call, an ``ETERNI-GATOR``. She has been a on and off investigator for the past 8 years and her best friends are Mormon. She has had a baptismal date before and it fell through. None of her family are members. (2 kids 2 parents) In fact her mother is a Eternigator as well. Her and her mother. Her father is against the church, super prideful and catholic. The son follows the fathers example. They are originally from Haiti. Anyways, one day she texted us for a lesson. That lesson changed her life forever. As we taught and talked to her, we decided to give her a new baptismal date. She rejected it at first, but we said according to what the spirit directed and she was then ok with it. I was so in tune with the spirit that I said a lot of bold things to her this day and I made her pray then and there in front of us, that if she would be baptized on a certain day. She ended up praying and started crying. I testified to her that this day would be a day her and her family would remember forever and that the wait was over

.... This Friday (or Saturday) she will become the ONLY member in her family and my companion will have the blessing of baptizing her. Her father and brother refuse to come. But I know she will be blessed and will be an example to them. She also told us in an appointment that she wants to serve a mission (in south korea hahaha) ... Her testimony is so strong and even as a non member, in high school she finished Seminary as a scriptorian. We are so happy. I can`t put it in words. The ward is wonder how did we do it. We just tell them its not us, its the Lord. I`m sure the ward thinks we`re big hot shots or something because of our 3 baptisms together. People are just ready... ready for the mix Elder Fontaine and I bring to the mission field in Victoriaville.

So both of the brakes on my bike broke last week and it was soooo hard to stop. My companion told me to brake by using my back shoe on my back tire and my shoe got THRASHED. hahahaha...

We tend to get rained on quite a bit... you can never tell when you will get POURED ON. And since we dont have a car... we are always biking! Its fun though.... COLD but fun...

oh and we got groceries on bikes... it was quite a sight....

We met with a less active named Guille. We always visit him but this time we visited him, he told us his convert story and said he saw an angel and thats what made him be baptized. Crazy stuff. He saw his angel twice... weird.

I love people who stare at us and forget the light turns green. I also love people who talk about us behind our backs and say mean stuff. But i hate being called Jehova witness. The Jehovas here are hardcore, they take ``tracting`` to a different level. The force themselves upon people so people fear men in ties and with books ... haha. Its always their first impression of us. ``La temoigne de Jehova!!!!`` NO! WE`RE THE MORMONS.

Teaching English every tuesday is rather fun. I get relate to people here learning a new language just like me! They`re are so hilarious. One of my students brought me and my comp. a fruit smoothie last week. She is so sweet!

Also, the families from France here eat FRENCH CHEESE. Hardcore moldy stuff and, I can`t eat it. They always joke around trying to give it to me and im like noooo! I`m lactose intolerant! and my companion is from france so he helps the members force me to eat it ... ahhhhhh hahahahaha... its an experience.

The Becquereau family says they will make escargot for me soon... OH MAN.

We found a new investigator named Bruno. In a nutshell, he let us in, he was super kind, and he said that THE BOOK OF MORMON WAS THE ANSWER TO HIS PRAYERS. He believes in some weird stuff though.... so we`ll see happens with him. We`re excited for him. He said he literally prayed the week before to have a new set of scriptures because he felt that the bible didn't contain the fullness of the gospel. PRAY FOR BRUNO! :)

Well, I guess I`ll end this email with some of my personal feelings.

Before my mission people always told me I was humble. That they always admired my humility. Well, Being on the mission I have learned that I am not as humble as people think. Being quiet and obedient does not make one, ``humble``. Not being able to teach people as well as I could in English, not being able to say what I want to say in my prayers, not being able to target a persons needs the moment I meet them and ask them questions they might need to hear at that time in English, not being able to sound as good as my companion when I know I could do just as well in MY language.... THAT IS HUMBLING. Praying for the strength to retrain my pride. Constant prayer with heavenly father to give me the energy to learn and loosen my tongue... THAT IS HUMBLING. Being on my mission is really teaching me true, and Christ-like humility. I am so grateful for all the trials I have already been through, and I pray I can be more humble. Think about what you could work on and pray for the strength to achieve that goal. The Lord will strengthen you. I promise, because I know how hard it is now. I love it here and I love you all. Keep choosing the right and until next time where I write you another huge letter.

Elder Castrejon

July 12, 2013

 

I LOVE YOU ALL.

2nd baptism went amazing.

The weather is super humid over here and it rains a lot after its super duper hot.

Still getting yelled at every week but still working hard!!

anyways, any questions feel free to ask me.

We had our first zone study this past week and it was marvolous with President Patricks and his family of 9 or so. They spoke to us and sang a number for us. It was crazy spiritual. They're great.

I have had 3 splits in 4 weeks. Crazy cool experiences on splits.

I have had a all french baptism and a all spanish baptism, and I had the oppurtunity to direct the Spanish baptism and translate it into the both languages for the branch.

Loving it. KEEP PRAYING FOR ME Y'ALL! I NEED IT!