San Marcos - Week 4 San Marcos - De Zavala

July 11, 2016

Well, this last week was pretty good. We ended up doing exchanges
twice this week which was super fun.

First I went over to New Braunfels with Elder Goeckeritz. It was a fun
day. They have a ton of less actives over there so we basically just
stopped by less actives all day. It was great.

Then Elder Rasmuson came to San Marcos with me for a day. That was
pretty interesting. Everyone that I need to do exchanges with doesn't
speak Spanish so it is kind of weird bringing them to my area because
we teach in Spanish. Elder Rasmuson showed me this awesome taqueria
that sells these super good tacos for a $1.25. So that was amazing.

This last week we were able to teach a lot of lessons. We have
actually started meeting people who are willing to meet regularly so
that is super great. And a few of the less actives that we have been
working with came to church this last Sunday which was exciting. The
work continues.

love y'all!

Elder Mackay

All the De Zavala Elders!

4th of July - Week 3 San Marcos - De Zavala

July 4, 2016

I hope that everyone is having a great 4th of July! Apparently a lot
of people like to come and celebrate here in San Marcos because there
are just people everywhere today.

This last week was great. We got to meet the new President. His name
is President Polley and he is great. We had our first interview with
him as well. That was pretty scary. He is a retired FBI agent and he
specialized in interrogation. But the interview went well, it wasn't
as scary as I thought it would be.

The other Elders in De Zavala had a baptism this last week. I got to
do the interview for them which was pretty fun. It is super cool to be
able to just talk to someone who is ready for baptism and just hear
their testimony. I talked to her husband a little bit as well. He was
super excited for his wife's baptism. He should be getting baptized
here in a few weeks as well. He was just nervous about it, but he said
that he wants to get sealed to his wife in the Temple and felt that
watching her baptism would help him out a lot. So that was great to
see.

We have been  able to work with a lot of Less Actives this last week.
We are really trying to help strengthen the Branch more right now
because there aren't a lot of active members. So we decided that a
great place to start was with the Less Actives. So far it has gone
great. We have been able to reignite the fire in a few people. And now
they are getting started with the process of preparing for the temple.
There is a lot of blessings waiting for them!

The church is true!

Have a great week! Love y'all!

Elder Mackay

New Mission President - Week 2 San Marcos - De Zavala

June 27, 2016

Well this week we are getting a new Mission President. I am definitely
going to miss President Slaughter but I am super excited for the new
President. We get to meet him tomorrow so that will be great.

This past week was great. It was super hot and we ended up doing a lot
of service so we spent a lot of time out in the sun. But it was great.
We started volunteering to help out at a garden that the Hospital has.
So now every week we get to work in a garden. It is way fun.

We were able to meet a lot of less active members this last week. We
went through the branch roster and made a list of everyone that we
didn't know. Then we started stoping by all of them. So we ended up
finding out that a lot of people have moved, but we also got to meet
lots of the members.

Right now since we don't have a lot of investigators we are trying to
work with all the less actives and get them to come back as well. And
we have been able to see a lot of success from it.

I hope that everyone has a great 4th of July! Love y'all!

Elder Mackay

New Mission President - Week 2 San Marcos - De Zavala

June 27, 2016

Well this week we are getting a new Mission President. I am definitely
going to miss President Slaughter but I am super excited for the new
President. We get to meet him tomorrow so that will be great.

This past week was great. It was super hot and we ended up doing a lot
of service so we spent a lot of time out in the sun. But it was great.
We started volunteering to help out at a garden that the Hospital has.
So now every week we get to work in a garden. It is way fun.

We were able to meet a lot of less active members this last week. We
went through the branch roster and made a list of everyone that we
didn't know. Then we started stoping by all of them. So we ended up
finding out that a lot of people have moved, but we also got to meet
lots of the members.

Right now since we don't have a lot of investigators we are trying to
work with all the less actives and get them to come back as well. And
we have been able to see a lot of success from it.

I hope that everyone has a great 4th of July! Love y'all!

Elder Mackay

De zavala - Week 1 San Marcos - De Zavala

June 20, 2016

Well this last week has been super hot! But it is already June so I
guess that is understandable.

Everything is going great in the new area. This last week we just did
a lot of finding because there aren't a ton of solid investigators. So
that involved a lot of walking around in the hot sun. So that was a
lot of fun. But we got to meet some hilarious people.

