Transfers and Updates (received 12/27)

Hey y'all I'm getting transferred back to Laredo!!!! I'm gunna finish training Elder Volcanes, good thing-- I hear he's good at Spanish!!!

so yesterday was AWESOME

Elder Harker loves to draw

President let us watch a movie, the choices; finding Dory or The Secret Life of Pets the movie started up and we read the intro to "STAR WARS, The Force Awakens" and the intro read out and we were like "WHHHHAAAATTTT" and it was AWESOME best movie I have watched in a church gym! I finally know who and what everyone is talking about, it was super sad seeing some things happen, and to see Daniel Craig's epic performance as a nameless storm trooper. well next year its on to Rogue 1!!!!!

I am kinda sad to leave Edinburg, we just found the Medina family and I don't want to leave the Elizondo family either but like I know the Elders replacing me and they are pretty good missionaries so it should all be fine. 

and I have news: a random guy me and Elder Widmer talked to on the street has been meeting with the English missionaries and is gunna get baptized!! super cool his name is George.

well I'll tell ya more next week about everything

but here is a small Christmas note

 2 And behold, he said unto them: Behold, I give unto you a sign; for five years more cometh, and behold, then cometh the Son of God to redeem all those who shall believe on his name.

 3 And behold, this will I give unto you for a sign at the time of his coming; for behold, there shall be great lights in heaven, insomuch that in the night before he cometh there shall be no darkness, insomuch that it shall appear unto man as if it was day.

 4 Therefore, there shall be one day and a night and a day, as if it were one day and there were no night; and this shall be unto you for a sign; for ye shall know of the rising of the sun and also of its setting; therefore they shall know of a surety that there shall be two days and a night; nevertheless the night shall not be darkened; and it shall be the night before he is born.

 5 And behold, there shall a new star arise, such an one as ye never have beheld; and this also shall be a sign unto you.

 6 And behold this is not all, there shall be many signs and wonders in heaven.

Our Heavenly Father knows how dim this word is, and how sometimes we need to be brought into the light to comprehend His light, and what Christ means to all of us, and how we can brighten our lives with His presence. 

​pics of us and the Beltran family

Swedish Pancakes and Huckleberry syrup

Elder Harker made breakfast for his comp and roommates 

Missionaries at the Palacios house with the Palacios and Rodriguez-Reyes families

 and choco Flan  

oh also went to a restaurant last night and tried Gator, super good​

this week (received 12/12/16)

Hey family,
don't have a lot of time was writing Presi. a whole lot. so...

Monday-visited the ward mission leader and his wife --they said they are working on their sister in law who has kids who love the gospel, but they kept venting about stuff so it didn't go anywhere.

Tuesday-visited the Palacios family who just got a big contract at work so they are gunna be staying in Texas this Christmas.

Wednesday-had interviews with Presidente, I got chastized pretty good for letting my comp get super trunky and not having investigators to teach, he was like "how is your greenie gunna feel, when he comes to the mission, only to find out there is nobody to teach" 

guess I'm training soon, but we have been doing better with that

we found a few people yesterday to teach so that was good.

​Thursday- visited the Elizondo family and taught about the Plan of Salvation watched a video in Spanish, left them with the commitment to watch the Restoration video

Friday-had the ward Christmas party, the Elizondos came, had turkey posole, and Sister Elizondo watched the movie!!!​

Saturday- helped the English ward decorate for their ward Christmas party, the Acostas gave us tamales for dinner, they are super good!

Sunday-we only had 1 investigator at church, super boring but we found 2 new investigators!

hope yall have a great week and catch ya next time!

-elder HarKer

Hope yall #ILUMINAelMUNDO this year

https://www.mormon.org/christmas/in-25-ways-over-25-days/jesus-taught-others

Elder Harker is liking the Christmas campaign this year..." It gives us something to talk about at the front door instead of "hey we are missionaries!""Slam!" ..."okay, need any help?"... "huh must be deaf."

Jeshua attached a ton of pics to his email this week, but with no explanations...so your guess is as good as mine.

Keeping good track of his blood glucose
and intake of food and insulin.
That diabetes life tho!

Calculator is for adding up carbs and
calculating the proper dosage.
That diabetes life tho!

Ward Christmas party

Hey family (received 11/28/16)

Weekly highlights!

well I forgot my planner with this weeks episode written down but here we go

New Zone- we have a zone where I don't hardly know anyone in the mission... I'm old.

greenie- one greenie told me he watched my blog and loved it before the mission and said i was famous(which i already know) and he started complimenting me ... the curse of wide spread fame.

Ward dinner- We had the ward Pavo(turkey) dinner. I like Mexican turkey better. It's not so dry and bland as regular turkey.

