Elder Adam Ray Allen's adventures in the New York, New York City Mission!!

Como les va? It's wild that Christmas is next week already  time is going! This has been a solid week, we had a few exchanges, and tons of miracles. To top it all off, my boy  Elder  Thompson (now Ethan) came back and knocked on our door to say what's up while he is visiting the mission. Such a dope surprise! I honestly could finish my mission in this area, Brentwood is the best. The ward is so tight knit and the members are the coolest. The people we are working with right now are truly seeking answers to sincere questions and seeing blessings from reading the Book of Mormon. This has been the best moment of the mission! I was studying this week about the gospel of Jesus Christ and what it means to me. I came across a talk from President Thomas S. Monson a few years back entitled "love - the essence of the gospel". It talks about how as we live the gospel, we are naturally going to show love to others. There's a quote I thought was

 We missed the district picture cause we're too busy :( Que tal el frío? Such a good week!  We got transfer calls and I'll be staying in Long Island for Christmas! Elder Mansfield and I will be holding down the Plainview zone for another transfer. Boutta see some awesome stuff here!! Side note: We have mice in our apartment and my companion killed one with a mug. It was awesome. Also a family we are teaching found a really badly wounded cat on the side of the road and didn't have a car. They asked us to save its life, so we took it to the nearest vet emergency room and they put it down  :( This dude was beat up  though so definitely a good play call. 😂 One of the coolest things I have seen this week has been the power the Book of Mormon has. We have been focusing all of our efforts on getting people to read, pray, and come to church. As these people have been taking those small steps, their lives have literally been changing in so many aspects. The

 W e take companionship's on a run at 5:30 am and this is the view at the end. Buenos días! One thing I learned this week: NEVER let my future job get in the way of my church attendance. I'm not sure if it's just a New York thing, but it seems like everyone here has tons of time during the week, and then when Sunday rolls around their boss just happens to call them in. Interesting... 😏 Looks like Elder Mansfield and I will be having to visit some of these people's bosses.👍 We had a pretty sweet week overall, with 3 exchanges which were all super fun. Split with Elder Ochsenbine!  I was on one exchange with a new missionary named Elder Ochsenbine, and we went off roading for a little bit. (it was just a dirt road to a Bible referral no worries). We knock on her door, and she is the nicest little lady ever. She was born without arms, and you know me.. just intelligent as ever, after we had talked for a bit I go to give her the Bible and she

Buenos días!  I swear I keep telling myself the mission cannot get any better, but every week it seems to improve. But hey, no complaints over here. We had some straight MIRACLES in Brentwood. We were blessed with 4 people who were ready to make the commitment to be baptized, and now are planning 4 baptisms for the end of December and beginning of January. The members of the ward have been a huge help and the relationships we are forming with them are awesome.  So almost forgot that Thanksgiving was last week, but yes mom I got fed more than I needed. We had a dinner at our bishops house, also got the best tamales ever from our recent convert and her husband, and to top off the night went to a Domincan throw down. The domincan one got me. My stomach felt like I had spent the whole day at Disneyland. But the plus side is that I kept it all down unlike last year. 😂 My stomach has gotten 10 x smaller, so putting down a lot of food isn't even an option any more

Buenos días familia y amigos! I don't think I have ever been this tired before, but hey no complaints because I'm loving it! We had 4 exchanges this week, lots of driving, and even more teaching and finding. I got to go on splits with my trainee, Elder Cuevas (Who is a straight beast), and also Elder Palmer (Who is also a beast). So needless to say, this week was pretty sweet. One thing I've been thinking about lately is how we should confront challenges when they come. It's inevitable that all of us will pass through hardships, and sometimes that hardship will seem impossible to overcome.  There's a story in the old testament about two men named Joshua and Caleb. They had made it out of Egypt with Moses and the Israelites, and were sent by Moses to go scout out the promised land with 10 other men. When the men returned with immense amounts of berries and all manner of food, most of them were saddened because the land was overrun by a pe

OUR RACCOON FRIEND TRYING TO MOVE IN!  So another quick week gone here in Brentwood, with tons of meetings, exchanges, and new facebook initiative that is being rolled out in our area here.  MTC GROUP! We had Elder Haynie from the 70 come into town for a mission tour, and he is the man. He came to our MLC, and dropped some straight fire on us. Literally, roasted us pretty well. So basically after that Elder Mansfield and I were pretty pumped just like the rest of the Zone Leaders and started kicking it up a noche in different aspects of the work that have never been focused on before by this mission.  One thing I loved that he brought up before he started talking about mission numbers was something about obedience in the mission. He said, "the tragedy of disobedience is that you go home the exact same way that you left."  It's so true! The biggest changes I have seen in myself have come when I am living the gospel of Jesus Christ in it's en