MY SISTER GOT ENGAGED

MY SISTER GOT ENGAGED.DANG.THAT IS AWESOME. I still don't know the guy personally yet, but I have heard a lot of great things and I know my sister has really high standards so I have complete confidence all is well. I wasn't really surprised or shocked opening the emails, because I saw it coming and yeah congrats Mallory. You will be a great mom to my future nieces and nephews.

So this week was pretty uneventful. We finally had investigators in the sacrament meeting, I can't tell you how happy I was to be sitting in the middle of the bench between my investigators and my less actives, greatest feeling in the world.

So I actually haven't bible bashed at all this week. I was given the absolute perfect opportunity in the morning. Someone knocked on our gate and we looked out the window to see who it was and we saw it was the Jehovah's witness missionaries. We were like OH YEAH. so we threw on some regular clothes took off our name tags and answered the door and I was like time for some bible bashing. They gave us some pamphlets and then the guy said can we share some scriptures with you and we were like yeah. He whipped out his bible and I was like alright here comes the macheting, but the spirit was like Logan don't contend, then I was ready to contend, but really strongly it told me don't contend. so I heeded the prompting and I was like thanks for sharing that message with us and then I was like thanks for what you do for helping others have faith in God. I felt good. I think I am going to try to give up more the bible bashing.

I am really pumped for General Conference this upcoming week. I cant believe that it has already been a year since the general conference that I was blessed to go to with all of my friends. I felt the spirit so strong that session and I know for a fact that Thomas S. Prophet is a living prophet who speaks face to face with Jesus and that he holds the keys to the Kingdom of God here on the Earth, I will never be able to deny the feelings that I had in that conference. I think it will be really cool that 3 new apostles will be called, Richard G. Scott, L. Tom Perry, and Boyd K. Packer are all continuing the work in the spirit world, but I know that God has prepared three special men to help guide us in these letter days.

If you haven't written me a letter. repent and write me a letter. 

With love, Elder Roberts

My little friend. 

Tulcan

Viva La Musica

Hey if anyone from Encore is reading this do you remember that song we sang? haha Viva La Musica?

Anyways, this week was special because I got to participate a lot with music. This old lady who is less active physically cant leave her house, because her husband is like critically sick and needs her there every second, so she doesn't get many visitors. I felt impressed to sing a hymn for her, my companion doesn't like singing, so I sang a solo, I did the first part in Spanish and the second part in English. She was crying and I felt glad that I could do that. I got to play the Violin twice this week. We had like a branch family home evening on Saturday and I played a medley of Come Come Ye Saints and I know that My Redeemer Lives, and then the Branch President asked me if I could play something on Sunday, so I played I need thee every hour. I love music so much, I know that music can be just as sacred as prayer and I am so blessed to be able to share my talents with the beautiful people here in Ecuador.

This week I had some pretty humbling experiences, we met some really poor families. Probably some of the poorest families I have seen in my life. Like you can see poverty and stuff on the Internet, but you don't really know what the word means until you see it with your own eyes. My companion and I were contacting a pretty rich neighborhood and as usual everyone was catholic and didn't want to listen to us and I saw this little hut in a field probably like a 7 minute walk away, I said lets go there. We went there and there were these 2 little kids who were super surprised, I think it was their first time that they had seen a gringo. Anyways, we asked if their parents were home and the dad came out and pulled chairs out and helped carry his wife out and it was obvious she was sick. the problem is they are too poor to go to the hospital and stuff, so we gave her a priesthood blessing. The next day she was feeling a little better and we were able to share a little bit of a lesson, and she told us her life story. Holy Cow, I have so much respect for her, everything bad that you could possibly have happen to you during your life has happened to this woman and I don't cry much in lessons, but I started to cry. This family literally has nothing, nothing, nothing. both the parents are handicapped and cant work and the kids are too young to work, so my companion and I did a little grocery shopping and spent like 10 dollars buying some basic foods and stuff, but I cant believe I was like sad in high school for not having a car. Seeing people here that don't have anything temporal but are still soooo happy happier than us in the U.S. Money doesn't matter at all.  I would have an infinitely more happier life living on a dirt floor and wearing the same clothes every day and only eating rice and living with my family with happiness in the Gospel than having all the cool new things of the world and not having the inner happiness of having a happy family. I love my family, I am grateful for humility, my parents have always been great examples, and I am grateful for this mission and so much it has taught me.

Love,
Elder Roberts

Lots of pictures from Ecuador!!!

