Letter: October 15, 2012

Hey family!!

It has been another fantastic week out here in Garden Grove. We have

once again seen a lot of miracles. We were tried this week too, but we

tried our best to work diligently and it paid off.

So we spent a lot of time this week at a certain house/street. The

family we often visit is the home of two recent converts. They are the

Familia Gomez. They are awesome. They've invited so many of their

family members to listen to us and to come to church. Many accepted

the invitation. I'll give you the names and what is going on with

them. They actually end up being about half of our investigators.

So first we have Ines and her daughter Kate. They were listening to

the missionaries before I got to this area. They never really

accepted baptism until my first week here. They have a date for the

fourth of November. We kind of got really worried about them because

they actually live outside of our area. President Bowen has given us

permission to teach them though. We don't really have the time to go

out there, but if we get lucky we can catch them at the Gomez home. Up

to about Friday we hadn't seen them, which worried me because we need

to see them in order to be able to teach them what they need to know

and do in order to be prepared to be baptized. We went over to the

Gomez home to celebrate the birthdays of Hma Gomez and one of her

daughters Jocelyn. We went and sure enough Ines was there. She

brought up a great question. "Why don't you believe in drinking

coffee?" I took this opportunity to teach her about the Word of

Wisdom. I even pulled out the Doctrine and Covenants to show her what

it says and the beautiful promise that is given to us if we follow

this commandment. She loved it, and she told us that she is going to

give up drinking coffee and drinking. It was awesome, and she also

committed to church and came. She loved the classes too. So she is

doing really well. We just need to see her daughter Kate. We'll get

there "poco a poco"

So the next person is awesome. Her name is Daisy. It is the cousin of

the familia Gomez. I guess she had seen the missionaries before and

when we got here she asked her cousin Dania (one of the recent

converts) if she could get taught by the missionaries. She is about

sixteen years old, and is a faithful Christian. Which is really good.

The first time we taught her was on Saturday night. We taught her in

this huge group of like ten people at the home of the familia Gomez.

We taught her, Ines, and their neighbor. It was kinda crazy. We taught

her the restoration. She showed a lot of interest in reading the Book

of Mormon. She even came to church as well. She thought it was very

interesting. It was a lot different than the church she attends, but

she wants to learn more. We are seeing her tonight as we do a FHE (Family Home Evening) with the familia Gomez.

We also have Ana. She is doing better. We finally got her to commit

to a date. We wrote a plan out with her about how we are going to help

her get baptized. She picked the date for the 16th of January. We are

going to work with her and get her for that date. In the meanwhile we

actually talked to her 11 year old and 8 year old sons about the Word

of Wisdom. They loved it and committed to live it. The 8-year-old son

has a really big desire to get baptized. So we believe that we are

going to put our main focus in them. They both (the sons) actually

came to church. It was a miracle. So we are doing good there

too.

We also had a HUGE miracle last night with Gudelia. We went over

yesterday morning to invite her to church. She had already gone to a

Catholic church with her family. We decided to comeback later that

night. We did so, it was perfect timing too because she showed up

right when we did. We played around with the kids for a minute and

then had a lesson with them. Afterwards we went and taught Gudelia. We

had planned about a week back to teach her about the covenant of

baptism and the importance of being baptized. So we started by reading

with her in 3 Nephi 11:37. Then we explained how baptism is a

commandment. Then the spirit really kicked in. It got to be so strong

that I was literally opening my mouth and not even knowing what I was

saying. It was awesome. I had the prompting to open up Mosiah 18:8-10

and read it with her. I followed it. She explained how she knows what

we teach is true, and how the Book of Mormon is true. And how willing

she is to keep that covenant. I told her to read verse ten. You could

feel it strike all of us with the powerful feeling of the spirit. Then

I had another prompting to invite her to be baptized again. She has

been invited at least 100 times by the missionaries that have been

teaching her. She accepted to be baptized. She accepted  to be

baptized on the 11th of November. We are going to have to work so hard

to get her ready, but we can do it. It was such a great lesson. It was

so cool to see Doctrine and Covenants 84:85 fulfilled. It was

awesome!!

