La Vida Es Una Carretera

Well another week in paradise, although the time is short today so Ima give you the low down in bullet points:

-We had transfers and I stayed here in Apopa.

-My companion, the wonderful Elder Herrera, left for a new area but also bought me a hammock before he left (bless his heart).

-My new companion, Elder Jimenez, is a friend from the mission who is a complete stud. He is from Honduras.

-We had a multitude of amazing experiences this week but the best was when Rosa told us she wanted to get baptized Tuesday at 4. And even tho it was weirdly specific we were cool with it and its awesome that we are gonna get the chance to see her take this step.

-DENNIS AND CAROLINA ARE GETTING MARRIED!!! And they told me I couldn't tell anyone but I don't think anyone there knows them so there ya go.

-Really just an awesome week, saw a lot of miracles and excited to grind here with Elder Jimenez.

Just to close out, I was reading this week in the Book of Mormon and at one part is says that the people didn't recognize Jesus when he was there with them. And I started to wonder if I too would recognize Jesus if he was here in front of me. In Alma chapter 5 it says that Christ is calling us but the question is if we will recognize the call.

As I went throughout the week, I focused on learning to recognize my Savior and it really changed the way I saw things. Look for the good and you'll find it as my mom always says. Look and listen for Christ and you'll find Him.

Hope everyone has a great week!

Saluuuu

Elder Moulton

"Deja Que el Espiritu"

Well another week flew bye in paradise, things are still cooking down here. We only got stuck in a rainstorm once but we covered our backpacks with trash bags and hit the streets. I'm going to have to keep it short this week because we don't have a whole lotta time, but this week was FULL of miracles. First off, and prolly the biggest, EDWIN WAS BAPTIZED!!! 

A few weeks back, my companion and I decided to go visit a member who hadn't come to church in years in a new area where we'd never been before. After wandering around lost for an hour and a half we found out that she had passed away but we ended up finding her daughter who told us to visit her nephew and long story short, within a week we met Edwin. He's 19 and just a complete stud. But when we found him he was really struggling with some bad influences in his life. Edwin left everything behind and in less than a month has changed basically 100%. After his baptism he went with us to meet people in the park and shared his testimony with a man who was struggling to express his pain and grief. With awe we watched as he testified of the truth of the Book of Mormon and invited this man to change his life. Seeing the change in Edwin and the power in his words just about brought tears to my eyes. 

The Spirit really hit us hard this week. There were 4 different times when we were walking down a street and suddenly we just had the thought pop into our head to visit a person or head down a certain area where we weren't planning on going. In the end, we found a mom and son who hadn't let us in for almost 2 months who invited us in with tears in their eyes, the sister of Eva (who was baptized just a couple months ago) who needed an answer from God, and a family that hadn't been to church in years, looking for the the way back. The point is the Spirit guides and we really felt it this week. Also we had a really fun zone activity where every companionship drew a part of the plan of salvation and we had a huge map in the central park.



 It was way fun and we met a bunch of people (shout out to the missionary who gave us the idea, you know who you are). Hope everyone has a killer week, thanks for all the love!

Saluuuuu

Elder Moulton

Una Semana Mas

Hey! Hope everyone had a great week. Everything is going well down here in paradise. Started off the week carrying an elder with a broken foot through the streets of Apopa through the pouring rain. Had to leave a lesson we were teaching because a dude came into the house and started spraying smoke all over to kill the mosquitoes. I finally installed the mosquito net over my bed. We discovered tamalpusas (½ tamale ½ pupusa). All in all it was a good solid week. A friend of mine in our ward got his mission call and he is going to Ecuador. I am super pumped for him because he has been trying to serve a mission for years. 

The highlights of the week would definitely be Kevin and Laura. Kevin is a little boy we have been teaching for awhile. He recently turned 8 and decided to be baptized. He is an awesome little kid and a great example for his family. 

Sunday before church Laura was finally able to be baptized. We had to postpone it because of some deaths in her family and some crazy stuff,  so it was awesome to finally be able to share that moment with her. 