Elizondos- talked to the Elizondos at the ward dinner, Hector and i talked about Call of Duty and i learned how to say stuff in Spanish like "ModernWarfare Dos!" and "tirar con un Ak fortysiete" Modern Warefare 2 and shoot an Ak47

Calling the Doctor- the next day I woke up with really bad pain in my abdomen, we monitored it and called Sis. Hewett, we were afraid that it was something wrong with the appendix but the whole day the pain stayed but no other symptoms came.

Sick- stayed the same the rest of the week, its a stomach virus

Bro. Rios- found a super cool less active who is really wanting to come back to church and bring his daughter, hes only like 26 but hey not a bad thing, we need more young blood here

still sick... ya...

Still need my routing number... cant pay fast offerings...

Hola familia! (received 11/21/16)

Weekly highlights

Brownies to Gonzalez-- so we have been making brownies to give to members and Bro gonzalez just got back from his mission and loved it when we brought him some!

Transfers- so we are staying, Widmer is dying here in Edinberg 2nd ward

Sisters in the District- We now have Sisters Tupuo and Monteczuma in our district

Leadership changes-- Elder Nelson is now our District Leader and is training a brand new greenie Elder Grannis from Arizona

Planner cover art-- I made the back planner cover for my planner. Milton the Dragon

Bro Galvan-- had a lesson with a less active. he has "too much going on in the club(biker gang) to come to church, oh well hes super cool to talk to

Posole-- visited a new member and they fed us Posole, not sure on spelling.

Carolina!-- another Less Activa, had to talk to her original missionary on how to help her. she found out i was diabetic and shouted "No Tocas los Brownies!!!" English: Dude don't partake brownies!

Rancho Guadalupe Long Horns-- got lost trying to find a less active and found a super fancy ranch, complete with warning signs saying "federal property" and there was a big longhorn bull at the entrance

Eating Tuna-- the Diaz family fed us Tuna(cactus fruit) its like a cucumber but 90% seeds

Del Angel house with Sisters we visted the Del Angels with the sisters, PACKED HOUSE

Week of Milagros

Weekly Highlights

Halloween- We spent the holiday with President and Mission Zone at Dove Chapel untill 7pm then we went home.

Rugby- while there we played Rugby with Elder Tomasi,

Diabetic crap- I met Sister Juchau, who is one of the 3 diabetic sisters in the mission, we talked about diabetes and she "out-diabetesed" me.

PMG- Sis Williams requested that I made her a "Predicad Mi Evangelio Por El Espiritu" cover for her Preach My Gospel

Intercambios- went on exchanges with Peacock and Gelalich

Alejandra- We received a referral to someone from the sisters, we decided while we were in the general area to stop by before the indicated availability time, we stopped by and some southern white dude answered, and we asked to see if Alejandra was there, he said "yes, Alex those guys are here" and he invited us in, well Alejandra peeked behind the door and was like "Pasale, pasale!!!"(come in) we started to take with her and found out she is an active member from Coahuila. and had been living with her Tios for the past month and didnt have any contact with any church members so we got her all set up to go to church. Yesterday she came, and bore her testimony on prayer and how her prayers were answered to be found, she sat down and the entire ward, swarmed her with cuddles and like"we are here for you, if you need anything let us know" and etc. 

Ward Temple Trip- the ward went up to the San Antone Temple, too bad we cant go:(

here are some pics and video, Elder Widmer and President were going hard at Ping Pong on Halloween!!!​

Elder Harker and another Elder
on Halloween 

Elder HarKer loves mail!

send to:

200 W. La Vista Ave.

McAllen, TX 78501

 Sis Williams requested that I made her a "Predicad Mi Evangelio Por El Espiritu" cover for her Preach My Gospel

Google Translate version: "Thanks to you for meeting me, nice day, see you on Tuesday too.

Google Translate version: "Thanks to you for meeting me, nice day, see you on Tuesday too."

Elder Widmer and President were going hard at Ping Pong on Halloween!!!​

I also forgot to mention, I have officially spent one year as a missionary as of November 4th!!! 

Elder Harker's first year!

One year down... one to go!

received October 31, 2016

Hello everyone, im a little short on time so heres a quick runthough of the week so far.

Elder Harker

Weekly highlights

La Familia Perales

so we found a less active family and they said no missionaries, nobody had been by in TWO years, so we have been teaching them and yesterday they were at Church!!!!

Conferencia de Zona 

Pres decided to take us into doctrine with some unteachable content, he went hard on about physical transfiguration to endure the presence of God and how the world was prepared for the Restauracion. 

dinner with the Alvarado family

Bro Alvarado made us Mexican enchiladas, VERY SPICY we got a little sick from them. 

