Happy New Year - Marble Falls week 2

December 28, 2015

I hope everyone had a great Christmas!

We had a pretty good week. Of course Christmas was a lot of fun. A
member had us over for lunch and it turned out they invited basically
their whole family. So there was a lot of people there. It was a lot
of fun.

Since it was Christmas there was a lot of people at home with their
families. So we got to meet a lot of great people and we had a lot of
amazing lessons this week. But nothing super exciting.

I've heard that there has been a lot of crazy tornadoes lately. But
don't worry there has just been a lot of rain here, nothing too crazy.

Have a great New Year! Love y'all!

Elder Mackay

The longer email to his mom:)

The day was pretty good. We ended up spending basically all day at the
members house haha. They really didn't want us to leave cause they had
planned on us being there for everything. They even took family
pictures with us in it hahaha. Aw that's too bad. You can try again on
New Years!

Not much really exciting happened since Friday. We taught a few
lessons, and met a couple of weird people. I've noticed that up here
since it's a wealthy area there isn't any crazy people. Some of them
are just really weird.

I got the picture from the Christmas conference so I will attach that.
And also I finally gave in to Texas.. I bought some cow boy boots
today. They were on sale and I had a bunch of money that members had
given us so I decided it was the best time. So yeah I spent like $90
but it was so worth it. They are sweet!

But yeah not much else happened. It rained a lot the past few days but
not terrible. Oh and the family that we were with is going to get us a
digital copy of the Christmas pictures they took with us so we can
send it to you. I believe they texted you another picture. They just
really wanted y'all to know that we had somewhere to be for Christmas
haha.

Love you!

Elder Mackay

Here is the Conference picture (hopefully you can find me) and here's
the awesome boots!

Elder MacKay and Elder Greene Christmas Day!

Marble Falls - Marble Falls week 1

December 21, 2015

We had transfers and I got transferred all the way up to Marble Falls.
It is somewhere by Austin, I'm still not exactly sure. But it was
pretty sad to leave Carrizo Springs but I'm excited to be up by
Austin. I've heard a lot about Austin!

It is kind of weird adjusting to this area. It is a really nice area
and everyone is white. So it's a lot different than Carrizo. The Ward
is also like 3 times bigger. I'm excited to see what we can do up
here. I am also a District Leader now and I'm training again. I'm with
Elder Greene, he has already been out 1 transfer so I just get to
finish his training. But he is already an amazing missionary.

We have been working hard to try and find people to teach. It is kind
of a struggle in this area because no one is ever outside and not a
lot of people want to talk. But we have been working hard and it's
payed off. We had a family come up to us in a restaurant and ask about
where the church is because they had been baptized a while back and
wanted to go again. And then we met a few other people who were pretty
solid.

There is people who are ready for the Gospel, some of then just hide
really well so it takes more work to find them!

Have a great Christmas, love y'all!

Elder Mackay

Here is the Guerreros. They are an awesome family from Carrizo.

Transfers - Week 17 Carrizo springs

December 14, 2015

Well transfers are already here! I got a call this morning and found
out I'm getting transferred. That won't happen until Wednesday though.
So I still have no idea where I'm going. But it is going to be sad
leaving Carrizo. It's basically the greatest place ever.

This week was an interesting week. We had a mission conference with
Elder Pino of the seventy. That was super cool. I learned a lot from
him. And man he is super funny! We also got some amazing BBQ after the
meeting which was great. And since it was in San Antonio we got to see
all the other missionaries that we never see because we are in exile
at the border. So that was fun!

We had exchanges again so I got to go to Eagle Pass with Elder Smith
again. That was pretty fun.   It's a bike area and the bike I was
using had no lights. So at night when it was dark I could not see
anything haha. So I just had to follow the little red light from Elder
Smith's bike.

Everything is going great. There are miracles everyday. God is
definitely in charge of this work.

Have a great week! Love y'all!

Elder Mackay

1 Year - Week 16 Carrizo Springs

December 7, 2015

Well in a few days I will hit my 1 year mark so that's exciting. It's
amazing how fast time goes by. I've learned so much in this past year,
it's a blessing to be in the service of the Lord.

Well I don't have too much time today, but this week we found a less
active that we have been trying to find. We saw him on a lot of
teaching records but he was never at home and the number we had didn't
work. But then we knocked on a door of some people that we had talked
to a while back and they let us in. So we started teaching and then
there was this other guy there so we invited him to listen as well.
Turns out he was the member we had been looking for!