The branch here is great. All of the people are awesome. It was super
funny, when church started there was like 10 people there. But at the
end of Sacrament meeting there was about 80.

Not too many exciting things happened. Just lots of walking around
talking to people, which was actually pretty fun except for the heat.

Have a great week, Love y'all!

Elder Mackay

Transfers again - Week 26 Marble falls

June 13, 2016

Well we are at transfers once again. I am going to be leaving Marble Falls and heading to San Marcos to serve in the Dezavala Branch. It will be pretty fun because its a Spanish Branch. But it is also going to be super sad leaving Marble Falls. I have met a lot of amazing people here and I am definitely going to miss them. 

This week was pretty good. We are still able to see a lot of success right now, even though a lot of our investigators have dropped us. We are still working a lot with Alondra, trying to keep them on track after their baptism. Unfortunately they didn't come to church yesterday so they still haven't received the Holy Ghost... So that is kind of a problem. But they are still doing good with everything, they just had some problems in the morning and are super nervous to do it because they don't want to go to in front of everybody at church. 

They are also combining Marble Falls and Llano again. So Elder Trent and his new companion should be pretty busy. That will be a lot of fun. There are a lot of great things going on right now. The work of God never stops.

Love y'all!

Elder Mackay

Baptism - Week 25 Marble Falls

June 6, 2016

Well this week we ended up doing a lot of service which was really
fun. There has been a lot of flooding lately so we helped out at a lot
of houses that had been flooded. It's always fun to be able to do some
service.

We also had exchanges this week with the Zone Leaders. So I got to go
up to Austin again for a day. It was pretty fun, you meet all sorts of
interesting people over in Austin. Especially since the Zone Leaders
cover the YSA Ward so they work with all the students from the
University of Texas.

The most exciting part of the week was the baptism! It was a pretty
crazy day. We headed over to the church early to clean the font and
make sure it was clean before. Well, we were filling up buckets of
water to clean it out and I ended up spilling one and flooding a room
in the church.. So we had to clean up all that too.

But we got everything cleaned up and set up. And baptism went great.
The spirit was there very strong and there was lots of crying so
that's always good. We had a few investigators show up at the baptism
as well which was awesome. All the investigators who came only speak
Spanish and so they all became friends and started exchanging numbers
and saying how they could give each other rides to church and
everything. It was awesome.

We also had a Stake Conference yesterday, because of they won't get
confirmed until next week. But it turns out that they created a new
stake so now we are a part of a whole new stake. The church is
growing!

Have a great week, love y'all!

Elder Mackay

The Elect - Week 24 Marble Falls

May 30, 2015

There has been a lot of rain this last week which has been really
good. Except for it has also been super humid and a lot of houses have
flooded. So thats no good.

This last week has been pretty interesting. We were working with a lot
of great investigators and a few of them were progressing really well.
Well it turns out that basically all of them have stopped talking to
us and are just avoiding us now. They won't answer the phone, or
answer the door. Even people who had a baptismal date before. So that
kind of sucks.

But we still have Alondra! They are basically the only investigators
that still talk to us, but it is totally worth it. Her and her
daughter Alondrita are going to be getting baptized on Saturday. I am
really excited for them. Ive known them basically the whole time Ive
been here. So it is going to great to see them finally take this step.

Other than that there is not a whole lot going on right now. We are
just focusing a lot on Alondra and getting everything set up for them.
But it has definitely been an eye opener of how there are many people
who will come to the truth and still not accept it. And it is because
of their agency which God can't take away. It really shows how much He
loves us. He is willing to let us make our own choices, even if He
knows it will end up hurting us.

Have a great week! Love y'all!

Elder Mackay

Lot of Rain - Week 22 Marble Falls

May 16, 2016

We had a great week this week. It has been pretty crazy but there was
a lot of great things that happened. The weather has been pretty feo
lately. Lots of rain which means it has been hot and humid.

We were able to teach Alondra and Alondrita a few times. We actually
met a less active member who is really good friends with them so she
helped us out in a lesson which was great. It was pretty cool
actually. She is a police officer and some crazy stuff happened with
Alondra a few months ago where she actually was dead for a few
minutes. And the member is actually the one who brought her back. So
she talked about how just like she got a 2nd chance in life, baptism
will give her a 2nd chance to have a happier life. It was a great
lesson.