These mountains are in Colombia 

 My old sector is that mountain

LA GUERRA SANTA

Ok, so this week we continued on our quest to get investigators, we had a miracle at the end of the week in the fact that we got 2 new investigators and they both have potential, but the whole week seemed like we weren't really getting anywhere. I cant tell you how many doors I knocked on and got slammed on my face. I have learned that Tulcan is probs the most hardcore catholic place on the earth. these are the three main reactions I get.

1. Automatic door slammed in the face

2. they ask if we worship Mary and afterwords slam the door in our face

3. they tell us they were born catholic and will die catholic and then slam the door in our face.

 Other reactions I have gotten include:

Getting pushed out of the doorway and falling down stairs

Getting flipped off and yelled at some choice words

A watter Balloon thrown at me?  

and occasionally a Jehovah's witness. Speaking of Jehovah witnesses this lady was like one minute and she came back with her bible and tried to bible bash with us and I used her own bible and she couldn't defend herself, I know the spirit of contention is bad, but it was kind of fun. 

We had a ton of success with less actives this week. We are having so much success with less actives, we had a ton at church. Our mission President said if we spend half of our time with less actives our baptisms will double, so we spend the majority of our time with less actives. I am so grateful that the saviors arms are always open, it is never ever too late to join and it is never impossible for the atonement to forgive us of our sins. I love being a representative of Jesus Christ, this opportunity as a missionary is probably the biggest blessing in my life other than my awesome mom and family I miss them.

This week in Gospel Doctrines class the lesson was on the roles of the Parents in a family and the teacher was like everyone loves their mom. And I stood up and Said, I miss my mom and everyone was laughing so hard. Mom, I miss you.

Well, keep on writing me, I love you all, send me goodie boxes. haha. CHAO 

Elder Roberts

Its green here in Ecuador 

 Me and my first district leader Elder Ramponi

KICHUWA 

 I contacted the catholic bishop, I don't think he likes that. 

Doing service

El Santo Sacerdocio

When I got my mission call to Ecuador I was thinking like a hot tropical paradise and I am living in Antarctica right now and it is super cooollllldddddd..... super cold haha. 

So this week I was privileged to help out giving a lot of priesthood blessings. For those of you who have know clue what priesthood means it is the authority and power of God that he gives to worthy men to act in his name. You can only obtain it by receiving it through the laying on of hands from someone who holds it. ( I have no clue how to explain this stuff in English) anyways, there was a really special blessing I got to give. One of the less active families we are working with has this sweet little daughter named Emily who is 5 years old. Every night she has horrible sleeping problems because she has hardcore nightmares and is always scared and waking up her parents, so I gave her a blessing of peace and strength that she could be able to sleep well. I felt the spirit so strong this blessing, I felt like I wasn't saying what I wanted to say, but I felt like I was guided by the spirit and that the Lord put words into my mouth, I think I said a couple verbs in Spanish that I didn't even know what they meant, it was a cool experience that I will never forget.

We haven't had much luck with finding investigators this week, we are doing everything we possibly can to find someone to teach, but nothing really seems to be working, but I don't feel too bad because I know we are giving it our absolute best and that is all that matters, on the other side we are learning how to contact a whole lot better and we are having a lot of success finding and reactivating less actives, so it is pretty cool. 

Well, I hope you all have a good week, I hope you all write me letters. 
Gracias, con amor your amigo 
Logan

I am a Missionary.

this guy teaches me kichua

its me mario

do you see something wrong with this picture

Autoridades Generales

So today was a great pday. I was able to make crepes, my favorite food, I haven't had them for 8 months, because today I hit the 8 month mark! dang the time goes by too fast.

This was a pretty hard week. None of our investigators are progressing and we found out like all of them have problems and probably wont be able to get baptized soon, so that is fun.not. And the people here aren't punctual at all, we confirm our visits and everything but nobody is there. It is just hard to find people. We are going to work our tails off this week to get new investigators that are really ready to progress. Fortunately we were able to find quite a few less actives this week and see a lot of them in the church. that was cool.

This week we took the 7 hour trip down to Quito to listen to Elder Ulisses Soares of the first Quorum of the Seventy. There were a ton of missionaries from the two Quito missions. He spoke a lot about the plan of salvation as well as what we can do as missionaries to balance our responsibilities better. It was great. Also, the Area President also a member of the first quorum of the seventy Juan Uceda was there and talked a little bit. I was able to shake their hands afterwords and look into their eyes and it was cool. I wont forget that experience. I definitely felt awesome being there and listening to them. 