We have been trying to work a lot with the members lately. We started
giving them cards to hand out to their friends and then share a little
about the church with them. It's been great. As they've shared the
gospel with others they have increased their own testimonies as well
and they have all said that they felt happy afterwards.

God is always willing to bless us, we just need to do our part!

Love y'all!

Elder Mackay

Here's an awkward photo

Exchanges with the mission President - Carrizo Springs Week 15

November 30, 2015

Well on Monday night President Slaughter called us and said he wanted
to visit a family in our branch. So after the Zone meeting on Tuesday
my companion went with another Elder and President Slaughter's son and
I went with President Slaughter. He took me to eat some good tacos and
then we drove 2 hours to Encinal where the family lives. It would have
been an even longer drive but we took a shortcut by cutting through a
different mission. It was super awesome. It was like a 3 hour
interview I just got to ask him any questions I wanted. He said the
only rule was that we had to speak Spanish. So that was a pretty
awesome day.

On Thanksgiving we ate a ton of food. We had 3 thanksgiving meals,
lots of tamales, it was great. On Friday we just ate left overs
because everyone let us take home a plate of food. And then on
Saturday we were walking down the street past a member's house, and
they were outside so we went and talked to them really quick. They
asked us if we wanted more tamales of course we said yes cause you can
never say no to tamales. So we ate even more tamales! It was awesome!

It was a pretty good week. The church also came out with a new video
for Christmas. Make sure to watch it and share it with all your
friends.
#ASaviorIsBorn Christmas.mormon.org
o si lo quiere en español #HaNacidoUnSalvador Navidad.mormon.org

Here's a picture of the PopEye statue in Crystal City
And everyone in Eagle Pass after exchanges

Love y'all!

Elder Mackay

Happy Thanksgiving - Week 14 Carrizo Springs

November 23, 2015

This week was another great week. The last couple days have actually
been cold. It's been pretty nice. It is still weird to be cold but not
see any snow though...

We had more exchanges this week which was pretty fun. Elder
Christensen, the new district leader, came down here with me. It was a
good day. We met an old Spanish lady who was super hard to understand.
It's always fun trying to talk to people when you have no idea what
they are saying to you.

I had an experience this week that reminded me of the importance of
becoming as a child like it says in the scriptures. We were having
lunch at the Branch Presidents house and they invited the Chavez
family over as well. And the 2 Chavez kids don't speak any English and
the Russo's niece was there who didn't speak any Spanish. And even
with that they just started playing and having a fun time together.
The language didn't matter. Well until Monce, the Chavez girl wanted
to learn more about her new friend so she got us to translate some
questions for her. It was pretty fun.
I think a lot of times children give us the best example of how we
need to be. It doesn't matter how different someone seems they are
still part of Gods family and we need to love them all the same.

Have a great Thanksgiving, love y'all!

Elder Mackay

I found where the Holy Ghost lives

Elder Christensen and I

Spinach Festival - Week 13 Carrizo Springs

November 16, 2015

Well this week was the Spinach festival in Crystal City. And Crystal
City is the Spinach Capitol of the world which means there was a ton
of people out there. So it was pretty hard to find people at home. But
it was still a great week!

We met a lot of less active members this week which was really good.
We have been trying to get to know all of the members of the branch
because it's pretty small so we could easily meet everyone. And that
way we know how we can best help them as well.

Yesterday we also had a potluck after church. And since it is close to
Thanksgiving it was a Thanksgiving potluck. It was super good.
Definitely ate way too much but that's alright. They told us that we
could take a plate home to eat later and one sister told me I should
take the whole leg. So I ate a turkey leg for lunch today and it was
just as good. I love Thanksgiving!

All in all it was a great week!

Love y'all!

Elder Mackay

Rain - Week 12 Carrizo Springs

November 9, 2015

Well there was a lot of rain again this week. And it was actually cold
so that was fun! Finally didn't have to worry about melting it was
great.

Unfortunately because it was cold and there was a lot of rain there
wasn't a lot of people outside. So we basically spent the week
knocking doors with not much success. But we did meet a lot of less
active members that we are going to start meeting with now so that was
really good.

We did have a gun pulled on us this week but other than that not too
many exciting things happened this week. But it is getting close to
tamale season so I'm super excited for that!