So that is really who we have right now. We are still teaching a lot

of great people who are reading out of the Book of Mormon and are

praying. We have also faced a lot of difficulties as well. We went

over to see Araceli on Friday and she opened the door and yelled, "I've

been trying to hide from you guys! Here is your book, and I don't want

you guys to come back to teach us ever again, Thank you and Goodbye!"

It was pretty devastating, but we decided not to let it bug us and

press forward, and we have been blessed with so many miracles.

I'm so grateful for all of the blessings our Father in Heaven has

given us. We still have a lot of work to do here. I know that as we

work diligently we will be blessed. I have been reading a lot about

that in the Book of Mormon. In the book of Helaman is all about when

Nephi goes out and preaches. He was rejected, but it talks about how

he went about with "unwearied diligence" In the end we can see that as

he did that the Lord made him so strong. In 3 Nephi 7 we learn that as

he worked diligently that his testimony and teachings were so powerful

that the people, even though they didn't like it, could not deny it to

be the truth. So amazing, and I know that that is true. So always be

diligent, no matter how hard things or times may be, and then "if thou

endure it well, God shall exalt thee on high"

I know this church is true! Thank you for everything! I love you all

and can’t wait to hear from you soon! Les Amo siempre, y tengan una

buena semana!

Elder Dallin M. Ollerton

Letter from October 9, 2012

Hey all!!

It has been a crazy, but awesome first week out here in Garden Grove!

It's been such a rewarding week.

First of all, CONFERENCE!!!!! I loved conference this year. It was

amazing! A lot about missionary work was spoken. When in doubt "Ask

the missionaries, they can help you." Haha.  Also President Monson's

amazing announcement about how Elders can go out at 18 and how sisters can go and 19. That can have some real big impact on the Ollerton

family. That means my cousin Easton can be out on his mission while

I'm just hitting over a year. My brother Justin will be able to leave

right after I get home. That would be amazing! I guess we will see

what happens with that. But I thought that was really incredible. The

Lord is really putting a lot of trust in the young people who live in the world right now. Awesome.

So this week. This week, regardless of all the meetings, not being

able to teach as much as a normal week. We taught a ton. We did a lot

of finding. Because neither Elder Walker nor I have been in this area,

well, Elder walker was in this area, but a long time ago. So we

decided to go out and find. The first lesson I taught here was to an

Investigator who has been listening to the missionaries for a long

time. her name is Gudelia. We taught her the Gospel of Jesus Christ

and the importance of being baptized. I invited her to be baptized.

She thought about it, but then kindly said that she needed more time.

We came to find out that the reason that she didn't want to be

baptized is because she didn't like bugging people about giving her a

ride to church. We resolved that concern and got her a ride for

church. She came to the two sessions we had on Sunday. She loved them.

I can remember sitting there in the other room listening and saying to

Elder Walker "I hope Gudelia is listening to this." If she really

listened she should be baptized. We are going to see her soon.

We also started to teach a lady named Ana. She is in her early

thirties and has three little boys. She has been listening to the

missionaries for a short time. I guess one of the recent converts

referred her to the Elders before us. She is very confused. That is

what she told us. Because all of these different churches have been

coming up to her and trying to covert her, but we talked to her about

The Book of Mormon and how that can help her understand what church is

true. She read, and prayed. She is making progress for the little time

we have known her. She is having a tough time right now raising three

kids on her own. She is so occupied with so many things that we aren't

sure how we are going to help her. But we set a date for her to be

baptized. So we've set the goal. Now we are going to work with her

little by little to get her to the waters of baptism.

Another awesome person we found is a neighbor of Ana. We saw this lady

outside a door. We decided to talk to her because Elder Walker knew

her from a while ago. She taught her, and she was very receptive. She

accepted a baptismal date for the 4th of November. We got really

excited for her. We came back to find her another day, but she wasn't

there. Her son was there. So we taught him and he also accepted a

date to be baptized. It was amazing!