We have a friend here that we have been teaching for a long time. He has never been able to be baptized because he isn’t married to the person he is living with. But the person he is living with is a member of the church that hasn’t gone to church in a long time. A lot happened with this little family. A long story short, she decided to leave her job, her house, and him to be able to go back to church. She is changing all of her life to come back to what she knows is true. Just thinking about her and Laura and a lot of these people we are teaching, there are people who sacrifice so much to be able to live the gospel of Jesus Christ. It is not always easy to do the right thing no matter where you live or what your life is like. But seeing the example of these people, who are willing to change everything can really put things in perspective. 

Hope everyone has a great week. 

Salud

Elder Moulton

?Pero Vamos a Ir Donde Queremos Ir?

I hope everyone had a steller past 7 days. Just for everyone to know, things are good down here in paradise. Among the highlights of the week, yesterday our bus broke down in the middle of the highway so my companion and I decided to use it as an opportunity and invited 50 people to church with us. It ended up like one of my old track pep talks. At one point I asked, “Did our bus break down?” and like 2 confused people were like, "YEAH" with a little too much enthusiasm. So I go, “ But are we going to get to where we need to go?” and this time like 5 people, "YEAH." And I said, "That's great, but what about after this life? Are we going to get to where we need to go?" I said that's the real question but don't worry to help you out we have a meeting next Sunday at the church and you have 2 muchachos here to help you find the answer. So that was a fun experience. Couple more chicken feet, although I ended up getting out of another chicken foot soup so we can count that as a win. 

But the real highlight of this week was when my mission president called me out of the blue on Friday and told me I had to be at the temple at 9 the next day. And the whole story is a little crazy so i will just try my best to sum it up. For those of you who don't know, I am not the first missionary in my family. I have had a lot of great examples stretching back through the years. But ever since I heard I would be serving in El Salvador, one of these examples has stood out for me. 50 years ago, Elder Moulton was here in El Salvador too. My grandpa served a mission here and I always thought it would be cool to meet some of the people who he talked to. Long story short, at the temple I was asked to be a translator for a group of Americans who were there to donate luggage and clothes to future missionaries here in El Salvador. So that was probably the coolest thing I have ever done. Got to have a little headset and everything. 

But during the meeting, the founder of the foundation stood up and asked me to present myself to about 50 or 60 of these future missionaries (many of whom were kids from my old areas which was awesome to see). 

And he started to share his story. 30 years ago he was a little kid here in El Salvador, and his family were good friends with another family. This other family invited them to church and years later this man is now and ex-missionary lives in California (actually in the same area where my Aunt and Uncle live - Shout out to the Sibbetts!) and is helping other kids prepare to go on missions. What makes this story so cool is that the family that helped this little boy get baptized was a family that my grandpa taught when he was here 50 years ago. Basically, because of my grandpa 50 years ago, I was able to be a part of this wonderful experience. But what really was crazy was afterward as we were leaving there was a couple who had just finished spending some time in the temple. And as we started talking to him we found out that HE WAS PART OF THE VERY SAME FAMILY THAT MY GRANDPA FOUND AND BAPTIZED! 

Really hard to explain exactly how neat of an experience this all was, how special. But it taught me something as well. I doubt my grandpa thought, 50 years ago when he first met this family, that his efforts would lead to helping 50 more young missionaries leave on missions. I doubt he thought that this family would find another family, or even that the work he did would extend much more than what he could see. But my point is this. The little things we do today are what are going to lead to great things tomorrow. And we can't always see that. Its easy to be sad or disappointed even. Sometimes your bus breaks down and you end up just asking why and feeling like you'll never get to the place you need to go. But in the end, the buses break down for a reason, in the end, talking to one little family here in El Salvador will end up touching the lives of thousands of other families that these future missionaries will teach. 

So if the grind gets tough or it doesn't seem to be worth the pain, remember that only God knows where the finish line is sometimes and only He knows the things that will come down the road. We taught a lesson this week about dominoes. I set up a bunch of dominoes and at the end a little action figure. Throughout the lesson, we focused on and just established one truth. And we talked about how if one thing happens it leads to another. In the end, after the family told us they believed that first point we knocked over the first domino. And we watched as the rest of the blocks started falling too. The last block knocked our little action figure off the table and into a perfectly placed glass of water. For those of you who don't get the analogy, they agreed to be baptized next week. 