Y Si Nos Toca Morir

the ward had an FHE and watched a movie about Poncho villa and the Mormon colonies of the church in mexico, it was old, all the guns in the movie were Mosin Nagants mk 18/91 

Sis. Castros Bday

We all went to Taco Palenque, my favorite, for el lonche

got lost

at the top part of our area we were searching for an inactive and found ourselves in the middle of an orchard. 

Halloween!!! 

Celestial P-day

return home at 6pm

and i wish there was more info its just been really slow, its picked up a little but ya..

Elder Harker voting for the first time

Elder Harker and Elders Peacock

Send Elder Harker some mail

Elder Widmer and Elder Harker

Elder Harker's work station

October 24--Hey

so this week was awesome I don't have much time but Tuesday we had interviews With President Torres, in ENGLISH!!!! That was crazy, he advised me to follow spiritual promptings and personal revelation, and then Saturday I went down to Pharr, to work with Elder Stone.

Like I said don't have time but I will leave y'all with this from 
1 Thessalonians 5

16 Rejoice evermore.

 17 Pray without ceasing.

 18 In every thing give thanks: for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus concerning you.

 19 Quench not the Spirit.

 20 Despise not prophesyings.

 21 Prove all things; hold fast that which is good.

 22 Abstain from all appearance of evil.

 23 And the very God of peace sanctify you wholly; and I pray God your whole spirit and soul and body be preserved blameless unto the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ.

weekly highlights

interviews - had interviews with Pres. Torres Tuesday in ENGLISH! it was weird, He told me to really follow revelation and spiritual promptings

exchanges w/ E. Peacock Thursday went on exchanges with Elder Peacock

exchanges w/ E. Stone Saturday went with Elder Stone one of our Zone leaders to his area

my A1c is 8.0  self explanatory. 

Eating at Texas Roadhouse
left to right E. Gelalich, E. Nelson(of whom through Gramma Lila we are 5th cousins), me,
E. Peacock, Elder Widmer and E. Torres

October 17-- hola todos

Pos a new week has come and gone, its been pretty crazy slowwwwww..... well in short it was very distracting. people here are gearin up for huntin Whitetail and its gettin me all riled up to go, and I gotta be focused on huntin souls and not meat for the freezer.

Some news we had mission tour with Elder Kopischke! All the way from Germany.

He came to teach us about the nature of faith and how it is the enabling power God has given us, and how there is a cycle of faith, when we have desires, we act, we must continue with our action having thoughts on Christ and me must do all we can and that is when our control is complete and the miracles fall into God's hands. super awesome to get to meet him!

 Well, we have been organizing our Area getting a map of Edinburg going as well as info on all our students, members and etc. 

our area has been VERY neglected and we get to fix it up.

So since everyone's mind has been on hunting, we have actually been doing a lot! tracking down addresses, updating 30yr old records and we have been finding a lot of people to teach which is good! and with lack of time I'll leave y'all with some wise words about hunting that the Prophet Jeremiah said in relation to missionary work and the gathering of Israel.

Jeremiah 16:16

 16 ¶Behold, I will send for many fishers, saith the Lord, and they shall fish them; and after will I send for many hunters, and they shall hunt them from every mountain, and from every hill, and out of the holes of the rocks.

Hola Todos!!!! (received 10/10/16)

So this week was fun 

HIGHLIGHTS WOOOOHOOOOO

Transfers entonces transfers came and eElder McLaughlin is now a Zone Leader in South Laredo

New Comp. i am now with Elder Widmer from Orem, Utah

Mission Tour This Thursday we have a special General Authority (with a German Accent) coming to the mission!

Familia Elizondo  Elder Torres y his greenie E. Gelalich found la famila Elizondo-Lumbreras for us and they are awesome and want to learn a lot! but the didn't come to church which was frustrating.

FOOOd well Saturday night the DelAngel family took us to "Comales" a mexican restuarante y we ate a ton. literally a ton of food. and took more home. they just put the food in front of us. they know the owner and get a hefty discount

So everyone I've been super busy that last few weeks with computer stuff I had to get done. Anyways Transfers came and went and so did my comp. Elder McLaughlin he is now a zone leader in Laredo South. 

My new comp is Elder Widmer from Orem, Utah. and we have been reorganizing our entire area! getting all the info down and getting rid of all the out of date info. and since I still don't have much time i will leave one small thing with you. 

Mosiah 8:18

 Always remember, We all have a purpose, and that our smallest actions can bring about the greatest miracles.

 18 Thus God has provided a means that man, through faith, might work mighty miracles; therefore he 

becometh a great benefit to his fellow beings.

until next week everyone!

here's some pics we took this last week at a restuarante "Comales"