We also have been talking a lot to this recent convert part member

family that lives in our area. They are the relatives of Ana. We also

met another relative as we were over at their house to see them. Her

name is Ines. We taught them and helped her overcome the doubt of how

she was already baptized once, and how she can find out how she can

find the right church. It was amazing. We committed her and her little

Nine-year-old daughter to get baptized too. It was awesome!!

Those are just some of the amazing people we have found to teach. We

have found ten new investigators and taught many lessons. It was

awesome! I love the companion I have. We have been working so hard and

we have seen so many miracles from it. Elder Walker is such a

hilarious guy. He also has such a strong spirit and he teaches with

such power. Nothing better right? He has been awesome. I'm so excited

to see what the Lord has in store for this area for the next week.

I love being a missionary! there is nothing better than this! I am

living the dream! I am so grateful for all the blessings I have been

given. I have been so blessed with such great family and friends such

as yourselves. Thank you for everything! I love you all and can't wait

to hear from you soon!

Elder Dallin M. Ollerton

Letter for October 1, 2012 (late post again, sorry)

Hey all!!

It was a very good and rewarding last week in the city of Anaheim. Yes, I have been transferred to a different area in the mission. Might I say I was very sad about this transfer. I was really getting to love the people. I left a lot of great people behind that are in this ward. I know thought that the Lord has so much more in store. I just can't wait to find out what that is!

So this week we taught a lot of people. I'll let you know of some of the highlights. The first I want to talk about is the Garcia Lopez family. They are a family full of members, except for the parents. Why, because they are not married. They didn't think they could be married for some reasons. But I told them of the experience I had in La Habra when we got David and Daisy Torreblanca married. They were in shock. So we had this awesome lesson on obedience to the commandments. The mom accepted a date to be baptized, the dad not quite. The next elders are going to work there to get it done. I am very excited for them.

Also, we got this referral from the church headquarters for this lady named Lisabeth. She is from here, but she went up to Utah to see some family she has in Heber. She decided to go to Temple Square to take a tour and to see what we were really all about. She filled out some info, we got her address, went over to see her and found out that she is golden. She is a truth seeker. She wants to know all about it. She even came to church. We set a baptismal date with her the very first lesson. She is getting baptized for sure. That is a miracle.

We are also teaching Miguel. But he didn't come to church. I fear that we will have to stop visiting him for a time. He finds all the excuses in the world to come to church. That was the same way in La Habra. Feel bad. He has a lot of potential. But I guess for a later time right? Oh and we also stopped seeing the Jehovah's Witness we saw. They just didn't want to accept the message we had. Which is their choice. Bummer. But they won't do the commitments that we give them and so forth. Time to move on.

So speaking of church. We were on our way to gospel principles class to sit with Lisabeth. When our ward mission leader came up to us and asked us if we could teach the class. I was in shock. I'm still working on my confidence in the language. I accepted. The topic was on prophets. We went up there, not knowing exactly what we wanted to say. WE opened our mouths and taught the class. I could feel the spirit very strongly. The spirit testified to me the truthfulness of what we were teaching. I loved it. Even though we were not prepared. It was awesome.

So those are basically the great things that are going on in that area. It was really hard to say goodbye to everyone. I guess that is a good thing. That is also probably why missionaries move often and go to different areas. You find that the members, and the investigators become like family to you. It's awesome.  As for me I have moved to the Garden Grove 10th ward. I will be serving in the area with a new companion named Elder Walker. He is from Farmington Utah. I am so excited to get going in this area. The best part is that we are "white washing" So we don't know what is going on here, but we are going to build it up and get it going.

Thank you so much for all of your support and for what you do. Oh don't forget that Elder Sumsion is coming home tomorrow. Will you go to his homecoming whenever it is and tell him I said hi and how much I love the guy? He has something for you too that I told him to give you. Love you all and we will hear from you soon.

Elder Dallin M. Ollerton