Sometimes it just takes one little thing to put Gods plans in motion, like my grandpa did 50 years ago. But I know its the little things that God calls us to do. On that note, have an awesometastic week, we will catch you all on the flippity flip

SALUUUU

(Elder Moulton #2 in El Salvador)

No Mira Hacia Atras

Hey everyone, hope everyone is doing great. This week was a pretty solid one, even when we got stuck outside in a torrential rain storm and nobody let us inside, or when we spent a night killing cockroaches left and right and even in the air, don't know why they have wings, its really not fair. But yeah we had a solid time. I got to work with 3 other missionaries this week, which was sad cuz I didn't get to spend a lotta time with Elder Herrera but we had a good time and managed to fit some pupusas in almost every day. And then today the rain cleared up and we were able to play futbol with a bunch of friends in the community so the little miracles are always fun to see. Also we got to go work and build a house for some members of the church down here and even though we got covered in cement it was fun and took me back to the old days working on houses (shout out to Brian, Ben, and Nacho). Lots of miracles this week but a lot of sad times too, a friend of ours, who was going to get baptized this Saturday, lost her brother and spent this weekend with family at the funeral. Which was really tough to hear but just makes me think of how blessed I am to have my family, God watches out. Also this week, we were teaching about the Book of Mormon to a lady and she wanted nothing to do with it. So we tried explaining, for like 10 minutes and nothing. At that point I decided that there wasn't any more we could do so I just said stop. And I told her that I knew this book was the word of God. And I told her if she could read just one verse of this book and tell me that its not the truth, that I would never read it with her again. I said open to whatever page and God will show you that this book is the truth. She paused for a minute and then opened up to Mormon 3:12. 

Behold, I had led them, notwithstanding their wickedness I had led them many times to battle, and had loved them, according to the ^alove of God which was in me, with all my heart; and my soul had been poured out in prayer unto my God all the day long for them; nevertheless, it was ^bwithout faith, because of the ^chardness of their hearts. 

And after that she told us she accepted. She told us God was speaking to her. God is real, the Book is true and if there is anyone reading this email that doesn't know that, find a Book of Mormon and open to a random page, read just one verse. And you'll know too.

But to explain my title, just something I was thinking a lot about this week, and something we shared with some members is that whats in the past, is in the past. Leave it there and grind. One of my favorite scriptures is Mosiah 27:8 and verse 29

Now the sons of Mosiah were numbered among the ^aunbelievers; and also one of the sons of Alma was numbered among them, he being called Alma, after his father; nevertheless, he became a very wicked and an ^bidolatrous man. And he was a man of many words, and did speak much ^cflattery to the people; therefore he ^dled many of the people to do after the manner of his ^einiquities.

29 My soul hath been ^aredeemed from the gall of bitterness and ^bbonds of iniquity. I was in the darkest abyss; but now I behold the marvelous light of God. My soul was ^cracked with eternal torment; but I am snatched, and my soul is ^dpained no more.

My point is that wherever you are in life, especially spiritually, the time is now to use what you got and trust the Lord. Don't look back. The past hurts sometimes and we can't always just outrun it. But we don't have to. Because God watches out. Have a great week everyone!!

SALUUUD

Elder Moulton

Que Haria Si. . .

Hey everyone, hope everything is going great. Sorry for the lack of emails lately its been kinda crazy down here. And while half the people here in Apopa think that our little earthquake was a sign of something catastrophic, we are actually doing pretty good. This week brought some good times and some bad times. The best way to sum it up would probably be yesterday when we had to turn down our 4th dinner because we were just stuffed but they still gave us cake, or running into the little horse (the one that bit me last week) in literally every part of town. We got to eat Taco Bell because my companion had to go to downtown,  but the highlight of the week would for sure be the baptism of Betsy. Betsy is a little girl who just turned 8 and decided she wanted to be baptize. She asked me to baptize her, which made my day, and we had a ton of support from local members who even brought cake. It was all in all just a really special experience.