I hope you all have a good week. thanks for the letters (not. nobody is writing me) haha. 

Elder Roberts

La Ultima Puerta

So this Wednesday we couldn't find anyone. all of our visits were like super planned out we called everyone on Tuesday to verify that they would be there, and nobody was there. I have come to the conclusion that when the people aren't there it is because the Lord has prepared someone else to listen. We spent the whole day contacting and nobody wanted to listen to us. We got rejected hardcore by a ton of catholics. SO many doors slammed in our faces. Some Jehovah's witnesses wanted to bible bash with us, but I pulled out my bible and started to machete them and they were like oh we don't have time....anyways after a whole day of rejection we just kept on going at it. By about 8:30 we were just beat up, it was a long hard day, so we decided to go ask a member for references, we were about to knock on their door and teach them, but they never have given us reference and I didn't think there was much purpose to this visit, so I turned to my companion and I was like Elder there is someone we need to find. We knocked the door of this tin hut right next to this family and this little guy came and opened it and invited us in. Inside this dirt floor house that only had a couple candles for light there were like 3 Colombian workers here for a couple of months, super humble, and they were of gold. THE LAST DOOR WE KNOCKED ON. IT WAS A MIRACLE.  I knew the whole day we needed to find someone else, and it took the whole day to find them, but we found them, it was awesome. 

This week we had a meeting with President Richardson in Otavalo, Otavalo is super awesome, it is like a different world, everyone is dressed in traditional clothing and all of the men have ponytails and almost everyone speaks kichua. It was so cool. But during the meeting President said I have some sad news Elder Godoy of the seventy will not be visiting us next week...and all the missionaries were like dang. but then President says, but Elder Soares of the Presidency of the Seventy will be visiting us next week. everyone was like DANG. it was cool, this week on Thursday the two missions of Quito will have a meeting with him this week with a TON of missionaries, it will be cool because all of our mission will be there and I will see all of my old companions and friends and get to listen to Elder Soares.

Well I love life. Send me letters and goodies and give my mom a big hug from me. with love from Ecuador, 

your friend Logan. 

Sunset in Tulcan

 Tulcan

My Companion, Elder Damian, he is cool

Listen to the promptings of the Spirit

Okay, Tulcan is like the absolute best place in the world. IT IS SOO BEAUTIFUL. It is like green mountains that are just fields and it is sick. It is super peaceful, my last sector was hectic, in the big city and super dangerous and it is the complete opposite here, I just feel at peace. and the people here are amazing. The only hard thing is that it is SUPER COLD. I am from Minnesota where it is cold, but after being in the hot equator for 7 and a half months, IT IS SUPER COLD HERE. for realz and our hot water broke yesterday, SO LIFE IS SUPER HARD. But I use my sweater every day and am still freezing, but it is worth it because Tulcan es buenaso.

Yesterday after church we went to this part of our sector about 20 minutes away in bus. We got there and had like 4 people to visit, we did a little contacting there earlier in the week and had some future visits lined up, but nobody was there. A cool new family we found wasn't there and across the street in another house was this old guy sitting outside, we were banging on the door, but nobody was there. I felt like I needed to talk to the old guy, but I was like I don't like talking to old people, they are all hardcore catholics and can't comprehend what we teach, so I ignored the feeling and we went down the street to find some other people. We couldn't find anyone for like an hour and the whole time I was just thinking about this old guy that I saw and felt like I needed to talk to him. We got back to the house with the family and they still weren't there and the old guy across the street was still sitting there and he yelled ¨NO HAY NADIE¨ so I crossed the street and said ¨Disculpe estabamos buscando por sus vecinos pero.....¨and then like all of his kids and wife came out and they were super interested, they let us in, and we taught them and they understood everything and felt like we were teaching the truth. WE GOT 2 NEW FAMILIES OF GOLD BABY. I learned my lesson to follow every prompting no matter how unpromising it seems. It is amazing how the Lord works and sends us his spirit to guide us. 

Something cool I did this week was contact from a car. One of my best friends from Calderon was visiting in Tulcan this week, and he has a car, so he drove us to a visit after we had lunch with his family and there was a family walking down the street, so we were driving alongside them slowly in the car and my companion and I were talking to them through the window and gave them pamphlets. They were super confused. I have now contacted from the inside of a car, I have contacted 5 buses, about 20 motorcycles, and I contacted a young couple making out on a park bench with a law of chastity pamphlet. 

I love being a missionary. YOU ALL NEED TO WRITE ME. or mail me cookies or something. 

Elder Roberts