Glendale, California: Week 104

I thought next week was going to be my last pday, but we got an email saying that Thanksgiving will be a pday, and that next Monday will not be. So I guess today was my last one!  

I will probably still write an email next week before I come home.

Last Monday we did our Armenian family home evening, and it was really fun! We played a card game, had food, had a spiritual thought, then at the end one of the guys got up and challenged us to shoot hoops. All these guys were like 50+ and they still made more baskets than I could!

On Sunday we had a combined ward primary program. Those are always so adorable. About 85% of the kids that participated were from the other ward cause our ward literally has like one family with young kids haha. 

I have to say, I am starting to get sad about leaving next week! I've met more amazing people out here than I can count. All the ward members, leaders, fellow missionaries, and even the random people I met on the street have had a huge impact on me. I'm excited to go out and make this last week count! 

Elder Clayton

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Pic of me and good friend Jeremiah:

 Glendale, California: Week 103

Well, a whole lot of this week was spent going by and calling inactive Armenian members. We're having a family home evening activity for the Armenian group and we're hoping to get as many people there as possible. In the past, there's been more people show up at events like that than at church. It seems a little backwards, but I think it's because there's food and games and such. Most of them that we stopped by didn't answer, but some of them did and I got to meet a few who I haven't even met before. One guy said he stopped coming because he got offended by political things, but when we came by he asked us when church services are and said he would like to come back! Another said he couldn't make it because of health problems but that he would like to watch over zoom. 

Also, on Wednesday we had a game night, where people brought various board and card games and we all played together. It was fun! We're planning to continue them every week.

That's about the only new and exciting things from this week. I'm also preparing to come home in a couple weeks, which is absolutely crazy! As part of preparing to finish the mission, I've been doing My Plan, which is a program the church does to help missionaries set goals for the future and reflect on what they've learned. It's starting to sink in how close it is to the end! I'm kind of sad but also definitely excited. 

As always, have a good week!

Elder Clayton

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 Glendale, California: Week 102

This week, Friday in particular was a day of miracles. We were having a lesson with our Armenian friend Victoria, and her friend knocked on the door. She invited her in, introduced us to her, and we all had a great conversation about the restoration. Now her friend wants to keep meeting with us, and both her and Victoria said they'd like to come to church! 

Then later on in the evening, we met a guy while we were out walking on the street, and he was really nice and actually struck up a conversation with us, which is rare haha. He said he met with missionaries in the past, like half a year ago, and the way he described them, I knew which missionaries they were. So now we'll be meeting with him again and he's already messaging us and asking us questions about the gospel.

Also, yesterday I gave a talk in sacrament meeting. I just kept it pretty simple and talked about faith, repentance, and ways of sharing about Jesus Christ with others. The other speakers along with me were Elder and Sister Womack, the senior missionaries assigned to the ward. 

We also had a cool missionary training where the APs came and taught our zone. Each companionship brought some members from their ward, and all the missionaries practiced teaching the members about using technology to share the gospel.

And for Halloween yesterday, we didn't do too much, but we went over and had dinner with some members, which was nice. Some trick-or-treaters came by their house when we were there so that was fun. 

Have a great week!

Elder Clayton

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 Glendale, California: Week 101

My whole mission up until now, I've never gotten sick. No colds, no sick days, nothing. But that streak ended this week unfortunately. There have been several missionaries and other people that are sick that we've been in contact with, and I must've gotten it from one of them. I was ok earlier in the week, but on Wednesday and Thursday I was feeling really tired and faint. And when I woke up on Friday I knew I was too sick to go out. It's sad, I was hoping to go the whole mission without getting sick! But oh well, I'm feeling better now, I just have a minor cough left. 

Other than that, the week was good! We had a good lesson with Micha and her Dad. We had the Bishop come along with us because he's also a lawyer and Micha had some legal papers that she wanted someone to look over. And the lesson went well, they had a lot of questions for Bishop about church organization and different points about the gospel. It was great. 

We also did exchanges this Wednesday, so I got to be with Elder Chatwin, who's only been in the mission a couple of months. He's a fun guy, and it's also fun being with younger missionaries and helping them to learn the basic missionary stuff. 

Well, have a great week! 

Elder Clayton

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 Glendale, California: Week 100

Wow, week 100! That's kind of crazy. 

On Saturday we did a big zone exchange, so I went north to a place called Sunland for the evening. Sometimes we go up there anyway, because there are a lot of Armenians. In fact, there's one man that we're teaching who speaks only Armenian, but he attends the english ward in Sunland because he prefers it and it's super close to him. That's one hard part about growing the Armenian group, there's actually quite a few active Armenians, but they just live too far away and prefer to attend an English ward. Anyway, it was a fun evening. It's always nice going on exchanges where we both speak different languages, cause now we were able to speak to anyone English, Spanish, or Armenian. That covers most of it but we still met a Persian guy we couldn't really talk to.

We're also planning a game night in a couple weeks for the Armenian group. They used to have them regularly before the pandemic with a pretty good turnout, so hopefully we'll have a nice group there.

I don't have any new pictures from this week, but I do want to attach some pictures of the past zones I've had. 

Have a great week!

Elder Clayton

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 Glendale, California: Week 99

Yesterday after finishing fasting we went over to our friend Micha's house for dinner. She said she wanted to have us over for a bbq, but when we got there we found out it was a giant feast with a bunch of her other family and friends, and all sorts of delicious Lebanese things (pics attached)! Micha is a professional painter, and I guess her artistic skills carry over to food preparation as well cause it all looked really fancy and good. 

We also got transfer calls on Saturday. This will be my last transfer... It's pretty crazy how fast it's come. I and Elder Stephens will both be staying here. Also, there will be equal number of sisters as elders in the zone, which is pretty insane. I've never seen so many sisters in one zone before. There are 6 new sister trainees coming into the zone this transfer! 

Finally, the weather has been pretty good recently. Highs have been in the 70s, and we even got some rain and lightning, which I haven't seen for a long time!

That's about it for this week.

Love,

Elder Clayton

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 Glendale, California: Week 98

Well, Don got baptized this Friday! And it was super cool! It was a fairly small service, with just a few of Don's friends from the ward and some missionaries. Afterwards, he said that he felt different, like he is now cleansed and at peace. I'm so happy for him, and also, I think he will be a great new member of the church. Sometimes I worry for people getting baptized that they may quickly fall out of activity in the church. But I really believe Don will stay strong and have a lot to contribute to the ward. 

It's also cool cause the day after his baptism, he got to watch general conference for the first time. We sent him the link to watch it in Thai, his native language. We haven't heard what he thought of it yet but I'm looking forward to talking about it with him. And on Sunday, we went over to our other friend Jeremiah's house to watch, which was awesome! Because of covid and things, I've never gotten to watch with someone who isn't a member. He seemed to really like it, and he asked us all sorts of questions. 

There were lots of great talks this time around. I think my favorites were by Elder Uchtdorf, Renlund, and Brad Wilcox. And something that stuck out to me was that multiple of the speakers quoted President Nelson about how the happiness in our lives has everything to do with the focus of our lives and not with the circumstances of our lives. I definitely think that that's true. 

Have a good week!

Elder Clayton

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