Now to explain my title, "What would you do if...?" This week my companion and I have been trying hard to look towards the future. Which means planning for potential or probable obstacles. When you start thinking down the road a little bit, you start asking the question, what are we gonna do if... ? or how would we react if...? and you get a little hypothetical (which is one of my favorite words in Spanish). While we can't predict the future we can plan for how we are going to handle it. If you make a decision as to, "What would you do if...?" before the situation actually occurs, you will be much more ready to overcome whatever "Ifs" come your way. I want to share the story of a friend of ours who recently stopped drinking alcohol. He told us when he first stopped drinking that he anticipated the process to be tough, he was thinking towards the future. He then proceeded to tell us that even though he would have temptations and tests, that he had made up his mind to say no. Long story short, 2 times this week different friends offered him something to drink and because he had made his decision beforehand, he was ready to say no. It wasn't easy but it was easier than an on the spot split decision because he had planned for this before. In the end, this friend of ours came to church with us this week and is preparing to be baptized with the goal of being a missionary too someday as he told us. And he taught me a great lesson. A lot of times, we know our own weaknesses, what will try our patience, our confidence, and most importantly our faith. But if we look towards the future and make the tough decisions now, the ones we know might come down the road, our beliefs and our goals will never fall. And to wrap it up I want to close with something my mother would occasionally tell me as a kid, "What Would Jesus Do?" Because the answer to both questions, "What would you do if?" and "What would Jesus do?" should usually be the same thing. Hope everyone is still balling out, stay grinding.

SALUD

Elder Moulton

A Shakeup in Apopa

Editors Note: 

A 6.8 Earthquake hit Tanner's part of El Salvador this week. Tanner said everything was falling in his apartment and it was crazy! Thankfully, all missionaries are safe. Power was out at the church where he normally emails, so he had limited access to a computer this week and was only able to voice call for a few minutes. He asked us to share the following highlights. . . 

Bit by a horse this week. 

Helped move three people.

Built a house.

Got to hang out the window of a pickup truck.

Ate Tacos - "That was awesome. Not as good as home though."

Celebrated his companions birthday with a chocolate war.

He also shared with us his testimony of the Book of Mormon and how a testimony of the gospel of Jesus Christ is dependent on having a testimony of the Book of Mormon. He said a testimony is a chain and a lot of the chain can be figured out logically but the chain has to start with faith and a testimony of the Book of Mormon.  

Thank you for all the love and support you show Tanner.

Yo Juego Para Ganar

Hey everybody! Were gonna keep it short and sweet this week but I hope everyone is doing great. This week was without a doubt one of the strangest of my mission. Spent like 4 of the past 7 days bouncing between health clinic and health centers with another missionary who was a lil under the weather. Some were sketchy but one had hot water and AC so we were livin large. But don't worry he's ok and nobody was really too sick or anything, they taking good care of us down here. 

In the end this week was kind of a bummer because I couldn't go out and be a normal missionary a whole lot but we got a few killa days in there so in the end it all worked out. Got to meet some crazy awesome people, got stuck in the street for a freakishly strong rainstorm, ate some crazy good food (update hospital food here is just as bad as it is back home) and also all of us missionaries here in the Apopa Zona got together and bought custom soccer jerseys. But then we got a little cocky and invited some members here to play with us and we got destroyed. But we looked good so that's what counts. 

Other than that I don't got a whole lot to update this week so I figured I'd throw in a lil scripture that always helps in the tough times, ALMA 26:27 "Now when our hearts were depressed, and we were about to turn back, behold, the Lord comforted us, and said: Go amongst thy brethren, the Lamanites, and bear with patience thine afflictions, and I will give unto you success."

Pero espero que todos tengan un buen dia y semana, y sepan que todo esta chevere aqui en El Salvador.

SALUUUD

Elder Moulton

Hay Lluvia. . . Pero Hay Sol También

Editors Note: Tanner had to help an elder out in his zone today so he wasn't able to answer emails. He wanted us to tell everyone hello and thanks for the support.

Well, welcome back to another update from your favorite missionary in El Salvador (hopefully, but I wouldn't be offended otherwise). This week brought some struggles as my hair continues to recover from the tragic self hair cut incident. But we stay strong, we stay grinding. Some other crazy things that happened this week was when a lady started shouting at us in the market, using the gift of tongues, but accidentally ended up singing something along the lines of the "Scooby Do" theme song. Or when a preacher tried to challenge me in front of the entire bus we were in. Or when a little girl named Dulce, with all the confidence of a 7 year-old and not a bit of hesitation, counted from 1 to 10 in English but left out the less important numbers of 4, 7, and 8. Or when my companion, Elder Herrera, accidentally introduced himself as being from Disney and not from Guatemala (we still aren't too sure as to how that connection happened). Or when we sang an original song in front of all the members of the church here in Apopa for a talent show. Or introducing the greatest group game of all time 'Mafia' to some families in a family activity (Shoutout to Chula Vista 3rd Ward young men). All in all it was a pretty stellar week.