We have just been trying to work a lot with the less active members.
The branch could be pretty big if everyone came but unfortunately only
like 20 people come. So we are trying to find those lost sheep.

It has been hard but it's been amazing to see the happiness that a few
people have felt as they have come back!

Have a great week, love y'all!

Elder Mackay

Baptism - Week 11 Carrizo Springs

November 2, 2015

This week was pretty good. We had a lot of good things happen and saw
a lot of miracles.

We had exchanges on Tuesday and so I was here with Elder Tingey. It
was a pretty fun day. We were in this small town called Big Wells and
we were just walking around when we started to hear chickens. So we
decided to follow the sound of the chickens and then we met this guy
named Roy who was super interested. That was pretty cool! Always
follow chickens!

We also had exchanges again on Friday with Elder Mora. He is from
Costa Rica so that was super fun. That was also a really great day. We
found a lot of people.

And on Sunday Rosa got baptized! So that was great. We had a day to
figure out everything for it so I'm glad that everything went well. We
also had a super great lesson with Chris and Selena that night.

It's amazing to see the love God has for everyone and how willing he
is to help and bless us as we choose to follow him.

Have a great week, love y'all!

Elder Mackay

Here is Rosa at the baptism and our district after the exchanges.

Creepy Story Caleb shared with me:

Well it was dark outside and we were walking down the street when we noticed there was a guy walking behind us a ways back. We got a weird feeling but we just stopped and said hi to him. He just walked up and shook our hands and just said "are y'all from the church?" Then we said yes then he just said have a good night and kept going. But when he shook my hand I just got the weirdest feeling ever. Just a really bad feeling and I noticed that his face was covered in blood and his shirt was just soaked with blood. He definitely got shot or stabbed or something. We asked if we could help him but he said no so we just got out of there because we just had a really bad feeling.

Happy Halloween - Week 10 Carrizo Springs

October 26, 2015

So apparently there was a massive hurricane in Mexico that was
supposed to just destroy everything here but luckily it stopped and
all we got was some rain. But the rain was super nice. Cooled down
everything so it hasn't been hot the last couple of days. That's been
super nice.

This week there was a baptism for a member. That was super great. We
had 3 investigators show up for it. So that was awesome. They all said
they enjoyed it.

We talked to one of the investigators named Chris who was at the
baptism the day after about it. He really liked it. He told us that
the girl who was baptized just looked like she was glowing after. Said
she just looked so clean and happy. And then he said he wants to feel
just as clean and happy as she was. Now we just gotta help him so that
he is able to do that. But so far he is doing great!

Everything is going great! The Lord is preparing his people!

Love y'all!

Elder Mackay

Big Dogs - Week 9 Carrizo Springs

October 19, 2015

This week we got to do a bit of flood relief help up in Eagle Pass. I
guess when it rained last week it actually flooded pretty bad over
there. Some houses got hit with 5 ft of water. Crazy! So that was fun
destroying walls and stuff!

Other than that the week was pretty normal. We did have a really
awesome lesson with Chris. We taught him like a month ago but then he
moved to San Antonio, but now he is back. It was a great lesson.
Everything finally made sense to him which was super cool to see.
There's a baptism this week for a member and Chris and his family said
they are going to go watch it, so that will be awesome.

We did have a giant German Shepard try to eat us. That was exciting.

Looks like I am going to be translating sacrament every week now. That's exciting. It is so hard. It was pretty embarrassing. The speakers kept saying Sacrament and I completely forgot the word. So I just made up the word "El Sacramento" then the final speaker used it near the end of his talk and finally I remembered the word "La Santa Cena" good job me.

We also had exchanges this week. So Elder Smith came down to Carrizo
with me. It was the day that we helped out with the floods so it was a
super short exchange but it was fun. Elder Smith just barely came out
as well. He is super funny, that was a fun day.

Love y'all

Elder Mackay

Great Week - Carrizo Springs Week 8

October 12, 2015

This week has been pretty good. We got some rain this week which was
really nice. That cooled everything down a lot.

Everything is going great down here in Carrizo. It's been a pretty
exciting week. We had a lot of great lessons, part of our ceiling fell
down and we also found out that since we have had to go to San Antonio
twice this month that we only have 200 miles left for the rest of the
month. Yay! Bike time!

We had to go all the way to Kyle again for the new missionary meeting.
The meeting went great. But that was a lot of driving that day.