They even came to church on Sunday which was really good. They could
only stay for the 1st hour but they really liked it. So they are doing
super good and are pretty excited about their baptism now.
Unfortunately Maria didn't make it to church. She got called into work
in the morning. She was pretty mad about that. So we had to move her
date back a bit. But she is still doing really good. Turns out that
she has had some weird stuff happening in her life and she really
wants some help for it. So she is going to talk to President Slaughter
tonight. That should help her out a lot.

Lots of great things are happening right now. This week will be a
little interesting. Our truck needs to get repaired so we won't have a
car for most of the week.

Love y'all!

Elder Mackay

Week without a truck - Week 23 Marble Falls

May 23, 2016

Well this week was pretty interesting. We had to get our truck fixed
so we didn't have a car for like 4 days. So we ended up just walking
around Marble Falls. So we ended up walking a lot. It was rough.

Since we were stuck in Marble Falls we couldn't really visit people in
other cities which was hard because we are working with a lot of
people in Granite Shoals and Cottonwood Shores. But still had a pretty
good week.

We really wanted to make sure that we could teach Alondra still this
last week even though she lives in Cottonwood Shores. But we didn't
really have a way to get out there. Luckily Alondra is awesome and
offered to drive us over there and then drop us off in Marble Falls
again after the lesson. That helped out a lot. So we taught her a few
times, they are still doing great. They also came to church again on
Sunday. The only thing keeping them from being baptized at this point
is just them being nervous about it.

It has been really great to teach all these great people that we are
teaching right now. It is always incredible to see the happiness that
comes to their lives as they change their lives to follow Christ. It
really is the only way to find true happiness.

Love y'all!

Elder Mackay

Happy Mother's Day - Week 21 Marble Falls

May 9, 2016

I hope that everyone had a great Mothers day!

This week was pretty great. Nothing too exciting happened but we did
have a lot of great lessons with the people that we are working with.

Maria is still all set to get baptized on the 28th and is super
excited for it. So right now we are just teaching her even more and
trying to help her stay excited. Alondra and her daughter Alondrita
are both doing really good as well. They both are reading and have
changed their lives a lot. They want to be baptized but are really
nervous about making mistakes after making a commitment like that. But
they should also be getting baptized as well pretty soon.

Have a great week. Love y'all!

Elder Mackay

Here is Carmen and I. She says that we are best friends because her
birthday is 1 day after mine.

Transfers - Week 20 Marble Falls

May 2, 2016

Well we got the transfer information this morning and I will be
staying here with Elder Trent another transfer. That will make it 4
transfers in Marble Falls! I'm pretty excited about that, it's a lot
of fun here.

Right now we have a lot of amazing investigators and so we were able
to teach a lot of great lessons this last week.

Maria is still doing really good. She finished reading the whole Book
of Mormon in only 2 weeks. She even came to church yesterday which was
really good. So she is still on track for her baptism at the end of
May. We are really excited for that.

We had a great church tour with Marcela this week. The spirit was very
strong when we showed her the font and talked about baptism. She also
accepted to be baptized at the end of May. She always has a lot of
great questions so it is really fun to teach her.

So we have 2 with a baptismal date set right now but then we have like
6 other investigators who are progressing a lot and are super close to
making that commitment as well. We are just being super blessed right
now.

I hope everyone has a great Mother's Day!

Elder Mackay

Marcela found out 1 of us might leave so she wanted a picture.

Dogs - Week 19 Marble Falls

April 25, 2016

Well this week was a lot of fun.

We were able to have a lot of success again this last week. And we had
a lot of interesting lessons. One less active member pulled out some
anti Mormon article and said that she wouldn't come to church unless
we proved it all wrong. That was a fun lesson, we won though!

I got bit by a dog again. That was fun, it wasn't too bad. This lady
opened the door then her chihuahua ran out. So I tried to stop it and
it bit my hand. But we had a super awesome lesson with her after.
Worth!

Maria is still doing super good. She is super excited for her baptism
even though it is in like 4 weeks. She has already read the whole Book
of Mormon and just accepts and understands everything super well. Now
we just need to help her get work off so that she can come to church!

Sorry I don't have a lot of time. It's Elder Trent's birthday so we
went fishing all day.

Love y'all!

Elder Mackay