Which brings me to my title, one which has turned into somewhat of a joke between Elder Herrera and I. As I mentioned last week, the rainy season has started which surprisingly didn't mean that the sun went away. So what we have been facing this week is the strange sensation of sunny rain. And as the water hits the cobblestone and steams into the air, we started, as always, to tie the sometimes awful, sometimes refreshing sunshiney rain to a lil real life experience. Because a sunny day is what everyone pictures when things are going right. And rain is what happens when things are a little more difficult, its sad, hard, tiring, etc. But at the end of the day, what we are usually faced with is a little bit of both, or as we see here in Apopa, a little bit of sunny rain. On the brightest, sunniest days, a little bit of rain will fall out of nowhere. And on the darkest, stormiest days, a little bit of sun will always come thru for us in the end. And what we decided in the end is that the rain helps us to appreciate the sun, and the sun helps us to appreciate the rain. A sunny day or a rainy day, neither of those exist. Its always a little bit of a mix. But its better that way. Because a little sadness, or a tough lesson, or a letdown here and there will just help us appreciate the good things down the road. And when things are going good, the lessons are flowing, things are going your way, we shouldn't forget about the rain. Because in the end we don't control the weather but we do control our reactions. So if it looks like rain, like everything is just going down the drain, the sun is still there, or at least the heat in our case. This week we were having a really rough stretch, struggling with some things in our area and just overall getting drenched by the 'rain'. And in the middle of all this, we met Kevin. Kevin is a friend of a friend who sells bread from his motorcycle to make a living. We hadn't really ever taught him but as we were out one night we ran into him on the street, as we left tired, sad, and dejected from a lesson that sadly didn't go so hot. As he pulled up his motorcycle, he shared with us something that helped bring the sun back out in the middle of all our rain. He told us he had been looking, searching to fill a gap in his life and that he wanted to talk with us. Long story short (a story with plenty of rain and sun in and of itself) Kevin came to church with us this Sunday and, as he searches for his answers is preparing to be baptized. If it hadn't been for the 'rain' of that day with all that had gone down, I don't know if we would've been in the right place or time to find the 'sun,' or Kevin in this case. So yeah it rained a little bit these past couple weeks, but it was always sunny rain in the end. And I don't doubt that that's the way God wants it. So have a great week, stay grinding, and thank you all for all the love and support, it makes the rainy days much more sunny.

SALUD

Elder Moulton

Trabajamos como CHUCHOS

The rain is back but you already know, your boys are still grinding down here in paradise. This week was another one for the books. And just to explain the title right off the bat, we all make mistakes. From me deciding it would be a good idea to try and cut my own hair, to our blind friend Jorge saying he wanted to see a baptism firsthand before he decides to get baptized. But the point is even if you mix up the words for tired and married in a lesson, you gotta work like a dog. Which is what my title says in English. Walking through the crooked, crowded, broken streets of Apopa this week in the pouring rain with Elder Herrera we couldn't help but smile at one point. Because yeah its true, theres gonna be rain but hey that just means we don't have the sun beating down on us. And we realized something, either way rain or sun, we are gonna end up wet. Be it sweat or be it rain, at the end of the day we end up soaked so we might as well work like dogs. This week brought its ups and lows and its always sad when someone decides that they don't want to talk to us anymore but we stay working. And yeah 3 people proposed marriage to my companion and I but we didn't let that get in the way either. But to be real, the highlight of the week was when Gringo Messi made a comeback. We were walking through a kind of back alley kinda place and we came by a soccer court. There was like 8 guys playing there so we decided to go make a deal. Its been a while since Elder Gringo Messi Moulton came to play but this week we decided to challenge these 8 dudes. The deal was I had 3 chances to score a goal from the entrance of the court. . .pretty far away. My first try was like 15 feet wide and frankly an embarrassment to my family, my companion, Eastlake High athletics, and just about everyone else I have ever known or loved. But I said a lil prayer and the next two rolled in with a classic missionary blessing finish. Sadly, they didn't follow through and we didn't see them at church this week but hey, gotta keep working like a dog. Keeping it short this week but hope everyone has a great next 7 days. 

SALUD

Elder Moulton