I think the best part of the week was Sunday. We had an awesome family
move in from Mexico. They are going to help the branch out a lot. They
only speak Spanish too which is fun. Their 4 year old son taught me
the alphabet in Spanish haha. Since they only speak Spanish I had to
translate for them. That was super hard. My brain just wanted to
explode.

But we also had 3 investigators at church which was awesome! Bro.
Chavez from Mexico already became pretty good friends with an
investigator we have been working with for a while. He told us that
next time we come over he wants us to bring Bro. Chavez with us. So
that is just super awesome.

President Russo's brother was visiting as well. So they had a big
Argentine BBQ. That was some really good food. I'm pretty sure it was
all from some weird part of the cow, but I'm not sure. I decided it
would be better not to know cause it was pretty good.

The Gospel brings happiness! Love y'all!

Elder Mackay

Pictures:

I made some really good taco stuff. Thought you would be proud so I
took a picture. And also part of the ceiling fell off...

Conference and Transfers - Carrizo Springs Week 7

Oct 5, 2015

Well we had transfers this week. And I have the opportunity to train a
new missionary! Basically I need to show him how to do missionary work
and what I teach him will probably affect the rest of his mission.
Haha no pressure right?

So I'm with Elder Hutchings now. He is great! It's funny cause
everyone here would always say how tall I was, well Elder Hutchings is
6'5 so that's exciting. I'm now the short one. :(

Conference was amazing. God has called the 98th, 99th and 100th
apostle since the restoration. What a historic day. I definitely
learned a lot from conference. I really loved the Ponderize idea, so I
decided to take the Ponderize challenge.

So this week I'm going to be pondering Moroni 10:32. So far, I've
learned a few things from pondering about it. As we continually
progress and strive for perfection in Christ  (like what Larry R.
Lawrence talked about in his talk) as we do that and love God with all
our might, mind and strength we will receive the grace of Christ. And
through that grace we continue to become perfected in Christ. Until
eventually, it says "ye can in nowise deny the power of God" we will
have a perfect, unshakeable faith.

Have a great week! Love y'all!

Elder Mackay

Here is Elder Hutchings and I. (With our ceiling that is caving in)

Another Week - Carrizo Springs Week 6

Well this week was really hot. It rained one day which was nice, but other than that it is still very hot here.

Everything is going great here. This is probably going to be a short email because I can't think of anything to write. Nothing really happened this week but we did have 3 lessons in Spanish which was super fun. We also had 2 investigators at church which was awesome. We also have an investigator who has a baptismal date in 3 weeks. Super excited for that!

There was a member who needed help building some stairs so we went and helped him. Building is pretty hard. We helped him for a long time and still weren't able to finish it. But it was some good service. It was pretty fun.

Not much else happened besides that. I'm excited for conference! Hopefully we can get lots of people to come watch it with us!

Have a great week! Love y'all!

Elder Mackay

Mexico! - Carrizo Springs Week 5

September 21, 2015

This week was pretty interesting haha.

Last P-Day we went down to Eagle Pass and went right next to the
border of Mexico. It was pretty sweet. So we took some pictures with
the giant Mexico Flag in the back.

So on Tuesday we had exchanges. It was the funniest exchange ever. I
went up to Eagle Pass again with Elder Tingey the new District Leader.
The day went great. We taught a lot of lessons and it was all in
Spanish so that was sweet. But to make a long story short we broke 2
bikes so we ended up having to walk around all day which took forever
but it was awesome!

There was a Mission Spanish Conference on Friday up in Kyle which is
about an hour and a half north of San Antonio. So we drove 3 hours to
San Antonio on Thursday and stayed with some other Elders then drove
the rest of the way on Friday. The conference was great. Learned lots
of cool things about Spanish. Then we drove the four and a half hours
back to Carrizo. So basically we were sitting down all day.. But it
was fun.

On Saturday we had a super hard lesson in Spanish. We were teaching an
old hispanic man and I would say something to him and he would look at
me like he had no idea what I just said, then he would ask me what a
word I said meant. So at first I thought it was weird cause he
actually speaks Spanish but then I realized that the words he asked
about had a TexMex version that I had heard people say. So I used
those words and then it was making sense. So we had to teach using
words that we aren't used to using. Which is really hard. But it was a
good learning experience!

That's all I can think of for last week! Have a great week! Love y'all!

Elder Tingey and I

Elder Caleb MacKay